July 1941
Nearly everyone was late into work that morning. After weeks and weeks of clear skies and peaceful nights, the bombers had returned; and while it hadn’t been quite as bad as the terrible raids in May, enough damage had been done to wreak havoc on everyone’s morning commute. It had been a shock, coming so long after what everyone assumed had been the end of the Blitz, never mind that the government kept telling everyone to remain alert.
The bombing had gone on for hours and hours, the all clear not sounding until almost dawn, and come morning, the streets had been littered with unexploded parachute bombs and sizzling incendiaries. Ruby had walked far out of her way to get to work, and when she did arrive at almost nine o’clock she found the office all but deserted. Even Evelyn, who got up at the crack of dawn every morning for her journey in from Ealing and was never, ever late, had called Kaz to say there was a bomb in next door’s garden and she had to wait for the bomb disposal crew to arrive.
The morning wore on, and one by one everyone appeared—everyone except Mary. Lunchtime came and went, and still she didn’t come in.
“I rang her at home, but there was no answer,” Kaz said worriedly. “Even for her this is awfully late.”
“Why don’t you go by her flat, then?” Ruby suggested. “Maybe she’s under the weather and doesn’t feel like getting out of bed to answer the phone. She did say she’d been feeling a cold coming on.”
“Yes, that’s probably it. I’ll walk over now.”
An hour passed, then another. Mary’s flat was on Eagle Street, just off High Holborn, less than a mile away. It should only have taken Kaz a half hour, at the very most, to get there. So why hadn’t he rung back with news?
Ruby waited and fretted and tried to work, and still there was no news. And then, when it was almost six o’clock and everyone else was packing up to go home, the telephone on her desk rang.
“Picture Weekly, Ruby Sutton speaking.”
“It’s Kaz.”
“Where are you? Did you find Mary? Is everything all right?”
“I’m at University College Hospital. Mary . . . her block of flats took a direct hit last night.” His deep voice broke. “It took a long while for them to . . . for them to dig her out.”
“No. No, it can’t—”
“They whisked her away. I had to find a cab and follow. I . . . I just got here, and no one will tell me anything.”
“Tell me where to go. I’ll be right there.”
“The casualty entrance. I’ll be there, or somewhere nearby.”
She left seconds later, not bothering to see if anyone was still in the office to lock up. On the cab ride to the hospital, which felt like forever but took little more than fifteen minutes, Ruby pushed away images of the countless buildings she’d seen leveled by bombs and focused on the survivors she had interviewed. No one she knew was stronger, tougher, or more invincible than Mary. No one. She would be, had to be, all right.
Rushing through the doors to the casualty entrance, Ruby skidded to a halt in front of the duty nurse’s desk. “I’m here to see Mary Buchanan. Mr. Kaczmarek asked me to come. He’s already here.”
“Yes, of course,” the woman said, her expression carefully blank. “Come with me.”
Kaz was slumped in a chair at the very far corner of the waiting area, his head in his hands.
“I’m here,” she said, touching his shoulder.
He looked up, nodded, and motioned for her to sit next to him.
“Why are we waiting?” she asked.
“The doctors are still examining her. I don’t know what’s wrong with her yet. How bad it is. The nurse would only say that her condition is ‘grave.’”
So they sat and waited, and no one came out to tell them what was happening, and minute by minute the pool of choking dread rose higher and higher in Ruby’s chest, until it threatened to eclipse every thought in her head. Why was no one coming to tell them what was happening?
They sat in silence for another quarter hour, and then Kaz shifted, settling his elbows on his knees, and tilted his head to look at Ruby. “Did Mary ever tell you the story of how we met?” he asked.
“No. Only that she’d known you for years.”
“She was the first photographer assigned to me when I came to London. I’d left the Liverpool Herald behind, convinced the grass would be greener in the big city. John Ellis had written a fulsome recommendation for me, far better than I deserved, and it had earned me a position at the very bottom of the editorial ladder at the Evening Standard. For my troubles I was sent out on the women’s beat, and to my everlasting shame I considered it a blow to my pride. Mary was the photographer for my first assignment.”
“I fear for you already,” Ruby said. “What was the story?”
“We were sent off to some market town in the depths of the Cotswolds. I’ve forgotten the name. It was the end of September and they were having their Michaelmas fair. As far as I can recall, it was some sort of landmark year—their seven hundred and fiftieth anniversary or something like that.
“We were lent a little car, though again I’ve no memory of where it came from. Likely it belonged to someone at the magazine. Fool that I was, I insisted on driving, even though I barely knew the clutch from the brake.”
“I’ve driven with Mary,” Ruby said, recalling their breakneck journey up to Coventry. “She’s not much better behind the wheel.”
“Oh, she’s a skillful enough driver. Just not a cautious one. So—we drove out there, and I was so, so nervous around her. She was about a hundred times smarter than me, and so glamorous and confident and regal that every bit of male pride I had just shriveled away.”
“What happened at the fair?”
“Nothing very dramatic. I was convinced I could find an edge to the story, some approach to it that would make my editor sit up and take notice of me.”
“And did you?”
“Of course not. It was a country fair, more or less the same country fair that had been held in that same market town for three-quarters of a millennium. Insofar as there was a story, it was in the people we met. But I was so busy trying to impress Mary and find some different angle that I hardly talked to anyone there at all, and when I did I talked over them. I didn’t ask questions and I didn’t listen.”
“What did she do?”
“She didn’t give me a hard time, not at first. Mainly just let me blunder around like a great idiotic bear and scare off every single person who might have brought some life to the story. After a while, she suggested we have lunch at the local pub. It was probably early afternoon by then, and when we sat down to eat she told me to listen and not say a word until she was done. She told me I was new and evidently needed some help, and so she would give me some advice. She said that I was ruining the story and unless I learned how to shut up and listen I would never amount to anything as a journalist.”
“Did she have that look on her face? The one where her eyebrows go up and she fixes you with the stare? The one you feel down to your toes?”
“She did,” he said, and smiled at the memory. “I felt as if she’d reached over, pulled a stopper out of my chest, and let out all the hot air. I knew she was right, but I didn’t know how to fix it.”
“And?” Ruby prompted.
“And so I asked her what I should do. She told me to eat my lunch, and then we would start again. This time, though, she wanted me to keep two rules in mind. One, I must never underestimate the intelligence of my readers. And two, I must never get in the way of my photographer. It worked.”
“She does have an instinct for finding interesting people,” Ruby said.
“She does. I let her take the lead, and she led me to people, and I just started talking with them. Not in an ‘I am from an extremely important London newspaper and I should like to talk to you’ way. More, I suppose, in a ‘what a beautiful display of marrows’ sort of way. ‘Did you grow these? You did? How long have you been growing marrows? What got you started?’”
He clutched his head in his hands, his back bowed. “I fell in love with her that day,” he whispered.
“Oh, Kaz. I did wonder, a few times. But the two of you were so discreet. I could never be sure if you were close friends, or if there was more.”
“There was. Never quite enough, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I finally worked up the nerve to tell her how I felt, a year or so after we met, she was kind. She didn’t laugh at me. She didn’t reject me, in point of fact. But she was clear. She might agree to be my lover, but she would never be anything more. She’d seen what happened to women who married and abandoned all their ambitions, and she swore it would never happen to her.”
He looked up, his expression somewhat abashed. “I hope you don’t mind my telling you this.”
“Not at all,” she assured him. “You are my friend, just as Mary is. But I am sorry. I wish . . .”
“I stopped wishing a while ago, and it was enough, I think . . .”
“Mr. Kaczmarek?” A doctor, not much older than Ruby, had approached as they were talking, and now stood a few feet away.
“I’m Walter Kaczmarek.”
“I’m Dr. Bannion,” he said. “Are you Miss Buchanan’s next of kin? Your name is given on her identity card.”
Kaz looked briefly surprised, but nodded readily. “I am.”
“May I sit?” the doctor asked, and without waiting for a reply he pulled over a nearby chair and all but fell into it, exhaustion a stark veil upon his young, handsome face.
“How is she?” Kaz asked.
“I’m afraid it’s not good. Miss Buchanan is suffering from extensive internal injuries, as well as a fractured skull and a subdural hematoma—a sort of injury to her brain. She was unconscious when they pulled her from the wreckage of her block of flats. I gather she and the other people in the building had been trapped in the cellar for some hours.”
The horror of it was almost too much to bear. To know that her friend had been trapped and alone—that she had suffered alone for so long. Ruby looked to Kaz, whose face was twisted in a rictus of agony, and without hesitating, she reached for his nearest hand and grasped it tightly.
“The only way to remedy such injuries is through surgery,” Dr. Bannion continued, “but we haven’t yet been able to stabilize her condition. If we were to operate now, she would almost certainly die on the table.”
“So are you saying . . . ?” Kaz faltered.
“I’m saying that Miss Buchanan’s condition is too grave to allow for surgery. It’s also the case that she has suffered such an acute head injury that, if she were to survive, I fear her faculties would be permanently impaired.”
“I don’t understand. Are you saying that you can’t save her?”
“I’m very sorry, but I think it best if we do not intervene any further. Her injuries are too extensive, and there is no reasonable prospect for recovery.”
“Is she still alive?” Kaz asked, his voice no more than a whisper.
“Yes. She is unconscious, and I doubt she will wake again. But she is not in any pain.”
“May we see her?” Ruby asked.
“Of course. She’s been moved to a bed on the ward, and there is room for you to sit with her. I don’t think it will be very long.”
The casualty ward was dim and quiet, with curtains drawn around several of its beds. Dr. Bannion led them to one of the nurses and, after a final, whispered apology, vanished down the hall.
“I’m Sister Milne. I’ll be here for the rest of the night. I’ll take you to Miss Buchanan now. We’ve drawn the curtains so you’ll have some privacy.”
Mary had been changed into a hospital gown, and apart from the bandages swathing her head she looked much as she always did, with no marks on her face or arms. A blanket had been tucked around her, and if Ruby hadn’t known otherwise, she’d have thought her friend was sleeping.
Two chairs had been left in the curtained alcove, and now Ruby took one and drew it close to the bed. “You sit,” she told Kaz. “Take her hand. I know the doctor said she’s unconscious, but that doesn’t mean she can’t hear you. Now is the time for you to tell her everything. I’ll wait outside.”
“You won’t go far?”
“No. I won’t be far.”
She closed tight the curtains, not wishing anyone to be a witness to Kaz’s farewell, and walked far enough away that she couldn’t hear him whispering to the woman he loved. She stood and shivered, wondering why they kept it so cold inside the hospital. Surely the patients needed to be kept warm.
Kind hands took her by the shoulders and directed her to a chair. “You’re in shock,” said Sister Milne. “It’s quite natural. Wait here while I get you a cup of tea.”
She accepted the mug, which was hot enough to scald her icy hands, and tried to take a sip. Her hands were shaking, though, and it was hard to drink without spilling.
“Go on,” the sister encouraged her. “You’ll feel better as soon as you’ve had something to drink.”
Ruby gulped it down, hating the taste but grateful for its cloying warmth. Presumably hospitals were allocated extra sugar rations for moments such as this.
“If I had anything stronger I’d give it to you,” the nurse said.
“This will do. Thanks.”
She could just hear Kaz’s voice, a murmur she didn’t try to decipher. Eavesdropping now would be the worst sort of betrayal. So she sat and waited and drank all her tea, even the sugary sludge at the bottom of the mug, and hoped she would find the strength for what was to come next.
“Ruby?”
She was across the ward in a flash. “Yes, Kaz?”
“I’m done. I . . . do you want to sit with us?”
“Of course.” Picking up the second chair, she brought it around to Mary’s other side and, sitting, took hold of her friend’s hand. It was beautiful, the fingers long and elegant. A strong, capable hand.
“She’s barely breathing,” Kaz said.
Ruby felt for the pulse in Mary’s wrist. It was scarcely there, a whisper of movement, no more. Together she and Kaz sat and watched and listened, the space between Mary’s breaths growing longer and longer, until nothing remained but a final, fading wisp of escaping air.
“Kaz,” Ruby whispered.
“I know.” Tears streamed down his cheeks, and he dropped his head to the bed, his back heaving with soundless sobs. Reaching out blindly, he took hold of Mary’s cold hand and, turning it gently, kissed her palm.
This was agony. This was loss. This was love, and it was too late, now, for Ruby to do anything about it.
Too late to thank Mary for her friendship. Too late to tell her just how much she admired and esteemed her. In Kaz’s pain she saw her own heartache reflected, for she loved Mary, too. Had loved her as the true friend she had been. Her first friend.
He stood, swaying for a moment, and Ruby rushed around the bed to steady him. “I’m all right,” he said. “Do you have a handkerchief?”
“Yes, although it’s a bit damp.”
“I don’t mind.” He wiped his eyes, stuffed it in his jacket pocket, and straightened his shoulders. “There,” he said. “I’m ready now.”
RUBY AND KAZ planned the funeral while also working flat out on the magazine. There hadn’t been any question of skipping publication for a week, not least because Mary would have been outraged at the idea. Kaz spent most of the week in his office, emerging periodically for editorial meetings that invariably ended with Nell in tears or Nigel shouting at someone.
Since Mary had never expressed any particular wishes on the subject of her funeral, it was left to Kaz and Ruby to try to arrange a memorial that would offend her as little as possible. “Probably a good thing she never said anything about it,” Kaz observed at one point. “God knows what she’d have made us do. A Viking funeral pyre wouldn’t have been out of the question.”
“I think she’d have understood we’re doing our best,” Ruby had said, too tired and heartsick to find humor in Kaz’s observation. “I did hear back from the vicar at the Scottish church in Covent Garden. We can have the service at eleven o’clock on Thursday. Vanessa has offered to host the reception afterward, too.”
“That’s kind of her,” Kaz said absently.
“I can’t help asking . . . have you heard . . . ?”
“From Bennett? No. I left a message with his work, but haven’t heard back. If he can be there, he will.”
“Of course. I had better get back to my desk.”
“Ruby?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you for sitting with me. Having someone else there made it bearable. I’m not sure how I’d have managed otherwise.”
“It just seems so unfair. To have lived through so many nights of bombing, and to be killed now. We’ve all been assuming the Blitz was over. Weeks and weeks without a raid, and then this.”
“It is unfair, but that’s true of nearly everything about this war. For that matter, life itself is unfair. Your only chance is to grab hold of happiness when you have it, and enjoy it for however long it lasts.”
Their eyes met, and after a beat or two of almost unbearable silence, they both burst out laughing.
“She’d have had your head for that, Kaz.”
“She would,” he admitted. “Now, back to work you go. I’ll let you know if I hear from Bennett.”
BENNETT’S CALL DIDN’T come until the morning of the funeral. It awoke Ruby just past dawn, the phone ringing so persistently that she’d staggered downstairs, still half asleep, determined to slam the receiver down on the person who was so inconsiderate as to call at such an ungodly hour.
“Yes? Who is this?” she barked into the phone, forgetting Vanessa’s insistence that she always answer by citing their telephone number.
“Ruby? It’s Bennett.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m in England, but I’m a few hours away. Ruby—I’m so sorry. I only got word this morning.”
“Have you spoken with Kaz?”
“Yes,” he said wretchedly. “He seemed to understand.”
“Of course he does. I do, too. And it doesn’t matter, because you’re back now. Can you make it in time? The service starts at eleven.”
“Yes. I’ll be a bit rough around the edges, but I’ll be there.”
He walked up just as they were about to enter the church, and after embracing Kaz, he took her arm and they sat together in the front pew, flanked by Kaz and Vanessa. When it was time for the first lesson, it was Bennett who rose and made his way to the lectern.
“A reading from the book of Solomon:
“My beloved speaks and says to me:
Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away;
for now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come,
and the voice of the turtle dove is heard in our land.
The fig tree puts forth its figs, and the vines are in blossom;
they give forth fragrance.
Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”