Maisie was sitting at a cramped table in the station tea shop when Enid found her.
'You've missed the train to Chelstone, Mais.'
'Hello, Enid. Yes, I know, I'll just wait until the next one.' Enid sat down in front of Maisie.
'So you know.'
'Yes. But it doesn't make any difference.'
'I should bloody 'ope not! I'm away from them all now, and what James does is 'is business.'
'Yes. Yes, it is.'
'And I'm earning real money now.' Enid brushed her hair back from her shoulders. 'So, how are you my very clever little friend? Cambridge University treating you well?'
'Enid, please. Let me be.' Maisie lifted the cup to her lips. The strong tea was bitter, but its heat was soothing. The sweet joy of meeting Simon Lynch seemed half a world away as she looked once again at Enid.
Suddenly Enid's eyes smarted as if stung, and she began to weep. 'I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Mais. I've been so rotten to you. To everyone. I'm just so worried. I lost him once. When 'e went to Canada. When they sent him away because of me. And now 'e's going to France. Up in one of them things--I've 'eard they only last three weeks over there before they cop it, them flyin' boys--and if God 'ad wanted us to leave the ground, I reckon we'd 'ave wings growin' out of our backs by now, don't you?'
'Now then, now then.' Maisie moved around to sit next to Enid and put her arms around her. Enid pulled out a handkerchief, wiped her eyes, and blew her nose.
'Least I feel as if I'm doing something. Making shells, like. Least I'm not just sitting on my bum while them boys get shot to bits over there. Oh, James . . . .'
'Come on, Enid. He'll be all right. Remember what Mrs. Crawford says about James--he's got nine lives.'
Enid sniffed again. 'I'm sorry, Maisie. Really I am. But it just gets me 'ere sometimes.' Enid punched at her middle. 'They look down their noses at me, think I'm not good enough. And 'ere I am working like a trooper.'
Maisie sat with Enid until she became calm, as the ache of farewell gave way to anger, tears, and eventually calm and fatigue.
'Maisie, I never meant anything. Really, I didn't. James will come back, I know he will. And this war is changing everything. 'ave you noticed that? When the likes of me can earn a good living even in wartime, the likes of the better-offs will have to change, won't they?'
'You could be right there, Enid.'
'Gaw, lummy . . . look at that time. I've got to get back to the arsenal. I'm not even s'posed to leave the 'ostel without permission. I'm working in a special section now, handling the more volatile--that's what they call it--the more volatile explosives, and we earn more money, specially as we're 'avin' to do double shifts. All the girls get tired, so it gets a bit tricky, tapping the ends of the shells to check 'em, and all that. But I'm careful, like, so they promoted me. Must'a bin workin' for that Carter for all them years. I learned to be careful.'
'Good for you, Enid.'
The two women left the tea shop and walked together toward the bus stop just outside the station, where Enid would catch a bus to work. As they were bidding farewell, a man shouted behind them. 'Make way, move along, make way, please.'
A train carrying wounded soldiers had arrived, and the orderlies were hurriedly trying to bring stretchers through to the waiting ambulances. Maisie and Enid stood aside and looked on as the wounded passed by, still in mud-caked and bloody uniforms, often crying out as scurrying stretcher-bearers accidentally jarred shell-blasted arms and legs. Maisie gasped and leaned against Enid when she looked into the eyes of a man who had lost most of the dressings from his face.
After the wounded had passed Enid turned to Maisie to say goodbye. The young women embraced, and as they did so, Maisie felt a shiver of fear that made her tighten her hold on Enid.
'Come on, come on, let's not get maudlin, Mais.' Enid loosened her grasp.
'You mind how you go, Enid,' said Maisie.
'Like I always said, Maisie Dobbs, don't you worry about me.'
'But I do.'
'You want to worry about something, Maisie? Let me give you a bit of advice. You worry about what you can do for these boys.' She pointed toward the ambulances waiting outside the station entrance. 'You worry about whatever it is you can
It seemed to Maisie that one second she was with Enid, and then she was alone. She walked toward the platform for the penultimate part of her journey home to her father's cottage next to the stables at Chelstone. With trains delayed and canceled due to troop movements, it would once again be many hours before she reached her destination.
The journey to Kent was long and arduous. Blackout blinds were pulled down, in compliance with government orders issued in anticipation of Zeppelin raids, and the train moved slowly in the darkness. Several times the train pulled into a siding to allow a troop train go by, and each time Maisie closed her eyes and remembered the injured men rushed into waiting ambulances at Charing Cross.
Time and again she fell into a deep yet brief slumber, and in her half waking saw Enid at work in the munitions factory, at the toil that caused her skin to turn yellow and her hair to spark when she brushed it back. Maisie remembered Enid's face in the distance, reflecting the love she felt as she looked at James Compton.
She wondered about love, and how it must feel, and thought back to last night, which seemed so many nights ago, and touched the place on her right hand where Simon Lynch had placed his lips in a farewell kiss.
As the train drew in to Chelstone station late at night, Maisie saw Frankie standing by his horse and cart. Persephone stood proudly, her coat's gloss equaled only by the shine of the leather traces that Maisie could see
