Five Children on the Western Front Page 7

  ‘You’re transparent,’ the Psammead said casually. ‘He thinks you’re ghosts.’

  ‘Transparent!’ The Lamb held up his hand, which was disappointingly solid and normal. ‘Can he see our bones? Why can’t I see them?’

  ‘Because you are guests in my vision. I am solid here because my body moves through time and space with equal ease. Yours don’t, so you’re not quite here. That’s why he can see through you.’

  Edie was sorry for the terrified old man. ‘We’re honestly not ghosts,’ she told him kindly. ‘We’re visiting from the past – from 1914. You might remember there was a war that year.’

  When she said 1914, the old man flinched as if she’d slapped him.

  ‘I feel your time tugging at me,’ the Psammead said. ‘And I’m dreadfully tired – pick me up.’

  ‘No good waiting for you to say please,’ the Lamb said. He went over to the cushion and picked up the Psammead. ‘Do take us home, there’s a good chap.’

  The Psammead peeped over the Lamb’s shoulder at the old man. ‘Nice to meet you.’

  And in a second the castle and the fire and the old man melted into a darkness that quickly arranged itself into the attic at home.

  ‘Lovely hard floor!’ Edie said.

  ‘Lovely furniture that we can sit on!’ said the Lamb. ‘I was getting jolly tired of the general sponginess in that castle.’ He put the Psammead into his sand bath. ‘Who was the old man?’

  ‘I told you.’ The Psammead sank into the soft sand. ‘He’s an ex-emperor. You’d recognise him if you saw him as he is now, because he’s a lot more famous here in 1914. Back in these days, he’s still Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany.’

  Nine

  A CHRISTMAS VISIT

  ‘I MUST ADMIT,’ ROBERT SAID, ‘when the Lamb wrote to me about meeting Kaiser Bill in the future, I thought he was pulling my leg.’ Seeing the Psammead’s baffled frown he quickly added, ‘I mean, I thought it was a jape.’

  Robert had finally taken his exams in the week before Christmas, in the college dairy because it was the only place that wasn’t filled with soldiers being lectured about field guns. The college had been taken over by the Royal Engineers, and the shrinking numbers of professors and students had to squeeze in wherever they could. The food was terrible and he was delighted to come home to Mrs Field’s cooking. Robert’s high spirits had brought a feeling of festivity into the White House, and made the absence of Cyril a little less horrible. The Winterbottoms held a big Christmas party over at Windytops. Robert and his old friend Lilian Winterbottom painted their faces, put straw in their hair, and pretended to be medieval wassailers, until Edie was faint with laughter – Robert, like Father, had a famously dreadful singing voice.

  ‘We’ve been wondering,’ Jane said, ‘whether that vision means the Germans are going to lose the war.’

  ‘It does sound promising,’ Robert agreed. ‘But 1938 is a long way off, and anything could happen before then. Gosh, I wish I’d been with you, to find out what’s going to happen to the Kaiser. At the present moment the beastly little man is in charge of an enormous empire.’

  ‘The beard he had in the future looked a lot nicer than that stupid pointed moustache he has now,’ Edie said.

  It was the evening of Christmas Day, and the children and the Psammead were squeezed around the fireplace in the old nursery, where Mother had said they could have a fire. Jane had put an old cushion on top of the coal bucket, so the Psammead could toast himself near the flames. The day had been delightful, but it didn’t feel right without Cyril – and they’d had to hide how much they missed him because it made poor Mother so sad.

  ‘Those Germans should have kept their emperor,’ the Psammead said. ‘He told me that the politicians they’re going to get in the 1930s are bandits and murderers, and frightfully common.’

  ‘I don’t see how the Huns could do much worse than Kaiser Bill,’ Robert said. ‘If it wasn’t for him, there wouldn’t be a war. Pity you didn’t shoot him – except that wouldn’t be much good in 1938. Why did the universe send you to meet him?’

  ‘The universe – or whatever it is – seems to be reminding the Psammead of his past crimes,’ Jane said. ‘We still can’t work out why Edie’s wish to be at home worked that time, when none of our other wishes work. I think it was a sort of hint that magic had come back to him.’

  ‘I’m afraid those poor slaves weren’t the whole of it,’ Anthea said. ‘I had a letter from Jimmy. His assistant, Mr Haywood, had some more leave and they went to look at an ancient carving in Oxford. Jimmy says if you read a certain hieroglyph as “sand fairy”, it tells how he brutally invaded the country next door.’

  ‘Mr Haywood is Ernie,’ the Lamb told Robert. ‘The one who thinks Anthea’s pretty.’

  ‘Stop it!’ Anthea looked very pretty with her cheeks reddened by the fire.

  ‘Well, I’m glad someone does,’ Robert said. ‘Because she’s notoriously hideous.’

  ‘To get back to the carving,’ Anthea said, smiling. ‘Apparently this sand fairy burned villages and killed people – just like the Kaiser.’

  ‘All right! Now that I think about it, I may have invaded a small country.’ The Psammead pulled in his telescope eyes and his voice became distant. ‘So what? It was in the way. That young warrior should stop snooping.’

  ‘He won’t be doing any snooping for a while,’ Anthea said softly. ‘He’s at the front now.’

  They were all silent for a moment, thinking of the bullets and bombs at the front, and the constant danger.

  ‘I wonder what Squirrel’s doing right now,’ Edie said. ‘I hope he likes the chocolate I sent him. I hope he’s thinking about us, and knows we’re thinking about him.’

  From the end of the lane the wind carried sounds of singing. It was the local carol-singers, who always appeared at around this time on Christmas night. The voices became louder as they walked up the lane to the White House.

  Downstairs, Father had already started to join in the singing, as he always did:

  ‘Silent Night, Holy Night,

  All is calm, all is bright—’

  Anthea, Robert and Jane smiled at each other. ‘I must go down,’ Anthea said. ‘I promised Mother I’d help her hand round the mince pies.’

  ‘Let’s go and join in,’ Jane said, ‘if only to drown out Father’s dreadful singing! Lamb – be a brick and put the Psammead back in his bath.’

  The three older children ran downstairs to see the carol singers.

  Edie carefully picked up the Psammead. ‘Let me do it.’

  ‘It’s been a queer sort of Christmas,’ the Lamb said thoughtfully. ‘If you were still in the business of granting wishes, Psammead—’

  ‘But I’m NOT! As I keep telling you, I don’t have power over my own magic anymore.’

  ‘—I’d wish like anything we could get a look at Cyril.’

  *

  ‘Well,’ the Psammead said crossly, ‘I tried to warn you.’

  The soft firelight of the old nursery had been swallowed up in a sea of muddy darkness, lit by sudden white flashes and rocked by constant explosions – some of them scarily close. They were in a narrow trench, leaning against walls made of rough wooden planks.

  ‘Crikey – we’re at the front! The actual front line!’ The Lamb quickly stood up straight. ‘Better not lean on that wall, Edie – I can feel it going spongy. Does this mean we’re transparent again?’

  ‘No,’ the Psammead said. ‘I feel a cloak around us – this time, thank goodness, we’re all invisible, just as we were to the castle servants. It means we won’t get shot or blown up – though it’s horribly DAMP in this trench. Even just looking at all these puddles of muddy water makes me feel ill.’

  ‘My wish was granted!’ The Lamb was dazed and his heart was thudding with incredible excitement. ‘This is the war, isn’t it?’

  Edie was so shocked that she felt oddly quiet and calm; she tried to say something, but her voice had frozen in her chest. />
  ‘Obviously this is the war,’ the Psammead said, ‘but it’s being fought very inefficiently. About half a mile away, across the dark wilderness they call No Man’s Land, is another trench full of Germans. How are enemies supposed to fight when they can’t see each other?’

  A series of deafening explosions rocked the spongy ground they stood upon and the air was thick with smoke.

  ‘It’s like a firework display with no fireworks!’ The Lamb gazed up at the flashing, flickering night sky. ‘That was a crump – or it could have been a Minnie.’ He had read about all the different kinds of bombs in the war stories he devoured, and now he was inside one, which was terrifying but thrilling.

  ‘Someone pick me up,’ the Psammead said. He was perched on a plank of wood that was sinking into the mud. ‘Lamb, it had better be you. Edie’s touch is gentler, but she looks as if she might start crying.’

  ‘I won’t, honestly.’ Edie had been on the point of crying but did her best to sound brave.

  The Lamb picked up the Psammead and buttoned him securely inside the front of his jacket. ‘And look here, there’s no need to gripe at Edie – she can’t help crying.’ He gave his little sister a rough pat on the arm. ‘It’s all right, we won’t get hurt.’

  Edie took a deep breath. She wiped her face with her sleeve. ‘Sorry.’ The flashes and bangs were terrible, but it helped a lot to know they couldn’t be killed by them. ‘I’ve stopped now. Where should we go to find Squirrel?’

  There was a wooden door set into the rough wall of the trench; someone had chalked the words ‘SALOON BAR’ across it. The Lamb firmly took hold of Edie’s hand and walked through it. The noise outside became muted. They were in a windowless cellar, where the dim and dirty yellow light came from an oil lamp on the table and oily warmth radiated from a dented iron stove in one corner.

  Two young soldiers sat at the table, eating slices of Christmas pudding off tin plates. One had a round, pink, cheerful face and brown hair that stood up like a brush. The other was Cyril.

  Edie gave a scream of joy and ran to hug him – but her arms went right through him and he went on eating as if nothing had happened.

  ‘It’s horrible that he can’t feel us!’ Edie’s tears were welling up again.

  The Lamb knew exactly what she meant; it was rather horrible to see Cyril without being seen by him. ‘But at least we know he’s safe,’ he said stoutly. ‘And getting a decent-looking pudding.’

  ‘I suppose so. I wish we could tell Mother he’s wearing the scarf she knitted for him.’

  ‘The other chap must be Harper – funny that we know such a lot about him yet this is the first time we’ve actually seen him.’

  ‘Harper?’ The Psammead twitched impatiently inside the Lamb’s jacket. ‘Who?’

  ‘You’d know if you paid more attention to Squirrel’s letters,’ Edie said. ‘He likes cricket and strawberry jam.’

  ‘Of course,’ the Psammead said. ‘Mr Harper – he has a twin sister called Mabel, and they both have double-jointed thumbs. You see, I was paying attention.’

  ‘This pudding’s stupendous,’ Cyril said, ‘but it’s like digesting a cannonball. I may never be able to move again.’

  ‘Careful how you bite it – my sister put in a silver threepenny bit,’ Harper said.

  ‘In my family it’s a sixpence.’ Cyril poured red wine into their tin mugs. ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Cheers.’ Harper leaned back in his chair. ‘I wonder what they’re doing at home?’

  ‘I know exactly what my lot will be doing right now.’

  ‘Oh no you don’t!’ said the Lamb, and he and Edie giggled.

  Cyril’s voice was wistful. ‘The local carol-singers will be making a daring attack, but Dad will be fighting them off with the worst singing you’ve ever heard.’

  ‘Yes, the singing of your father is frightful,’ the Psammead agreed. ‘When I heard it on the landing the other day, it reminded me of the death rattle of a mammoth.’

  The two young officers were both smiling dreamily over their wine.

  ‘Our house will be overrun with cousins,’ Harper said. ‘They’ll be rolling back the sitting-room rug now, ready for dancing, and winding up the gramophone. That’s normally my job, due to my two left feet. I wonder who’s doing it this year?’

  ‘The little ones will be going up to bed now,’ Cyril said. ‘Arguing all the way, of course. My smallest brother never takes bedtime lying down.’

  ‘That’s because it’s plain stupid to send a chap to bed when he’s not tired,’ the Lamb said. ‘Especially on Christmas Day!’

  Cyril chuckled, as if he had heard. ‘Funny, I can see those two so clearly in my mind’s eye.’ He reached into his pocket for his wallet. ‘I’ve got a snap of them.’

  He showed Harper the photograph Father had taken last winter, of the Lamb and Edie with their giant snowman. Father had written on the back, ‘All their own work! Lamb, Edie and snowman, Jan 1914.’

  ‘Jolly little cubs,’ Harper said. ‘I bet they lead you a dance.’ He reached for his own wallet and carefully pulled out a small photograph. ‘My parents and Mabel – and Hamish.’

  ‘That’s their little black Scottie dog,’ Edie said, looking over Cyril’s shoulder at the picture. ‘Isn’t he sweet?’

  ‘My father gave me this photo just before I left,’ Cyril said. ‘He told me to look at it if I ever forgot what I was fighting for.’

  They were quiet for a long moment, listening to the pounding of the guns along the line.

  ‘I don’t care if he can’t feel me,’ Edie said. ‘I’m going to hug him anyway.’ She put her arms around him as best she could and kissed the air near his face. ‘Merry Christmas, dear good old Squirrel!’

  Cyril grinned suddenly. ‘Tell you what, let’s drink a Christmas toast to everyone at home.’

  ‘A splendid idea.’ Harper held up his mug. ‘Here’s to Mother, Dad, Mabel, Hamish and the whole dear old boiling lot of them!’

  ‘To Mother and Father, Anthea, Bobs, Jane, Lamb and Edie,’ said Cyril. ‘And Sammy.’

  ‘Well, I am most gratified!’ The Psammead was so pleased to be toasted that he swelled importantly inside the Lamb’s jacket. ‘I don’t have my full power, but I’m sending out very strong vibrations of goodwill.’

  ‘I can feel them!’ the Lamb said. ‘You’re shaking like a little machine – don’t burst off my buttons.’

  There was a loud knock at the door and a man in a balaclava and tin hat stuck his head inside.

  ‘Beg pardon, Mr Harper – you speak German, don’t you?’

  ‘A bit,’ Harper said.

  ‘The Huns are giving us Merry Christmas, and we’d like to return the compliment.’

  ‘Crikey,’ Cyril said. ‘Wonders will never cease!’

  The Lamb and Edie followed them out of the dugout. The trench was now packed with soldiers, all grinning. The sky flashed above them as the great guns boomed, but the machine guns had gone quiet.

  ‘Shh – there it is again!’ someone said.

  Far away in the darkness, voices chorused, ‘MERRY CHRISTMAS, TOMMY!’

  A murmur went along the trench. ‘Go on, Mr Harper!’

  ‘I don’t suppose there’s any harm in shouting back,’ Harper said. He climbed the ladder up to the machine gun in its nest of sandbags and yelled at the top of his voice, ‘FROHLICHE WEIHNACHTEN, FRITZ!’

  From the German lines they heard the sound of cheering.

  *

  And they were back in the solid warmth and quiet of the nursery at home, listening to the carol-singers downstairs.

  ‘Peace on earth and mercy mild,’ the Psammead said. ‘You humans are always going on about peace – but if you liked it that much, you’d have more of it.’

  Ten

  BELIEVING IN FAIRIES

  1915

  ANTHEA, ROBERT AND JANE were annoyed that they hadn’t been included in the magical visit to Cyril. For the first few days after Christmas all the children debated
furiously about whether to tell Cyril that they’d seen him. The girls thought he would be pleased, but Robert and the Lamb were dead against it. Eventually, during a cold supper in the dining room while their parents and the servants were out, the boys won the argument.

  ‘We don’t want him to think we’re spying on him,’ the Lamb said firmly. ‘It makes me feel like a sneak.’

  ‘Hear, hear,’ Robert said. ‘I do wish I’d had a glimpse of good old Squirrel – but I might be seeing the war for myself soon enough, if it goes on much longer.’

  They were all quiet for a moment. Cyril was a soldier, strong enough to take on any number of Germans. And though Robert had said he wanted to be a soldier when he was a little boy, he’d grown up into a lanky, weedy, bookish young man who wore glasses, and nobody could imagine him on the front line.

  He saw their faces and quickly added, ‘Not that I’m thinking of joining up yet – I’m going to finish my exams first, and the war might be over by then.’

  The war was spreading across everyday life like a khaki stain; soldiers milled on the streets and crowded the pubs and trains; Father’s train into London was constantly being ‘beggared about with’ whenever there was a big movement of troops. He said you always knew when there had been heavy action at the front because of the long lines of khaki ambulances streaming out of the big London stations and bringing the traffic to a standstill. Suddenly all the young men had gone, and Mother couldn’t get anyone to mend the gutter.

  In spite of the war, however, a lot of things carried on as if everything was normal. In the first frosty days of 1915, Father’s cousin Geraldine treated them to a trip to the theatre to see Peter Pan. Cousin Geraldine was great fun and her outings were lavish. She took a whole box at the Coliseum, and when Mother clucked about the expense, she just laughed, and said, ‘I don’t have any kids of my own – so I can’t see Peter Pan unless I borrow yours.’ She was also good for chocolates and lemonade in the interval.

  ‘I still don’t understand,’ the Psammead said, ‘precisely what you are going to see. Is it a form of worship, like going to church?’