GARDENS, BERMONDSEY, LONDON SE
SENT: 09:45 / RECEIVED: 10:10
SENT LETTER YESTERDAY. TOO RESTLESS TO AWAIT REPLY. LUNCH? 1PM. SIMPSONS? ROAST BEEF IS DIVINE. E.
Telegram from Thomas to Evie
9TH OCTOBER 1915
TO: EVELYN ELLIOTT. POPLARS, RICHMOND, SW
SENT: 11:45 / RECEIVED: 12:12
SPENT MORNING AT OFFICE WITH HOPPER, AND HOURS WITH FATHER LAST NIGHT. DESPERATE FOR A PRETTY FACE. WALK THROUGH REGENT’S PARK AND PUB AFTER? T.
Telegram from Evie to Thomas
9TH OCTOBER 1915
TO: LT. T. HARDING c/o ABSHIRE, 34 LOVELACE
GARDENS, BERMONDSEY, LONDON SE
SENT: 12:15 / RECEIVED: 12:40
MEET AT FOUNTAIN. 2PM. WILL BRING PRETTIEST FACE I CAN FIND. E.
Telegram from Evie to John Hopper
9TH OCTOBER 1915
TO: JOHN HOPPER, 23 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON EC
SENT: 12:30 / RECEIVED: 13:40
CAN’T MAKE DINNER TONIGHT. RATHER UNWELL. RAIN CHECK TO NEXT WEEK? EVELYN.
Telegram from Thomas to Evie
10TH OCTOBER 1915
TO: EVELYN ELLIOTT, POPLARS, RICHMOND, LONDON SW
SENT: 08:00 / RECEIVED: 08:25
MORNING WITH FATHER, BUT MEET AFTER? T.
Telegram from Evie to Tom
11TH OCTOBER 1915
TO: LT. T. HARDING c/o ABSHIRE, 34 LOVELACE
GARDENS, BERMONDSEY, LONDON SE
SENT: 08:15 / RECEIVED: 09:00
WHAT A WONDERFUL EVENING. SIDES ACHE FROM LAUGHING. FEET SORE FROM DANCING. YOU ARE A TONIC. E.
Telegram from Thomas to Evie
11TH OCTOBER, 1915
TO: EVELYN ELLIOTT, POPLARS, RICHMOND, LONDON SW
SENT: 18:25 / RECEIVED: 18:50
LAST AFTERNOON WITH YOU TOMORROW? BOATING OR A DRIVE. BRING BIRDER MANUAL. PICK YOU UP IN SWIFT AT TWO O’CLOCK. PROMISE TO WEAR NICE TROUSERS. ONE DAY LEFT. HOW AM I TO RETURN TO IT? T.
Telegram from Evie to Thomas
11TH OCTOBER, 1915
TO: LT. T. HARDING c/o ABSHIRE, 34 LOVELACE
GARDENS, BERMONDSEY, LONDON SE
SENT: 18:52 / RECEIVED: 19:23
LOOK FORWARD TO IT—ESPECIALLY THE TROUSERS. WILL WEAR BLUE DRESS, AND A GARDENIA IN MY HAIR. E. X
From Evie to Alice
11th October, 1915
Richmond, England
Dearest Alice,
My apologies, in advance, for the nonsense I am about to write but I am dreadfully confused and I need to tell someone.
Tom finally came home on leave last week. It was all very sudden. He was anxious to see his father, and to meet with his business associates to make sure the LDT is in safe hands during his absence. But between his meetings and hospital visits we saw each other every day. Lunch at Simpson’s, cocktails at Archer’s, walks along the Thames. It was bliss.
The thing is, Alice, for those few hours I spent with Tom each day, I felt like the old Evie. The Evie who laughs and jokes and always sees the joy in things. When we were together it felt—for just a little while—that we are not a country at war, and that Tom was just a regular Oxford scholar, not a Lieut. in the British Army. It was all so easy and wonderfully normal. A little too wonderful, perhaps. Nothing at all was said between us on matters of affection, but I cannot help feeling that so much was left unsaid.
I know you are already convinced that my heart was stolen by Tom Harding years ago while I wasn’t paying any attention, and I’m beginning to think you may be right, darling. Still, it makes no sense at all, not least because John Hopper sent a telegram this morning inviting me to have dinner with him tonight, and I’m being dreadfully indecisive about what to wear (a sure sign that I am not just going along for the food).
What if I am falling in love with him, Alice?
Please send some words of advice. You were always much better at dealing with affairs of the heart.
With much love,
Evie
X
P.S. Do not show this to a soul. In fact, burn it.
P.P.S. I am so wrapped up in myself that I forgot to ask how the nursing is going. I hope it isn’t dreadfully gruesome. x
From Alice to Evie
22nd October, 1915
Somewhere in France
Dear Evie,
I knew it! You always get cross before you admit you like a boy. But love! My friend, I never thought I’d hear you utter the word. You liked Tim Smith and Peter what’s-his-name. You liked Jonathan Sawyer. But my goodness, you might be falling in love?
And with whom would that be—Thomas Harding or John Hopper? I noticed you left that rather ambiguous in your last letter, you tease! But really, how could it ever be anyone but Tom. Of all the fellows, he’s the one. He’s charming without knowing it, intelligent without being boastful, and kind without expectation. He’s known you most of your life and the spark between you two is immediately apparent to everyone in the room.
I wonder how he kisses. You’ll have to tell all when you get to that!
I’m not so certain about this Hopper fellow. Didn’t you say Tom has some reservations about him? Also, he isn’t at war, is he? I must say, this gives me a seed of doubt as to his character, though if my Evie likes him so well, I’m sure I will grow to like him too.
As for me, I’ve been transferred out of the dressing station. I’m to drive an ambulance! I’ve seen a few other nurses doing the same, though not a large number. But imagine me behind the wheel, barrelling down the road at top speed—the girl who crashed a bicycle each time she rode it. Sometimes I wonder if they’re mad to give me such responsibility, but they are in dire need. How glad I am for Billy Peters’s tuition earlier this year! I’ll help load the injured and race to the hospital trains with my precious cargo. Just think of it! I’ll be a heroine. If this wasn’t such a dreadful set of circumstances, I would don a pilot scarf, maybe a little rouge to look the part. Alas, this is no time for my silly antics. It’s a serious business, saving lives.
How are things at home? I miss you horribly.
Gros bisous (as the French would say),
Alice
From Thomas to Evie
28th October, 1915
Somewhere in France
My dear Evie,
I couldn’t bring myself to write to you the last fortnight. I’ve been sullen and angry with nothing nice to say. Despair. That’s what I’ve felt. Despair that this blight on humanity continues and that I am in the middle of it; despair that Father is failing rapidly and I can’t be there for his final days. It eats away at me.
Though a short reprieve, my trip home spoiled me quickly and I can think of nothing now but fine meals, sleeping in my warm bed, and your bright laughter. It’s quite infectious, you know. The waiter at Simpson’s was taken with it—and you—though perhaps it was your scandalous dress which drew his attention. Really, when you wear blue, you don’t give menfolk a chance.
I’ve taken to card tourneys with the Tommies after dark. We use pebbles as tokens, and trade goods from home. To the winner goes the spoils. It’s about the only time I don’t feel like screaming until my lungs pop or someone shoots me. Whatever comes first.
Thank you for being there when I came home. Really being there. Beyond my poor father, it was a week of perfect days. I hope there will be more of them someday soon.
Yours,
Tom
From Evie to Tom
5th November, 1915
Richmond, England
My dearest Tom,
I have never known the weeks to drag so awfully. One minute you are here and it is as if we don’t have a care in the world, and the next you are gone and there is nothing but a dreadful silence and endless worry. Every day since your return, I searched for my name in my postbag. Every day I had to endure the disappointment of finding nothing. You cannot imagine the relief when I received your letter, and yet now I face an entirely new anguish as you sound so awfully gl
um. Unusually so.
Is it unbearable to be back? Did your time here not lift your spirits and remind you of everything you are fighting for? Try to recall that roast beef and think of a time when we’ll go to Simpson’s again. If only Will were still there to jolly you along. He would tell you to stop stewing and to buck up and no doubt make you laugh with one of his ridiculous yarns. I miss him dreadfully, Tom. I miss so many things.
You will no doubt have heard the awful news about Edith Cavell being executed in Brussels for helping POWs escape to the Netherlands. It was all over the papers. The country is up in arms. Anti-German sentiment is at an all-time high. Men are rushing to the recruiting offices. I was very shaken by the news. I foolishly imagined women like Cavell would be immune to the German bullet. It seems that nobody is safe. Nobody. I worry dreadfully for Alice. She writes with news that she is to become an ambulance driver. She never ceases to surprise me. For someone who struggled to master control of her bicycle, I really don’t hold out much hope for the poor men she transports. Then again, Alice always did love a bit of drama, didn’t she? Ever the girl to go rushing headlong into some madcap adventure. I only hope that war will not prove to be an adventure too far.
Did you notice the date at the top of the letter? Bonfire night. The bonfire on the green is much smaller this year—you’ll remember how impressive it usually is. We have become quite efficient at conserving everything, wood included. What would Fawkes and his conspirators make of this war we find ourselves in, I wonder? It makes their few barrels of gunpowder seem rather paltry. Remember, remember. Gosh, Tom. All I want to do is forget.
I will make sure to visit your father whenever I can manage time away from my duties here. He is in the best place and there is nothing more you can do for him, other than to make him proud to know that you are doing wonderfully well over there.
I must close. Mama is calling for me to help with her latest fund-raiser. If I drink much more tea I’m sure I will drown in the stuff.
Yours,
Lady Evelyn Elliott
P.S. I must apologise for all the wretched snivelling on your shoulder when you left. I don’t know what came over me. In my despair, I forgot to give you my latest sketch, so I have enclosed it here. This little fellow is a brambling. I think him rather adorable.
P.P.S. As for my dress being scandalous! Really, Tom, you are terribly old-fashioned at times. Your eyes would pop out of their sockets if you saw the munitionettes. They wear trousers, Tom. Trousers!
P.P.P.S. (Sorry, I should probably have started another letter.) Latest column enclosed.
A WOMAN’S WAR
by our special correspondent in London, Genevieve Wren
“When the Boys Come Home”
There are brief moments when it seems as though we are not a country at war. Those occasional hours when we might share a cup of tea with a friend or take a walk in our favourite park, laugh at a joke or a shared memory and almost forget what is happening across the Channel. Almost forget, but not quite. However briefly we may feel the burden of worry or grief lift from our aching shoulders, it is always there, like a shadow following close behind.
Perhaps we feel this the most when a loved one comes home on leave. They walk back into our lives and our homes as if they’d merely popped out to collect the milk or the newspaper. Like a ghost they appear in our sculleries and hallways, and we cannot quite believe they are really there at all. We can’t stop touching them, eager fingers desperate to make sure they are real.
What blissful agony it is to have them back. All our hopes and dreams come true. Those long months without them, fading into nothing. They are here—in our arms and our beds, at our tables and by our sides. And yet, something is different because part of them is not here with us at all. It is still over there, with their pals. With their brothers in arms. And for all that we love them with every bone in our bodies, part of us daren’t get too close because it is always there, lurking in the shadows: the knowledge that they must go back, and that when they do, our own battle with hope will begin once again.
We might never understand the life they have lived while they’ve been away. We might never understand their longing to return to life in the trenches, or their desire to relieve the man whose turn on leave is next. We might never understand the horrors they see in their dreams and shout about in the dark as we try to comfort them and remind them they are safe. We might never understand any of this.
They return to us as husbands, lovers, brothers, friends—but they also return to us as soldiers. War is part of who they are now. Part of who they will always be. And we will love them while they are here, and we will love them when they go back.
We will love them until we see them again, because no matter how far away from home they are, they will never be far from our thoughts or our hearts.
Until next time—courage!
Genevieve
From Thomas to Evie
10th November, 1915
Somewhere in France
Dear Evie,
Please ignore the brown smudges. I have a cut above my eye that won’t stop bleeding. Got hit by shrapnel this afternoon. I’m low on paper or else I’d toss this and start again. We followed orders from Lieutenant Colonel Duncan, my superior, and stalked through a patch of forest not far from the river. Barbed wire ran along the hill right to the water’s edge so we knew the Boche (French slang for Germans, in case you didn’t know) were nearby or had set a trap. We scooted around the edge of the wood, glad to find it vacated. But we didn’t know we were standing in a minefield—until it was too late.
Two mines went off and took out a dozen men. I ran around the outskirts of the field like a madman, ordering my men to follow me. We were either going up in flames in an instant or getting the hell out of there. Walking gingerly on tiptoe, sweating after each measly footstep, would have been too excruciating. Thankfully, we lost only one more soldier as we pulled out.
Make a mad dash for it, Will used to say. “Like we should in life, Tom. Always make a dash for it.” It was his voice I heard as I ran. I swear to God he saved my life.
I was pretty ragged after, wretched with disgust at the senselessness of it all, and these weapons we’ve devised to annihilate more, and more, and more. A good friend was shipped off to the hospital. He lost at least one limb. His face looked pretty bad as well, but I think he’ll pull through. I can’t imagine what he’ll do with himself when he discovers he’s bound to a wheelchair the rest of his life. He was a champion rugby player at university. He’ll be crushed, poor chap. At least he’s alive, though I’m not sure that’s much of a consolation to some.
I heard about Edith Cavell. What kind of man shoots a woman, in particular one who has devoted her life to helping others? Had I been on that firing squad, I would have walked away, faced punishment for disobedience. It isn’t honourable, and in the midst of all this suffering, a man’s honour is what distinguishes him from the beasts.
On a lighter note, I have a little scrapbook of your bird sketches now. You notice this time I didn’t attempt to replicate one. With a buggered hand and a bleeding brow, my attempt at a brambling or a robin would likely make you laugh. It’s difficult to write today as is.
Evie, about your tears. It was nice to feel appreciated and missed, feared-for even. I will reserve my shoulder for the curve of your cheek anytime. I hope I am lucky enough to feel it again.
Yours,
Tom
P.S. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel like weeping the day I set foot on French soil again. Also, I miss Will, too. Every single day.
From Evie to Alice
20th November, 1915
Richmond, England
Dear Alice,
Apologies. I seem to have no time to put pen to paper. I am very busy at the post office with the approach of Christmas, which brings a flurry of new letters every day, and with the pathways too icy to take Rusty out, my round must be done on foot. Also, my column takes more time than I
’d imagined. I fall into bed at night exhausted and barely have a moment to think, although when I do, it is the same thoughts I keep returning to and I remain as confused as ever when it comes to matters of the heart.
You do not know John Hopper, so I cannot expect you to be as sympathetic towards him, but I can assure you he is the perfect gentleman: handsome, witty, intelligent (and not without considerable wealth in his various businesses). He makes it very difficult not to be charmed in his company (I can only imagine those eyelashes of yours fluttering under his gaze). What is a girl to do when otherwise wholly deprived of male company? John encourages my writing and talks of opportunities that might present themselves when the war is over. He firmly believes women will find themselves better placed to continue in the roles they have adopted during the men’s absence. He talks about the future a lot, Alice. He has hinted, on more than one occasion, that he would very much like me to be part of his.
As for Hopper not being at war, he assures me he would like to be, but is on official war duty with the War Office at Wellington House (don’t ask me to explain what he does there. It is all rather secretive). We must remember that the war is being fought from many angles, and not always with a rifle in hand. After all, they do say the pen is mightier than the sword.
And then there is Tom. I’m certain he still sees me as nothing more than Will’s sister and a good friend, and yet there were moments when we were together recently, moments when I thought he might take my hand, or look at me a certain way. His latest letter referred to “a week of perfect days” that we spent together during his leave. He also says that he hopes his shoulder can be used for the curve of my cheek again sometime soon. Much as I adored the time we spent together, when I think about it with a level head, much of it was occupied with the usual lighthearted banter that has always existed between us, and not of anything one might misconstrue as romance. You know how we like to poke fun at each other—always have. With Hopper it is different. I feel more like a woman in his company, but then I feel more like myself in Tom’s.