reflection.
You must write often so I know you’re all right. Please promise you will. And no, if Hugh was involved in your getting the job at the Admiralty, I had no idea. Although now I come to think of it, he did say something in one of his letters from the Front. It was a few weeks after you were sent to that awful prison. He said he felt he understood you, now. It was such a strange remark, and completely without any further explanation, but I suppose he couldn’t say too much for fear of the letter being read. He asked how you were, but of course I couldn’t tell him very much at the time as you hadn’t been allowed to write any letters yet. That was a terrible time, not knowing what was happening to you.
If you like, I’ll go to see Pip Wharton on my day off and ask him about it. I don’t suppose I know him any better than you do, but I’m sure he won’t mind an old acquaintance visiting to talk about Hugh. In fact, I should have visited him before now—poor man, it can’t be much fun for him shut up in that big house, having to get about in a bath chair.
You know, I’m gladder than ever that I didn’t give up the nursing, like Father wanted me to. I should hate to be stuck at home with nothing to do but worry for your safety—especially now, when I might reasonably have expected to have left all that sort of thing behind me. Write often.
Affectionately yours,
Mabel
George refolded the letter with a strong sense of guilt, tempered with the uncharitable feeling that if Mabel didn’t want him in danger, perhaps she should have thought twice about voicing her concerns about Hugh’s death in the first place. Although that really wasn’t fair of him—she’d only asked him to set the wheels in motion, not to jump into the chariot himself.
At any rate, it was too late for second thoughts. He was here now. The die was cast.
Matthew’s predictions regarding the weather proved to be well-founded. In the course of the week, it turned bitterly cold, with frosts and snow flurries and the promise of worse to come. Mrs. Mac started to grumble both about her joints and the price of coal, and George and Matthew took to wearing sweaters under their jackets even in the house.
The football match due to be played that Sunday was cancelled owing to the pitch being a foot deep in snow, a circumstance met by the once-again-present Watkins with disgust and sour insinuations that the government was somehow to blame, by Matthew with cheery fatalism, and by George with concealed relief.
At least until he realised the weather meant he and Matthew would be stuck for the afternoon in the cramped sitting room with Miss Lewis, Watkins, and Watkins’s opinions.
“It’s the men at the top I blame,” he was saying, although George wasn’t entirely certain what he blamed them for . Everything, probably. “Them with their titles, their Lord This and their Sir That. What have they ever done to make them better than good, honest working men? How is it that it’s the men at the top what got the cushy jobs in the war, them they called officer class , while it’s the man in the street what did all the fighting?”
“ Tom ,” Miss Lewis admonished him. “You know Mr. Connaught was an officer in the war. You can’t say he never did any fighting, can you?”
George felt the first faint prickling of unease at the subject being brought up, and tried to tell himself he was overreacting.
“Actually, casualties among officers were rather higher, in proportional terms, than among the men,” Matthew put in almost apologetically. “Comes of leading the charge.”
Obviously not daring to contradict him, Watkins turned his sneer upon George. “I suppose you was an officer in the war?”
George blanched at the direct attack. “I… Ah…”
He was saved by Matthew’s interruption, a breach of manners that was quite unlike the normally polite young man. Perhaps his attention had wandered for a moment—but George rather
You must write often so I know you’re all right. Please promise you will. And no, if Hugh was involved in your getting the job at the Admiralty, I had no idea. Although now I come to think of it, he did say something in one of his letters from the Front. It was a few weeks after you were sent to that awful prison. He said he felt he understood you, now. It was such a strange remark, and completely without any further explanation, but I suppose he couldn’t say too much for fear of the letter being read. He asked how you were, but of course I couldn’t tell him very much at the time as you hadn’t been allowed to write any letters yet. That was a terrible time, not knowing what was happening to you.
If you like, I’ll go to see Pip Wharton on my day off and ask him about it. I don’t suppose I know him any better than you do, but I’m sure he won’t mind an old acquaintance visiting to talk about Hugh. In fact, I should have visited him before now—poor man, it can’t be much fun for him shut up in that big house, having to get about in a bath chair.
You know, I’m gladder than ever that I didn’t give up the nursing, like Father wanted me to. I should hate to be stuck at home with nothing to do but worry for your safety—especially now, when I might reasonably have expected to have left all that sort of thing behind me. Write often.
Affectionately yours,
Mabel
George refolded the letter with a strong sense of guilt, tempered with the uncharitable feeling that if Mabel didn’t want him in danger, perhaps she should have thought twice about voicing her concerns about Hugh’s death in the first place. Although that really wasn’t fair of him—she’d only asked him to set the wheels in motion, not to jump into the chariot himself.
At any rate, it was too late for second thoughts. He was here now. The die was cast.
Matthew’s predictions regarding the weather proved to be well-founded. In the course of the week, it turned bitterly cold, with frosts and snow flurries and the promise of worse to come. Mrs. Mac started to grumble both about her joints and the price of coal, and George and Matthew took to wearing sweaters under their jackets even in the house.
The football match due to be played that Sunday was cancelled owing to the pitch being a foot deep in snow, a circumstance met by the once-again-present Watkins with disgust and sour insinuations that the government was somehow to blame, by Matthew with cheery fatalism, and by George with concealed relief.
At least until he realised the weather meant he and Matthew would be stuck for the afternoon in the cramped sitting room with Miss Lewis, Watkins, and Watkins’s opinions.
“It’s the men at the top I blame,” he was saying, although George wasn’t entirely certain what he blamed them for . Everything, probably. “Them with their titles, their Lord This and their Sir That. What have they ever done to make them better than good, honest working men? How is it that it’s the men at the top what got the cushy jobs in the war, them they called officer class , while it’s the man in the street what did all the fighting?”
“ Tom ,” Miss Lewis admonished him. “You know Mr. Connaught was an officer in the war. You can’t say he never did any fighting, can you?”
George felt the first faint prickling of unease at the subject being brought up, and tried to tell himself he was overreacting.
“Actually, casualties among officers were rather higher, in proportional terms, than among the men,” Matthew put in almost apologetically. “Comes of leading the charge.”
Obviously not daring to contradict him, Watkins turned his sneer upon George. “I suppose you was an officer in the war?”
George blanched at the direct attack. “I… Ah…”
He was saved by Matthew’s interruption, a breach of manners that was quite unlike the normally polite young man. Perhaps his attention had wandered for a moment—but George rather
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