love was a fever, it was a fire raging through my body and I couldn’t be logical, practical. So I got up and wrote my letter by candlelight. I decided that if I switched on the light my mam and dad might be disturbed and come to investigate. I keep a candle by my bed to pray by at night. So I s’ppose it was apt because this would be a prayer, a prayer from the heart. The proper writing paper was downstairs and I didn’t dare fetch it. I made do with scribbling my letter to Thorston in a notebook I keep in the drawer by my bed.
Dear Thorston
,
I miss you. I miss the feel of your body holding mine. I miss your kisses. I miss you inside me, part of me. I miss your eyes, so kind and loving behind the lenses of your spectacles. Only you don’t have spectacles now. They’re broken. But the day after you left I crept to the bins when Mam was busy, and I found some of pieces of glass, still with your blood on them, and the tiny wire frame all screwed up, and I kept them in my pocket. I have them hidden under my mattress now in a small box. Thorston, I believe I shall die if I can’t see you again. You’re the father of my baby. We are meant to be together. I am sending this to the camp at Llanmartin. I don’t know how yet but I’ll find a way. I must find a way. If you’re not there perhaps they know where you are, where you’ve gone to, perhaps they’ll forward it on. If this reaches you, get word to me, tell me where to go and when, and I promise I’ll be there. I don’t care about the rest, so long as when I wake up in the morning it’s your head on the pillow next to mine
.
I love you – always and forever
.
Bethan x
.
Next day I stole an envelope, from the drawer in Dad’s desk, and addressed it to Mr Thorston Engel, POW Camp Llanmartin, Newport, Wales. I’d nowhere else to turn and it was worth a try. I didn’t have a stamp either and that’s where I thought I was going to flounder, that the letter would stay tucked under a scrap of carpet in my bedroom. And then the most wonderful thing happened, and it
was
a miracle, a real miracle. Mr Powell the vet came to look at one of the cows that was in calf and very sickly. And I was peeping out of the window at his car when I saw his daughter Aeron climbing out from the back seat. Aeron – Aeron my friend! We used to sit together at the same desk in school. It was before the war and it felt like another lifetime, but if I remembered her then there was a good chance that she would remember me. When her father was on his rounds and called in, she’d never been with him before. Don’t you see? It was a sign. The miracle I needed. And then I heard her ask my dad where I was, if she could see me. Oh Lord, I held my breath until I was so light-headed I almost fainted. And I clutched my hands together and my eyes bored straight through the ceiling and the roof of the house and up into the sky where God sits. When my dad said yes, and nodded in the direction of the house, I fell to my knees. God be praised, I thought. God and all your angels be praised. I dashed to the carpet, lifted up a corner, grabbed the letter and stuffed it in my pocket. Then I smoothed out the wrinkles in the pile hurriedly so nobody would suspect.
Next moment and Mam knocked on my door. She checked what I was wearing, a baggy jumper and trousers. You couldn’t see my bump. I didn’t show under all the folds of a green, orange and beige hand knit that she made for Brice. She didn’t meet my eye, just looked at the floor, at the scrap of carpet that only minutes ago was shielding my letter – ironic that.
‘You have a visitor,’ she said stiffly.
‘Oh! And who might that be, Mam?’ I acted all surprised as if I couldn’t imagine who had come calling.
‘Aeron. Aeron Powell, the vet’s girl. You can see her for five minutes in the front room.’ I jumped up but Mam immediately barred the doorway, arms flung wide like a prison guard. ‘You’re not to tell her about … about
Dear Thorston
,
I miss you. I miss the feel of your body holding mine. I miss your kisses. I miss you inside me, part of me. I miss your eyes, so kind and loving behind the lenses of your spectacles. Only you don’t have spectacles now. They’re broken. But the day after you left I crept to the bins when Mam was busy, and I found some of pieces of glass, still with your blood on them, and the tiny wire frame all screwed up, and I kept them in my pocket. I have them hidden under my mattress now in a small box. Thorston, I believe I shall die if I can’t see you again. You’re the father of my baby. We are meant to be together. I am sending this to the camp at Llanmartin. I don’t know how yet but I’ll find a way. I must find a way. If you’re not there perhaps they know where you are, where you’ve gone to, perhaps they’ll forward it on. If this reaches you, get word to me, tell me where to go and when, and I promise I’ll be there. I don’t care about the rest, so long as when I wake up in the morning it’s your head on the pillow next to mine
.
I love you – always and forever
.
Bethan x
.
Next day I stole an envelope, from the drawer in Dad’s desk, and addressed it to Mr Thorston Engel, POW Camp Llanmartin, Newport, Wales. I’d nowhere else to turn and it was worth a try. I didn’t have a stamp either and that’s where I thought I was going to flounder, that the letter would stay tucked under a scrap of carpet in my bedroom. And then the most wonderful thing happened, and it
was
a miracle, a real miracle. Mr Powell the vet came to look at one of the cows that was in calf and very sickly. And I was peeping out of the window at his car when I saw his daughter Aeron climbing out from the back seat. Aeron – Aeron my friend! We used to sit together at the same desk in school. It was before the war and it felt like another lifetime, but if I remembered her then there was a good chance that she would remember me. When her father was on his rounds and called in, she’d never been with him before. Don’t you see? It was a sign. The miracle I needed. And then I heard her ask my dad where I was, if she could see me. Oh Lord, I held my breath until I was so light-headed I almost fainted. And I clutched my hands together and my eyes bored straight through the ceiling and the roof of the house and up into the sky where God sits. When my dad said yes, and nodded in the direction of the house, I fell to my knees. God be praised, I thought. God and all your angels be praised. I dashed to the carpet, lifted up a corner, grabbed the letter and stuffed it in my pocket. Then I smoothed out the wrinkles in the pile hurriedly so nobody would suspect.
Next moment and Mam knocked on my door. She checked what I was wearing, a baggy jumper and trousers. You couldn’t see my bump. I didn’t show under all the folds of a green, orange and beige hand knit that she made for Brice. She didn’t meet my eye, just looked at the floor, at the scrap of carpet that only minutes ago was shielding my letter – ironic that.
‘You have a visitor,’ she said stiffly.
‘Oh! And who might that be, Mam?’ I acted all surprised as if I couldn’t imagine who had come calling.
‘Aeron. Aeron Powell, the vet’s girl. You can see her for five minutes in the front room.’ I jumped up but Mam immediately barred the doorway, arms flung wide like a prison guard. ‘You’re not to tell her about … about
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