Henrietta's War Read Online Free Page A

ago.
    â€˜Oh,
that
war,’ she said. ‘That was quite different.’
    When I asked her why, she said that, for one thing, the last war had been entirely unnecessary.
    Having dismissed the sacrifice of a few million young lives as a sort of boyish prank, she bought a box of rubber bands and left the shop.
    Always your affectionate Childhood’s Friend,
    HENRIETTA
    February 7, 1940
    M Y DEAR ROBERT
Now that we may talk about the weather, I will tell you that it was very cold indeed after Christmas, and in early January. Our Visitors kept on saying, ‘Do you call this Devon?’; and, really, one could hardly blame them. The fact that there were seventy-nine degrees of frost in Russia did little to cheer them, and the burden of their refrain was that they came here because they understood that it was the Riviera of the West.
    It will shake you, Robert, when I tell you that there was skating on the Eel Ponds, but that is a fact. There hasn’t been any skating in this place, so old Widdecombe tells me, since the year you and I had measles and missed it all.
    I went down one afternoon and it was a gay sight. Not that many people were actually skating, because, of course, hardly anybody in this part of the world knows how to, even if they had skates, which they haven’t. But there was a large, admiring, pink-nosed crowd watching. The sun was shining out of a perfectly clear blue sky, and I felt that if only the Visitors could have been told that this was the Switzerland of the West they might feel that they were getting their money’s-worth, and stop grumbling.
    Mrs Savernack, with a grim expression on her face, and wearing a peculiar woollen cap which I feel she must have bought in Switzerland a long time ago, was skating round and round the pond in an efficient way. Every now and then she would suddenly turn and begin going backwards. Each time she did this there was a murmur of applause from the crowds on the bank.
    Faith, looking quite lovely in a yellow jumper, was skimming about with her Conductor, their arms linked together. ‘I didn’t know you could skate so well, Faith,’ I said enviously when they came to rest beside me.
    â€˜My dear, I can’t,’ she said with a happy smile. ‘I should fall
flat
on my face if he let go of me.’
    But shortly afterwards, when the Conductor fell flat on his face, I saw Faith pick him up in the most efficient way, so I fancy she was not quite the novice she would have us believe. Nobody in the world can be as helpless and clinging as Faith when she wants a strong, manly arm all to herself.
    Colonel Simpkins in a corner, his back very straight and his chest stuck out, was doing something clever round an orange. But he had to keep stopping to chase away little boys who wanted to slide. As a matter of fact, I was longing to slide myself, but apparently it is not done on skating ice. After a time, when his back was turned, one of the urchins stole the orange, so that was the end of all his fun, and after an unsuccessful attempt to link up with Mrs Savernack he lost heart, and began taking off his skates.
    I was just beginning to think it would be nice to feel my toes again, when Lady B arrived, looking very trim in a black, pleated skirt.
    â€˜Good Lord! What have we here?’ said Mrs Savernack, and Colonel Simpkins went quietly away and fetched a ladder which had been brought down in case of emergency.
    Lady B was puffing a bit by the time she had laced up her boots, and I trembled for my old friend as I helped her on to the ice.

    Floated away like a big, black bird
    Once there, she took a few faltering steps, and then suddenly she lifted up her arms and floated away like a big, black bird. Everybody gasped. You couldn’t have believed, Robert, that anything so – well – bulky could have been so light and graceful. Faith said it reminded her of those very big, black smuts which float in the air when your chimney is