Letters from Skye

by Jessica Brockmole

  Walking the island here, I remembered that poem. I stand up on the hills, looking out over the sea, and shout all of the lines into the wind. It whips my dress through my legs, sprays my bare arms, puts the taste of salt on my lips. And I know what that poem means.

  Because, as much as the wind batters you up on the hills, as much as it demands to be noticed, the moment you climb back down, it begins to fade. And it’s no less intense down below, to be sure. The gulls fight it; the grasses blow flat. It’s there, but, after a while, it drifts from your mind. It’s a given, a constant, an expectation. You don’t think about it being there until one day, suddenly, it rushes right over you, fills your mouth and your ears and your soul and you remember what it’s like to breathe. You’ve been breathing every day but, in that instant, feel completely alive.

  From the day you came into my kitchen with that basket of cabbages, you’ve been there. Always with me, like the wind. But that first time I found a letter from you in the post, my heart leapt as it never had before. You rushed right over me and I knew I was in love.

  I wish you were here with me to feel the wind. It’s poetry in itself.

  Love,

  Maisie

  London, England

  28 August 1940

  Dear Sir or Madam,

  Many years ago, a young man named David Graham was a student at the University of Illinois. He graduated in 1913, with a degree in natural sciences. I don’t know if he is active in the University of Illinois Alumni Association, but I understand that you often hear news from alumni and maintain a record of their whereabouts since leaving the university.

  If you have any information on David Graham, can you please contact me? You can write to me at the Langham Hotel, London. I thank you in advance.

  Sincerely,

  Mrs. Elspeth Dunn

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Elspeth

  Somewhere between Edinburgh and London

  September 22, 1916

  Oh, Sue!

  It was so hard to get back on the train this time. Not that parting was ever easy before, but it is especially hard now that I know what it is to be separated from you. The last time we parted and I got on that train, heading for a boat to take me across the channel, my mind was so full of you but at the same time so full of anticipation and uncertainty. This time, I am sitting and gazing out at the English countryside blurring by the window and all I can think about is that every hedgerow and neat green field we pass is one more hedgerow and green field between us.

  I’m going to mail this before leaving England, so I can write a bit more freely than I can under the watchful eyes of the censors. I couldn’t tell you face-to-face, but I’m becoming a bit tired of it all. The last poste we were at, out of Château Billemont, was so utterly consuming and utterly exhausting, but at least I felt like I was involved in the war, more so than I have at some of the other postes. We always seem to be either on the move or en repos.

  We hear the shells, sometimes see them when they fall on the roads, but that’s as close as we get to the action. We live vicariously through the stories we hear from the blessés. Sometimes I feel as if we’re hanging around outside the cinema, trying to piece together the flicker from the bits and pieces we overhear as the patrons come out of the theater.

  That time I ran up the ridge to help that wounded brancardier, in full view of the Boches and their guns, the familiar prickles of danger and excitement grabbed me. I felt so alive. It was as if I were scrambling up the wall with those squirrels again. To be doing something instead of just waiting back and watching others do it. I tell you, it was so hard to go back to my usual work after getting out of the hospital.

  Do you understand why I couldn’t tell this all to you, Sue? You would’ve wrapped those surprisingly strong arms of yours around me and not let go. Not that I would’ve minded too terribly being held captive by such a jailer, but, like I told you, I need to finish out my year. I have to accomplish something in my life. If I can’t stick it out for a whole year, then what can I stick out? You don’t want a man who can’t finish anything.

  Speaking of the future, I can’t believe you got an apartment in Edinburgh! Only for the week, but still. You knew what it would mean to me. For a guy who’s been living out of an ambulance, to walk up and see those curtains at the windows, it was just like coming home.

  I’m still tired, but I’d much rather be tired from an excess of lovemaking than from an excess of work. I didn’t want to waste a moment of my time with you on sleeping. That’s what the train journey back to London is for.

  Despite my tiredness, I do feel like a new man. Clean, well fed, clothes washed and mended, warm new greatcoat. Body and spirit sated. You laughed at me, but I had to save up my “satiations”! I’ve gone so long without that I wanted to put in extra stock, the memories to be pulled out and savored as needed.

  Even that one incident couldn’t spoil things for me. I know you were upset, Sue, but you did nothing wrong. He shouldn’t have said the things he did, but I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by them. I hope you’ve gotten past it.

  On that note, I think I’ll end for now so I can close my eyes and pull out one of those aforementioned memories. What do you think—the one in the bathtub?

  David

  Somewhere between Edinburgh and Skye

  22 September 1916

  Davey,

  I hate this! I hate having nothing but these snatched days with you! It is so hard to lose myself completely in them, because I can hear the ticktock down to your departure, like that blasted alarm clock in our Paris hotel.

  And to have part of our precious holiday ruined by my brother. Oh, he makes me furious! He’s not been right since his discharge anyhow, but then add his problems with Kate and with Iain’s death. None of it is my fault, yet he heaped it all on me. I’m telling myself that he didn’t mean what he said, that they were words spoken only in anger, that I’ll get home and we’ll go walking on the shingle together to look for stones, the way we always did. But the way he spat at my feet, as if I were nothing, the way he looked when he walked away. I fear something broke in that instant, and I have no idea how to hold it together.

  Not that I’m very good at mending broken things. But you, at least, I can do something about.

  Davey, if only you knew what good you were doing, even far back from the front lines. How you’ve sacrificed so much time with me just to be there. If you knew the importance of your work, the way that you matter, you wouldn’t worry that you should be doing more. You wouldn’t envy those in No Man’s Land.

  You don’t know how glad I am that you are far from the danger. You don’t know how glad I am to keep you safe and whole for another trip to Edinburgh. That first night, after you arrived, I lay awake next to you for the longest time, just watching. Your eyelashes fluttering, your inhales and exhales. I rested my fingers right on your bare chest, simply to feel your heartbeat and know that you were there. And, Davey, how I thanked God right then and there for bringing you back to me. I couldn’t bear to lose you too.

  I could already see these doubts in you, in the way you brushed off what was going on in your section, in the way you shrugged when I said how lucky we were to be here together. And that’s why Finlay made me so angry, to stir up your doubts that way, to make you feel you were doing wrong by being here, with me.

  Because, Davey, there’s no more important place for you to be. You’re my breath, my light, the one my heart flies towards. You said you worried you’d take away from what I had with Iain. That you didn’t want to compete with a memory. That you didn’t want to be less of a man than he was. But, Davey, he’s gone. And I’m not back in my cottage, missing him. All week I’ve been right there. With you.

  Sue

  21 Rue Raynouard, Paris, France

  September 25, 1916

  Sue,

  Got back here to Paris and who do you suppose I found? Pliny, Harry, Riggles, Wart, and a few more of the guys all camped ou
t at the headquarters here at Rue Raynouard. They came up the line only yesterday.

  Just when I thought things were getting to be boring around here, opportunity presents itself. The French have asked for a section to go up to————near————. From what they tell us, it has been a bit of a hike for the brancardiers to maneuver the blessés by hand back to the poste de secour. Since the Boches took the nearby hill, the road to the poste is exposed and under fire. They want a fleet of fast ambulances to speed almost right up to the line and back. This route will go closer to the frontline trenches than any of the other routes. And it will have to be done at night.

  Instead of sending Section One up there, they created a whole new section, with good ol’ Pliny promoted to command. They’re sending him some new recruits to fill the ranks, but Pliny is quite obstinate in insisting on the fastest, most foolhardy veterans he can find. They gave him leave to pick a handful of guys from Section One, and the rest will be assigned either from the other sections or from new recruits coming in. We’ve all heard stories and know what a tough sector it will be to work. You have to be fast and nimble.

  Since yours truly is both fast and nimble (and, I suppose, foolhardy), Pliny asked me to transfer over to his section. Can you believe it, Sue? Not only does it sound like just the ticket for what’s been ailing me, but Harry and all of my old pals will be there. I think it will be bully!

  The French must be planning a big push, as they want ambulances in place by a week from last year. We’re waiting for the rest of the section to arrive and for our brand-new Lizzies to be delivered. For now we’re resting up.

  More later!

  David

  21 Rue Raynouard, Paris, France

  September 27, 1916

  Dear Sue,

  Just got your letter here, the one you wrote on the train. Don’t worry about your brother—it’s not like I haven’t had a shiner before. He was only being protective. You are his only sister, after all. I understand. What brother wouldn’t fly off the handle to see his sister with an American? You forget, we’re all outlaws and cowboys. I hope you got things sorted with him when you got back up to Skye. And you will. Siblings cannot stay angry forever. Especially not Finlay and you.

  And, Sue, though I was disillusioned, trust that it wasn’t with you. Never in a million years. True, I was fed up with the Field Service and my inactivity behind the lines. And, true, things felt different on this trip, what with Iain being gone and all. So many of your recent letters have been about him. Understandably so. But it’s funny, isn’t it, that on this trip I felt him more between us than before.

  Believe me, those disillusions vanished the moment I lay my head on your lap. I told you that seeing your name outside the apartment felt like coming home. And, Sue, that’s enough for me. To know that I’m doing something worthwhile here and that you’re waiting for me in Scotland. That’s all I need.

  Well, after all of that worry about the new recruits, we’ve been sent the best of the bunch. Among others, we have Rex Redman, the stunt cyclist. Leo Nickles, a crackerjack pilot who was with the Escadrille. My personal favorite, Roy Jansson, race-car driver. I actually saw him race at Speedway Park in Chicago. Can you believe he got up to a speed of 100 miles per hour?

  The men from the other sections have begun to trickle in. Anyone who has made a name for himself in his section has been recommended for what is already unofficially known as “Plinston’s Boys.” They’ve promised us one hot sector after another.

  We should be moving out of here tomorrow or the next day, so I’m not sure when I’ll be able to write again. Harry has a stack of letters for Minna, and I’ll try to slip my own envelope on the bottom of the stack.

  David

  October 4, 1916

  Oh, Sue,

  This is what I was born to do! You can’t imagine the exhilaration. Yes, I’m working harder than I’ve ever worked before and I am dog-tired at the end of the day, and, yes, I realize that my job is just duck soup compared to what those boys out in No Man’s Land are working at, but this is what I needed.

  We work runs to only two poste de secours, both accessible by a single road, a road as straight as a yardstick and nearly as narrow. We have hardly any cover, and the Boches have recently taken a position that gives them a perfect shot of anyone who happens to be caught on that road. The stretchers used to be taken back along this road by hand, but the Boches had to pick off a fair number of brancardiers before the French finally got the message.

  When we get a call and start heading for the postes, a certain spot by a derelict barn marks the unofficial boundary between the shelled zone and the safe. As we approach that barn, there’s an instant where we toss any fears out the window and open the flivver up as much as she will go.

  We can’t think as we drive down this Corridor of Death, we can’t concentrate, we can’t reason. We just look at the brown ridge of the rear trench that marks the end of the corridor and forget all else. It takes only twenty-six seconds to drive this road, but it feels like twenty-six minutes, so we’ve taken to counting it aloud. Yesterday I made it in twenty-five.

  Oh, God, I don’t know how Riggles could be content with selling autos after this is all over with. I don’t know how Harry can be content teaching whining undergraduates. I don’t know how any of us can be content with doing anything that doesn’t make us feel invincible.

  David

  Isle of Skye

  4 October 1916

  Davey,

  My brother is gone.

  When he walked away from me in Edinburgh, he walked away from the whole family. He didn’t even send Màthair a telegram to say goodbye. She hasn’t come out of her bed in days.

  The way he’s always kept an eye on the horizon, I think we all half-expected this would come, especially after his discharge. Deep in my heart, I’ve always thought he’d leave one day. Màthair said he only ever stayed on Skye because of me, that when he saw, growing up, that I would never set foot on that ferry, he tucked away his wishes and let Da take him out on the fishing boat. If I couldn’t leave, he wouldn’t either.

  But now he did! Without a backwards glance, he sailed away. I should be glad he escaped the fishing and crofting life he never looked for, but I can’t help but cry. After all this time, he did it without me. Worse, he did it to spite me.

  I wrote Finlay a letter, even though I have nowhere to send it. I told him I was sorry but that he was wrong, that “my American,” as he put it, had made me a promise. My American isn’t going to forget about me up here on my island. He isn’t going to sail back to America without a backwards glance. “Here I am,” he said to me once. And he is. He’s there, no matter what happens. And, in another month, his contract will be finished, and he’ll come up here and sweep me away.

  You promised me Christmas, Davey. I know you won’t walk away like my brother. Please.

  Sue

  France

  October 18, 1916

  Sue,

  I hate having to say this, but I don’t know if I’ll be home by Christmas. I know you’ve probably thrown this letter across the room already, but once you pick it back up, hear me out.

  I wasn’t happy back when I told you I would renew only until December. The glamor of this all, the excitement I’d felt last fall when I volunteered, had started to fade. I wasn’t doing much but sitting around behind the lines waiting for the next sector. I wanted nothing more than to go on permanent repos with you.

  But now, with the new section, I feel so alive. You wouldn’t believe how much. Sue, for the first time, I matter.

  Remember, I couldn’t cut it as a student. I couldn’t cut it as a teacher. Hell, I couldn’t even cut it as a son. My dad still thinks I’m a disappointment. But now, using the bravado that did nothing but get me in trouble as a kid, I’m succeeding. Guys who otherwise wouldn’t make it now do. And all in the back of my flivver. Mine.

  So, you see, I can’t leave now. Not when I’ve really begun. Can’t you see th
at, Sue? Would you pull me away from all this just when I’m needed most?

  David

  Isle of Skye

  1 November 1916

  “Would you pull me away from all this just when I’m needed most?” Yes, yes, I would, especially when you’re needed even more here. Davey, I’m pregnant. So stop all of this nonsense and come home.

  France

  November 12, 1916

  This is how you tell a fellow news like this? This wasn’t supposed to happen. That’s why I brought the French letters. We’re not in a position to make a decision like this. A family, Sue? You’re still mourning, I’m still “playing war.” We’re seven hundred miles apart. And look at how your brother acted in Edinburgh. I deserved each blow. After all, I’m the American who came between you and your husband. I’m the one who caused the rift with your brother. Why would your family welcome me after that?

  Isle of Skye

  29 November 1916

  Then come and take me away from here! Whisk me away to America, where there is no war or disapproving brothers. The neighbours are already starting to whisper and, oh Davey, I just want to go away with you and start on that future we keep talking about.

  Yes, this is enormous. It’s overwhelming. It’s even a bit scary. But how can the thought of impending fatherhood be scarier than speeding down the “Corridor of Death” every day?

  It terrifies me too. The way I’ve already torn my own family in two, I’m not fit to raise a child. Maybe I was right all those years ago when I said I shouldn’t be a mother. I don’t think I can do this.