Like his classmates, he’d grown up playing cops and robbers at recess and painting diecast soldiers, reenacting stories they heard at their dinner tables and read in their textbooks. But when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor nearly two years ago, the recreational aspect of exploring one’s fledgling manhood was put to the test. And the all-too-real prospect of going to war became a silent terror concealed by outward bravado.
Would his father be happier if he made it home safely or if he died gloriously on the battlefield?
As to his own feelings about it, they were drowned in the brackish waters of his parents’ conflicting expectations, laid out since the day the doctor had declared, “It’s a boy!”
He’d done his best to please them ever since.
He’d not yet seen combat, but the training had been fierce and had carved a camaraderie between those in his unit. Especially among himself, William Farlane, and John. William had two sisters back at home and John had one. Tom lacked any siblings at all. So they became each other’s brothers. Tom was enriched by John’s ability to remain calm in surrounding storms and by William’s entertaining stories of home in Arlington as the son of a congressman.
Tom glanced at his watch and was disappointed that this little respite was over. He mounted the rickety bicycle and approached Littlecote House, which emerged from the landscape like something from a movie. He recalled seeing Rebecca a few years ago—when Laurence Olivier drove up to Manderley and his young bride marveled at the expansive brick and stone manse covered in ivy.
It was just like that.
From this view alone, he could count seventeen redbrick chimneys.
Who needed seventeen chimneys?
Tom never dreamed he’d see such a place for himself, and it was easy enough to take John’s advice and be convinced—even for a moment—that he was here as a tourist.
The feeling was short-lived. The sound of a Willys Jeep rolled down a distant road and soon enough, he saw the open-aired vehicle kick up dirt as it sped toward the house. The passenger was likely one of the many high-ranking brass who came and went from the grounds. It had been requisitioned for the regimental staff of the 101st Airborne. The Screaming Eagles.
The rank and file like himself were scattered around private homes in Ramsbury, Chilton Foliat, Froxfield, and Aldbourne. He, William, and John were bunking together in a farmhouse with an elderly couple who’d turned down the compensation offered from the government to house American troops, insisting that at their ages and with no children of their own, it was the least they could do for the war effort. Completing the makeshift family was the Browns’ blind sheepdog named Victoria, whom they doted upon as much as any parent would a child.
William had originally been assigned to stay alone in a carriage house on an estate near Aldbourne, but gladly gave up those swanky digs when the Browns told John and Tom that they could accommodate one more.
It was a five-mile walk—or as it was measured here, eight kilometers—from the farmhouse to their training ground in Aldbourne. On days where there was no vehicle with which to hitch a ride, they convinced themselves that it was a lucky opportunity to become even more fit. But on most days, Mr. Brown was kind enough to give them a ride in his hay wagon, at least one of the ways.
What a luxury it would be to have a Willys Jeep like that one!
The Jeep was his cue to keep going. As he approached the house, he wondered which of the many doors he was supposed to enter through. One was quite a bit grander than the others, so he leaned the bicycle against the wall next to it and pulled a rope. The sound of a bell rang on the other side, echoing through what sounded like a vast chamber.
He half expected a tuxedoed butler to answer, if the movies were to be believed. Ideally with a tray of sweet tea. But he’d discovered that the Brits liked their tea hot with cream, not iced with sugar. He probably missed that more than anything.
Sweet tea coursed through the veins of every Virginian.
Instead, a middle-aged woman appeared, dressed in an olive-green dress that downplayed her likely connection to this fine estate.
“Yes, sir?” she said. She squinted against the sun that was setting behind Tom, and he shifted to the right to block it for her.
“I’m Private First Class Thomas Powell. I’ve brought a message for Colonel Sink.”
She nodded and opened the door wider, motioning for him to come in.
If the outside was impressive, the inside was beyond description. And indeed, it was as vast as he’d imagined.
Everywhere he looked, the opulence of history dripped down Tudor-style walls. Though it occurred to Tom that they were likely original Tudor. Not replicas. Dark panels were adorned with portraits of men dead for centuries, their eyes seeming to leer at him as he followed the woman down the hall.
The closest thing he’d seen to this was in Richmond, forty miles from his home. Fifteen years ago, two businessmen had purchased a fifteenth-century manor called Agecroft Hall, dismantled it piece by piece, and shipped it across the Atlantic to be rebuilt on the eastern banks of the James River. He’d seen the pictures in the newspaper and his mother read the story to him as they both marveled at the feat. But forty miles might as well have been four thousand, too far away to go without one of the new automobiles that were coming to market. And though they’d eventually purchased one, it was not until last year when some ladies at church chartered a bus to make a day trip that he and his mother finally got to see it for themselves. A festival full of period reenactors immersed them in the bygone time and whetted both of their appetites to see England for themselves one day.
Now, to be in the halls of an even more vast estate, sitting on its original land, was an experience that left him awestruck. His mother would be beside herself.
He hoped in a peaceful world, she could come here too.
Tom followed the woman as she continued through the manor. Their footsteps echoed just as the bell had, despite lavish tapestries hanging from the tallest ceilings he’d ever seen.
“Wait here. I believe the colonel is in a meeting. Would you like some tea?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“With ice?” She grinned. Clearly, she’d grown accustomed to being around Americans.
“Yes, please.”
When in Rome, William had said, taking a liking to the British presentation. But John and Tom had not yet discovered an affinity for it.
Tom sank into the proffered chair. Who might have sat here before him? Kings? Queens? And now, Thomas Robert Powell of Charles City County, Virginia. It sent a shiver through him. Some of the very people who had walked these halls might well be the ones his ancestors had fought in the revolution. And now he would fight alongside their descendants against a new aggressor. Enemies turned allies.
The woman returned and smiled at his awkward positioning on the chair. Even his tall frame was no match for the enormity of the furniture.
“You’d think they were made for giants,” she said. “But in fact, the original family to own this house was quite diminutive, like most people of their day.”
“Then why all of this?” Tom waved his hand around the room.
“It’s for show. It was expensive to make furniture in this scale. And especially to have it upholstered. The larger it was, the more it showcased your wealth.”
They exchanged a look that Tom understood to be an agreement that such things were insignificant now, especially in light of the reason they were all gathered here. Extravagance was an unknown word in this age.