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“No, just the one,” said Liza cheerfully, “but you know how these things are. Nothing for weeks and weeks and then you get fifteen all at once.”

“Yes, that must be what it is,” said Alice Patton, turning away from the pile, which contained nothing for her.

“Time to work, ladies!” Mrs. Rutherford crumpled the telegram and let it drop to the table. “We cannot rest on our laurels! This is a war zone. Time is of the essence. Miss Moran, Miss Van Alden—Courcelles. Miss Patton, Miss Mills, Dr. Pruyn—the dispensary, then take the jitney for visits. Miss Englund, Miss Cooper—the wheel has come off the White again. Miss Baldwin, Miss Dawlish, Miss Ledbetter—sewing and carpentry classes for the children of the nearer villages.”

“What about us?” Maud asked. She was looking at Mrs. Rutherford and the crumpled telegram in a way Kate didn’t quite like. Cat and canary, Fran had called it yesterday, and she wasn’t wrong. If Maud had had whiskers, she would be licking them.

Mrs. Rutherford looked at Maud, her face seeming suddenly older. “Miss Randolph and Miss Shaw—load the Ford truck for the traveling store. Ava, if you could come with me for a moment?”

“Certainly,” said Dr. Stringfellow, casting a quick, concerned glance at her old roommate.

“Onward!” said Mrs. Rutherford brightly, clapping her hands together, and whisked out of the room with more speed than grace.

Dr. Stringfellow followed Mrs. Rutherford through the connecting door from the dining room into their office, which was also their bedroom, and shut the door firmly behind her, leaving the rest of the Unit in the dining room, staring after them.

“I wonder what that was all about,” murmured Kate to Fran, but Fran didn’t answer. She was holding her telegram, her face frozen in an expression of disbelief. “Fran? Are you all right?”

Fran lifted her head, her eyes glazed. “It’s my mother. She’s dead.”

Chapter Twelve

I don’t dare say much about the war. Somehow, the actual horror never got hold of me while I was at home, but here there is no escaping it. I can no longer think in terms of flags and parades and patriotism and glory. I just see mutilated bodies, destroyed homes, and wretchedness.

—Miss Alice Patton, ’10, to her sister, Mrs. Gilbert Thomas

September 1917

Grécourt, France

“Dead?” repeated Alice, horrified.

Fran turned the telegram around so they could all see the stark block capitals.

MOTHER DEAD TUESDAY STOP RETURN HOME SOONEST STOP AUNT M.

“That’s . . . blunt,” said Kate.

Fran gave a choked laugh. It was a horrible sound. “Auntie Mill won’t have wanted to spend the extra money to say passed away.”

Marie stuck her head around the doorframe. “There are children in the Orangerie,” she said, much as she might have said mice. “Many children.”

“Oh dear,” said Anne Dawlish. “That’s my carpentry class. Fran—”

Fran gave a terse nod. “The children are waiting. Go.”

Miss Baldwin followed, giving Fran’s hand a quick squeeze along the way.

Miss Ledbetter paused in the doorway. “When the old lords passed away, their bodies would lie in state in the castle chapel, all their loyal retainers passing by to pay homage—”

Kate looked at her incredulously.

“The children are waiting, Miss Ledbetter.” Anne Dawlish grabbed the older woman by the arm and tugged her away before she could start singing entirely apocryphal medieval funeral songs.

“I think that’s her way of showing sympathy,” murmured Emmie.

“We have a cook and a scullery maid,” said Fran unsteadily. “I don’t think they’ll be kneeling by my mother’s corpse with candles. Corpse. Mother. I can’t believe— She’s been poorly for so long—we thought her illness was . . . a sort of hobby.”

Kate and Emmie exchanged alarmed looks.