Free Time Shall Reap by Doris Davidson

and prayed that he would not come upstairs – she couldn’t face him just yet – but in a few minutes he walked in, looking very ill at ease. Standing at the foot of her bed, he murmured, rather awkwardly, ‘The war’ll be over by Christmas – the Gordons’ll make short work o’ Kaiser Bill and his Huns.’
    Looking at her sympathetically, he turned and went back to the kitchen, leaving Elspeth considering what he had said. She had heard other folk in the village saying the same thing, now that she came to think of it, and Christmas was less than five weeks away. John would be home ... and they would be married ... and everything would be all right.

 
Chapter Seven
    The hostilities were not over by Christmas – only an English festival and an ordinary working day in Auchlonie, even the bairns waited until the last night of each year to hang up their stockings. Nettie and Kirsty had commiserated with Elspeth when she went back to work the day after learning what John had done, but had forgotten about it in the anticipation of Hogmanay, and she felt that no one understood her misery at being denied the opportunity to say goodbye to him and to wish him luck.
    She was unable to enter into the spirit of the festivities to bid farewell to 1914 and to welcome in a new, hopefully better, year, although the neighbours ‘first-footed’ the Grays with the traditional gifts of shortbread or lumps of coal, taking their own whisky bottles in with them because they knew that Geordie never had any spirits in the house. Her New Year’s Day off was like another Sunday to her, apart from not having to go to church.
    In the workroom next day, Nettie told the other two what had happened at her house after the clock had struck midnight on Hogmanay. ‘Everybody was singing, and Johnny Low was that drunk by the time he got to us, he was going round kissing all the lassies.’
    ‘Did he kiss you?’ little Kirsty asked eagerly.
    ‘He tried, and I wouldna have said no if he’d been sober.’ Nettie’s laugh was rueful – Johnny Low was quite handsome in a rough sort of way. ‘I can’t stand the smell o’ drink on a lad, and that’s a fact.’
    Elspeth reflected sadly that she would have let John kiss her supposing he had hardly been able to stand, but he hadn’t given her the chance that Saturday in November.
    On January 3rd, having had to unpick the lining of a costume jacket because she had inserted a right sleeve into a left armhole in her distraction, Elspeth was doubly dispirited and wondered why her mother seemed so excited. ‘A letter come for you second post, Eppie,’ Lizzie burst out.
    Her dejection falling away like magic, the girl picked up the buff-coloured envelope addressed in a flowing hand to Miss Elspeth Gray, The Cottar Houses, Mains of Denseat, Auchlonie, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, with ‘Army Post Service’ stamped at the side. Her fingers trembled as she feverishly tore it open and Lizzie watched with amusement as her daughter skimmed over the page, then went back to the start and read it again out loud, her face wreathed in smiles.
    My Dear Elspeth,
    I am very sorry for not coming to supper that night, it feels like years ago. I suppose you had heard that I got drunk that forenoon, and I am really ashamed of it. I should not have let the other lads talk me into going drinking. I was still not right sober when it was time to catch the train on Sunday morning, and I did not have time to come to see you anyway. I could not manage to write to you before we sailed, but I often thought about you. Please forgive me for leaving you waiting, it must have been terrible for you, not knowing. Remember, you are my whole life and I promise to wed you when I get home next time. Thinking about that is what keeps me going in this awful place. Once again, I am very sorry for what I did, but I will make it up to you some day soon. Yours forever,
    John
P.S. I love you
    This written avowal of his love made Elspeth’s