In The Same Boat

War brings change in this powerful short story set in Scotland by Jessma Carter.

War was coming and times were changing for everyone . . .

ANNA lifted her wicker chair and dragged it into the sunshine. It was Sunday and the harbour was quiet. She had come back from church and, as usual, the peacefulness of the building allowed her to reflect.

She hadn’t paid much attention to the sermon.

Not that she didn’t like the preacher, but it was the only time in the week that she could sit and think and plan – and regret.

The minister was a fine chap and he would understand that, what with her husband being not quite himself and her boys at odds with one another, Anna needed time to think.

Maybe, if she listened hard enough, she would get an answer to her problem.

Ian Linklater, Anna’s husband, had always been a fisherman. Way, way back, his folks had come from Orkney to Fife.

He had been tall and fair and blue-eyed when she had first noticed him and she knew that all the other girls envied her when he took notice of her.

He had his own boat and dots of light in his eyes and a teasing way with him.

Now, after almost 30 years married, she looked at him as he sat, silent, and longed to reassure him that the family were fine, and hold his hand and help him believe her.

Many an afternoon she had stood on the quay, straining her eyes, watching for his boat to come in. There had been such a bustle before the war.

The excitement of seeing the catch of silver herring, smelling the hot tar used to seal the hulls, listening to the shouts of the buyers as they haggled with the skippers.

Life had been fresh and good then. It had held for them all the thought of good things to come.

Their sons had been born with the promise of a good life. A promise that now seemed cruel.

It was the war that changed everything. That announcement on September 3, 1939, by Mr Chamberlain had stopped the nation’s easy breathing. “Britain is now at war.” The country had leaned into the crackle of its radios and waited . . .

****

It was a black morning a few months after the announcement of war when Ian came home and sat beside the kitchen stove.

“What’s ado?” Anna asked. “Why are you no’ out yet? Is there something amiss with the boat? And where’s George?”

“Gone for a walk.” “A walk? What for would he go for a walk, and the boat and the sea waiting?”

“The Navy’s takin’ our boat. No’ just ours, but the best of them,” Ian said. Anna sat down by him. “What do you mean?”

Ian looked up at Anna. “It’s for the war. The

Navy have to search the North Sea for mines and they need our help.”

Anna felt suddenly cold. “I don’t understand.”

Ian rubbed his hand over his head and didn’t look at his wife.

“The Navy will use my boat and I’ll be the skipper. George will come with me.” “What about Tam? ““Tam’s no’ coming with us. I refuse. He’s a good help with the fishing but too young to help the Navy. It will be dangerous work.”

She saw the look in his eyes and knew there was no more to be said.

“At least you’ll be here, still going out in your boat. We’ll stick it out together.

“A war cannae last that long.” She tried to accept the inevitable.

****

That evening, when the family were together, Anna was exasperated with the boys.

“I’ve a good mind to knock your heads thegither. You’re worse than when you were infants.”

Tam felt insulted when his father said that George could go with him to help find the mines.

“What’s wrong with me? I’ve known the workings of our boat since yon time.”

“It’s settled, Tam. We’ll say no more.” Ian was firm.

But Tam felt left out. So he was to stay at home while his father and brother went out to search for mines?

He was almost eighteen years old – as tall and strong as his twenty-yearold brother.

And now his brother, who had

always been his best pal, was saying to him that he could be company for his mother and help the old fishermen!

Aye, that would go down well with the lassies when they asked what he was doing for the war effort!

The quarrels went on for days. It was hard for Anna to keep the peace.

Negotiating between brother and brother and father and son wasn’t easy.

Only Anna knew how deeply vexed her husband was.

George would be a help on the boat, a real help and a bit of companionship.

But Ian couldn’t allow his younger boy to endanger himself, too.

Anna understood. Ian was a good man who had always taken pride in being in charge, and now he found himself having to take orders.

And then there was Tam. “Am I no’ good enough? There’s George, helping in the war, and what am I doing?”

He pushed past his mother and stormed out of the house.

That had been early morning – now it was dark.

The moon shone on the waves lapping against the harbour wall and the Linklater household sat almost silent.

Anna couldn’t sit still. “Where can he be? This is no’ like him.”

She was beyond tears. She felt the shadows of the room; there had been no laughing, no joking, no easy squabbles, for a long time.

Is this what war does to us, she wondered.

Is it because we can’t understand the hugeness of countries fighting that we fight among ourselves?

She had cradled Tam in her arms not so long ago and Anna wanted him back, the young boy, the baby who trusted her.

She swayed back and forth, back and forth, on her chair.

****

Eventually Tam came bursting in.

“That’s that, then.” He pushed past them into the bedroom at the back.

“Tam, come here!” Ian shouted after him. “Tell us what you mean.

“We’ve been sitting here hour after hour waiting for you.”

The boy came back, shaking a form in his hand.

“I’ve enlisted. I go in a couple of weeks, as soon as I’m eighteen, to train in the Army.”

Then he went back into his bedroom.

We just have to get through this muddle, this change, this frightening experience, Anna thought later.

But even Ian, with his strong arms around her, couldn’t quite comfort her.

She lay in the darkness thinking of her father in the Great War, of how he had come home and never spoken of it.

How he had always been shrouded in a black silence about his experiences.

She must be willing to wait.

She had learned to wait, as every fisherman’s wife had; as every serviceman’s wife had.

****

Anna got up from her wicker chair when the sky was darkening.

She had done what she had learned to do, throughout the bad years of the war, to keep her family together and safe.

She had spent the long afternoon weighing up the possibilities.

Anna listed what she was grateful for.

She had a husband and both her sons and a fine wee house near the harbour.

Her husband still owned his boat and her sons were healthy and strong.

On the other hand, it would take a while for the fishing industry to get back to normal and she could see that her husband’s heart was no longer in it.

“It spoiled it for me,” Ian had said to her.

“It was dangerous, far beyond fishing, and there was no joy in it.

“There wasnae the pleasure of coming home like it used to be, coming into harbour with our load of fish.

“I mind, before the war, coming near; seeing the folk waiting and waving, the welcome it was.

“They were fine lads in the Navy but they didnae look at the sea the same as us.”

Anna waited for the men to come home.

They had wandered off, one by one, little talk among them, to have a think and meet the other men.

To blether about nothing at all, avoid decisions.

Ian was the first home. “It’s you, is it?” Anna said to him. He was looking weary.

“Sit you down and listen to what I’ve got to say.”

He looked at her and managed a smile.

“You’ve an idea, then, lass?”

“I think you should sell your boat, that’s number one.

“And I think you could start selling the fish around and about.”

Ian looked doubtful and shook his head.

“What for? There’s no’ much fish to sell.”

“Just you listen to me. It’s high time for me to have a say in what you men do.

“We women have learned no’ just to sit at home waiting for you men to decide what to do.

“You sell that boat to a youngster, ready to work. There will be good catches now.

“There’s more fish than ever there was in the sea, or so I’ve heard.

“They’re there waiting to be caught. You’ll no’ have a problem selling your boat.

“You and George have both had a scunner using the boat and Tam is ready to meet people – people who are not soldiers, people who just get on with their ordinary lives.”

Ian laughed shortly.

“And me, George and Tam? What will we do for the rest of our lives?”

“You’ll go to the fish markets and buy what you can and our sons can sell them round about.

“Folk havenae had much fresh fish for a long time. You put it to the boys.

“Don’t say as how it was me that thought it. Think on and speak to them.

“I’ll no’ have you all moaning and groaning. It’s no’ the way to do things.”

****

It took some time, but it happened and Anna was happy to let them think that it was all their idea.

She sat contentedly at the door for many an evening and only half listened as they planned.

It was enough to hear their voices, quiet and slow, sometimes laughing, sometimes silent.

Enough to listen to the words blend together like they understood one another.

Ian sold his boat and went round the fishmarkets, choosing fish to sell, feeling only occasional regret that he was not the one who had caught them.

There was enough money from the sale of the boat for George and Tam both to get an old van.

They had fun with the vans.

They cleaned them and painted them and then travelled around the county, Tam in the north and George in the south.

There was never any trouble getting customers.

George had painted a slogan on his van.

When you hear the toot, come on oot. The best fresh fish for sale.

The best fresh filleted fish – there’s no bones aboot it was on Tam’s.

They became friendly rivals, joking and teasing one another.

Anna was content. The only thing lacking in her life was children. Her boys were grown and she’d always loved watching the wee ones running around.

“I was thinking,” she said one night to Ian. “That girl Todd – you know, Alex Todd’s daughter. She’s a fine girl, is she no’?”

“Stop thinking, will you?” Ian gave her a hug.

“Enough thinking for now.”

The End.