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    Hush: A Short Story from Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War
    Hush: A Short Story from Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War
    Hush: A Short Story from Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War
    Ebook65 pages55 minutes

    Hush: A Short Story from Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War

    By Hazel Gaynor

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    About this ebook

    New York Times bestselling author Hazel Gaynor captivates with a beautifully rendered short story about the strength of a mother’s love as the Great War comes to an end at last . . .

    As the final moments tick down to the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, signaling the end of fighting, midwife Annie Rawlins is doing everything she can to save an infant’s life. Too many have lost too much and Annie prays that the time for sorrow has passed. Meanwhile across the fields of France her son, Will, is on patrol one last time, clinging to thoughts of home and doing all he can to make it there. As the Armistice bells ring out, Annie and Will must fight one last time to grasp the hope of a new life and a new day.

    Originally published in the moving collection Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War, this e-book also includes an excerpt from Gaynor’s new novel, The Girl from The Savoy, coming in June 2016.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateMay 17, 2016
    ISBN9780062476609
    Hush: A Short Story from Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War
    Author

    Hazel Gaynor

    Hazel Gaynor is an award-winning, New York Times, USA Today, and Irish Times, bestselling author of historical fiction, including her debut THE GIRL WHO CAME HOME, for which she received the 2015 RNA Historical Novel of the Year award. THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPER'S DAUGHTER was shortlisted for the 2019 HWA Gold Crown award. She is published in thirteen languages and nineteen countries. Originally from Yorkshire, Hazel lives in Ireland with her family.

    Read more from Hazel Gaynor

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      Book preview

      Hush - Hazel Gaynor

      Dedication

      For Dad and Grandpa Tom.

      With love.

      Contents

      Dedication

      Hush

      Buy Link to Fall of Poppies

      An Excerpt from The Girl from The Savoy

      About the Author

      Also by Hazel Gaynor

      Credits

      Copyright

      About the Publisher

      Hush

      Monday, November 11, 1918

      10:58 A.M.

      ANNIE RAWLINS STOOPS OVER THE PALE, LIFELESS FORM AT the foot of the bed, her back turned to the narrow lattice window of the station master’s cottage. She checks the small watch pinned to her apron and notes the time. Time is everything now. Time is what the infant doesn’t have; what none of them have had since the war started. Too often, Annie has seen how everything can change in an instant: a gas attack, a sniper’s bullet, a shell explosion, the dreaded telegram from the War Office: The King commands me to assure you of the true sympathy of His Majesty and the Queen in your sorrow. Another son, lost. Another mother’s heart, shattered. Moments that arrive in a sudden second and roar endlessly on, forever affecting the remaining fragments of a broken life.

      She looks at the helpless infant. A child, much longed for. A life, slipping silently away. She takes a deep breath, gathers her thoughts, and draws on all her years of experience.

      Come along now, she urges, working quickly to clear the mouth and nose. "Breathe, won’t you. You must breathe."

      The weak winter sun flickers against the rain-speckled glass at the window, hesitant to come inside. If only it would. Annie is certain that everything would be all right then. "Everything feels better with the sun on your face. Don’t you think, Mam? She sees her boys standing by the back door. Jack, the eldest, has his eyes closed. A carefree smile at his lips as the autumn sun bathes his face in a soft buttery glow. So handsome in his uniform. And there’s Will, kicking at the dirt, his eyes red with angry tears because he is too young to go. It’s not fair. I always miss out on the fun. She wraps her arms around him, hugging him tight to her, nuzzling her nose into his thick black hair. She is glad of his tears; glad he cannot go. It’ll all be over by Christmas," Jack had said as he’d kissed her good-bye on the station platform.

      It’ll all be over by Christmas.

      For Jack, it was. His war was over before most men had even arrived to fight. She sees his face and hears his voice as clearly as if he were standing beside her now. But he isn’t. Never will be. There’s only Will now. Out there. Somewhere in France. That’s what his letters say. How her arms ache to hold him. She would fight for him if she could, would become his bones, his skin, his very breath, if only he could come home safe to her.

      Sensing the long shadows cast by her boys’ absence and Annie’s fear for the infant, the sun creeps quietly away from the station master’s cottage. It ducks behind a cloud, drawing the pale yellow light from the room. The fragile life in front of Annie fades with it.

      She struggles on. Come along now, she urges. "You’ve got to fight. You have to. You must breathe. Breathe."

      The infant’s appalling silence fills the room like an autumn mist rolling down the valley, drifting away from the tiny form to settle uncomfortably against the framed pictures of stern-looking men and women on the oak chest, against the rose-patterned ewer on the night stand, against the faded hearth rug and the splintered floorboards, against the distempered walls and the blackened grate of the smoldering fire; the simple possessions of a hardworking, loving family. The simple possessions of a man who valued life too much to fight. Annie knows the names they call him. Conchie. Feather Boy. She has watched this family’s suffering and wishes them no ill. Death doesn’t belong here. Not today.

      The silence is disturbed momentarily by the mother’s soft moans. My child. Where’s my baby? Why doesn’t it cry? Her words drift through the fog of laudanum that clouds her mind, her questions a broken

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