Fragile Wings

another without any real clue as to the direction she was walking. London was a city full of landmarks, almost impossible to be entirely lost in, but she did not know precisely where she was either. She would recognise a building or perhaps the name of one of the Underground stations she passed, then turn a corner and find herself somewhere entirely unfamiliar. Finally, she emerged into an open space she did recognise. It was Trafalgar Square. She recognised the fountains and Nelson on his tall column. She’d been a happy sightseer, still new in London, with Lilian by her side, the last time she’d been here. How much had changed. And yet the square had not at all. Nelson was still impassive. It was one of the things that fascinated about London, how it remained so unchanged by all of the stories that played out in its buildings and streets. So many people, so many stories, but always London with its familiar landmarks, its famous places. London was an entity larger and more timeless than its transitory population. Somehow this was a comfort. Whatever happened to her, Evelyn was only the smallest part of London, and London was just one city.

Emotionless now, more numb than angry, she trudged on. There was nowhere she could go. She could not return to the Graingers’ house. She doubted she could ever go there again. She dared not return to the Yellow Orchid, much as she thought Vernon would help her. It was possible Lilian was still there, or that she had rallied her friends amongst the patrons. She could try Jos’s flat again, but if Jos did not want to be found, even by her brother, what good would it do to turn up there now, especially with nowhere else to go? Such a need might only frighten Jos further. So she walked, waiting for an idea to strike.

Through Trafalgar Square she passed, on down Whitehall, where the business of government was conducted. She passed army buildings and government ministries; she passed the black gates of Downing Street and wondered briefly what Mr. Baldwin was doing at that moment. Then she saw, ahead of her in the middle of the wide road, something which drew her steps.

Rising from the grey road, carved in white Portland stone, stood the Cenotaph. The empty tomb memorial, unveiled in 1920 as the memorial to all the dead of the Great War. Ornate laurel wreaths decorated its angular flanks, the red, white, and blue of the Union Flag and various ensigns of the armed services hanging from their angled poles. In the diminishing winter light, it was bright and yet stately. Quiet, despite the bustle of the road all around it.

Evelyn waited for a car to pass, then crossed to the structure itself. Three shallow steps formed the base, on which were laid one or two poppy wreaths, as had become the custom of rememberance in recent years, blood red against the pale stone.

Reverence in her heart, Evelyn approached the memorial and laid a hand on the smooth, cold stone. It seemed as nothing at all compared to the many young, vibrant lives it represented. In fact, to memorialise those young men in hard, unforgiving stone felt almost tragic in itself. The Cenotaph, the empty tomb, was a thing of death. But those men had lived and would have continued living, had war not cruelly prevented it.

Caught in the emotion, Evelyn laid her cheek against the stone, closing her eyes. She thought of Edward, not dead but still lost to her. She thought of Frank Grainger, who had been so kind to her Eddie, wondered what impact his loss had really had on Lilian and James. She thought of the men they had known, the men who had died by their side, and those who had survived but carried the hell of the battlefield inside them. Her thoughts moved on to Jos and Vernon, their parents taken from them by explosions from the sky. To the men of West Coombe whose names were on a smaller memorial, near the harbour. She thought of the new friends she had found in London, wondered how the war had touched their lives. For it had touched all of their lives.

Perhaps, she thought, this memorial wasn’t simply for the dead soldiers. Yes, they deserved it and the country mourned them formally every November. But she remembered the pressure there had been for this permanent memorial in Whitehall, carved in eternal stone. It seemed clear to her now that it was not just for the soldiers and sailors and pilots who were killed. Not just for the nurses and engineers, ordnance factory workers and civilians who died. The memorial was for all of them. For all who remembered a life before the war, who remembered those who had died when they were vibrant and vital. It was for a way of life which had slipped away. Carved here in stone was the world they inherited from their parents, it was the last testimony to the world under Victoria and Edward. That world had been swept away in bloodshed, and afterwards, nothing was quite the same. Everything was modern now. But the quiet dignity of the Cenotaph was a reminder of another time, the time before. It was the gravemarker of a time that had passed.

Evelyn was not of that time. She had been a child then. She was of the new world and it was that which had driven her to London. Edward’s urging had simply shown her the path. The people of the time before, her parents, had accepted the world as it was, taken what they were given, assumed it was good and proper for a young man to fight and die for glory. They were different now, in a world where everything had died. They were left with dreams. The pursuit of those dreams was surely what made them modern, even if they did not really know what those