Seeing her friend worn out by her day’s work, Matron said, ‘Promise me, dear, that you’ll go home straight away and get some rest?’

Ada didn’t quibble; her back was hurting after stooping for so long over the delivery bed.

‘Don’t worry,’ Ada assured her. ‘I’ll be very glad to lie down.’

42. Tobruk

Even though she was exhausted, Ada’s eyes as ever drifted to her beloved fells, where the afternoon sun picked out dark hollows and sparkling streams like silver rivulets coursing down the mountainside, frothy with cow parsley and bright-green bracken. Leaning on her garden wall, inhaling the heady perfume of sweet peas and summer lilies, Ada heard a cuckoo calling plaintively for a mate. Remembering the old rhyme, Ada murmured softly,

In April, come he will.

In May, he sings all day.

In June, the cuckoo changes his tune.

In July, he prepares to fly.

In August, go he must.

Wishing with all her heart that Jamie could be standing there close beside her listening to the bird in the wood, Ada gave a deep sigh as she recalled her husband’s last letter home.

‘Africa,’ she murmured as a shard of fear shot through her body. What was her husband enduring while she was safe at home, wrapped around on all sides by breathtaking beauty and peace? Was he hungry, thirsty, tired, injured? Ada wanted to wrap around him too, hold him tight in her arms and never let him leave her side. Now he was even further away, on another continent fighting for territory that, so far at least, the Germans had a firm grip on.

Knowing she was overtired and would soon become emotional, Ada hurried indoors intent on making a hot cup of tea, but instead, to her delight, there was a letter from Jamie lying on her doormat. Grasping the letter, she hurried outside to read it in the warm sunshine.