With her heart pounding in her chest, Rosie stood tensely at the bar waiting for the landlord to return; when he did, he waved a tattered envelope with her name scribbled on the front.

‘Somebody left this for you.’

‘Mick?’ she cried hopefully.

‘No, I think I would have recognized him – some fella I’ve never met, said he was a pal of Mick’s.’

With trembling hands Rosie took the envelope. ‘When was it delivered?’

‘Let’s see,’ the man considered. ‘Maybe two or three months back.’

Quickly thanking him, Rosie hurried out into the street, where she tore the grubby envelope open.

Dear Mrs Pickles,

Your husband and I were good pals. We joined up at the same time and fought together on the Front Line. I’m very sorry to have to tell you that as we retreated under enemy fire I realized that Mick had gone from where I saw him fall, and from where, I’d assumed, he’d lost his life. Unfortunately, shortly after this discovery I had the misfortune to step on a landmine, which killed many of our men and took half my leg off. You will understand that with my injuries I was in no position to search for Mick – all I can say is I sincerely hope he might have managed to crawl away from the crossfire. I’m now a registered invalid and discharged from active service, but I often wonder what happened to my pal Mick and worry that I could have done more for him. I hope he did make it back home and that he is safe and well.

Causing passers-by to stare at her, Rosie exclaimed, ‘NO! He didn’t come home.’ Quickly turning back to the letter, she read on,

Anyway, as I say, the experience has troubled me to such an extent that I felt obliged to make contact with Mick’s family, but when I visited his former home (address courtesy of our regimental records) there was nothing left standing. I entrusted this letter to the landlord of the local pub in the hope that one day you, Mick’s wife, might read it and make your own enquiries.

Yours,

Arthur Timbs

Rosie slumped against the wall. ‘Is he alive or dead?’ she wailed.

Trying to pull her thoughts together, Rosie took some deeps breaths; if her husband was confirmed dead, his regiment would have said so; as it was, they had only informed her that Mick was ‘Missing in Action’. Now she had to take on board another possibility in this painful story: that Mick had managed to crawl away from a battle scene.

‘Missing says it all,’ she thought wretchedly. ‘He could have been captured, he could be wasting away in a POW camp in Germany, he could be in hiding … or he could be dead?’ Remembering that she would soon be meeting up with her friend, Rosie rallied.