Chapter Six
Mickey
Amidst all the many, varied comings and goings on the crowded platform of the Gare Maritime at Calais, sitting cross-legged on top of an empty luggage trolley, along with his cousin Danny, while his parents, his uncle and aunt, were all inside the waiting room talking to Aunt Edith, young Robert Crawley had just offered Saiorse one of his last gobstoppers. That had been just after Danny himself had suggested to his sister that she might like to come with them and see the engine, when, at last, both their fathers finally chose to re-emerge from the station waiting room.
Saiorse's reply had been all too predictable.
"Why should I want to come with you two and see some silly old engine?" she asked, assuming, what she hoped, amounted to the appearance of supercilious indifference.
"Come on sis. It'll be fun. Da will be coming with us" coaxed Danny.
That particular piece of information gave Saiorse at least a moment's pause for thought. If her beloved Da really was going to be there too, then that might make such an expedition just about bearable, even with these two idiots in tow.
"Would you like one of my gobstoppers, Saiorse? You can choose..." began Robert, but before he could say anything else, Saiorse cut him off. She hadn't forgotten hearing him snigger when, in public, Ma had told her to apologise to her Aunt Mary on the staircase back on board the steamer. Saiorse had been utterly mortified. And she intended to get even with Robert for that snigger too, and with the sound of it still ringing in her ears, she now glared at him as if he had offered her a dose of arsenic.
"No thank you, Robert! I'd sooner starve!"
At her curt refusal, Robert looked crestfallen, which pleased Saiorse no end.
Standing on the platform in front of the two boys, she gazed disdainfully down, first at her cousin, and then at her elder brother. They really were the absolute limit! Both of them! Not that Saiorse was especially annoyed with Robert, at least no more than was usual, apart from that snigger of course. No, what it was which had really made Saiorse so cross, apart from having to apologise to her Aunt Mary, was that she had so much wanted to talk to her other aunt: her Aunt Edith.
For, unlike both Ma and Aunt Mary, Aunt Edith went to all kinds of such interesting places, met all kinds of such interesting people, did all sorts of such interesting things, brought back Saiorse such interesting presents too, from strange, faraway places, that she always made sound so fascinating and mysterious – well certainly more fascinating and mysterious than Blackrock, but, thought Saiorse, that wouldn't be difficult. Blackrock was duller than Dermot Delany, and he was the most stupid boy in her class.
In the past, Aunt Edith had always made time for Saiorse at least that was until today. But now, and completely unexpectedly, things seemed to have suddenly changed. For, instead of staying outside and talking to her, for some strange reason, Aunt Edith and all the other grown-ups had gone inside the waiting room, were all inside there now. None of the children had been allowed to go in with them, which was why Saiorse had been forced to stay outside on the platform with these two idiots.
She scowled angrily again at Danny and Robert.
Honestly, boys!
Feeling that she had at last got the better of them, at least of Robert, now satisfied, Saiorse walked to stand but a few feet off, where she deliberately turned her back on both Danny and her cousin and stood facing the other way, only to be confronted, unexpectedly, by a decidedly uninteresting stretch of blank wall.
Somewhat further along the platform, standing some distance away, and pre-occupied as they both were, looking after Simon, Bobby, and Rebecca, Nanny Bridges, and Mary's maid Hodges, had, perhaps fortunately, singularly failed to overhear the exchange of pleasantries which had passed between Saiorse, her brother, and her cousin, the more so, because it transpired there was now something of a problem: Master Bobby desperately needed the toilet. Neither Nanny Bridges, nor Hodges spoke any French, and, while young Master Bobby, now screwing up his face, continued to squirm beside them on the platform, they both tried to decide how best to deal with this seemingly intractable difficulty. Then, thankfully the door to the waiting room opened and the earl of Grantham, followed by his brother-in-law Mr. Branson, both came out.
Seeing her adored Da, along with her Uncle Matthew, at long last now re-emerging from the waiting room, Saiorse, who had finally got bored of looking at the same uninteresting stretch of wall and turned round, now smiled broadly, and made to walk towards her father. But, as she did so, her brother Danny and her cousin Robert both claimed Tom's undivided attention. Saiorse paused, hung back. She really didn't like sharing her beloved Da with anyone, not even with her brother Danny, and certainly not with that unspeakable boy Robert.
"Da! Da! Can we go and see the engine now?" asked Danny scrambling up from off the luggage trolley.
"May we father? May we please?" Robert asked, doing likewise.
Matthew and Tom both smiled at their sons' eager faces, both lit in boyish epiphany.
"In a moment, boys", laughed Tom, ruffling his son's hair. "What time does the train leave, Matthew?"
"In about half an hour or so, I think. Perhaps a little longer". Matthew glanced at his wristwatch.
"Yes, I think we've time to...
"Oh, excuse me Your Lordship. Mr. Branson, sir. Am I that glad to see the both of you. Master..." began Nanny Bridges, but Bobby's shouted words cut off the necessity of the poor woman having to explain things any further.
"Da! I need a feckin wee!" piped young Bobby at the top of his treble voice. He was now jigging up and down almost uncontrollably and the little boy's shouted explanation of his present predicament carried the length and breadth of the entire platform.
Fortunately, the Irish expletive went unrecognised by everyone for what it was, apart from Tom of course, even by young Bobby, who, for the very first time that morning, had heard his father use the same word, in the bathroom at their hotel when Tom had nicked himself shaving. Liking both the sound of the word and the way his father had said it, young Bobby Branson had mentally stored it away for future use, and, in his boyish innocence, now chose this particular moment to do just that.
But, even if the Irish expletive passed all of them by, given the fact that most of those passengers now boarding the train, or waiting to do so, were English, heads turned from all directions to see just who it was who was now announcing to one and all what it was he so urgently needed to do.
"Master Bobby! That's not how to..."
"It's alright Nanny, I'll deal with it" said Tom looking round for the whereabouts of a public toilet. Grinning broadly, Matthew nodded, and pointed Tom in the direction of a sign at the far end of the platform.
"Over there old chap. I'll stay here with the boys. Bon voyage!" Matthew quipped.
Having picked Bobby up in his arms, dodging and weaving through a seemingly never ending flood of passengers, avoiding porters and luggage trolleys, in a manner of which Noel Murphy would have been proud, Tom fairly raced down the long platform in the direction indicated by Matthew.
On reaching the men's public toilet, even if he had not understood the sign above the door, the smell emanating from inside, would have indicated to anyone passing by outside, as to just what use the place beyond the open doorway was put. Tom deposited Bobby back on the ground, and taking him gently by the hand, led him inside.
While Tom undid the front of the little boy's shorts, then helped him pull out his penis, Bobby wrinkled his nose.
"Pooh! Da! It stinks in here!"
"I know son, I know" said Tom. "There now, point Mickey at the china, do your business, wash our hands, and then we'll be all done".
While waiting for Bobby to do what he needed so desperately to do, Tom glanced nonchalantly around at the peeling walls of the public convenience. As he did so, through the slatted vent high in the wall, immediately above his head, he heard the sound of foreign, guttural voices, drifting in from somewhere outside. He recognised at once the language being spoken: German, and then in a rush of words which he didn't understand at all, heard clearly the one word which he did: "Crawley".
Author's note:
Noel Murphy (1904-1987) was an Irish rugby player. Between 1930 and 1933, he won eleven caps, playing as a flanker.