Coming Round to the Idea
Summary:
Armistice Day, 1941. Sam faces up to a much altered future. Foyle confronts remembrance. A sequel to Like Diamonds We Are Cut....
Disclaimer:
The creative rights to the characters and plotlines in "Foyle's War" belong to Anthony Horowitz. This story is a not-for-profit homage to the television series, to the talented actors who bring its characters to life, and to a fascinating era.
Author's Notes:
December 7th, 2014 is the 73rd anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the final infamy that toppled the United States into war with the Axis powers.
The other stories in this series can be found on my profile page. Order for reading is:
1. Derailment
2. Fire and Ice
3. Where the Heart Is
4. Bells in Wartime
5. Like Diamonds, We Are Cut
6. Coming Round to the Idea
...
Thanks to dancesabove for her valuable edits.
Coming Round to the Idea
Tuesday, 11th November, 1941
Sam fed her arms through the peach ribbon straps of her petticoat, slipped it over her head, and tried to pull it down. Halfway over her six-month bump, the flimsy garment stuck, and wouldn't budge for any kind of pulling. She sighed and peeled it off again, defeated. Yesterday the thing had fitted. Just. Today the straining seams begged for reprieve.
She puffed a lock of hair out of her eyes, exasperated. None of her underwear fitted any more, apart from the French knickers, which were latterly on a draw-string due to the elastic shortage. Her brassiere, on the last notch, was giving her the unattractive choice of either bulging underneath the bottom band or spilling out over the top. Stockings were a total fag, now that she couldn't fasten her suspender belt. The alternative, elastic garters (which she'd managed to fashion from two precious bits of strip elastic) itched like blazes. As a last resort—once autumn brought cooler weather—she'd taken to wearing Christopher's grey wool socks around the house.
Top clothes weren't much better. The only skirt that she could comfortably wear these days was one her father had bought her from a tartan shop in Edinburgh. They'd gone up there on a visit to their Scottish relatives the same year that she'd finished school, and Sam had prided herself on keeping her girlish figure ever since. Now even that skirt—a Royal Stewart wrap-over ladies' kilt—barely wrapped over any more. Teamed with his grey socks, the jolly tartan 'outfit' had taken Christopher's attention when he'd arrived home from work one day and found Sam at the sink. He'd inquired light-heartedly whether she was dressed to do the Highland fling—and was stunned to earn himself a lowland dishcloth flung at his head. There had followed a bout of impotent tears from Sam, which required several minutes' coaxing apology before she'd let him nuzzle his way back into her good books.
This morning there was no tantrum, no histrionics; Sam just sank onto the bed, folded her hands in her lap, and hung her head.
"C'mon, Love." Sensing comfort was required, Foyle lowered himself beside her and joined his arms around her middle, cheek abutting hers. "The clothes mean nothing. You're my beautiful girl. You look better in my socks than I do; and as for the petticoat... who's going to notice?"
"It's all right for you to say," she told him miserably. "I feel awkward. Clumsy. Quite the lump. Unalluring and unfeminine. And..."—she bit her lip—"uninvolved."
Her husband frowned. To him it seemed incomprehensible that Sam could think her state 'unfeminine'. The ample curves beneath his touch struck him as womanly in ways that clothing couldn't ever be. When Roz had been expecting, twenty-something years ago, she'd sailed blithely through her expansion in her last months, clad in artist's smocks, so pleased to have him back from war that other inconveniences faded in comparison. He understood, of course, that clothing wasn't all of Sam's complaint. He also understood Sam wasn't Rosalind, but of a different generation, with the self-determinism that this war had strengthened in the nation's women. He tried to imagine how it must feel for Sam to lose that sense of an involvement: youth, vigour, and infectious sunniness, wrapped around a serious desire to be engaged with what was happening in the world at large.
Instead of which, she'd finished up engaged to him.
He grimaced. The problem was obvious. The opportunities brought by war had suited Sam. Her stance in uniform spelt eagerness to serve, pridein public service, and liberation from the home. Foyle's generation, he acknowledged quite freely, was entrenched in the belief that women packed their jobs in once they married. It didn't look good on your husband if you earned. The best that married women of his age and social standing could have hoped for in their day was volunteer work for charitable or benevolent causes. Anything else would have been looked on as a slight upon a husband's manhood, effectively labelling him as 'unable to provide'.
Of course, the war had gone a long way towards toppling that convention. Women—even married women now—were being called to do their bit. But Sam had been unusual: she'd stepped up for duty very early in the scheme of things, a full year earlier than conscription had begun for women. Sam had volunteered as soon as war had been declared—and done so with that youthful vigour and enthusiasm that exuded from her every pore.
Perhaps, Foyle smiled in fond recollection, that first day in his office, the scent of eagerness had been a bit too heady for a startled old bloke's blood.
After their wedding she had pocketed her wedding ring and hung on fiercely, as 'Miss Stewart', behind the wheel. Together they had stuck it out for several months, until the physical evidence of her condition couldn't be masked from the people they encountered out on duty. Built like a bird, she'd worn her pregnancy like a knot in cotton for the first five months, but by the beginning of October, the game was up. Sam's growing waistline would no longer fit the image of a 'Miss', and public tolerance—just like her khaki uniform, and now her straining petticoat—wasn't going to stretch another sixteenth of an inch.
So, staffing shortages persisting, Foyle had slid across into the driver's seat. He hadn't even bothered asking for another driver. Truth told, he'd only ever asked for one as an excuse to get up AC Summers' nose; and once the Greta Beaumont scandal had erupted, Summers and his nose had sniffed their last in Foyle's direction.
Tempting as it would have been to sprinkle itching powder on the new AC—another self-important twerp who'd tried to make a puppet of him back in June—Foyle was still in far too good a mood to give his pompous boss even a gentle mauling. New fatherhood ahead, and Andrew back inside the fold, in sentiment if not in body. And so, he hadn't pushed his right to a chauffeur.
For his part, AC Rose, still smarting from the chagrin of being bested by the very man he'd sought to dominate, was giving Foyle a wide berth anyway. Which suited all concerned. The less Foyle had to deal with AC Rose, the better. In any case, Foyle didn't want another driver in Sam's seat. He wanted Sam, and if he couldn't have her, he would rather drive himself.
"Know how you feel," he offered. "Miss you every day at work."
"I just miss being in the fray," moaned Sam, leaning wearily into him. "Hate to think of you out there on your own."
"Can't be the murders that you're missing," he cajoled. "I bring you dead bodies all the time."
Sam chuckled at his reference to her first day, when she'd voiced her predilection for a juicy murder.
"Christopher, they've all got fins and scales. And every one is covered in your fingerprints. It's not the same."
"You've dusted trout for fingerprints?" Foyle's eyes widened, tongue poking into his cheek. "How bored do you get with kitchen duties?"
Sam sighed. "I've dusted plenty of your catch with flour, pretending to myself it was detective work."
His eyes closed underneath a frown. It was a sweet attempted joke, but there were undercurrents.
"Love... if I said sorry, would it help?" His lips brushed at her ear, preparing to do reparation.
Sam's shoulders heaved under a pull-myself-together breath. "Don't be silly, Darling. It'll pass... I'm just... I feel in limbo. This... still doesn't feel real. Don't suppose it will, until the baby's born."
"Now... well," he ventured carefully, "p'raps after things settle down, we could get you some help in. Ask Mrs Weston to come in a couple of days a week, so you can have that time to look around...?"
"Mmm." Sam rocked her head sceptically. "I really wonder how easy it would be to switch motherhood off and on again. But thank you for the thought."
Foyle gathered her against him till he felt her body slacken.
"Sspeaking of, um, trout," he began, gambling that a change of subject would be tolerated, "Charles Howard's about to flop into our pond."
Sam turned lazily in his arms. "You're very rude about your brother-in-law, Christopher."
Foyle's eyes teased down at her. "Well, he's Navy. They're a fishy lot."
"Sour grapes, because you didn't get that job in Liverpool?"
"Nunno." He stroked her hair. "Charles warned me fair and square not to antagonise Messinger. Can't hold that against him." He tightened his embrace. "Anyway, things turned out rather better for me here."
Sam snuggled into his sheltering arms. "Glad you think so, Darling. When's he coming, then?"
Foyle grimaced. Charles had telephoned him at the station late the previous evening, and he had clean forgotten to make mention of it to Samantha.
"Emh...tonight?"
Sam looked up, mildly piqued. "Well, thanks a bunch for all the notice. What brings him our way?"
"Business in Eastbourne." Charles' presence in the area was no great surprise to Christopher. Heavy bombing of the coastal towns, and Eastbourne in particular, had raised concerns for the arterial railway along the south coast. In consequence, the Admiralty had ramped up its interest in the town's defensive options. They simply could not afford for an important port supply-line to be cut.
"He'll be calling in on his way back to London. Could we give him early supper?"
Sam frowned. Feeding a guest on such short notice—particularly one used to privileged Whitehall fare—wasn't going to be a simple matter. It was lean pickings at the butcher's recently; even the less-than-popular horsemeat option seemed to have bolted. Unless...
"Provided he'll eat whale meat. It's the only thing off-ration."
The corner of her husband's mouth hitched up. "Wull, hardly going to refuse that maritime delicacy, is he?"
"Hope you're right," observed Sam darkly.
Her gaze drifted across the bedroom, alighting on the tartan skirt draped over a chair.
"I've nothing presentable to wear, you know," she added, with meaningful emphasis.
"Perhaps that's what you should wear, then." Foyle arched an eyebrow, hardening the muscles of his midriff in anticipation of the riposte that his mischief was about to earn.
Sam lifted puzzled eyes. "Wear something un-presentable?"
"No. Wear nothing."
...
"Here are the Reichs-zender Hamboorg Station Bray-men and Station DXB on the 31 metre band. You are about to hear our news in English..."
"Jairmanee calling! Jairmanee calling!" mocked Sam at the wireless. "Miserable traitor!"
Still, there was a sort of masochistic 'pull' about Lord Haw-Haw's crowing broadcasts.
Arriving home to the strains of Sam's mockery drifting into the hallway, Foyle grinned as he shed his overcoat, calling out, "If he makes you angry, turn him off."
"What makes me angry is that I can't HIT him!" complained Sam, craning backwards in her chair so her voice would carry better. Then the smug tones of the broadcast started up again, and she bent forwards eagerly.
"I'll just stick with it a bit, though. I want to hear what drivel he's spouting this time..."
Foyle leant against the door jamb watching his young wife, head resting on her hands and elbows propped on knees, in thrall to every menacing, sarcastic word that issued from the wireless. She'd made a special effort with her hair, he noticed, twisting it and pinning it into a fetching updo. A few golden wisps escaped the upsweep at her nape to caress the graceful downslope of her neck.
A fond smile curled his lips.
Samantha's outfit was a new one—a soft, light wool smock in a shade of moss green that seemed made to send into relief the honey blond warmth of her hair. Foyle was in no doubt his mischief earlier today had cost him that new dress at least, and probably a few more items upstairs that he hadn't seen yet. He reflected that he would've gladly paid up anyway—for anything she wanted over and above the running of the household. He had seen to it since their marriage that everything Sam earned she kept as pocket money for herself. Now that she wasn't earning any longer, he would naturally see to it that she was never short. As long as Sam could find the coupons, he would always foot the bill.
For now, though, Sam could not be less preoccupied with personal appearance, her full attention focussed on the smug, insinuating tones of William Joyce:
"...these allegations against Germany are entirely unfounded: every German interest favours the maintenance of peace, whereas only England and France could be interested in causing trouble in this region, which..."
Sam's eyes narrowed in contempt. "Ooh! You... you thing!"
A tender look crossed Foyle's face as he hovered in the doorway. He moved in to lean over her, reaching for the Bakelite knob.
"May I?"
Sam fidgeted, embarrassed by the hold the broadcast had on her, but feeling still compelled to bargain.
"Aren't you even curious?" she ventured, raising sheepish eyes to his.
"Nup. By listening and upsetting yourself, you give the weasel air. Turn him off, and he's stifled."
She tried to glare at him. "Stop being so… reasonable."
"Reason is my stock-in-trade." A pang of guilt pricked at his conscience. It was a lie. There was no reason in his motives. Half the nation listened in to Haw-Haw, often in the hope of getting a true picture of events kept muted by the BBC. But something in him didn't want Sam knowing how bad things were really getting.
He turned the knob to 'Off' and planted a soft kiss of greeting on her cheek, then raised his head and sniffed.
"I smell marine life in the oven..."
"Well you might," she grinned, "but what you've failed to smell is apple and courgette cake."
Christopher's nose wrinkled. "Marrow? In a cake?"
"Mmm, why not? Baby marrow. Isn't far from a carrot, is it?"
He stretched his eyes. "A bit late in the season... for that sort of thing?"
"Well, since you mention it, I bumped into Mr Lucciano."
Foyle formed a quiet smile. Carlo Lucciano, saved from a cruel and untimely death the previous June, when vandals, fuelled by Mussolini's declaration of war on Britain, had attempted arson on his restaurant. Fortunately, Christopher's raw memories of the tragedy of Elsie Kramer's internment had left him bent on averting similar injustices. He had voiced concerns to Hugh Reid about possible anti-Italian feeling in the town, and Hugh had detailed uniformed patrols to keep an eye on Hastings' Italian businesses. Thanks to the vigilance of young Hardcastle on the beat that night, Carlo had escaped with his life, and only minor damage to his property. And Carlo was a man whose memory for a favour rendered was as elephantine as his gratitude was bottomless.
"And when I mentioned we were having a guest for supper," Sam continued, "lo and behold, I was ushered through his door and treated to"—she listed on her fingers—"delicious lunch, a tour of his greenhouse, a share in his sultana stash, and his Italian mama's special recipe."
"Bella signora!" Foyle bent his head to kiss her hand with Italianate courtesy, "I'd expect no less from Carlo, for a lady of such beauty."
Sam grinned. This was the playful side of Christopher, unseen outside the home, and very rarely seen inside it.
"The cake's turned out to be delicious," she told him proudly. "I sneaked a bit when it was fresh out of the oven."
"I sssee. How long ago was that?"
Sam blinked. Why did it matter? "About ten minutes."
"Rrright. In that case, should still be able to taste it on you." And thereupon, he claimed a full and lingering kiss.
"Zucchini," Sam informed him dreamily, when they'd stopped for breath.
"Mmmost kind of you to say so." He smiled in smug acknowledgement of what he knew full well was not a compliment.
"Very funny. It's what Carlo calls courgettes."
"Ah. How Continental of him." Christopher's lips sank to her collar bone and explored the tantalising hollow where the bone dipped in the middle.
"The apples and zucchini... complement... each other... well," she told him, breathy with distraction.
"An unlikely but successful pairing," he observed, and felt her breast shake in a chuckle, and a soft kiss planted in his curls.
...
Charles Howard presented on their doorstep just after six, looking every bit the immaculately-groomed, ruddy-cheeked officer that Sam remembered—very important in his braided uniform, she thought. More importantly, though, he arrived bearing two tins of corned beef.
"I imagined you'd prefer these to flowers," he smiled winningly down on Sam, whose eyes lit up at such treasure. "Least I could do, considering I'm here to eat you out of house and home."
Sam clasped the tins against her chest as he leaned in to peck her on the cheek. "How terribly nice of you, Commander Howard!"
Her guest halted halfway, making a moue of gentle admonition.
"Charles," amended Sam, smiling a shy apology. "Can't get used to having you as a... sort-of relative."
To be accurate, Sam couldn't claim any relationship to Rosalind's brother; but it had meant a lot to her and Christopher that his late wife's only close relatives had given Sam such a warm welcome to the fold. As Charles had joked to Christopher after the wedding, "Alice will be relieved to have you off her books at last." Indeed, the succession of widows to whose company Christopher had found himself exposed chez Howard had proved a monumental disappointment for his matchmaking sister-in-law. Nevertheless, Alice had pooh-poohed his mild complaints with a tough-skinned, "Save your breath, Dear Heart. You're too young to be giving up at your age." His marriage to Samantha in the spring had (happily for both of them) expunged him from her list of worthy causes.
They all sat down to dine, and with the (surprisingly gamey-tasting) marine life main course and the apple/bijou marrow cake (pronounced 'interesting') behind them, their after-supper conversation was interrupted by the telephone, which called Foyle out into the hallway.
Charles stood as Sam began to clear the table, and, offering his help, followed her into the kitchen.
"How are you, Sam? Alice is most anxious to know if you're short of anything. We get more opportunities in London, so you'd let us know, wouldn't you?"
"Oh, you're very kind. We don't do too badly here in Hastings. But thank you for the offer. Mostly, I suppose the problem isn't things, it's boredom, now I've had to stop work. And Christopher isn't keen on my doing anything too strenuous."
"Hmm." Charles leant back against the draining board, suspecting that he'd hit a nerve.
"It feels selfish to complain," continued Sam as she stacked the plates in the sink, "and I am coming round to the idea of domesticity. I really am... but I suspect that Rosalind was rather better at occupying her time at home than I shall prove to be."
Sam paused, then added ruefully, "I don't want you to think me a bad wife to him, Charles."
Commander Howard reached into his breast pocket. "Stuff and nonsense, Sam. I've never seen him happier. Mind if I smoke?"
"Not in the slightest."
To her surprise, Charles opened the back door and stepped outside into the garden. Wiping her hands hastily, she followed him.
"Honestly, Charles, there's no need to—"
"I'm used to being banished when I try and smoke here. Will you have one, Sam?" The proffered case contained Benson & Hedges cork tip.
"Mmm! Haven't had one for an age. Don't mind if I do."
Sam sent him an apologetic look. "Christopher isn't normally so rude as to banish guests."
Charles grinned. "No, not Christopher. It was a habit of Rosalind's. She even bullied Christopher into giving up."
"Ah." Sam bit her lip. "She must have been a formidable personality to manage Christopher."
Commander Howard's glance was cautiously appraising. "There was a lot of love there, Sam. I gather he doesn't talk much about the past?"
Sam lowered her eyes. "No. Um. No, he doesn't." She sighed, lifted her chin, and plucked a slender fire-stick from the neat row in the case.
"Not Navy Cut, then?" Sam grinned, and twirled the cigarette between thumb and forefinger.
Her cheeriness seemed forced to Charles.
"Find they tend to stick to the lip," he offered drolly. "Practical on the high seas when it's blowing a gale; less essential to a desk tar like myself." He flicked his lighter open. "I'll leave 'em for His Majesty. No doubt the King has his own reasons."
Sam bent over the flickering flame until the light took, and inhaled greedily, cupping her elbow in a stance of relaxation. It was short-lived. So many tastes had changed for Sam in these last months; yet she was dismayed to realise she'd lost her smoker's palate. Tongue braced against teeth, she turned with a reflexive shiver of revulsion, and hastily stubbed the cigarette out against the brick overhang of the windowsill. Oh, what on earth?! she moaned silently. Another pleasure closed off?!
Charles read her expression. "Oh dear. Mistake, was it?"
Sam coughed and held the barely singed cigarette out to him. "Here, Charles. You'd better take it back."
"No, keep it. You might feel like it later."
Sam doubted that, but dropped the item in her pocket anyway. One wasted nothing in this war, if one were wise.
She leant against the wall and plunged her hands into the pockets of her new smock. "I wish he would talk more... you know... about her. I don't like to pry."
"I think," Charles told her kindly, "that it'll come in its own good time—the habit of remembering out loud. You'll see."
They were already back indoors and side by side at the sink, with Charles gamely drying dishes, when Christopher popped his head around the kitchen door.
He stretched his eyes, and curled his tongue to touch his upper lip. "A far cry from your usual sphere of influence, Charles," he quipped, before retreating.
Charles and Sam exchanged glances. There was a meanness in the teasing. Sam plucked the towel from Charles's hands and urged quietly, "Don't mind him. Go. I'll finish here." She turned back to the washing up.
Commander Howard found his host in the living room, pouring two whiskies.
"Something bothering you, Christopher?" he inquired levelly. "Or is the subject out of bounds?"
Foyle squinched an eye and handed Charles a glass, nodding him towards an armchair before settling himself in the other, elbows resting on the high arms.
"That was your nephew on the phone." Foyle plucked at his trouser leg. "Giving nothing away, as usual."
"Like father, like son," observed his brother-in-law pointedly.
Foyle stared into the golden liquid. "Don't hear from him for three weeks. Then, out of the blue, he needs to know how things are with his father. That can only mean he's going to be flying ops again."
Most likely, at this stage of things, he'd be assigned to bomber escort duty. This made him among the first to be taking the fight across the Channel into Hitler's Germany.
Foyle flicked his fingers in an irritable gesture. "My firstborn's off to risk his life against the spawn of Baron blasted Richthofen..."—he lowered his voice and pinched between his brows—"my second's on his way into a world at war. This nation's stretched, Charles, stretched beyond capacity. If Britain goes under, I'm a certain bet to be stood against the wall and shot for failure to lick jackboots. Then what's in store for Sam and the child?"
His hand slid underneath his collar and rubbed at the back of his neck in exasperation.
"What in God's name was I thinking of, to put her in this mess? How have I bred a son so cocky that he thinks he's got a chance in a propeller-driven gnat?"
Charles Howard clung resolutely to his tumbler. "Dark thoughts, old chap. It's the worry talking."
Foyle gave a conceding wince. "Prob'ly about right."
"He came though the worst of it last year. Wears his Spit like a second skin."
"Yep." Foyle raised his glass in a morose salute. "Well, cheers."
Charles met the toast, then leant back and crossed one elegant, sharp-creased trouser leg over the other, eyes fixed on his companion.
"Listen... take heart in some good news I can share with you..."
Foyle canted his head. "Oh?"
"This week," continued Charles, "Roosevelt has quietly placed the American Coast Guard under the authority of the U.S. Navy."
Christopher leant forwards, elbows on knees, and sent him a keenly interested look. "Hhhas he, now?"
Commander Howard raised a satisfied eyebrow. "Leaping ahead, I see."
Foyle's lips twisted as if to minimise the compliment. "Well, normally such a transfer of control is reserved for wartime."
"Correct. But this step comes just one week after the torpedoing of the Reuben James in neutral waters."
Foyle's gaze sharpened. "The Germans have sunk an American vessel?"
"They have, indeed. Made front page news in the American papers. An utter scandal—and of course, a tragedy."
Christopher's eyes narrowed as he made his next deduction. "I imagine... wwe'd like it to be viewed as an act of war?"
"Certainly we're calling it a cynical violation of American neutrality—though some will argue that Roosevelt has been treading a very thin line with the patience of the Axis powers. But as you've deduced, the incident is likely to be of immense advantage to us here in Britain."
He would have liked to mention that Churchill had barely been able to contain his joy at the news of the sinking, but refrained.
"And meanwhile," he added, "America is allowing its merchant ships back into European waters."
Foyle sighed, raising his eyebrows. "Wouldn't like to be in their shoes, with torpedo-happy U-boats circling below."
"Congress have agreed to let them arm themselves."
"Well, that's something. Ssstill don't fancy their chances much."
"You're right not to. Our own merchant navy's losing an average of thirteen ships a day. Merchant seamen are the unsung heroes of every war. Some good may come of the Reuben James tragedy, though. My expectation is that the President will use this incident to sway the vote in Congress—in which case, believe me, Christopher, America will be coming round to the idea of war."
Foyle's cradled his glass. "Wull, good to hear. We've paddled this canoe alone for long enough."
They sipped their drinks in silence for a while. Then Christopher asked, "Were you at the Cenotaph on Sunday?"
Charles inclined his head. "I was. Sobering to see how many Londoners turned out. Worn down by the bombings, yes, but uncowed. You had a ceremony here, of course?"
A nod from Foyle. The shifting of the ceremony to a Sunday had made it easier, with people working all hours in the week. "Yup. Laid a wreath in Alexandra Park from the Hastings Police. As you say, um, a respectable showing, given that half the population's been evacuated."
Charles met his eyes. "Not that you and I need an occasion to remember..."
"True enough. The trick lies in forgetting."
"Not easy to forget Passchendaele."
"Nor Jutland."
"Nor Jutland. And it seems that Germany's manners around neutral shipping haven't improved since the last time they needled America into joining the fray."
"Wull, some people never learn." Foyle's mouth quirked upwards. He grimaced in apology. "But we can't honourably drink to that."
"No. No, we can't. But we can drink to the memory of the men lost on the Reuben James."
They raised their glasses in solemn acclamation.
"God rest their souls," breathed Foyle, downing a draught.
"And God forgive us for the sin of self-interest," reflected Charles.
...
Their guest sent on his way, Sam and Christopher lay in bed, pleasantly tired, Sam on her back and Foyle on his side, curled in towards her.
"Lovely meal. Fetching outfit. Thank you, Sam."
"Andrew upset you, though. And you were a bit mean to Charles."
"Oh, he can take it. We talked afterwards. I shared my single malt with him."
"I've hoped..." began Sam tentatively, "that you'd share more with me."
He feigned surprise. "You want my whisky?"
"NO, you OAF."
Christopher grinned winningly against her neck. "I'll share it all with you, Sam. Every. Last. Drop." One hand stole underneath her back, the other crept across her middle as he moved in closer.
Sam smacked his hand and wriggled in impatience. "That isn't what I meant. Might have known better than to try and talk seriously to you when we're in bed."
"Shhouldn't be so irresistible, then." His lower body pasted itself against her hip, leaving no room for doubt about her irresistibility.
"No one who knows you would believe you're this fresh behind closed doors," complained Sam to the ceiling.
"Don't want people knowing everything about me," he protested mildly. "Only you."
Sam tucked her chin in close, so that she could gaze down on his head. Here was her opportunity.
"If that's the case, share Rosalind with me."
She felt Christopher's body stiffen. "I, um... Sam," He pushed himself up on an elbow and searched her face, "don't... good Lord, don't imagine that I'm hiding things."
"It isn't that." Sam's trailed a hand across his chest. "But I wish you'd talk to me about her. I feel as if I need to know more, Christopher, because she meant so much to you. I want to understand the woman who..." she grasped for the right words, "who tempted you from bachelorhood, rubbed off your rough edges—even stopped you smoking!"
"Charles told you that?"
"Mmm. We went outside to smoke."
"I wish you wouldn't, Sam."
"You see?" she shot back, eager to demonstrate the point. "That's Rosalind at work! Goodness, Darling, she's a part of you. And I love every bit... each nook," Sam nestled herself underneath his arm, "each cranny. Want to know the woman who helped make my Christopher."
He smiled down at her. "It's, um... just... I'm out of practice sharing her with people, Sweetheart."
Sam thought back to the Sunday ceremony in the park. They'd stood before the town memorial in solemn contemplation until it was his turn to lay the wreath. She'd seen a shadow cross his features then, in memory of the fallen. Remembrance on that day was not for Rosalind, but Sam suspected there were moments every day when she was in his thoughts, and once a year, his vigil by the grave...
"Today's the real remembrance day, though, isn't it?" she tried. "A good day for remembering. Remember Rosalind for me. Not just inside your head. Share something of her now."
"Um, wull, I'll try. Where would you have me start?"
"What did you love about her?"
What should he say? The subject was so boundless. She was as gentle as a breeze one moment, and as spirited as a mare the next? She filled this house with laughter, and her passing shocked it into silence?
Christopher closed his eyes and pictured the serene, soft features he had loved for thirteen years, and mourned for many more.
"Roz... was sensitive, and loving, and she had that gift... that knack of making people happy."
He rubbed a weary hand across his brow. Life had a habit of eroding everything you took for granted. You tried to keep a hold of what you had, and yet the drip-drip-drip of passing years wore all your certainties down to the nub. It was the natural way as time rolled by. But Rosalind had been so young, there'd never seemed the possibility of losing her so early.
"When she died, it left us reeling," he told her softly.
Sam's eyes misted, and her hand reached for his cheek. "Oh, my love. To have all that and lose it..."
Christopher clasped her fingers tight, and squeezed. Conjuring pain from memory was difficult. Rather, a life contained remembered episodes of pain, and each was graded in the memory by degree, alongside others. In the last war he had known the searing pain of shrapnel, and the gnawing pain of hunger when supply lines to the trenches failed. Starvation felt like being scoured from within, and torn flesh throbbed and skewered through your senses, but at least you knew you were alive. To lose Roz had felt worse than either—a cold, paralysing numbness in the first months, and an empty, dulling, fearful stupor when the numbness dissipated.
"It wasn't easy." He spoke in a tone that clearly hoped to close the subject.
Sam studied him. The pauses in between his answers told her there was much he'd left unsaid. He'd been quite serious when he'd said that he was out of practice. She tried a different tack.
"Do you think Rosalind would've liked me?"
Christopher's answer came without a moment's hesitation. "Not a shadow of a doubt." He knew Roz would've wanted her for Andrew, though.
Sam lay back; tucked her hands behind her head. "It's strange, isn't it, when someone's gone, to speculate on whether they'd've taken to you?"
The corner of his mouth quirked. "I've taken to you. Isn't that enough?"
"I mean, I wonder...," Sam's brows puckered as she gazed up at the centre light, "would we have fallen for each other if she'd been alive?"
Christopher felt a prickle of disquiet. "You don't ask easy questions, Sam."
"I think the answer's 'no'," she pressed on, unabashed. "There wouldn't have been room for me."
"Sam—don't."
"I'm not saying that because it bothers, or upsets me. It's just being realistic. So many things about you drew me to you: your extraordinary cleverness, your caring nature; how you tease me." Sam propped herself up and caressed his temple; let her thumb sweep slowly over one unruly eyebrow. "But what made me love you was the sadness. If Rosalind had been alive, you wouldn't have been sad. No gap for me to fill. No room."
Sam's face shone with an honesty that would've left him feeling naked, were they not already wound around each other in the altogether. She'd seen him, and she'd felt that "pull" of emptiness. It was a theory of nature he'd learned first at school, among the charts and test tubes of the science lab—horror vacui —nature abhors a vacuum. Then, strangely, later, the selfsame idea from Rosalind, who'd taught him how the phrase was used in art, as together they'd admired the work of Gustav Klimt. Now Sam was telling him she'd fallen for a fractured soul, imploring to be filled.
And she was right: his heart would have been full of Rosalind, had she lived.
But memories were all he had of Roz now. Andrew had his own life, and mere shades couldn't compete with flesh, and warmth, and future. Past was past; and present pulled at him. He turned his lips to graze his young wife's palm, and squeezed his eyelids tight.
"There's room for no one else now, Sam. Twice in my life, I've been a very lucky man."
"So share," she pressed. "I'm listening. I need to know."
Christopher settled back and pulled her to him, bringing her head to rest on the flexed muscles of his upper arm.
"Comfortable?" he asked, and Sam remembered how it felt to be a little girl about to hear a story.
"Mmm," she chuckled. "Snug as a bug in a rug."
"The first time I saw Rosalind," he began, "she was dressed in a sailor suit, with ribbons in her hair, being tickled by her brother."
Sam closed her eyes and conjured up the image. "I realised that she was young."
"Fourteen."
"That young?" Sam looked up, startled.
"Don't jump the gun, Sam. Give a man a chance." His eyes widened in admonishment.
"Charles and I had first met on the rugby field. Our two schools were drawn against each other for a tournament match, and as a sixth-former and prefect—our junior sides were competing—Charles was one of the referees. I'd been badly fouled in a late tackle by a winger from his school, and Charles had seen it happen."
"Ouch! I hate rough ball games," complained Sam. "They always leave one black and blue. My shins have never been the same since hockey. How badly were you hurt?"
"Sprained ankle. Put me on a stretcher. The other boy expected his own school's ref to minimise the foul..."
"Oh, no!"
"...but found himself summarily red-carded by Charles, which left his school's team one man short."
"Oh, bravo, Commander!" Sam patted at her husband's chest contentedly.
"Yep. A brave decision." And not one that had endeared the young ref to his own side, as Christopher recalled. After the match, Charles had come to see how he was bearing up, and they soon discovered that they shared a sense of humour. "Wasn't the last time we met," continued Christopher, "on the rugby field or off. I rather liked the way he treated me as if I were his equal, though he was my senior by a couple of years..."
"Mmm. You've never been put off by conventional boundaries," observed Sam soberly, and drew a look of fondness from her husband.
Christopher went on to explain that the year he finished school, Charles invited him to stay out at his family home in Pembury, near Tunbridge Wells.
"That was when I got to know the Howards. Surprisingly, they seemed to take to me."
Sam dropped a tender kiss on his jaw. "Why 'surprisingly'? I'm not surprised."
"Wull, thank you, Sam."
"And saw Rosalind in her sailor suit?"
"Rrright."
"Did she like you instantly?" Christopher felt Sam bounce excitedly against him.
"Wellll... Thought nothing of it at the time, but Charles did take to teasing her, and asking why she wasn't tossing up on the grass or turning cartwheels. I ss'pose she was... em... curbing her exuberance..."
"I'd say she must've been," Sam informed him, knowledgeably. "Rosalind was trying to act ladylike around you. I think that's jolly sweet. I used to hate being a child, with grownups overlooking me. I'd absolutely ache to be noticed by adults. I'd certainly've wanted to be noticed by you."
"Nnnot likely I'd've missed you. You don't take no for an answer... much." The corner of his mouth lifted a fraction.
"Did Rosalind already paint in those days?"
"She did."
"Imagine that..." Sam's tongue burrowed into her cheek. "I bet you took an interest in her portfolio."
"Enough of that," he tutted. "There were river scenes. She showed me where she'd sat to paint them, annnd we got round to talking about..."
"Say no more!" put in Sam. "If you still fascinated her after you'd talked fishing, then it was obviously a match made in heaven."
"Oh, now, Sam. You've hurt my feelings. I don't think I can go on." Christopher slid his palms behind his head in a teasing gesture of withdrawal.
"Never leave an audience hanging. They might rebel." Slender fingers crept across his belly and attacked.
"A-ha-ha!" A strong hand darted down to restrain the tickling. "Sam! Stoppit!" The pitch of his voice rose as her fingers danced over his flesh. "All right! Mercy!"
Sam pinched him lightly. "Christopher, you're losing weight."
"Mmmight've shed a bit. Pack it in, will you?"
"So. You were saying?"
"I was about to say... "
The second time his path and Rosalind's had crossed was late spring, 1917. For once, Christopher's leave lined up with Sub-lieutenant Howard's, and Peter Foyle, who took the call from Charles inviting Christopher to stay, had made no bones about sending him for a quiet week or two away from everything.
"My father packed me off to Charles's family the third day of my leave," explained Christopher. "And this time, Rosalind wasn't quite the little girl I'd met before. Rather, she was wafting round her mother's garden in a wide-brimmed hat and layers of peach georgette. Suddenly the boot was on the other foot."
Sam gave a muted whistle. "You were smitten."
He smiled in fond recall. "Didn't have a chance. We married on my next leave, in the autumn, grabbed a two-night honeymoon in a country inn in the High Weald—the weather was exceptional—then Andrew came along almost immediately."
Sam digested that, and concluded that she wasn't satisfied. "Are you perhaps... skipping over some events in favour of a weather report?" she wondered gently, toying with the soft hairs on his chest.
"Ah. Well..."
Sam's eyes were closed now, but she could almost feel his self-conscious smile.
"... hhhardly matters to be telling you this now—now that she's gone... resisting an enticing fiancée has never been my forte."
He nipped nervously at his cheek, a burden shed. He would've liked to share another secret with Samantha, but that secret wasn't his to tell.
"Poor Christopher." Sam curled against him. "It isn't just the criminals that have their little tell-tale habits, is it?"
He had to grant her that. In any life, a pattern of behaviour formed. Two wars, one anguished parting... but two loves that led to marriage.
"I hope we never ever have another war," observed Sam, having quietly calculated that she was his second wartime wife.
"Wull, quite."
"So... Rosalind?" She rubbed his belly in encouragement, pausing to assess his midriff yet again. "You really have lost weight, you know..."
"SO. Rosalind..." He stilled her hand, which threatened to become distracting, and gave a brief account of their first months of married life—a difficult time, made worse by enforced separation. Christopher had found himself shipped back to the Front for the remaining months of the war, while Rosalind declared herself a Foyle in more than name by moving in with his father.
"Golly. That must've been a big adjustment for them both," observed Sam.
"Certainly was. Roz had never worked, nor run a house. My father was nothing if not set in his ways. The blessing turned out to be Mrs Temple, our neighbour. She'd been keeping an eye on us since my mother died, and took Roz under her wing. Roz and Father slowly found their level while I was away."
"Were the Howards content to let her stay in Hastings?"
"No sniff of interference until Rosalind's mother found out she was expecting."
He'd received a letter from Roz reporting that Mrs Howard wanted to fetch her home to Pembury, but that she was resisting staunchly.
"She was five months gone when the armistice was declared. I was demobbed, started back with the police, and finally we had our first real chance to live as a couple."
There was more. The young wife he'd come home to had faced a host of challenges without his help. He'd cursed himself a fool for leaving her pregnant and vulnerable, but the Rosalind he found on his return was self-possessed and cheerful. She'd welcomed back a battle-weary husband, worn down by the rigours of the trenches. Vivid in his mind now was the feel of Roz's hand laid on his head as he had slept, exhausted, in her lap that first day home. He bit his lip.
"She was... a fearless sort, Roz. Never could quite understand how she put up with carrying our child and living in a strange town so young."
Sam stretched and snuggled in. "I think we lose our nerve a bit as we get older. My father always says it makes his hair curl when he thinks back to the things he did as a young man."
Christopher squinted down at the blond waves draped loosely on his shoulder. He combed his fingers through the tresses from her temple.
"What makes your hair curl, Sam? Any regrets?"
"None. But I fret about the future."
"Because you made a wrong choice?"
"Because I... Stop thinking this is about you. Because I want to be better than I am. More capable. More useful. More..." She sighed dejectedly, grateful for his reassuring hug.
"We can only do our best, Sam. We're only human."
Suddenly she longed to shift the spotlight from herself. "Were you shy of each other? I mean, you'd barely spent any time together..."
Christopher smiled down on her head. "I suppose you could say that we married, quite some time before we finished courting. But you know... ?"
"Hmm?" Sam gazed up at him searchingly.
"Well, ah..." his warm smile poured down into her, "lllike to think wwe still have some courting left to do. Not that I'd want you to be shy of me. You're not, are you?"
Sam found she couldn't free her gaze, caught in the blue of his. "Never when we're here," she answered weakly,"but there are times when you're difficult to read, my darling."
"Which, yyyou're training me out of?"
"Well, it's good for you," offered Sam in cheery defence.
"Right." His eyes flashed mischief at her. "To answer what you asked, we dealt with each day as it came. My police examinations, her body changing, looking for a house in Hastings so that we could set up our own home."
"Here at Steep Lane?"
"Nunno. Couldn't have afforded this house on a sergeant's wage, and Rosalind was tactful enough not to let her parents help, although I do suspect they offered. We rented a two-bedroomed place at first. Then, as luck would have it, I was promoted to inspector quickly, so we moved here when Andrew was four."
"Nothing to do with luck," beamed Sam proudly. "You were a clever-clogs."
"Wwwhich, in some ways, would have kept me back, um, job-wise, if Rosalind hadn't..." he winced, "urged me to tone down my natural—em—self-confidence."
Sam raised her head and squinted up at him, intensely interested. "Urged you how?"
"W'let's see..." Roz had, in fact, delivered a few choice pieces of advice, such as 'if you have to prove the superintendent wrong again today, be sure to wipe that impatient look off your face first'. "She suggested I—ah—mask my attitude to those higher up the chain and slower than myself."
He felt a puff of mirth against his chest, followed by the soft vibrations of barely suppressed laughter against his side.
"Something up, Sam?"
"Nuh." Her voice came out constricted, and his brows knitted in impatience as he waited for the half-stifled hilarity to subside.
"And, um," Sam reached up to wipe away a tear of mirth, "did she also tell you not to do that thing with your eyelids?"
"What 'thing'?" Christopher's eyelids drooped suspiciously.
"The not-quite-open thing." Sam glanced up. "Hah! You're doing it NOW!"
He pulled his chin in and frowned down on her in mild affront. "Nnnot sure I approve of this irreverent attitude to my person, Sam."
"You can stand a little rough handling," she informed him, unperturbed.
"No respect," he told her. And it came out as a rumble of endearment.
"Wasn't that a disadvantage in the army, too?" Sam wondered. "The attitude?"
"Nnnot so much." Sam felt him tense. "The slow ones didn't last long in the trenches. Which is how I got promoted."
"Ah. Oh, Lord. I know so little."
"Different life, Sam."
They both lapsed into silence, held on tight, and contemplated wasted lives. Eventually, Sam found her voice.
"I don't think Rosalind's advice stuck, though, did it? I mean, your recent set-to with the AC..."
"Probably won't be my last. But at least I've learned to keep a neutral countenance until I'm certain of my ground."
"I don't think your face is quite as neutral as you think it is. And are you ever uncertain?"
"Nnot often." Christopher worked to keep a plain expression, but one corner of his mouth rose just a fraction.
"Have you any idea"—Sam turned enraptured eyes upon him—"how irresistible that makes you?"
"Wull, now, don't get a chap's hopes up, Sam. He might expect a demonstration."
Sam closed her eyes, attention pulled towards his early life once more. "I was sort of wondering, how you both managed to claw back a little time alone when you were living with your father. I can imagine you escaping to the river. And Rosalind would paint and you would fish."
"About the size of it." He stretched his eyes and let his hand do the petitioning. It glided hopefully down Sam's slender arm, finally lacing fingers through hers and squeezing. "Sweetheart, haven't I reminisced enough for now?"
"I can see it in my mind's eye," Sam continued, both accepting and ignoring his overture. "You, perched on the river bank, and Rosalind in pale muslin, reclined against you."
Christopher arched an eyebrow. "There you're wrong, Love. Roz stood in the shallows in my spare waders, and netted the fish."
"Nooo!" Sam's head snapped up. "And Andrew would've been—what?—a couple of months old at the time?"
He rocked his head, considering. "P'raps. Yes. A little more, maybe."
"Ooh!" There was indignation in Sam's tone and she tried to wrest her fingers loose. "You won't even let me volunteer to mind the town hall in an air raid, Christopher!"
Foyle held on tight. "Absolutely right, I won't. Standing in shallows on a sunny day in peacetime is one thing. But I won't have you in your condition mixed up in situations where you might end up hauling fire-buckets and cranking stirrup pumps to save some municipal bloody building."
"But I want to help. It's only fire watching." She huffed. "It's hardly fair."
Not fair? He pushed himself up on one elbow and stared down at her, uncomprehending of her pique. "When Jerry drops his fire bombs, I want you a million miles away," he told her testily, "or failing that," his hand described a swooping curve that culminated in an index finger pointing through the doorway, "I prefer to know you're up the garden in the Anderson. The devil with the town hall! I want you in one piece—both of you."
Sam swallowed, dumbstruck at his sudden agitation. Their eyes locked in an impasse. Sam was the first to avert hers.
"Well it's no good you being cross. You'll just have to come around to the idea of letting me do something. I'm growing melancholy," she offered quietly, eyes lowered.
He pursed his lips, "Sometimes we have to bow to circumstances, Sam."
Silence fell between them for a moment, then Sam raised her chin.
"You know what I think?"
He let out a ragged breath. "Imagine I'm about to find out."
"I think you're trying to make up for all those months you weren't there to protect Rosalind." Sam's gaze contained a gentle admonition. "I know I'm young... by some standards, but I'm hardly a sixteen-year-old. Compared to Rosalind when you were newly married, I'm an old, old woman."
Back-footed, Christopher plumped for quiet appeal.
"Sweetheart, I don't ever doubt your capability..." His voice trailed off. Truth was, as he got older, he liked risk less and less—and Sam had further complicated things by becoming that very thing he didn't dare imperil. To lose one wife had been a foul misfortune; to lose two... Damned if he was going to be seen as careless.
Christopher released Sam's fingers, only to take the same hand gently in his own and press it to his lips.
"Of the old school. Indulge me."
Sam gazed down on his bowed head, and her heart bled for his 'old school' argument, smacking as it did of desperation. It would have been so easy to give in. Instead, she frowned away her wave of tenderness, and answered, "No."
"No, Sam?" Feeling the reproof, he scanned her face for any sign she wasn't serious.
"No." Sam shook her head. "I can't. It's everybody's war. There must be something more that I can do than simply 'Make do and Mend'."
He stroked her belly. "Seems to me this is enough. You need your rest."
It was his genuine concern. Sam's natural energy was flagging; she'd been sleeping eight-hour nights in bed, and two hours in the evening after dinner. Rosalind had been the same, and that was without this war's more stringent rationing to sap her strength. Even with the extra green book rations, Christopher worried for Sam's nourishment, and often saw to it she took the lion's share of any food at home. The phrase 'I ate a decent lunch', or 'I've had an ample sufficiency, thank you' had become frequent refrains of his at the dinner table—and then he'd push his plate towards her so that she could finish for him. The results, as Sam had noted, were unintentionally beneficial to his waistline: he'd felt his midriff shrink and tauten with the smaller portions, all in measure as Sam's grew. Coupled with the frequent, healthy exercise afforded by the intimate exertions of a newly-married life, it made him feel in better nick than he'd been for years. And more contented.
Sam, apparently, was not. But there was nothing to be done. Except to sympathise.
"It worries me you feel this way," he told her gently. "All I can say is that I'm grateful for your patience, just for now."
"But I'm not doing anything important any more!" Sam fretted.
"Nothing, Sam?" He curled a finger underneath her chin, and Sam found herself swimming in a sea of blue persuasion. "Making new life when the world's hell bent on self-destruction? I'd say that what you're doing is the most important thing that anyone can do. I know the burden falls on you; I also know it isn't fair, but nature can't be changed. And what would it make me if I encouraged you to take on duties that might hurt you and the child? We've already stretched things beyond what most women do when they're expecting."
Sam compressed her lips. In these few months, she'd gone from freedom, recognition, and involvement, to a drab, domestic slot. What use was it to say that driving was an easy job, and being on a case with him felt glamorous, and housework was both hard and unappreciated? And Christopher was telling her she had to grin and bear it. She knew he wouldn't budge.
"I wish I were a man," groaned Sam.
Christopher's eyebrows climbed. "Wull, I certainly don't."
"Nothing really changes for women, does it?" she lamented. "This 'pulling together' is all for show. And when the men come back, we'll all be out of jobs again."
"Wull, those who come back, Sam."
The measured restraint of his tone pulled her up sharp.
"Sorry..." She shook her head. "It was an insensitive thing to say... about them coming back. Was Andrew giving much away on the phone this evening?"
"Not much," he offered lightly. "Got the impression he was waiting for orders."
Sam wasn't easily thrown off the scent. "Waiting to be scrambled, you mean. You're upset, aren't you?"
"There's..." Christopher looked away, and slowly licked his lips, "a lot at stake."
Sam scanned his features. Behind the stoic gaze there was a battle being fought. Competing worries.
She swallowed. This was not the time to make a stand.
Sam cleared her throat. "Perhaps I'll... bake cakes for the WVS. Or I could volunteer to man the mobile café?"
His eyes closed briefly. Sam read it as relief.
"You won't hear any objection from me. No lifting, though."
"Going to do my level best to pass for domesticated. I expect I'll come round to the idea."
"I'd say there isn't much you can't do, if you set your mind to it. Just bide your time, my love."
Sam brightened. "Apple and courgette cake might catch on, d'you think?"
"I think," he smiled, "that Hastings might come round to the idea."
*** FIN ***
Additional Notes:
Sam had been unusual: she'd stepped up for duty... a full year earlier than conscription had begun for women.
From spring 1941, every woman in Britain aged 18 to 60 was required to register and declare her family occupations. Subsequently, any woman adjudged to have time and capacity was required to choose from a range of activities to support the war effort. Many women ended up in jobs that put them under fire.
In December 1941, the National Service Act (no 2) made the conscription of women legal. At first, only single women aged 20 to 30 were called up, but by mid-1943, almost 90 per cent of single women and 80 per cent of married women were employed in essential war work.
...
...her full attention focussed on the smug, insinuating tones of William Joyce
Lord Haw Haw's broadcasts actually went out at 9.30 in the evening, rather than early evening, as implied here.
...
...yet she was dismayed to realise she'd lost her smoker's palate.
Well, we can't have Sam smoking while pregnant, can we? Even if most people in those days did believe it cleared your lungs :o)
...
"... this step comes just one week after the torpedoing of the Reuben James in neutral waters."
On the last day of October, 1941, the destroyer U.S.S. Reuben James was torpedoed by a U-boat in the waters off Iceland, killing more than 100 U.S. sailors. It was the first loss of a U.S. warship, at a time when America was still officially neutral.
In Invasion, we learn that Captain John Kiefer lost a brother in the tragedy, and that was the spur for him to volunteer for the armed forces in advance of the U.S. declaring war.
However, the political usefulness of the Reuben James incident to the interventionist cause became a moot point: only five weeks later, on December 7th, 1941, the wasp stung the elephant—Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.
...
"Today's the real remembrance day, though, isn't it?"
Beginning in 1939, the two-minute silence for Armistice Day was moved to the Sunday nearest to 11 November in order not to interfere with wartime production. After the war, Armistice Day was renamed Remembrance Day in Britain, and Veterans' Day in the U.S.
...
Horror vacui
Aristotle's theory that 'nature abhors a vacuum' has been blown out of the water in modern times. Apparently it's just the force of gravity at work!
...
To lose one wife had been a foul misfortune; to lose two... Damned if he was going to be seen as careless.
Based on one of Lady Bracknell's absurdities in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest:'To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose two looks like carelessness.'
...
L'Aimant will be back shortly. Oh, and the apples and zucchini are for AnneBronteRocks :o)
GiuC