The Child Left Behind by Anne Bennett Page A

damaged giving birth to Yvette. There will be no sons for my father. She feels that she has failed him.’
    Finn could understand only too well what a blow that would be. Farmers felt the same about sons. They often wanted a fine rake of sons to ensure continuity on the farm and yet only the first son inherited. On the death of the father, the others, who had often grafted all their lives, had to then make their own way in the world, and yet to have no sons at all would be hard on any man.
    ‘My father says that Yvette and I will have to make good marriages,’ Gabrielle continued. ‘What is even scarier, he keeps hinting that he has someone in mind for me already. Isn’t that a dreadful thought?’
    ‘It is indeed,’ Finn said. ‘Surely your husband is your choice.’
    ‘He should be,’ Gabrielle said. ‘But six days a week I am either in the shop with my mother, or else in the bakery with my father. I see no one but customers, and apart from going to Mass my only outing is a walk with my sister on Sunday afternoon if the weather allows. We go to bed at half-past eight,’ she added contemptuously. ‘What sort of time is that for a girl of my age?’
    ‘Well,’ said Finn, ‘we don’t keep late hours in the country, with cows to milk early, but half-pasteight seems ridiculous. Why have you to go to bed at such an hour?’
    ‘Because my father goes at that time so that he is up before dawn to light the ovens,’ Gabrielle said. ‘When he goes to bed, we all have to go to bed. Even Saturday night, when he goes into the town himself, as the bakery is closed on Sunday, he still wants us in bed at the same time. We stay up a bit later with Maman, but not too long, for she would get in trouble if he found out and we are never sure when he will be in.’
    ‘I can understand how frustrating you would find that,’ Finn said.
    Gabrielle went on, ‘In the summer with the windows open I can often hear the sounds of merriment in the streets below and sometimes I long to join in and meet up with people my age. I could easily, for there is a tree just outside my window I could climb down. I wouldn’t dare, of course, because Father would be bound to find out. Sometimes, though, I am so restless and the room so stuffy I have climbed into the branches of the tree to feel the breeze on my face. I always wait until Yvette is asleep to do this.’
    ‘You must be careful that you don’t fall.’
    ‘Oh, no, it is a safe old tree.’
    ‘You must keep safe always,’ Finn said in a voice made husky with emotion. ‘I would hate anything to happen to you.’
    ‘My dear, darling Finn…’ Gabrielle said softly. Then she added, ‘Just think, if I hadn’t met youalmost accidentally and we had set up these meetings, we would never had got to know each other.’
    ‘That is a dreadful thought,’ Finn said. ‘Because I am sure that I love you. If there was no war on, then I would take you away from here and we could get married.’
    ‘And I would go with you anywhere,’ Gabrielle said.
    ‘I don’t feel I have the right to ask you to wait for me till the war is over, though,’ Finn said, and a frown creased his forehead.
    ‘Why ever not?’ Gabrielle asked.
    ‘Well, you are young and—’
    ‘Haven’t you listened to a word I’ve said?’ she demanded. ‘I know what it is to love someone and that someone is you. I will wait for you as long as it takes. All I ask is that you come back to me safe and sound and I will go to the ends of the earth with you if you ask me to.’
    ‘What of your father?’
    ‘He can plot and plan all he likes, but he cannot make me marry anyone if I refuse, and I promise you with all my heart that I will only ever marry for love, and my love is you, my darling, Finn.’
    Finn kissed Gabrielle that day when they parted, but though it was on the lips it was a chaste kiss. His desire for Gabrielle was mounting daily but he knew that he had to proceed carefully. She was pure and innocent, and