Inside the house, Ian, Emma, and Delia jump when they hear the sound of the bombs.
Mrs. Walsh just sits still. It’s a sound she’s heard before, one she was expecting.
“Wha-” Ian says, his mouth open and his head turned towards the windows, wishing, desperately, that he could see out. “What was that?”
“Bombs, darling,” Mrs. Walsh says from her spot in her armchair by the unlit fire, her head resting back against the fabric, exhausted. “That is the sound of the battle beginning.”
Ian grimaces and Emma knows that he wishes, above all, that he could be there. Ian is a boy who needs to be in on the action – he will be absolutely restless until he feels that he’s at the center of it all, helping his side.
Keeping him here, safe and sound, is torture for him.
“Mom,” Emma says softly, turni
