Uprooted - a Canadian War Story

  Cameron was quite a secretive boy, and he’s a secretive man right to this day. He never sat down and told us the full story of what happened while he was making his run for home. Just the bare bones, we got.

  But across the years since then, little dribs and drabs of the story have come out. Auntie Millie told us some of it after the war. Someone else told us more. And as Cameron and I grew up, sometimes, just sometimes, when we were together (which wasn’t all that often, till recently) I would ask him careless-sounding questions. Little questions, like “Didn’t anyone try to stop you buying a ticket, that time?” or “Did you talk to anyone, on the train?” or, once, when he was a little bit drunk, “Did you feel me willing you to come back?”

  And little by little I’ve pieced it together. Of course, I have to cheat a little, because I wasn’t there, and some of it I’ve had to guess or imagine. It’s Cameron’s story. But when I asked him, the last time I saw him, “Do you want to write it? You should, you really should – it’s your story,” he said, “No. You write it. I give it to you. Just please don’t make me sound like all kinds of a damn fool.”

  So. The day he ran away, he took with him only the bare necessities in a small suitcase. And Hank’s hundred dollars. And fifty dollars it turned out he’d borrowed from Mr Gustin, and another twenty-five from Leo. How many of us there were who felt guilty about having helped, or encouraged, Cameron to make his run! I thought Mummy was the only one who didn’t need to feel it was her fault, but she did anyway, because of the row she’d had with him at the lake. She thought maybe it was true that she didn’t look after him properly.

  He took a streetcar to the train station and went to the ticket office.

  “One-way juvenile ticket to Montreal,” he said in his best English accent.

  “Are you travelling unaccompanied?” asked the man.

  “Yes,” he said, and then, using what he’d been practising, “I’m going to visit my grandmother.”

  “No school?” the man said suspiciously.

  Cameron thought the whole thing was coming to an end right there. But he was inventive.

  “She’s ill and she’s asked for me. I’ve got permission.”

  “So what’s with the one-way? Ain’t ya comin’ back?”

  “I’ve only enough money for one way. When I get there someone will give me the money to make the return journey.”

  On the train he prepared for the long, long journey. He’d cleared the first jump but his legs hadn’t stopped shaking, and they didn’t, for hours. He’d brought England, Their England, for company, but he couldn’t read it. He told me how he stared at the lines of print (he knew whole chunks of it by heart) and they danced before his eyes and he couldn’t take in a word.

  There was an elderly man sitting opposite him who kept staring at him. Cameron felt like a criminal being watched by a policeman. He became more and more nervous. He began to fiddle in his suitcase. He brought out a pair of socks.

  “Cold feet?” asked the man with a smile.

  Cold feet was exactly what Cameron had. But he said, “Just wanted to make sure I’d packed them.”

  “Where are you bound for?”

  “Montreal.”

  “That’s a heck of a long way for a kid to be travelling on his own.”

  “I suppose so,” said Cameron in his ‘cool’ voice. “I’ve done it before. I’m going to visit my grandmother.”

  The man didn’t ask him any more questions, but passed a few remarks about the scenery and then they both went back to their reading.

  The ticket collector came along as the sun was going down. He looked from Cameron’s ticket to him and back again. Cameron tried to look calm and casual, but he was panicking inside. There was a long silence. Then suddenly the elderly man said, “It’s all right, he’s with me.”

  “Is that right, son?” said the man. He didn’t sound too sure, but when Cameron nodded, he punched the ticket and left.

  Cameron sat staring at his ‘saviour’.

  “Why did you say that?” he asked.

  “I ran away from home myself, a long, long time ago,” the man said.

  Cameron waited for him to start asking him questions, but the only one he asked was, “D’you mind if I smoke?” Cameron shook his head. The man went back to his newspaper.

  The next day, travelling through Manitoba, Cameron was the one asking questions.

  The elderly man’s name was Jacob Johnston. Oddly, he didn’t ask Cameron’s name. He said he was going to Montreal to meet someone. Someone coming from England.

  “Someone a bit like you,” he said.

  “Like me?”

  “Well, you’re from England, aren’t you. Probably an evacuee.”

  It wasn’t a question so Cameron didn’t answer it.

  “And so is he.”

  “Is he a relation?”

  “Yes.”

  After another two or three hours, loneliness made Cameron try again.

  “Why did you run away?”

  “It doesn’t matter. But it matters why you are. No,” he said, “please don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.”

  “But why did you help me?”

  “I just thought I would. Someone helped me once. Not too much. Just enough.”

  After several hours more, Cameron said, “Aren’t you going to tell me I ought to go back?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?” Cameron asked, almost desperately. By this time – nearly twenty-four hours since he’d left us, twenty-four lonely, frightened hours – he wanted to be told to go back. He wanted to be forced to. He didn’t want to give up, but he wanted somebody to take him over.

  But the man wouldn’t interfere. What he said was, “You look like a smart boy. There’s only one person who can tell you to go back.”

  Cameron’s ticket didn’t give him proper meals or a proper bed. He couldn’t help hoping that Jacob Johnston would be another Hank, and might offer to pay for a meal for him, but he didn’t. At mealtimes he folded his newspaper and put out his cigarette and left the carriage, coming back to his seat after half an hour, looking well fed. Cameron went down to the observation car and bought peanuts and an occasional sandwich, and sat outside watching the countryside unroll. He found he could read now and that helped. He was rereading, for the dozenth time, England, Their England.

  Back in their carriage, he had short conversations with Jacob Johnston.

  “How old is your relative that’s coming?”

  “He’s nearly nine.”

  “Is he coming alone?”

  “Supervised, but basically, yes.”

  “I came with my aunt and my cousin.”

  “Did you? Lucky for you.”

  Cameron thought this kid didn’t know what was ahead of him. No auntie or cousin to keep him company. Just this strange, hard-to-talk-to old man.

  Poor little beggar, he thought. I’m glad I’m not him, anyway.

  By the time he reached Montreal he was dirty, hungry and very tired. Cameron was a very clean boy and he liked things to be regular and so he was thoroughly uncomfortable in about five different ways. One was fear. What would he do now?

  He said goodbye to Jacob Johnston as they were leaving the train. The man put out his hand and Cameron shook it.

  “Good luck, son,” he said. And then, just as he was going, he suddenly seemed to remember something. He put down his case and felt in his breast pocket for his wallet. He took a card out of it.

  “This is my hotel in Montreal,” he said, and gave it to Cameron. “I’ll be there for three nights.” Then he left.

  Cameron picked up his own case and left the station. He followed close behind Mr Johnston. He didn’t want to part from him. He was scared and very unhappy. I’d like to think that was partly because he’d been receiving my come-back thought-messages and blanking them. But when I asked him about that, sixty years later, he said, “All I remember thinking was that the police would be looking for me.”

  H
e knew how worried Mummy would be. Not to mention me. So I don’t care what he remembers now. I’m sure his conscience must’ve been beating him up. But one of his favourite expressions was, “The die is cast,” meaning that it was too late to change anything. He kept saying it to himself over and over, as he found the right transport to take him to the docks.

  He did tell me about that.

  Docks – any big docks – are scary places for a child alone. The ships looming up beside the quays, vehicles driving about where there are no real roads, big cranes loading, loudspeaker messages booming out, great sheds alongside the quays – and, although there were lots of hurrying people, nobody to ask.

  Cameron was so hungry after three days of eating from the observation car buffet that he blew three of his precious dollars on a hamburger and fries. And a cup of coffee (his first – Mummy didn’t think kids should drink coffee) to wake him up.

  He’d made his plan. He knew troopships and liners weren’t carrying civilians back across the Atlantic, so big ships were hopeless. He had to find out where the smaller, merchant boats docked. But the sheer size of the place nearly beat him.

  At last, after wandering about for hours, with his suitcase getting heavier and heavier, he found what he was looking for: small ships that didn’t look so huge and forbidding. They looked, in fact, rather ramshackle and shabby, and the men on and around them were shabby to match. No smart naval uniforms for them! They just looked like men of the sea, working men. The sight of them did nothing to change Cameron’s mind about joining the regular navy. But he needed these men now.

  He stood beside one of the boats, staring. He was wishing he were six inches taller with a bit of a beard, willing the sailors to be very short-sighted. Useless … He knew he looked like what he was: a boy too young to go to sea.

  It wasn’t long before he caught the eye of one of the seamen.

  “Hey, you – lad. What arta hanging round for?” this burly man shouted down at him from the foredeck.

  Cameron had already seen the name of the boat and its home port painted on the back. It was a British ship out of Hull.

  He knew that lies weren’t going to help.

  “Are you the captain?”

  “Say I am.”

  “Do you need anyone? I want to get home,” he heard himself say.

  Just as he’d half expected, the man threw back his head and roared with laughter.

  “Not on my ship, tha won’t, tha soft tyke! Go suck thy mam’s titty!”

  Cameron didn’t flinch. “I’m too old to do that. Couldn’t I work my way? I’m strong and I know the parts of a ship. I won’t eat much. I can sleep anywhere. Just take me with you. I can pay.”

  “Oh cansta? Eh, tha’s a caution and no mistake! Right. Two hundred pounds. Cash in hand!” And he sprinted down the gangway and held out a horny hand as if to take the money.

  “I’ve only got fifty-one dollars,” Cameron said. “But you can have that.”

  “Byyyy … Didsta think I meant it? Doosta know what’s going on out there?” He pointed east, towards the ocean. “I heard there were a lad only fifteen drowned with his ship last month. Reginald his name was … At my age I take my chances, but I’m not goin’ down knowing I took a lad wi’ me no older than my youngest.” He straightened up. “Any road, tha’d be no manner of use at home. Stay here and make t’best on it till war’s over. Now move off, I’ve work to do.”

  Cameron didn’t give up. He tried three or four ships. Once he was invited on board and allowed to look round. They were sorry for him. Said they understood. He walked about looking and thinking – how could he give them the slip? How could he stow away and stay on board? With the ship and the seamen all around him, the seagulls crying overhead, the smell of the sea in his nose, he felt so near to his goal! He peered down into the open hold and thought of jumping into the deep darkness.

  But it was no use. When he’d finished ‘the ship’s tour’ they gave him a couple of biscuits and a cup of cocoa and shooed him back on shore.

  By nightfall he was exhausted, disappointed, and desperate for somewhere to sleep.

  He drifted back to the main part of the port. He didn’t mean to give up yet. He kept thinking of his mother all alone in that big house where he’d grown up, with Bubbles probably dying and his father gone. No servants any more – they’d all gone too. How would she manage, how must she be feeling? (Well, that’s what I’d have been thinking.)

  As he was passing the first boat, the one where the captain had teased him and told him he’d be no use at home anyway, something happened.

  As he dragged himself past the ship from Hull, someone called down to him. The docks were quieter now and he didn’t have to shout. He called quite softly.

  “Hey, lad.”

  Cameron looked up. The same Yorkshireman was standing at the rail of his ship, smoking a short pipe.

  “Didst’ have any luck?”

  Cameron shook his head.

  “Tell thee what. Gi’ uz the fifty dollars, come back tomorrow afore we sail, and I’ll sneak thee aboard.”

  “But you – you said—”

  “Aye. I know. A man can change his mind. Tha’rt a plucky young whelp as’ll make a good seaman.”

  Cameron, as he remembered it, stood stock-still in the shadow of the ship. He put down his case and reached into his inside jacket pocket. With his hand on the money, he hesitated.

  “I’ll come. I’ll pay you then.”

  “Nay, tha’ll pay me now, or never.”

  “And you’ll take me home?”

  “Aye.”

  There was very little light, and Cameron was light-headed from weariness. It seemed like a dream. He didn’t believe the man. He’d already decided it couldn’t happen. But maybe it could! Maybe he could get home after all! Just the same, he wasn’t going to hand over the money now.

  “I’ll come back tomorrow!” Cameron called. He picked up his case and with the last of his strength, he ran.

  Sleeping sitting up in the train was comfortable compared to curling up on a pile of filthy sacks in one of the warehouses. He dropped asleep breathing dust, thinking, I’ve done it. I’m going home – and fell into a dream of being at sea and the long longing, like stretched elastic, getting slacker. But in the middle of the night, someone bent over him and shook him awake. His head reeled with shock.

  The night watchman took him by the arm and marched him to the port police post. He said he was a vagrant, a homeless person. This was too much for Cameron.

  “I’m not! I just got tired. Look, here’s a card. Phone this hotel and ask for Jacob Johnston. He’ll tell you I’m not a vagrant!” he said furiously.

  Was Jacob Johnston expecting the call? I think so. I think in his strange, roundabout way, he’d planned it.

  It was four o’clock in the morning, but he got dressed and took a taxi and arrived at the police post in half an hour.

  “Hi,” he said to Cameron. Then he told the lone policeman on duty that he was a friend of “this young man’s” and that he would take responsibility for him. If it had been a proper, city police station, they’d probably have had Cameron’s name on some list as a missing person, but this was just a little port-post and the man on duty only wanted to be shot of him. When Cameron said he knew Mr Johnston, the policeman let him take him off their hands.

  There was a spare bed in Mr Johnston’s hotel room. Cameron had his first bath in three days, crawled, clean and full of a room-service hot dog, between cool sheets, and slept as if he’d never wake up.

  Early in the morning Mr Johnston brought him a cup of coffee (his second ever, and his first black) and said, “Get up now. We’ve got things to do.”

  They ate an enormous breakfast in the hotel dining room. Cameron still had his money, and he tried to pay for himself, but Mr Johnston said, “No. I’ve watched you go hungry long enough. This is on me.”

  “Why didn’t you offer before?” Cameron asked curiously.

  “Was I su
pposed to help you run away? You had some lessons to learn.”

  “Did you go hungry, when you ran away?”

  “I ran away without a penny in my pocket.”

  “Well, I still have fifty-one dollars, and a captain told me he’d take me home for that.”

  Mr Johnston stared at him.

  “Do you believe him?”

  “I don’t know. I need to go back to the docks.”

  “Good, because that’s where I’m going.”

  Then Cameron remembered.

  “Are you going to meet your relative?”

  “Yes. His ship will have docked by now.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Benjy. I want you two to meet. And for that, I’d better break down and ask what your name is.”

  Cameron told him. He was going to ask why Mr Johnston hadn’t asked before. But he had a sort of idea of the answer. He couldn’t put it into words, though.

  The cab left them at the quay where a huge liner, as big as the Duchess of Atholl that we’d sailed in on our trip to Canada, was tied up. The gangway was let down and people started leaving the ship. There were a lot of children. Mr Johnston and Cameron stood together, watching. Suddenly Mr Johnston, who’d always seemed so distant, did a funny thing. He put his arm around Cameron’s shoulders.

  “Be nice to him,” he said. Then he squeezed and let go.

  After a long time of waiting, with the sun beating down, Mr Johnston stiffened, rose on tiptoe, and jerked his arm up in a wave.

  “There he is!” he said in a voice Cameron hardly recognised, it was so excited.

  At the top of the gangway Cameron saw a small boy wearing school shorts and a blazer. There was a woman behind him with her hand on his shoulder, guiding him, or pushing him down ahead of her. He was looking all around, over the rail, which he was only just tall enough to see over.

  Suddenly he spotted Mr Johnston. He stopped still, half blocking the gangway, and waved both arms. He looked wildly happy – and relieved, Cameron thought. And, watching Mr Johnston waving just as wildly, he had an intuition.

  “He’s your grandson, isn’t he?”

  “Yes! Yes!” Mr Johnston started forward, through the crowd. “Come on! You must meet him! Benjy! Hallo! Hallo!”