Shirker

Mr. Adams was early for the office. He found his way through the wave of office girls on the block near Toronto's Queen and Yonge without any problem. Being a fair haired young man, it was not unusual for him to be challenged as a shirker. Anyone that looked like he should be in the army was questioned as to why he was in civilian clothes. Girls had been known to give them a small white feather. Today however, they seemed interested in other things.


Strange, he hadn’t heard from his man in Kingston. Usually Portland called him by ten in the evening, but last night he had heard nothing. He picked up the Toronto Star from the floor outside the door and flipped it open. “Unidentified Man” the sub headline said. Quickly turning to page 4, he read:

The body of a short stout white male was found beside the Grand Trunk line just east of Ganonoque last night. The body had no identification, and was clothed in a dark blue business suit. Pockets contained only a small sum of money Local police say it seemed he had fallen from the passing Montreal bound train. Anyone having information about this man or missing someone of this description is asked to contact the Ganonoque police or the Grand Trunk Railway Police “

Adams thought for minute. Portland wore a dark blue suit and would definitely be described as short and stout. No mention of any other pocket contents. Maybe the authorities were holding back details, in case someone inquired. He picked up the phone and asked to be put through to the British American Hotel in Kingston. After a few moments, Adams asked if a Mr Portland was in residence, the employee said, “No he’s not here now. He ran out last night and never returned. Do you know if he’s coming back? Where can I send the bill?’ Adams hung up and then asked to be connected to the Grand Trunk Railway terminal in Kingston. A short fat man had tried to purchase a ticket to Montreal on the 9:17 but it was leaving, so he got on the train without a ticket. Adams thought “What is going on here?” Dialing “0” he asked the operator to connect him with Walnut 254.

“Hello, is this Jimmy?”

“Yes”

“This is Adam. Do you have a dozen cream cakes?”

There was a moment’s pause and then the voice said “We are out of cream cakes, but I can supply strawberry tarts. Where would you like them delivered?”

Adams said “In front of the parliament buildings at Queen’s Park by the main entrance at 10:15. I will be wearing an orange marigold in the lapel of my brown suit. I will be carrying a brown paper package”

“Brown paper package, orange marigold, brown suit, in front of the parliament building” the voice repeated. The line was disconnected.

Sharp and the girl sat side by side in the terminal. She was very quiet. Sharp looked over at her. Her eyes moved back and forth over the passing crowd. She seemed to be checking on passing people, but not as though she would recognize anyone she saw. Sharpe said “What now?”

He said “I guess you’d like me to accompany you, watch your back trail, run interference?”

She said “I can’t ask you to do that. Your wife will be worried, your CO will think you’ve gone AWL. You could get cashiered”

Sharpe looked at her as if that thought had never entered his mind before. She was right. He said “Let me worry about that. I can’t leave you out here alone and un protected. Old Richard Sharp would rise up from his grave with that terrible sword of his, and have my gizzard”

She smiled. “You come from a long line of fighting men, don’t you?”

“You might say that. My pappy went to South Africa with the Gordons and his father Patrick Sharpe fought at Inkerman. If it wasn’t for some good luck and fine nursing by a Scottish lass, I wouldn’t have been born”

“What about Patrick’s father?”

“Old Richard? He was a piece of metal. Born the son of a whore, signed on with the 95th Rifles and fought his way up through the ranks of Wellington’s army till he became a Colonel. Captured a French eagle, he did. Married a French lady and retired in Lancashire. My dad Patrick was named after his best friend. They were hell fire and brimstone, those two”.

“How did you end up in Canada?”

“Well, I wanted to make something of myself. As I said, father married a Scottish lass and they lived in Dundee. I came over and lived in Ottawa with my wife Jessie. Since I came from a family of soldiers, I joined the local militia. It’s where I feel most comfortable. When the present unpleasantness broke out, I went to a friend of mine who lived in Ottawa, a Col Bill Hughes, and asked him to keep me in mind if he ever he raised a battalion. A few weeks later I got a note from him, saying “Get down here” and I ended up in the 21st Battalion in Kingston.”

The comfortable muted Scottish accent was pleasant to listen to. She half turned to him and asked: “How did you meet Jessie?”

“Oh, she was working on the ship as a ladies maid when I came over. I met her in the passage way, carrying some laundry. As I reached her, the ship pitched and she and her pile of pantaloons, slips and chemise careened into me and we both fell to the floor in a mess of lingerie! I was too embarrassed to do anything but help her to her feet, but she smiled at me and put me at ease. That’s how it all started, in a pile of lingerie.”

She laughed and seemed to relax. “Do you have any children?”

“No.”

They sat for a long time without speaking. “How did you end up in the office in Kingston, with the war still on?”

“I really don’t want to talk about it”, he said “My health hasn’t been good. There are more ways to wound a man than blow a hole through his hand”

She saw then, for the first time, a star shaped scar on the back of his right hand, and looking into his eyes, saw unnamed horror written there. He turned and looked away. She shuddered and said “Thanks for helping me. You are doing me and the country a great service. More than you know”

“You can’t tell me anything about it?

“No”

“Well, orders is orders” Sharpe chirped. He stood up and said “Let’s go find some tickets”. She picked her bag and followed him to the ticket counter.

A Sharp Response

The short fat man sat in the lobby of the British American watching the front door. His eyes never waivered and he never left the chair. He’d been there since three o’clock. She hadn’t returned. When she left, no suitcase, just a small bag, she looked like she was off for an afternoon’s shopping. It was now past supper and getting into the evening. He began to wonder.


His stomach rumbled. Labouring out of the chair, he headed for the grill. She must be out for supper. She would have to come back on her own. Perhaps steak and kidney pie and some 12 Star.

Finishing his meal, the fat man went to the concierge and asked if room 230’s occupant had picked up her key.

“No,” the lad tending the desk said, I haven’t seen her all evening… in fact I think she checked out”

Thinking a moment he said to the lad “Is there a train due to leave here soon?”

“There’s the 9:17 Grand Trunk to Montreal in about 20 minutes.”

The fat man rushed out the front door and along to the only taxi on the street. He jumped in and the taxi sped away in a cloud of dust. Arriving at the station, the fat man saw the train still standing. Paying the driver, he hurried to the wicket and asked if a young woman had just purchased a ticket. Informed that a lady in a checked coat had purchased two tickets to Montreal, the fat man threw some bills on the counter and said, “I’ll have the same”.

“Sorry sir, but the train is already boarded and ready to leave.”

The fat man scooped up the bills, ran out the door, across the platform and up the steps into the nearest passenger car. He’d buy his ticket on the way.

Chapter Three

A Sharp Response

Sharp sat looking out into the night. The lights of the lamps in the farm houses, played by the window. He saw the sign on the station at Ganonoque and then closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

A gasp from the girl caused them to open. Her face was bloodless and her mouth had dropped open. She was gazing over his shoulder and when Sharp turned to see what she was looking at, a short fat man careened down the aisle between the seats. As he reached their seats, he said “Miss, you had better come with me” She clutched her bag to her stomach and before she could say anything, Sharp realized that this was who she feared. The short fat man reached past Sharp and as he did so Sharp took the Mauser from it’s place and jammed it against the man’s side.

“You’d better sit down”, he said. He grabbed him by the coat tail, and pulled him into the aisle seat. “Now, what is going on here”, he growled.

The man burst from the seat , ran to the rear of the car, and out the door. Sharpe leapt after him. When Sharp caught up to him he was struggling with the door to the outside of the train,. As it swung open, the man grabbed for the hand hold on the outside. Sharp slammed the butt of the Mauser against the man’s fingers and watched as he screamed his way toward the embankment 20 feet below. The body bounced as it hit a telegraph pole. The train sped on. He swung the door closed.

He told her what had happened, and said “I don’t think they will bother you anymore”

She looked at him. “You really don’t know do you? He is probably supposed to report at regular intervals. When he doesn’t, they will start looking for him. When they don’t find him they will trace him and that will only lead them to us.”

She bit her lower lip.

Sharp reached over and placed his hand over hers. “It will be alright”, he said, “I promise.”

The train reached Montreal at 9:00 AM the next morning. The Grand Trunk station that used to welcome passengers to Montreal had burned and was now just an empty hole. Speculation was that a saboteur had fired it, but that had never been proved. Sharp was encouraged to see them starting to rebuild, even in the midst of a war.

They glided into the temporary wooden structure. Clouds of steam filled the barn and the mechanical sounds of the brakes, the bells and whistles wakened the sleeping girl. He walked her through the station. Montréal’s citizens had long been at work and the streets were fairly empty as they reached the restaurant. Eggs, bacon, home fries and coffee, soon brought their spirits back.

After a quick visit to the restrooms to clean up, both Sharp and the girl felt ready to tackle the next part of the journey. They walked back into the temporary station and looked for a place to sit and discuss what to do next.

Across the station, a returning Sgt Haggerty of the 21st Btn was waiting in line for train tickets to Kingston. As he saw a nice looking couple walking along the west side of the hall, he muttered to himself, “That feller is the spitting image of old Sharpey”. His place in line changed and he had to move up. When he looked again, they were gone.

“Strange” he thought, “I don’t think that’s the girl I met in Kingston. Bloody officers”

Chapter Two -

Grand Trunk Railway Station Kingston Ontario

To whom it may concern

He saw her walking along the road even before she spotted him. She was moving along quickly in a black and white checked coat, her shoulders hunched forward, looking from side to side and occasionally looking back the way she’d come.

He had been sitting at his desk in the Casualty office in The Armouries. The door swung open and she entered.

Life for a returned injured officer in Kingston was anything but interesting. He had followed Hughes to England and trained near Hythe in Kent. His men had matured as they chaffed to get “over seas” and into France. He remembered the trip the battalion took, tossing about in the St Seiriol and the long march to Boulogne to their first billet. That was the easy part.

Sharp had seen fighting, seen men blown to pieces and, eventually suffered his own wounding. More than that however had been the great weight of guilt that followed sending men over the top and watching them shredded by shrapnel, gassed and shell shocked into madness. Obtaining permission to recuperate at home, he paid for his own way back to Kingston in 1917. He was appointed Casualty Officer of Military District Number Three in Nov 1917 with the rank of Major.

She hesitated, saw a sergeant at the desk, and walked quickly over to him.

“Sergeant”, she said, “I want to see the officer in charge” Sergeant Watkins looked over his shoulder toward Sharpe, who nodded.

“Right this way, Madam”, said Watkins and limped ahead of her to Sharpe’s door.

She closed the door and said “You are going to think this is absolutely crazy”. She again checked to see they could not be overheard. “I think I’m being followed and I saw The Armouries and ….”

Reddish hair was wound in a knot at the nape of her neck. Her face, with its fair, slightly translucent skin, was framed by a wide brimmed summer straw. Dressed neatly, but not expensively, in clothing that obviously had come from Eaton’s catalogue, she presented a most charming picture. Looking Sharp intently in the face, she said “Can you help me? Will you help me?”

Sharp duties involved routing casualties to hospitals in Canada as they returned to the Dominion and helping them apply for pensions and benefits. He told her this but something about the way she spoke kept him from quickly dismissing her. Sharp had dealt with all sorts of men in his years with the 59th and 21st . This needed more than a simple refusal.

“Miss”, he said, “You are going to have to tell me more. I can’t be of any use to you if you can’t tell me why you need my help”

She paused for a minute, examining his face and then reached into her handbag and produced a letter in a brown paper envelope. He slipped the letter out of the envelope, adjusted his pinz nez and read the following:

To whom it may concern:


The bearer of this letter is to be afforded all assistance, without question as the bearer is a special constable of The Dominion Police..

The letter was signed R. Borden, Prime Minister The Dominion of Canada.

Sharp had been a civil servant in Ottawa before the war. He knew the Prime Minister’s signature.

“Do you have something else?”

She reached into her bag and withdrew a pocket novel. Peeling paper on the inside of the cover back ,she extracted a thin metal card. She handed it to Sharp who examined it.

“Can you assist me?, she asked, again. “Will you help me?

I must get out of Kingston as quickly as possible. They are watching me.”



As she drew nearer, Sharp saw her there was no suit case, nothing but a small bag. She said “Did everything go as planned?”

Sharp exhaled and said, “Jesse had guests. I told her I was going to The Armouries to the Officers Mess. I took the money from petty cash as you instructed. With what you have, we should be OK. I think the bundle of clothes I left at the pond will slow them down for a few days, so we should get clear of Canada, before they realize I’m not in the river. What Jesse will do, I really hate to imagine. She’s pretty springy though. I’ve not been good to live with since I got back from overseas, headaches, liver problems.” He stopped and sighed again.

“How did you manage the clothes?”

“I took them out the back door with me when I left.”

She looked into his face and said “I think we should be alright then, for a few days before they figure it out”

“Well, we have about half an hour to get to the station, so I suggest we get started”

Sharp reached to take the carpet bag from her, but she swung it away from him, but then said pleasantly, “I can manage, thanks”

He looked at her and then said “By the way, I’ve brought this with me.” He held open his coat and she could see the butt of a small 7.65 mm Mauser pistol under his arm.

Her eyes sprang wide and she exclaimed “Where did you get that?

“Off a dead Bosch”

“This is terrible. Someone could be hurt or killed? I didn’t want that.”

“The way you were acting I thought…”

“Well, we can’t leave it here for a child to find.” She stalked away. Sharp meekly followed.

They plodded along the tracks, stepping unevenly on every second tie. Sharp saw the water tower and then the freight sheds and station.

She turned and said “You would be recognized at the station, wouldn’t you?”

“Maybe” Sharp said.

“You better let me buy the tickets and then you can just get on the train and find me”

Sharp sat near the water tower to the west of the station and waited. He saw people assembling to catch the train, mostly business men and government officials headed for Montreal and Ottawa. He packed his pipe with tobacco and drew in the fragrant smoke.

If they were caught by authorities, there was always the letter to justify their actions. He grinned. He was beginning to feel useful again.

He thought about his great grand father Richard, who had come up through the ranks of Wellington’s army to become a Colonel, he thought of Richard’s son, Patrick who served the Queen in the Crimea. There had been a lot of Sharps in service to the Crown. His side wasn’t hurting anymore. Maybe this was to be his chance.

The train was on time. He saw her enter the third car from the rear and waited until the station master turned away to signal the engineer. Sharp ran the short distance to the train and sprang up the steps on the end of the last car. The locomotive gave two short blasts of its whistle and eased away. He was committed.

The Sharp Affair

Chapter One – Naked in the Ooze

H.E.s  crashed in some demonic, discorded symphony. His nose filled with chlorine, cordite and corruption. Terror rose in his gorge. He gasped, inhaled water and burst coughing through the surface of the water.
Sharp floated on his back, the warm water of the Cataraqui, soothing the skin. The pressure on his body, relieved the arching bursts of pain from his sides as his kidneys protested his existence. He knew they thought it was the alcohol. He could only think that his body, never really robust, had been attacked when he was gassed and buried by the H.E.s explosion. The medical board admitted that intense physical trauma could shut down and damage kidney and liver. Probably didn’t matter how. What mattered now was the time he had left.

He swam to the river side. Reeds and other vegetation edged the bank. He waded through the soup in which they grew, and walked the short distance to where his uniform was neatly folded in a pile. The warm August evening air played against his body and he sighed with the wholesome pleasure of it all. Reaching his uniform and the small bag beside it, he picked up the forage cap that sat on top. He polished an imaginary fleck of dust off the silver 21 on the badge and placed it carefully on top of the uniform. Drying on a small towel, he folded it and placed it beside the uniform on the grass. Opening the bag, he quickly put on his underwear, a white shirt with a celluloid collar, tied the slim tie and put on the pants. Before slipping on the jacket, he tucked the Mauser into a holster under his left arm, put on a white Havana Panama. Picking up the bag, he started to walk toward the Grand Trunk station.