Audrey felt as though she had gotten to know Alex through Lizzie’s descriptions of her. The nursing they did in the Presidio was demanding and exhausting, but also rewarding when they were able to help save a limb or a life. The men returning from the Pacific were badly damaged. Audrey knew that both of Lizzie’s brothers were there now. Greg had enlisted in the army as a physician and was serving at a hospital in New Caledonia. It was a prefab building with a real structure, not a tent hospital, and he said it was very efficient, with running water and electricity. They treated the wounded from battle zones, and the men suffering from diseases like malaria. Henry was a medic south of the Solomon Islands. Both of them were a constant source of worry for Lizzie, and they all followed the news closely. The Hattons had all three children in the army now. Audrey knew her brother would have been there too, if he were still alive. He was one of the first casualties of the war.

By the fall of 1942, most of Europe had fallen into Hitler’s hands, and the war was raging on. The German Luftwaffe had bombed England mercilessly, and there had been countless deaths during the Blitz in London: 43,000 civilians had died, and 140,000 were wounded. In November of 1942, British and American forces invaded North Africa.

Meanwhile, Audrey was waging her own war against her mother’s illness, and slowly losing ground. A bad cold which turned into bronchitis nearly took Ellen’s life on Christmas. Audrey sat up with her day and night, with visits from Mrs. Beavis to give her a break, until after Christmas. Miraculously her mother survived it, but Audrey knew then that they wouldn’t be able to stop the inevitable for much longer. Ellen couldn’t get out of bed by then, and hadn’t in a long time. Audrey said little of it to Lizzie when she wrote to her. There was no point whining to her about it, and the reports would have been too depressing, so she soldiered on alone, with no break, no support, and only Mrs. Beavis to help her. She felt as though she were trapped on a desert island, shipwrecked, and help was no longer coming. She felt incredibly alone.