All I Have to Give (34 page)

Ada was working hard, learning about aspects of childcare so that she could command the respect of the nannies she was to manage. She was rising to the challenge, and the love she held inside
her endeared her to the more experienced nannies that she was meeting as they were engaged. Ada had proven, too, that she was up to the admin side of the general management of the home, because
already she had worked out the shifts that would be needed and had even put some rosters in place, marking the number of workers she would need on each shift. She’d said she would like the
nannies and cleaners and cooks to choose which hours would best suit them. Edith had thought this might cause Ada a few problems when she actually put it into practice, but was willing to give her
free rein and allow her to sort it out if it didn’t go to plan.

It all seemed possible now that Jimmy’s Hope House would really and truly come into being. For Edith, too, there was a sense of great relief and excitement about her own children coming to
live there.

Descending the stairs, she went to place the letter to Laurent on the tray for posting, but thought better of it. She would enjoy the walk to the post office. A letter addressed to her lay on
the platter. It looked official and held the stamp of the Guild of Surgeons. Opening it, she read the phrase ‘Shepherd’s Bush Military Hospital’. As she scanned the words, her
heart lifted to see that she had been accepted to work on a part-time basis as a surgeon at the hospital. Built to care for wounded soldiers, Shepherd’s Bush Military Hospital had been
largely founded due to the efforts of the noted surgeon Robert Jones, a friend of her father.

It seems everything is falling into place for me. If only I could hear from Laurent. And, even more so, from Petra!
But whether she heard from Petra or not, she would call there on her
return home and collect her twin girls. Nothing would stop her doing that. Her heart thudded at the prospect of holding them again.

Edith’s return to France shocked her. The peace had gone, and the reality of war was all around her. Now, everywhere she looked, there were gaunt-looking older men and
wounded younger ones, plus women and children who looked as though they were on the verge of starvation. Buildings had a tired, uncared-for look about them, as if the life had been drained from
them.

‘My beloved France – how she suffers.’

Edith did not say anything to this comment from Marianne. She knew the mutiny of French soldiers after the disastrous Battle of Aisne had greatly affected Marianne and so she did not want to
open sore wounds. The French were once again enthusiastically engaged in battle with the Allies at Passchendaele, so the refusal to fight had passed.

Instead, changing the subject, Edith thought this a good time to broach the matter of the length of her stay. ‘Marianne, I hope you won’t think me rude if I only stay for six days,
instead of the promised ten?’

‘What? Why is this,
ma chère fille
? I had hoped to persuade you to stay longer, not to cut short your visit!’

‘I’m sorry, but there is so much to do. I give a great deal of importance to my charity, and if I am not there, then the extra responsibility on Jay and Eloise is too much to ask.
Eloise has her own charity to run.’

‘Oh, you girls! You are wonderful. It is no more than I expect of you. I should be doing work to help the war myself. I may well do so, now that travelling through my beloved France has
shown me the devastation this war is wreaking on my people. I hadn’t realized. We’re so protected in the South.’

‘So, you won’t mind?’

‘Of course I will mind. But I understand.’

The six days passed at a snail’s pace for Edith. No letter had awaited her arrival, and none came during her time in Nice. Not from anyone. Her worry increased each day.
Part of her wanted to go to Laurent’s mother, to try and find out how he was and whether he was still alive. But although he had worked, lived and studied in Paris, his mother lived in
Perpignan, which lay towards the border with Spain, at the foot of the Pyrenees – in the opposite direction to where she must travel.

As Edith boarded the train to Bordeaux – a necessary ploy to prevent suspicions arising in Marianne – her heart felt heavy. She had no idea why Petra hadn’t contacted her.
Checking with her bank before leaving England had told her that the cheque she had sent to Petra and Aleksi had been cashed. So why had there been no word.
Why?

Changing trains en route, Edith boarded one for Paris. Once there, she would stay the night before finding a suitable mode of transport to take her the thirty miles or so to the farm, which lay
in the remote countryside of the Chaumont-en-Vexin area. The remoteness of the farm also made her journey difficult; it was only accessible by horse-driven vehicle or car, or on foot. No train went
within miles of it. If she couldn’t hire someone to take her, then she would have to buy a car, if that was possible. What if she got lost? If only Petra had answered her letters; through
contact with them, she could have told them of her plans and Aleksi would have come to pick her up in Paris.

Letting her head flop back and shifting her bottom, which had become stiff like a rock, she allowed her eyes to close. It would take another four hours to get to Paris. Her bones ached with the
strain of the journey, and her stomach churned over and over with trepidation.
Please don’t let anything have happened to my babies . . . please!

The night in Paris was a restless one. After a welcome and delicious dinner, during which Edith had seen that, as a lone woman, she was the subject of much speculation among
the other guests, she had taken a bath and tried to relax. But her thoughts and fears had given her no peace.

Now, having risen at seven, she had breakfasted in her room – a plush, overbearing suite, with its dull beige walls a backdrop for even duller pictures of Parisian scenes in heavy gold
frames. Add to this the purple silk drapes around the bed and adorning the windows, and the overall impression was that of a funeral parlour. Sighing, Edith realized how tired she felt and was
unsure of her next move. Crossing over to the window, her feet sank into the over-patterned, thick beige and purple carpet.

Outside the sun shimmered weakly, shrouded in misty, floating clouds. The street below bustled with people, horses, carriages and cars. How strange the contrast in life was. Not two hundred
miles away, men fought valiantly, dying in their thousands, to preserve this way of life and save this city from occupation, and yet life went on. As it must for her.
What to do next? How am I
to get to the farm?
Her eyes rested on a cab. Horse-drawn, it would take at least two hours to get her to the farm, but it seemed her only option. It wasn’t a prospect she relished, as
much of the terrain was very rough going, and it would mean she would be bruised and sore by the time she reached her destination. Once there, though, Aleksi would hopefully bring her and her
children back to Paris, to begin her journey home.

Her mind now made up, she tugged on the bell-cord and instructed the porter who attended her to engage the cab and take her luggage down for her.

At last Edith could see the farm. Her heartbeat quickened, her body shifted to the edge of her seat and, sliding the window down, she peered out. Where were the cows? Had
Aleksi not let them out of the barn yet? They were just yards away from the farm now and yet she could not hear the hens. But then would she, over the hooves of the horses?

Reining in the horses, the cab driver looked down at her and asked in bewilderment, ‘Is this the place? I have followed your directions, but it looks deserted. Are you intending to stay
here, Madame?’

Fear held her silent.

‘Madame?’ He was at the door. He was a stocky man in his forties. ‘Madame, I have to get back. Are you alighting or not?’

‘Yes. I – I . . . Thank you. Please unload my cases.’

‘But, Madame, there is no one here.’

‘I – I’ll be fine. Thank you.’

‘But—’

‘Look. Will you return for me in two days’ time? I will pay you well. I must stay. I must make enquiries in the area as to what has happened to my friends.’ Somehow she managed
to compose herself, even though inside she was screaming in panic:
Where are they? Where are my babies? Where are Petra and Aleksi? Oh God, my babies, my babies.

Thankful to have found the key where Aleksi always left it, hanging on a nail behind an old coat that hung in one of the outbuildings, Edith was at last alone. The kindly
driver had been like a father-figure to her and had wanted to check that there were supplies for her before he left.

Oh yes, there were supplies. The pantry held enough food to sustain her for days: cheeses, preserves, flour and yeast, a ham even, hanging from the ceiling. Cured and dried, it would have lasted
for months, but combined with the freshness of the cheese and eggs and the lack of growth sprouting from the potatoes, Edith knew Petra and Aleksi couldn’t have left the farm many days before
her arrival. But they must have planned it, as all the livestock had gone – they must have sold everything.

As she moved frantically from room to room, her cries of pain and anguish echoed around the empty building. But nothing gave her any clues. There was nothing to tell her what had happened, and
no leftover clothes or possessions of Petra’s or Aleksi’s, or her darling children’s personal belongings. Most cupboards, drawers and wardrobes were empty.

Going back down the rickety stairs and into the living and kitchen area, she saw, through tears that stung her eyes, a letter propped up against the still-ticking clock. Her name was scrawled
across the front of the envelope. As she ripped it open, hope rose inside her, but it wasn’t from Petra:

Oh God, two days ago!

With shaking hands, Edith read on, hoping for a clue as to where Laurent might be now:

This last line Laurent had repeated in French.

‘Oh God . . . Oh God!’ Her fists thumped the table, her tears soaked her face, but she did not care. Her open-mouthed sobs racked her throat. Her pain deepened into despair. Laurent
hadn’t received her letters and still didn’t know the truth about her. What would he think when he did?
Oh, Laurent . . . Laurent. And my babies – my babies . . .

London, September 1917
A love declared

‘I can’t believe Edith has abandoned this project, Jay. It is bad form of her!’

The now-completed Jimmy’s Hope House had been up and running for two weeks. They were sitting together in the office. It had been ten weeks since Edith had left for France.

‘My dear Eloise, she hasn’t abandoned it. She has asked us to continue with it, until the war ends.’

‘But how could she not tell us her plans? It’s as if she has duped us into taking care of things here. It was only going to be for a few weeks, and now she writes to tell us that she
won’t return until her work is done – whether that coincides with the end of the war or not! I mean, who knows when the war will end? Let alone when the field hospitals will close. Why
couldn’t she have been satisfied with helping the war effort by working in Shepherd’s Bush Military Hospital and continuing what she started here, instead of returning to Abbeville?
This is all too much work for us, on top of our work for my charity.’

‘I can’t answer that. I somehow don’t think she planned it. Her letter said that she didn’t, and I believe her. I think it happened how it happened: being back in France,
and so near to the war, she felt compelled to return to her post.’

Eloise fell silent. Jay could see from her face that she was very cross. Much of this, he knew, was down to her being tired. Ada did a wonderful job of heading the nannies and had recruited a
team of cleaning and maintenance staff, but Jimmy’s Hope House was filling up rapidly and the administrative side had so far been down to himself and Eloise. Much of its success had been due
to the contacts made through Eloise’s charity. All of her coordinators made referrals, on an almost daily basis, of orphaned children and widowed mothers in need of a break. This meant that
the workload had increased at that rate too.

The unmarried-mothers unit hadn’t developed at all, however. In some ways that was a good thing, but in others it was a worry that they weren’t reaching those who might need their
help. And if they did, without Edith here to take care of the medical side of things there wasn’t a lot they could offer. It was also strange how Edith had thought there would be genteel
ladies in need of the charity. He couldn’t imagine ladies like Eloise and Edith ever being in the position of being unmarried mothers. But then there had been Andrina. Yes, Andrina could well
have ended up in that position. He himself had been on the verge of. . .
Oh God, how wrong that would have been!
Yes, he had known his true position in life by then, but Andrina
wasn’t the right person for him; he knew that beyond any doubt now. She had just been accessible, and her attentions had flattered him. But how long would it have been before he discovered
his true love?