The army had to be informed, compassionate leave applied for, a funeral arranged. Somehow these things were done, somehow they lived, breathed, ate – did they? Somehow. Dymphna’s sister came from across London to comfort the distraught family. Ann, who was kindly and of a practical nature, took in the whole situation and insisted that Molly stay until after the funeral. ‘The poor girl’s got nowhere to go,’ Molly heard her say to Dymphna, ‘and the state of her, she looks half mad.’ ‘Well he was her future husband,’ Dymphna said, in a tear-thickened voice. ‘Now it’s all taken away from her – from us all.’ Sometimes she’d say, ‘When they join up you’re always afraid for them. But it shouldn’t have happened like that, not like that.’ They all kept inside, the curtains half drawn, Fred smoking silently, Dymphna with rosary beads in her hands, lips moving constantly, the hours swimming by somehow. Molly was too lost and bewildered by the shock of her grief to take in how kind they were – Ann kept them all fed and supplied with cups of tea, and she and the two girls tried to help, but then one would start crying and they’d all set each other off.
