Christmastime 1943
A Love Story
Linda Mahkovec
Also by Linda Mahkovec
The Dreams of Youth
Seven Tales of Love
The Garden House
The Christmastime Series
Christmastime 1940: A Love Story
Christmastime 1941: A Love Story
Christmastime 1942: A Love Story
Christmastime 1943: A Love Story
Text copyright © 2015 Linda Mahkovec
All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.
This e-book is a work of fiction. While specific characters in this novel are historical figures and certain events did occur, this is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
Cover Design by Laura Duffy
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ISBN-10: 1-946229-16-4
ISBN-13: 978-1-946229-16-8
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In loving memory of my father –
a small town boy from Illinois who joined
the Army Airforce in 1943
and flew 25 missions over Europe.
Historical note:
In WWII, there were over 425,000 prisoners of war (mostly German) in the United States, with POW camps in all but four states. They were used to help fill the labor shortage, working on farms, and in canneries and factories.
Chapter 1
*
War and Christmas. Soldiers and shoppers. Fear and festivities. Another holiday season on the home front. Lillian pulled her scarf closer around her neck as she gazed out the window of the Monday morning crosstown bus. A soft snow had begun to fall, bringing to life the early Christmas decorations in the store windows and highlighting the rows of Christmas trees that were lately set out. Lillian’s thoughts of war and Charles and the holiday season were interrupted by the sight of a woman walking briskly along the sidewalk. She was dressed in a deep green coat, swinging her arms, full of energy. Izzy.
Lillian got off the bus one stop early and called out to her friend, but Izzy was moving in some happy world of her own. Only when she paused to look at the Christmas decorations in a department store window, was Lillian able to catch up with her.
“Izzy, wait up!”
Izzy spun around. “Morning, Lilly!” She swept her arm towards the store window. “Just look at that – a real Christmas fairyland for the kids.” She thrust her hands into her pockets and looked up and down the avenue. “Don’t you just love this time of year? Everything so festive, everyone so happy.”
Lillian turned away from the miniature Christmas village in the window and raised her eyebrows at Izzy.
“I know. I’m like a kid.” Izzy lifted and dropped her shoulders with excitement. “I can’t help it. It’s going to be a wonderful Christmas! I can just feel it.”
“Okay,” said Lillian, linking her arm with Izzy’s as they headed towards Rockwell Publishing. “What’s changed since last week? I seem to remember you wishing the holidays were over.”
Izzy reached into her handbag, pulled out a letter, and waved it. “This!”
Lillian laughed at her exuberance. “Which one is that?”
Izzy pulled a face of mock offense and pressed the letter to her heart. “The only one I care about. Sergeant Archibald Reynolds. Archie,” she sighed. “He arrives next week for a two-week furlough.”
“Well that explains everything. Is that Handsome Kansas?”
“Handsome Kansas? Heavens, no! Kansas got married in June. And he really wasn’t all that handsome. It was just that line about bringing me a sodie pop that initially charmed me. No,” she sighed again, “Archie is the one from Yonkers. Really, Lilly, he’s perfect. Funny, charming, handsome – and madly in love with me.”
When they arrived at the office building, Izzy pushed through the revolving door, cutting Lillian off mid-sentence. “Sounds more serious than – ”
“Than the others?” laughed Izzy, brushing the snow from her coat.
“No, I was going to say more serious than I realized.”
“Morning!” Izzy said, passing some of her colleagues. “Good morning!”
This was definitely not Izzy’s usual Monday morning demeanor.
They walked through the crowded lobby and waited for the elevator.
“I know it’s hard to believe, but I’ve gotten to know him so much better over the past several months. Sure, it started with the whirlwind romance in the spring, but it’s the letters that’s really brought us closer.” She gazed off blinking sweetly at the ceiling. “He has a real way of expressing himself.”
“I’m happy for you, Izzy,” Lillian said, delighted to find that, after two years, Izzy had finally moved past her heartbreak with Red and was able to love again.
Izzy held up a warning finger. “And no excuses about you being too busy to go out. I’ll drag you out if I have to. I want you to meet him. Oh, I don’t know how I’m going to get through another week.” Izzy caught Lillian’s fleeting look of concern and squeezed her arm. “Still no word?”
Lillian shook her head. “It’s been over two months now.”
“Well, it can take a while. I’m sure you’ll get a letter soon.” But her words did nothing to dispel the sadness in Lillian’s face. “Look, Lilly, I know how hard it’s been for you. Barely married last year before Charles was whisked away. And you’ve been apart for most of this year. That’s rough. And I can just imagine how upset Tommy and Gabriel are. But things will look up soon.”
They stepped into the elevator, and Izzy turned to her. “Hey, have you thought more about going to your sister’s for Christmas? You should be around family this time of year. And I bet the orchard is beautiful in the snow.”
Lillian envisioned the rows of bare fruit trees, the cider house where the kids liked to play, the coziness of her sister’s home, and nodded. “It would be good for the boys. Everything with them is war and tanks and guns. Tommy got into another fisticuff over the weekend. Gabriel’s grades are slipping and he seems distracted all the time. I think some time in the country is just what they need.” Lillian’s expression changed to one of doubt as she pondered the trip. “I’m still undecided. Charles’s last letter said that he wouldn’t be home anytime soon, but I don’t want to take the risk of missing him. Or his letters.”
“Well, Christmas is still weeks away. You have some time to decide. I’m sure you’ll hear from him before long.”
The elevator doors opened to the main floor of Rockwell Publishing, and Izzy stepped out. She tapped under her chin in an exaggerated “chin up” gesture.
Lillian playfully raised her chin and nodded – but her smile faded as soon as the doors closed. In her heart she knew that Charles would not be home for Christmas. He was sure of it in his last letter. So many furloughs were being cancelled – fighting was fierce and relentless.
As the elevator continued to the higher floors, she tried to focus on the victories, the signs that the tide of war was changing. The Allies had defeated Rommel in North Africa, had taken Sicily, and were now pushing
up into Italy. And in the Pacific, they were taking back the islands that the Japanese had so ruthlessly seized.
Yet the fate of the world was still unknown. Everyone knew that the heaviest fighting still lay ahead. And despite victories, the losses were staggering. They were fighting an enemy that seemed to have no heart or soul – cruel, aggressive forces that would stop at nothing.
Though she knew it was unreasonable, she derived some comfort in knowing that Charles was somewhere in Europe. It was a matter she frequently debated – which theater of war she preferred Charles to be in. Today it was Europe. It was closer, and she was better able to imagine him there, across the ocean where she could get to him more quickly if she had to – though she knew how unlikely that was.
But then she changed her mind when she thought of him in the freezing cold. Though she couldn’t be sure, she believed that he was still in the turbulent, frigid waters of the North Atlantic. Every time she thought of him on an icy deck or in an arctic gale, a chill shot through her. She fantasized about having one night with him so that she could keep him warm, cook him a proper meal, fix him a hot bath, and make sure that he had a deep, peaceful sleep with her arms around him in protection. She had spent many nights wrapped in such visions. She worried constantly about the toll the war was taking on him, and she lived in fear of the U-boats, of planes bombing his ship –
She pushed those thoughts away. The best way to keep fear at bay, she had learned, was to keep busy, to do her part for the war effort. She didn’t mind that her hours at the publishing house had been extended. More often than not, she worked through her lunch break, and took assignments home. Every now and then, she went to the office on Saturdays to complete an illustration in time for publication. She had a hard time working fast enough to keep up with the various projects, and Rockwell was demanding. But she never minded. The war-themed illustrations, largely calls to action, were a way of bringing her closer to Charles.
Lillian got off the elevator on her floor and entered the Art Department. She hung up her hat and coat, and took a deep breath to settle into another workweek. Scattered on her desk were sketches for a series of posters she was working on – women in the workforce. With most of the men gone or in training, work shortages were severe and it was crucial that women fill the gaps. She had just read that twenty percent of the workforce was now enlisted, which meant that millions were needed to replace them. Millions!
She had already submitted drawings of women working directly in war production jobs, such as welders and riveters in the shipyards and factories. Other drawings portrayed women delivering mail, pumping gas, and driving taxis, buses, and trolley cars. A recent poster depicted several older women running day care centers so that the young mothers could step into jobs that had recently been vacated by men. The only way to win this war was to keep production at the break-neck pace that President Roosevelt had established; he had made it clear that the enemy must be “out-fought and out-produced.”
Lillian shuffled the drawings around on her desk. The theme of the next poster series was women and farm production. She glanced over at her drawings from last week of women driving combines and pickup trucks, harvesting hay, and plowing fields.
She studied one drawing of a pretty, young woman in overalls driving a tractor and holding up the two-fingered victory sign in greeting to the army trucks passing by. The young woman had a cheerful, energetic ease about her – though Lillian knew that the reality was much bleaker for most farmwomen.
But reality was not what Mr. Rockwell, or the War Department, had asked for. They wanted optimism, hope, even glamor. Women must be compelled to join the workforce, and what better way than to make the idea attractive? So the women in the posters had to be pretty, with good figures, and an expression of spunky determination in their eyes. The drudgery of work was dispelled by a touch of lipstick, or one of the war-time hairstyles championed by the Hollywood stars, or anything that added charm and allure. Charm on the farm, Lillian thought, lightly tapping her pencil.
She set the drawings aside and looked out the window, her habit when envisioning a new composition. The snow was falling more heavily now, softening the gray of the buildings outside. Her mind filled with thoughts of Charles’s sister, Kate, in Illinois – practically alone on her farm, along with her two teenaged daughters. Her husband had died years before, and now all four of her sons were gone. Francis – sweet Francis – had been killed in Tunisia in the spring, and the fate of her eldest son, Eugene, was precarious, flying mission after mission over Europe. James was in the Navy and on his way to the Pacific. And now the youngest, Paul, had joined the Army, against his mother’s wishes. Although it was allowed for one son, often the youngest, to stay and work the farm, Paul had enlisted shortly after Francis’s death, lying about his age to be accepted.
Kate’s last letter was full of hope and determination, but Lillian knew that it belied despair. Francis’s death had come as a devastating blow to the family. Ursula, the elder daughter, was taking it especially hard. Francis and Ursula had been close in age and had always looked out for one another. Jessica, the younger daughter, was closer to Paul. Now, with Paul gone, it was just Kate and the girls – and Ed, the old farmhand. Kate wrote that they would manage somehow, like everyone else.
Lillian’s mouth softened into a sad smile as she remembered the trip to Kate’s the summer before the war. All of Kate’s sons were fine young men – hard-working, good-natured, handsome – and Lillian admired them all. A bittersweet sorrow filled her at the memory of Francis. There was something special about him. He was quiet, gentle, and always at hand when anyone needed help. She had a particularly fond memory of one dewy early morning when he helped her cut bunches of lavender before the bumblebees became active. As they filled a basket with the fragrant flowers, he told her about his dreams of going to college to study agriculture, and how he hoped to marry his girl, Maria, and buy a farm of his own. Lillian closed her eyes, and wondered how Kate could bear the loss.
Everyone had been touched by the war, knew of someone who had been killed – if not a son or husband, then a cousin, a brother-in-law, the boy down the street. The euphoria of the early days, when morale and determination ran high, had been replaced by gritty determination. The wounded were returning in greater numbers, and the list of those killed was ever growing. More and more men were leaving, and more women were filling jobs on the home front. Food and fuel were rationed, and housing was scarce. There was less of everything. Except loneliness – that seemed to increase as the months wore on. Lillian hadn’t seen Charles since early summer when he was home for one brief week.
Realizing that she was slipping into self-pity, Lillian caught herself and sat straighter. She thought of Izzy’s parting gesture and raised her chin. I’ll get through this. We’ll all get through this.
The Monday morning department meeting ran over by an hour, and Lillian found herself taking on yet more assignments; she would have to learn to work faster. As she returned to her desk, she heard a tapping sound in the hallway and wondered what new information was being posted.
Several of her co-workers went to see, their conversation floating back to her while she continued working on the sketch of the girl on a tractor. Lillian studied it and realized that she had largely based the girl on Jessica, the younger of Kate’s daughters – blonde, cheerful, wholesome. Lillian had first tried the sketch based on Ursula, but the look was all wrong.
Again, Lillian gazed out the window, tapping the pencil against her cheek. Both of Kate’s daughters were extremely pretty – but Ursula had that elusive quality of beauty. Though her features were striking, Lillian felt that her beauty had more to do with her expressions, her soft way of speaking, her behavior – she was both pensive and brisk – as if her mind pulled her in one direction, and her body in another. No, thought Lillian, Ursula was more difficult to imagine on a tractor than Jessica, even though Kate wrote that Ursula had really taken up the slack at the farm as one by one her
brothers had left. It was easier to imagine Ursula as some kind of mythic heroine – Diana the huntress, perhaps, or a winged victory figure.
Lillian thought of Ursula as she was two years ago – setting out on one of her restless walks across the fields or along the country road, or tucked away poring over a book. Her heart was set on going to college, and that was the life that would best suit her. She was intelligent, curious, strong willed. Kate had sent a photo in the summer, and Ursula was prettier than ever. Lillian began a sketch of such a girl – tall and slim, with wavy dark hair, and those exquisitely lovely eyes – deep blue, beneath eyebrows like angry wings, smooth and beautiful. An air of intensity surrounded her, as if a quiet fire burned within.
As the drawing took shape, Lillian frowned at the goddess in overalls. She tried adding a straw hat, and then scratched it out. It just didn’t work. No – to capture that wholesome Midwestern spirit of hard work and determination, she would need to go with Jessica. Perhaps she could use Ursula for another –
“Lilly! Come take a look at this.”
She saw Izzy poking her head around the corner, waving her over.
As office manager of Rockwell Publishing, Izzy was in charge of the distribution of information regarding contests, drives, and volunteer opportunities. When Lillian stepped out to the hall, she found Izzy smoothing down a poster on the wall. An older man, who did double duty as mail deliverer and handyman, eyed the tacks on the poster and then gave them all a final tap.
“Take a look. What do you think?” asked Izzy
Lillian stood behind a few colleagues in front of the poster and read: “Artists for Victory.”
“Right up your line,” said Izzy.
“Another contest?” Lillian asked, remembering her disappointment at last year’s government sponsored contest in which she hadn’t even placed.
Christmastime 1943 Page 1