Innocent on the run Part 2.

Brian and Ricky walked home through the town to the East side. ‘Another plastic cup for the mantlepiece,’ Ricky said, eyeing his prize. Brian laughed, ‘Yea, but think about it, one day it could be a gold cup or even a Lonsdale belt.’ Ricky’s turn to laugh, ‘Maybe one day we’ll win a cup big enough to drink a pint out of.’ ‘You could keep it behind the bar in the King Billy,’ Brian chuckled. ‘If the landlord gets changed,’ he added. ‘This one’s a miserable so and so.’ ‘I know,’ Ricky agreed. ‘ Did you hear him ask me if I was eighteen last Saturday? He nearly didn’t serve us.’ ‘We could try the Royal this week.’ ‘No fear. That’s too near home. My old man goes in there.’ They stood on the corner of Brian’s street. ‘I’m fed up with this town,’ Brian said. ‘Wish someone would give us a chance to get away to sea.’ He kicked a stone into the gutter. ‘Let’s try the docks again tomorrow,’ Ricky suggested. ‘Okay. I know a few more ships came into port yesterday. We may be lucky this time.’ ‘Okay, see you in the morning. I’ll be around about eleven.’ Brian turned to walk up his street. ’See you, Rick.’ Ricky walked up the hill towards his home, wondering if the next day would be the one where they got a ship together. Their burning ambition was to go to sea and for over a year they had trailed around the docks, boarding every new arrival, asking the same question of anyone in authority, ‘ Do you need a deck boy or galley boy, please?’ They had always been refused but they never gave up. They both knew that there were three methods of getting away to sea in the nineteen fifties. You either went to Nautical College where your parents paid the fees for your apprenticeship, you went to a Seaman’s training school or you knew someone who could get you a job on a ship by recommending you to the captain. Nautical College was out of the question for the two boys as their families were large and everyone had to earn a living to make ends meet. Ricky's dad was a fireman in the local fire brigade and his Mum was a part time cook at the fire station. His dad's wage was just enough to pay the rent on their tiny house, and pay for the essentials like groceries, coal and gas bills. There was no electricity in the house and only gas lighting in the living room and kitchen. When going to bed they used candles to light the way. The only entertainment, apart from amusing themselves by reading or playing cards and games, was the Radio Relay, which was a radio signal piped in to the houses by the local Radiocommunications Company. They paid a rental for the receiver and could switch in either of two programmes. Three months training in Liverpool at the Seaman’s training school was a non- starter for the same reason, and as they knew no one with influence, they trailed around the docks, hoping that a Captain would one day give them a chance. Some of their friends had done it that way in the past. Ricky had seen Merchant Seamen pay off vessels in the town and splash their bundles of money around, buying new suits and shoes, treating their families to luxuries and generally having a good time. He’d listened to their stories of visiting exotic ports; meeting beautiful dusky maidens and he’d been green with envy. He wanted the same for himself and couldn’t wait for the new life of excitement, money and adventure to start. If it meant trailing around the docks every day, enquiring on every vessel regardless of nationality and flag, then that was what he would do. As Ricky approached school leaving age, his parents tried to get him into an apprenticeship. They made sure that he applied to the local council and to the factories in the area, as well as the Dock's Board. He was interested in carpentry and had made some useful items from wood in the woodwork class at school, but there were too many boys chasing the same apprenticeships and Ricky was unlucky. He also tried for entry into the building school in Cardiff, and although he passed the entrance exam, they offered places to the Cardiff boys first, so he was unlucky again. Some of Ricky's mates got apprenticed to bricklayers, some to roofers, and some to painters. A lot went on to the railway as cleaners, which eventually led to them becoming firemen, and then drivers. Ricky's elder brother had started as a cleaner but was now a fireman. A few of the boys who left school that year had managed to get apprenticeships as electricians, but they were all from the grammar school. The Secondary Modern school, as it was called now, provided a good, solid, but basic education, which was adequate for most employers in the town. The companies associated with the docks took on apprentices in the engineering and electrical trades. The Docks board itself took on Boilermakers, Pipefitters, Sheet Metalworkers, Laggers, Shipwrights and Riveters. Riveting ships sides was a dangerous and very dirty job. The riveter would heat up the rivets to red heat, pick one up in his tongs and throw it to the apprentice, who would catch it in a bucket, before fishing it out with his tongs and shoving it in the hole in the steel plate on the ship's side. Other riveters would then apply the hammers to flatten out the rivet. Ricky didn't fancy that job at all. He'd heard stories of boys being burnt, when they missed catching the red hot rivet in the bucket, and it had landed on them. Copyright 2005 by Deric Barry