Prologue
1st of January, 1943
Dearest Diary,
Little did I know how important you would become when Charlotte gave you to me. You’ve been my confidant in what has proven to be the greatest journey of my life, and though I’m saddened that our time together has come to an end and I shall never forget the people I wrote about between your pages, it’s a new year and I’m embarking on a new journey, one of being a married woman...
26th of April, 1942
Dear Diary,
Our life in the country has been so very different from those who remained in the cities, where bombs have destroyed so much and killed so many, and I fear all that is about to change. Lately, I’ve insisted that the children sleep holding on to their gas masks, ready to put them on at my command, and wear their clothes to bed so they’ll be somewhat warm if we need to run to the bomb shelter. It’s so very frightening.
I wrote about the arrival of American troops back in January. How everyone claimed the Americans will help us give the Nazis what they deserve. I can’t say that has happened, but I can tell you this. They built a Bomber Command Station right here in High Wycombe!
Shortly after the American servicemen arrived, the headmistress of Wycombe Abbey girls’ school received an official notice to evacuate all the girls within a fortnight to make room for the United States Army Eighth Air Force. That caused a tremendous influx of students into the small village school. Local children now attend lessons in the mornings and the evacuees in the afternoons, which includes all of the nine children living here with Norman and Charlotte. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, the past week planes started flying in and out of the base like flocks of birds. There is nothing to stop the German bombers from following those planes, intent upon dropping bombs on the base, which would have them flying directly over the farm!
Norman insists Father assured him there is nothing to worry about, that having the base so near should make us feel safer and that air raid sirens would sound if the German planes flew near, but there are no sirens close by us. Furthermore, by the time the sirens sound, it could be too late. That has happened elsewhere. No one can say it hasn’t.
When I was evacuated out of London, here to Norman and Charlotte’s, I did feel safe and have continued to for the past couple of years, but I truly fear there is no safe place in our country right now. Nowhere that families are safe. I also fear there soon won’t be anything left of the country we are all working so hard to protect.
I also wonder why we are expected to put so much faith in the Americans. These aren’t their homes. Their families. Their children.
I don’t mean to sound so harsh, but I am weary, Dear Diary, and dare only share these thoughts with you. Unlike so many others, I can’t put all my faith in the Americans. If they really cared about us, about what has been happening the past two years, they would have arrived long ago. Long before our cities and villages were little more than piles of rubble and long before our children became orphans.
Those planes flying overhead scare me, almost as if I somehow know one of those planes will change my life for ever.
The rumble of planes growing nearer sent Kathryn’s nerves on edge. She tried to pedal faster, but the road was rutted and wet from the heavy spring rains that had fallen the night before. Her hands and arms, even her legs, shook as the noise overhead grew louder. Afraid to look, but unable to stop herself, she twisted enough to glance towards the sky behind her.
Fear grasped her entire body. Not only was the sound deafening, she’d never seen a plane so close. It was flying right at her, would hit her. Frantic, she tried to steer the bicycle off the road, but it wobbled uncontrollably and then toppled.
She hit the ground so hard, the air was knocked out of her. It was a moment before she could gather the gumption to cover her head as a powerful gust of wind tugged at her scarf and coat.
The noise was so great that her ears were ringing and she felt as if time had stopped, or wondered perhaps if this was how it felt when time ends. Life ends.
It was a moment or two before she realised the noise was fading and another before she concluded the plane hadn’t landed on her. That it was still in the sky, flying higher now and away from her.
A sense of relief washed over her, until she saw the contents lying around her. The eggs, cheese and milk that had been in the wicker basket attached to the handlebars of her bicycle. Anger began to coil its way through her system. Every morsel of food was precious
