Annabelle forgot about her birthday completely. One day bled into another, and she had no idea what day it was. She only realized a week later, when she saw a newspaper someone had brought from Paris, that she had turned twenty-four. A month later in June, everyone was excited to learn that the first American troops had landed in France.

It was three weeks later, in mid-July, when a battalion of them came to Villers-Cotterêts and set up camp on the outskirts of the city. They were joined within a week by British forces, all of whom were preparing for an offensive at Ypres. It livened up the area considerably to have British and American troops roaming around everywhere. They were happily seducing all the local women, and military police were constantly dragging them out of bars and off the streets drunk, and delivering them back to their camps. If nothing else, it provided a little distraction, and despite the inevitable rowdy soldiers, some of them were very nice. Annabelle saw a group of American soldiers one day, walking along with some very young French girls, as she rode back with the ambulance from a field hospital nearby. She was in no mood to banter with them, as the man they were carrying back to the hospital in Villers-Cotterêts had died on the way. But as the ambulance drove past the Americans, they shouted and waved, having seen two pretty women in the front. And for an aching moment, she had an intense longing to hear American voices. She waved back and smiled. One of the men in uniform ran along beside them, and she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “Hi.”

“Are you American?” he asked in amazement, and the driver of the ambulance stopped and smiled. She thought he was cute. She was French.

“Yes,” Annabelle said, looking tired.

“When did you get here? I thought the nurses weren’t coming over till next month.” It had taken them longer to organize the women’s volunteer units than the conscripted men.

She laughed at the question. There was the sound of Boston in his voice, and she had to admit, it was nice to hear it. It felt like home. “I’ve been here for two years,” she said, smiling broadly. “You guys are late.”

“Like hell we are. We’re going to kick the Krauts right back to where they came from. They saved the best for last.” He looked like a kid and was, and as Boston Irish as they came, and it reminded her of her visits to Boston, and summers in Newport. She was suddenly homesick for only the first or second time in twenty-two months. She couldn’t even remember the last time she felt that way.

“Where are you from?” he asked her, as one of his friends chatted up the ambulance driver, on the other side of the truck, but they both knew they had to get back. It wasn’t right to hang around talking with them, with a dead man in the back, although others had done worse. At some point, the horrors of war no longer shocked you as they once did.

“New York,” Annabelle said quietly.

“I’m from Boston,” and as he said it, she could smell the alcohol on his breath. As soon as they left the camps where they were billeted, most of them drank a lot. They had good reason to. They drank, and chased every girl that crossed their path.

“I could tell,” she said, referring to his Boston accent, as she gave her colleague the signal to get started again. “Good luck,” she said to him and the others.

“Yeah, you too!” he said, and stepped back, and as they drove back to the hospital, a wave of nostalgia for her own country washed over her, and she had never been so homesick in her life. She missed everything familiar that she hadn’t seen or allowed herself to think about in two years. She sighed as the two of them carried the dead man on the gurney into the morgue. He would be buried on the hills with countless others, and his family notified. There was no way to send the bodies home. There were just too many of them. And makeshift cemeteries covered the countryside now.

Thinking of the Americans they had seen that afternoon, Annabelle went for a short walk that night, when she got off duty, before she went back to her room. They had lost every man they had driven back from the field hospitals that day. It had been depressing, and although it was a common occurrence, it upset her anyway. The boys were all so young, many of them years younger than she was. Even many of the nurses were younger than she was now. At twenty-four, with a year of medical school behind her, she didn’t feel like a young girl anymore. Too many difficult things had happened to her in the past few years, and she had seen far too much pain.

She was wandering along, thinking about her lost life in the States, with her head down, not far from her barracks, on the way back from her walk. It was after midnight, and she had been working since six o’clock that morning. She was tired and not paying attention, and she gave a start when she heard a British voice behind her.

“Hey, pretty girl,” he said softly. “What are you doing out alone?” She turned and was startled to see a British officer walking along the same path on his own. He had obviously been drinking, and had left a nearby bar without his companions. He looked very dashing in his uniform, and very drunk. He was a good-looking young man, about her own age, and he didn’t scare her, particularly once she saw that he was an officer. She had seen plenty of drunken men in the past two years, and she had never had any trouble keeping them in line.

“Looks like you need a ride,” she said with a matter-of-fact smile. “Go that way,” she pointed to one of the administration buildings where they often handled matters of that sort, since it was a common occurrence. It was wartime, after all, and they dealt with thousands of men on a daily basis, many of whom caroused at night. “Someone will give you a ride back to camp.” Particularly given that he was an officer, there would be no questions asked. Sometimes they gave the enlisted men a slightly rougher time. But officers were always given the respect due their rank. She could see from his uniform that he was a lieutenant, and hear from his accent that he was an aristocrat. It didn’t stop him from being as sloppy as anyone else while he was drunk, and he was reeling slightly as he looked at her.

“I don’t want to go back to camp,” he said stubbornly, “I’d much rather go home with you. What do you say, we stop off and have a drink? What are you anyway? A nurse?” He was looking down his nose at her somewhat haughtily, and trying to focus.

“I’m a medic, and you’re going to need one if you don’t go lie down somewhere.” He looked like he was about to pass out.

“Excellent idea. I suggest we lie down together.”

“That’s not an option.” She looked at him coolly, wondering if she should just walk away and leave him to it on his own. There was no one else on the path, but she wasn’t far from the barracks. By then, everyone had gone home for the night, except those who had the late shift and were driving ambulances or working in the wards.

“Who do you think you are anyway?” he asked, as he lurched forward to grab her, and she stepped back. He stumbled and nearly fell, and looked angry as he righted himself. “You’re nobody, that’s who you are,” he continued, looking suddenly nasty. “My father is the Earl of Winshire. And I am Lord Harry Winshire. I’m a viscount,” he said grandly, but slurring.

“That’s good to know, your lordship,” she said politely, responding to his rank and title. “But you need to get back to camp before you get hurt. And I’m going to my barracks. Goodnight.”

“Bitch!” he said, spitting the single word at her, as she moved past him. The exchange had gone on long enough, and she didn’t want to linger. He was obviously drunk, spoiled, and getting unpleasant from the quantities of alcohol he had consumed. She wasn’t afraid of him, she’d dealt with worse before, but she didn’t want to press her luck. But before she got more than a step farther on the solitary path, he grabbed her and spun her around hard into his arms and tried to kiss her. She pushed him away firmly and fought hard. He was surprisingly strong even though he was drunk.

“Stop that!” she said loudly. But she was shocked by his strength, and the force of his arms.

Suddenly she realized that she was being overpowered by him. He covered her mouth with one hand, and with the other dragged her to the dark doorway of a nearby barracks. There was no one around, and he was covering her mouth so hard that she couldn’t scream. She bit his fingers, but it didn’t deter him, and she fought like a cat, as he knocked her to the ground and lay on top of her with his full weight. He had knocked the wind out of her when she fell, and the hand not covering her mouth had yanked up her skirt and was pulling her underwear down. She couldn’t believe what was happening, and she used all her strength to fight him, but she was a small woman and he was a large, powerful man. And he was suddenly driven by rage and drink and was determined to have her. She had infuriated him by dismissing him before, and he was going to make her pay for it now. All she could see was the black fury in his eyes as he continued to grab her and press her down. He never took his one hand from her mouth, and all she could make were muffled guttural sounds that no one could hear.

The night was quiet all around them, except for the laughter of women and drunken shouts of men as they left the bars. Whatever sounds she made were far too slight for anyone to hear them, and there was terror in her eyes. By then he had unbuttoned his pants with his free hand, and she could feel him hard against her. What Josiah had never been able to bring himself to do, this drunken stranger was about to take from her by force. She did everything she could to stop him, to no avail. He kicked her legs apart with his own, and in an instant, he was inside her, pumping violently and groaning while she kept trying to fight him, but he pressed her hard to the ground, and each time he drove farther into her, she winced with pain, and he smashed her back against the doorstep where they lay. And in an instant it was over, he released himself with a shout, and then threw her away with such force that she lay huddled in the doorway like a battered doll. She couldn’t even scream then, or make a sound. She was too afraid to. She turned over, vomited, and choked on a sob. He stood up, buttoned his pants, and looked down at her with contempt.