by Jane Peart
Of course, Bryanne and her nice husband, Steven Colby, came to visit. However, he was completing his studies at Oxford, and Bryanne was pursuing an artistic career as a sculptor, gaining some recognition with her children’s figures. So their visits were not all that frequent. Bryanne did phone once a week, and it was always good to hear her sweet voice and her news.
Garnet sighed again. Maybe these bouts of nostalgia were common as one grew older. She considered herself very fortunate. She had her health, thank God, and life went on in spite of loss, suffering, pain. She had at long last come to accept that, take what joy she could find. She had to—nothing was going to change. All she could hope for was to live out the remainder of her life in comparative contentment.
Still, a person had to know what was going on. Garnet settled down in her favorite armchair. On the table beside it was a small radio. In a few minutes she would turn it on for the BBC’s six o’clock news. The reports had been bad lately, yet she felt obligated to listen. Surely the European countries would not repeat their mistakes. But one never knew what that madman in Germany and his equally awful colleague in Italy might do next to upset the balance of the world’s peace.
In spite of herself, Garnet shuddered. How often had Jeremy halted her trivial worries—not that this was trivial—to say, “Learn to live in the present moment, darling. That is, after all, all that any of us have.”
She turned on the radio, adjusted the dial, prepared to listen to the regular commentator. At first she thought she must not be hearing correctly. She had been having trouble with her hearing lately. She twisted the knob to increase the volume as the well-modulated, perfectly calm voice said, “The prime minister’s office has officially announced that Great Britain and France have declared war on Germany.”
Shakily, Garnet reached for the folded evening paper beside her chair, as if to confirm the truth of the announcement. Her glance moved rapidly over the page, from the banner headline to the detailed article outlining the steps that had led the country to this inevitable fate. Hitler had invaded Poland, in direct opposition to his signed nonaggression pact with England.
Garnet began to shiver. She had known war firsthand. In America as a young girl, it was the War between the States. Less than twenty-five years ago it was the Great War, the one that was to end all wars. It couldn’t be happening again!
“I’m too old for this too!” she said aloud, throwing aside the newspaper. She declared, clenching her jeweled hands, “I can’t go through it again. It will kill me!”
From the hall she could hear the telephone ringing. Marsden, her elderly butler, would get it. She heard the low murmur of his voice, and then he entered the room. “It’s Miss Bryanne, madam.”
Bryanne, of course. By now she would have heard the news, too. And Steven! With a clutching sensation in her heart, Garnet thought, Steven will have to go. Steven—thoughtful, intelligent, with his low-key sense of humor and his supportive love for her granddaughter—would surely have to sign up for one of the services. What a waste. Leaning heavily on her cane, feeling suddenly quite stiff, Garnet made her way out to the hall phone.
She talked for several minutes with Bryanne.
“Well, my dear, if or when Steven has to go, you must come here, be with me,” Garnet said.
They spoke another few minutes. Then, before she hung up, Bryanne promised to let her grandmother know what they would do.
Garnet felt somewhat comforted after the conversation. England at war with Germany for the second time in her life. Would America eventually be drawn in, like last time?
What could she do at her age? In 1916 she had turned Birchfields into a convalescent home. This war, too, would have its casualties. Could she do it again? Of course, she would need help. She couldn’t manage it all on her own, as she had then. But if Bryanne came here, perhaps…
Where had she put her old scrapbooks, her photo albums, her account books, the detailed daily record of the time when Birchfields had been a haven for ambulatory patients? She got up, went over to the window again. In a few months the garden would be budding with lovely blossoms, perfuming the air. Yes, it really could happen. Even in a darkening world, Birchfields could again become a healing place, full of hope, promise.
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