Wednesday 11th – Ivan and Marta Spring/Summer 1941 (another token effort - not been too well)

Depending on the cargoes that he’s been hauling recently, the bargee’s pockets will harbour coaldust/peppercorns/peanuts, and he’ll smell carbony/spicy/nutty – or a combination of all of these disparate cargoes. The bargee represents a world that’s inaccessible to people like Ivan and his family: a world where dirty people crowd into bars and dirty eating houses, where people shout and fight in the street, and where there’s danger, unpredictability and irresponsibility. Michael is closer to this world, living as he does on the fringes of the [ghetto area], and it shows in his cunning and street smartness, in his inventive way with words, in his knowing, pitying looks whenever Ivan hazards an opinion about ‘grown up’ matters. The men who work the canals are all threateningly strong and confident and clever, with strong fingers and eyes that can see past what you’re saying and straight into what you’re thinking. Whenever they wink and make their jokes to the boys as they pass through the locks, Ivan always gets the sense that Michael is understanding much more of what the men are saying; in contrast, this banter always makes Ivan feel humiliated and stupid. He’s somehow afraid that one of the men will grab his scrawny arm with their hard, strong hands and shake him – maybe even slap him around the face – and there won’t be anything he can do about it: if he tells papa about it, papa will assume that he deserved his punishment and give him another bash for his cheekiness.
Ivan opens his eyes. “Potatoes,” he says.
Michael says, “Coal. It’ll be coal. Three shillings. Or do you want to make it five?”
“Three is all right, thank you.”
They both look downriver.
The barge comes into view, unfurling smoke and covered in oil and greasy-looking baked-on muck. As soon as he sees the state the barge is in, Ivan knows that Michael is right. Coal.
Michael’s eyes are set in a little tight rictus of grinning wrinkles. Smug.
“So,” he says, “how many shillings is that now?”
“About a hundred,” says Ivan, downcast.
“No need to pay me straight away,” says Michael, like he always does.
The barge moves slowly towards them along the [‘single-lane’] stretch of the canal between the locks, labouring, as if it were climbing an incline. As it comes closer, Ivan can see that the bargee’s face is blackened with coal dust, just his white eyes and pink lips providing contrast. There’s something of Ivan’s golliwog in this appearance.
The barge is fully in the lock now. The bargee cuts the power and, seeing the boys, nods to them and gestures towards the lock gates, just as they hoped he would. They run down the slope and combine their strength to push the open gates closed before running to the other pair of gates and opening the sluices. The bargee grins at them and says something, but the sound is lost in the tumble and froth of the sluicing water. He waves them over to him, and they approach, respectfully.