“Sorry, goes with the territory, I’m afraid.”
“So why didn’t he work on these other things?” she asked.
“He would have been separated from Imogen. He couldn’t do that.”
“He must have loved her very much to have given up his dreams for her.”
“You know, they were the oddest couple at Oxford. She was all fire and fury, with ideas that broke through all societal norms. And Ignatius was calm and quiet and—”
“Opposites sometimes do attract,” Molly pointed out.
“Quite so.”
“He certainly always spoke highly of her. And forgave her quite a bit.”
Bryant coughed and looked around at the others.
“Don’t worry, I will give away no secrets, Major,” said Molly. “I only wish that Mr. Oliver had realized how very special he was, too.”
“Yes, well. He was just not the sort to dwell on himself.”
“But his memory will be carried forward through us.”
“You really are quite mature beyond your years, Molly.”
“And I am quite fortunate indeed to have known Ignatius Oliver.”
After the burial, Molly and Charlie sat in the study, with a small fire warming them.
“When do we go to Yorkshire?” he asked.
Arrangements had been made for them to move to Yorkshire and live with the Tinsdales for the foreseeable future.
“Next week, by train. It’s all confirmed.”
“Are you sure they want me?” said Charlie.
“They are very sure. And if you don’t go, I won’t go.”
He looked at the fire. “It feels quite odd bein’ here without him.”
“It will always feel that way, I suppose. He was this place, really. You can’t imagine one without the other.”
“He was truly a good bloke.”
“I wish I had told him something,” said Molly.
“What?”
“He always talked about how brilliant Imogen was, so much smarter than he, so much cleverer at everything, really. And while he and I talked some about that habit of his, I wish I had told him far more often that he was quite extraordinary, too.” She looked earnestly at Charlie. “What do you think?”
“He had to make it look like he was workin’ for the Jerries when he was really workin’ for us. That’s quite tricky. He was really brave, with all he done, the air warden bit and everythin’. I mean, I guess it was brave for Imogen to jump off that cliff. I never coulda done it. But... I think it was braver to stay here and keep tryin’ to do the right thin’. Like Mr. Oliver done.”
“I think you said it far more eloquently than I could, Charlie.”
“And he knew that you felt that way ’bout him, Molly. He really did. We loved each other. Only thin’ that kept us goin’ was that. We didn’t have nobody else.”
She sighed and looked at the Crown typewriter with the blank page.
“So’s we can come back here when we’re older?”
“Yes,” Molly said. “This is our home, Charlie.”
Home Once More
Molly was seated in the study of The Book Keep. It was a fine spring evening with a warming breeze and a mostly cloudless sky. During the war people in London would be looking anxiously to the skies for German bombers on such a lovely night. But now it was just a fine time to be alive.
She was writing a letter using her father’s old Conway Stewart pen. She loved the flow of the instrument and the elegance of the ink bleeding onto stiff paper.
She was now fifty-one years old, divorced, and the mother of a son and a daughter, one still at uni, and one who had graduated and was now working at a museum in Amsterdam. Her hair was cut shorter and fashioned in the style of the day. It held more than a touch of gray that she was debating covering up. That decision seemed trivial and absurd after what she had faced during the war. But that was also what made it wonderful to be able to contemplate. Her face was fuller and her frame about two stone heavier than during the war. She was in good health, and the recent jettisoning of her faithless husband had been the best decision she’d made in the previous decade.
She was a fully qualified clinical psychiatrist with a thriving practice, an excellent reputation, numerous scholarly papers, and two medical textbooks to her credit.
She knew that she had chosen this particular field because of what had happened to her mother. Dr. Foyle had desperately wanted something better with which to treat troubled patients. And now Molly and other health care professionals had a spectrum of medications to prescribe to those in their care. Sometimes they didn’t work; sometimes they did more harm than good. But they were all better and far more humane than poking sharp metal objects into fragile brains.
She understood her mother’s condition now. Her psychoses probably could have been managed with modern-day medications and professional counseling. Unfortunately, her mother’s condition had occurred too early for those types of remedies. But Molly’s current patients benefited from them and from her training and empathic bedside manner, which, as a nurse long ago had told her, was half the battle.
She finished the letter, slid it into an envelope, sealed it, and wrote an address on it.
It was a missive to the Tinsdales. They had been so very kind to her all this time, and she kept in close contact with the family, whom she had visited many times over the intervening years. Molly set the letter aside and looked at the finished manuscript that sat on her desk. She next focused on the names of the two authors of the book set forth on the title page.
Imogen Oliver and Molly Danvers.
This novel seemed as far from her medical writings as possible, but perhaps not. It was full of psychology, the human condition, in the most traumatic of times. People did not typically need her help when suitably happy with their lives. They needed her skills when the opposite occurred, as it so very often did in life.
Molly had barely revised the first portion of the novel written by Imogen decades prior. It turned out the dead woman had been a more naturally gifted writer than Molly, but the second half of the novel had more than held its own in the storytelling, at least her agent had told her that. And there were several reputable publishers currently formulating serious offers to purchase the rights to the story.
Out in the shop she heard the bell tinkling and customers coming and going. She had two very good people helping in the shop, and it had prospered over the years.
She rose, opened the door, and stared out into the bookshop area as a half dozen customers looked over various volumes, while a queue of others were having their purchases rung up and bagged at the counter. She had retained much of the untidiness from Ignatius Oliver’s days, and customers seemed to like that attribute as they explored the stacks and crevices for new literary treasures.
She also had a special section of the works of George Sand, with not a single one missing any pages.
Molly closed the door, walked back over to her desk, and looked at the framed picture of Charlie and his family that was placed there. He lived in Australia now, where he had a ranch. As a young man he had traveled the world via freighters, trains, and planes, written down all that he saw and experienced, and he was the only one who read a word of it. He now had five children, and his wife, Meredith, was very kind and welcoming. Molly had been to visit once, and Charlie had even taught her how to ride a horse while she was there.
She had been terrified, her heart thudding in her chest, but in his calming voice, which had changed only slightly from his youth, he had said all the right things to carefully wean her from the panic. Even though he lived so far away, she could not imagine him not being a part of her life. He was the godfather to her son, and she was godmother to his oldest daughter. They spoke on the phone at least once a week.