Acts of Love and War by Maggie Brookes

Author:Maggie Brookes [Brookes, Maggie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780735246089
Publisher: Penguin Canada
Published: 2022-08-23T00:00:00+00:00

His letter plunged Lucy into anguish. She had failed to persuade either Jamie or Tom to return home. She had failed Mrs Murray. All she could do now was focus on the children and make sure she didn’t fail them too.

In the last days of July, a ship docked in Valencia with all Lucy needed for her holiday camp, and English lorries used by the Friends were despatched to collect it. Great sacks of beans, peas, lentils, rice and sugar were deposited from the Friends’ stores and half a dozen convalescing International Brigaders came down to the beach near Benidorm to unload the tents and poles, pots and pans, buckets, mattresses, cutlery and the cases of cocoa, dried milk, jam and bacon which Francesca had sent from England. There were also bats and balls, supplies for basketry and weaving, books, pens, crayons and paper. Juan, the sorrowful fisherman, came to help them. The empty beach was quickly transformed into what Lucy thought looked like a Scout camp as the soldiers and Juan erected tents, dug latrines and trenches for the stores, and built a central marquee, topped with palm leaves.

The International Brigaders pitched four tents for the girls under the pine trees, and three for the boys nearer to the shore. Lucy had her own small tent. When their work was done, the soldiers played in the sea, diving and splashing, carefree as children themselves for a few hours.

Lucy returned to Murcia to gather up the helpers she had identified. A young Spanish girl called Ana was the daughter of Protestant missionaries and she was already helping to teach the other children to read. Sixteen-year-old Juanita and her sister Carmelita had taken readily to the sewing and reading classes, but that wasn’t the principal reason Lucy wanted them with her. Juanita said she had been plump before the war, but deprivation had removed fat from her waist while leaving generous padding on her breasts and hips. Her long, dark, wavy hair fell over her shoulders and seemed to invite the eyes of young men to her opulent curves and tiny waist. Crowds of boys followed her around the Pablo Iglesias shelter nudging one another and calling out to her. The cheekiest pushed the bravest into her so they put out their hands to save themselves, colliding with her chest. Juanita snarled and spat at them which kept them in line, but it seemed only a matter of time before they would overcome her by sheer weight of numbers and surging testosterone. Her skinny younger sister Carmelita stuck close to her, guarding her and shoving away the troublesome packs of boys, but Lucy was keen to remove Juanita from danger.

She also chose two seventeen-year-old boys she liked – Julio and Alfonso. Julio was smart and respected by the other children while Alfonso was a slender, timid boy whose eyes glanced off Lucy’s in the manner of someone who has been teased or tormented and who longs to be invisible. He too might be better off in another environment, she thought.

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