FRAGILE LIVES
by Richard Banks
Despite her husband's
disapproval Mrs Gipson opened the front door of their terraced house and placed
her chair on its tiled doorstep. “It was wide enough,” she said, she wasn't
stopping anybody getting in or out. “What can be the objection?” Mr Gipson said
she knew perfectly well what the objection was. “People don't do that here.
This is Eastbourne, not Wapping. In the old
house, there were so many fleas in summer that nobody stayed indoors, but
Eastbourne's not like that, it's better, that's why we moved here. We've got a
back garden with grass and flowers. Why don't you sit out there?” Mrs Gipson
replied that she preferred the front. The greengrocer's cart was coming and she
didn't want to miss it. Anyway, she could hear the guns more clearly in the
front. She wanted to hear what Fred was hearing and if she looked down the road
at Mr Cox’s newsagent’s shop she was also looking in the direction of France where
the fighting was. She knew that because Mrs Pennyfather told her so; she had an
atlas and compass that proved it.
Mr Gipson suppressed a snort, drew sharply on his pipe and
retreated indoors. Unlike his wife he was doing his best not to think about the
war. Although a man of limited imagination he knew what was happening in France was no
ordinary battle. A war in another country you could hear in England, it was
unbelievable. A louder than usual bang rattled the front windows and sent him
scurrying through the back door to check the glass in his cold frame. On
finding it undamaged he began to double dig a flower bed that yesterday he had
cut from turf. Its oblong shape reminded him of a grave; he wished he had dug
it round.
* * *
* * *
In France, a mile
north of the Somme river, a soldier was also
digging, his
excavations widening a communications trench between the front
line and a medical post. Like his father, he was trying not to think about the
war. If he was to remain sane he had to fill his head with other things:
thoughts of home, of football matches he had watched or played in; of the Kings
Head on a Saturday night - if only he
could stay alive. For six days the allied guns had pounded the German trenches.
When they stopped, the infantry would be ordered to advance into no man's land,
a frontal assault at walking pace on the enemy line; if the barrage was not
successful, if enough Huns survived to man their machine-gun posts, what then?
These thoughts he kept to himself. For now, the men were cheerful, hopeful of a
decisive breakthrough. There was talk of the war being over by Christmas, but
then that had been said before.
He had joined the West Ham Pals in 1914, at the start of the
war, with four lads from the same football team eager to see action before it
was all over. The Pals were mainly West Ham supporters. It was rumoured that
the club's center forward, Syd Puddefoot, was also a Pal but they later learned
he had opted to see out the war in a munitions factory. Nevertheless, there
were several part-time pros in the battalion, as well as a hundred or more good
amateurs from local leagues. In between the fighting, there would be some decent
matches to be played. His best friend, Joey Pennyfather, from four doors down,
had squeezed a football into his kitbag; beneath his tunic, he had taken to
wearing his football shirt. It was his lucky shirt he said, and so far it hadn't
let him down.
Tomorrow they would be transferred up the line to another
unit with five other men. An officer told him to write a letter to his missus
before he left but what was the point of that? Four years into an unhappy
marriage he and Connie were glad to be apart. He would write to Mum, but not
now; he had work to do, a kit bag to pack.
* * * * * *
Mr Gipson reached across
the bed and turned off the alarm clock. It was not until he was in the
scullery, washing at the sink, that he realized that the only sound outside was
the cooing of a pigeon. He returned to the bedroom where Mrs Gipson was putting
on her dressing gown. “It's over,” he declared, “the guns have stopped, the battle
must be over.” Mrs Gipson asked if they had won, and Mr Gipson replied, more
sharply than he intended, that he didn’t know, how could he know. He would have
to buy a newspaper like everyone else. He dressed hurriedly and brought a Daily
Mail in Cox’s shop, but the news was little changed from yesterday. Something
big was happening, but, as yet, there was nothing about it in the Mail. He
wondered if the Mirror had more. Mr Gipson returned home, pushed the newspaper
through the letterbox, and hurried off to his work. Old Bill, his foreman, read
the Mirror, he would have a borrow of that.
Mrs
Gipson drew back the curtains from the front bay windows, and through
the
translucent weave of her net curtains watched her husband walk briskly back up
the street. She wondered why he hadn't come in and said something? Was it bad
news? She snatched the newspaper from the mat and took it into the back room
where there were no net curtains and the sun streamed in through french
windows. She read the first two pages and wondered how so many words could tell
her so little. She dressed and took up her position outside on the front
doorstep. If there were casualties, and there must be casualties, telegrams
would be sent. Her view towards the High Street included the Post Office. There
two boys in tall hats and navy blue uniforms with shiny buttons waited for the
messages they would deliver by bicycle. The double doors of the Post Office
opened inwards as if by themselves and the first customers entered. The
telegram boys wheeled out their cycles, placed them in the rack outside the
sorting office window, and retreated indoors.
At a quarter to ten Mrs Pennyfather stopped by on her way to
the shops. She had received a letter from Joey that mentioned Fred. They were
still together, still playing football. Indeed judging from Joey's letter there
was more football going on than fighting.
Mrs Gipson smiled and then groaned as one of the telegram boys
approached the cycle rack and fetched down his bike. Mrs Pennyfather hastened
to reassure her. “Don't worry, Ethel, he's not going to the likes of us, only
officers' families get telegrams. It's the brown envelope through the post that
goes to us. The boys will soon be back, safe and sound, you mark my words. One
big push and it will be all over by Christmas.” Mrs Gipson smiled again and
pretended to be comforted. Why was it always Christmas? she thought.
* * *
* * *
Lieutenant Shaw finished another letter and
reflected on the disaster of the
previous day. The Generals had promised it
would be so easy, that the artillery bombardment would kill every last German,
that the men had only to saunter across no man's land to take possession of the
opposing trenches, but the Bosche were still there, waiting with their machine
guns to decimate the infantry that walked towards them in lines as vulnerable
as ninepins.
“Follow the flash,” he had
shouted, meaning the flash on the back of his collar, “follow me,” and he had
led them like lambs to the slaughter.
He wondered why he had survived when so many had not. He
consoled himself with the thought that there would be many other opportunities
to die. For now, his duty was to write to the families of the dead, expressing
his condolences, assuring them that their sons and husbands had died bravely
for their country. Most had. He wrote saying that they had not suffered, that
death was instantaneous, a bullet through the heart. What else could he say –
that they had died in agony while others had been blown to pieces?
He made himself a mug of tea and begun another letter. This
one was to the wife of a Pvt Frederick Gipson. He had not known Gipson, he was
one of seven men reassigned to his Company on the final day of the bombardment.
No one knew much about him. The few details he had gleaned would have to be
used carefully, skilfully; mixed with the usual platitudes his letter must
console, bear testimony to the how, where, and when of Gipson's death. What he
would not say in his letter was that an artillery shell had landed near Gipson
erasing one side of his face, detaching an arm and propelling it into the fetid
sludge of a crater where it was later discovered with his helmet and identity
disc. But this had not been the cause of death; Gipson's body bore witness to
an earlier intervention.
Death had been instantaneous Lieutenant Shaw would write for
the tenth time that day, a bullet through the heart. For once he knew this to
be true.
* * * * * *
Two days had passed since
the arrival of form B104-82B, a printed letter with handwritten insertions. It
was addressed to Fred's wife but as she had now left the Gipson household for
her parents' home in Enfield,
Mrs Gipson had no hesitation in opening it. As far as she was concerned there
was only one Mrs Gipson, the other one, 'the imposter', had deserted her post.
The letter was
in a brown envelope as Mrs
Pennyfather said it would be, and Mrs Gipson picked it up off the mat
with a hand so tremulous
she could hardly open it. When she did, she had only to read the first few
words to know that Fred was no more: 'It
is my painful duty to inform you,' it began, 'a report has
been
received notifying the death of...
' Below in neat, upright lettering was written Fred's name, number, and rank,
the name of his regiment, a date, and the words 'killed in action'. She forced herself to read on, two paragraphs of
unbroken typescript about 'the disposal'
of Fred's personal effects to next of kin. At first, this seemed insignificant,
a bureaucratic footnote but in the horrid, dismal days that followed, Fred's
possessions in France
assumed the importance of religious relics. On his departure, she had given him
a bible, a small shaving mirror, and a cigarette case. Fred's body she would
never see might never know where he was buried but these few precious objects
she was determined to have. Accordingly, she had written to the War Office
stipulating that Fred's effects be sent to herself and Mr Gipson.
On the day the letter was sent, another arrived in the
Pennyfather household informing them that Joey was 'posted as missing'. But, as Mrs Pennyfather said, this did not mean
that he was dead. “If he was dead the form would have said so, but it didn't.
Anything might have happened: he might be wounded, captured, or separated from
his Company. In the confusion of battle, mistakes were made, mistakes that had
soldiers killed or missing only for them to return home safe and well.” She knew this to be true, she had read it in
the papers. Mrs Gipson listened patiently, not knowing whether to pity or envy
her. The chances that Joey was alive were slim, but at least she still had
hope, even a small sliver of hope was better than none.
* * *
* * *
Having shared tea and
sympathy with Mrs Pennyfather, Mrs Gipson returned to her house where the front
room curtains were closed and a wreath hung limply from a nail hammered into
the door. As she entered the darkened hallway, a rectangle of light from the
open door illuminated a single envelope. She picked it up from the mat and took
it into her back parlour where the curtains were open and normal life, as far
as it existed, was allowed to take place. The letter was addressed to Connie.
As before, Mrs Gipson opened the envelope with a perverse relish that suggested
she was exacting a minor act of revenge. Inside she found Lieutenant Shaw's
letter. For a few moments, she thought it might contain something unexpected,
something wonderful, a miracle. Then her eyes took in the first line, 'it is with the deepest regret that I write
concerning the death of your husband.' Her dejection mingled with the hope
that had preceded it. Poor man, she thought, how many of these had he written?
So hard it must be to write about fallen comrades, men he knew and commanded.
But how well had he known Fred? The answer came in the next sentence: 'While your husband was with us for only a
short time he was held in the highest regard by all who met him, his quiet,
dedication to duty an example to us
all.' Mrs Gipson briefly considered these words and angrily rejected them.
Fred had never done anything quietly in his life and as for his dedication to
the cause that had long been replaced by bitter disaffection. Clearly Lieutenant
Shaw knew next to nothing about Fred, may never have spoken to him.
Mrs Gipson crumbled the letter into a tight ball and sent it
hurling across the room, but even as she did so she realized that she would
have to read it to the end; Mr Gipson would want to read it; surely there would
be something in Lieutenant Shaw's letter that was worth reading. She knelt down
beside it and tried to smooth out the creases against the yellow linoleum that
covered most of the floor. The words, 'shot
through the heart' caught her eye. This she believed because she needed to,
she thanked God he had not suffered. The letter concluded by saying that Fred
had been buried in woodland behind the reserve trench, a hymn sung, prayers
said.
Mrs Gipson took the letter back to her chair. On reading it
a second time she discovered a final paragraph that had previously escaped her
attention. 'As you will be aware,' wrote
Lieutenant Shaw, 'your husband was a member of the Eastbourne Falcons football team
who, I am told, play their matches at Compton
Place in the South East
Sussex league. The officials and players of that team will, no
doubt, wish to know that at the time of Private Gipson's unfortunate death he
was wearing a Falcon's football shirt beneath his tunic. I hope it will be a
consolation to yourself that he died in a battalion closely associated with our
national game, among comrades who shared his passion for all things football.'
Mrs
Gipson stared incredulously across the room into a mirror that reflected Mr
Gipson's garden. It was wrong, the letter was wrong and she had the proof! At
least she thought she had the proof. It would be in Fred's wardrobe in the
drawer at its base. At first, she could not find it, then, as if by magic, it
was there, the red and white stripes of his football shirt. She hugged it to
her black mourning dress as though the evidence of her eyes was not enough. She
needed to feel it, smell it, check the label on which she had written his
initials. This was Fred's shirt, not the one on the dead soldier. He was
still alive, she told herself, but why hadn't the mistake been discovered and
she informed? Was it too late to expect another letter? For now, all she could
be certain of was that the dead soldier wasn't Fred, another Falcon to be sure,
but not Fred. She tried to remember their names. There were four: Joey, Mrs
Warner's two boys and another lad they called Birdy. One was already dead, one
discharged with the shakes, another wounded. Was the wounded man back at the
front? She thought not. That left Joey. The dead soldier was Joey. Poor, dear
Joey - but not as dear as Fred. For now she would say nothing, do nothing. It
would not be her who snuffed out Mrs Pennyfather's hope. Soon all might be
clear: the effects of the dead soldier would arrive or further letters
received. Until then they could both go on hoping.
Mrs Gipson drew back her front room curtains and saw the sun
creep out from behind a cotton wool cloud. Almost without thinking she was out
through the front door and standing at the gate reveling in the mundane
normality of a warm summer's day. The sunshine-filled her with optimism that
Fred was still alive. He might soon be home, she thought. After the battle he
would surely be given leave; even now he might be on his way home. At the station
end of the road she could see a khaki uniform among the varied hews of civilian
passengers.
As yet the soldier was too far off, no wider than a match,
but if he did not turn left into Park
Road he must continue on towards her. Mrs Gipson
reached into her pocket where her glasses were. She raised them to her eyes,
but the soldier was gone.
Copyright Richard Banks
