“She is, isn’t she?”

“What are you going to call her?”

“Elizabeth Annabelle Whitfield.” She and William had decided that long before, and she thought it suited the peacefully sleeping baby.

He left her after that, and came back again late that afternoon to see how they were doing. Phillip was watching the baby in fascination, but snuggling close to his mother.

Joachim brought flowers, and a big piece of chocolate cake, a pound of sugar, and another precious kilo of coffee. And she was sitting up in bed, looking surprisingly well considering all she’d been through. But this time had been easier than the first, and the baby weighed “only” nine pounds, Emanuelle announced as they all laughed. The near tragedy had ended well, thanks to Joachim. Even Emanuelle treated him kindly. And as Sarah looked at him, after Emanuelle left the room again, she knew that no matter what happened in their lives, she would always be grateful to him, and she would never forget that he had saved her baby.

“I’ll never forget what you did,” she whispered to Joachim as he held her hand. That morning, an undeniable bond had formed between them.

“I told you. It was God’s hand that touched her.”

“But you were there. … I was so frightened….” Tears filled her eyes as she remembered. She couldn’t have borne it if the baby had died. But he had saved her.

“I was frightened too,” he confessed to her. “We were very lucky” He smiled at her then. “Funnily enough, she looks a little like my sister.”

“Mine too,” Sarah laughed softly. They each had a cup of tea, and he had smuggled over a bottle of champagne, and he toasted her and the long life of Lady Elizabeth Annabelle Whitfield.

Eventually, he stood up to leave. “You should sleep now.” Without saying a word he stooped to kiss the top of her head. His lips brushed her hair, and he closed his eyes just for an instant. “Sleep, my darling,” he whispered, as she drifted off to sleep before he even left the room. She had heard what he said in the distance, but she was already dreaming of William.






Chapter 15





Y the summer of the following year, London had almost been destroyed by the constant bombing, but not the British spirit. She had had only two letters from William by then, smuggled in to her through circuitous routes in the Resistance. He insisted that he was well, and reproached himself repeatedly for not getting her out of France when he should have. And in the second letter, he rejoiced over the arrival of Elizabeth, after he had gotten Sarah’s letter. But he hated knowing that they were in France, and that there was no way for him to reach them. He didn’t tell her that he had explored numerous possibilities of being smuggled into France, at least for a visit, but the War Office had objected. And there was no way of getting Sarah out of France, either, for the moment. They just had to sit tight, he said, and he assured her that the war would soon be over. But it was a third letter from him in die fall that brought Sarah the news which almost killed her. But he hadn’t dared not to tell her, lest she heard the news some other way. Her sister Jane had written to him, since she knew she could not contact Sarah. Their parents had been killed in a boating accident off Southampton. They had been on a friend’s yacht when a huge storm had come up. The yacht had sunk, and all of the passengers on board had drowned before the Coast Guard could reach them.