Chapters (57)
- Cover
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Forty-one
- Forty-two
- Forty-three
- Forty-four
- Forty-five
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- POPULAR BOOKS FROM THE ERA
- When We Meet Again
- A Conversation with Caroline Beecham about When We Meet Again
- Discussion Guide
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- What’s next onyour reading list?
When Alice came to, she was lying on the sofa in Penny’s empty living room and straining to hear whispers in the hallway outside. After a while the door opened, and Penny and Michael came in.
“Saint-John’s-wort tea,” her friend said as she handed Alice a mug and sat in the chair opposite, Michael perching on the armrest. “It should help relax you.”
The steam rose quickly and filled her nostrils with a bittersweet smell, and Alice placed the mug down on the carpet. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be silly. You’ve nothing to apologize for. But, Alice, we’ve been talking, and we think you need to see a doctor first thing in the morning, then go back to the police.”
Alice pulled herself up to sit. “There’s no point—”
“Yes, there is. I’m not going to take no for an answer,” Penny said sternly. “Can’t you see? You’re not well enough for all this. You’ve done great work looking for Eadie, and now you have to let the authorities handle it.”
“I told you, they’ll never find her, that’s why I have to keep looking. And thanks to you, we might have found another way, through the warden network.”
Penny and Michael exchanged a look before she turned back to Alice. “Is that the real reason?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I have to ask . . . have you told the police who the father is?”
Alice looked away. “I don’t see that it matters to anyone else,” she said sharply. “And there’s a chance his family might want to keep Eadie . . . then I’d be certain to lose her.”
“Surely it’s worth taking a chance,” Michael suggested gently. “Better to risk finding and losing her again—at least you’d know she was safe.”
“It really makes no difference to the police.”
“But it might help if they knew,” said Penny.
Alice grew quiet. How could she explain to her friends how women like her were treated? It was all right for Penny—Michael was a loving husband and father, she was respectable—but there was little time or pity extended for women like Alice. Giving Rupert’s identity to the police wouldn’t help them find Eadie; it would just mean that there was a chance that he and his family could make a claim on her.
Penny glanced at Michael, who shrugged, and she pressed her lips together. “Well, thanks to your performance the book group left very motivated, so hopefully they’ll come back with some stories.”
Alice looked at her friend and smiled weakly. “Yes, I hope so.”
Nineteen
London, April 5, 1943