A Little While

April 16, 1917

Aster House, Kingsport, Nova Scotia

(Dispatches, Chapter 30: "With Mine Own Hand")

(Di)

Nan is quiet at last. Sleeping? Perhaps. She still shudders a bit with every breath.

I stroke her hair and murmur to her, promising I will take her home to Rainbow Valley. She only curls herself tighter around the pillow.

The telegram didn't come to Aster House. Of course not. That's not how these things work. The Army papers list a soldier's next of kin, and for Jerry, that's still his parents. That's where telegrams go when there's something to tell. If they had been married before he left, it would have come to her, but who could have imagined all this back then? They always thought they had plenty of time. We all did, I suppose.

Of course, we got the telephone call as soon as the Manse had the news. Rosemary called, not Mr. Meredith. At first, Faith assumed the call was for her and answered brightly, but I watched her face fall and felt supper turn sour in my stomach. Beside me, Nan dropped her bobbins in a tangle and went to take the receiver like someone being led to the block.

She didn't cry on the phone, only sounded very small, answering Rosemary in single syllables. When she hung up, all she said was, "Wounded."

That was hours ago. Faith and I helped her upstairs and Sylvia made a heartening broth that's still over on the nightstand, congealing. The same she made for us last fall, I suppose. I don't think I ever tasted it.

When they left us, I helped Nan on with her nightgown and sat beside her as she hugged her knees.

"Tell me about hospitals," she whispered. "Where is he now?"

I explained as best I could. How wounded men were treated at dressing stations at the front and then sent to a Casualty Clearing Station nearby and then, when they were stable, on to a General Hospital. Jerry would get good treatment there, and maybe surgery if he needed it. Then, once he was on the mend, they'd send him to a convalescent hospital.

"It's been a whole week since Vimy Ridge," I said, "so he'll be in a General Hospital by now. A warm, clean bed. The best doctors Canada can send."

"Wounded in the back," she said, those huge hazel eyes like burnt holes in a blanket. "What might that mean?"

She needed the truth, but tenderly. "It could mean just about anything."

"Seriously wounded, Di."

I took her hands between mine and tried to warm them. "We'll just have to wait a little while for his letter. You know he's writing, maybe even this very minute."

"You think so?"

I smoothed back an errant, nut-brown lock. "You two grinds are singlehandedly keeping paper mills in business. I'm going to throw stamps at your wedding and call your firstborn Nibby, no matter what you name her."

She laughed a single sob, then dropped her head to my shoulder.

"I wish I were brave," she said. "Like you and Faith and Sylvia."

I almost told her then. The whole truth. How I had been dreading this week even before the telegram about Jerry. How I was terrified of U-boats in the North Atlantic and zeppelins over London. How I only hoped that I could persevere as she had through these long, long years of separation, but that I wasn't sure I could bear it. If there were ever news to tell, it wouldn't come to me, either. I almost told her the truth, and I wish I had.

Instead, I helped her climb under the covers and held her while she trembled.

Now, the window has gone dark and my arm tingles, but I don't want to disturb her. I can't do a thing for Jerry and I can't stop Sylvia from leaving, but I can take care of Nan. I'll take her home to Mother and Dad in a few days, hide her away from the world. Exams can go hang.

A flicker of quavering light glows in the doorway and I blink up at Faith, golden-brown curls escaping her braid and falling over the shoulders of her flannel nightgown. She smiles that angelic smile, though her eyes are sunken in the aftermath of many tears.

"Let me stay with her a little while," she murmurs. I open my mouth to object, but Faith meets my eye. "You need to be elsewhere, don't you?"

Her eyes are amber in the lamplight, like a hawk's, sharp and steady and seeing. They hold mine. We've never spoken frankly, though I think she worked things out ages ago.

It's difficult to extricate myself without waking Nan. She sighs and stirs, but Faith has wriggled into the warm hollow I left in the mattress before I'm fairly out of it. She snuggles down next to Nan and shoos me.

I take the lamp and pad down the hall, past my own door to the paisley-papered room at the end of the hall. It's silly to knock.

"Di!"

I'm barely over the threshold before Sylvia has her arms around my neck. I hold the lamp away from her hair and squeeze her with my free arm, burying my face in the lemon scent of her nightgown. We sway, locked together for a long moment before she releases me, takes the lamp from my hand, wipes at my face with her sleeve.

"How is she?"

"Asleep."

"And you?"

I want to say that I'm in a terrible state, of course. How could I be otherwise, with her leaving and Nan grieving and nothing I can do to fix either. But the pink bow of her lips is drooping and there's certainly something I can do about that. She melts away under my kiss, retreating in a smile that breaks it almost before it starts. I will miss them both, her kisses and her smiles, and so much more besides. Today was dreadful and tomorrow may be worse and I don't know how I will go on, kissless and smileless.

"Sit, love," she says, pressing me gently into a chair.

Sylvia clucks as she undoes my garters, pulls the stockings from my feet, the pins from my hair. I kicked off my shoes before getting into bed beside Nan, but that's about it. Now, Sylvia is massaging my scalp with quick, firm fingers and I groan in relief. She sweeps my hair over my shoulder and kisses the back of my neck.

"When are you going to bob it?" she whispers somewhere behind my ear.

She's been teasing me for months over the picture of Irene Castle I cut out of a magazine and pinned to my dresser.

"Would you like me like that? With my hair all short?"

Her fingers are still moving, loosening the tight places where the pins have lain too long. It's a satisfying sort of pain.

"I like you every way. But you'd be devilishly handsome shorn."

She means it. When we saw Poor Little Peppina at the cinema, the whole crowd gasped in horror at the cutting of Mary Pickford's curls, but Syl squeezed my thigh in the dark, her fingers as sharp as the teeth biting her lower lip to keep her from singing out her laughter.

"Get your scissors."

Had she meant right now? Maybe not. But if I've learned anything at all, it's that right now is all we have. Besides, I'd cut off my nose if it would please her.

Sylvia steps around the chair to see if I am serious, which I am. Then it's just a matter of combs and shears and water in the basin.

"Ready?" she asks, poised with a lock of my hair in her hand.

I tighten the towel she has draped around my shoulders. "Ready."

Sylvia's clever fingers making quick work of the copper waves. Bright hanks fall around me and I think of the Greeks in Walter's stories who were shorn in mourning. How satisfying to carry your love visibly like that. I feel it every time I wear my hospital garb, keeping faith the best way I know how. Now, people will look at my my hair askance and I will smile.

When she finishes, I feel lighter. Hair can't weigh so very much, can it? But I shake my head like a pup reveling in new spring grass and feel reborn. Sylvia takes the measure of my new style with a playful ruffle, then slides a hand down to my cheek.

"Very dashing," she says against my lips.

She's going soon, but she's here right now.

"Syl," I say, taking her face between my hands. Such a short time to lay in a sufficient store for the hard season ahead.

She returns my kisses and nudges me to my feet. I need no convincing. I am already walking her backward, taking a kiss for every step. When the bed interrupts our progress, I turn again, alighting on the edge and leaving her standing before me. We are of a height now that I am sitting, and she holds me with a frank and steady gaze.

"You know that I love you," she says, pushing up my skirt so that she can stand between my knees, arms draped around my neck. "I won't go if you want me to stay."

If only I could ask that of her. If only I could dig my fingers into her skirts and say stay of course you must stay I need you too much to let you go. I never would. She wants to go, is blazing with the righteousness of going, and I am only sorry that I'm not going, too.

"I will always want you just exactly where you are right now," I say, stroking down her sides and resting my hands on her hips. "But we both have work to do, and I won't keep you from yours."

If I had only wanted smiles, I might find myself disappointed by her reply, but I am greedy for every one of the kisses she presses to my mouth. She tastes like July, like cherries or currants or raspberries left a day too long on the vine. Bright and ripe, with a late mellow note when her tongue finds mine. She is all over fullness: the gentle curve of her shoulders as I ease her nightgown down over her arms, the soft roundness of her belly, the swell of her breast filling my cupped hand. In the moonlight, she reminds me of the bronze statue Mother keeps in the sitting room at Ingleside: Artemis of the Silver Bow. How many hours did I spend following those arcs, bare breasts and graceful bow thrumming with tension in her capable hands? Now my own hands are proficient. I lay her down on the coverlet, smiling, kissing, and ask a question with my fingertips. Will you let me worship you a little while, if a little while is all we have?