Kissed a Sad Goodbye

breakfast in which the rashers of bacon seemed endless, John had taken him back to the stables and allowed him to help polish the autos. This Lewis had done with reverence, rubbing at the merest smudge on the Bentley until its black paint shone like glass. For the rest of his life he would associate the scent of automobile wax with comfort; for those industrious hours spent with John, listening to his stories and receiving the occasional word of praise, held homesickness at bay as nothing else could.
    In the afternoon, John officially introduced him to the horses, showing him how to fill their water troughs and mangers and how to sweep the soiled straw from their stalls, and promising that when Lewis felt a bit more comfortable, he would teach him how to use the curry comb and brush.
    There was no further sign of the elegant 'William Hammond, and by the time Lewis fell into bed after supper, he had almost forgotten about him.
    Sunday, September 3rd, dawned clear and mild. Lewis woke to a chorus of birdsong floating in through his open window. Not liking to think what his mother would have said about his consorting with Methodists, he’d refused John’s invitation to attend chapel, and so found himself at a loose end after breakfast.
    Cook, seeing a pair of idle hands, set him to work at the kitchen table peeling carrots and potatoes for Sunday dinner.
    It was there, in the warm steaminess of the kitchen at eleven o’clock in the morning, that he heard Prime Minister Chamberlain announce over the wireless that Britain had declared war on Germany.
    Cook sat down, fanning herself and clucking with dismay. “Oh, Lord, who’d have thought it, after the last one? All the young men will go—such a terrible waste.” She shook her head. “I lost both my brothers in the Great War. Just boys they were, too young to die in the trenches.”
    At the sight of Lewis’s face, she reached out and pressed her damp, red hand against his. “Oh, dearie, I am sorry. You told me you had brothers, didn’t you?”
    Lewis nodded, but the constriction in his throat kept him from speaking. What he hadn’t told her was that his brothers meant to sign up the very second that war was declared, and had sworn him to secrecy. His mum would be inconsolable when she found out what they’d done.
    “Well, mayhap it’s a tempest in a teapot, and nothing will come of it,” Cook said comfortingly. “And speaking of tea, I think a nice cuppa would brighten us up a bit,” she added, heaving herself to her feet. Watching her ample backside as she bustled about the cooker with kettle and teapot, Lewis tried to come to terms with the fact of war. In spite of the weeks of preparing for the blackout, the talk of shelters, the antiaircraft balloons that floated above London like escapees from a child giant’s birthday party, he hadn’t really believed in it. He hadn’t thought his evacuation would mean more than a week or two away in the country, and now it looked as though he was here to stay.
    The door to the hall swung open and William Hammond came in. He was dressed as he had been yesterday, in school blazer and tie, but his hair had sprung up from its neat combing as if unable to contain itself. “I say, have you heard? Isn’t it tremendously exciting?”
    Cook turned from the kettle with an admonishing shake of her head. “You don’t know what you’re saying, Master William. If your mother heard you —”
    “Mummy’s had hysterics all over the parlor. Father’s administered the smelling salts and sent her upstairs for a lie-down,” William volunteered. “And Aunt Edwina wants to see everyone in half an hour, in the drawing room. I think she’s going to make a speech. I’m to tell all the staff.” With that, William charged out as energetically as he had entered, and Lewis was left to wait with Cook.
    They gathered in the kitchen—John Pebbles and his wife, Mary, a delicate woman with soft brown hair; Kitty, the parlormaid, a girl not much older than Lewis; Owens, the Welsh butler with the singsong voice; Lewis; and Cook. As they waited, they muttered and exclaimed among themselves, yet when the bell summoned them they trooped to the front of the house in silence.
    Lewis found himself last as they entered the drawing room, but that gave him a moment to take in his surroundings. After the smokey dimness of the kitchen and the polished, dark woodwork of the hall and staircase, the white-plastered room seemed garden-bright. A