Sundown Tragedy, The

ลำดับตอนที่ #4 : Three

Eric and Reese had been best friends for many years before.  They had been in the same school since they were five or six.  Reese usually remembered Eric as mostly friendly, sensible and patient.  Eric had though too been very independent.

Reese often wondered that if the war was true, would Eric, or anyone else, be safe to be so far away—in Wales, for instance.  He too wondered if he would be crying if he was told that Eric had been hurt or killed during a night’s raid—or if he himself was killed, would Eric be saddened?

But neither Eric nor Reese could die.  Hitler would not kill the children—that his wars would be with soldiers, with tanks, ships and aeroplanes—in sunny deserts, stormy seas and snowy forests...

            Usually after Sunday school, Reese and Gus would go biking.  They would, on their favourite push-bikes, go down Broad Street and to the streets that they were most familiar with.

            Down Broad Street were many rows of houses and groceries, lined up closely along the road.  Many roads on that Sunday were very empty, not like the other busy days of the week.

            But too, on Sundays, months before that summer, pavements had been crowded with pedestrians and roads by cars.  They had never been this empty.

            “Did you know that you can’t kill yourself by holding your breath?” asked Gus.

            “Hmm?  And where did that come from?”

            “Library,” he said.

             “I know you’ll die if you hold your breath.  That’s awful.  Have you tried it?”

            “You go un-kong-shus, but you won’t die.  Daddy says tis true.  The brain’ll slug, but tis come back.  After a while, maybe.”

            “You also die by being a smart alec,” said Reese.

            “Do you remember Harold?” said Gus, “Harold Witte?”

            “Yes.  Another one of MacLoaf’s.”

            Harold Witte was a boy from school.  He was rather a black sheep in Walter’s gang, but nonetheless a bully, like everyone else in that gang.

            “Few days ago, he and his mates were coming down the street.  Tis unlucky, they ran into Taylor Road’s.”

            “Well, wouldn’t that be nasty?” said Reese reluctantly.  Reese had hated gangs—as much as Gus had hated winged insects.  Reese asked, “Did anyone die?”

            “No!” Gus gave a blank stare, “Witty’s a bloodied nose, though.”

            “Yes.  Serves him right,” said Reese.

            Reese and Gus soon came past their school.  The school building stood against the sun, so every brick of the building glowed before them.  On that Sunday, the school was unusually quiet.  Reese would clearly picture empty classrooms and corridors inside.  Schools are best empty, Reese thought.

            Perhaps rooms, as Gus believed, were never empty—that the ghosts of the previous pupils who had died in the War would return and sit in those seats. 

            At the school gate stood a man.  The man was a bearded and tanned figure in his finest clothes, walking unevenly towards the notice board.  Reese looked at the man’s hat.  It gave a large shade over his face.  The man then pinned a piece of paper onto the board and left.  From the distance, Reese could read the note very unmistakably:

            ‘School will be closed owing to evacuations.’

            Reese slunk towards the notice with his push-bike and stared at it.  Then, with the notice paper staring back at him, Reese began to understand and remember the words.  They were the very words that made most of the war posters, seen on every wall in every dark alley of London.

            “Wot’sat mean?” asked Gus.

            Reese shrugged.  He began to back away from the school fence and back onto the street, although he knew full well what was meant.

            Back home at night under a partly lighted room, Reese sat by the fireplace in his nightclothes.  The lamplight was lit from the other side of the room, where Gus and their grandmother were sitting.  On their couch, they quietly read one of Gus’ storybooks, the one with dragons and princes.  Reese could hear little of their voices.  Reese observed how Gus’ eyes followed Grandma’s finger determinedly, as she read with him.

            Reese would remember reading a few of them storybooks when he was younger.  But Reese never really loved dragons and princes as bed-time stories.

            Sitting alone quietly in the shadowed region of the room, Reese then thought of Dad’s stories of the War.  He often thought how frightening it would be to dine under a restless sky—a sky so filled with German bombers that the birds would not dare fly.  Dad said he was on the settee when the first bomb hit, tearing the whole roof apart.  His bed then came through the ceiling and landed flat in front of him.  And that was very much the end of it.

            Resting on the couch, Reese slowly looked upwards at the ceiling.  It began to seem feeble.  Perhaps right above where he sat was his bed, and perhaps he would not be as fortunate as his father once was.  Perhaps his father was meant to survive, so that Reese could be born.

            Reese turned back to look at Grandmother and Gus.  He then looked at the old cut on his left arm.  He felt it with his thumbs.

            “Gus, love,” said Mum quietly, “It’s bed time, dear.  Reese.”

            Gus took as long as he could to slowly remove his eyes from the storybook.  It was as if he did not want to leave the magical world that the book constructed for him to enter.

            “Go to bed, little prince,” said Grandma, kissing Gus softly on his cheek, “We’ll continue tomorrow, won’t we?”

            “Say good night to Grandma, love,” said Mum, “It’s very dark now.  She should go home.”

            “Good night, Grandma,” said Reese, “Good night, Mum.”

            And before that summer, going to sleep had never been so effortful.

But that night, Reese actually slept and dreamt. 

But his sleep was short.  Reese did not remember much of that dusky night—the night in which he was wakened from his dreams of a blue sea.  His parents sat on the edge of his bed and had their longest talk.  Reese, though, remained under the cover of his sleep.

“If they’re to go, they’re to go now,” whispered Dad.

“You must, love,” said Mum.  It was all that she decided to say to Reese, and she said it most reluctantly.  “You must go.  You will like it…”  She looked away, “They will… Won’t they?”

“Yes, Irene,” said Dad, and he found her hands.

Reese, in the shadow of darkness, did not know at first if it was reality or just another dream.  On the other bed, Gus was still in his sleep—him and his ‘rotting teddy’, sleeping their way to America.

Reese made no interruptions.  Mum found Reese’s hand under the blanket and held onto it softly.  It was the same warmth and softness that Reese had expected.  She shut her eyes.  The tears on her face were sparkled by moonlight.

“You must go, love,” she said, “To the countryside love…  You must.”