Chapter Six: MCMXIV (1914)

Downton Abbey, 4th August 1914

The sun beat down on her wide-brimmed hat, and Mary closed her eyes for a moment against the glare of the bright sunlight on the white tent. Everything was perfect for this, the event of the year, the annual garden party.

She was quietly proud. Mama had handed over more responsibility to her than she had expected, and she had spent weeks planning and preparing. She spent a minute basking in her success, savouring this moment.

This was her world. This was why she had married Patrick. This was who she was, this was who she had been born to be. She was the sparkling, elegant hostess, serenely sailing on through the complex arrangements, the meticulous organization, the sensitive management of guests and servants. She was in control and she loved it.

She drifted seamlessly through the throngs of guests, saying just the right things to just the right people, ensuring everyone was happy, checking that Patrick was speaking to the right people and saying the right things and covering for him when he slipped up. His pathetic looks of gratitude when she did so made her want to roll her eyes and sigh, but of course she didn't, and in a way, it was nice to be so needed and appreciated.

She saw Edith slipping away with Sir Anthony Strallen and smirked to herself. The man was going to propose, and Edith was going to say yes, and it was really very amusing that Edith seemed happy to be marrying a baronet who was at least as old as Papa, and in Papa's own words, 'as dull as paint'. Oh, they would suit each other very well, if they didn't bore each other to death. Best of all, it would get Edith out of her hair.

She was becoming quite accomplished at managing Patrick's presence in her life, ensuring that their schedules always worked out so that they never spent more time together than was absolutely necessary, and with Edith gone too, she would be quite satisfied with her life.

She even dared to hope that perhaps… it was early, far too early to know for certain, only days, really, but she was quite seriously beginning to suspect… perhaps Downton's future would soon be secure. She briefly touched her flat stomach and smiled. She would speak to Dr Clarkson tomorrow, she decided.

She looked out across the lawn again, and saw a beaming Edith clinging to Sir Anthony's arm like a silly schoolgirl. She smiled. She didn't begrudge Edith her happiness. She had won the county's great matrimonial prize, so Edith was welcome to her leavings, just as she had been welcome to her too-small or out-of-fashion clothes when they were young. It wouldn't take her sister long to realise that Sir Anthony was even more dull and irritating than Patrick, but came with none of the advantages.

She saw Patrick coming towards her, smiling his adoring smile and it was easy to smile back. He reached her and offered his arm. She took it. They looked good together, she knew that. Downton's golden couple, the handsome young heir and the beautiful eldest daughter of the Earl. All was well with the world.

She should have known that the moment was too perfect and golden to last.

Suddenly, her father was calling for silence and she frowned in confusion as she saw his stricken expression.

And then, with one short sentence, her perfect, elegant, ordered world was shattered forever:

"I very much regret to announce that we are at war with Germany."

As she was dressing for bed that night, she found blood in her undergarments. She cried.

A few short hours ago, the future had seemed more secure than it had ever been. Now, she had never felt more uncertain.

Manchester, Autumn 1914

Matthew took one look at his morning newspaper, sighed, and put it down on the table. He picked up his tea and stared into it as if the answer to the dilemma that had been eating away at him was to be found at the bottom of the cup.

He could feel his mother's eyes on him. She would ask him what was wrong in a minute, and he knew that this time, he would tell her. He couldn't keep it to himself any longer.

He looked up at her and she smiled expectantly. She could predict his moods too easily. He didn't need to wait for her to ask.

"I've been thinking about something a lot recently, Mother," he began, watching her expression, wondering if she had guessed this as well.

"Yes. I know," she said pleasantly. "And now you're going to tell me what it is, finally. I'm listening."

He didn't know whether to be irritated or to laugh. He decided to laugh. He loved his mother, however irritating she could be. And he knew they were standing on the edge of a precipice of a world in which occasions for laughter would be few and far between.

"I'm going to volunteer," he said carefully, still watching her expression. "I'm… I'm going to join the army."

She nodded slowly. Sadly, he thought, but also as if she had been expecting it. She was already resigned to it.

"You're sure?" she asked. "Because you know, war is no game. What your father saw… and he wasn't even on the front lines. It's serious, Matthew. Dangerous."

"I know," he said. And he did know. He wasn't naïve like all the young lads he's seen rushing to enlist as soon as they could, thinking it would be some sort of adventure. "And I know it won't be over by Christmas. I've thought about it. But I think I must do it."

"I know," she said. She continued to look at him gravely, but said nothing more.

"You're not going to try to stop me?" he asked. He almost wanted her to. It would give him an excuse to delay. He was all she had, and he hated to leave her.

"No. I won't stop you. I know you wouldn't have said anything if you hadn't thought it over and decided. You see it as your duty. I know. I'll miss you, and it will be awful, but this is war. No parent wants their child to go to war, but every man already out there, and those who will be there soon, they are all somebody's sons. If you feel you must go, then you must."

He nodded stiffly. He had expected more of a fuss, but now he thought about it, this reaction was exactly what he should have expected. Isobel Crawley was not one to make a fuss. She knew he would either go anyway, or stay at home and feel guilty, and she didn't want to fight. Yes, he understood her. It had been just them since Father had died, of course they understood each other.

"Do you mean to go straight away?" she asked calmly, although he could see the pain in her eyes.

"I need to set things in order at work. And there are other things to sort out." Writing a will for one thing, he thought, but he didn't say it. "I won't do anything until after your birthday." That was three weeks away. Too soon, and yet, not soon enough when men were already dying in their thousands.

She nodded.

Matthew wondered if it would be the last birthday he spent with her, and he guessed she was probably thinking the same. He wished there was no war, that there was no reason for him to cause his mother pain. But there was a war, and he had to do his duty, or he would go mad. He wasn't married, he had no children, and there was plenty of money for Mother to live on, whatever happened to him. He was young and fit and healthy. He had no excuse not to volunteer.

From Downton to London and back again, Winter 1914-1915

Patrick need never have gone to war. Of course every family like theirs was being forced to wrestle with the impossible question of whether it was unpatriotic to use one's connections to keep precious heirs away from the front, but the Crawleys had never had to worry about that; Patrick had worked at the Foreign Office up until his marriage, and was immediately asked to return to his legitimately important desk job.

He moved back to London, and Mary went with him. She hated to be away from Downton, but there was a certain excitement to being in London, running her own household and hosting dinners for Patrick's colleagues, at which the conversation focused on important political issues rather than farm machinery, or the latest mad thing Billy Skelton had done, or the village flower show.

She and Patrick got on better there, she thought, both too busy to irritate each other, and with enough to talk about that the awkward, polite conversations that had characterised their first year of marriage were replaced by real interest in what they had each been doing that day. Away from Downton, the injustice of Papa's unbounded favouritism towards Patrick stung just a little less, as it was Mary who kept up to date with what was going on at home while Patrick threw himself into city life.

And so, for several months, Mary's life went on quite smoothly even as the world fell apart around her.

But as the months lengthened and it became clear that there was no end in sight, as Patrick's friends began to leave the safety of their desk jobs for commissions in the best regiments, he began to look wistfully at men in uniform.

Mary watched him, and saw, and was not surprised when he blurted out over dinner one night when they were visiting Downton that he was going to volunteer, that he felt he had to. Papa had been devastated, but he had understood, had given Patrick his blessing.

And despite trying to argue that he needed to stay at least until there was an heir, that he had a responsibility to his family and to Downton as much as he had to his country, Mary had not stopped him in the end, never quite knowing whether she admired his bravery, or whether she wanted to shout, scream, slap him, anything to wake him up from his naïve dreams of heroism.

The weeks before Patrick left went terrifyingly quickly, and Mary found herself unable to forget the date and the number of days her husband had left for even a moment. She wasn't in love with him, of course she wasn't, and she still found him inordinately irritating, but the thought of naïve, gentle Patrick being forced to fight was awfully, painfully wrong. The thought of him as an officer, commanding many other men, seemed ridiculous given how easy-going and peace-loving he was. God, he couldn't even bear the slightest of disputes with her, his wife! He was born to shoot pheasants, not Germans.

Patrick had wanted to go immediately, but between she and Papa, he had been convinced to prepare properly, set his affairs in order, give his friends and family a little more time.

They closed up the London house and returned to Downton. She had rather enjoyed their time in London, but she had no desire to live there alone.

It was strange at first to be home, and she missed running her own household within less than a week, but she soon realised her family provided a welcome barrier between her and her husband.

She found herself oddly tongue-tied when she was alone with him. What could she possibly say? She couldn't say all the sweet things wives were supposed to say to their beloved husbands when they were bound for war, she couldn't tell him she loved him; it wouldn't be true, and she couldn't pretend. She couldn't tell him he would be alright, or that she would be alright, or that the war would be over soon, because those things weren't true either. And she couldn't pretend that nothing was different.

She found herself preoccupied with the question of an heir. She wasn't pregnant yet, and Patrick's life was obviously going to be in danger. Without either a husband or a son, she had nothing, was nothing. The house and estate that were her home, that should be her home forever, would go to some distant cousin she had never met, and she would be left drifting, uncertain, alone.

And so she allowed Patrick into her bed every night she could bear it, even encouraged him when he showed no sign of following her into her room. He, of course, was delighted with her new enthusiasm, and began to try to get her upstairs early in the evenings. Probably because he knew there was no chance of being allowed to stay in her bed later, she thought. Retiring early was the only hope he had of more time with her. She indulged him, indulged her father who smiled whenever he thought he saw them getting on better, indulged her mother who was as desperate as she was to have her future safely settled.

She bore his attentions well, she thought, and sometimes, for a few moments, she would forget that this was her annoying cousin Patrick who was kissing her and touching her and thrusting inside her. She would forget that she was Lady Mary Crawley and that Downton should be hers by right and that this was all about conceiving an heir to secure her uncertain future. She would forget that she didn't love him, and she would forget Pamuk and the dangers of passion and excitement.

And then, quite suddenly, it was his last night.

He was only leaving for training, of course, nothing too dangerous….

And yet. This was the end of their dull, comfortable married life, the end of the early nights and hopes for an heir, and the beginning of something else, something different and serious and wrong. He was leaving.

Everyone tried to make that last dinner a celebration. Mrs Patmore had made all Patrick's favourite foods, and her father had asked Carson to open only the best wines. They all tried to keep up a normal conversation at the table, to smile and laugh and let it all be normal for one more night.

It failed, of course.

For once, she was actually genuinely eager to go up early, to escape the atmosphere that was too jovial, too tense, too wrong. She followed Patrick up to her bedroom, but stopped when he stood in front of her door. She waited for him to either go to his dressing room, or open the door to her room, but he did neither. Instead, he reached up and cradled her cheek gently. She froze for a moment. Then, involuntarily, she found herself leaning into him slightly.

He swallowed nervously. "Mary, could you… could you maybe not ring for Anna? I should like it very much if I could have you to myself tonight."

She gaped at him. He had never made such a request, not since that night on their honeymoon when he had dismissed the servants and she had made her displeasure known in no uncertain terms.

"Patrick…" she began, oddly distracted by his warm hand.

"I know you like your clothes looked after, I know you like your hair done, and I'll make it knotty, it's only I want to be with you, just you, for one night, just us, and…" he broke off, shaking his head. He had spoken so quickly and nervously, he was a little breathless.

When she didn't respond, he looked down. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked, of course you…"

"Yes," she said, interrupting him mid-apology. She didn't know what had got into her, but he looked so desperate, and his hand was so soft, and his eyes so blue…

He stared at her, wide-eyed. "You mean…"

"Yes. I can do without Anna for one night." She was smiling, and she didn't understand herself at all, but for this one night, she truly didn't mind.

He blinked a few times, then grinned, looking so much like the boy he had been, the boy he still was really, she felt a lump in her throat. He opened the door, then pulled her gently after him. As soon as the door was closed, he kissed her. She kissed him back. There was something rather thrilling about letting go for one night like this, of allowing him this one night of happiness before he left.

And so she surrendered to it, allowing herself to smile at his adoration and to feel the pleasure of his hands on her body that she had been enduring rather than enjoying for so many months. They undressed each other, and she actually laughed at how long it took him to figure out her corset, and how impatient he was as he tried. They fell into bed and he kissed her again and again, eager and desperate at the same time.

It was nice. She had never thought this could be anything but a trial, an ordeal necessary for the begetting of heirs, a duty to her husband, but that night, it was nice. Of course she didn't share in the ecstasy Patrick seemed to feel, but there was no pain, and it actually felt rather good, his closeness familiar and comforting and welcome.

Afterwards, when Patrick roused himself to leave as he usually did, she almost reached for his arm to pull him back down. The sheets were tangled, and they were sticky with sweat, and it would have been terribly uncomfortable to sleep together, but Mary almost let him. He was leaving tomorrow. She could let him have tonight.

She didn't. He left, as he always did, for his dressing room. To sleep alone.

His train left early the next morning, and when she awoke, he was already gone.

Somewhere in Northern France, Spring 1915

The ground shook again, and Matthew closed his eyes as a suffocating muddy dust was shaken loose to hang in the air and clog his lungs and make him cough. A week ago, the dugout had seemed almost homely, decent enough accommodation in comparison with the hovels his men were sleeping in. But that had been before this latest bombardment had started.

Six dead today. More wounded that anyone could count under these conditions.

Perhaps, just perhaps, that might be all for today. Outside, the light was fading. Perhaps another hour before everything began to quieten down for the night. Germans needed to sleep too.

Sometimes.

Of course, he would not sleep. The constant pounding of the guns, the shaking of the earth, the screams of grown men made him believe each day that nothing could be worse, that he would do anything just to make it all stop. And yet each night, the moments of silence became more unbearable. During the day, there was always far too much to do to stop and think and be afraid. In the tense stillness of the cold nights, there was no such distraction.

Matthew had not slept properly for days. He was well beyond exhaustion now, functioning on instinct and running on fear. There was nothing of the man he had once been left. How could there be, here? There was no time or space or energy for the learning and the clever problem-solving and the attention-to-detail that had served him so well as a lawyer, no place for questioning orders or caring too much about men that might be dead within the week.

The man he had been did not belong here. The man he was now…

What sort of mad world thought he was suited to this? What warped logic had led the army to the conclusion that men like him, with little to distinguish them but for their educated voices and university certificates, were qualified to lead strangers to their deaths? Some of them, he knew, had grown up on stories of heroism and adventure, had been shaped by their education to rule and give orders and serve the empire, but that had never been him. And he suspected anyone brought up on tales of heroism and the Charge of the Light Brigade would find themselves quite as lost as he was in this impossible broken world into which they had been thrown.

Nothing could possibly prepare anyone for this.

And yet what choice did he have? What choice did any of them have? This may be worse than he could possibly have imagined, but he could not regret his choice to volunteer. They were at war, perhaps the most important war since Napoleon's defeat; this was his duty, and he would not shy away from it.

He would give everything he had to this war, would do all he could to keep as many of his men alive as he could, and himself too, if that was possible in this hell. Because there was no other option open to him, no other option that would have allowed him to live with himself.

But what would be left of the man he had once been when all of this was over, he did not know.

Downton Abbey, Spring 1915

When Mary moved back to Downton and Patrick left, she had half-expected life to go back to how it had been before her marriage. Of course there was a war on, and of course everyone's lives could never be quite the same, but Downton was not London, and the rest of the world and its problems seemed very distant in those first few months compared to the change that had been so evident in the city. The men had not left yet, not in the numbers they would do in later years, and although Papa spoke of little else except the war, life went on much as it had before.

It did not feel that way to Mary.

Everything that made Downton the same only served to make her feel more off-balance. In London, she had been a married woman with her own household, and Patrick had kept her better informed regarding the progress of the war than any amount of diligent study of the newspapers could. The streets had bustled with life as England came together to organise itself against the enemy. The world had been changing, and it had been terrifying and exciting in equal measure.

Now, far from all of this, the increasingly worrying news that gradually reached them from the continent seemed entirely incongruous with the familiar pace of village life and the slow, seasonal rhythms of the farms.

Edith married Anthony in a small ceremony, her smile so radiant that even Mary had to admit she looked rather lovely. Anthony, of course, looked more like a father giving his daughter away than a bridegroom, but he looked at his bride with such blissful admiration, nobody could have mistaken the odd union for anything other than a love match.

And suddenly, Edith was gone and Patrick was gone and it was only Sybil and Mary and their parents at dinner.

It should have been a relief to be free from the sister with whom she could never manage a civil conversation and the husband she didn't love. And in a way, it was.

At night, Mary was glad to have the large bed to herself, to be able to read late into the night if she wanted, to keep her sheets free from the still-strange male scent of her husband. She was glad not to have to steel herself for yet another night of allowing him to grope and kiss and thrust while she hoped and hoped that there would be some point to it all.

She was glad that she no longer needed to feign interest in Patrick's ill-thought through political opinions, his obsession with sport, the latest endeavours of his dull, indistinguishable friends in love and hunting and government.

She was glad that there was no surrogate son for Papa to sit and talk to for an hour after dinner while she sat and seethed and wished for someone to take her seriously and talk to her about important things.

But as the months dragged on, and the letters bearing bad news began to arrive, she could not stay glad for long.

Papa may not have his son there to discuss the estate and the war and politics, but he did not even seem to contemplate that Mary might be a good substitute, even if a substitute was all she could be.

At night, even as she revelled in the joy of her large, empty, Patrick-free bed, she could never forget for long that the reason she had this luxury was because he would soon be sleeping in some dirty trench in France, while bullets and bombs rained down on him.

She read his short, tired letters from his training camp, and tried not to feel the growing pressure in her chest as the months and weeks and days of his training slipped away, and the date of his departure to the front approached.

She didn't love him, and she didn't want him the way he wanted her. But she could no longer deny, even to herself, that she cared about him enough that she would endure his presence in her bed every night, would listen patiently to his boring conversations, would even force herself to laugh at his pathetic jokes, if only she could know he would be safe.

Manchester, Summer 1915

Isobel looked at the clock for what must have been the hundredth time that afternoon. It's too early, his train won't even be at the station yet. A part of her wanted to be at the station when he arrived, to see him as soon as she possibly could, to calm the worry that had been with her since the moment he had left.

But his letter had been very clear. He would be home in plenty of time for dinner, but she was not to meet him at the station.

It can be disorientating for them to be home.

Perhaps he wanted time to collect himself a little. That would be perfectly reasonable, surely. Or perhaps he simply didn't want to be greeted by his mother when there would be other soldiers being greeted by their wives and sweethearts. That would make sense too, and oh, how she hoped he would find someone who made him happy while the world was falling apart. Although her Matthew had never been embarrassed by her…

They may not know how to act, even with familiar people in familiar places. Take your lead from them.

She knew he might seem different. She had been working almost every day at the hospital since the very first of the wounded had started to arrive, before Matthew had even left for training. She had read everything she could find about helping the men when they came home. She was prepared. Everything would be fine.

They may seem older than their years, or younger.

It had been months, but it felt like years. She had kept herself busy, but the days dragged, and she spent far too much of her time waiting for his letters, and then reading them over and over. His tone was always so careful, she was always looking for what he wasn't saying, what he couldn't tell her.

They won't be able to talk about it. Not really. You can't understand. Accept that, and help them in any way you can.

The wounded were coming in a steady, unstoppable stream now, and every time a new load arrived at the hospital she found herself looking for him, even though she knew she would have been informed if he had been injured seriously enough to be sent home.

They probably have scars from injuries that seemed too trivial to mention. Because anything that isn't catastrophic, or doesn't at least get them a ticket home, seems trivial to them now.

The streets and shops and offices were beginning to empty of young men. At first, it had been the brave ones, the stupid ones, those from army families… and the dutiful, honourable men like her Matthew. She had privately cursed his sense of duty at first, even as she had felt a warm surge of pride and had forced herself to calmly accept his decision to go. Now, she feared it would make little difference whether men were brave or honourable or not. They were dying too quickly out there, and needed to be replaced, and if things carried on as they were, it would surely only be a matter of time before any man who was young and able-bodied would be unable to avoid it.

They will have lost men who served beside them.. friends… commanding officers… men they themselves ordered and led into battle.

It hurt to think of her gentle son carrying weapons and ordering men into battle. He would be good at it, she knew that; he had always been a better leader that he thought he was, so good at projecting a confidence he didn't always feel, so effortlessly remembering the names and interests of the younger students at school and university and helping them with their studies, so impossible not to admire and respect.

But still. A world that put him on the front lines of a war was a world in which something terrible had gone wrong.

She checked the clock again. The train was here then, if it had arrived on time. He was here. In Manchester. Home. It was a twenty-minute walk from the station, but perhaps he would get a cab. But he hadn't said he would be home straight away, only that he would be back for dinner.

They will be too thin. They don't starve them, but there is rarely enough food, or the right kind of food, and nothing supresses the appetite quite like dining in the company of corpses. Don't let them eat too much too quickly.

She hadn't even needed to ask Mrs Bird to cook his favourite foods; she had already planned it, bought all the ingredients and started on the preparation, seeming almost as eager to make him feel comfortable and welcomed and loved as Isobel was herself. Matthew had always been so very easy to love.

She remembered the first time he had come home after going away to school. He had grown what seemed like inches in only a few weeks, and had burst into the house with more stories than he could find the time to tell, and she and Reggie had listened, enraptured by his joy, his excitement, his life.

And then when he came home from Oxford after his first term, so full of new ideas and a world of knowledge just opening up to him, laden with Christmas presents and law books and a new cricket bat he was so enamoured with, he had apparently been unable to leave it behind, although who he thought he would be playing cricket with in the middle of winter in Manchester she did not know.

It would be so different this time, and her heart ached for her little boy, her clever young man, joyful and earnest and so full of ideas of honour…

They will seem different.

She was ready. It didn't matter if he didn't speak a word, if he slept the whole time he was home, if he cried in her arms. She was ready, and she would help him, and he would go back - and how she wished he didn't have to go back! – in a better state than he arrived. She was perfectly prepared for all eventualities. He would be alright, she would make sure he was.

They are usually very tired; there isn't much opportunity to sleep out there… They will seem different… There will almost certainly be lice in their clothes. Don't make a fuss about it, but make sure everything is thoroughly washed… Don't overwhelm them with affection, let them take the lead… They won't be the same, they can't possibly be the same after all they will have seen… They may seem impatient, but you must be patient, because they will be different… I'll make sure he's alright, I'll do everything I know to make him alright, but he might seem different, Oh my boy…

She must do everything right, must make him feel safe and loved and comforted, must not put any pressure on him, must do everything she could to make this short week perfect for him, must send him back rested and healthier and well-fed and knowing he was loved, and…

The front door opened, and there were footsteps that made her ache with their familiarity, and then the door opened just as she stepped towards it.

And there he was. Home.

For a moment, they both stood in silence, drinking in each other's presence.

For a moment, he was almost a stranger. Her son, and yet not her little boy. Any vestiges of childhood had melted away, and his face was all sharp angles and dark stubble and a moustache that made him look far too serious. For a moment, she barely recognised him.

It was only a moment.

He smiled, and suddenly Isobel was beaming too, and clutching his hands, taking him in not as a stranger, but as the man her boy had become. He was older, he was tired, and he was thin, and she was sure he and his uniform needed a thorough wash… but he was here. And all the well-meaning advice she had drilled into herself in preparation was suddenly unnecessary, forgotten. Because this was Matthew, her son, her boy, and she knew him as well as she had known anyone.

And then her arms were around him, and his were around her, and the new hard muscle that had replaced the softness she was accustomed to didn't matter as the soldier in her arms became her loving little boy who had never been embarrassed at his mother's affection even as his friends had asserted their teenage independence.

Matthew was home, and for one short week, all was well in her world.

Downton Abbey, Summer 1915

Patrick's arrival at Downton for his first leave, after training and before being sent off to France, was strangely without ceremony. He had arrived earlier than expected, he explained later, and walked up from the station alone.

But Mary didn't know this when she came down the stairs with her mind occupied elsewhere and looked across the hall, and suddenly he was just… there.

She stood back a little as Papa greeted him like a son. Patrick kept glancing at her, and she didn't know what to do with his sudden presence.

They had known each other since before either of them could remember, and yet they were almost shy with each other. It had been months, and the world had changed so much in that time, they didn't know how to behave anymore.

The last time she had seen him, he had been leaving her bed, sweaty and sated and drowsy.

Mary covered it well, she thought, playing the part of the dutiful wife; quietly pleased to see him, but not overly emotional about it in front of the family. It was more difficult that she had expected. She had been expecting the Patrick she had known all her life, the boy who adored her as much as he irritated her. Yet this Patrick was not a boy, but a man. He had filled out his frame, had somehow grown into himself, and in his smart army uniform, he even looked rather handsome. And yet it took only moments for the boy she had known to reappear when he looked at her.

"Mary," he breathed.

"Patrick," she said, pleased when her voice came out far calmer than she felt.

He stepped towards her, watching her closely, meeting her eyes, startling her a little with his newfound confidence when he didn't look away.

"You look even lovelier than I've been imagining you," he said with a smile. "Are you well?"

"Perfectly," she replied coolly.

He stepped closer again. "I've missed you," he said sincerely, still smiling.

Mary swallowed. She should tell him she had missed him. That would be the right thing to say, surely? But wouldn't that be a pointless lie? Had she missed him?

"Of course you have," she said instead. "I'm glad to have been missed."

His smile didn't drop, but something in his eyes shifted, and Mary realised that she didn't quite know what that meant, that she had never paid enough attention to his eyes and his expression to know. Was he disappointed? Perhaps he had reason to be.

But he stepped closer yet again, bold and broad and somehow more solid than she remembered him.

"Have you not missed me, even a little?" he asked, reaching out to take her hand. His palm was rough, hardened and calloused from… she didn't know. Holding a gun? What did men even do in officer training? How did she not know?

"Well, you see, I've been terribly busy," she lied. But his gaze was distracting, his blue eyes dark, intense, searching. "But yes," she said after a moment. "Perhaps I have. A little."

And Mary realised, with a sudden shock, that it wasn't a lie. That it had not only been London and the life that had lived there that she had missed all these months; it had been him, Patrick, boring and familiar and unoriginal in all his thoughts and opinions, but somehow part of her life now.

"And will you welcome your soldier home?" he asked, pulling her closer, so much bolder than he had ever been with her before.

"Are you truly a soldier yet? Before you've seen action?" she asked, playing for time.

"Will you welcome you husband, then?" he asked.

She swallowed, and found herself smiling. "Yes."

That was all the invitation he needed to pull her closer, to kiss her, polite and soft and appropriate for the almost public setting of the hall, but backed by a new confidence that was unfamiliar to her.

She remembered the last night before he left, the boyish, tentative smiles and kisses, her irritation and affection for him confused in her mind. Now, it was the same, and different at the same time.

He was her cousin, and her childhood friend, and her husband, and yet he was all of these things in a new way. This was not love, it was not passion. But he was her husband, and he wanted her, and she liked to be wanted. How could she deny him what little affection her cold heart had to give him when soon, he would be far away, fighting for his life. How could it be real?

She kissed him back.

He was home, and he was safe, and soon, he would not be home or safe at all. The dull innocence of their awkward marriage was disintegrating as the world fell apart around them.

How had her life come to this? How had the stakes suddenly become so high?

She did not love him.

But she did not want him dead.

From MCMXIV (Philip Larkin, 1964)

Never such innocence,

Never before or since,

As changed itself to past

Without a word – the men

Leaving the gardens tidy,

The thousands of marriages,

Lasting a little while longer:

Never such innocence again.

Author's Note: Rather a long chapter this week, but I just kept adding more and more - if I don't post it now, I'll just keep going, I think!

Please go and read the whole of Larkin's MCMXIV - I thought the last stanza was the most appropriate for this chapter, but you need to read the whole thing to really understand it. It's one of my favourite poems, and has been in my mind as I've been writing this chapter in particular, and many other parts of this story too. It should be easy enough to find on the internet.

Also, I can't not mention Chickwriter's 'Never Such Innocence Again' - perhaps my favourite MM story - for anyone who hasn't already (why not?), please go and read it! It's in my favourites list on my profile.

Next chapter, we'll be mostly back in 1919...