Heroes for Ghosts by Jackie North
Summary:Love Across Time #1
Soulmates across time. A sacrifice that could keep them apart forever.
In present day, near the village of Ornes, France, Devon works on his master's thesis in history as he fantasizes about meeting a WWI American Doughboy.
In 1916, during the Battle of Ornes, Stanley is a young soldier facing the horrors of the battlefield.
Mourning the death of his friends from enemy fire, Stanley volunteers to bring the message for retreat so he can save everyone else in his battalion. While on his mission, mustard gas surrounds Stanley and though he thinks he is dying, he finds himself in a peaceful green meadow where he literally trips over Devon.
Devon doesn't believe Stanley is who he says he is, a soldier from WWI. But a powerful attraction grows between them, and if Stanley is truly a visitor from the past, then he is Devon's dream come true. The problem is, Stanley's soul wants to finish his mission, and time keeps yanking him back to relive his fateful last morning over and over, even as his heart and body long to stay with Devon.
Will Stanley have to choose between Devon and saving his battalion? Will time betray their love, leaving each alone?
A male/male time travel romance, complete with hurt/comfort, French coffee, warm blankets, fireplace kisses, the angst of separation, and true love across time.
This was brought to my attention when I asked in a FB M/M book rec group for stories with a similar concept to the movie Groundhog Day, the whole repeating the day over scenario. When I also learned this had a WW1 element, I was all kinds of grabby hands. I was not disappointed.
I have to start off by saying this: I don't often make mentions of details in stories because I'm a spoiler-free reviewer but this isn't a spoiler, this is more of a feeling, a reason why I'm a history lover. When Devon is wobbly about his thesis, about telling the story, wondering if anyone will care, Stanley's answer is spot on how I feel about history and why it's an important subject and why everyone needs to learn it.
“The whole thing is stupid,” said Devon. “After everything you’ve been through. After hearing about it from you and having you show me the trenches, telling me about that guy who lost his leg—which isn’t in the records anywhere—because you were there, and you suffered for it. For me to write a paper about it, it’s like I’m benefiting from that without having paid the price.”The twisted feelings that had started when Stanley had shown up on the green grasses that were all that was left of a disastrous battle had risen to the surface, and he’d said them aloud. He could barely look at Stanley with this confession ringing in the air. His constant awareness about the futility of war was only the half of it. The other half was the loss that war brought, inexplicable and never-ceasing, and Stanley had been the one to go through that. Not Devon.“But you’re telling the story,” said Stanley as he stood up and came over to Devon, so close that as he took a step forward, Devon found himself against the wall. “You’re telling all of our stories, mine, Isaac’s, everybody’s.”“Nobody will care,” said Devon. His voice broke on the last word because he realized that it was true. None of his friends cared, and his thesis advisor had strongly suggested he focus on another aspect of the Great War. In the end he was alone, except for Stanley, who could be dragged back through time at any moment.“I care,” said Stanley. “And you care. You can put the stuff that I told you in your paper, and then one day, somebody will read it. It’ll matter to somebody, someday.”
Now, I know the whole time-travel sub-genre gives this historical a fantasy twist but this moment in time, this exchange the author gives between the two men is so important, it really resonated with me, it's how I have felt whenever someone says "why do I need to know, it happened years ago to people I don't know". Their actions had a bearing on life today, time is what connects us all but most importantly, those souls of yesteryear, be it on the world stage or your own family tree, lived, they mattered and those stories need to live on. In these few paragraphs that I shared the author put voice to the importance more than anything I've ever read before. For that alone, I have to say a huge "Thank You" to Jackie North.
Okay, off my soapbox and onto the story.
HOLY HANNAH BATMAN!!! How have I not seen this series before? How did it not cross my reading path? Heroes for Ghosts is a brilliant tale of history, fantasy, science fiction, romance, and drama with characters that are likeable, loveable, wanting-to-know-able, I'll be honest it ticks every single one of my reading boxes. I've read historical paranormal/supernatural/fantasies before but too often the historical element gets lost in the world of fantasy so for Jackie North to combine all these factors AND keep the historical accuracies is just pure . . . well it's magical(and I'm not talking about the time-travel bit😉).
Devon is a history lover after my own heart, thesis or not if I didn't have family keeping me grounded now, the idea of going to the place history happened and living in a mostly state of seclusion to do the research sounds absolutely heavenly. I can also honestly say, if I came across Stanley the way Devon did, my mind would be a bit teeter-totter as to believing him and worried he escaped from an institution too. I don't see how anyone couldn't love either of these men, they are just so real and wonderfully written, there is no doubt to this reader they have to have their HEA. If you follow me you'll know what my next statement will be: to see how the men get there you'll have to experience their journey for yourself.
And what a journey it is! You won't regret it, historical lover or not, if you love an old fashion journey of storytelling than this is for you.
I'll add that this is my first Jackie North and it certainly won't be my last because if her backlist is only half as good as Heroes for Ghosts than it will still be a pleasure to dive in.
Summary:
Love and art escaping the past in 1920s London
London, 1924. Evan Calver is enjoying a quiet pint, when he notices a man smiling at him across the bar. While the Rose and Crown isn’t that kind of pub, Evan thinks his luck might be in, and he narrowly escapes humiliation when he realises the man is smiling at a friend. Eavesdropping on their conversation, Evan discovers the man is named Milo Halstead and served as an army captain during the war.
When they meet again by chance in the British Museum, artist Milo asks Evan if he would sit for a portrait. Evan is amazed that an upper-class artist wants to paint the son of a miner, and he’s just as surprised when their acquaintance blossoms into friendship. When he discovers that Milo is a man like himself, he hopes that friendship might become more. But as Evan and Milo grow ever closer, can they escape the fears of the past to find their future happiness?
Historicals are an absolute favorite of mine and personally I don't think there is enough set in the 1920s so when I find one I gobble it up. Strokes on a Canvas is a wonderful little tale of post-war existence. H Lewis-Foster's attention to detail shows respect for the past but don't think this novella reads as a history lesson because even with the little detail accuracies this is still a romance that made me smile and warmed my heart.
Milo and Evan meet by chance and then find themselves in each other's company once again, but it is not insta-love however it is pretty immediate friendship that quickly turns to love. They really are made for each other and because of friends and family they may have it a bit easier than others of the time but that doesn't mean the danger isn't lurking around every corner. You want them to find happiness, a place where they can just be who they are without fear but then you remember its 1924 and that place probably doesn't exist with any kind of 100% certainty.
Society from an LGBT standpoint has a ways to go to achieve complete acceptance and equality however if you want to appreciate just how far the world has come than look at history. Historical fiction may not be an exact and perfect representation of their reality but it is generally a good place to start to get a feel on how far society has come. H Lewis-Foster's Strokes on a Canvas shows that even with the law and moral stance on gay relationships there were safe places love could exist and that not everyone saw it as a wrong to be punished. It's this representation of Milo and Evan's love from the author that makes Strokes an easy read and by that I don't mean there isn't much substance to it but that it sucks you in and pretty soon you find yourself turning(or swiping😉) the last page, its easy to get lost in and you'll be sad to see it end. Its that feeling of sadness I feel at a story having ended that tells me I found a winner and when its a new author to me that gave me that feeling then I also know I just found another author to add to my keep-an-eye-out-for list.
RATING:
Summary:
Cambridge Fellows Mystery #8
The Great War is over. Freed from a prisoner of war camp and back at St. Bride’s College, Orlando Coppersmith is discovering what those years have cost....
All he holds dear—including his beloved Jonty Stewart, lost in combat.
Then a commission to investigate a young officer’s disappearance temporarily gives Orlando new direction... The deceptively simple case becomes a maze of conflicting stories—is Daniel McNeil a deserter, or a hero?—taking Orlando into the world of the shell-shocked and broken. And his sense of Jonty’s absence becomes painfully acute. Especially when a brief spark of attraction for a Cambridge historian, instead of offering comfort, triggers overwhelming guilt.
As he hovers on the brink of despair, a chance encounter on the French seafront at Cabourg brings new hope and unexpected joy. But the crushing after-effects of war could destroy his second chance, leaving him more lost and alone than ever…
All he holds dear—including his beloved Jonty Stewart, lost in combat.
Then a commission to investigate a young officer’s disappearance temporarily gives Orlando new direction... The deceptively simple case becomes a maze of conflicting stories—is Daniel McNeil a deserter, or a hero?—taking Orlando into the world of the shell-shocked and broken. And his sense of Jonty’s absence becomes painfully acute. Especially when a brief spark of attraction for a Cambridge historian, instead of offering comfort, triggers overwhelming guilt.
As he hovers on the brink of despair, a chance encounter on the French seafront at Cabourg brings new hope and unexpected joy. But the crushing after-effects of war could destroy his second chance, leaving him more lost and alone than ever…
Original Review August 2014:
This was definitely the most emotional entry in the series so far. Recovering from the war, dealing with loss, trying to return to "normal" life, and a mystery that seems to embody all those elements as well. Definitely a multi-hankie read. Not much I can say about this one other than it plays havoc on your heart, even pretty much knowing what the outcome will be from the very beginning. A true example of how the greatness of a story isn't always in where it ends but the getting there. I'm eager to read number 9 & 10 but as I didn't look into it ahead of time, I have to wait for the paperbacks to arrive as they aren't yet available in ebook form, at least that I've discovered. Once they arrive I will be digging in immediately.
RATING:
The Courage to Love by EE MontgomerySummary:
Sequel to Between Love and Honor
In 1915, after his beloved Carl died from a vicious beating, David Harrison enlisted in the Army and went to war. He returns home to find a world seemingly unchanged, while he will never be the same. At Mrs. Gill’s boarding house, he meets Bernard Donnelly, a young man suffering the aftereffects of his own war experiences. David finds himself increasingly attracted to Bernard, but that terrifies him. He blames himself for Carl’s horrific death and fears he isn’t strong enough to lose another love to violence.
Bernard needs David to help him face each day and find a way they can be together without stigma—and without putting them in legal and physical danger—but David clings to his idea that the only way to keep a lover safe is not to have one. His fears threaten to destroy everything, unless he learns that sometimes the risk is worth it and finds the courage to love.
This story is so powerful and emotions are all over the place. I'll admit that the first few shell shock induced nightmare scenes are a little confusing but afterwards, I realized that the mild confusion I felt only added to the severity of what both David and Bernard were dealing with. I've always been a bit of a history buff, so this is not my first story surrounding World War 1 veterans but the author still managed to tug at my heart when dealing with the shell shock. Some people might see the continued nightmares and David's reluctance to open his heart again after losing Carl as repetitious but I see them as showing how far they've actually come and at the same time reminding us that it's not a clear cut scenario that can be bad one day and completely fixed the next, it's ongoing. David and Bernard and even the memory of Carl, David's first love, are the main focus of the story but those around them are so important to story. Mrs. Gill is amazing, she's the mother that David should have had, she's caring but she's also right to the point. As for David's mother? She's not actually in the story much but she certainly leaves a lasting impression and it's not a nice one either. This is the first time I've read E.E. Montgomery but it won't be the last.
RATING:
Summary:
It’s 1919, and Frank Huddleston has survived the battlefields of the Great War. A serious head injury has left him with amnesia so profound he must re-learn his name every morning from a note posted on the privy door.
Gerald “Jersey" Rohn, joined the Army because he wanted to feel like a man, but he returned from the trenches minus a leg and with no goal for his life. He’s plagued by the nightmare of his best friend’s death and has nervous fits, but refuses to associate those things with battle fatigue. He can't work his father's farm, so he takes a job supervising Frank, who is working his grandparents’ farm despite his head injury.
When Frank recovers enough to ask about his past, he discovers his grandparents know almost nothing about him, and they’re lying about what they do know. The men set out to discover Frank's past and get Jersey a prosthesis. They soon begin to care for each other, but they'll need to trust their hearts and put their pasts to rest if they are to turn attraction into a loving future.
This is an amazing story of love, friendship, and overcoming both physical and emotional difficulties. Added on top of all that, it was a time when a gay relationship was not only shunned but illegal. Jersey and Frank both have their own issues to overcome that linger after returning from the war, alone they just manage to "get by" but together they find strength to not only get by but also grow and overcome. I loved the way the author dealt with their individual issues and meshed them together at the same time. Not all the characters are likeable but they aren't suppose to be and the author writes them in a way that is understandable, at times leaves the reader wanting to shake them till they realize what they are saying and doing could do with some rethinking. A definite must for those who love historicals and for those that enjoy a good romance and character study, because you just might find something that makes today a little brighter, I know I did.
RATING:
Heroes for Ghosts by Jackie North
Chapter One
A mortar shell exploded at the far end of the trench, spraying black debris that slammed into the mud and sent up the acrid odor of burnt tar and hot, damp earth. Stanley hunkered down with mud up to his ankles, his backside pressed against the broken end of a mortar gun, his hands on his helmet as his body shook with the force of the blast. He tried to stem his tears as Lieutenant Billings stabbed at the radio with a bit of metal wiring to see if he could get it to work again. Between the mortar rounds, the radio responded with squawks and low pitched shrieks and then went quiet.
If the radio had been even six feet to the left, it would have been safe from being torn apart by the shell that had directly hit the trench mid-morning. And if Bertie, Isaac, and Rex had been on the other side of Stanley when that shell had hit, then they would be alive. Then he would have had someone to worry with, someone who would bolster his courage so he could respond to Lt. Billings’ earlier request.
He missed his friends, but he wanted to be brave for them now. Lt. Billings needed a volunteer to run across the trenches and the misty, frost-bitten fields to contact the major in charge to get the final message for retreat. The battalion needed a retreat or all of the 200 men were going to be smashed to bloody bits and their families would not hear from them come Christmas.
It was horrible. Stanley wondered how he ever imagined that signing up and shipping off would be an adventure worth having, something he could tell everybody about back home. There was no way he could convey the tragedy of it, the futility of a radio that didn’t work, of trying not to look at the bodies of his friends that were currently beneath a tarp for decency’s sake.
Whether there would be a break in the shelling so that they could be buried was anybody’s guess; the way it had been going, they would likely get frozen in place, spattered with mud and bits of shrapnel, and nobody would be able to bury them till spring. By which time, the war would be over, or they’d all be dead. Or both.
Stanley was shaking all over, and told himself it was because he was trying to warm his body up, but that was another futility, a lie he could barely hold on to. The Germans were coming closer with each passing hour. The shells were louder and more on target, and soon they would die. All of the battalion’s efforts would come to nothing, and Stanley would be another body beneath a tarp, and nobody would have the energy to bury him.
He would become part of the landscape, part of the stretch of brown mud and red blood, decorated with torn limbs. The uniform he wore so proudly would turn into the tattered remnants of desire to do good, to fight for one’s country, and to keep families and children and grandmothers safe. At least that’s what the recruitment posters had stated, and behind every one had been the American flag, rippling with patriotism and an overwhelming urgency.
Stanley had signed up alone, but had soon met his three friends during training. They’d stuck together, sharing the burden of fear, bolstering each other up, proud to fight and do right. Only it was wrong, so, so wrong because what was happening seemed to be for no reason at all, and everything they did as a battalion felt like they were merely going through the motions.
Men kept dying, though the sudden silence across the top of the trenches indicated that the Germans seemed to have let up for the moment. Which left Stanley alone with Lt. Billings, and on the verge of blubbering. He was shaking with the effort of not crying, though his face was hot with tears he kept having to blink away as he tried to focus on what Lt. Billings was doing.
“The wire goes under,” said Stanley with a croak. “Under on the left.”
“Oh, yes?” asked Lt. Billings. His voice was gruff.
He didn’t look at Stanley, all of his attention on the radio. He moved the wire as Stanley had suggested, and while this brought a sound from the transmitter, it ended in another ineffectual squawk.
The worst of it was that Stanley had previously thought the radio was too much in the open and ought to be moved, just in case. He’d not wanted to step on Lt. Billings’ toes, though, as the lieutenant had only just taken over from Colonel Helmer, and had not said anything.
Helmer had been the worst commander anybody had ever seen, and the muttered comments among the enlisted men had almost grown into a roar. Though Stanley might have given him some leeway, due to his age, Colonel Helmer had taken the coward’s way, run off in the night, and had not been heard from since. With the tenseness among the men, Stanley hadn’t wanted to point out that the radio was in harm’s way. It might have been seen as a challenge to the order of command, which was the last thing that Stanley wanted to do.
He’d refrained from talking about Helmer, and had generally kept his mouth shut. But if he’d not done that, if he’d given into his natural proclivities to think with his mouth open, they might have a radio now, might already be in an officially sanctioned retreat, and Rex, and Bertie, and Isaac would not be dead. They’d be beside him as they all scuttled to the rear of the battle and clambered into trucks to be taken to somewhere a bit safer than where they were.
It was all his fault, then. All of it. His lungs felt as though they were running out of air, and his belly dipped so hard he thought he might shit himself in fear. The only thing for it was to do something so that it didn’t get worse. And that meant answering Lt. Billings’ question from earlier that morning.
“Sir?” asked Stanley, though he realized that his voice was too soft to be heard. “Sir?” he asked again, more loudly this time.
“It just sparked,” said Lt. Billings, completely focused on the radio. “If I move that wire again, I’m going to fry this fucking thing.”
Stanley scrambled up from where he was, his boots slipping on the mud as he surged forward to land on his knees at Lt. Billings’ side.
“Sir, I’ll go,” said Stanley. “I’ll take the message and bring the code back.”
Lt. Billings’ hands froze in the midst of what he was doing, and then he slowly turned his head. The lieutenant’s eyes were red-rimmed, and his face was be-grimed with smoke and mud that seemed to have pushed its way into his skin. He didn’t smile as he looked at Stanley, and his expression was grim.
“You might not come back,” said Lt. Billings. “In fact it’s a death sentence. Do you want that?”
Lt. Billings was so unlike Commander Helmer in every way; Stanley knew that it was a death sentence, so Lt. Billings, not one to suffer fools, was making sure that Stanley knew exactly what he was getting into. A zigzag run across a field of dead bodies, horse carcasses, guns, gouged earth, and barbed wire, all the while dodging bullets and shrapnel and mustard gas.
“There’s no other way,” said Stanley. He wiped his hand across his upper lip, and took a hard breath, feeling his metal ID tag like a circle of cold ice in the middle of his throat. “You said so this morning. If we don’t get the order to retreat, we’re all going to die. Right here in this trench.”
He did not add that they could retreat anyway, without the order, and save a whole lot of lives. But Lt. Billings was a seasoned army officer, and while he might take it upon himself to take control of a battalion that was currently officer-less, it was not in his makeup to call such a command without a direct order.
Stanley could try to convince Lt. Billings to overstep his authority, but that would only get everyone irritated, and as they were all so edgy already, it would be the worst way he could contribute. The best thing for him to do, besides throw himself on a land mine, was to step up and volunteer. It wouldn’t bring his friends back, but it would give their deaths meaning. Or would it? At any rate, it would be better than sitting with his ass in the mud watching Lt. Billings mess with equipment in a way that was probably making it worse. If only Stanley had spoken up and told him to move the radio.
If only Stanley had told his friends to sit someplace other than where they had. If only Stanley had been born at a different time, and had missed this stupid war entirely. One hundred years ago or a hundred years from now, it made no difference to him. But he was here now, and he needed to do his best for the sake of his friends’ memory.
He stood up and made an ineffectual pass at the front of his wool sweater vest. He winced as his fingers touched dried blood, the source of which he didn’t want to identify, but which had been the spatter from Rex’s head as it exploded. Rex would have gone with him, big and silent and close as they crossed the field of battle to carry the message.
“I’ll go,” said Stanley.
Lt. Billings stood up too, though he didn’t reach out to shake Stanley’s hand. Stanley was glad about the lack of the gesture because that would have truly meant that Lt. Billings did not expect him to return, but was only sending him out because there was nobody else who would go.
“Find Major Walker,” said Lt. Billings. “Give him half the message, and he’ll know I need the other half. He’ll tell you what that is, and when I have the whole message I can call retreat. Tell him I sent you, you got all that?”
“Yes, sir,” said Stanley. His heart was thumping in his chest, threatening to push its way out, and his knees started to knock together. “I’ll bring the message back, I promise.”
“It’s a foolish thing to make such promises,” said Lt. Billings. He shook his head, and looked down at the busted radio before looking up at Stanley. His expression was so deep and serious that Stanley knew he was going to die the minute he stepped out of the trench. The alternative, however, was to stay in the trench and watch while his friends’ bodies froze in the mud, taking his heart with them as they became one with the earth, and that he could not bear.
“Here’s a canteen and here’s your rifle,” said Lt. Billings. “You might need to kill some Krauts, and you won’t believe how thirsty you can get when you’re running hard, terrified enough to piss your uniform.”
Stanley took the canteen and looped it over his neck and shoulder, then hung the rifle across his chest in the other direction. He wasn’t exactly armed to the teeth, but he had a pouch of bullets and could give somebody a run for their money. After that, he’d be out of bullets and dead in a ditch somewhere.
He couldn’t think about that now. He needed to go over the top and start running. The major would be in a trench at the back of the field, at least that was the general idea in most battles.
“That way, right?” asked Stanley. He pointed over his shoulder with his thumb.
“More over that way,” said Lt. Billings. “Straight across and then over. He’ll be in the right quadrant. You won’t see any flags, but it’s going to have more sandbags and look a damn sight tidier than where we are now.”
“Yes, sir,” said Stanley.
He straightened up and gave Lt. Billings the most efficient salute he’d ever managed, out of respect. Then, not allowing himself one last glimpse at the pile of bodies at the end of the trench, he pushed his way past the three soldiers who were manning a Howitzer that was almost out of shells, and climbed up the ladder.
Stanley slipped at the bottom rung, and was tempted to call it done then and there. For the memory of Isaac, Rex, and Bertie, and all the others, he made himself go up and up till he was standing on top of the ridge, looking over the dip in the earth that ran next to the ruined castle and the small cottage whose roof was half gone.
The sprawl of barbed wire along the top of each trench was intertwined with the dark flags of smoke that twisted and moved as though it was alive. The sun was a smudge through the brown and black haze, and the smell of hot oil and human excrement shot itself into his lungs with his first breath. The air was cold and it seemed as though frost speckled the air like little bits of diamonds made half yellow by the smoke from fires and the general exhalation of despair and gloom and death. Stanley watched a shell explode a hundred feet to his left, turned the other way, and started running.
The idea was to get out of the line of fire, for that was where the major was to be found. The easiest way was to follow the line of trenches, to run inside of them, along the bottom, and make his way there. He started to run, his canteen bouncing, his rifle banging into his thigh the whole while.
At the edge of the trenches were the round tops of helmets. Beneath those glimmered the exhausted, tired eyes of soldiers who saw him go, who knew where he was headed, and who had no hope that he would make it. A few soldiers stood up and fired beyond Stanley to draw enemy attention away from him when he had to cross over the top of a trench to get to the next one. The shots zinged around him anyway. If he slowed down, he was going to take a hit, so he kept low in the trenches and kept running.
His boots slipped as he headed down a small hollow, and he almost fell to his knees as he went up the other side; it was like trying to run up a waterfall, only this one was of mud, with bits of shell and hunks of rock. Just as Stanley got halfway to the top, he heard the high-pitched pop of a canister as it opened, and even before he smelled the bitter tang, a yellow cloud of mustard gas descended around him like a blanket of pure poison.
He brought his hand to his mouth, and staggered to the top of a trench, and though he kept his breath shallow, he felt his lungs collapsing, and fell to his knees, coughing up spit, his hands in the mud, his eyes closed. The yellow swirl filled his brain until there was nothing left but an empty ache and the sting in his lungs. He barely felt his head hit the mud and then sighed, thinking that it would be good to stay right where he was, for what did it matter anyhow? And then it became blackness, so, so much blackness.
Strokes on a Canvas by H Lewis-Foster
London, April 1924
Evan took a sip from his pint of beer. It wasn’t the best ale he’d tasted, but he intended to drink every drop, delaying his return to Beston House and another inedible meal served up by his landlady, Mrs. Grindley. To be fair, the boarding house wasn’t a bad place. His room was clean and the bed was bigger than the one he’d shared with his brother, but Mrs. Grindley’s cooking would challenge the strongest constitution. Her stew had the texture of wallpaper paste, her soup was little more than hot water, and it was said the pastry on her blackberry pie had broken a former tenant’s tooth.
The barmaid handed Evan his change and narrowed her eyes in what may have been interest or disapproval. Evan was hopeless at reading female gestures and hints, but he was worse at interpreting men’s secret signals, which could sometimes prove to be quite a problem. He took another mouthful of beer and was wondering how long he could make his drink last, when he glimpsed a man with sweetly tousled black hair a short way across the bar.
The Rose and Crown was by no means rough, but the man seemed out of place, his brown tweed jacket and gold-rimmed glasses lending him an academic air. He looked older than Evan, somewhere around thirty, and his blue, almost turquoise, eyes were striking behind his spectacles. Evan had a soft spot for men in glasses. For one thing, he thought their imperfect vision might make them less aware of his physical quirks—namely his slightly crooked nose, broken in a cricket match, and the unruly mop of ginger hair he’d inherited from his father.
Evan also fancied bespectacled men were a cut above the intellectual average, a quality he found far more attractive than a flawless face. While he’d left school at thirteen, Evan had tried to improve himself by reading and learning as much as he could, and he was drawn to scholarly types like the man at the bar. He imagined them strolling in cap and gown across a sunlit college quad, then retiring to their rooms for philosophical debates with their old school chums. Evan saw such men in the shop from time to time, buying tobacco or cigarettes, but he rarely spoke to them if he could help it, afraid they’d laugh at the Derbyshire accent he tried his best to disguise.
Despite his cultured appearance, the man in the tweed jacket didn’t look like he’d mock Evan’s working-class roots or lack of formal education. His blue eyes were kind, as was his smile, which Evan suddenly realized was directed at him. Evan looked down at his pint, unsure of the smile’s meaning. The man may have been the sort who smiled a lot, an open and friendly person who liked to put people at ease. Or perhaps his smile signified something quite different.
While the Rose and Crown wasn’t that kind of pub, it wasn’t unknown for illicit liaisons to begin in respectable places. Evan was no innocent in such matters, but he always waited for his partner in crime to make his intentions clear. He’d never been in trouble with the law, not even scrumping apples when he was a boy, and he didn’t intend to go to jail now because of a misunderstanding.
Evan lifted his gaze to see the man was still smiling. He knew it could be a ruse—a policeman out to trick men into revealing their true nature—but Evan couldn’t help smiling back. He raised his glass in a tentative greeting and the stranger nodded in reply, his eyes flickering in the direction of the pub door. Unable to believe his good fortune, Evan gulped down the rest of his beer as the man stepped purposefully toward him. His haste wasn’t surprising—he probably had a wife to get home to once he’d satisfied his immoral desires—but he didn’t look nervous, as most men did in such a risky situation.
The man held out his hand, and Evan prepared to return the affable gesture. Then he caught a glimpse of movement to his left and the sleeve of an overcoat skimmed his arm. There beside him was a tall, blond-haired man offering his hand to Evan’s prospective playmate. Evan froze where he stood, his hand raised from his side. Then he slowly turned to the bar, trying to look casual as he leaned against the counter. Evan rested his fingers against his temple so that he could discreetly observe the two men. The man in the glasses was first to speak, his accent implying a privileged background somewhere in the south of England.
“I’m so glad you got in touch, Haynes. How is your dear wife? And your two beautiful girls?”
“They’re very well, thank you, sir.” The blond’s voice was a comforting Norfolk burr. “Vera sends her regards and said to thank you for the cake you sent at Christmas. It was most appreciated.”
“It was my pleasure, Haynes. And please don’t call me sir. It’s been a long time since I held rank. I’m plain Milo Halstead now.”
“You’ll always be Captain Halstead to me. The best officer in the regiment by a mile.”
Evan tilted his head and saw Milo blush endearingly.
“Nonsense, Haynes. Now, let me buy you a drink. Is beer all right, or would you like something stronger?”
“I’d better stick with the ale. My train back to Norwich is in an hour, and Vera won’t be happy if I miss it.”
Milo laughed and they moved to the bar. For a moment, Evan thought they might stand next to him, but thankfully they settled a few feet away, where Milo ordered two pints of beer.
Evan’s pulse throbbed in his eardrums and his heart thumped in his chest as he realized how close he’d come to disaster. However intelligent he looked, however refined he sounded, Milo was a former soldier and seemingly a good one. If Evan had offered his homosexual hand, he might well have received a vicious beating in return, and the thought of his landlady’s woeful cooking suddenly seemed quite enticing. Evan took a last glance at Milo and Haynes drinking and chatting, then slipped unnoticed out of the pub and into the London mist.
“Sorry I’m late, Mrs. Grindley. I got held up at work.”
With her dark hair scraped back in its customary bun and a look even more frosty than usual, Mrs. Grindley plunged a knife into a large and sagging suet pudding.
“You’re working at the pub now, are you, Mr. Calver?”
Evan was amazed by his landlady’s sense of smell. She could detect a mere hint of alcohol across a crowded room, and if her gifted nose told her that one of her charges had missed his weekly dip in the tub, she dispatched him to the bathroom with a flea in his ear and a bar of carbolic soap.
“I only had the one, Mrs. Grindley. It’s been a tough day.”
“Oh, really? I didn’t know working in a grocer’s was so tiring. I suppose your wrist must be dropping off, what with taking all that money and writing receipts.”
“It’ll not be writing receipts that’s hurting his wrist.”
A collective snort of laughter erupted around the table.
“What was that, Alexander Wallace?”
“Nothing, Mrs. Grindley.” Sandy smiled, angelic as ever with his rosy cheeks and waves of golden hair. “But I’m looking forward to your delicious supper.”
Mrs. Grindley slopped a portion of pudding onto Sandy’s plate, and he beamed like he’d been served caviar and smoked salmon at the Ritz. He rarely ate a mouthful of her meals, but Sandy knew there were worse places to board at higher prices, so he used his easy Scottish charm to keep on Mrs. Grindley’s good side. With his own greasy helping swimming on his plate, along with two bullet-hard potatoes, Evan picked up his fork and prodded something that may have been kidney, though he couldn’t be sure.
Evan forced down a few morsels of food, still not certain what he was eating, and joined in the mealtime conversation. Sandy was entertaining as always. He worked at the nearby chemist’s and was a good one for gossip, divulging the locals’ embarrassing ailments and intimate irritations. While he never named his customers, everyone knew that the auburn-haired woman with a bad case of piles was Mrs. Kent from number twenty-two, and the pipe-smoking man with constipation was Reverend Maguire. Mrs. Grindley scolded him for discussing such subjects at dinner, but she enjoyed his stories too much to stop him and loved a bit of tittle-tattle as much as anyone.
Apart from Sandy, there was Dennis, an insurance clerk who worked down the road from Evan and told his share of anecdotes about his customers’ dubious claims. He wasn’t a bad bloke and was certainly good-looking, with his sleek brown hair and pale green eyes, but he had a slightly superior air that wound Sandy up something rotten. Then there was Victor, a shy young student with an adorable smile who was happy to share the regular gifts of sweets and chocolate his mother supplied. Finally, there was Fred, a cheery lad who worked in a brewery and was therefore the subject of their landlady’s scrutiny more than the rest of them.
They were all far from their families, having made the move to London in the hope of making something of their lives, but they were a jovial bunch and mostly rubbed along well, sharing their triumphs and tribulations in work and football, and sometimes romance. Sandy was the group’s Lothario and always had a girl on the go. He’d even sneaked one or two into his room when he knew Mrs. Grindley was out. Sandy was also the one person Evan could talk to about his own private life.
Evan still wasn’t sure how Sandy had guessed his sexual inclination, but as they’d strolled home with their chips one Saturday night—Mrs. Grindley took a welcome break from her culinary duties at the weekend—Sandy had asked, completely out of the blue, if Evan preferred boys to girls. Evan had almost choked on a scalding hot chip, and once Sandy had thumped him on the back, he’d cautiously admitted he wasn’t all that keen on girls, at least not in that way. He’d been sure Sandy wouldn’t use his confession against him, but Evan had still been wary, having never confided in anyone before. Sandy, however, had been unflustered by his revelation. He’d asked a few forthright questions, to which Evan had given self-conscious replies, then he’d let the subject drop, telling Evan he could talk to him if he wanted or needed to.
Evan had been astounded by Sandy’s generosity, and he’d slept exceedingly well that night, knowing he’d found a friend who would listen to him without judgement. He’d soon called on Sandy’s counsel, when he’d been confused—as he usually was—by signals he’d been getting from a new chap at work. After a lengthy conversation with Sandy, Evan had decided not to act on his unreliable intuition. The lad had been more than friendly since he’d started at Bailey’s, but Evan couldn’t afford to lose his job, which would be the least of the repercussions if he turned out to be mistaken. When his colleague had announced his engagement to a girl from Clapham the following month, he’d been sincerely grateful for Sandy’s wise advice.
As Evan attempted to finish his dinner, he thought he’d have a natter with Sandy later. They often met up for a chat in one or other of their rooms before they turned in for the night. Today’s topic of choice would no doubt be Sandy’s latest rendezvous with Ada, the girl from the Lyons tea shop, but Evan thought he might mention his close shave with the man in the pub. Cheered by the prospect of a chinwag with Sandy and his afternoon off the following day, Evan found his last mouthful of suet pudding just a little more palatable.
Evan took a sip from his pint of beer. It wasn’t the best ale he’d tasted, but he intended to drink every drop, delaying his return to Beston House and another inedible meal served up by his landlady, Mrs. Grindley. To be fair, the boarding house wasn’t a bad place. His room was clean and the bed was bigger than the one he’d shared with his brother, but Mrs. Grindley’s cooking would challenge the strongest constitution. Her stew had the texture of wallpaper paste, her soup was little more than hot water, and it was said the pastry on her blackberry pie had broken a former tenant’s tooth.
The barmaid handed Evan his change and narrowed her eyes in what may have been interest or disapproval. Evan was hopeless at reading female gestures and hints, but he was worse at interpreting men’s secret signals, which could sometimes prove to be quite a problem. He took another mouthful of beer and was wondering how long he could make his drink last, when he glimpsed a man with sweetly tousled black hair a short way across the bar.
The Rose and Crown was by no means rough, but the man seemed out of place, his brown tweed jacket and gold-rimmed glasses lending him an academic air. He looked older than Evan, somewhere around thirty, and his blue, almost turquoise, eyes were striking behind his spectacles. Evan had a soft spot for men in glasses. For one thing, he thought their imperfect vision might make them less aware of his physical quirks—namely his slightly crooked nose, broken in a cricket match, and the unruly mop of ginger hair he’d inherited from his father.
Evan also fancied bespectacled men were a cut above the intellectual average, a quality he found far more attractive than a flawless face. While he’d left school at thirteen, Evan had tried to improve himself by reading and learning as much as he could, and he was drawn to scholarly types like the man at the bar. He imagined them strolling in cap and gown across a sunlit college quad, then retiring to their rooms for philosophical debates with their old school chums. Evan saw such men in the shop from time to time, buying tobacco or cigarettes, but he rarely spoke to them if he could help it, afraid they’d laugh at the Derbyshire accent he tried his best to disguise.
Despite his cultured appearance, the man in the tweed jacket didn’t look like he’d mock Evan’s working-class roots or lack of formal education. His blue eyes were kind, as was his smile, which Evan suddenly realized was directed at him. Evan looked down at his pint, unsure of the smile’s meaning. The man may have been the sort who smiled a lot, an open and friendly person who liked to put people at ease. Or perhaps his smile signified something quite different.
While the Rose and Crown wasn’t that kind of pub, it wasn’t unknown for illicit liaisons to begin in respectable places. Evan was no innocent in such matters, but he always waited for his partner in crime to make his intentions clear. He’d never been in trouble with the law, not even scrumping apples when he was a boy, and he didn’t intend to go to jail now because of a misunderstanding.
Evan lifted his gaze to see the man was still smiling. He knew it could be a ruse—a policeman out to trick men into revealing their true nature—but Evan couldn’t help smiling back. He raised his glass in a tentative greeting and the stranger nodded in reply, his eyes flickering in the direction of the pub door. Unable to believe his good fortune, Evan gulped down the rest of his beer as the man stepped purposefully toward him. His haste wasn’t surprising—he probably had a wife to get home to once he’d satisfied his immoral desires—but he didn’t look nervous, as most men did in such a risky situation.
The man held out his hand, and Evan prepared to return the affable gesture. Then he caught a glimpse of movement to his left and the sleeve of an overcoat skimmed his arm. There beside him was a tall, blond-haired man offering his hand to Evan’s prospective playmate. Evan froze where he stood, his hand raised from his side. Then he slowly turned to the bar, trying to look casual as he leaned against the counter. Evan rested his fingers against his temple so that he could discreetly observe the two men. The man in the glasses was first to speak, his accent implying a privileged background somewhere in the south of England.
“I’m so glad you got in touch, Haynes. How is your dear wife? And your two beautiful girls?”
“They’re very well, thank you, sir.” The blond’s voice was a comforting Norfolk burr. “Vera sends her regards and said to thank you for the cake you sent at Christmas. It was most appreciated.”
“It was my pleasure, Haynes. And please don’t call me sir. It’s been a long time since I held rank. I’m plain Milo Halstead now.”
“You’ll always be Captain Halstead to me. The best officer in the regiment by a mile.”
Evan tilted his head and saw Milo blush endearingly.
“Nonsense, Haynes. Now, let me buy you a drink. Is beer all right, or would you like something stronger?”
“I’d better stick with the ale. My train back to Norwich is in an hour, and Vera won’t be happy if I miss it.”
Milo laughed and they moved to the bar. For a moment, Evan thought they might stand next to him, but thankfully they settled a few feet away, where Milo ordered two pints of beer.
Evan’s pulse throbbed in his eardrums and his heart thumped in his chest as he realized how close he’d come to disaster. However intelligent he looked, however refined he sounded, Milo was a former soldier and seemingly a good one. If Evan had offered his homosexual hand, he might well have received a vicious beating in return, and the thought of his landlady’s woeful cooking suddenly seemed quite enticing. Evan took a last glance at Milo and Haynes drinking and chatting, then slipped unnoticed out of the pub and into the London mist.
* * * * *
“Sorry I’m late, Mrs. Grindley. I got held up at work.”
With her dark hair scraped back in its customary bun and a look even more frosty than usual, Mrs. Grindley plunged a knife into a large and sagging suet pudding.
“You’re working at the pub now, are you, Mr. Calver?”
Evan was amazed by his landlady’s sense of smell. She could detect a mere hint of alcohol across a crowded room, and if her gifted nose told her that one of her charges had missed his weekly dip in the tub, she dispatched him to the bathroom with a flea in his ear and a bar of carbolic soap.
“I only had the one, Mrs. Grindley. It’s been a tough day.”
“Oh, really? I didn’t know working in a grocer’s was so tiring. I suppose your wrist must be dropping off, what with taking all that money and writing receipts.”
“It’ll not be writing receipts that’s hurting his wrist.”
A collective snort of laughter erupted around the table.
“What was that, Alexander Wallace?”
“Nothing, Mrs. Grindley.” Sandy smiled, angelic as ever with his rosy cheeks and waves of golden hair. “But I’m looking forward to your delicious supper.”
Mrs. Grindley slopped a portion of pudding onto Sandy’s plate, and he beamed like he’d been served caviar and smoked salmon at the Ritz. He rarely ate a mouthful of her meals, but Sandy knew there were worse places to board at higher prices, so he used his easy Scottish charm to keep on Mrs. Grindley’s good side. With his own greasy helping swimming on his plate, along with two bullet-hard potatoes, Evan picked up his fork and prodded something that may have been kidney, though he couldn’t be sure.
Evan forced down a few morsels of food, still not certain what he was eating, and joined in the mealtime conversation. Sandy was entertaining as always. He worked at the nearby chemist’s and was a good one for gossip, divulging the locals’ embarrassing ailments and intimate irritations. While he never named his customers, everyone knew that the auburn-haired woman with a bad case of piles was Mrs. Kent from number twenty-two, and the pipe-smoking man with constipation was Reverend Maguire. Mrs. Grindley scolded him for discussing such subjects at dinner, but she enjoyed his stories too much to stop him and loved a bit of tittle-tattle as much as anyone.
Apart from Sandy, there was Dennis, an insurance clerk who worked down the road from Evan and told his share of anecdotes about his customers’ dubious claims. He wasn’t a bad bloke and was certainly good-looking, with his sleek brown hair and pale green eyes, but he had a slightly superior air that wound Sandy up something rotten. Then there was Victor, a shy young student with an adorable smile who was happy to share the regular gifts of sweets and chocolate his mother supplied. Finally, there was Fred, a cheery lad who worked in a brewery and was therefore the subject of their landlady’s scrutiny more than the rest of them.
They were all far from their families, having made the move to London in the hope of making something of their lives, but they were a jovial bunch and mostly rubbed along well, sharing their triumphs and tribulations in work and football, and sometimes romance. Sandy was the group’s Lothario and always had a girl on the go. He’d even sneaked one or two into his room when he knew Mrs. Grindley was out. Sandy was also the one person Evan could talk to about his own private life.
Evan still wasn’t sure how Sandy had guessed his sexual inclination, but as they’d strolled home with their chips one Saturday night—Mrs. Grindley took a welcome break from her culinary duties at the weekend—Sandy had asked, completely out of the blue, if Evan preferred boys to girls. Evan had almost choked on a scalding hot chip, and once Sandy had thumped him on the back, he’d cautiously admitted he wasn’t all that keen on girls, at least not in that way. He’d been sure Sandy wouldn’t use his confession against him, but Evan had still been wary, having never confided in anyone before. Sandy, however, had been unflustered by his revelation. He’d asked a few forthright questions, to which Evan had given self-conscious replies, then he’d let the subject drop, telling Evan he could talk to him if he wanted or needed to.
Evan had been astounded by Sandy’s generosity, and he’d slept exceedingly well that night, knowing he’d found a friend who would listen to him without judgement. He’d soon called on Sandy’s counsel, when he’d been confused—as he usually was—by signals he’d been getting from a new chap at work. After a lengthy conversation with Sandy, Evan had decided not to act on his unreliable intuition. The lad had been more than friendly since he’d started at Bailey’s, but Evan couldn’t afford to lose his job, which would be the least of the repercussions if he turned out to be mistaken. When his colleague had announced his engagement to a girl from Clapham the following month, he’d been sincerely grateful for Sandy’s wise advice.
As Evan attempted to finish his dinner, he thought he’d have a natter with Sandy later. They often met up for a chat in one or other of their rooms before they turned in for the night. Today’s topic of choice would no doubt be Sandy’s latest rendezvous with Ada, the girl from the Lyons tea shop, but Evan thought he might mention his close shave with the man in the pub. Cheered by the prospect of a chinwag with Sandy and his afternoon off the following day, Evan found his last mouthful of suet pudding just a little more palatable.
All Lessons Learned by Charlie Cochrane
High Table was excellent as always and coffee back in the SCR was almost as good as the stuff Matthew had tasted in Boston with Rex. “I didn’t think you could get coffee like this in England. Camp Coffee seems to be the standard fayre and that’s hardly worth the effort of putting in the hot water.”
“Might as well drink diluted shoe polish,” Orlando agreed, with a smile. “The world’s changing, Mr. Ainslie, and I’m not sure I like the way it’s turning out.” Outside the security of his study they were back to surnames, just as it had always been his custom with Jonty. They wouldn’t change things, especially now the driving force for change had gone. “Goodnight, Dr. Panesar.” Orlando waved a greeting as the man in question departed, grinning madly as he dragged a poor unsuspecting guest off to the labs to show him his latest heap of metal masquerading as a technological breakthrough.
“He was on good form tonight. Certainly lights this place up.” Matthew tipped his head towards the other occupants of the SCR, only half a dozen remaining now and three of those apparently asleep.
“Aye, Panesar keeps this college alive at times. All the rest seem to have descended into semi-torpor.” Just so must life in St. Bride’s have been prior to 1905.
The comparative solitude gave the opportunity to speak more openly than usual in this room. “Why did you sign up for the army? You were doing such a worthwhile job already in Room 40.”
“Worthwhile? I suppose it must have been. It was certainly safe, if you’re really asking why anyone should turn up a cushy number in search of a surefire way of getting himself killed.” Orlando couldn’t hide the bitterness in his voice.
“I’m not asking that. It just occurred to me that your brain was maybe more usefully employed doing things that only men of your intelligence could do.”
“As opposed to being cannon-fodder like any other man with two arms and two legs and who cares how much brain?” Orlando frowned, passing his hand over his face. “I’m sorry, that was uncalled for. Your argument’s a fair one and I had it put to me on more than one occasion. How best to serve my country and all that.” He closed his eyes, rubbing his forehead as if soothing away the years. “Too many of them had died, Mr. Ainslie. My students. Did you know the Stewarts turned the Manor into a sort of hospital-cum-convalescent home? Opened the doors to a stream of soldiers—not just officers, other ranks as well—who needed some peace and quiet and care. My Italian sort-of-cousin took charge of the medical side and Mrs. Stewart was quartermistress.”
“Ah, the Italian connection.” Matthew grinned. “I saw the Baron Artigiano del Rame in The Times recently, taking over as chairman of Mrs. Stewart’s charity for—what did she call them? Unfortunate girls.”
“That’s the one.” Orlando couldn’t hide his pride in the family he’d never known he had, not until he was a grown man. “They’ve become quite pally, the houses of Coppersmith—Italian version—and Stewart. There’ll be an intermarriage with one of the latest batch of offspring, no doubt. One of Paolo’s girls and young George Broad is where the smart money lies.” Shame the really great love match between the two families could never have been officially recognised.
“Do you see a lot of them?”
“Not as much as I should, I suppose. I like them, don’t get me wrong, and they’ve welcomed me beyond all I could have hoped for, but it’s not like it was with the Stewarts.” Once experienced, nothing could compare to that family’s love and generosity.
“The hospital at the Manor…” Matthew brought the conversation back before the silence became awkward.
“Of course. I went down and visited one of my ex-students there.” Orlando shuddered in remembrance. “Physically it looked as if nothing had touched him and his mathematical capabilities were all still there, better than most of my dunderheads. But something had snapped inside him.”
Matthew nodded. “Never to be put together, no matter what any of the king’s horses or men could do?”
“It was that visit which made up my mind for me. How could I sit in a safe little room playing with letters and numbers when young men I’d had in my study trying to understand vectors, were being sacrificed? Little more than boys, who’d not seen anything of life, some of them.”
“So young.” Matthew shook his head, staring into his coffee cup. So many fresh faced lads he’d seen, passing through on their way to the front, enthusiastic and emboldened. He’d seen a few of them passing back—broken shells, bare remnants of humanity.
“So many.” The silence of the SCR was broken only by a murmuring from the other end of the room, one whispered conversation and the droning of gentle snores. “We had to go. We couldn’t not go, in all conscience.”
“At least you didn’t have to lie about your ages.”
“We’d have only had to if we’d been quick off the mark. By 1916, they weren’t so choosy.”
“I wish they’d been more scrupulous. Dear God, some of the lads I saw looked no more than schoolboys.” Such meticulous and painstaking checking there’d been at some of the recruitment centres, such desperation to get bodies into the system. Seventeen, did you say? Go out and come back in and then answer the question again, there’s a good man. Babes in arms, literally.
“There were times I didn’t think there’d be one of us left standing.”
“I still can’t believe I’ll never see Mrs. Stewart again. Oh, I’m sorry.” Matthew worried whether he’d overstepped the line, if the pain of bereavement was still too close for anything more than formal expressions of condolence. Orlando’s face suggested too much hurt still lingered.
“No, please talk about them. So few people do talk of the dead.” Orlando managed an unexpected smile. “A world without Mrs. Stewart’s kind heart seems a much colder place. She meant a great deal to me.”
“I saw the obituaries in the papers, although they didn’t do either of their subjects justice.” Matthew drew out his wallet. “I kept the clippings, just in case you wanted them and hadn’t been able to get hold of the newspapers. I’ll understand if you would find them too painful.”
Orlando put out his hand, which was shaking slightly. “I’d appreciate them very much, thank you.” He took the little pieces of paper without reading them, putting them in his notebook for later scrutiny. Perhaps.
“It was the flu, they said, that took both of them. Or complications following it.” Matthew slipped his wallet back into his inside pocket, the action giving him time to choose his words. “The newspapers weren’t very clear.”
“Lavinia said they’d made a bit of a mess of things, one of the so-called correspondents getting all the details wrong. There was quite a stir, I believe, among the family.” Orlando studied his hands. “I wish I’d been here to help, to clear up the mess. I felt so bloody helpless, miles from anyone.”
The uncharacteristic swearing—especially in the SCR—the equally uncharacteristic baring of the Coppersmith soul, took Matthew aback. Still, it was understandable. He had Rex to tell his troubles to, if the occasion arose, but Orlando hadn’t a confidante in all the world, except for him.
“The news shook me up pretty badly. God knows, I saw enough death out there, but that…” he ran his hands through his hair, “…that was almost the last straw. Something snapped inside me.”
Matthew held his tongue. There’d been at least one occasion in the past when things had snapped, when things had overwhelmed Orlando to the extent he’d upped sticks and left, leaving Jonty and his family bereft and desperate to find their prodigal.
“I volunteered for a mission from which I didn’t expect to return.” Orlando raised his hand to prevent any interruption. “I was an idiot, I know. And apparently they didn’t expect me to return, either. Missing, presumed dead, that’s what everyone was told.”
“Couldn’t you get word back?”
“I did as soon as I could. Trouble is I was out for the count for a fortnight. I woke up in a German hospital and couldn’t even remember who I was for the first few days. Lost a lot of blood, with it.” Orlando passed his hand over his eyes, in remembrance of the previous time he’d lost his memory. Some mysterious part of his brain seemed inclined to shut down when it decided he needed protecting. “It seemed to take forever to get word back that I was still alive. It must have been the October of last year.”
Matthew waited as Orlando gathered himself again. He knew what it was like to lose someone you loved to a violent death, but for loss to have piled upon loss… No wonder something “had snapped”. Maybe it could never be repaired.
“I’m sorry, I sound like some snivelling child.”
“That’s fine, old man. God knows it doesn’t bother me.” Matthew reached into his pocket again. It was time for decisive action. “This may not be the opportune moment, but I’ve got something here—I’d be grateful if you could cast your eye, and your mind, over it.” He produced an envelope, which he put in Orlando’s shaking hand.
The effect was better than he’d hoped, his friend showing an instant, if slightly grave interest in the letter the envelope held. “It’s from Collingwood.” The genuine note of curiosity in Orlando’s voice was a good sign. “Isn’t he retired by now?”
“Do solicitors ever retire? He keeps his hand in, for favoured clients. He remembered the time you helped us and he wanted to turn to you again.” Matthew was heartened by the glint in his friend’s eye, one he hadn’t seen there for a long time. “If you’re still willing to take a commission.”
“Willing?” Orlando turned the letter in his hands, as if he was trying to remember what a commission might entail, why it was being brought to him. He smiled, suddenly and unexpectedly. “Of course I will. It’ll give me something to live for, Mr. Ainslie. I thought I would never have that feeling again.”
The Courage to Love by EE Montgomery
Chapter One
Brisbane, July 1919
THE westerlies began early this year. The icy winter wind cut straight through my clothes. I tugged my collar closer around my face, shoved my gloved hands into the pockets of my overcoat, and stared at the weathered headstone. The words carved into the pale granite were now dark and legible. The southern side of the stone held a slight greenish tinge, the beginnings of moss growth, but someone had been caring for Carl. The grass around the grave was neatly trimmed, and there was a small bowl of fresh camellias beside the headstone.
We could not say good-bye.
My heart is broken.
“It still is, Carl,” I whispered. “Every day.”
Eventually, my shivering became so extreme I had to leave. I looked up at a sky tinged orange and pink and knew if I didn’t run, I’d miss the last tram into the city.
MOTHER’S shrill voice started before I finished unbuttoning my coat. “Where have you been, David? Dinner’s been ready for over an hour. You know what time to be home.” The diminutive woman who ruled my every waking moment when I was at home came into the front hall. She had pulled her graying hair back into her usual severe bun, her thin lips were pinched in disapproval, and her gray eyes glared accusingly as I turned from hanging my coat on the coat stand. “Well?”
“I was just walking around, Mother.”
“Mrs. Edwards and Esther came for afternoon tea. I expected you to be home.”
I stifled the sigh that wanted to escape, but judging by the frown on Mother’s face, I probably didn’t hide my relief very well. The excuses I’d once used dried on my tongue. I would no longer pretend to be someone I wasn’t. After Carl, I’d not get drawn or trapped into marrying a woman my mother chose. Or any woman.
“Did you go to the Post Office and get your job back?”
I couldn’t control the sigh this time. I had gone in there in the morning, and nothing had changed. The checkered tiles still muted footsteps from the doors to the counter. The polished oak counter and stair railings gleamed in the light as they had before. The large room still smelled of old paper, ink, and furniture polish. The only difference was the new faces behind the counter. And me. I was different too, but no one understood that, least of all my mother. I didn’t want to go back to the Post Office, but I wanted to stay in this house even less.
“I begin on Monday.”
Her consideration of me changed, and I suppressed a cringe, standing taller, my back rigid, knowing what she’d say next.
“Good, then you’ll be able to pay more board.” She returned to the living room and sat among the threadbare spotlessness of worn carpets and upholstery. A small fire burned in the grate, lending a homey feel to the one room my mother spent time in. She positioned her feet precisely together, as a lady should, and picked up her mending. “Your dinner is in the oven.”
Dried-out cottage pie and wrinkled, woody carrots, burned on the tips, sat forlornly on an enameled plate in the hot side of the wood-fired oven. I sat at the scarred kitchen table and shoveled the food into my mouth, chewing and swallowing without tasting anything. I didn’t care what my mother served. Everything here tasted better than what I’d eaten the last four years. If I never saw bully beef, tinned peaches, or golden syrup again, it would be too soon.
When I finished, I placed my plate in the tub of water sitting in the sink and stared at the dim reflection of myself in the grubby window. I shuffled my feet against the gritty, sticky floor, then went up the stairs to my room, grateful every day that it was positioned directly over the kitchen and its warmth.
I pulled my suitcase from the top of the wardrobe, sneezed at the dust that came down with it, and packed as many of my clothes and books as would fit. I put the filled suitcase back on top of the wardrobe, hung my pants, coat, and shirt over a chair, crawled into my narrow bed, and stared at the stained ceiling.
I woke in the dark hours before dawn to screams echoing in my room and, from what I knew from her complaints after other nightmares, the thump of my mother’s shoe hitting the other side of the wall above my head. I rose and dressed, then went down the back stairs. Within five minutes, I was free of the house and headed for the river.
OUR glade was unchanged except for the cigarette ends that littered the flattened grass in the middle. The white paper-ends, left by careless smokers, glowed dully in the predawn light. I crawled under the drooping leaves of the willow and leaned against the trunk. I closed my eyes as I remembered the times I’d spent there with Carl, holding his warm body against mine, before the ugliness of our world exploded.
I woke reaching for my rifle, only to have my fingers bump against roots and dew-damp mulch. Murmured voices faded downriver as their unseen owners meandered along the nearby path. I stared through the fractured canopy above me until my breathing settled and my heart rate calmed. When I was sure I was in the glade and not at war, and that no one waited to shoot me, I crawled out of the dimness, brushed myself off, and walked along the riverbank toward Mrs. Gill’s in New Farm.
The house had suffered while I’d been away. The paint looked dull. Sections on the western side had begun to peel and flake away. Dirt clouded the louvered windows that formed the top half of the closed-in wraparound verandas on both the ground floor and the floor above. A small gum tree sprouted in the drooping gutter at the corner of the corrugated iron roof. The front gate needed oiling—the hinges caught and screeched as I pushed it open and closed. The grass beside the path needed cutting, while the flower beds on either side of the short set of stairs to the front door still flourished amid a tangle of weeds, though not much but azaleas were in bloom. The roses, planted in round mounds of mulch leading the way from the gate to the stairs, had been pruned and were beginning to shoot. Over to the side of the front yard, between the house and the fence, a scraggly Geraldton Wax leaned away from the wind, its purple geometrically arranged flowers whipped to a frenzy against the fence dividing this yard from the one next door.
I took the front stairs two at a time, as I always had, only remembering when I reached the landing, there was nothing worth running toward anymore. I took a deep breath and knocked on the door. I hoped Mrs. Gill remembered me and that she had a room to spare.
“Mr. Harrison, you’re back!” Mrs. Gill pulled me into the entry and enveloped me in a lavender-scented hug. Then she pushed me away and fussed with the position of a bowl of camellias on the side table. They were the same color as the flowers at Carl’s grave. “Come on in and tell me when you got back.”
I followed the bustling woman down the long hallway—past the doors to the dining room and parlor, the stairs to the upper level, and the short hallway that led to boarders’ rooms and the downstairs bathroom—to the back of the house and stepped down the single step into the warm kitchen.
There were only good memories in this room. Mrs. Gill’s stove was the same model as my mother’s, but where my mother’s was dull black and smoked from its poorly cleaned flue, Mrs. Gill’s shone from Stove Black and produced a sweet, clean warmth that immediately soothed me. Mrs. Gill tapped the back of one of the wooden chairs as she passed. “Sit, sit, Mr. Harrison.”
She dragged a heavy kettle from the back right corner of the stove to the left, directly above the fire. I looked around the room as I sat. The scrubbed wooden table top was the same, but the large basket that usually contained fruit was gone. The potato sack hanging on the back of the open pantry door was half-full. On the floor in the pantry was a bucket filled with turnips and cabbages. The icebox in the corner of the room didn’t sweat as it usually did when freshly stocked with ice but appeared to be the same temperature as the rest of the room. The stone floor gleamed, clean and smooth in the early morning light that streamed in through the windows over the stove.
Outside, in the backyard, the vegetable patch brought memories of lazy Sunday afternoons in my room, laughing as Carl, naked and flushed from our loving, leaned out the window and tried to scare the crows from the corn. Tall stalks of corn and trellised beans waved in the breeze, but appeared neglected, overgrown with weeds, like a remnant of a better life that would never be seen again. The tall jacaranda tree in the back corner appeared unchanged, and provided shade over nearly half the yard. In front of the vegetable garden, over to the side of the privy, white sheets flapped in the breeze on lines strung across the yard from the small washhouse.
“I’ll make us a nice cup of tea, and you can tell me all that you’ve been doing since you came back and what you have planned now.” Mrs. Gill pulled down cups and saucers from the dresser against the wall facing the sink.
I sat and breathed deeply for the first time in what felt like months. Everyone else wanted to know about the war. They asked if I’d had fun in France and how many French women I’d met. They told me I must be “so proud to have served King and country” and be pleased to have driven the Huns back. I’m glad Mrs. Gill didn’t.
“So how are you settling back in, Mr. Harrison? Several of our young men from here never returned.” She cleared her throat. “But you’d know more about that than I would, I expect.” She placed a cup of steaming tea in front of me and pushed the sugar over. “We lost nearly half our chickens in a storm a few months ago, so it’s going to be difficult to keep eggs on the table until new ones arrive, but I’m sure we’ll manage, dear. We always do.” She sat and, pulling the saucer, drew her teacup toward her.
I flinched at the rattled china-scrape across the table.
Mrs. Gill added milk to her tea, picked up a teaspoon, and stirred it as she stared at the swirling liquid. “I suppose you’ve found better accommodations since you returned?”
“Actually, no, Mrs. Gill. I’ve been staying with my mother, but I was wondering if my old room was available.” My speech was as I had rehearsed, but my throat felt scratchy, like I wanted to cough or vomit. I had no idea what I’d do if Mrs. Gill had rented my room to someone else. The only thing I knew for sure was I couldn’t spend another night under my mother’s roof.
“Oh.” Mrs. Gill looked up at me, her faded blue eyes showing an endearing combination of surprise, pleasure, and dismay. “Actually, it’s not available, Mr. Harrison. I put Mr. Donnelly in your old room, on account of it being at the back of the house and quieter.”
I nodded and tried to smile, but my stomach churned. I twisted my fingers together in my lap, my nerves stretched so tight I thought I would start screaming and never stop.
“I expect you’re looking for a quiet room as well.” She considered me carefully for several seconds. I was relieved that she seemed to instinctively understand. “With so many motor cars around lately, all the front rooms will be too noisy for you. You could have Mr. George’s old room if you wanted.” After making this statement, Mrs. Gill jumped up, grabbed a cloth, and wiped the table down, then refilled my cup, even though I’d barely taken two sips from it.
“It’s not taken?” My heart pounded and I closed my eyes against the image of Carl, in pain, his eyes crying out his love for me even as he breathed his last. I didn’t know if I could go back into that room, yet part of me couldn’t stay away.
“No.” Mrs. Gill hesitated. “Some gentlemen don’t like the thought that someone died there, but you and Mr. George were such close friends, I thought you wouldn’t mind.”
The alternative was my mother’s. I’d rather be somewhere Carl had been. “I start back at the Post Office on Monday. Would I be able to move in today and pay the board after I receive my first wage?”
Mrs. Gill beamed at me. “Of course, dear. You didn’t bring anything with you?” She looked around the kitchen as if expecting to see a suitcase materialize even though we both knew I hadn’t arrived with anything. Mrs. Gill reached over and patted my arm. “It’s good to have you back, Mr. Harrison.”
I smiled at her. “And it’s good to be back, Mrs. Gill.”
For the first time since the ship had landed back in Australia, I meant those words.
I RETURNED to my mother’s house in the afternoon. Today was her library afternoon, in which she met several like-minded matrons at the local library and they discussed in hushed whispers the state of the neighborhood. It was cowardly, but I didn’t want to face her. I’d had enough of people screaming at me, and if I had to listen to one more of her tirades, I would say something irrevocable. As much as I no longer wanted to live with her, she was my mother, and I needed to treat her with as much respect as I was able to. Unfortunately, that meant behaving like the basest coward and running away.
I left a note on the kitchen table, collected my suitcase, and shoved the front door key under the door as I left.
CARL’S room felt like me: it looked the same, but it was empty. The washstand still held the same fluted blue-and-white basin and jug, but his brushes and shaving gear were gone. I laid out my toiletries precisely but on the opposite side of the basin from where he’d always stored his. After hanging my clothes in the single wardrobe, I pushed them to the left, leaving enough room for as many again beside them. Then I positioned the suitcase on its side on top of the wardrobe. I stared at the bed, but didn’t touch it. His bed had always been narrower than mine, so I’d never slept in it. If I closed my eyes, I could see Carl as he was the last time I saw him, belly swollen, bones broken, tears streaming down his face.
I didn’t close my eyes.
Mrs. Gill let me take one of the brocade wing-back chairs from the downstairs sitting room. I positioned it near the window, facing out so I could sit and look at the garden, with the branches of the jacaranda tree gracefully protecting the corner of the vegetable garden from the midday sun. I kept it at an angle so I could also see the door. On the floor beside the chair, I placed a sturdy branch that had fallen from the gum tree in the neighbor’s yard.
At dinner that night, I met the other boarders. I remembered one from my previous time there, but the other two were new. I forgot their names before I’d finished shaking their hands. They took their places at the dining table, leaving one place setting unclaimed. They sat silently and avoided looking at each other, a stark contrast to the noisy conversation that had heralded their arrival. The two other dining tables were bare of place settings. I went to the kitchen.
“Mrs. Gill, is there anything I can help you with?” I asked as I walked into the room.
A crash greeted me, and I looked over to see a tall, thin young man, with a head of unruly mahogany curls, crouched over a smashed plate. He frantically scooped scattered food onto the largest piece of plate. As I watched, blood bloomed on his hand, and I rushed over to him.
“Mr. Harrison, don’t.”
“You’ve cut yourself,” I murmured as I reached for the young man’s hand. “Let me see.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what happened next. One moment I crouched next to the injured man, the next I lay sprawled on the floor with food splattered over me and the young man curled into a whimpering ball, pressed against the wall beside the stove. His trousers rode up his ankles as he curled in on himself, but I could see the fabric gathering under his belt, a testament to recently lost weight.
“Mr. Harrison, come away now.”
I looked up to see Mrs. Gill standing on the far side of the table, concern etching wrinkles into her forehead.
“Come now, Mr. Harrison, I’ll put your dinner in the dining room with the others.” She loaded a large wooden tray with plates of steaming food and left. I glanced at the man on the floor, and I felt torn between doing as Mrs. Gill instructed and helping the man.
The whimpers had stopped, but the man hadn’t moved, his face resolutely hidden from me. I determined to ask Mrs. Gill about him after dinner, then went to eat my meal.
By the time I’d finished eating, I’d decided I would ask Mrs. Gill if I could eat in the kitchen from then on. Anything would be better than the uncomfortable silences alternating with generalized complaints against society that had accompanied my meal in the dining room.
“THAT’S Mr. Donnelly.” Mrs. Gill efficiently dried plates and put them in a stack with a clack. “I mentioned him this morning.”
“Is he…?”
“He was in the war, Mr. Harrison.” Mrs. Gill turned to stare at me. “I’m sure you know the kinds of things he might have experienced.”
Shell shock. I’d seen it before. Good soldiers, even great soldiers, started to sob and not stop, even when the medics came to carry them out. Others experienced flashbacks so bad they went on rampages and shot everything that moved. Hell, I’d even experienced some of that myself. I still had nightmares.
“How long has he been with you?”
“Only a couple of months. He just needs things quiet for a while, I think.”
Hence giving him the back bedroom. I placed my hand on her shoulder. “You’re a good woman, Mrs. Gill.”
Brisbane, July 1919
THE westerlies began early this year. The icy winter wind cut straight through my clothes. I tugged my collar closer around my face, shoved my gloved hands into the pockets of my overcoat, and stared at the weathered headstone. The words carved into the pale granite were now dark and legible. The southern side of the stone held a slight greenish tinge, the beginnings of moss growth, but someone had been caring for Carl. The grass around the grave was neatly trimmed, and there was a small bowl of fresh camellias beside the headstone.
We could not say good-bye.
My heart is broken.
“It still is, Carl,” I whispered. “Every day.”
Eventually, my shivering became so extreme I had to leave. I looked up at a sky tinged orange and pink and knew if I didn’t run, I’d miss the last tram into the city.
MOTHER’S shrill voice started before I finished unbuttoning my coat. “Where have you been, David? Dinner’s been ready for over an hour. You know what time to be home.” The diminutive woman who ruled my every waking moment when I was at home came into the front hall. She had pulled her graying hair back into her usual severe bun, her thin lips were pinched in disapproval, and her gray eyes glared accusingly as I turned from hanging my coat on the coat stand. “Well?”
“I was just walking around, Mother.”
“Mrs. Edwards and Esther came for afternoon tea. I expected you to be home.”
I stifled the sigh that wanted to escape, but judging by the frown on Mother’s face, I probably didn’t hide my relief very well. The excuses I’d once used dried on my tongue. I would no longer pretend to be someone I wasn’t. After Carl, I’d not get drawn or trapped into marrying a woman my mother chose. Or any woman.
“Did you go to the Post Office and get your job back?”
I couldn’t control the sigh this time. I had gone in there in the morning, and nothing had changed. The checkered tiles still muted footsteps from the doors to the counter. The polished oak counter and stair railings gleamed in the light as they had before. The large room still smelled of old paper, ink, and furniture polish. The only difference was the new faces behind the counter. And me. I was different too, but no one understood that, least of all my mother. I didn’t want to go back to the Post Office, but I wanted to stay in this house even less.
“I begin on Monday.”
Her consideration of me changed, and I suppressed a cringe, standing taller, my back rigid, knowing what she’d say next.
“Good, then you’ll be able to pay more board.” She returned to the living room and sat among the threadbare spotlessness of worn carpets and upholstery. A small fire burned in the grate, lending a homey feel to the one room my mother spent time in. She positioned her feet precisely together, as a lady should, and picked up her mending. “Your dinner is in the oven.”
Dried-out cottage pie and wrinkled, woody carrots, burned on the tips, sat forlornly on an enameled plate in the hot side of the wood-fired oven. I sat at the scarred kitchen table and shoveled the food into my mouth, chewing and swallowing without tasting anything. I didn’t care what my mother served. Everything here tasted better than what I’d eaten the last four years. If I never saw bully beef, tinned peaches, or golden syrup again, it would be too soon.
When I finished, I placed my plate in the tub of water sitting in the sink and stared at the dim reflection of myself in the grubby window. I shuffled my feet against the gritty, sticky floor, then went up the stairs to my room, grateful every day that it was positioned directly over the kitchen and its warmth.
I pulled my suitcase from the top of the wardrobe, sneezed at the dust that came down with it, and packed as many of my clothes and books as would fit. I put the filled suitcase back on top of the wardrobe, hung my pants, coat, and shirt over a chair, crawled into my narrow bed, and stared at the stained ceiling.
I woke in the dark hours before dawn to screams echoing in my room and, from what I knew from her complaints after other nightmares, the thump of my mother’s shoe hitting the other side of the wall above my head. I rose and dressed, then went down the back stairs. Within five minutes, I was free of the house and headed for the river.
OUR glade was unchanged except for the cigarette ends that littered the flattened grass in the middle. The white paper-ends, left by careless smokers, glowed dully in the predawn light. I crawled under the drooping leaves of the willow and leaned against the trunk. I closed my eyes as I remembered the times I’d spent there with Carl, holding his warm body against mine, before the ugliness of our world exploded.
I woke reaching for my rifle, only to have my fingers bump against roots and dew-damp mulch. Murmured voices faded downriver as their unseen owners meandered along the nearby path. I stared through the fractured canopy above me until my breathing settled and my heart rate calmed. When I was sure I was in the glade and not at war, and that no one waited to shoot me, I crawled out of the dimness, brushed myself off, and walked along the riverbank toward Mrs. Gill’s in New Farm.
The house had suffered while I’d been away. The paint looked dull. Sections on the western side had begun to peel and flake away. Dirt clouded the louvered windows that formed the top half of the closed-in wraparound verandas on both the ground floor and the floor above. A small gum tree sprouted in the drooping gutter at the corner of the corrugated iron roof. The front gate needed oiling—the hinges caught and screeched as I pushed it open and closed. The grass beside the path needed cutting, while the flower beds on either side of the short set of stairs to the front door still flourished amid a tangle of weeds, though not much but azaleas were in bloom. The roses, planted in round mounds of mulch leading the way from the gate to the stairs, had been pruned and were beginning to shoot. Over to the side of the front yard, between the house and the fence, a scraggly Geraldton Wax leaned away from the wind, its purple geometrically arranged flowers whipped to a frenzy against the fence dividing this yard from the one next door.
I took the front stairs two at a time, as I always had, only remembering when I reached the landing, there was nothing worth running toward anymore. I took a deep breath and knocked on the door. I hoped Mrs. Gill remembered me and that she had a room to spare.
“Mr. Harrison, you’re back!” Mrs. Gill pulled me into the entry and enveloped me in a lavender-scented hug. Then she pushed me away and fussed with the position of a bowl of camellias on the side table. They were the same color as the flowers at Carl’s grave. “Come on in and tell me when you got back.”
I followed the bustling woman down the long hallway—past the doors to the dining room and parlor, the stairs to the upper level, and the short hallway that led to boarders’ rooms and the downstairs bathroom—to the back of the house and stepped down the single step into the warm kitchen.
There were only good memories in this room. Mrs. Gill’s stove was the same model as my mother’s, but where my mother’s was dull black and smoked from its poorly cleaned flue, Mrs. Gill’s shone from Stove Black and produced a sweet, clean warmth that immediately soothed me. Mrs. Gill tapped the back of one of the wooden chairs as she passed. “Sit, sit, Mr. Harrison.”
She dragged a heavy kettle from the back right corner of the stove to the left, directly above the fire. I looked around the room as I sat. The scrubbed wooden table top was the same, but the large basket that usually contained fruit was gone. The potato sack hanging on the back of the open pantry door was half-full. On the floor in the pantry was a bucket filled with turnips and cabbages. The icebox in the corner of the room didn’t sweat as it usually did when freshly stocked with ice but appeared to be the same temperature as the rest of the room. The stone floor gleamed, clean and smooth in the early morning light that streamed in through the windows over the stove.
Outside, in the backyard, the vegetable patch brought memories of lazy Sunday afternoons in my room, laughing as Carl, naked and flushed from our loving, leaned out the window and tried to scare the crows from the corn. Tall stalks of corn and trellised beans waved in the breeze, but appeared neglected, overgrown with weeds, like a remnant of a better life that would never be seen again. The tall jacaranda tree in the back corner appeared unchanged, and provided shade over nearly half the yard. In front of the vegetable garden, over to the side of the privy, white sheets flapped in the breeze on lines strung across the yard from the small washhouse.
“I’ll make us a nice cup of tea, and you can tell me all that you’ve been doing since you came back and what you have planned now.” Mrs. Gill pulled down cups and saucers from the dresser against the wall facing the sink.
I sat and breathed deeply for the first time in what felt like months. Everyone else wanted to know about the war. They asked if I’d had fun in France and how many French women I’d met. They told me I must be “so proud to have served King and country” and be pleased to have driven the Huns back. I’m glad Mrs. Gill didn’t.
“So how are you settling back in, Mr. Harrison? Several of our young men from here never returned.” She cleared her throat. “But you’d know more about that than I would, I expect.” She placed a cup of steaming tea in front of me and pushed the sugar over. “We lost nearly half our chickens in a storm a few months ago, so it’s going to be difficult to keep eggs on the table until new ones arrive, but I’m sure we’ll manage, dear. We always do.” She sat and, pulling the saucer, drew her teacup toward her.
I flinched at the rattled china-scrape across the table.
Mrs. Gill added milk to her tea, picked up a teaspoon, and stirred it as she stared at the swirling liquid. “I suppose you’ve found better accommodations since you returned?”
“Actually, no, Mrs. Gill. I’ve been staying with my mother, but I was wondering if my old room was available.” My speech was as I had rehearsed, but my throat felt scratchy, like I wanted to cough or vomit. I had no idea what I’d do if Mrs. Gill had rented my room to someone else. The only thing I knew for sure was I couldn’t spend another night under my mother’s roof.
“Oh.” Mrs. Gill looked up at me, her faded blue eyes showing an endearing combination of surprise, pleasure, and dismay. “Actually, it’s not available, Mr. Harrison. I put Mr. Donnelly in your old room, on account of it being at the back of the house and quieter.”
I nodded and tried to smile, but my stomach churned. I twisted my fingers together in my lap, my nerves stretched so tight I thought I would start screaming and never stop.
“I expect you’re looking for a quiet room as well.” She considered me carefully for several seconds. I was relieved that she seemed to instinctively understand. “With so many motor cars around lately, all the front rooms will be too noisy for you. You could have Mr. George’s old room if you wanted.” After making this statement, Mrs. Gill jumped up, grabbed a cloth, and wiped the table down, then refilled my cup, even though I’d barely taken two sips from it.
“It’s not taken?” My heart pounded and I closed my eyes against the image of Carl, in pain, his eyes crying out his love for me even as he breathed his last. I didn’t know if I could go back into that room, yet part of me couldn’t stay away.
“No.” Mrs. Gill hesitated. “Some gentlemen don’t like the thought that someone died there, but you and Mr. George were such close friends, I thought you wouldn’t mind.”
The alternative was my mother’s. I’d rather be somewhere Carl had been. “I start back at the Post Office on Monday. Would I be able to move in today and pay the board after I receive my first wage?”
Mrs. Gill beamed at me. “Of course, dear. You didn’t bring anything with you?” She looked around the kitchen as if expecting to see a suitcase materialize even though we both knew I hadn’t arrived with anything. Mrs. Gill reached over and patted my arm. “It’s good to have you back, Mr. Harrison.”
I smiled at her. “And it’s good to be back, Mrs. Gill.”
For the first time since the ship had landed back in Australia, I meant those words.
I RETURNED to my mother’s house in the afternoon. Today was her library afternoon, in which she met several like-minded matrons at the local library and they discussed in hushed whispers the state of the neighborhood. It was cowardly, but I didn’t want to face her. I’d had enough of people screaming at me, and if I had to listen to one more of her tirades, I would say something irrevocable. As much as I no longer wanted to live with her, she was my mother, and I needed to treat her with as much respect as I was able to. Unfortunately, that meant behaving like the basest coward and running away.
I left a note on the kitchen table, collected my suitcase, and shoved the front door key under the door as I left.
CARL’S room felt like me: it looked the same, but it was empty. The washstand still held the same fluted blue-and-white basin and jug, but his brushes and shaving gear were gone. I laid out my toiletries precisely but on the opposite side of the basin from where he’d always stored his. After hanging my clothes in the single wardrobe, I pushed them to the left, leaving enough room for as many again beside them. Then I positioned the suitcase on its side on top of the wardrobe. I stared at the bed, but didn’t touch it. His bed had always been narrower than mine, so I’d never slept in it. If I closed my eyes, I could see Carl as he was the last time I saw him, belly swollen, bones broken, tears streaming down his face.
I didn’t close my eyes.
Mrs. Gill let me take one of the brocade wing-back chairs from the downstairs sitting room. I positioned it near the window, facing out so I could sit and look at the garden, with the branches of the jacaranda tree gracefully protecting the corner of the vegetable garden from the midday sun. I kept it at an angle so I could also see the door. On the floor beside the chair, I placed a sturdy branch that had fallen from the gum tree in the neighbor’s yard.
At dinner that night, I met the other boarders. I remembered one from my previous time there, but the other two were new. I forgot their names before I’d finished shaking their hands. They took their places at the dining table, leaving one place setting unclaimed. They sat silently and avoided looking at each other, a stark contrast to the noisy conversation that had heralded their arrival. The two other dining tables were bare of place settings. I went to the kitchen.
“Mrs. Gill, is there anything I can help you with?” I asked as I walked into the room.
A crash greeted me, and I looked over to see a tall, thin young man, with a head of unruly mahogany curls, crouched over a smashed plate. He frantically scooped scattered food onto the largest piece of plate. As I watched, blood bloomed on his hand, and I rushed over to him.
“Mr. Harrison, don’t.”
“You’ve cut yourself,” I murmured as I reached for the young man’s hand. “Let me see.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what happened next. One moment I crouched next to the injured man, the next I lay sprawled on the floor with food splattered over me and the young man curled into a whimpering ball, pressed against the wall beside the stove. His trousers rode up his ankles as he curled in on himself, but I could see the fabric gathering under his belt, a testament to recently lost weight.
“Mr. Harrison, come away now.”
I looked up to see Mrs. Gill standing on the far side of the table, concern etching wrinkles into her forehead.
“Come now, Mr. Harrison, I’ll put your dinner in the dining room with the others.” She loaded a large wooden tray with plates of steaming food and left. I glanced at the man on the floor, and I felt torn between doing as Mrs. Gill instructed and helping the man.
The whimpers had stopped, but the man hadn’t moved, his face resolutely hidden from me. I determined to ask Mrs. Gill about him after dinner, then went to eat my meal.
By the time I’d finished eating, I’d decided I would ask Mrs. Gill if I could eat in the kitchen from then on. Anything would be better than the uncomfortable silences alternating with generalized complaints against society that had accompanied my meal in the dining room.
“THAT’S Mr. Donnelly.” Mrs. Gill efficiently dried plates and put them in a stack with a clack. “I mentioned him this morning.”
“Is he…?”
“He was in the war, Mr. Harrison.” Mrs. Gill turned to stare at me. “I’m sure you know the kinds of things he might have experienced.”
Shell shock. I’d seen it before. Good soldiers, even great soldiers, started to sob and not stop, even when the medics came to carry them out. Others experienced flashbacks so bad they went on rampages and shot everything that moved. Hell, I’d even experienced some of that myself. I still had nightmares.
“How long has he been with you?”
“Only a couple of months. He just needs things quiet for a while, I think.”
Hence giving him the back bedroom. I placed my hand on her shoulder. “You’re a good woman, Mrs. Gill.”
The Door Behind Us by John C Houser
Chapter 1
1965
THE YOUNG man still had a dressing over one ear and a crust of blood inside one nostril. The doctor paged through the chart. Notations recorded progress as good as could be expected for such a recent amputee. “Mind if I look?” He pulled back the sheet and noted the wound drained normally. “How’d he rest last night?”
The resident pulled at his narrow tie. “Poorly. He was yelling and thrashing around. That’s why I asked for you to look in.”
“Hmm. Has he been given anything to help him sleep?”
“No, he even tried to refuse the morphine.”
“That’s interesting.” He watched the steady rise and fall of the muscular chest. “He’s a sergeant. Was he a squad leader? Do you know what happened to him?”
The resident shook his head, yawning. “Nope. He hasn’t said much.”
“Does he know about the leg?”
“We told him there was too much nerve damage.”
“The nightmares started before the surgery?”
“Before.” The resident yawned again. “From the first night he was here.”
“There’s not much I can do for him until he wakes up. You’ll have me paged?”
Chapter 2
1919
FRANK CAME into the barn sniffing the air like the scent might tell him whether the place was dangerous.
“About time you got here. Saw the note, I take it? Any questions?” Charlie watched the boy take in the stone barn, from hayloft to the three-legged stool where he sat. “Questions?” he prompted the boy a second time.
Cocking his head as if sorting through a stack of mental index cards, the boy eventually picked a pair of questions. “What happened to me? Why can’t I remember?”
“You received a head injury, maybe from a shell explosion. That’s what the quacks at the hospital told us. But that doesn’t answer your question, does it? Why don’t you remember anything? I don’t know. Here, grab a bucket. I expect your hands remember how to milk a cow, even if your head don’t.” Charlie watched the boy’s hand creep upward to touch his head. “Queenie knows you, even if you don’t know her.”
Frank picked up a bucket hesitantly.
Charlie nodded at a Jersey cow that stamped impatiently at her stanchion. “She’s waiting.”
What was it like for the boy to discover who he was every morning from a note tacked to the door of the privy? If the boy had any feelings about it, he never told Charlie.
THE BOY discovered the note after waking in an unfamiliar room. Pale light filtered through a dusty window at the end of a tunnellike dormer. Feeling exposed even under a woolen blanket, he slid to the floor and rolled part way underneath the bed. More comfortable with the solid frame looming over him, he stayed for a time, staring upward. As the light strengthened, he let his gaze follow the lines of wood grain in the window frame. The builder of this house had cut matching pieces for the verticals, their patterns mirrored on either side of the window.
Eventually he rose and struggled out of the tangled bedclothes. A small writing desk, cluttered with loose sheets of writing paper, a fountain pen, and an inkpot, was tucked into the dormer. A stack of unopened envelopes lay next to the writing supplies. The first was postmarked in July of 1918, and the last in October of the same year. Why didn’t this fellow, Francis Huddleston, open his mail?
Gut fluttering like an anxious bird, he peered under the bed for a chamber pot. Finding none, he rushed down to the second floor looking for a toilet or the way to the privy. Steps led down toward either end of the house. The set in the back were coarse and painted rather than finished, a servant’s stair. He knew the term, even if he didn’t know where he’d learned it. Down again, he found a large kitchen and heavy door framed in pantry shelves. He ran out into the yard. A well-worn path led to a small, clapboard structure with high windows. A minute later, as he tried not to breathe the acrid stink, he noticed a ruled sheet of writing paper tacked to the door in front of him. GOOD MORNING was blocked out in square letters.
GOOD MORNING
Your name is Francis “Frank” Huddleston. You are a soldier, returned from the war in Europe. The white-haired man milking the cows in the barn is your grandfather, Charlie Clark. He will welcome your help with the chores. When you return from the barn, the gray-haired woman in the kitchen will give you breakfast. She is your grandmother, Edith “Eddy” Clark.
Charlie continued to milk his own cow and watched as Frank began to squeeze a stream of milk from Queenie’s teats, the familiar act calming the boy. Soon the milk squirted steadily, and Frank fell into a kind of trance, his movements automatic, until a diminishing stream and restless stamp from Queenie signaled time to change to a new pair of teats. Shifting to a new set, he rested his head against Queenie’s side and continued mechanically.
Charlie finished first and went to stand behind the boy. When Frank was done, he placed his hands on his knees and looked around. Charlie held his breath and watched Frank’s face. But there was only a tightening around Frank’s mouth and a narrowed gaze. Charlie sighed and placed a hand on Frank’s shoulder. “It’s all right, boy. I’m your grandfather, Charlie Clark. You’re Frank Huddleston, come home from the war with a head injury. That’s why you don’t know me. Let’s go in and meet your grandmother. She’ll give us something to eat. Are you hungry? Don’t forget your bucket.”
EDDY’S SPOTTED hands twisted in her lap as she spoke. “Charlie isn’t a young man anymore. You’re a great worker, Frank, but it’s the forgetting. With one of us staying with you all the time to answer your questions, we can’t….”
Frank fidgeted in his chair and let his gaze wander over the worn fixtures and scarred wood of the kitchen. He wondered if they would ask him to leave, the strangers who had fed him for months, judging from the thick wad of notes in his hand. Would their faces ever be familiar?
“… so Charlie and I, we’ve posted a notice at the Grange Hall. We hope to have someone here by the harvest.”
Frank became aware the room had fallen silent—except for the tap dripping in the sink and the birds calling outside. Eddy and Charlie. They watched him closely as if they expected something, as if they were unsure of his response. He didn’t know why. Eddy’s careful announcement seemed to have little to do with him.
“Will you hire someone I knew… before?”
“No, Frank. You were with your parents in Philadelphia before the war. Nobody around here knows you.” Charlie looked away. His voice took on a rote quality. “They thought you might be more comfortable here with us while you recovered.”
“Will the new person stay with me or work with you?”
Charlie rubbed fingers across his forehead like he was trying to erase the wrinkles there, but Eddy answered in firm tones. “We have to be careful with our money, Frank. It may be cheaper to hire somebody to keep an eye on you and to help you remember when you have one of your spells. Charlie will work around the house.”
Frank fingered his notes again. “So… you want me to keep feeding the horses and milking the cows?”
“Yes, you’ll do that and other work as well.”
“Now, Eddy.” Charlie’s voice was gentle. “The boy’s still recovering. I’m not dead yet.”
“He’s strong as a bull, Charlie.”
“I don’t mind doing more, if that’s what you want.” Frank shifted from face to face until he focused on the sharp furrows at the side of Eddy’s mouth. “Just tell me what you want.”
“That’s what the new man will do,” Eddy said, looking at Charlie.
Charlie’s gaze dropped to his callused hands.
1965
THE YOUNG man still had a dressing over one ear and a crust of blood inside one nostril. The doctor paged through the chart. Notations recorded progress as good as could be expected for such a recent amputee. “Mind if I look?” He pulled back the sheet and noted the wound drained normally. “How’d he rest last night?”
The resident pulled at his narrow tie. “Poorly. He was yelling and thrashing around. That’s why I asked for you to look in.”
“Hmm. Has he been given anything to help him sleep?”
“No, he even tried to refuse the morphine.”
“That’s interesting.” He watched the steady rise and fall of the muscular chest. “He’s a sergeant. Was he a squad leader? Do you know what happened to him?”
The resident shook his head, yawning. “Nope. He hasn’t said much.”
“Does he know about the leg?”
“We told him there was too much nerve damage.”
“The nightmares started before the surgery?”
“Before.” The resident yawned again. “From the first night he was here.”
“There’s not much I can do for him until he wakes up. You’ll have me paged?”
Chapter 2
1919
FRANK CAME into the barn sniffing the air like the scent might tell him whether the place was dangerous.
“About time you got here. Saw the note, I take it? Any questions?” Charlie watched the boy take in the stone barn, from hayloft to the three-legged stool where he sat. “Questions?” he prompted the boy a second time.
Cocking his head as if sorting through a stack of mental index cards, the boy eventually picked a pair of questions. “What happened to me? Why can’t I remember?”
“You received a head injury, maybe from a shell explosion. That’s what the quacks at the hospital told us. But that doesn’t answer your question, does it? Why don’t you remember anything? I don’t know. Here, grab a bucket. I expect your hands remember how to milk a cow, even if your head don’t.” Charlie watched the boy’s hand creep upward to touch his head. “Queenie knows you, even if you don’t know her.”
Frank picked up a bucket hesitantly.
Charlie nodded at a Jersey cow that stamped impatiently at her stanchion. “She’s waiting.”
What was it like for the boy to discover who he was every morning from a note tacked to the door of the privy? If the boy had any feelings about it, he never told Charlie.
THE BOY discovered the note after waking in an unfamiliar room. Pale light filtered through a dusty window at the end of a tunnellike dormer. Feeling exposed even under a woolen blanket, he slid to the floor and rolled part way underneath the bed. More comfortable with the solid frame looming over him, he stayed for a time, staring upward. As the light strengthened, he let his gaze follow the lines of wood grain in the window frame. The builder of this house had cut matching pieces for the verticals, their patterns mirrored on either side of the window.
Eventually he rose and struggled out of the tangled bedclothes. A small writing desk, cluttered with loose sheets of writing paper, a fountain pen, and an inkpot, was tucked into the dormer. A stack of unopened envelopes lay next to the writing supplies. The first was postmarked in July of 1918, and the last in October of the same year. Why didn’t this fellow, Francis Huddleston, open his mail?
Gut fluttering like an anxious bird, he peered under the bed for a chamber pot. Finding none, he rushed down to the second floor looking for a toilet or the way to the privy. Steps led down toward either end of the house. The set in the back were coarse and painted rather than finished, a servant’s stair. He knew the term, even if he didn’t know where he’d learned it. Down again, he found a large kitchen and heavy door framed in pantry shelves. He ran out into the yard. A well-worn path led to a small, clapboard structure with high windows. A minute later, as he tried not to breathe the acrid stink, he noticed a ruled sheet of writing paper tacked to the door in front of him. GOOD MORNING was blocked out in square letters.
GOOD MORNING
Your name is Francis “Frank” Huddleston. You are a soldier, returned from the war in Europe. The white-haired man milking the cows in the barn is your grandfather, Charlie Clark. He will welcome your help with the chores. When you return from the barn, the gray-haired woman in the kitchen will give you breakfast. She is your grandmother, Edith “Eddy” Clark.
Charlie continued to milk his own cow and watched as Frank began to squeeze a stream of milk from Queenie’s teats, the familiar act calming the boy. Soon the milk squirted steadily, and Frank fell into a kind of trance, his movements automatic, until a diminishing stream and restless stamp from Queenie signaled time to change to a new pair of teats. Shifting to a new set, he rested his head against Queenie’s side and continued mechanically.
Charlie finished first and went to stand behind the boy. When Frank was done, he placed his hands on his knees and looked around. Charlie held his breath and watched Frank’s face. But there was only a tightening around Frank’s mouth and a narrowed gaze. Charlie sighed and placed a hand on Frank’s shoulder. “It’s all right, boy. I’m your grandfather, Charlie Clark. You’re Frank Huddleston, come home from the war with a head injury. That’s why you don’t know me. Let’s go in and meet your grandmother. She’ll give us something to eat. Are you hungry? Don’t forget your bucket.”
EDDY’S SPOTTED hands twisted in her lap as she spoke. “Charlie isn’t a young man anymore. You’re a great worker, Frank, but it’s the forgetting. With one of us staying with you all the time to answer your questions, we can’t….”
Frank fidgeted in his chair and let his gaze wander over the worn fixtures and scarred wood of the kitchen. He wondered if they would ask him to leave, the strangers who had fed him for months, judging from the thick wad of notes in his hand. Would their faces ever be familiar?
“… so Charlie and I, we’ve posted a notice at the Grange Hall. We hope to have someone here by the harvest.”
Frank became aware the room had fallen silent—except for the tap dripping in the sink and the birds calling outside. Eddy and Charlie. They watched him closely as if they expected something, as if they were unsure of his response. He didn’t know why. Eddy’s careful announcement seemed to have little to do with him.
“Will you hire someone I knew… before?”
“No, Frank. You were with your parents in Philadelphia before the war. Nobody around here knows you.” Charlie looked away. His voice took on a rote quality. “They thought you might be more comfortable here with us while you recovered.”
“Will the new person stay with me or work with you?”
Charlie rubbed fingers across his forehead like he was trying to erase the wrinkles there, but Eddy answered in firm tones. “We have to be careful with our money, Frank. It may be cheaper to hire somebody to keep an eye on you and to help you remember when you have one of your spells. Charlie will work around the house.”
Frank fingered his notes again. “So… you want me to keep feeding the horses and milking the cows?”
“Yes, you’ll do that and other work as well.”
“Now, Eddy.” Charlie’s voice was gentle. “The boy’s still recovering. I’m not dead yet.”
“He’s strong as a bull, Charlie.”
“I don’t mind doing more, if that’s what you want.” Frank shifted from face to face until he focused on the sharp furrows at the side of Eddy’s mouth. “Just tell me what you want.”
“That’s what the new man will do,” Eddy said, looking at Charlie.
Charlie’s gaze dropped to his callused hands.
Jackie North has been writing stories since grade school and her dream was to someday leave her corporate day job behind and travel the world. She also wanted to put her English degree to good use and write romance novels, because for years she's had a never-ending movie of made-up love stories in her head that simply wouldn't leave her alone.
Luckily, she discovered m/m romance and decided that men falling in love with other men was exactly what she wanted to write about. In this dazzling new world, she turned her grocery-store romance ideas around and is now putting them to paper as fast as her fingers can type. She creates characters who are a bit flawed and broken, who find themselves on the edge of society, and maybe a few who are a little bit lost, but who all deserve a happily ever after. (And she makes sure they get it!)
She likes long walks on the beach, the smell of lavender and rainstorms, and enjoys sleeping in on snowy mornings. She is especially fond of pizza and beer and, when time allows, long road trips with soda fountain drinks and rock and roll music. In her heart, there is peace to be found everywhere, but since in the real world this isn't always true, Jackie writes for love.
H. has worked with books for a number of years, and is delighted to finally find herself on the author’s side of the bookshelf. She enjoys writing historical romances, and contemporary stories too, and while her characters travel all over the world, they always have a touch of British humour.
H. has lived in various parts of the UK and currently lives in the north of England, where she’s enjoying city life as much as the beautiful countryside. In her spare time, H. loves going to the cinema and theatre, and her very eclectic tastes range from quirky comedy to ballet and Shakespeare, and pretty much everything in between.
As Charlie Cochrane couldn't be trusted to do any of her jobs of choice - like managing a rugby team - she writes. Her favourite genre is gay fiction, predominantly historical romances/mysteries, but she's making an increasing number of forays into the modern day. She's even been known to write about gay werewolves - albeit highly respectable ones.
Her Cambridge Fellows series of Edwardian romantic mysteries were instrumental in seeing her named Speak Its Name Author of the Year 2009. She’s a member of both the Romantic Novelists’ Association and International Thriller Writers Inc.
E E Montgomery wants the world to be a better place, with equality and acceptance for all. Her philosophy is: We can’t change the world but we can change our small part of it and, in that way, influence the whole. Writing stories that show people finding their own ‘better place’ is part of E E Montgomery’s own small contribution.
Thankfully, there’s never a shortage of inspiration for stories that show people growing in their acceptance and love of themselves and others. A dedicated people-watcher, E E finds stories everywhere. In a cafe, a cemetery, a book on space exploration or on the news, there’ll be a story of personal growth, love, and unconditional acceptance there somewhere.
John C HouserJohn C. Houser’s father, step-mother, and mother were all psychotherapists. When old enough, he escaped to Grinnell College, which was exactly halfway between his mother’s and father’s homes—and half a continent away from each. After graduation, he taught English for a year in Greece, attended graduate school, and eventually began a career of creating computer systems for libraries. Now he works in a strange old building that boasts a historic collection of mantelpieces–but no fireplaces.
Jackie North
EE Montgomery
EMAIL: eemontgomery11@gmail.com
John C Houser
GOOGLE PLAY / AMAZON / iTUNES
EMAIL: johnchouser@gmail.com
Heroes for Ghosts by Jackie North
Strokes on a Canvas by H Lewis-Foster
AMAZON US / AMAZON UK
B&N / KOBO / PRIDE PUBLISHING
iTUNES / GOODREADS TBR
All Lessons Learned by Charlie Cochrane
The Courage to Love by EE Montgomery
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