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‘Ours too, Beth,’ he said, his voice cracking. ‘Stay strong, and we’ll try too. I’ll ring again as soon as we know more.’

He was gone. Beth sat there with the receiver in her hands, unable to move, not even to wipe her tears away.

‘He’s gone?’ she heard Rose say. ‘Oh, darling, I’m so sorry.’

Rose enfolded Beth in her arms, rocking her. For some ten minutes Beth stayed there, not speaking. It was the end of every dream and happy thought she’d ever had about him. She felt she had nothing now, no future, hope, not even the will to go on.

‘Thank goodness I’ve got you,’ Beth said eventually, her face still pressed against the older lady’s chest. ‘We’ve become hardened to news of death, and now it’s my turn and I can’t believe how much it hurts.’

‘It will for a while,’ Rose said softly. ‘When I lost Duncan I didn’t want to go on alone. But day by day it does get easier. I was lucky I had my son, he pulled me through.’

‘Everyone is going to say it was for the best because he wouldn’t have wanted to spend his life in a wheelchair.

’ Beth sat up suddenly and her eyes blazed with anger.

‘Why couldn’t I have seen him just one more time, or even talked on the telephone.

He shouldn’t have had to survive in pain for all this time, should he. ’

Rose tilted Beth’s chin up to look at her, and dried her cheeks with her hanky.

‘I agree, that was terribly cruel. But every aspect of war is cruel, my darling. Families forced apart, homes destroyed, hideous injuries, and dreams shattered. If women were in charge of countries there would be no war, anywhere, or so I believe.’

‘If those women were all like you,’ Beth said. ‘But I can think of many women who’d make a pig’s ear of it. My mother included.’

‘I’ve always wondered what “making a pig’s ear of it” actually means,’ Rose said. ‘I wouldn’t have the first idea how to make one.’

If it wasn’t for the seriousness of the moment Beth would’ve laughed. Rose often queried the sense in common phrases.

‘Well, I’ve made a bit of a pig’s ear of my life so far.’

Rose said nothing, just caressed Beth’s cheeks in deep sympathy.

For over two weeks Beth carried on as normal, shopping, cleaning, gardening and going to the convalescent home.

But she said nothing about Jack to anyone.

She felt as long as it didn’t become common knowledge, she could tell herself it wasn’t true, or a mistake– after all, the Red Cross had to keep tabs on so many POWs.

She didn’t want people saying it was for the best, and she didn’t want to cry in public anymore.

It was bad enough at night, crying herself to sleep, waking the next day and having to face that there would be no reprieve from her misery.

Rose did her best to help. She didn’t keep asking her how she felt, offering advice, or sympathy. In fact, an outsider would imagine she either didn’t know Jack was dead, or didn’t care.

But Beth knew better.

Then two weeks later on her Thursday stint at the home, she got there to find Harry dressed in civilian clothes and sitting on a chair just outside the ward, without the plaster on his leg.

‘When did that come off?’ she asked.

‘Yesterday, and now I’m going home.’

‘That’s marvellous,’ she said. ‘How does your leg feel?’

‘Stiff, a bit weird, I’ll need a stick for a while. But last night it was bliss to sleep without the plaster. But come and sit with me for a minute or two. You’ve lost weight and your smile. Are you going to tell me what’s up?’

No one else had guessed something was wrong, but she might have known observant Harry would pick up on it.

‘Jack died,’ she said simply, and sat down beside him. ‘Please don’t say it’s for the best.’

‘I won’t,’ he said and took her hand and squeezed it. ‘But I’m very sorry, nonetheless. And for his folks. Was it the infection?’

‘Yes, his father got further news just a few days ago. He’s being buried there. So not even a funeral to pay our respects and offer a few prayers. But his parents are planning to have a memorial service in Falmouth. I’ll go there for that. But tell me about you?’

He reached out and smoothed her hair back from her face.

‘How like you to concern yourself with an old soldier like me,’ he said quietly.

‘I’ll go back to my regiment in a couple of weeks, I expect, and they’ll find me a few desk duties to keep me busy.

It looks like it might all end soon. We’ve liberated Paris, and I’d like to be back in action to enjoy the last rites, and come back to England in triumph.

’ He looked every bit the conquering hero as he spoke, and it warmed her inside where there had been nothing but misery since Jack died.

‘You just make sure you don’t take any more risks. No climbing on tanks or hurtling over fences,’ she said. ‘I’m going to miss you on the ward.’

‘Not as much as I’ll miss you, Beth. There is something about you. I can’t quite find the name for it, but you are strong yet gentle, caring and funny too. Not easy to forget.’

‘Neither are you,’ she laughed, and realized it was the first laugh since before the news of Jack. ‘But I appreciate the compliment. And I wish you all the best for the future.’

He leaned forward and, cupping her face in his hands, he kissed her on the lips. Not just a peck, but long enough to be meaningful.

‘I suppose I should apologize?’ he said. ‘But I won’t because I couldn’t leave here without doing it.’

Beth was shocked, but his dark eyes were twinkling, and those rakish good looks delighted her. ‘I’m glad you did,’ she admitted. ‘But now I’ve got beds to make, and dressings to change on wounded men.’