Her mother gently woke her father, and they all stood up and walked upstairs together.
“You’ve come home, then,” was all her father said to her. He hadn’t doubted that she would, or that Max would. They had always faced everything together, and they would face this too. Pru kissed her mother when they said good night. The door to her parents’ room closed softly, and Max walked Pru to her own room.
“Will you be all right?” he asked, with eyes filled with loss and sorrow too.
“We always are, aren’t we?” Pru said quietly, and he nodded. “I can’t imagine him not being here when the war is over.” Max nodded agreement, gently stroked her long brown hair, and then walked to his own room to grieve in silence.
After she put her nightgown on and turned out the light, Pru stood looking out over their land in the moonlight. It had always been such a peaceful place, where she felt safe, until the war started. And now nothing was safe, nothing was sacred, nothing was certain, and she never knew who would be gone tomorrow. She longed to come back here, and just be with Max and her parents. But who knew what would happen by then, who else they would lose, how much more sorrow and loss they would have to endure, or how strong they would have to be, how many times. A cloud crossed the moon as she thought of Phillip. In his own room, Max was looking out the window, with silent tears running down his face, thinking how hard it must be to be a woman, always having to be strong and comfort others, and how lonely it was to be a man.
* * *
—
Constance, Pru’s mother, was already in the dining room the next morning when Pru came down to breakfast. The table was set impeccably, as it always had been, although her mother did it now. There were hardly any servants left. The young ones had gone, and only very old ones were left. Their butler had died of pneumonia in the first year of the war. But her mother saw to it that everything looked the same.
“How’s Father?” Pru asked her, wondering why it was always the men they worried about. They seemed to be much more frail in hard times somehow.
“He’s all right.” It had been a terrible shock to both of them, but now they were no different than their neighbors. Everyone in the village and all their friends in London had lost someone. They no longer went there in the war, and preferred to stay in Yorkshire. Constance had the children they were housing to think about. They would keep her busy now, which she viewed as a blessing not a burden. The young women who took care of them had already given them breakfast in the old servants’ dining room that no one used now, and had taken them outside to help with the gardening and then take a walk to the lake that Pru and her brothers had loved as children. Their old governess had always been afraid they would drown, and scolded them when they went there alone, which they did as frequently as possible.
Max came into the dining room then, poured himself a cup of coffee, and sat down with a careful look at their mother. She seemed all right, which didn’t surprise him. He expected nothing less of her.
“Father?” His concern was in the single word. His father wasn’t young, nor was his mother, but she showed her age less, with her long stride and straight back, and a healthy glow from the outdoors year-round. Today was different. She could have let her guard down, her strong protective shield, but she never did.
“He’ll be all right. It’s a terrible shock, but we’re the last ones we know to go through it.” All of their friends had lost at least one son in the last five years. And now they were no different, no matter how painful it was, or what a golden child Phillip had been. No one was exempt. “One wonders if it will ever be over.”
“We’ll never give up the fight, if that’s what you mean, Mother,” Max said staunchly. “We’ll fight on, whatever it takes. Churchill estimates it will take another year.”
“I hope not,” Constance said with an exhausted look.
“How are your missions going?” Max asked Pru as he sipped his coffee. He didn’t ask his mother for sugar, since it was rationed and he knew how hard it was to come by. “The Flying Angels, isn’t that what you call yourselves?” There was a teasing look in his eyes, which was comfortably familiar and reassured her that some things hadn’t changed despite the enormous loss they had just suffered. Max would have to do all the teasing now, since Phillip wouldn’t be there to do his share. They loved teasing Pru, even at their age.
“That’s what the others call us,” Pru said quietly. “We’re just nurses.”
“And doing a damn fine job, from what I hear. Two of my friends have passed through your hands, or your colleagues’, and spoke well of you. One of them claims the Flying Angels saved his life. He was delirious, I suspect. Flying Devils, more like, if you’re part of it,” he said and smiled at her as their father walked into the room, and Max stood up in respect. Thomas Pommery looked like he’d been through the wars himself, but his back was straight as he took his place at the head of the table, and they ate in silence. Constance served him toast with the jam she made from the fruit in their orchards. There was no butter, and he hated the taste of the margarine. They were both rationed, and there was little enough of that too.
After breakfast, their parents went for a walk to discuss the service for Phillip, and they walked to the cemetery on their property to decide where they would put the monument to him. Pru and Max sat in the sunshine in the garden. It was peaceful there, in spite of what had happened. It felt good to be home, together, whatever the reason. Max was stationed at a base not far from where she was, but he never had time to visit.
They took a walk down to the lake on the path that was so full of memories for both of them. Pru looked up at the trees she had climbed to escape her brothers or taunt them. She’d jumped into the lake more than once in all her clothes.
“You were always braver than we were, you know.” Max smiled at her. “We just pretended. You really were brave. Phillip said that to me once, and I never realized it before, but he was right.”
“I don’t know that I was. I don’t know how brave I am now. You just do what you have to do to get the job done. I took a bit of a walking tour behind enemy lines in France a few weeks ago. We lost an engine and went down. We were MIA for a while, but we got back all right. It took eight days.” It didn’t surprise him, nor the cool way she said it, but it worried him anyway.
“You and your crew?”
“One of the nurses and me. Hell of a plucky girl. We’ve been working together for quite some time. She’s rubbish at reading a map, but a hell of a nurse, and made of strong stuff. She’s a bit of a firebrand, bright ginger hair to go with it.” She smiled, thinking of Emma and their eight days on the run.
“One of your Flying Devils, I assume,” he said with a laugh, and Pru grinned. It felt strange to smile now, with Phillip gone. It almost made her feel guilty.