Katie's War Read Online Free Page A

Barney or to her. Then he turned the trap towards the gate and stood back.
    â€˜Thank you,’ called Father as they passed. ‘Hand in that rifle of yours and we’ll teach you how to make slates!’
    â€˜Soon now,’ replied the lad. Then to Katie, ‘No reckless driving!’
    There were people and carts and a couple of motor cars in the station yard and Katie had to concentrate. But she managed one glance back as she left the yard. He was still there. He raised a hand. Katie wanted to wave back but her hands were full. Then they were in the street being carried along by the flow of traffic.
    As they left the town behind them she kept thinking of all the bright, clever things she could have said to the soldier instead of being tongue-tied like a schoolgirl. Then she realised she didn’t even know his name! She’d never see him again. How had the beautiful day, which had promised so much, gone wrong? Suddenly she was in a foul temper.
    With the two men in the back, the front of the trap was raised like the prow of a ship, and Barney had no weight on him at all. Katie wanted to stand up, like the English queen she had seen in a magazine, driving her chariot to war. Out of the corner of her eye she could see the little Welsh boy. Oh Mother of God! – a summer with those boots! They were clear of the town now. She slapped Barney with the reins, half stood up, collided with the boy’s knees and sat down with a jolt. Barney broke into a canter.
    â€˜Steady now, Katie,’ said her father. She gripped the reins tightly. In the picture, the queen’s chariot had had scythes on the wheels. She drove as close as she could to the edge of the road, imagining mowing the dandelions down as if they were her enemies.
    By the time the road crossed the Newtown bridge and Barney slowed for the rise through the village, the heat of her anger had passed. She thought she ought to try to be civil. Keeping her eyes away from his boots, she glanced across at the boy. ‘Tell me about your quarry. Do you work in it?’
    â€˜No, no – still at school I am. Just in the holidays. Odd jobs, like,’ again that lilting accent.
    The men had stopped talking. ‘He splits a very nice slate, does Dafydd,’ the boy’s father stated.
    Dafydd blushed. ‘Father’s the foreman – see – next to the manager. Met your Dad in the war. Always talking about working with the Irish in the war he is. You see, nobody thought much of the Welsh miners, digging under the German trenches to blow them up. Treated the Welsh like dirt. But the Irish didn’t, they were all right. The English didn’t like the Irish any more than the Welsh, see. “Two dogs with a bad name,” Dad says.’
    â€˜But the Irish were fighting with England,’ said Katie indignantly. ‘Dad was a volunteer, “Fighting for the freedom of small nations”. Little countries like Belgium!’
    â€˜Perhaps it’s just because we’re both different from the English. Different languages too.’
    â€˜Why? What do you speak at home?’ asked Katie, surprised.
    â€˜Welsh, nothing but Welsh, except in school and with the quarry manager. I like speaking English though.’
    â€˜Our teachers are off to school themselves next week to learn Irish. In a few years we’ll all be speaking Irish too.’
    â€˜I never spoke a word of English before I was six,’ said Dafydd. ‘That’s why Dad wanted me to come. Brush it up, that and …’ He looked up the hill then as something caught his attention and called, ‘Hey, Dad, look at the slate tips. Doesn’t that make you feel at home?’ pointing to the tips ofwaste slate now just visible from the road.
    â€˜Ask him in Welsh,’ Katie challenged.
    â€˜More than my life’s worth.’
    They clopped on steadily for a while. Katie was listening to the talk of the men in the back. The news