When the boy pretended to shoot, as if playing at being a cowboy, Gareth lowered the barrel to point at the ground and spoke to him. I couldn’t hear what he said, but I saw something in the boy’s face that made me recall something Lizzie had told me when she found out Gareth was to be an officer. “The army could do with a grown man leading them lads. Posh accents don’t seem to be up to the job, according to what I hear.” She was right. Gareth had the authority to lead. I’d seen it with the younger compositors, and in the printing room too. I tried to imagine it in France, but couldn’t.

We walked along Castle Mill Stream. Gareth was wearing his uniform, and although he complained that it looked too new, everyone we passed greeted him with a nod or a smile or a vigorous shake of the hand. Only one person looked away as we approached: a young man, his civilian clothes conspicuous.

I’d stopped wishing that Gareth hadn’t signed up, but I couldn’t stop thinking that he was walking towards death. The notion kept me awake at night and I’d watch him sleep. It had me touching him unnecessarily, and at odd times. I wanted to know what he thought about everything, and I tired him out with questions about good and evil, and whether we English were one and Germans the other. I was trying to uncover more layers so that if he died I would be left with more.

Gareth was recalled from leave after the Battle of Festubert. The “In Memoriam” list in the Times of London included four hundred men from the Ox and Bucks. We’d been married less than a month.

“I’m not being sent to France, Es.”

“But you will be.”

“It’s likely. But there are a hundred new recruits who need training before they’re sent anywhere, so I’ll be at Cowley for a while. I’m close enough to catch one of the new autobuses into Oxford. I could meet you for lunch. And on my days off, I can come home.”

“But I’ve grown used to your lumpy mashed potatoes—and I think I may have forgotten how to wash dishes,” I said, trying to be lighthearted. But I’d spent too many evenings in solitude over the past few years not to know how lonely I was going to be. “What will I do with myself?”

“The hospitals are calling for volunteers,” he said, glad to think he’d found a solution. “Not all the boys are from around here, and some never get a visitor.”

I nodded, but it was no solution.