Utter relief

The day's salt-dry, sunburnt seventeen-mile journey by foot led to darkness. Selena remembered just forty-eight hours ago, in the protective confines of her own home, encased in the loving embrace of deep red brocade draperies, dark mahogany floors, thick wood furniture, marble bathrooms and kitchen -- the chestnut-scented fireplace warming their hearts -- and now, this, running from the war, escaping the enemy army's siege of the city where she'd lived and loved since her marriage just five years ago. But Hamish had died just six months into the war, leaving her a city widow, their boy not yet born. Now she made her frenzied way along the oft-traveled path -- this time by foot, not by the luxury of a carriage as many times before.

Selena, her 4-year old boy, her ailing sister-in-law, her popeyed maidservant, they would all find comfort and company in her family's country home, the white mansion anchored into the ground between two endless rows of oak trees. Mother would give her sister-in-law the guest room, nurse her to recovery. Papa would play with her son, frightened to death by the bombs and the shells, make him laugh and forget the nightmares that plagued his every night -- until the bombs stopped, the silence even more frightening, not knowing what the enemy planned, whether to ambush the city itself or to retreat to fight a different battle. Her sisters, coquettish in their pursuit of country gentlemen, would give her all the county gossip, safe in the quiet of the country, the happy embrace of the home, the family where Selena had spent her life before Hamish took her to town.

The four of them ached and moaned, reaching the top of the final incline that would bring the house and its oaks into view -- but darkness played tricks on their eyes, dizzy from a day's walk with no food and very little water -- Selena certain she could see only the vacant shell of a house, the two rows of oaks little more than stumps and leafless branches, alarming for the hot September they'd just encountered. They walked further on, down the hill and up the avenue -- no sign of life, no light in the house, just a black void with a roof. Ominous and lurid shadows cast from the trees, from picket fences collapsed on their sides. Selena broke free from her son's hand, her sister-in-law's arm, and ran the remaining two hundred feet.

Utter relief – the house had made it! The front door opened without turning the knob -- emptiness, scattered, broken furniture in the wide foyer where music once played. She darted into the dining room where feasts of roast beef, turkey, and ham, the smell of roasted chestnuts and sweet potatoes in the air had once made their mark -- no table, no shining silver, just an empty void -- even the portrait of her grandparents gone. She turned back, crossed the hall, and into the salon -- no portieres, no settees, no tables -- not a thing remained in this room but emptiness. Mother? Papa? Her sisters, where had they all gone? All gone, the seventeen mile journey that had brought the four of them from the hell of the city into this final abyss, abandoned and hopeless.