though he doesn't like her....

iv

Five months later.

The Manor, Wyck-on-the-Hill, Gloucestershire.

_May 30th, 1915._

My darling Anne,--Queenie will have told you about Colin. He was
through all that frightful shelling at Ypres in April. He's been
three weeks in the hospital at Boulogne with shell-shock--had it
twice--and now he's back and in that Officers' Hospital in
Kensington, not a bit better. I really think Queenie ought to
get leave and come over and see him.

Eliot was perfectly right. He ought never to have gone out. Of
course he was as plucky as they make them--went back into the
trenches after his first shell-shock--but his nerves couldn't
stand it. Whether they're treating him right or not, they don't
seem to be able to do anything for him.

I'm writing to Queenie. But tell her she must come and see him.

Your loving

Adeline Fielding.

Three months later.

The Manor, Wyck-on-the-Hill, Gloucestershire.

_August 30th._

Darling Anne,--Colin has been discharged at last as incurable.
He is with me here. I'm so glad to have him, the darling. But
oh, his nerves are in an awful state--all to bits. He's an utter
wreck, my beautiful Colin; it would make your heart bleed to see
him. He can't sleep at night; he keeps on hearing shells; and if
he does sleep he dreams about them and wakes up screaming. It's
awful to hear a man scream. Anne, Queenie must come home and
look after him. My nerves are going. I can't sleep any more than
Colin. I lie awake waiting for the scream. I can't take the
responsibility of him alone, I can't really. After all, she's
his wife, and she made him go out and fight, though she knew
what Eliot said it would do to him. It's too cruel that it
should have happened to Col-Col of all people. _Make_ that woman
come.

Your loving

Adeline Fielding.

Nieuport. _September 5th, 1915._

Darling Auntie,--I'm so sorry about dear Col-Col. And I quite
agree that Queenie ought to go back and look after him. But she
won't. She says her work here is much more important and that
she can't give up hundreds of wounded soldiers for just one man.
Of course she is doing splendidly, and Cutler says he can't
spare her and she'd be simply thrown away on one case. They
think Colin's people ought to look after him. It do