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‘Wasted on you,’ said Frances
‘Well, he knows that now,’ Margaret grinned, ‘so, anyway, he gets to ours, and he knocks on the door, and just as he’s stepping in, I’ all his clothes on the floor because I’ to run around after hi in the hallway and s Then Dad runs in, yelling that the cows have got out Joe’s standing there, still in shock at the sight of rabs him and says, "Come on, lad Look alive," and hauls hiaret leant back ‘Well,’ she said, ‘it was chaos There’s around forty of theht down one of the fences, and there’s two tearing up what’s left of Mu down his face, trying to prop up Mu down the track in the truck, horn blaring, trying to head off the ones sta like John Wayne And then there’sto corner the rest of them in the shed’
She looked around the faces opposite her ‘Ever seen a frightened cow, girls?’ She lowered her voice ‘They shit like you’ve never seen And where they’re wheeling around, it’s going everywhere Poor old Joe is covered with it, top to toe, his beautiful shoes, everything’
‘How disgusting,’ said Jean, raising a sest girl decides to et , he’s no pushover – but the way she went into hi backwards
Even Margaret, supposedly immune to the faret up, tried to wipe hi, but eventually realised he was saying, ‘The ring, the ring’ The two of them had spent almost half an hour on their hands and knees in the cowshed, trying to find Joe’s token of everlasting devotion in the slurry
‘And you – you still wear it?’
‘Cow dung included To me that’s part of the romance’ Then, as Jean’s hand went to her mouth, ‘Oh, Jean! Of course I washed it before I put it on I had to do the sa as his fiancée was spent washing and ironing his uniforet into trouble back at base’
‘Stan asked me while ere at a dance,’ said Jean ‘I reckon I was the youngest there – I was still fifteen But it was lovely I earing a blue shantung silk two-piece, it belonged to irl in the room He’d had a few, but when they struck up with "You Made Me Love You" he turned to histo marry You hear that?" And then he said it louder And I made out I was dead embarrassed but, to be honest, I really liked it’
‘I’
‘He was the first person to tell littered with tears ‘No one ever told me that Not my mum Never even ot nothing back there, nothing He’s the best man I ever met’
They had sat, in near silence, for al to the traders to coht, at ridiculous cost, two necklaces for Letty, telling herself they would be a lovely gift, knowing it was a feeble atterew fiercer, and the sun e-point out of the shade, she thought aboutBut no entertain to the forht of the with each other in the little dor listlessly at a s towards therey shapes on board, watching thely distinct at it drew closer She heard exclath of the ship as other women realised what it was
‘Girls!’ she yelled ‘It’s the post! We’ve got post!’
An hour later, they sat in the canteen, the nore-scented air now thick with anticipation, as a Red Cross officer collected all mail to be sent and distributed small bundles of letters from a trestle table at the end The announcereeted with squeals fro called up to collect an award, rather than correspondence Around them the ere propped open to allow the sea breezes to penetrate the roo ocean low
Jean had been a the first called to the table: her impressive seven letters from Stan had restored some of her vitality She had handed them to Frances, who read them aloud in her low, sonorous voice, while Jean puffed nervously at a cigarette ‘Did you hear that?’ she kept interrupting ‘My naht araret and Frances had exchanged a glance ‘And,’ Frances continued, ‘he’s won four pounds in a boxinginvolved trying to block Stan’s punches with his nose’
‘Hear that?’ Jean nudged Margaret ‘Trying to block punches with his nose!’ If her laughter was a little too high to suggest genuine hing at all
Later Frances would confide that she had left out several paragraphs: those that warned Jean to ‘behave herself’, and the story of a sweetheart deserted by one of his friends once he heard she had been ‘playing fast and loose’
‘Margaret O’Brien?’
Margaret was out of her chair with a speed that belied her cumbersome frame Breathless, she launched herself at the sheaf of letters proffered towards her, and returned, glowing and triuotten She wondered, briefly, whether she could go to the cabin and read the offence But just as she was about to ask, she heard a chair scrape back, and looked up from the envelopes to see Avice seat herself carefully in front of thearet, a little taken aback that Avice had chosen to seat herself a’s quarrel, wondered if she ot news,’ Avice said