Danielle Steel - Crossings

“You look like someone died.” George remarked on her mood again later that night. “I think you work too hard at that foolish Red Cross place.” And it was Saturday too. He disapproved of that even more than her working there on weekdays.

“What we do isn't foolish, Uncle George.”

“Then why do you look so depressed? You should be out having fun.” It was an old refrain between them now.

She smiled at him. At least he's stopped trying to fix her up with his friends’ sons. He had realized a year before that she wouldn't budge. All she lived for were the letters she got from Armand. They arrived dog-eared and limp, smuggled out through the Resistance in the South of France, and sometimes they were stalled for weeks before someone went to England or Spain, but eventually the letters reached her, and each time she would heave a sigh of relief and report to the girls that Papa was well. It still amazed George that she was so determined to hang in. There were plenty of women he knew who wouldn't have been as true. He had known some of them during the last war, he thought, smiling. But Liane was more like her father than like him. He admired it about the girl, although he thought her foolish too.

“You would have made a good nun, you know,” he teased her that night.

“Maybe I missed my calling.”

“It's never too late.”

“I'm in training now.” She always played dominoes with him and they bantered with each other night after night. It was hard to believe now that another Christmas was at hand, and she'd been in San Francisco for a year. It seemed as though the war had already gone on for a thousand years, actually more than two years in France, and Armand was still all right, she thanked God every night. He hinted now sometimes at the work he did, and she knew about André Marchand. But there was no sign anywhere that the war would end. The bombing in London still wore on, as the British carried on their brave fight, and although Germans were dying by the thousands behind Russian lines, they showed no sign of giving up the fight. And it all seemed very far from where she sat, until that same night, December 6, when she lay in bed, unable to sleep. She got up and walked around the silent house, thinking of Armand, and at last she wandered into the library and sat down at the desk. She liked writing to him late at night, it gave her more time to gather her thoughts, and she often did that. She hadn't slept well in months, and tonight she wrote for a long time, knowing that much of her letter to him would be blacked out. He could write to her through the underground, but she could not reach him by the same channels. Her letters had to reach him through the German censors in Paris. She tried to be aware of it as she wrote, and at last she yawned as she wrote the address, and stood looking out into the December night. And then, feeling better again, she went to bed.

But the next morning, she still had a troubled feeling as she rose. Her mind was filled with Armand, and she pored carefully over the paper as she always did, looking for reports of the war in Europe.

“Was that you I heard prowling around last night, Liane? Or was it a burglar?” He smiled at her over their breakfast on Sunday morning. He knew about her midnight forays now. The first time he had heard her, he had snuck out of his bedroom, holding a loaded handgun, and they had both screamed and jumped.

“It must have been a burglar, Uncle George.” “Did he get the Christmas presents?” Elisabeth bounded into the room. She was nine years old now, and the days of Santa Claus were over. She was far more concerned that a burglar might have made inroads in the enormous stack of presents gathering in an upstairs closet.

“I'll have to check.” Liane smiled at her daughter as she went out to the garden with her sister. They were happy in San Francisco, and although they still missed their father, they had adjusted well, and the ugliness that had struck diem in Washington had never happened here, thanks to George's caution in not referring to his niece's husband as a Nazi. Liane was grateful to him for that, and she left for her day at the Red Cross with a lighter step than she had the day before. She wondered how Nick was faring after the shock of losing custody of John, but she knew from her own sorrows that time had a way of softening life's blows. She was sure that it wouldn't be easy, but in time the agony would be less acute, just as it was now when she thought of him. He had stayed on her mind for a long time as she carried on her quiet life in San Francisco. She was often surprised at how near he seemed when she closed her eyes and remembered their crossing on the Deauville . But now he was beginning to seem like a distant dream. And sometimes at night, as she slept, her dreams of him would get confused with those of Armand, and she would awake not knowing where she was, or with whom, or how she had come there, until she looked out the window and saw the Golden Gate Bridge or heard the foghorns, and she would remember where she was, far from them all now. Nick was a part of the past, but a part she still cherished. He had given her something no one else ever had, and his words had stood her in good stead for the past year and a half. She had needed every ounce of the strength he had reassured her she had when they left each other. She needed it each time she waited three or four or five weeks for a letter from Armand, or read a news report that filled her with terror, or thought of Armand working with the Germans in Paris. She needed it every day, every hour, for herself, for the girls, even for Uncle George. And she needed it as she turned on the radio in her bedroom after returning from church with the children. She often listened to the radio, for the latest news, but as she did now she stood transfixed in the center of the room, unable to believe the words she was hearing. Six great battleships had been sunk or seriously damaged in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and the Air Corps was left with only sixteen serviceable bombers. The Japanese had made a surprise early-morning attack on Hawaii, leaving scores of dead and wounded, and there could be no doubt now, the United States had been pulled into the war with one swift, vicious gesture.

Her heart pounding, her face pale, Liane raced downstairs to find her uncle, and she saw him standing in the den, listening to the news himself, with tears streaming down his cheeks. For the first time in his life his homeland, the country he held so dear, had been invaded. Liane went soundlessly to him, and they clung together, listening to President Roosevelt's words a few moments later. There was no question about it. America was at war now. It remained only to be confirmed by the Senate the next morning, and three days later, on December 11, Germany and Italy declared war, and Congress passed a joint resolution accepting a state of war for the United States. For Americans, a new day had dawned, and a sad one. The entire country was still in turmoil over the attack on Pearl Harbor, yet everyone wondered if the Japanese would be even bolder, attacking major cities on the mainland. Suddenly nothing was certain or safe.

n the morning of December 7 all was panic in New York too, but the terrors were not quite as acute as they were on the West Coast. Hawaii was a little remote, although the realization that America's shores had been attacked brought everyone to a screeching halt that morning. And Roosevelt's announcement to the nation, declaring war, was almost a relief. The United States could roll up its sleeves and fight back. The Americans’ only hope was that the Japanese wouldn't get to them first, and attack the rest of the country as they had Pearl Harbor.