September, always a favourite month of Emily’s, began most happily indeed. The weather turned fine and sunny and although the nights were sometimes chilly, certainly cold enough to need the fire in the sitting-room, the afternoons were very warm.

The new raspberry canes which weren’t supposed to produce a crop in their first year, surprised her by doing exactly that. The fruit was tiny at the beginning of the month, but she decided to leave the berries as long as she could given the warm sunshine and see if they got any bigger and ripened. Not only did they get bigger, but flavour became richer as each week of good weather passed.

At the end of the month, when a few fat berries dropped to the ground she gathered them all within the day, claimed her jam sugar allowance from the grocer and produced eight jars of a rich, dark red preserve. With pretty gingham covers cut from a worn-out table cloth and a handmade label, she glowed with pride at having some Christmas presents ready to put in the cupboard.

There was good news too from Cathy. Shortly after they’d moved to the new flat, she’d put her name down at the local Education Office, hoping she might get a teaching job sometime in the future. She wrote and said they’d been pleasant and helpful and had commented on the value of her special additional qualifications, but to their own surprise, they seemed to have more teachers than jobs.

Then, suddenly, only two days before the beginning of term, a young man who’d had to be turned down by the Air Force because of his eyesight, was offered a job in the Air Ministry. The Education Office was happy to release him at such short notice, because they had Cathy on the books.

In turn, she’d had no difficulty with the WVS unit with whom she’d been working since the move. Her senior officer had simply said that getting the work done was what they were in business for. Children needed teachers. She could teach. Other women couldn’t. Good Luck.

It was clear to Emily how delighted her daughter was to be back in the classroom, especially in a city school, which was large enough to have a proper staff and much better facilities than her single-teacher school in Cheshire. She wasn’t entirely surprised when Cathy owned up to the fact that she’d become dispirited in her village school with no one to share the problems of a large class, mixed in age and ability.

The new flat was a source of great joy. The cleanest and tidiest of girls, she’d surprised her parents by searching out the street markets which sold carpets and curtains from bombed-out houses. Dirty and torn, they didn’t look much, she told them, but they were cheap and did not require points, unlike fabric in short supply in the shops. Moreover, Brian had put his knowledge of solvents to good use in helping her make them useable. One particular square of carpet, a very soiled dark red when they bought it, had revealed a pattern of blue butterflies by the time they’d finished with it.

Thinking back to the letters she’d had from Cathy a year earlier, Emily could hardly believe the difference. Then, she’d found herself dreading having to respond to the newest problem, but now she looked forward to hearing from her.

Cathy’s new-found happiness did something to offset the sad fact that there’d been no letters from Lizzie for over a year now. Emily had sent a letter and a birthday card via Cathy, so that she could deliver it when they met, but she and Alex had decided communicating with her that way was not fair to Cathy. The only thing to do now was let Lizzie make her own decision and wait and see what happened. Meantime, they had established that she was now working in London and had three stripes. The last time Cathy had seen her she was smoking heavily, but seemed in very good spirits, but she could say nothing whatever about her work, not even in which part of London she was based.

October came with cold nights and sudden chilly squalls, but Emily was heartened by a visit from Jane. This time, she had not been on night duty. She looked fresh and very pretty, her blonde curls cut short for convenience, her blue eyes sparkling as she took in everything around her. One glance told Emily that the news from Johann must be good.

He had indeed had a difficult time over the summer. As he explained to Jane in his now fluent English, loss breeds loss. The loss of his mother in the Hamburg raids had animated all the other losses he’d suffered personally, starting with his father’s death in a Labour Camp, followed by the insistence that he and his brothers join the fighting forces. He felt the sadness weighed upon him like a yoke across his shoulders. He told her that he couldn’t put it down, yet he felt equally he couldn’t carry it.

‘As I told you, Ma, the prisoners at Dungannon are very varied,’ she began, as they sat in the conservatory drinking coffee. ‘Some are quite old, veterans from the first war, others are even younger than Johann. There are no Nazis or S.S. men, for they go to the high security camps in Scotland and the North of England, but there are some who are very pro-Hitler. Sometimes there are arguments that lead to blows.’

She paused, looked distressed and then took a deep breath.

‘You know, Ma, sometimes the worst things can have a good side,’ she said unexpectedly. ‘I was so upset when I found out about the big fight. Johann had a cut on his cheek and a really bad bruise. It was still purple when I saw him two weeks after it happened.’

‘One of the guards hit him with a rifle butt. Probably by accident, because Johann was actually trying to separate two men who were fighting. Typical Johann. He couldn’t bear to see a man who was small and not very robust being set upon by this big chap, because he’d said Hitler was a tyrant.’

‘Anyway, Ma, to cut a long story short, when it was sorted out, a young man whom Johann had never spoken to before, because he rather avoided contact with other prisoners, came to him and shook his hand and said how sorry he was he’d been hurt when he was trying to do what was right. His name was Matthew and his father was a Lutheran pastor, a lovely man by the sound of it. Matthew had been studying in Switzerland in 1938 with a man called Carl Jung when his father was interned for preaching against the state. Have you ever heard of Carl Jung, Ma?’

‘Yes, I’ve heard of him, but I’ve only read a little bit about his work. I don’t think any of his books have been translated into English yet. I’d have to ask Brendan about that.’

‘Well, Johann and Matthew have become friends,’ she continued. ‘They talk and talk, and it’s such a comfort to me to know that he has a real friend now, although he did always get on well with most of the others. Matthew wants to go to London after the war and finish his studies, but meantime, he’s been helping Johann with his problem,’ she explained with a smile.

‘We did do some basic psychology in our nursing training, as you know, but Matthew is very clever,’ she went on, shaking her head. ‘He says no one can heal your mind for you, but you can be helped to heal it for yourself. If you have a hurt, you can’t just fix it, but if you recognise it and become familiar with it, then you can move past it. He also said that when you suffer loss, grief is a necessary process. Denying your loss brings about a kind of stunting of one’s emotional growth.’

‘And Johann has been able to use what Matthew is offering?’

‘Oh yes,’ Jane said vigorously. ‘That’s why I’m so happy for him. He told me that once he’d let himself weep and stopped feeling he couldn’t do anything, he began to feel better. Older, sadder and wiser, he said, but not so burdened and worn down.’

‘Oh Jane, that is good news. There will be so many in need of people like Matthew when this war is finally over. What about Matthew’s family? Does he know what’s happened to them?’

‘Oh yes. He knows alright,’ Jane replied grimly. ‘Matthew came back from Switzerland in 1938 when his father was interned. The family tried to have him released, but they failed. His father died in a labour camp in 1939, just like Johann’s father and the authorities took Matthew’s passport away. He couldn’t go back to Switzerland and so he was conscripted. He tried to join a Medical Unit, but he wasn’t allowed to, so he let himself be captured. It was the only way he could avoid having to kill.’

‘But wasn’t that very risky?’ she protested. ‘He might have got shot on the battlefield. The Geneva Convention doesn’t always hold if someone sees a German and has a gun in his hand.’

Jane nodded.

‘Matthew knew that. But he said it was a risk he had to take. There was no other way. Just like Johann that day he flew to Ireland and crashed on the edge of the lake at Millbrook. Is it any wonder they’ve become friends?’

Emily beamed at her and shook her head.

‘You know, you’ve just reminded me of a story your father often tells about the First World War. He and your Uncle Sam sat in the workshop at Liskeyborough and the pair of them tried to decide what they’d do if there was conscription here. As Uncle Sam was a Quaker and your father has never had the slightest wish to harm anyone, they decided it would have to be the Ambulance Corp. Mercifully for me, and probably for you, Ireland was so unstable in 1914 that conscription was never brought in, so they weren’t put to the test. But at least in this country it’s possible to be a conchie.’

‘Conchie?’

‘Conscientious objector. People like Sam and Alex and Matthew’s father. The worst that happens in this war is that our conchies are put in jail if they’re not willing to accept the alternative to military service they’re offered or someone manages to see them as a security risk. Hitler has no such scruples.’

‘Such wickedness, Ma. Sometimes I just can’t grasp the awfulness of everything that’s happening round us.’

Emily smiled as she glanced at the clock. It was nearly lunchtime and she was due to leave for Lenaderg at 1.30 to prepare for an afternoon of games and music.

‘Perhaps it’s as well we can’t grasp everything,’ she said abruptly. ‘Perhaps it’s a necessary defence. Ask Johann to see what Matthew thinks of the idea next time you have the chance. And don’t forget to tell me,’ she said, standing up.

‘Now, do you want to come and meet my new boyfriends as your father calls them or would you like an afternoon of peace and quiet?’

The sad thing was that Emily felt she’d only just got to know Chris’s new young men when it was time for them to go. When they’d first started the various entertainments for these younger troops back in ’42, they’d been staying for nearly four months. Now it was a bare two.

At times, Emily wondered if all the effort was justified for such a short period. The baking and packing that she and her four friends did almost every week, the transporting of the five of them, of the school children and of the young men themselves. Then there was the setting up of halls, community centres and church rooms. That meant more work for caretakers and church ladies and the office staff at the four mills. Not that any of these people ever grudged the time they spent, but one hoped that what they did was worthwhile.

She was ironing shirts and blouses in the kitchen one wet morning late in the month, when she heard a jeep come round the corner of the house and splash through the puddle that always gathered in front of the workshop after heavy rain.

Through the rain-spattered window, she saw a figure jump down and head briskly for the back door. She placed the iron carefully on its asbestos mat and got there in time to open it as he arrived on the doorstep, his jacket inflating as if he’d been blown in by a squall.

‘Morning ma’am,’ he said as he stepped inside, the raindrops trickling down the black waterproof.

‘Captain Hillman, how nice to see you. I wasn’t expecting a visitor on such a morning. Is the hollow by Tullyconnaught flooded?’

‘No, not yet, but I guess it soon will be. The dykes are full. Sheughs, I think you call them.’

‘Do put your jacket over the chair,’ she said, as she turned her iron off. ‘I hope you’ve time for coffee.’

‘I have, ma’am. In fact, I have a permit for coffee,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘My superior officer says I need to talk to you about morale and he assured me I would be offered coffee and cake. He also sends his greetings and is looking forward to his next visit,’ he went on, rather formally.

‘Then do sit down while I make it and we’ll go into the conservatory. It’s pretty gloomy in there this morning, but the armchairs are more comfortable and it doesn’t smell of starch,’ she added, as she indicated a chair at the far side of the kitchen table.

With his long legs she needed to settle him as far away as possible from the sink and work surface while she put up a tray.

‘Am I required to call you Captain Hillman or may I call you Giovanni?’ she asked, glancing over her shoulder as she measured coffee.

‘I answer to Chuck, ma’am.’

‘Right, Chuck, then tell me about morale. Are you having problems at the camp?’

‘No ma’am, not so far as I am aware, but it is my business to find out about such things. In fact, I have been giving a lot of thought to the social events laid on in the community for the boys,’ he said flatly. ‘You are aware I’m sure just how tight the training schedule now is,’ he continued, in his usual matter-of-fact tone.

‘Yes, indeed. It must put extra pressure on everyone,’ she agreed, as she cut slices of cake and put the lid firmly back on the tin.

He stood up, opened the door to the conservatory, waited for her to go through and then sat down, the tray on a low table between them.

She looked across at him as she poured his coffee and wondered if he thought the time spent giving piggy-backs to school children would be better redeployed. He might be right.

Meantime, she passed him the cake and saw a slight softening of his rather sad face. She was beginning to think that Chuck was a rather unhappy young man.

‘Did your grandparents emigrate to America?’ she asked, before she had entirely thought about how he might respond.

The amazing change in his face took her aback.

‘Who told you that? How can you possibly know that?’ he demanded.

His reaction expressed fear rather than aggression and she felt sorry now she’d upset him. She thought of Sam Hamilton who always claimed that sometimes one simply spoke when the Spirit moved. But he hadn’t pointed out that, if you did, you had to take the consequences.

‘Well, I’ll explain if you want me to,’ she said soothingly. ‘No one told me. But there were three things that made it seem likely that your family had come from Germany some time back,’ she offered, sipping her coffee and giving him time to recover himself.

‘First, when we met and we talked about your home, you told me you were from Michigan,’ she began. ‘There is a very large German community there and many still speak German. Secondly, you said sheugh,’ she added, smiling. ‘I’ve never heard anyone not from Ulster pronounce that word correctly. My husband Alex can say it, but then he speaks German.’

‘He speaks German?’ he repeated blankly.

‘Yes,’ she explained. ‘He was a farm labourer in the States at a place called German Township before he came to Ireland in the hope of finding his family. He’d been sent to Canada as an orphan, though in fact he wasn’t.’

There was a moment’s silence and Emily offered Chuck another piece of cake. He looked at it for a moment, then picked it up and said Thank You, as if he’d had to make a major decision in accepting it.

‘You said there were three things, ma’am.’

‘Yes, I did. Your name. Hillman. I know a very nice young German boy called Hillman who comes from Hamlin. We haven’t met yet, but he is engaged to my daughter Jane.’

‘But how can that be, ma’am? Is she abroad somewhere?’

‘No, but Johann is a prisoner-of-war in Dungannon. They met when his aircraft crashed into the water supply at Millbrook on her birthday. She was here and went with her father to see what they could do to help him.’

‘So you don’t hate all Germans?’

Emily shook her head slowly.

‘No. We fear for ourselves and our fighting forces,’ she said honestly. ‘Hate what Hitler has done and all the suffering he has caused. But Johann, or your grandparents, or my Pennsylvanian cousins’ German cousins, why should anyone hate them?’

He nodded abruptly and looked at his watch.

‘I’m most grateful to you ma’am.’

He moved forward in his armchair with all the signs of a man poised to leave.

‘What about morale?’ she reminded him. ‘I think perhaps you were going to say that, with the reduced time available, perhaps social activities were not high priority.’

‘No, ma’am, not so. I did think that when I first came to the camp. That was why I decided to produce a questionnaire and do a survey of the boys,’ he said, reaching his hand back into his map pocket and bringing out a notebook.

‘There were a number of questions about first impressions. I’ve copied up some of the replies for you. I think you’ll find them interesting. They were all entirely positive. It was Lieutenant-Colonel Hicks who said I might benefit by discussing the question with you,’ he added, as he handed over the black, waterproof notebook.

‘Thank you,’ she said, somewhat taken aback.

‘He was quite right, of course, about talking to you,’ he said, smiling at her for the first time, as he got to his feet and waited for her to lead the way back into the starch-smelling kitchen.

‘No wonder he got promoted,’ he added, as he pulled on his waterproof jacket and zipped it up.

He beamed at her as he raised a hand and stepped out into the pouring rain.

October ended in a blaze of autumn glory. Certainly not as dramatic as Vermont, but even Chris Hicks commented on the crisp mornings and the sunlight falling on the shoals of leaves brought down in their avenue by the first frosts. The hedgerows were bright with jewelled branches of hawthorn and the mountain ash on the eastern boundary of the flower garden was full of feasting birds.

‘Grand mornin’, Mrs Hamilton,’ said Robert Cooper, as he met her coming up from the garden with a handful of dahlias and a few autumn-tinted ferns. ‘I’ve left your letters on the drainin’ board. A whole wee pile left waitin’ for me at the office this mornin’. Someone loves you, as the sayin’ is.’

‘Thank you, Robert, that’ll brighten up my tea-break,’ she replied, smiling.

‘Are you for the quarry?’ she called after him, noting his purposeful stride as he humped his bag more comfortably on his shoulder.

‘Aye, they’re powerful busy these days, but I’ll leave the bike in your gateway if that’s all right. Wi’ them big lorries yer safer on yer feet,’ he said sharply.

‘Of course it’s all right. Any time. We don’t get many bicycle thieves up here.’

She turned back towards the kitchen and eyed the little pile as she ran the tap and put the flowers and ferns she’d picked in a basin to drink before she arranged them in a vase. There were at least half a dozen items of varied sizes, secured with a rubber band.

Ten minutes later, she was sitting with a cup of tea in the conservatory, her family letters by her side, a seed catalogue, the electric bill and a circular abandoned on the kitchen table.

Emily smiled as she tucked the short letter back in its envelope. Such a cheering picture of Cathy and Brian and their life together had emerged in the last weeks. Cathy had never been very forthcoming as a girl and although Emily knew that she loved Brian very much and couldn’t bear their being apart, she’d never before been allowed such an intimate glimpse into their life. The thought of them laughing over her letter was a real joy.

A further delight was a missive from Johnny. She opened it to find a single sheet with a mere two sentences in his generous hand, but inside the folded sheet were three photographs. With flare on the edges and burnt out sky and sea, they were not exactly works of art, but she was grateful to the owner of the Box Brownie who had taken Johnny with his arms round two other airmen, Johnny in uniform and Johnny in swimming trunks, looking brown and flourishing, his blonde hair so bleached by the sun so that it looked almost white.

She studied the photographs carefully. Alex and Chris were probably right that he was somewhere in North Africa. Possibly in the desert, as that comment about the girls would suggest. But then, she argued with herself, it was all guesswork. That he was well and happy was the one thing she could be sure of from the note and photos.

The third letter was an American Airmail, the handwriting and the return address now familiar and most welcome. Jane Ross wrote regularly and she and Emily were busy sharing the detail of their own lives as well as speculating about the remaining puzzles over what had happened to Alex and Jane as children.

As Emily opened her letter carefully so as not to damage the stamps which she saved for young Jimmy Cook, she noticed it was a good deal thinner than usual. She pulled out the closely written airmail sheet and began to read quickly.

Emily wiped her eyes and read the letter through again in case she had missed anything, but she hadn’t. It was one of the commonest stories of the war, the enemy position that no one had identified. Hank and one of Chris’s groups, boys who had played games and given chewing gum to children and smiled and carried her baskets and boxes.

She thought of the morning he had said goodbye to her, when he told her his mother’s name was Jane and she had guessed that Alex had found his sister. She had kissed him and said the kiss was from his mother, to wish him luck.

He was probably lucky to be alive, but at this moment all she could think of was what he had lost. She went into the sitting-room, took out her writing materials and sat down where she was in the dim, cold room and wrote to Jane.

It was only when she came back into the kitchen and propped up the letter by the bread bin to give to Danny, whose day it was to call, that she saw the other items from the post, still lying where she had left them. She picked them up, opened the seed catalogue and leafed through it briefly, glanced down and saw that it had covered a small, dull orange envelope. In plain capitals above their address it said POST OFFICE TELEGRAM. Down one side, in red lettering, block capitals spelt out the one word, PRIORITY.

Suddenly anxious and barely able to control the shake in her hands, she ripped open the envelope and drew out the single flimsy sheet. Under the time and place of dispatch and the address of the Air Ministry in Oxford Street, London W1, it deeply regretted to inform them that F/O John Hamilton was reported missing while on operations in the Mediterranean and that any further information would be immediately communicated to you pending receipt of official notification.