After checking on Danielle, I tiptoed downstairs and changed into my dress. The cotton fabric still had a faint scent of the spices from the merchant ship that had brought it from India. It was hazelnut brown with white polka dots. The pattern I’d followed had short sleeves and what Merle called a sweetheart neckline. There was a single pleat below the bust to allow the dress to swing out when you danced.
I was standing by one of the windows, watching the sun dip below the apple trees in the orchard, when Merle came back to the library.
“Look at you!” She sighed. “I had a waist like that once!” She opened her handbag and took out a velvet pouch. “I thought you might like to borrow these.” She pulled open the drawstring and tipped a pearl necklace and matching bracelet onto the desk. “I was wearing them when I left Guernsey,” she said. “I had quite a bit of jewelry in those days—Maurice was a generous man, for all his other faults—but I left most of it behind in the evacuation.” She picked up the necklace, running the pearls through her fingers. “I used to like getting dressed up, but . . .” She trailed off as she handed it to me.
There was a mirror above the bureau. As I stood in front of it, fiddling with the clasp of the necklace, I caught Merle’s reflection. The wistful look in her eyes made me wonder if she was thinking about Fred. I wished there was something I could do to lift her spirits. Seeing me heading off for an evening out wasn’t likely to make her feel better.
When I turned around, she smiled, but her eyes were filmy. I wondered if it was the sight of me in her jewelry, triggering memories she was struggling to suppress—or whether it was the thought of what might happen to me in France.
“You enjoy yourself tonight, do you hear?” She gave me a hug. “Shall I go and tell him that you’re ready?”
I shivered as Merle went out into the hall. I wasn’t sure if it was the draft or the thought of the evening ahead. When she came back, she said that Jack had gone to bring the Alvis round to the front door, and that I should go and wait on the porch.
It wasn’t cold outside. The sky was still light. The sun had beaten down all afternoon, heating the stone walls on either side of the front door. I could feel their warmth through the fabric of my dress as I listened for the crunch of tires on the gravel drive. I’d never heard of an Alvis. The only car I’d traveled in during the past decade was the battered Model T Ford the nuns had used to get to and from the railway station at Elisabethville.
When Jack’s car glided into view, I caught my breath. It was a vision of elegance—a two-door convertible with sky-blue bodywork and a dark blue roof. Chrome spoked wheels matched the winged eagle crest on the engine grille, which glinted as Jack pulled up. He jumped out, smiling. He was wearing the same well-cut suit he’d worn to church on Easter Sunday, but with a different tie, sea green this time, with a heraldic design beneath the knot. I recognized it at once; it was the same device I’d seen on the gate to the walled garden and engraved in the stone arch over the front door—the pelican piercing its breast with its beak, shedding drops of blood: symbol of parental devotion and self-sacrifice. It seemed bitterly ironic in the light of what Jack had told me about Ned.
“Is that a new dress?” He took my arm as I came down the steps.
I felt the blood surge up to my face. “Yes. I . . . it is,” I stuttered. I wanted to tell him that I’d made it, not bought it. I didn’t want him to think that I’d been extravagant, that I’d spent a lot of money for an event that he was only attending because he felt he had to. But suddenly I was tongue-tied.
He opened the door to the passenger seat, holding it as I climbed in. The warm, earthy scent of the leather upholstery enveloped me as I sank into it.
“It shouldn’t take us long to get there,” he said, as the engine purred into life. “You haven’t been to Constantine, have you?”
“I passed through it on the bus, on the way to Falmouth.”
“It’s a sleepy little place—I think the Americans decided to hold this dance to inject a bit of life into it.”
He told me about visiting the camp they’d set up outside the village, the huge consignment of supplies that had arrived at the Falmouth docks to feed the men who had effectively tripled the size of the local population overnight. He described things I’d never heard of: cans of something called Spam, which was cooked pork that would last for years if necessary; a fizzy drink called Coca-Cola, which had a kick like coffee; and Hershey Bars, which I could imagine the Land Girls fighting to get their hands on, because people in Britain hadn’t tasted chocolate for years.