Read Online The Silent War by Victor Pemberton - Free Book Online

Pearl and Harry.
    The one fly in the ointment was Lennie Jackson.
    Doll and Joe Mooney hardly ever went shopping together. Joe hated trailing his wife with a bunch of kids in tow, and then having to stand outside Sainsbury’s whilst she gabbed with one of the assistants on the cheese counter. But this was a special occasion, for within the next few days their youngest, Josie, was having her third birthday. Luckily, they soon found a toy car for the birthday girl. It came from the Children’s Department in the North London Drapery Stores in Seven Sisters Road, although a bit on the expensive side at two shillings and sixpence. A toy car was an unusual choice, but Josie much preferred the presents her brothers got to the dolls and toy kitchen sets that were supposed to be so beloved by little girls.
    Sunday and her mum bumped into the Mooneys as the family were making their way along Hornsey Road on their way back to ‘the Buildings’. The Mooneys lived in the same block as the Collinses, but on the floor below. They had the reputation of being like rabbits because they had already bred four kids, and as good Catholics, chances were they had every intention of completing a football team.
    ‘Looks like it’s all over bar the shouting,’ bleated Doll Mooney, who, with all her hair pinned on top of her head, was only as tall as her husband. ‘Did you hear it on the eight o’clock news this morning? They reckon the invasion’s comin’ any minute.’
    Sunday could have screamed. She was sick to death of hearing about the invasion. Yes, she had heard it on the wireless that morning, and she couldn’t care less. In fact, she was far more interested in what the Radio Doctor had to say about gall bladders than whether and when the Allies were going to land in France.
    ‘I shall pray for them every night,’ sighed Madge anxiously. ‘When I think of what our boys went through at Dunkirk, it sends a chill up my spine.’
    Two of the Mooneys’ older kids started laughing and playing tag with each other. Sunday wanted to laugh with them, but even she thought it was hardly the moment to do so.
    ‘Cut it out you two!’ snarled Joe Mooney, in his rich Irish brogue. It was his only contribution to the idle pavement gossip, for he had a wandering eye for any bit of skirt that happened to pass within a hundred yards or so.
    ‘The fing I’m really worried about though are these secret weapons they keep talkin’ about.’ As Josie was beginning to grizzle, Dolly had to pick her up out of her pushchair and hold her in her arms. ‘They’re sayin’ if it’s true, this time ’Itler could blow up the ’ole of London.’
    ‘’Itler’s got no secret weapons,’ growled Joe. ‘It’s all bluff.’
    ‘I don’t know, Joe,’ said Madge. ‘The papers are full of it.’
    ‘Planes wivout pilots. That’s wot I read.’ Doll was doing her best to keep little Josie’s fingers from prodding her in the eye.
    ‘Planes without pilots! Come off it Doll!’ Joe pushed his flat cap to the back of his head, and retrieved a dog-end from behind his ear. ‘Next t’ing yer’ll be tellin’ me is that they’re fillin’ up bombs with horse shit!’
    ‘Joe!’ snapped Doll. ‘Don’t be so coarse!’
    This time Sunday did laugh. All in all, she liked the Mooneys; they were always good for a laugh, despite Doll’s doom-laden forecasts of death and destruction. However, despite her efforts to dismiss all thoughts of the war from her mind, Sunday was also concerned about the possibility of a renewed aerial bombardment by the
Luftwaffe
, this time from pilotless bomber planes. It was true what her mum had said. The newspapers were full of speculation about Hitler’s last-ditch stand, and how his new retaliatory secret weapon had been designed to turn the tide of the war in his favour. Sunday still had painful memories of those dark days during the Blitz, when life and death for everyone was balanced on a knife’s edge. She remembered how