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“No!” came the shout, and I was shouting along with them.
“Shall we knock the stuffing out of them then?”
“Yes!” we roared in unison.
The sergeant major nodded. “Good. Very good. Then we shall need you.” He was pointing his stick now into the crowd, picking out the men. “You, and you and you.” He was looking straight at me now, into my eyes. “And you too, my lad!”
Until that very moment it had honestly never occurred to me that what he was saying had anything to do with me. I had been an onlooker. No longer.
“Your king needs you. Your country needs you. And all the brave lads out in France need you too.” His face broke into a smile as he fingered his immaculate moustache. “And remember one thing, lads — and I can vouch for this — all the girls love a soldier.”
The ladies in the crowd all laughed and giggled at that. Then the sergeant major returned the stick under his arm. “So, who’ll be the first brave lad to come up and take the king’s shilling?”
No one moved. No one spoke up. “Who’ll lead the way? Come along now. Don’t let me down, lads. I’m looking for boys with hearts of oak, lads who love their King and their country, brave boys who hate the lousy Hun.”
That was the moment the first one stepped forward, flourishing his hat as he pushed his way through the cheering crowd. I knew him at once from school. It was big Jimmy Parsons. I hadn’t seen him for a while, not since his family had moved away from the village. He was even bigger than I remembered, fuller in the face and neck, and redder too. He was showing off now just like he always had done in the school yard. Egged on by the crowd, others soon followed.
Suddenly someone prodded me hard in the small of my back. It was a toothless old lady pointing at me with her crooked finger. “Go on, son,” she croaked. “You go and fight. It’s every man’s duty to fight when his country calls, that’s what I say. Go on. Y’ain’t a coward, are you?”
Everyone seemed to be looking at me then, urging me on, their eyes accusing me as I hesitated. The toothless old lady jabbed me again, and then she was pushing me forward. “Y’ain’t a coward, are you? Y’ain’t a coward?” I didn’t run, not at first. I sidled away from her slowly, and then backed out of the crowd hoping no one would notice me. But she did. “Chicken!” she screamed after me. “Chicken!” Then I did run. I ran helter-skelter down the deserted High Street, her words still ringing in my ears.
As I drove the cart out of the market, I heard the band strike up again in the square, heard the echoing thump thump of the big bass drum calling me back to the flag. Filled with shame, I kept on going. All the way back to the farm I thought about the toothless old lady, about what she had said, what the sergeant major had said. I thought about how fine and manly the men looked in their bright uniforms, how Molly would admire me, might even love me, if I joined up and came home in my scarlet uniform, how proud Mother would be, and Big Joe. By the time I was unhitching the horse back at the farm, I was quite determined that I would do it. I would be a soldier. I would go to France and, like the sergeant major said, kick the stuffing out of the lousy Germans. I made up my mind I would break the news to everyone at supper. I couldn’t wait to tell them, to see the look on their faces.
We’d barely sat down before I began. “I was in Hatherleigh this morning,” I said. “Mr Cox sent me to market.”
“Skiving as usual,” Charlie muttered into his soup.
I ignored him and went on. “The army was there, Mother. Recruiting, they were. Jimmy Parsons joined up. Lots of others too.”
“More fool them,” Charlie said. “I’m not going, not ever. I’ll shoot a rat because it might bite me. I’ll shoot a rabbit because I can eat it. Why would I ever want to shoot a German? Never even met a German.”
Mother picked up my spoon and handed it to me. “Eat,” she said, and she patted my arm. “And don’t worry about it, Tommo, they can’t make you go. You’re too young anyway.”
“I’m nearly sixteen,” I said.
“You’ve got to be seventeen,” said Charlie. “They won’t let you join unless you are. They don’t want boys.”
So I ate my soup and said no more about it. I was disappointed at first that I hadn’t had my big moment, but as I lay in bed that night I was secretly more than a little relieved that I wouldn’t be going off to the war, and that by the time I was seventeen it would all be over anyway, as like as not.
A few weeks later the Colonel paid Mother a surprise visit, whilst Charlie and I were out at work. We didn’t hear about it until we got home in the evening and Molly told us. I thought something strange was going on as Mother was unusually preoccupied and quiet at supper. She wouldn’t even answer Big Joe’s questions. Then when Molly got up saying she felt like a walk, and suggested both Charlie and I came with her, I knew for sure something was up. It was a very long time since we’d been out together, just the three of us. If Charlie had asked me, I’d have said no for sure. But it was always more difficult for me to refuse Molly.
We went down to the brook, just like we’d done in the old days whenever we’d wanted to be alone together, where Molly and I had met up so often when I’d been their go-between postman. Molly didn’t tell us until we were sitting either side of her on the river bank, until she had taken each of us by the hand.
“I’m breaking a promise I made to your mother,” she began. “I so much don’t want to tell you this, but I must. You have to know what’s going on. It’s the Colonel. He came in and told her this morning. He said he was only doing what he called his ‘patriotic duty'. He told us that the war was going badly for us, that the country was crying out for men. So he’s decided that now is the time for every able-bodied man who lives or works on his estate, everyone who can be spared, to volunteer, to go off to the war and do his bit for King and country. The estate will just have to manage without them for a while.” I felt Molly’s grip tighten on my hand, and a tremor come into her voice. “He said you’ve got to go, Charlie, or else he won’t let us stay on in the cottage. Your mother protested all she could, but he wouldn’t listen. He just lost his temper. He’ll put us out, Charlie, and he won’t go on employing your mother or me unless you go.”
“He wouldn’t do that, Moll. It’s just a threat,” Charlie said. “He can’t do it. He just can’t.”
“He would,” Molly replied, “and he can. You know he can. And when the Colonel gets it into his head to do something, and he’s in the mood to do it, he will. Look what he did to Bertha. He means it, Charlie.”
“But the Colonel promised,” I said. “And his wife did too before she died. She said she wanted Mother looked after. And the Colonel said we could stay on in the cottage. Mother told us.”
“Your mother reminded him of that,” Molly replied. “And d’you know what he said? He said it had never been a promise as such, only his wife’s wish, and that anyway the war had changed everything. He was making no exceptions. Charlie has to join up or we’ll be out of the cottage at the end of the month.”
We sat there holding hands, Molly’s head on Charlie’s shoulder, as evening fell around us. Molly was sobbing quietly from time to time but none of us spoke. We didn’t need to. We all knew there was no way out of this, that the war was breaking us apart, and that all our lives would be changed for ever. But at that moment, I treasured Molly’s hand in mine, treasured this last time together.
Suddenly, Charlie broke the silence. “I’ll be honest, Moll,” he said. “It’s been bothering me a lot just lately. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to go. But I’ve seen the