Hearts AND HURTS
The English House, Belgium. Spring 1917 Some days, when the cafe was closed, Alice could relax and not worry about soldiers going off to the Front, perhaps never to return. Other days, she couldn’t stop worrying about them. Occasionally, she worried about the war. It appeared the British Army was drafting in anyone who could point a gun and shoot, no matter how young or old.
Only today, she’d chatted with a soldier who looked about 40 and was a butcher. He’d fought in the last war, against the Boers, never thinking he’d be made to fight in another. Yet there he was, in the cafe, eating a penny bun, drinking a cup of tea, awaiting orders.
If Alice had been pressed, she’d have admitted she didn’t stop worrying about one soldier in particular. A soldier by the name of Private Thomas Williams. Six months had passed since he had been lying in the Army hospital, waiting to be shipped back to England.
An injury to his arm had been made worse in a fight, which Alice still felt had been her fault. Thomas wouldn’t accept that, wouldn’t have anything bad said about the man whose nose he punched, either, except that he hadn’t behaved properly towards Alice. Not gentlemanlike. Not how a captain should behave.
He wouldn’t have anything bad said about the man whose nose he punched
Captain Saunders had helped Alice, her uncle and Max, a
