In a slightly more positive frame of mind she waited for Tom to join her.

It took Tom almost two hours to get through to someone at the hospital in Portsmouth who was able to tell them what was wrong with Ben – and it wasn’t good news.

‘Severe burns.’ The strain showed on his face as he dropped the receiver back into the cradle. ‘They’re all down one side of his face and one arm, apparently.’

Cissie and Sunday held hands tightly as they both remembered what a handsome chap Ben had been.

‘Will he be badly scarred?’ Sunday breathed.

Tom nodded, his face set in grim lines. ‘It sounds like it. They’ve already done a number of skin grafts – but I’ll know more tomorrow. I’m going to catch the first train out in the morning and go down to Portsmouth.’

‘May I come too?’

He stared into Sunday’s anxious face. ‘Of course, if Cissie here can manage on her own.’

‘She won’t have to, I’ll be here to help,’ Lavinia said as she joined them. ‘You two just shoot off and pack an overnight case. It’s too far to travel there and back in one day. We’ll be fine, won’t we, Cissie, my love? You just go and give Ben what comfort you can and tell him we’re all longing for the day when he can come home.’

Tom had a lump in his throat that prevented him from speaking. It was so unfair, he thought. Why couldn’t it have been him? Ben was so young to have to bear something so horrible. He had his whole life in front of him. But that was war for you. It was no respecter of age or circumstance, and Ben was just one of hundreds of thousands of young men who had suffered the same fate or worse.

Raising a grateful smile for Lavinia and Cissie he limped away to get out his travelling case, and Sunday went with him.

Chapter Fifty-One

May 1918

‘Right, m’ ladyship, get your arse out of that bed right now!’ Miss Fox stamped across the room and swished Ruby’s curtains aside. ‘It’s halfway through the afternoon and it’s high time you got up!’ Her eyes rested on the empty sherry bottle at the side of Ruby’s bed. Things had been going steadily downhill for months, with Ruby sinking into a deep depression. No doubt they should be grateful that as yet they had escaped the Zeppelin raids. Many other areas in London had not been so lucky. But that wasn’t the only worry she had now. Earlier that morning the cook had presented her with a pile of unpaid bills.

‘The butcher is saying he won’t deliver any more meat till this is settled,’ she’d fretted. ‘And most of the other tradesmen are putting their foot down, including the dairy, the grocer’s and the coal man, though that’s not so important now the weather is changing for the better. I’m sorry to trouble you with this, Miss Fox. The mistress usually sees to all the bills, as you know, but she hasn’t been well of late, has she.’