You know, I’m content right now, but that contentment is as fragile as an egg. I’m cushioning it and trying to keep it from the booms and crashes across the channel. I’m so afraid something is going to crash so loud that it will reach clear across to my little island.

E

Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.

July 21, 1915


Dear Sue,

I have your picture propped up on my desk as I’m writing this, and I’m trying to imagine you reading my letter after it arrives. Your description—it didn’t do you justice. I don’t think I need to tell you how lovely you look to me.

But now, having seen your picture, I can see why your dad thought you looked like a fairy asleep in the garden. If I wasn’t certain you were bigger than my thumb, I should’ve guessed your dress was fashioned from rose petals and spiders’ webs. You look quite fey amid the blooms. And your expression is so wistful. What were you thinking of right then when the photo was snapped?

I didn’t realize the stories of my antics and asinine exploits were so important to you—“afloat in this sea of chaos”? I never hoped I could achieve more than a hearty chuckle or round of applause for the stunts I pull. I feel I have a lot to live up to now, but, as always, I’m up to the challenge. If you believe—


Since writing the above, something has happened. Harry let Lara into my room to surprise me and she spotted the letter on my desk. She snatched it and read it before I realized what was happening. Lara’s called the engagement off for good, in fact tossed the engagement ring in my wastebasket. She says she fancies I’m in love with you and she can’t compete with someone who’s been winning all along.

You know, for a girl who didn’t finish college, she’s quite smart.

David

Isle of Skye

4 August 1915


Davey, oh, Davey! You shouldn’t have written what you did. If you hadn’t written it, then I wouldn’t be in this quandary. I could go along, carrying my secrets. I would go on expecting to be a widow, checking the newspapers to see each fresh casualty list. You would go on being my cheerful correspondent, an admirer of my poetry, and an interesting friend. And now you’ve spoiled that with your last letter. You can never now be just my “interesting friend.”

What should I say? I should say that it’s terribly presumptuous of you to write to a married woman and claim to be in love with her. But what do I wish to say? I wish to say that I don’t think you would have written that if you weren’t somewhat sure of how I felt.

What was I thinking about when that photograph was taken? I thought you knew, Davey. I was thinking of you.

Sue

Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.

August 20, 1915


My dear Sue,

Do you realize how nervous I’ve been, waiting for your reply? If I were a betting man, I would’ve put a large wager on you not replying at all. But the small part of me that saw signs and portents in every letter you sent, the part of me that not only read between the lines but above and below, that part would have put a wager on you writing back and knowing exactly what I was talking about. I’m glad that part of me won the bet, for the prize is so much greater.

What happens now? If you lived down the street in Chicago, I’d ask you to dinner. Or maybe not. What does one do with a married woman, apart from leave her alone?

See, I’m going to make a muddle of this. Whatever “this” is. You’ve seen how I’ve been failing at just about everything I’ve set my mind to these days. A guy with nothing going for him but guts. Why would you want a guy like me?

Wondering, David

Isle of Skye

6 September 1915


Davey, Davey, Davey,

You’re not a worrier. Why are you thinking so hard about this? The past three years, we’ve let things fall as they may, and love happened. Do we need to plan out what comes next? Do we even need to know?

I hope you realise that I’ve never thought of you as “a guy with nothing going for him but guts.” If you only knew how you keep me going, how you keep me waking up, simply because I know you’re thinking of me. You moved me to write again when I thought my muse had fled. You reminded me that I’m not just a lonely recluse. I have something more now. I have you.

Do you really think you need to prove yourself to me? Do you think you have to do anything but continue to be there? That’s all I ask. Just be there.

Thinking of you, Sue

Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.

September 28, 1915


Sue,

So much has happened here. You’ll never guess—I’m going over to the front! Harry saw an ad for the American Ambulance Field Service, looking for volunteers to drive ambulances for the French Army. Wilson can’t get off his duff and let us Americans into the war, so we’ll have to find our own way in.

Think of it! Driving an auto as fast as I can, shells whizzing by overhead, men’s lives actually dependent on me driving as recklessly and as fearlessly as I can. Can you think of anything more perfect for me? I couldn’t manage as a teacher, but this… this I can do.

We don’t get paid, but I have a small trust fund set up by my grandfather. Harry has already said we’ll pool our resources once we get to France and, if we have to eat canned beans or brown bread or whatnot every day, so be it. No money forthcoming from my father!

Harry and I went over there for dinner last night to break the news. My mother left the table, dabbing at her eyes, and my father asked, “Why on earth are you going to France?” Harry leaned back in his chair and said, “Hell if I know. But it will be a damned fine adventure,” then saluted my father with his glass of Madeira. My father turned purple and I thought he would have an apoplexy.

We have a few things to do here. Have to get a typhoid inoculation, which will take a couple of weeks, and we’re waiting for official letters from the headquarters of the American Ambulance to send to the State Department. We’ll need letters of credit from our banks. We have supplies to get together (boots, sweaters, driving gloves), but we’ll get our uniforms in Paris. And photographs! I need a dozen or so copies of my passport photo for licenses and identification cards. So much to do and we’re trying to get it done as quickly as we can.

We officially sign on for a six-month term of service and can reenlist for three months at a time after that. Both Harry and I told them to count us in for at least a year. We’re not the kind of guys who do anything halfway.

I finally feel as if I’ve found my purpose in life, Sue, and I can hardly wait to get there!

Exuberant, Davey

Isle of Skye

15 October 1915


You stupid, stupid boy! Did you expect me to be happy about this plan of yours? With a husband at the front and a brother crippled from this blasted war, what on earth did you think I’d really say?

I don’t even understand why you’re doing this. What do you owe France? Or any other nation, for that matter? Why do you feel duty-bound to get involved in the foolishness on this side of the ocean? What makes you think this war has anything to do with you?

Did you stop to think for a moment about me in all this? How, only recently, I offered my heart up to you, tentatively, hesitantly, not trusting my own feelings but trusting you implicitly? And now you’ve trampled all over it in your haste to run off.

All I wanted was for you to be there. Why are you leaving?


Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.

October 31, 1915


Dear Sue,

I know you’re angry; please don’t be. Talk of “duty” and “patriotism” aside, how could you really expect me to pass up on this, the ultimate adventure?

My mother’s been floating around the house, red-eyed and sniffling. My father still isn’t speaking to me. And yet I feel like I’m doing something right. I messed up in college. I messed up at work. Hell, I even messed up with Lara. I was beginning to think there was no place in the world for a guy whose highest achievement included a sack full of squirrels. Nobody seemed to want my bravado and impulsivity before. You know this is right for me, Sue. You of all people, who seem to know things about me before I myself do. You know this is right.

I’m leaving tomorrow for New York and have to trust my mother to mail this letter. When you read it, I’ll be on a ship somewhere in the Atlantic. Even though we get a reduction on our fares if we sail the French Line, Harry and I are bound for England. He has Minna over there waiting for him. And I… I have you. Like knights of old, neither of us can head off to fight without a token from our love to tuck into our sleeve.

I’ll be landing in Southampton sometime in the middle of November and will be going up to London. Sue, say that you’ll meet me this time. I know it’s easy for me to ask, far easier than it is for you to leave your sanctuary there on Skye. Don’t let me go off to the front without having touched you for the first time, without having heard your voice say my name. Don’t let me go off to the front without a memory of you in my heart.

Yours… always and forever, Davey

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