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“I’ll leave my blankets,” said Fran, looking around the room as though trying to memorize it. “I’m sure you can find a use for them.”
“Are you sure you won’t want them in Paris?” asked Emmie, and then realized how silly that sounded. “You’ll be going back to the Quai Voltaire until you sail? At least you’ll be able to get one of the rooms with a bed this time.”
“Yes,” said Fran bleakly. “Small blessings.”
Emmie tried to make it better by bustling around, plumping pillows and rustling blankets. “Would you like to lie down? Can I get you a cold compress?”
“I’ve been bereaved; I haven’t bumped my head. It’s all right, you don’t need to hold my hand. I have—I have some letters I should be writing.”
“Are you sure? I could—” The look on Fran’s face stopped her. It was a look of such uncomprehending misery that Emmie wanted to run to her and hug her, but that was clearly the last thing Fran wanted, so Emmie backed toward the door, saying, “I’ll just go help Maud and Liza with the boxes, shall I? I’ll be in the cellar if you need me. For anything. Anything at all.”
“Thank you,” said Fran distantly.
Through the bare windows, Emmie could see Fran sitting on her bed, not writing, not reading, not doing anything, just sitting. She looked the way Emmie’s schoolchildren did when they fell in the play yard, when they realized they’d been hurt but hadn’t quite started howling yet, that moment of stunned disbelief before the pain set in.
“Mademoiselle!” Emmie gave a guilty start as Marie bore down on her, launching into a detailed scold.
The other girls, they had been asking about their laundry. Did they not know that the laundry was available only on Sunday? Marie couldn’t be expected to do all things. And why hadn’t they finished the pot-au-feu she had made for them last night? Did they not appreciate her cooking? Did they know what it was to cook on a range beneath a canvas roof with such ingredients as she was given?
“I’m so sorry,” said Emmie, when she could get a word in edgewise. Marie had already threatened to quit twice in the ten days since they had arrived; the answer was usually to apologize and offer her more money, but Emmie was feeling too wretched to go through the regular routine. “Miss Englund—her mother just died. Everyone’s terribly upset.”
Marie was instantly in charge of the situation. A consommé, that was what was needed—she would wring the neck of a chicken at once.
“Oh, please don’t,” said Emmie, and immediately realized her mistake. “I’m sure it would be delicious, it’s just that we need the eggs for the children, if they ever do start laying eggs. I do hope they start laying eggs soon. But perhaps some coffee? You do make the best coffee.”
Maybe Fran might even want the coffee. Emmie wasn’t sure what else to do for her.
It was only ten o’clock. It felt terribly strange to be left at Grécourt while the others were out. They had been here ten days now, and, except for the mass, Emmie had spent every day “visiting,” making the rounds of villages with Kate, calling on each local mayor, looking in on families. Most days, they didn’t even make it back for lunch, dining on bread and cheese as the White truck bounced between ruts.
She really should have just gone with Kate. Fran didn’t want her. But it was too late now, so she would just have to make the best of it and try to find something useful to do in between checking in on Fran.
Emmie hurried down to the cellar, where Maud and Liza were bumping boxes around, sorting out goods to put on the truck for the inaugural journey of their traveling store.
“—today?” Liza was asking, her voice muffled by a large pile of linens.
“I don’t know. It depends what they—oh, Emmaline! We didn’t see you there.”
Maud made it sound like an accusation.
Emmie looked around the newly whitewashed room. The poilus had done a thorough job; she couldn’t see where the chicken wire or the rude German inscriptions had once been. “Fran is writing letters, so I thought I’d come and see if I could help you down here.”
“Yes, it’s too terrible about her mother. But at least she gets to go back to Paris. You don’t mind playing porter, do you? We’re just about ready to haul everything up to the truck.”
Emmie carried armloads of pots and kettles up the stairs to the truck, juggling rakes and scrubbing brushes, papers bristling with pins, spools of thread in serviceable blacks and browns, boxes of nails, shovels and trowels in all lengths and sizes, and even a consignment of axes, which Emmie held very, very carefully as she navigated the uneven treads.
“I never thought I’d turn peddler,” said Maud. “Lord, what they’d say at home if they could see us now!”
The truck backfired and finally started. Emmie waved farewell to them, watching as Liza narrowly avoided smashing one of the gates on her way out. She could hear Maud’s protest all the way over the moat.
Overhead, a plane wheezed by, and then another, circling each other, emitting puffs of smoke. Those little cotton-colored clouds looked so innocent until one remembered they were ammunition, meant to bring a plane down and end a man’s life. Another plane joined in, way up in the clouds, puffing away like anything. Forty puffs, like candy floss, and the high, whining sound of the motors overhead.
Dr. Stringfellow stuck her head out of the room where she was in conference with Dr. Rutherford. “Where’s Kate?”
“She went to Courcelles,” said Emmie, surprised that Dr. Stringfellow had forgotten. “Is something wrong?”
The doctor didn’t bother to answer. “When she gets back, send her in to us.”
Dr. Stringfellow’s head disappeared again before Emmie could ask why they wanted Kate. She hoped Kate wasn’t in trouble. She wasn’t sure why Kate would be in trouble. Unless it was something to do with . . .
