Читать книгу Uprooted - A Canadian War Story - Lynne Banks Reid - Страница 10

We reached Saskatoon at six o’clock in the morning. Mummy woke us early, when there was hardly any light coming through the window of my berth – just enough to see the endless wheat fields rushing by. She took us along to the cramped, smelly washroom at the end of the carriage and produced some clothes she’d been saving for us to make a good impression when we arrived. My frock was very creased but at least it was clean. Cameron wore his school blazer, even though it had been getting hotter every day.

“Shall I wear a tie?” he asked.

“I don’t know … We should have asked Hank,” said Mummy.

She was putting make-up on. She hadn’t worn much on the journey, just lipstick and some powder, but now she put on eye shadow and mascara, and earrings. I thought she looked beautiful, and actress-y.

She wore a very pretty dress I hadn’t seen before, and stockings, and shoes with a bit of a heel. She wrapped her lovely blonde hair in a sort of turban. She looked like at home when she was going out for lunch. We bundled all the rest of our things into our suitcases as the train rocked the last few miles to our destination.

We stood near the exit door. Mummy smoked. She said, “I remember feeling just like this before I went on stage on a first night to play a big part.”

I’d once acted a big part in a school play – a queen. I suddenly remembered standing in the wings in my red dress with my hair down my back, with such a sudden terror of forgetting my lines that I nearly ran away. Yes. It was like that now.

Only Cameron seemed completely calm. “I wonder if they’ll come to meet us in a horse and buggy,” he said.

Just as the whistle blew for Saskatoon, Hank turned up. He must have got up early to say goodbye.

“You’ve been quite wonderful,” said Mummy. “A lifesaver.”

He shook hands with her, but she suddenly kissed his cheek. She had to stand on tiptoe.

“You’re welcome,” said Hank.

We’d never heard that phrase before. Mummy stared at him.

“What a very nice thing to say,” she said.

“Here’s my address in Calgary,” he said, giving Mummy a card. “Let me know if you need anything. Be good kids for your mom, now.” He shook Cameron’s hand and gave me a hug. “Go git them gophers!” he said. “Oh! I forgot to tell you – you want some pocket money, the government pays a bounty for every tail!”

The train pulled into the station. Right opposite where we stood, hung the sign that read ‘SASKATOON’.

“Is that an Indian name?” my clever cousin asked.

“Yep,” said Hank. “It’s the name of a berry. And ‘Canada’ is an Indian word too. It means ‘Big village’.”

Mummy and I were hanging out of the doorway, looking up and down the platform. There were lots of people waiting. But suddenly Mummy said, “There they are. Look. Those three down there, the white-haired man and the man and woman. Bet you.”

The train hissed to a stop and people started forward to get on or to greet people. ‘Our three’ were staring anxiously at the doorways. Mummy stepped out, waved, and called quite loudly, “Uncle Arthur!”

The older man turned quickly. Then, with the help of a walking stick, he came hurrying towards us, his face alight.

I didn’t know him at all, only that he was Mummy’s uncle, that he lived alone, that he was a retired bookkeeper. That he’d taken the trouble to find us some people to live with. But when I saw his face for the first time, warm with welcome as he strode towards us, I knew at once that I would love him.

He clasped Mummy in his arms, his stick falling to the ground. Cameron jumped down and scooped it up. We stood beside them, waiting. I happened to look up and saw Hank in the train doorway. He lifted our suitcases down and Cameron took them one by one. He looked at Mummy with a funny, soft look, and gave us a tiny wave. Then he disappeared, and we were smothered in a mass hug from Uncle Arthur, who smelled of pipe tobacco and welcome.

There was a lot of bustle all around us, but I felt someone close behind me. I turned, and faced a stranger with dark hair and glasses and a beaming smile.

“I know who you are! You’re Lindy!” he exclaimed. “I’m Gordon! I’m your new Poppa, the guy you’re coming to live with! Gee, this is great! Can I give you a li’l hug?”

I let him. He smelled strange. It was a smell I knew, but it was out of place here. Then he turned and a woman with hair too white for her face came forward rather shyly.

“This is Luti, my wife. Mrs Laine – Momma! – meet our little girl! And this—” he almost pulled Cameron forward with a hand on his shoulder, “this must be Cameron!” He wrung Cameron’s hand, pumping it up and down. “Gee whizz, you’re such a big boy, I didn’t expect – I thought you’d be about this size!” He put his hand about a foot from the ground.

Luti said softly, “Don’t be silly, Gordon.” She gave me a quick kiss on the cheek. “Welcome to Saskatoon, Lindy.”

Mummy had turned towards us, still holding Uncle Arthur’s hand. There were introductions and more handshakes.

Mummy said, “We must go and see to our big luggage.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that!” Gordon said heartily. “They’ll have it off the train by now. Our railways are wonderful! Don’t you folks just love Canada? C’mon kids, let’s go find your bags!”

I noticed Cameron had peeled off his heavy school blazer. It was sweaty hot at seven in the morning.

Uncle Arthur called a taxi for him and Mummy and some of the luggage. Cameron and I drove to our new home in the Laines’ car. Cameron, who knew all about cars, hissed to me in the back seat that it was a Hillman Minx. He sounded surprised. Later he explained, “I thought they’d be rich.” Hillman Minxes weren’t, it seemed, what rich folks bought, at least not in England.

Gordon chatted the whole way.

“It’s gonna be so great to have kids around the place, huh, Mrs Laine? I mean Momma? I can’t wait to get started being a poppa! Look, kids, there’s our river! Bet you didn’t expect it to be so big, huh?”

We hadn’t expected it to be, at all. It was certainly the most exciting thing we’d seen for twenty-four hours of prairie. It was wide and had waves and steep banks, and rushed under the big bridge we were crossing.

“The city of bridges! That’s what we call Saskatoon! This one’s called Broadway Bridge. You’ll soon be criss-crossing it on the streetcar, to get downtown to the movies, I bet! We’ve got five movie theatres! Waddaya think of that? Almost like London, eh?”

“Of course it’s not like London,” said Luti in her quiet little voice.

“Only kidding,” said Gordon.

The car pulled up in a curved street with some pleasant-looking houses on each side. The house where we were going to live had a lawn that came down to the pavement, and as soon as we opened the car door, a dog came rushing to meet us. I could feel Cameron’s mood changing. He just couldn’t help himself.

“Here comes Spajer to say hi to you!” said Gordon.

Spajer was a golden cocker spaniel with long, silky ears. He jumped all over us. He was a lovely dog and Cameron couldn’t resist patting him, but I sensed he felt a bit disloyal to Bubbles.

“Is Spajer an Indian name?” asked Cameron.

Gordon roared with laughter, but Luti said, “We had another dog before him called Jasper.”

“Oh, I see! An anagram,” said Cameron.

Both the Laines stared at him.

“Smart boy,” said Gordon, sounding surprised.

Mummy and Uncle Arthur arrived and there was a kerfuffle as we got the luggage into the house. There suddenly seemed to be an awful lot of it, and Gordon made a joke about “You folks planning to stay awhile?” which I don’t think any of us got.

Mummy was very quiet and tense and stuck close to Uncle Arthur. He kept his arm around her whenever he could. I knew they’d never met before, but already they seemed to love each other. I know now that Mummy felt close to him because he was family and everybody else in this whole city was a stranger.

The house was pretty, though not like an English house – very new-looking with lots of windows and polished wooden floors and modern furniture, all clean and shiny. There were gardens on three sides. The curved street was wide and not too busy, with trees and front gardens without fences. We all wanted to see our bedrooms and I wanted to have a bath – Mummy kept sort of picking at her dress where it was sticking to her – but Gordon wanted to talk.

“You kids’ll soon learn the neighbourhood,” he said. “See that li’l park across the street? You can go there by yourselves and play and find pals. In the winter they turn the whole park into a skating rink. Bet you can’t ice skate!”

We agreed we couldn’t.

“I just can’t wait to teach you! Bet you’ve never seen snow like we get here! Two, three feet at a time! That’s not counting the drifts!” He held his hand right over his head to show how deep the ‘drifts’ got.

Snow higher than a man? Cameron gave me a look. He was thinking what I was – we could make forts and tunnels, crawl in and play amazing adventure games. From then on I started looking forward to winter. And not just because of the heat now, which was the worst I’d ever felt.

Luti excused herself and went into the kitchen while Gordon offered us drinks – Coke for us (ugh! – but at least it was cold) and iced water for Mummy and Uncle Arthur, after they’d both refused ‘a li’l snifter’. I didn’t know what that was, but then Gordon opened a shiny cupboard in the corner and brought out some bottles. Mummy looked amazed to be offered alcohol so early in the day, but Gordon had one. It didn’t look so ‘li’l’ to me.

Gordon stopped talking to sip his whiskey and we just sat there on the chintz armchairs. There was a long, difficult silence. Finally Uncle Arthur said, “You know, I think my folks might like to see their rooms and maybe clean up before breakfast.”

“Luti!” Gordon called. She came almost running in. “What are you thinking of, honey? Take these folks up to their rooms, huh? I’ll bring the bags up.”

“But I’ve just put the bacon on,” she said.

Cameron and I looked at each other. We’d suddenly remembered Hank’s tale.

“So we don’t have to ride out on the prairie to shoot our breakfasts?” Cameron said.

“Whaaaat?” Gordon shouted.

Luti gaped at us, her blue eyes staring.

Their faces! We suddenly realised we’d been had!

Cameron and I laughed until we choked. We couldn’t stop. Mummy had to calm us down.

“Please can we go to our rooms?” she begged.

Uncle Arthur left us. At the door, he said, “I don’t like ‘Uncle Arthur’. Sounds Victorian. Why don’t you call me O’F?” Then he kissed us all goodbye.

Mummy seemed to cling to him. Luti led us upstairs and showed us our rooms. One for Mummy and me with two single beds and a dressing table with a frill round it. The window overlooked the back garden. I went to look out, and noticed something funny. The window had netting on it, like our meat safe at home.

“We have screens on the doors too,” Luti said, following my gaze. “The bugs get in anyhow. We say our mosquitoes are as big as cockroaches and the cockroaches are as big as gophers.”

“What are the gophers as big as?”

“Beavers, I guess!” she laughed. “Tell me if I’ve forgotten anything you need.” She stared at Mummy for a moment. “You’re real pretty,” she said suddenly. “Everyone’s going to love you.”

I decided I liked Luti. I liked her saying Mummy was pretty. Although she wasn’t pretty. She was beautiful. Even tired out and stressed and with her make-up sweated off.

Cameron had a smaller room. He looked round it bleakly, but then he saw it had a desk with lots of drawers, and a bookcase with some books in it.

“In her letter, your mom told me you like to read, Cameron,” Luti said. “I chose some books for you. I hope you like them.”

“Thank you very much,” said Cameron, sounding really grateful.

“We only have one bathroom,” she went on, “so it may get a bit crowded. But for today it’s all yours. I’ll delay breakfast. Come down when you’re ready.”

Mummy went first. She said she was desperate to get clean and asked us to wait, which we did, in Cameron’s room. He started off by going through the books Luti had bought, but then there was a scratching at the door, and Spajer joined us, and after that no reading got done. I think Spajer decided round about then that he was at least half Cameron’s dog.

Mummy came out of the bathroom at last, in a dressing gown, smelling lovely.

“Bubble bath. That Luti,” she said to me quietly, “has thought of lots of little kind things.” Then she said one of her favourite phrases, “The little more, and how much it is. The little less, and what worlds away!”

Cameron went next. I watched Mummy start doing her face.

“Gordon talks a lot, doesn’t he?” I asked.

“Lindy.”

“What?”

“Shut the door.” I did. “Listen, darling. I want you to remember something. We’re going to owe these people a lot. They’re going to have to pay for everything – everything we need, everything we eat, and everything we do that costs money. I want you to be aware that this is their house, and that they’re here. Don’t say or do anything that might offend them.” She took the towel off her head and began to comb out her long blonde hair. “I’ll say one other thing. We’re ambassadors for England. People will be watching us. They’ll judge England by how we behave. Do you understand, my poppet?”

“Yes. But he does talk a lot, doesn’t he?”

“Yes. I hear Cameron coming out … Go and have your bath and I’ll come in and wash your hair for you.”

That first Canadian bath, after the three-inches-of-hot-water ones we’d been rationed to at home, was unforgettable. So deep, so hot, so full of bubbles! I felt as if I was washing off the grime of a coal mine, and then I felt like a movie star. As I lay chest-deep while Mummy washed my hair, I forgot all about the journey, the war, the strangeness. I just wallowed.

“Maybe it’ll be all right – Canada. Saskatoon. The Laines,” I said.

Mummy just made lots of lather and said nothing.