“You don’t think they have a point, do you?”
“I think,” said Kate carefully, and that very care was somehow alarming, because it meant that Kate was watching her words, was watching them with her, Emmie, “that we’re more than qualified for canteen work, or even to go on with what we’re doing now. I’m not sure we have the skills to reconstruct a destroyed village—much less eleven destroyed villages. Liza can barely speak French. And to call me a chauffeur is nothing short of absurd.”
“You passed your test.” Emmie felt a little clutch of panic in her chest.
“Only because the person just before me crashed into a camion and goodness only knows how many crates of apples. The street was impassable for nearly an hour.”
“Aren’t you underestimating yourself? And besides, you learned before—I remember you driving me down Thames Street in Newport without bashing into anything at all!”
“Yes, but that was six years ago,” said Kate.
And there it was. Emmie could feel those six years sitting between them, weighing on them like lead. Six years of distance against four years of friendship.
“Has that much changed?” she asked, and she knew she wasn’t just talking about driving. “You’re still the same person you were.”
“Yes, but the car isn’t,” said Kate, and Emmie felt like she’d been very neatly put off. Again. Some of her distress must have shown, because Kate leaned across the table and gave her cold hand a quick squeeze. “Emmie. Don’t worry. I’m not part of Maud’s cabal—I don’t think she’d even think to ask me! I just wonder. That’s all.”
“I don’t,” said Emmie in a small voice, but she didn’t know if Kate heard her because a horn was honking outside, gears grinding, people shouting, doors flinging open, footsteps running down the stairs.
“What on earth—” Kate ran to the window, Emmie bashing her shin against a chair as she followed, and there, in the middle of the street, was an army truck, cheerfully beeping its horn, and, on top of it, in full Unit uniform and an alarmingly large hat with a feather, sat Mrs. Rutherford.
“Well, that’s an entrance for you,” said Kate, looking at Emmie.
“Girls!” Mrs. Rutherford was calling as she waved farewell to her escort. “Girls!”
“We thought it was the Germans,” said Maud crossly, coming downstairs with her hat in her hand.
“Not the Germans—the French. They were kind enough to give me a lift from the station,” said Mrs. Rutherford, swinging her maltreated carpetbag to the ground. Her face looked thinner than it had two weeks ago, but it glowed with windburn and joy. “All is arranged for us! I’ve left them at Grécourt waiting for our arrival. I can’t tell you how much they need us.”
Emmie felt the tight knot in her chest relax a bit. “But our trucks . . .” she said hesitantly.
“Ha,” said Mrs. Rutherford. “The people of Grécourt need us and they need us now. It’s absurd to sit here waiting for our trucks any longer. If Mahomet won’t come to the mountain . . .”
“Mahoment? Is he one of the Algerian soldiers?” asked Liza.
Mrs. Rutherford ignored her. “Miss Cooper, Miss Englund, Miss Moran, Miss Patton, Miss Shaw, make your excuses to your places of employment and pack your bags. If the trucks won’t come to us, we must go to Saint-Nazaire and get them! If we leave tonight, we can be in Saint-Nazaire by morning. I’ve booked places for us on the train.”
Liza cast an anxious look at Maud. “So fast?”
“It’s actually a rather slow train,” said Mrs. Rutherford, unpinning her hat and drawing off her gloves, “but it was the best one available. And I’m sure none of us minds a bit of discomfort in a good cause. We’ll fetch our trucks and be off to Grécourt within the week.”
“You see,” murmured Kate as they went up the stairs to the attic. “You were worried for nothing.”
“Ye-es,” said Emmie. It was a relief that Mrs. Rutherford was here and that they might, just might, actually get started.
But she wasn’t sure that Maud would give up so easily. And she couldn’t quite forget that Kate hadn’t wanted to go.
Chapter Seven
For two weeks and more we anxiously awaited the anticipated arrival of our trucks, which were meant to be forwarded by the YMCA from the port. When it became evident that they were too busy to attend to the matter, I decided to go myself with chauffeurs to bring the cars to Paris. . . . We at once located the crates containing the two Ford trucks and the White truck, also the sixty sections of the six portable houses, severally, some on a quay, some on a freight car, and some stacked in the freight yard. The cars had been exposed to sea air and were frightfully rusty.