Don't Know Where, Don't Know When (The Snipesville Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  Don’t Know Where, Don’t Know When

  By

  Annette Laing

  Confusion Press

  Statesboro, Georgia

  For My Grandmother, May Simpson, and All the British Ladies of Two World Wars

  Who Enlivened My Childhood, With Much Love.

  Copyright © 2007 by Annette Laing.

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Confusion Press.

  CONFUSION, CONFUSION PRESS and associated logo are trademarks of Confusion Press.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Confusion Press, P.O. Box 2523, Statesboro, GA 30459

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2007901732

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  Cover design: Deborah Harvey

  Inside design: Kelley Callaway

  Front cover:

  WVS member distributing pies to Kentish hop pickers.

  By kind permission WRVS.

  Back cover:

  Hoylake WVS, War Weapons Week Parade. 7th March 1942.

  By kind permission WRVS.

  Children examining ration books and identity cards. IWM D779.

  By kind permission Trustees of the Imperial War Museum.

  Author website: www.AnnetteLaing.com

  Contents

  Foreword by Dr. K.G.D. Harrower, Snipesville State College

  Prologue

  ONE

  Snipesville • 1

  TWO

  The Professor • 20

  THREE

  Changes • 28

  FOUR

  Evacuation • 35

  FIVE

  Lost • 40

  SIX

  Leaving • 48

  SEVEN

  Splitting Time • 61

  EIGHT

  Meetings and Messages • 84

  NINE

  Messages and Meetings • 105

  TEN

  Mysteries and Messages • 129

  ELEVEN

  Messages and Mysteries • 151

  TWELVE

  Arrivals and Departures • 160

  THIRTEEN

  Reunions and Revelations • 182

  FOURTEEN

  Returns • 201

  FIFTEEN

  Time… and Time Again • 209

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Foreward

  by Dr. K.D.G. Harrower, Snipesville State College

  Dear Reader:

  Don’t read this if you don’t want to. The last thing I want to do is to bore you silly, especially because I’m not the author of this fine book. I am just the person writing the introduction, or Foreword. So if you feel your eyelids starting to droop, or if drool is beginning to trickle from the corner of your mouth, flip to the real start of the story, which you’ll find on page 1. Honestly, I don’t mind.

  If you have foolishly decided to read this introduction, I promise I will try not to sound like a history teacher who is trying out for the next United States Olympic Boring Team.

  There two very important things I must tell you:

  • I am an historian.

  • This is not a history book.

  But because much of this book takes place in Britain during World War I and World War II, the author believes you will find it helpful if I tell you a little bit about the history. I hope she’s right. I shall try to keep it short and silly, rather like the author herself. That’s a joke, by the way. She is an old friend, so I’m sure she won’t mind.

  I should first explain that Britain is one country made up of three smaller countries: England, Scotland, and Wales. It’s not hard to understand if you think about it. It’s just like how the United States of America is composed of fifty states. See? Now you can impress your parents by explaining this to them.

  • World War I started in 1914. Nobody was quite sure why. It ended in 1918 because everyone was fed up of it. The First World War was a disaster. Millions of young men were killed or injured for no good reason. But in 1915, a year that we will visit in this book, the terrible truth was only beginning to dawn on most people. Soldiers, of course, were the first to know how badly things were going on the battlefield.

  • World War II (1939-45) was the sequel to World War I. But it was a very different kind of war. The Second World War began on September 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. Too many Germans had lost their minds in the 1930s and decided that Adolf Hitler was their ideal leader. Hitler was a nasty little man with a silly moustache, who spent a lot of his time and energy hating people he didn’t know, and thinking of ways to kill them. But I bet you already knew that.

  • By summer, 1940, Germany was winning World War II, and Britain was almost its only undefeated opponent. Britain’s leader, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, hinted to the United States that although the Americans had arrived late for the First World War, it would be very, very nice if they could show up promptly for this one. But Americans remembered what a waste of time and people World War One had been. And so, although American President Franklin D. Roosevelt wanted to help Britain, he was unable to convince his people to send soldiers. Still, America sent weapons and food to the besieged Brits. Indeed, America sent lots of food, even if it was mostly dried eggs and Spam.

  • In fall, 1940, Germany was preparing to invade Britain. To pave the way for the invasion, Hitler launched a massive bombing attack on British cities, especially London. The bombs killed thousands, and destroyed much of that fine old city. The British nicknamed this attack the Blitz. Thousands of children were evacuated from the cities to escape the bombing, and were known as evacuees. Most evacuees were sent to live with strangers.

  • Britain unleashed a secret weapon during World War II. It wasn’t a bomb or a plane, but a civilian army of tough, brave, take-no-nonsense women. Prime Minister Churchill probably should have sent these women to deal with Hitler. Had he done so, the war might have ended much sooner.*

  Alright. That’s it for the history lesson. After all, this isn’t a history book, and I should know, because I am an historian.

  This is the story of Alex, Brandon, and Hannah, who are three twenty-first century American kids. They are much like any other kids of their age, perhaps including you, except for one thing: They are time travelers. They have lived through the history I have just described, and much more. To them, indeed, it is not history at all.

  You are about to read their first adventure, which took place long before they were born. I do hope you will enjoy reliving the journey with them, just as I enjoyed watching them live through it the first time.

  Sincerely,

  K.D.G. Harrower, Ph.D.

  Dr. K.D.G. Harrower

  Department of History

  Snipesville State College

  Snipesville, Georgia

  *These women were amazing. One of them actually did visit Hitler in Germany, three years before the war began. Dame Irene Ward was an enormous woman who wore enormous hats and carried enormous handbags. In 1931, she was one of the first women elected as a Member of Parliament, or M.P., in the House of Commons (sort of like the House of Representatives, but with more power and very bad manners.)

  In 1936, Dame Irene was among a group of British M.P.s attending a polite party with Htiler in Germany. Suddenly, as sometimes happens at adult parties, the room fell silent, and everyone clearly heard
her tell Hitler off: “What absolute bosh you are talking!” she said. She was probably the only person ever to scold this ruthless dictator, and live to tell about it. You see what I mean about those women…

  Prologue

  I am sorry to interrupt this book, but it’s me again, Professor Harrower, the person who wrote the Foreword you have skipped over. I just want to warn you that this story begins in different places, and at different times. I told the author that you might find it helpful to be introduced to the people, places, and times of this tale. So here they are. KDGH

  Balesworth, England: July 11, 1915

  The First World War was almost a year old, and would have more than three years still to go. Rain was falling yet again on the High Street in the sleepy English town of Balesworth, thirty-five miles and a world away from London. A balding Scotsman in his forties stood on the covered front porch of his large two-story brick row house, which was also where he practised his profession as a dentist. With him were his nephew, a small boy of only seven, and his handsome young son of twenty-one, who was dressed in the uniform of a second lieutenant of the British army.

  “Send me a postcard from France, Cousin James,” said the little boy eagerly.

  “With a bit of luck, Oliver,” the young man replied, laughing and roughing up the boy’s hair, “I’ll send you more than one.” He turned to his father. “Aren’t Mother and Peggy coming out to say goodbye?”

  Mr. Gordon looked uncomfortable. “War is difficult for women, James. You know that.”

  Nothing more on the subject was said.

  “All the best, then, James,” said his father, awkwardly shaking his hand, and trying not to look as anxious as he felt. “And keep your head down.”

  Balesworth, England: September 11, 1940

  It was a year since World War Two had begun, and now, Britain stood alone in the fight against Germany. Rain tapped on the windows, and a coal fire glowed brightly in the two-story cottage on a road on the very edge of Balesworth, a growing town north of London. On three sides of the house were open fields. A small boy with dark hair, wearing the short grey trousers, white shirt, and grey woolen vest of his school uniform, was lying on the floor. He was playing noisily with a paper airplane that he had just made, his half-drunk mug of cocoa sitting forgotten on the small table nearby.

  The tall, grey-haired woman sitting at the desk was busily writing with an ink pen in a small notebook with a marbled cardboard cover. A black Labrador lay sprawled at her feet, while a tiny red and white spaniel was taking advantage of her absence to curl up in the armchair by the fire.

  Finally, as she always did, Mrs. Devenish finished by writing out the date of the following day’s entry, September 12, 1940. She took off her reading glasses, put down her pen, replaced the diary in the desk drawer, then rubbed her eyes, and stifled a yawn.

  Noticing the empty bucket next to the fire, she said to the small boy, “Eric? Would you please go and fetch more coal? It’s almost time to listen to the wireless. The prime minister is to address the nation about the German bomb attacks on London.”

  “Sure fing, Mrs. D.,” he said, and scrambled to his feet.

  She looked askance at him, and said wearily, “Eric, the letters “T’ and “H” both appear in the word “thing” but, to my recollection, the letter “F” does not.”

  He smiled to himself as he picked up the bucket and left the room. He was used to her constantly correcting his London accent, and he really didn’t mind.

  Snipesville, Georgia: Today

  It was another hot day in the small, tumbledown town of Snipesville, Georgia, an hour inland from Savannah and the Atlantic Ocean. The temperature was already in the high eighties, and the humidity was even higher. It was only ten in the morning. Inside the small old whitewashed clapboard house, the air conditioning churned noisily. The screen door opened. A short-haired black boy, wearing a T-shirt and shorts, stepped outside, and grimaced as he felt the heat. Carrying a handful of change, Brandon walked down the street to the convenience store, and slotted the coins one after the other into the Coke machine outside the entrance. The soda can came clattering down, and he leaned down and collected it from the slot below.

  “You doin’ alright there, Brandon?” asked a kindly older man, a friend of his father’s, who stopped on his way into the store.

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Dixon. How ‘bout you?”

  “Jes’ fine, thank you.”

  It was the exact same conversation Brandon always had with Mr. Dixon, in fact, with most adults come to that, every single time they met. Short, sweet, and exactly the same.

  San Francisco, California: Today

  The girl with long brown hair was packing the last of her stuff into a box in the apartment in the Mission District. She threw in a teddy bear, and then began to clear the photos from the top of her dresser. There was one of her with her brother, Alex, at Disneyland. Another photo showed her with her dad, on a cable car in San Francisco. Yet another image captured a visit with her grandparents at a winery in Napa Valley. Finally, she picked up the last picture, and hesitated.

  Here was the photo of her mother at the Golden Gate Bridge, taken years before Hannah was born. Her mom was giving a crooked smile into the camera lens, and the teeth of a strong San Francisco Bay wind. Her chestnut brown hair was held down by a burgundy scarf so it wouldn’t fly away, and she was pulling her thick black wool coat around her, her hands in the pockets. She looked so young and so beautiful. Stifling a sob, Hannah thought how, now, she always would.

  “You okay?” It was Alex, who had appeared in the doorway.

  She wiped at the tear that had trickled down her nose. “I just can’t believe we’re actually leaving California. I looked up this place in Georgia on the web, and it looks soooo boring.”

  “Hey, c’mon Hannah, it’ll be an adventure! Anyway, you’re always saying how bored you are here, so what difference does it make where we are?”

  She scowled at him. “You can be so annoying, dork.”

  Balesworth, England: Today

  There is a library in Balesworth, a growing English city that is separated only by a few precious acres of farmland here and there from the growing sprawl of London. The library is in a building made of concrete, glass and steel. Once upon a time, after World War Two, this building style was called modern. Now, as it grows old and grey, it’s known simply as ugly.

  The young librarian stopped the cart, and picked up the small notebook with its bent corners and marbled cardboard cover. She placed it on the heavy oak table in front of the Professor. “That woman’s diary from World War Two you were asking about? We found it, finally,” she said.

  “Thanks very much for hunting it down,” said the Professor with a smile.

  “Well, I knew you’d be happy to have it before you fly back to America tomorrow. Here’s the volume for 1940. Just let me know if you want me to get any of it photocopied for you.” The Professor thanked her again, and she moved on to make more deliveries to other researchers in the room.

  The Professor opened the notebook, and began to read the neat handwritten entries. She often thought to herself that one of the great pleasures of being an historian was that she got to read other people’s letters and journals, without anybody thinking she was weird.

  Twenty minutes went by. The only sounds in the small archive were those of turning pages and clicking keyboards, as researchers tapped notes into their laptops. If any of the people present had looked up from their books, old documents, or computers, they would have seen the Professor suddenly sit up straight, exhale sharply, slump back in her seat, and rub her eyes. If they were good at lip-reading, they would have also seen her say silently to herself, “Oh, no, not again.”

  You cannot be an historian without traveling in time. But the Professor is different. Time travel is not something she can end simply by closing a book or filing away a manuscript. It is real.

  Chapter 1:

  Snipesville

  Han
nah Dias looked around at the packing boxes in her room, frowned, sighed, and tossed back her hair. It was all so totally unfair.

  She hated Snipesville from the moment the car crested the only hill in the whole of South Georgia, and she first clapped eyes on the town. It was all billboards, decrepit houses, mobile homes, and subdivisions. Oh, yes, and trees. Her brother Alex had talked constantly, all the way from Savannah Airport, about how many pine trees there were in Georgia. Yes, said Hannah, lots and lots. Big whoop.

  Before they left California, Dad, Hannah, and Alex had visited Grandma and Grandpa in Sacramento for a farewell dinner. The grandparents’ house was brick, with little fake turrets, like a castle, and an arch that created a small courtyard next to the front door. When she was little, Hannah had liked to pretend it was a cottage from a fairytale, like Little Red Riding Hood.