Winter Roses by Amy Myers

magic, so she tried a burst of song since at the moment Our Lord seemed far away: ‘Fight the good fight …’
    That didn’t work either. Then she heard Miss Caroline’s voice in the hall, laughing at something or someone. Miss Caroline – she would cheer her up, if she could think of an excuse to beard her. It occurred to her she could tell her about Farmer Lake, since it would affect her rotas for agricultural work.
    Margaret hurried to open the kitchen door. As she did so, however, the Rector emerged from the study further up the passage and called out to his daughter.
    ‘Caroline, I need to talk to you. Could you come in here for a moment?’
    As she returned disconsolately to her tea, it briefly crossed Margaret’s mind to wonder what the Rector wanted to talk to Miss Caroline about. And why he had been talking quite so long to Mrs Lilley, who was still in the study with them. But she forgot both these things, as she remembered it was almost time to bath baby Frank.

Chapter Four
    Why were both her parents here? Caroline, trying to subdue a sudden jolt of fear, followed her father’s suggestion that she sit down in the comfortable armchair at the side of his study desk. This only increased her apprehension, however, and she found herself on her feet again. Felicia? Aunt Tilly? Isabel? No, if this were a mere matter of where Isabel was to live, there would be no need for both Father and Mother to be here. She began to feel slightly sick.
    ‘It’s Reggie, isn’t it?’
    ‘Yes, my darling.’ It was her father who answered, and both he and her mother rushed to put their arms around her. Father reached her first. ‘I’m sorry, darling.’ He hugged her. ‘I know how much you care for him even though—’
    ‘Yes.’ She knew what he was going to say. Just because her engagement had been broken, it didn’t mean that love had entirely vanished. How could it? There had been alifetime of Reggie and a few months without him. Love had merely been defeated.
    She knew she should say something, for her parents wore that concerned look that close friends and family have when no words seem adequate and silence has to speak for them. Even her father, so soothing and comforting to bereaved parishioners, was dumb. As was she, for there was nothing but numbness in her mind.
    ‘Is it in the newspaper?’ she managed at last.
    ‘Not yet, my love. Sir John heard this morning and came down immediately with Daniel to break the news to his wife; then he telephoned us. He particularly asked me to tell you first, Caroline.’
    ‘That was good of him.’ Was this her, responding with such apparent normality? Perhaps, but the real Caroline was curled up in a ball inside her, conscious that if a last flicker of hope for a life married to Reggie had been lingering inside her, then it had been snuffed out for ever. ‘After all, I’m not engaged to Reggie any more.’
    ‘He has a high opinion of you, and they too need support.’
    Support? With a mighty effort, Caroline forced herself to think of the Hunneys. Tragedy had hit their family another mighty blow. Three years ago they had two healthy sons, both with brilliant futures before them. Now, one was dead and the other maimed for life, even though by his own efforts he was struggling to resurrect his former hopes. Many families had no such comfort. The newspapers were full of stories of those who had lost their complete families; she had read of one widow who had lost seven sons.
    ‘Poor Lady Hunney,’ Caroline jerked out in compassion, recalling how she had looked a year ago when she had told Caroline that the offensive at Loos had begun that day. Lady Hunney had known that the 1st Division, which included the 2nd Royal Sussex, was engaged in it, and for the first time Caroline had seen her as a woman and not as an enemy to be conquered. Reggie had survived Loos, however, although he had been wounded, and over the intervening months Lady Hunney had reacquired her former