Down to the East End
D OWN TO THE E AST E ND
C HARLIE FOLLOWED THE CURBS , trees, and lampposts that had been painted white to help folks navigate the city at night. There were no exterior lights permitted on buildings, and vehicle lights had to be concealed, except for a small crack in the covering. The traffic lights were also shrouded, again save for a small slit so drivers could view the necessary colors. All streets other than the main thoroughfares were dark, and these roadways only possessed a small starlight filtering downward so as to give no aid to the Luftwaffe above.
The buses had signs that read LOOK OUT IN THE BLACKOUT . Yet even with these aids, people were still regularly struck and killed by cars, taxis, lorries, and double-decker buses lurching out of the darkness at them like leaping predators on the prowl. Charlie had had more than his share of close calls. Thousands of others had not been so fortunate and currently lay six feet under the earth for their effrontery at taking a walk in the city.
The blackout had been difficult for many Londoners, who had been used to a city brilliantly lighted at night. Charlie could still recall when the blackout had been instituted. He had watched with his grandfather from atop a building as, sector by sector—including the mighty Big Ben—the great city went dark. And with the absence of light came a deluge of fear for many, because everyone knew that terrible things always tended to happen in the dark.
Along the way home, the sore-footed Charlie was still nimble enough to latch on to the rear end of a full bus that was shepherding folks engaged in the round-the-clock war efforts to either their homes or places of work. He had been taught how to expertly perch on the outside of buses by Lonzo. It required strong fingers and exceptional balance, with the bottoms of your feet pressed against the vehicle’s metal hide, as well as the ability and courage to safely jump off a moving bus if the ticket conductor spied you and angrily came for the freeloader with his club.
At his ramshackle building in Bethnal Green, Charlie entered his tiny flat the way he always did after one of these nighttime forays. The overturned dustbin in the alley led to the bottom of the frayed rope attached to the lowest rung of the fire escape ladder. A tug on the rope brought the ladder down. After a quick clamber up the steps to the landing above and resetting the ladder, he was in through the window that, unlike the back door to St. Saviour’s School, had never latched properly.
Charlie slid into the wooden crate that represented his bed inside the space that had once been a small storage cupboard. When they had first moved here, it had been cozy. Now, with his quickly lengthening limbs and torso, it felt akin to a coffin. Yet at least he had a room of his own. He had many mates who did not.
Charlie had learned that his crib had once been an egg box, where as a wee thing he’d spent much time lying in nappies. As he’d grown, his digs had been replaced with an orange crate. He didn’t know what his current box had once been, but at least it was larger, because so was he.
Despite the cramped quarters, Charlie knew he and Gran had it better than most around here. Many East Enders lived multiple families to a few rooms with exterior toilets and no kitchens, with the fronting streets barely ten feet wide. And being jettisoned into those same streets was, for many folks, only an illness or death of a husband and father away.
His grandmother had once told him in front of a meager fire and lukewarm tea, “There was a workhouse in Whitechapel, Charlie.” She had shivered at the memory. “Bloody awful place. Nearly a thousand helpless souls. And the whole family had to go and share in the shame of being destitute. Shaved your head to keep off the lice. Fed you but not really with what I would call food. And they separated husbands and wives, and their children too. It was hard labor every day, and the law said the living conditions had to be worse than that of the working poor. And that’s saying something, Charlie, because we’re working poor, aren’t we? And look at us! And if you were old and your family couldn’t take you in, you went there, too. Bread and soup, and one day out so you could do your begging on the streets.” She had paused, lips quivering with emotion. “You hear anyone ever speak of the workhouse howl , luv?” she said in a fearful tone.
Charlie had shaken his head. “What’s that?” he’d said, with dread in his voice.
She had settled her despondent gaze on him. “Well, Charlie, it’s hard to describe. It’s… it’s when folks have been so beaten down by life and all the hardships that go with it, least for our kind, that… that all that sadness and, well, anger too, just comes out of your mouth and you howl away, like some poor, suffering beast. Because that’s what folks can become who haven’t ever had a decent turn in life. You still see it often round here,” she’d added bitterly.
“Have… have you ever had to howl like that, Gran?” he’d asked.
She had hurriedly changed the subject and didn’t answer him.
Charlie knew he never wanted to go to the workhouse. And he never wanted to be so sad that he howled, though some days he could see it happening.
He tugged a single tattered sheet over his wet self, felt in his pocket for the biscuits, and broke off a piece. He pushed it into his mouth and quickly chewed. He wanted to eat slowly, but he was too ravenous for that.
With his other hand, he felt for the paper money and coins. Food and proper money, instead of a shilling or mere pence. His prospects had gone up quite nicely with a single night’s larcenous labor.
He lit a candle stub, angled it into the crevice between the wooden box and several old pillows that constituted his mattress, and pulled the money out. His soiled fingers rubbed over the countenances of the august royal images imprinted on the notes and then touched the coolness of the coins. On the penny farthing was the image of Britannia on one side and George the Sixth on the obverse.
In total there was thirty-eight pounds in paper, plus an assortment of coins adding up to around another four quid. He had never held such a fortune. He slowly put it all back in his pocket and turned his contented attention to the book. In the dim light Charlie noticed for the first time that there was nothing printed on the cover or the spine. When he turned to the first page his hopes of more bounty from this stolen article fell. He quickly flipped through all the pages; every single one was blank.
“Bloody useless,” he commented to the darkness. He hid it under the pillows, snuffed out the candle with moistened fingers, and listened to the quiet outside. It was interrupted only by the occasional passing of a sputtering car belching dodgy petrol, or the sharp strike of regulation boots on pavement, heralding a weary constable or an air warden performing their important rounds.
As time passed, there came the frail echoes of a wireless from the flat next door. Charlie and his gran had once had an Ekco brand radio, but it had gone to pay bills. Charlie missed listening to the BBC. The radio broadcasts reported the war-related news, certainly. But there were also programs that made him laugh, and Children’s Hour , one of his favorites, which came on every day. Sometimes, he would sit out in the hallway at night and listen to the wirelesses of other people, hoping to hear well enough to chuckle at something—anything, really, to take him away for even a few moments from the desperation of his daily life.
At three in the morning he heard the gong of a tower clock. A minute later this was followed by a bullhorn blast from a ship, either navigating up or down the long, winding thread of the mud-coated Thames. The 215-mile-long river essentially defined Charlie’s world, becoming tidal at Teddington, and sliding into Greater London at Thames Ditton. It fanned wider and ever more winding as it headed east. All the fine bridges were to the west because of that. The unmistakable loop around the Isle of Dogs made the East End and the all-important docks easily visible from the sky for German bombers, especially on moonlit nights. And the Luftwaffe had taken advantage of that unique topographical quirk, with devastating results.
A moment later the sharp cry of a train whistle cut right through him. Charlie tried to think of which station it could be but then gave up. And when would he ever be on a train? He had been born in this city and he felt quite certain that he would perish here as well without ever once traveling anywhere else; the only unknown was how many years from now. Or days. And whether his end would be natural or violent. These thoughts were not the result of an overactive imagination. Charlie had seen much that was unthinkable and terrible in every conceivable way.
Yet nothing, for him, could ever take away the horror of that late summer’s day.