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Wisconsin: September 1918
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ALICE ARMSTRONG CLOSED her eyes and let the early September sun, bright and warm in a nearly cloudless sky, flow over her. The breeze light and birds singing, it was the perfect end-of-summer day in northwest Wisconsin.
She did a quick inventory of the wagon bed. “Do we have everything?”
“I think so.” Betty Young did a quick review of the wagon’s contents and nodded. “A large blanket to sit on, umbrellas to protect from the sun, picnic lunch, fishing poles, bathing costumes, and towels.”
Alice laughed. “How can three girls need so much for one day at the lake?”
“Perhaps we should put on our bathing clothes now,” Lizzie Hudson suggested. “There’s no place to change at the lake.”
“And ride through town in them?” Betty’s gasped and covered her mouth with both hands. Her exaggerated shock and horror made Lizzie blush.
Alice put her arm around Lizzie’s shoulders and hugged her. She loved Lizzie’s sweet, kind heart. It was a happy relief when Fred Finley finally proposed marriage, and Lizzie tearfully accepted, because now Alice knew she would never have to worry about her friend again. Fin would keep Lizzie close and never let anything happen to her.
“We’ll change in the woods, one at a time, while the other two keep watch,” Alice assured her.
Lizzie’s smile returned. “That’s a marvelous plan. You always know just what to do, Alice.”
Betty smiled. “Of course, she does. That’s what Harry loves best about her.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.
Alice knew Betty had always been jealous of her relationship with Harry. Betty tried to lure him away several times over recent years, causing hard feelings between them, but Alice thought they’d gotten past it.
“Wait.” Betty spun around. “I’ll be right back,” she called over her shoulder, returning to the house.
“What did you forget?” What could Betty possibly have left behind? She’d already loaded everything imaginable.
“My magazines.” Betty disappeared into the house, the screen door slamming behind her.
“Don’t slam the door!” Mrs. Young hollered from somewhere inside. She’d be getting ready to head over to the hotel soon. Since Betty’s father died, she’d thrown all her attention into managing the hotel and restaurant. Mrs. Young’s strong business mind soon caught the attention of several local widowers, but she made it perfectly clear from the start she was not interested in a new husband.
“Sorry, Mother.” Betty reappeared on the porch with an armful of magazines. The screen door slammed shut again.
“Betty!” Mrs. Young followed her onto the porch, broom in one hand and the other on her hip. Lizzie giggled through her fingers.
Alice smiled and waved. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“It is. You girls be careful now. Don’t get too much sun.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Alice turned back to her friends.
Betty stepped up onto the wagon and scooted over to the far side of the bench. “Let’s go, before Mother changes her mind and decides I need to stay home and scrub floors, or some other awful chore.” Alice sat next to her. Lizzie squeezed on last.
Alice handed the reins to Lizzie as soon as they passed the last of the houses. She untied her hat, dropped it in the wagon bed behind her, and unpinned her hair letting it fall in loose curls half-way to her waist.
“Aren’t you afraid you’ll freckle?” Betty adjusted her hat. Her porcelain complexion was her greatest pride.
Alice tossed her head, closed her eyes, and drew in a deep breath. “I don’t care if I do. I love the sun. I wish it was summer all year round.” She took back the reins.
Lizzie leaned forward to look past Alice to Betty. “I think she’s beautiful. Not a single freckle.”
Alice smiled and squeezed Lizzie’s hand.
Betty clucked her tongue. “Harry isn’t going to be happy if he comes home from the war to find you brown as a nut.”
Lizzie’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Don’t you listen to her.” She shook a finger at Alice. “Betty’s jealous because the two most handsome men in town love us. I think she’s afraid she’s going to die alone. Someday it will be Betty all alone in a house full of cats.”
“Not true, Elizabeth Hudson. I have plenty of young men knocking at my door wanting to spend time with me.”
“Name one,” Lizzie challenged. “And remember, I live right next door, so I know exactly who comes and goes from your house.”
“I suppose you would, seeing as your mother’s the biggest gossip in town with her nose in everyone’s business but her own.”
Alice stopped the horses. “I’ll kick you both out of my wagon right now, make you walk back to town, if you don’t stop your bickering immediately.”
“I notice you couldn’t name one,” Lizzie mumbled under her breath.
Betty opened her mouth to reply.
Alice shot her a warning glance. She looked from one friend to the other and smiled. “Pine Lake girls, friends forever,” she cheered.
“Friends forever,” was their reluctant reply.
She snapped the reins, and they continued their ride in awkward silence. Alice smiled. Despite their occasional little quarrels, they would always have each other.
As they rode, fields of colorful wildflowers were taken over by trees then opened up again to reveal the lake glittering in the sunlight and surrounded on three sides by the pine trees giving both the lake and town their name.
She pulled the horses to a stop and turned to her right. Betty pretended to study a non-existent spot on her skirt. Alice turned to Lizzie, who looked down at her hands folded on her lap.
Alice nudged Lizzie with her elbow. “Betty was right about your mother. She is a horrible gossip. You’ve said so yourself.”
The start of a smile twitched at the corners of Lizzie’s mouth. “Where do you think I get all my best information?” They laughed.
Betty hopped down and placed her magazines carefully in the wagon bed. “Come on, you two. I don’t feel like fishing. Let’s get changed and go for a swim. Then we can eat while we dry off, and I can tell you all the latest movie star news.” She grabbed the bag with her bathing costume. “I’ll go first. You two keep an eye out for Peeping Toms.”
“Don’t you mean one of your many admirers?” Lizzie giggled and gave a sly sideways glance toward Alice. Betty stuck out her tongue and disappeared into the trees, but not before Lizzie stuck out her tongue in return.
* * *
WITH THEIR HAIR NEATLY tucked into their caps, they stood at the water’s edge. Lizzie dipped her toes in and jumped back. “It’s cold.”
“That’s why you have to get it over with fast.” Alice didn’t stop running until only her head and shoulders were visible, squealing all the way. Teeth chattering, she faced her friends. Lizzie wasn’t kidding when she said the water was cold.
“Come on in. The water’s fine.” Maybe she could trick them into following her. “I’m already warm.” She forced her best fake smile.
With a shrug and a grin, Betty grabbed Lizzie’s hand. They ran splashing and screaming after Alice.
They rose and fell, bobbing on the waves like flower petals in the wind. Their red and yellow and orange swim caps dotted the water.
Lizzie spread her arms and floated on her back like yellow flotsam. Betty skimmed her hand along the water, sending a wave over Lizzie’s face. She sputtered, folded like a pocketknife, and sunk. A moment later, her cap popped up without her.
Alice snatched up the cap. “Lizzie?” She kicked and twisted side to side. Lizzie was an excellent swimmer. Where was she?
“Lizzie, this isn’t funny.” Betty screamed, her arms flying above her head, before disappearing in a red blur as she was yanked beneath the lake’s surface.
Lizzie appeared next to Alice. Laughing, she pushed her hair out of her face. “Serves her right for being such a cranky puss today.”
Betty surfaced with a gasp.
Alice shoved Lizzie’s cap back on her head. It hung at an awkward angle down one side. “And you thought this would cheer her?”
Lizzie gave up trying to straighten her cap and took it off. “She splashed me. I dunked her.”
Alice studied Lizzie for a moment while Betty struggled to regain her breath. She shook her head and smiled “True.”
Betty glared. “Lizzie Hudson, I ought to kill you for scaring us.”
“But you won’t.” She turned toward shore. “Pine Lake girls, friends forever,” she cheered as she swam away.
Betty turned to Alice. “I probably deserved that.”
“You did.” Alice nodded and followed Lizzie. “Pine Lake girls, friends forever!”
“Friends forever!” Betty echoed.
The sun was hot and high when they emerged dripping from the lake. The breeze making the heat tolerable on their morning ride, died to barely a whisper. The only sounds as they sat wrapped in their towels were the drone of insects, the waves lapping against the shore, and the occasional splash of a fish jumping to eat a water bug swimming on the surface.
Alice dropped her towel and rose to her feet. “I’m starving.”
“Me, too.” Lizzie jumped up. She spread the blanket while Alice set out their lunch and Betty retrieved her stack of magazines. “Another minute without food and I would certainly curl up and die.”
Alice smiled at her friend. Some people might think Lizzie fat, or pleasingly plump, if they wanted to be kind, but Alice loved Lizzie’s soft curves and round pink cheeks. She pictured her surrounded by Fin’s babies, each one as happy as their adoring mother and proud father.
They ate ham sandwiches on Alice’s home-made oatmeal bread. Betty brought dill pickles and fresh pears so ripe the juice ran down their chins with every bite, leading to another round of giggling.
Betty licked mustard from the corner of her mouth. “I’ll be glad when the war is over and we can return to eating like normal people. Meatless meals. Wheatless meals. Meatless and wheatless meals. Who can keep track of all the rules?”
“Today’s Thursday,” Lizzie explained. “On Thursday, the noon rule is there is no rule.”
“And ham?” Betty took another bite of her sandwich. “I thought we’re supposed to save all the pork for the soldiers.”
“Porkless is only Saturday noon and evening,” Lizzie recited. “You work in your mother’s hotel. Doesn’t she have the poster hanging in the kitchen?”
“Probably.” Betty popped a pickle slice into her mouth, sucking the brine from her fingers before wiping them on her napkin. “But who reads those things, anyway? Not me.”
Lizzie shrugged. “Well, maybe you should. Then maybe you’d remember. It’s for our men and our starving allies.”
Alice reached for the top magazine. “So, Betty, why don’t you tell me and Lizzie all the news from Hollywood.”
Betty slapped her hand away. “You’re all sticky.”
Alice wiped her hands and face. She reached again, but this time more gingerly, afraid of another slap.
Betty pushed Alice’s hand away, wiped her own, and gave her the top issue.
“Let me see.” Lizzie leaned in. “I never heard of Theatre Magazine.”
Alice shook her head. “Me, neither. They don’t sell it at Erikson’s.”
“I have a subscription.”
Alice flipped pages, glancing at headlines, pictures, but not stopping to read the articles. “Looks like all gossip to me.”
Lizzie nodded. “I prefer Today’s Housewife or Woman’s Home Companion. Erikson’s sells both, and they’re full of all kinds of useful information, recipes and tips on housekeeping, babies and such.” She held out a tin of oatmeal cookies.
“I thought we were supposed to be rationing sugar and fats.” Betty’s lip curled like it always did when she was trying to start an argument. “For our men.”
“So, now you suddenly know the rules?” Lizzie huffed. “For your information, Miss Smarty Pants, I’ve been holding back just so I could bake these cookies for a treat.”
Betty opened her mouth to reply then closed it again. She snatched her magazine from Alice and changed the subject. “This isn’t gossip. It’s all fact. See, this article’s about Mary Pickford. The photograph is of Miss Pickford and her husband Owen Moore.”
“If they’re married wouldn’t her name be Mary Moore?” Lizzie nibbled on a second cookie.
Betty rolled her eyes. “You don’t understand these things, Lizzie. Mary Pickford is a modern woman, and modern women don’t always want to take their husband’s name. Don’t have to.”
Lizzie took another cookie. “You’re right, I don’t understand. When a woman loves a man and promises to be his wife, she’s promising to take his name.”
Alice agreed. “The old ways are the best. But I can understand why Mary Pickford would continue to use her own name. That’s how her fans know her. I’ve heard it’s called a stage name.”
“Well, I still think if she truly loved her husband, she’d want to take his name.” Lizzie held out the cookie tin again. “One left. Someone eat it before I do. I’ve already had three.”
Betty shook her head. “No, thank you. I’m watching my waistline. And you better slow down with all the sweets. Fin won’t recognize you when he comes home. You’ll be fat as a cow and your pretty wedding dress won’t fit.”
Alice took the last cookie. “They’re delicious. And I think you’re perfect.” Tears puddled in Lizzie’s eyes. She had always been sensitive about her weight. “I’ve never known a man to love a woman more than Fred Finley loves you.”
“Speaking of Fin,” Betty barely glanced up from her magazine. “I hear you got a letter from him not long ago. How is Mr. Finley doing out on the Western Front?”
Alice’s stomach tightened. She dropped her cookie and clutched Lizzie’s hands. “Why didn’t you tell me about Fin’s letter? What did he say? Did he mention Harry? I’m so happy for you. I know how worried you’ve been.” The words, the questions, tumbled out almost faster than Alice formed them. It had been months since either of them received a letter, and those last ones were short, void of any real news.
“He didn’t mention Harry. He only said he’d be coming home soon.”
Alice squeezed Lizzie’s hands tighter. Lizzie flinched and pulled away. “Sorry. You must be so excited, but I wonder why Harry didn’t write.”
“Perhaps his letter got lost somewhere. Military mail isn’t reliable. I’m sure you’ll hear from him any day now.”
“Yes.” Alice nodded, but wasn’t certain she believed her. Something didn’t feel right, and she was afraid what news a letter might bring.
Betty set down her magazine and picked up another. “Or, perhaps he’s not coming home.” She flipped through the pages. “Maybe he’s married some French woman. Or, perhaps he’s dead.”
Lizzie’s slap was sudden. Betty’s head snapped around and her magazines fell across the ground. Alice gasped, one hand over her mouth. She’d never seen her friend so angry before.
Lizzie shook with rage. “Don’t you ever say such a horrid thing again, Betty Young. Harry is not married to a French woman, and he is certainly not dead. He’s coming home any day now, and he’s going to marry our Alice.”
Betty held her hand to her cheek. Tears slid over her fingertips, quickly followed by a choking sob. “I’m sorry, Alice. I don’t know why I said that. I really don’t. I’m so sorry.”
Alice pulled her friends into her arms and hugged them tight.
Betty cried. “Forgive me.”
“Of course. Friends forever.”
Lizzie wiped Betty’s tears. “And I’m sorry I slapped you.”
“They’re coming home,” Alice said, so quietly she almost couldn’t hear herself. “All of our men will be home soon.”