Read Online Letters From an Unknown Woman by Gerard Woodward - Free Book Online

evening she had set aside for writing, finally, to Donald. She thought she would enclose it with her own letter, once she had written it. Sitting at the escritoire, she began,
Dearest Donald,
Forgive me if I seemed harsh in my earlier letter. We have been apart for a long time and it has taken me a while to try to see things from your position. I understand, now, how difficult things must have been for you, and how the struggles and sufferings you have endured must have affected your thinking, and your memory. I’m sure this is why you have not asked about your children and their circumstances, or mine and Mrs Head’s. First, let me tell you about the children. They have been very lucky in finding good foster families, and they are living in such a beautiful part of the world I feel quite jealous. They were, of course, overjoyed to learn that you are alive and well. I have only been able to visit them once since they were evacuated, but we write regularly. They have devised some plans for your escape which I think you will find amusing.
    Mrs Head and I live in quiet and peaceful coexistence. Mrs H keep herself busy with shopping and cooking and visiting her friends, while I have taken work in a factory. I did spend some time as a searchlight operator, but I’m afraid I wasn’t very good at it, and would have let hundreds of German planes sneak past unilluminated had I stayed in the job, so was glad to be relieved. I can do much less damage to the world in a gelatine factory, though I do sometimes wish I was doing something a little more important than packing gelatine.
    The raids continue nearly every night. I do not know how much longer the city can take this sort of attack, although our part has escaped the worst so far (apart from a single bomb that fell on Old Parade, destroying Dando’s and several other shops), but I do know that the spirit of the people of London has not been broken and never will be, no matter what happens.
    She added that last sentence after realizing her letter would be read by Germans. This thought also made it hard to decide how she would write what she thought she should write next.
Donald, I am thinking of what you asked for in your earlier letters …
    She sat back, nibbled the end of her pencil nervously, glanced up at the wall, on which hung a framed photograph of Mr and Mrs Head, Mama and Papa, taken to commemorate their engagement, though you would not think this from the expressions on their faces – passive, stern, bored, two sepia-toned Victorians, her hand on his arm, gazing into space. For some reason the studio setting of this photograph was of the seashore. There were pebbles strewn on the floor, a starfish, and white cliffs were painted rather badly onto the draped background. At least they were not looking at her directly as she wrote. On the wall to the left there was a little engraving of Leonardo’s Last Supper . Donald had said this picture was all wrong, that Jesus and his disciples had eaten like the Romans, reclining on couches.
    She half closed her eyes and wrote:
I imagine you taking me in your manly arms, my love, and then putting one of your hands on my behind.
    She wrote this sentence as if hurrying out of a smoke-filled building – blindly, stumblingly and fast. She signed her name, then sealed the letter in the envelope quickly, deciding at the last moment that she couldn’t possibly include Tom’s with her own. She gave another abashed glance at the photograph on the wall – could it be possible that they now looked a little bit shocked?
    After posting the letter into the leering red mouth of the box on the corner of Peter Street and Mark Street, she imagined, at the other end, prison-camp guards in jackboots and those horrible streamlined helmets, ripping open her letter and laughing loudly at its last sentence. She imagined it being passed around the guardhouse for the amusement of the whole patrol. She couldn’t help cherishing the hope that