John Donne, Songs and Sonnets LAURA’S STORY At breakfast one morning near the end of June, Mr Brownlow, flicking through the post, a weary look on his face, let out an animated ‘Aha! It’s a letter from Tom,’ he explained cheerfully. He slit open the envelope and began to read. Then: ‘Dora!’ he...
Vanessa rarely seemed in the mood for conversation, but she was pleased when Agnes offered to read to her to pass the time. The girl tried out some short stories by Thackeray and Dickens, but Vanessa complained that they made her head ache so. In the end, it proved, the only literature tolerable ...
From there, another train took them back to Paris. The train they’d been on,’ she added quickly, seeing Fay’s expression of surprise, ‘had been damaged in the air raid, and anyway would not have been able to continue because of the fighting ahead. The German forces were tightening their noose aro...
If she left the office at five, she was usually safely on the bus at five past for the sleepy stop-start journey from Trafalgar Square to Camden High Street. It was partly the anticipation of seeing her baby that made her happy, but sitting on the bus was also one of her few opportunities to be q...