No Peace for Amelia by Siobhan Parkinson Page A

it’s because we are opposed to war.’
    â€˜Yes, Mama.’
    â€˜And we are so opposed to war, that we don’t think that children should even play at war. Do you understand , Edmund?’
    â€˜Yes, Mama.’ Edmund suddenly looked up at his mother and added: ‘Mama, I wasn’t playing at war. I was only playing at cowboys.’
    At this, the whole family – all except poor Edmund, that is – burst out laughing, the tension of the dreadfulafternoon broken at last.
    Even Papa laughed. He fluffed Edmund’s hair and reached out for the gun.
    â€˜Here, give it to me,’ he said. ‘I don’t think we’ll give it to Mary Ann’s brother. I don’t think he should play with guns either, even if he is grown up. And now I am going to write to my MP to protest at this disgraceful invasion of privacy.’
    â€˜That’s an excellent idea, Charles,’ said Mama. ‘I think I shall write a few letters too. We have to let those in authority know the outrage this has been, on a pacifist household such as this.’
    Mary Ann and Amelia exchanged glances. They didn’t either of them think those in authority would be particularly impressed by outraged letters from Amelia’s mother. Her record as a model citizen was not entirely untarnished, for she herself had been arrested a couple of years ago for a breach of the peace while attending a Suffragette meeting, and had spent some time in gaol.
    But this didn’t appear to occur to Amelia’s mother.
    â€˜Now,’ she went on, ‘I expect Mary Ann has a lot of catching up to do and would be glad to have her kitchen to herself for a while. I suggest that all Pims evacuate the kitchen. You will stay, Mary Ann, dear, won’t you? We’d be lost without you, and I think Amelia would just die of grief. We do trust you, and we know you wouldn’t betray our trust, whatever your political feelings might be. Isn’t that right?’
    â€˜Oh yes, Ma’am,’ said Mary Ann fervently, resolving on the spot never again even to dream of using this house as a hiding place for anything even remotely connected with violence. She would personally dispose even of Edmund ’s toy gun in the dustbin, and that was the very last she would ever have to do with guns of any description.

Amelia Writes a Letter
    T he flower head that Amelia had randomly but lovingly snapped off and stuck in her buttonhole stood now in a little porcelain bud vase. Its purply blue spears had glowed staunchly for some days, and its searing yellow streak had gladdened her heart. But now it was starting to lose its gleaming hues, and the petals were turning mauve and papery and sad. Amelia touched it sorrowfully with the tips of her fingers as she pored over her task, and it rustled a papery rustle.
    When Frederick’s letter had arrived, Amelia had been suffused with happiness. It lay there innocently by her breakfast plate, looking fat and exotically stamped and full of promise. It meant he was alive, of course, which was a relief, but it also meant that he cared enough to write to her. She didn’t even need to read the letter to know that much. The mere fact of its being there, plainly addressed, in the Quaker style, toAmelia Pim, was assurance enough.
    ‘Aren’t you going to open your letter, Amelia?’ Edmund had asked, spitting toast crumbs across the table cloth.
    ‘Yes,’ Amelia had replied vaguely, happily, not opening it.
    ‘Well, go on then,’ Edmund urged her, wriggling on his chair.
    Slowly, Amelia had picked up the letter and slit it open with her knife. It wasn’t as long as it looked. It was fat mainly because Frederick had written on thick, lined paper, not because he had written a great deal. She tried not to be disappointed when she saw it was just a page and a half long, and she made a point of reading it very slowly to make it last. She didn’t want the happy feeling to go away.
    But no matter