It was a speech, from rote, and the young man knew it. A shadow passed across his face. Of course it did, the poor darling—he only had one chance to interact with her, only one thing he could decently say: that he loved her music, that it took him away from this place, from this night, one week before shipping overseas to the Western Front, where young men like him died in droves, and that she, she, had given him this indescribable gift of escape, all the while being so sincere and fascinating in her absorption in the music. Propriety allowed him only to tell her that he enjoyed her playing, when he wanted to say so much more, and the one thing he dared hope was that she would feel how desperately he meant it.
And her eyes, he now discovered, were wide and deep, rimmed with long black lashes.
Poor James.
Hazel knew she’d gotten it wrong. She swallowed her fear and looked into his eyes.
“Truly,” she said, “thank you.”
The shadow passed. “My name is James.” He offered her his hand.
She took it, warm and dry, in hers and wished she didn’t have a pianist’s wiry, muscular thumb and fingers. Incidentally, that is not at all how James perceived her hands.
“And you?” He smiled. Never mind Hazel; I nearly swooned myself.
She blushed. If she did any more blushing, her cheeks might spontaneously combust. “I’m Hazel,” she said. “Hazel Windicott.”
“I’m glad to meet you, Miss Windicott.” James etched her name into permanent memory. Hazel Windicott. Hazel Windicott.
“And you, Mr. James,” replied the piano girl.
He smiled again, and this time dimples appeared in his cheeks. “Just James,” he said. “My last name is Alderidge.”
The stout woman running the entertainment, one Lois Prentiss, came bustling over to see why the music had stopped. An older woman, a favorite of mine named Mabel Kibbey, popped up like a gopher in a hole.
“Miss Windicott has worked hard all evening,” she said. “I’m sure she’d like a moment’s rest. I’ll play for a spell. I think I know some tunes the young folks will like.”
Before Hazel could protest, Mabel Kibbey had pried her out from the piano and pushed her toward James. “Go dance,” she said. In a blink, James led Hazel to the edge of the dance floor and offered her his arm. Dazzled by the pink spots on James’s cheeks, just above the dimples, she placed her left hand upon James’s tweed shoulder and rested her right hand in his.
Mabel Kibbey struck up a slow waltz. James pulled Hazel as close as he dared.
“I’m afraid I don’t really know how to dance,” confessed Hazel. “There’s a reason I stay behind the piano.”
James stopped immediately. “Would you rather not dance?”
Hazel fixed her gaze on his necktie. “No, I’d like to. But you mustn’t laugh at me.”
“I wouldn’t,” he said seriously. He slid back into the music.
“When I trip and fall, then?” She hoped this would come across as a bit of a joke.
He pressed his hand a shade more firmly into her back. “I won’t let you fall.”
Nor did he.
James, in fact, was a fine dancer, not showy, but graceful. Hazel wasn’t, but she was musical enough to find the beat. James supplied the dancing. She only needed to follow along.
I sat next to Mabel Kibbey on the bench and watched. This dance could be a beginning, or an end, depending on a thousand things. Could they speak? Would one speak too much? Or say something stupid? Should I do something?
“They’ll be all right,” Mabel said, casting a glance my way.
“Why, Mabel Kibbey,” I whispered, “can you see me?”
She flipped the page of her music. “I’ve always seen you,” she said. “You’re looking especially well tonight.”
I gave her a squeeze about the waist. “You’re a darling.”
She twinkled. “It’s nice to know you’re still here for the young people,” she said. “This dreadful war. How they need you now.”
“Not only the young.” I nodded in the direction of a spry older gentleman, seated across the room. “Would you like me to make you an introduction tonight?”
Mabel laughed. “No, thank you.” She sighed. “I’ve had my day.”
We both saw, then, a faded wedding photograph, an empty chair, and a gravestone.
“Who’s to say you can’t have another day?” I asked her.
She reached a repeat and flipped her page back. “You go see about Miss Hazel.” So I did.
They had covered the basics: She was eighteen. He was nineteen. Hazel, only child, from Poplar, daughter of a music hall pianist and a seamstress. Done with school, practicing full-time and preparing to audition for music conservatories. James, from Chelmsford, older brother to Maggie and Bobby. Son of a mathematics instructor at a secondary school. He, himself, worked for a building firm. Or had, until now. He was in London, staying with an uncle. Here to see about his uniform and kit, before reporting for duty in a week, to be stationed in France.
The war.
You had to walk into the room then, Ares. A final ending, a permanent goodbye.
Yet you were the reason everyone was there. The war was in every sermon, every street sign, every news report, every prayer over every bland and rationed meal.
And so James went from stranger to patriot, hero, bravely shouldering his duty to God, King, and Country.
Hazel went from stranger and pianist to reason why the war mattered at all, symbol of all that was pure and beautiful and worth dying for in a broken world.
When I found them, their heads were nestled together like a pair of mourning doves.
James, the soul of politeness, wouldn’t dream of drawing Hazel too close on a first dance. Which was not to say he wouldn’t like to. But Hazel, baffled by finding herself so safe and warm in the arms of this beautiful young man, realized, when the song ended, that she’d been resting her forehead against his cheek. That cheek, she had wanted to caress, and now, in a way, she’d done it. She began to be embarrassed, but as the other dancers applauded, James cradled her in his arms, and she knew she didn’t need to apologize.
Lois Prentiss began to boom out her thanks for all who’d made the evening a success, but Mabel Kibbey, with a wink at me, cut her off by starting a new song, even more tender than the first. While other couples jockeyed to find partners, Hazel and James found each other wordlessly, having never broken apart, and danced the entire dance, their eyes closed.
If I couldn’t knit these two together by the end of a second dance, Zeus might as well make Poseidon the god of love, and I’d go look after the fishes.