A Memory Between Us Read Online Free PDF Page B

can almost smell the chalk dust.”
    But Jack looked to the top of the page where it read, “Dear Penny.” He tapped the name and gave her a smug smile.
    She flinched as if the letter had slapped her across the face.
    “Don’t worry,” he said in a low voice. “I won’t tell anyone.”
    “I don’t go by that name anymore. I hate it.”
    “Because of your hair?” It wasn’t a copper shade at all, more like the cherry wood cabinet in the parlor at home in Antioch, but kids still teased.
    “No, I just …”
    Jack had never seen her flustered before, a trait he found sweet and appealing. He gave her an encouraging smile.
    She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. “All right.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, and she leaned a bit closer. “My name’s Penelope Ruth, but I’ve gone by Ruth since I left home. I much prefer it.”
    “Ruth.” He savored the sound of her name and the presence of her face no more than a foot from his. “It fits you.”
    “It does?”
    Jack nodded, careful to maintain visual contact. “When was the last time you read the book of Ruth in the Bible?”
    Her gaze flitted to the letter in her hands. “Oh, a while, I guess.”
    “Read it again. She’s fascinating—strong willed, loyal to family, hardworking, and kind. Like another Ruth I know.”
    The Ruth he knew met his gaze again, her eyebrows raised. A ring of gold surrounded the pupils in her blue eyes, and Jack suspected a ring of gold surrounded her heart. He wanted to be the man to find it.

5
    June 5, 1943
    Ruth slipped Aunt Pauline’s letter into her cape pocket, passed precise military rows of the hospital’s Nissen huts, and rubbed the heel of her hand against her forehead. How on earth would she manage?
    Redgrave Hall stood to the west, but Ruth headed south across the road the ambulances used and entered a lightly wooded meadow and another world. How could one family own so much land? Two hundred acres? Stables, parks, lodges, kennels, even an orangery—imagine that—a greenhouse just for citrus.
    If Ruth had resources like that, she wouldn’t be in a fix.
    When Congress doubled Army nurse salaries in December, she thought her troubles were over. Even Aunt Pauline couldn’t complain about forty-two dollars a month. Surely that was plenty to feed and clothe eleven-year-old Maggie.
    Aunt Pauline, however, never seemed to be satisfied.
    Ruth sat on the grass by the lake that cut a stomach-shaped path across Redgrave Park. She hugged her knees to her chest, her dark blue cape tented around her against the gray chill.
    Somehow in the past she’d always had a reprieve. Aunt Pauline had made noise in the spring of ’41, but when Harold joined the Navy, Ruth was able to divide her salary in four instead of five. More noise in the spring of ’42, then a small pay raise in June. More noise in the fall, then December’s hefty raise.
    But now? Where would the money come from now? Promotions were meager in the Army Nurse Corps. All the nurses were second lieutenants except the chief nurse, a first lieutenant. At twenty-three, Ruth was too young and inexperienced to become a chief nurse.
    She’d always solved her own problems, but now she longed for advice, and she kept thinking about Major Novak.
    What was it about that man? She thought about him too often. Thank goodness he’d be discharged by the end of the month, and she’d never have to see him again. In the meantime, she could share her problem with him. He might be a pastor, but he wouldn’t say something hackneyed about waiting on the Lord. She couldn’t afford to wait.
    Her stomach twisted like the lake before her. How much time did she have? Today’s letter complained about how costly things were nowadays. Aunt Pauline’s grumblings would escalate—what sacrifices she made, she didn’t know how much longer she could manage, could Ruth spare any more? Last would come a chilling statement—what a shame it would be to send Maggie to the