There was an unaccustomed pause.
“My apologies, Miss Mary. I have attended you since you were small, and I should like to make sure that I have the message correct. I’m to tell Madam that you won’t be joining her?”
“Thank you, Palmer, for always getting the message.”
A pause. A breath. And then, with no expression, “Very good.”
When Palmer returned with brandy, he carried it on the heavy silver tray. Mary glanced up. “Oh, is my father back from the House?”
“Not until this evening, madam.”
“Then why . . . ?”
His impartial eyes. “Forgive me, Miss North.”
“Oh, Palmer . . .”
“Will there be anything else?”
“No, thank you. That will be all.”
“Very good.”
Half an hour later, when the door clicked shut behind her, Mary found Hilda in the back of the taxi that waited on the curb.
“What are you doing here?”
Hilda’s scars were puckered and raw, her confusion twisting them further. “I thought you had asked for me?”
“I did nothing of the sort.”
“Oh . . . but on the telephone Palmer said I was needed very urgently.”
Mary softened. “And you came for my sake?”
“I have missed you dreadfully.”
Mary hesitated only for a moment. “You had better get out then, hadn’t you? We can hardly go for a stroll with you sitting in there.”
Mary paid the taxi driver, linked arms with Hilda and they walked through the rain. They spoke of small things at first, since it was best, when reattaching threads, to begin with the easiest knots.
Later, Mary said, “Alistair’s alive.”
Hilda put her hands to her mouth.
“I love him,” said Mary. “Do you hate me?”
“No. I’m glad for you.”
“I’ve missed you too, you know.”
Hilda took her hands. “Come and stay at the flat for the weekend, won’t you? There’s a sofa bed, the wireless, and as much tap water as you can drink. Unless you need to be at the Lyceum?”
“Maybe my taking a weekend off would do everyone good. You and I have met people on fire who made less fuss than children being forced to learn reading.”
“You’re a dreadful teacher anyway.”
“Thanks. And you’re a useless nurse.”
“So, you’ll come to stay?”
“Thanks, I should love to.”
They walked east and north toward Hilda’s flat, the undamaged streets giving way to the general destruction. The sleet came harder now. As they approached Regent’s Canal only a thin path had been cleared between the mounds of rubble.
“Don’t mind the mess,” said Mary. “I shall build cottages along here for you—little thatched things such as one sees in Lowestoft—and I shall arrange for a handsome and unattached man to be installed in every one.”
“Tall?”
“You’ll need a ladder to kiss them. One of those two-step efforts you get in libraries.”
“Dark?”
“I shall organize them by street for you. Dark, blond, funny, rich. If you want more than one quality, you just knock near an intersection.”
‘Uniform?”
“Any you like. Soldier, sailor, engine driver. Every house will have a dressing-up box.”
“I believe I will like your new London very much.”
“Then you shall be mayor of it,” said Mary, sweeping an arm in a magnanimous arc.
“I suppose it should be me. You’ll be too busy with Alistair.”
Mary saw the twitch in her friend’s smile. “I’m sorry, Hilda.”
“Don’t be. You’ll be married, I suppose?”
“He’s in prison, in Gibraltar.”
Hilda stopped. “What for?”
“He left Malta before he should have.”
Hilda looked miserable. “I sent him a letter, you know. I told him you were gone to the dogs.”
Mary considered it. “I can’t say you were wrong.”
“Yes, but it wasn’t right. It’s no wonder I’m alone.”
“Stop it. You’ll meet someone soon.”
“But how? There aren’t any parties anymore. Either that or there are parties everywhere, and no one tells me.”
“Yes, I should think it’s that. You’ve always struck me as a charmless and unpopular girl.”
“But it’s these scars,” said Hilda. “They’re the only known antidote to me.”
“Then we’ll find you a man with scars that match.”
Hilda smiled.
“See?” said Mary. “You’re pretty when you do that.”
“I don’t suppose I have done it much, since we fought.”
“Me neither. From now on let’s remember the trick of not fighting, shall we? Why do you suppose we ever forgot?”
Hilda sniffed, turned her face up to the gray sky, and caught sleet with her tongue as it fell.
“Hard to tell,” she said. “Perhaps it’s something they put in the bombs.”
December, 1941