In the sea there were no markers for the dead. No place in the deep to mourn, no place to leave flowers. Just degrees of latitude and longitude on a chart.
Mrs. Graham nodded toward the rectory. “We have a new rector now. And a new doctor. Times are changing. But then nothing stays the same forever, does it? Even one’s children grow up and go off to die.”
“You’re worried for Jonathan,” I said.
“Dr. Philips tells me the bandages will be off in another fortnight. After that, it will be a matter of days before his orders come.” I could hear the pain in her voice and for once was thankful that my own mother had not had a son.
“They’re in desperate need of men,” I said.
It was not what she wanted to hear.
She gave me a sharp glance and didn’t answer. We walked on down the street, where brick houses lined the road. One of them, set back a little, was covered in what would be honeysuckle and roses in summer. Their bare branches arched across the front of the house, trembling in the wind.
Mrs. Graham caught the direction of my interest and said, “That’s the doctor’s surgery. And just down there is the house that Arthur would have had, if he’d lived. It’s part of our property, going to the eldest son on his marriage. There’s a caretaker now, one of my school friends who fled London at the start of the war. She was that certain the Kaiser would sail up the Thames before she could pack her boxes.”
It was a handsome house, with a front garden set off by a low wall and a cat curled on the doorstep, waiting to be let in. I smiled without realizing it, and she said, “Yes, the cat goes with the house. It or its ancestors have always lived there. Arthur was fond of cats, did you know?”
But he hadn’t said anything to me about cats or dogs. I would have replied, if anyone had asked me, that we’d spoken of everything under the sun. I realized now that “everything” hadn’t included his childhood or his family. How much had I told him about the Colonel? I couldn’t remember… We’d lived in the present. It turned out to be all there was, though he’d wanted a future.
At the next corner, where a row of shops began, we paused. “Did you know this was once a famous smuggling area? Goods were brought up from the coast and hidden wherever the Hawkhurst Gang believed they were safe. There’s a hotel now where the inn stood-it provided the horses and wagons for the smuggled goods, and the story has come down that an underground passage ran between The Rose and Thorn and the church. We couldn’t find Arthur and his brothers one afternoon-he must have been twelve or thirteen at the time. We finally discovered them in the church, searching for the secret door to the tunnel. I had to explain to them that nearly every village with a smuggling past has such stories of underground passages. They were sorely disappointed.”
I smiled as we turned back the way we’d come. “It was probably a story the smugglers themselves invented to keep Customs officials busy searching in the wrong places.”
A little silence fell. I could sense that Mrs. Graham was on the point of asking me about what I’d told Jonathan, and I was bracing myself to meet her pleas. I was grateful when a young man came out of one of the other houses we’d just passed and called a greeting to her, heavy with relief.
“Just the person I was after. Could I borrow your Susan, Mrs. Graham? I’ve got an emergency on my hands, and Betsy is with Mrs. Booth, awaiting the baby.” He caught up with us, nearly out of breath and flushed with worry.
“Certainly not,” Mrs. Graham answered him. “We have a guest at present, and Susan is indispensable.” She turned to me, her face stiff with disapproval. “Miss Crawford, this rude young man is Dr. Philips.”
“My pleasure, Miss Crawford. And my apologies. But I’m shorthanded, and there’s little time for polite exchanges-”
I interrupted him. “I’m a trained nurse,” I said. “Can I help in any way?”
The doctor stopped short. “Are you indeed? Oh, thank God. Will you come with me?” He hesitated. “You aren’t put off by swearing, are you?”
“Not at all.”
“Then I must take her, Mrs. Graham, and return her to you later in the day. Forgive me, but it’s urgent.”
Mrs. Graham wanted no part of this arrangement. She said, “Dr. Philips. Miss Crawford will not accompany you. You may have Susan-under protest-but you must make certain she’s back in time to serve our luncheon.”
He glanced at me and then said, “Miss Crawford volunteered, I believe. I’ll have her back to you, no harm done, as soon as possible. Come along, there’s no time to waste.”
“Dr. Philips-” Mrs. Graham was indignant.
“It’s quite all right, Mrs. Graham. I have a duty to help. Forgive me, but I must go.” I could see the anger in her eyes. I’d disappointed her in some way, but there was nothing I could do about it now. “Dr. Philips?”
He touched his nonexistent hat to her, then took my arm and led me away, his strides twice the length of mine.
“I expect I’ve caused you no little trouble, Miss Crawford. But I’m rather desperate, and my patient comes first. I’ll do my best to smooth matters over for you.”
He was a tall man, prematurely graying, with dark eyes. A strong odor of pipe tobacco swirled in his wake as I tried to keep pace with him. We’d reached the house he’d just come from and were hurrying up the walk. “What’s the matter with your patient?”
As I spoke I looked back. Mrs. Graham was standing where we’d left her, staring after us. I turned away and followed Dr. Philips through the door of the house.
Dr. Philips was saying, “This is a man who suffers from shell shock. You don’t have any preconceived notions about that, do you? Cowardice, and all that? No? That’s good. He terrifies his poor wife, but there’s nothing she can do when he has one of his spells. I’ll give him an injection and he’ll calm down. But you’ll be there to see to it that he does himself no harm meanwhile.”
I had had some experience with shell shock. None of it the sort of thing I wanted to walk into the middle of, not knowing the circumstances.
“Who is in the house with this man-besides his wife?” I asked.
“No one at the moment, worst luck. It’s the housemaid’s day off, and she’s gone to Cranbrook to visit her sister.” We stepped into the cold entry, went through the inner doors, and turned down a passage on the left side of the stairs.
A harried young woman stepped out of the nearest room. She had been crying. She said, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t know what else to do-I left him there, I couldn’t watch him any longer.”
“You did just the right thing, Mrs. Booker. Now run along to your mother’s house and let her take care of you. Miss Crawford and I will see to Ted.”
He was walking on as he spoke, opening the last door along the passage, pushing it wide for me to enter. It was a small back parlor where a man sat in a chair in front of the windows, a shotgun across his knees.
I stopped, surprised. I hadn’t expected to find him armed. Small wonder the man’s wife had been terrified.
“Come along, Ted,” Philips said in a strong voice. “You aren’t going to kill yourself here, in the house. Certainly not in front of this young woman. You don’t want to upset her, do you? Let me take the gun and give you something for the pain.”
From across the room Ted Booker stared at him, unaware who the doctor was. I could see the blankness in his eyes. Ignoring us, he went on talking to invisible companions, men
He was arguing, vehement and insistent and profane. It appeared that a sniper had already killed three of his men, and he was on the field telephone, asking someone to do something about it.
“I can give you his range, damn it.” His voice was ragged, close to the breaking point. “We can’t hold out much longer. I tell you, the Hun’s got us in his sights-”
He ducked then, swearing, and shouted, “Someone stop that bastard!
I said quietly to Dr. Philips, “Who is Harry?”
“His brother.”
Dear God, no wonder this poor soul was distraught!
The doctor tried again, but I could see he wasn’t getting anywhere asking the man to buck up and put the past
