Rag Dolls

Rag Dolls

There were whispered conversations about the flight plans.  The parents hurriedly put some of their belongings in packing cases. The question was,  what to take for the children. Emily and Celia‘s mother Frances, talked softly to Angel, Celia’s governess, about what to pack for the girls. “I think we have to take their rag dolls and I have an idea about how to doctor them up, (pas devant les enfants).  Angel can you help me there is not much time” Emily and her older sister Celia cried when they were told they could not take their life sized dolls, Veli Sah and Sailor Boy. Emily cried even more loudly  when she heard the parents say:  “ They will have to be content with that, there is no room for anything else.”  Rio Rita with her lovely black plaited hair, was to be left behind. The two girls were allowed to take their rag dolls, Dolly Love and Margot.

Unbeknown to the children their mother and Angel opened Dolly Love and Margot up and placed a Turkish gold coin into the insides of each doll. The mother was to keep a watchful eye on the two dolls throughout the journey that faced them.

It was on the 3^rd of September 1939 at 11.15 am Neville Chamberlain broadcast to the British nation that  Britain was at war with Germany. This was May 1941.

The women and children were flown out in small aircraft. Celia and Emily were not to see their father for more than a year and they never saw Angel again. “Good bye, Angel, good bye Daddy” and then they were waving from the window of the small plane where they were seated. Angel was as close to Emily as if she were a second mother and she cried again as she saw Angel running along the tarmac when the plane took off, to get a last glimpse of the girls.

Their life was changed.

From Kirkuk they flew to Jerusalem. Emma remembered being in a place where she did not belong.  From Jerusalem, they went to Port Said at the northern entrance of the Suez Canal.

They were herded, women and children, like sheep into a big shed. There was no food or water. Some of the children were crying. Evening came and still they waited. It was only at midnight that they were taken to the dockside and were put on a large cattle barge. The water lapped under her feet and her legs slipped between the planks. There were bombs dropping all around them. They could see the flames.

 The noise of the bombs, the crying of women and children and the sinister lapping of the water under her feet never left her.

They saw the shape of a ship looming in the darkness and scrambled up a gang plank. The mother, Celia and Emily were shown to their cabins.

The ship travelled in convoy with other ships and the names were erased from all documentation in order to keep the convoy secret.

The mother kept a constant vigil on the girls and their dolls. Emily cried for Rio Rita. She only had Margot.” Why Mummy, could I not keep Rio Rita? I loved her? Who is looking after her now?” The mother worried that Emily would throw Margot overboard, in one of her now frequent, tantrums.

One of the ships in a different convoy was torpedoed and went down with all lives.

The ship arrived at the dockside; the travellers disembarked. Some Durban families arranged for the evacuees to stay in their own homes and it was one of these families that took Emily, Celia and their mother in for the next few weeks. Then they were on their own.

Life was hard. The mother spoke to the man at the gold coin exchange and changed one of the gold coins for money. “Where did you get this coin? I have to be careful with receiving stuff like this.”

 “It is mine. We have come from the Middle East and we collected coins as a hobby.”

“It is not in pristine condition, so I can only give you the value of the coin, in relation to its weight in gold”

They lived in a small boarding house, near the Botanical Gardens on the Berea.

 The mother placed the girls in a kindergarten. She approached the head of the little school.

 “Do you think I could come and work at the school, I will be happy to be a  volunteer? I would like to be near my children. We do not know what has happened to their father and they feel very insecure and frightened at times. " Frances was employed by Mrs Jones,  as a voluntary assistant, to look after the smaller children.

Time passed and Emily grew to love her rag doll. Margot was the only familiar thing from her past. The doll’s face was wrapped around with a purple coloured pointed cap, like an elf’s hat. Her eyes and mouth were painted on and her legs were yellow striped corduroy with pointed feet at the end. The arms were purple cloth ending in soft pink hands.

Celia’s Dolly Love, was similar in type, made from a furry pink material and the head enclosed in a similar furry pointed shape.

“Let us play, Celia, you be the Mommy and I will be Lady Mazotti coming for tea and we will have a tea party.”

The second gold coin was removed from the inside of Dolly Love and the money helped the three evacuees to survive.

 They moved in to the house of Mrs Bardien, who was letting a room, in order to survive  the war. Mr Bardien had joined the South African Army and was somewhere in Egypt.

Mrs Bardien had a dog called Spotty, a very troublesome little dog who barked at the girls continuously, whenever they appeared, although they treated him with affection,  sometimes dressing him up in a handmade bonnet and shawl.

One Sunday morning, Emily left Margot lying on the lawn, as she ran inside to have a cup of cocoa. When she came back, there was Margot lying twisted and ragged on the grass. Spotty had sharpened his teeth on the doll. There was nothing left of the face and the pointed purple hat was almost gone.

Emily ran inside.

“ Mummy, Margot has been eaten, Spotty has eaten her.”

I had to go in for surgery of course. It was not just a matter of putting me to bed with a cold. I was afraid I would be for the trash can, but no, the mother  picked me up and looked for a few scraps of material to do some mending. She was quite skillful with a sewing needle which was fortunate for me!  As long as I had the gold coin in my stomach I knew I was safe. But it was long gone. There was small change from that and I did not fancy becoming a piece of rotting rubbish, mixed up with yesterdays sardine cans.

The scraps were found in Mrs Bardien’s scrap bag. The colour of the material was pink. Pink!  Moi! I was going to be in the pink!

The mother painted new eyes and mouth and even gave me some long eyelashes.  I was not only going to be in the pink but I was becoming  quite a siren.  Moi! The rag doll from Kirkuk, the doll that Emily lamented having along with her, instead of that horrid little Rio Rita! We were well rid of her! She was a spiteful little cat, wriggling her way into Emily’s affections with her black hair and rosebud mouth.

With my new clothes and eyelashes, I looked quite ravishing. Emily liked the new me and when she grew too old to play with me, taking me to fancy dress balls and that sort of thing, I was put in a strategic place in her room, visible to all.

The next thing I knew, Emily was in love. The recipient of her love was a young man with the astonishing name of  Archibald. There is no accounting for taste.  But then what is in a name ?  I would like to have been renamed Ryn but it didn’t happen.

When the bride was packing for the honeymoon, Archibald came to check her suitcase. Seeing me on the shelf , he gazed at me for a moment or two. I fluttered my eyelashes at him and it was a steal deal. He picked me up. “We have to take Margot along Emily. Can’t leave her behind”

I breathed a sigh of relief. A few years later Emily handed me with pride, to her four year old daughter and here I am going through the motions again, of just being a rag doll!