He felt sick as he stepped into the cattle lot and got a close look of Joseph Moennig. The side of Joseph’s face was so white it seemed to reflect the hot, late-morning sun.
Red dropped awkwardly to his good knee next to his friend and gently rolled him to his back. Joseph stared without sight toward Heaven—his new home.
“Roberta Moennig.”
Bertie caught her breath, and looked up at Franklin.
“Yessir,” she said, taking care to turn off the lathe and keep her hands away from the moving parts. Her wound was beginning to ache as the pain killer wore off.
Franklin’s broad face didn’t have the usual scowl she’d come to know and dislike. When she met his eyes, he looked away. Then she realized he’d called her by her real name instead of hillbilly.
“You want something?” she asked.
“Your injury doing okay?” he asked, his voice still gruff, but sounding almost sincere.
“I’m fine.”
She started to return to her work, but then he spoke again. “You need to report to the front office. Talk to Charlotte.”
She stared at him as a chill traveled across her shoulders and down her arms. “What’s she want to see me for?”
He avoided her look. “You’ve…got a call.”
“What kind of a call?” Had he actually followed through with this morning’s threat to dismiss her?
It couldn’t be. Franklin enjoyed firing people, didn’t he? Right now, he didn’t look as if he was enjoying himself too much.
“Just get to the office,” he muttered, turning away.
She nodded and left her worktable. She refused to beg. If she got fired, she’d find another job easily enough. Hughes Aircraft wasn’t the only place in town that could use a trained machinist.
Still, she wished she’d watched her mouth a little closer with Franklin this morning. Sass and vinegar weren’t always a good thing.
Minutes later, she stepped into the business office, abuzz with so many typewriters clattering and telephones ringing. Most folks in the plant wanted an office job, but not Bertie. Give her a machine over a typewriter any day. Machine work made more sense to her, and she loved operating a lathe, forming the parts that would be used to build the airplanes that would help win the war. She felt she was doing something useful. Of course, the people working in the office were useful, too.
If she couldn’t work with machines in the shop, give her a barn full of milking cows rather than a typewriter in a stifling office. In fact, she’d pretty much prefer anything over being cooped up in an office all day.
A woman with dark hair tied severely away from her face was the first person Bertie encountered when she walked through the door. The woman didn’t stop typing, didn’t even look up, when Bertie approached her desk.
“Help you?” the woman asked.
Bertie paused, waiting for eye contact.
When the woman finally looked up, her fingers continued their clattering across the typewriter keys. “What do you need?” she snapped.
“I’m Roberta Moennig, and I was told to report to Charlotte. You care to point her out to me?”
The woman’s eyes widened, and she stopped typing. The sharpness vanished. “I’m Charlotte,” she said in a voice suddenly gone soft. She paused, eyeing Bertie. “Why don’t you have a seat, Roberta.” She pointed toward the chair in front of her desk, then picked up a telephone receiver from the desktop and handed it to her.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, placing a hand on Bertie’s shoulder before rising from her chair and walking away.
Bertie stared after her in confusion, aware that others in the office had stopped their work and shot glances toward her. Something wasn’t right.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Hello?” she said into the telephone receiver. “Who is this?”
“Bertie? It’s me. It’s Red.”
Her mouth dropped open, and she gasped. It was him! Here she’d been thinking about him and…“Red! Where are you? I’ve not heard from you in so long I was beginning to wonder if you were okay. What’s…why are you…” She frowned. “Are you okay? Why are you calling me in the middle of the—”
“I’m…home.” His voice was gentle, uncommonly soft. “I’m back home in Hideaway.”
“For good? You’ve been released?”
“I’ve been discharged.”
“I wondered if they’d send you home after Germany’s surrender, but since I never heard a word from you in six full weeks, I couldn’t help wonderin’—”
“Bertie, we’ll have a long talk about that later, but I didn’t call to talk about me right now.” He paused. “Ma picked me up at the train station, and we stopped by your Pa’s place to check on him.” Another pause.
Bertie leaned forward. She hated the solemn sound of Red’s voice. “What is it? Is Dad all right? Is he sick?”
“Bertie, I’m sorry. I…” He cleared his throat. “I found him…he’s gone.”
Chapter Eight
For a moment, Bertie didn’t grasp what Red meant. She was dreaming—or this wasn’t really Red. It was some kind of practical joke.
“I don’t understand,” she said, hearing the tremor in her own voice. “H-how can you find him if he’s gone?”
“I found his body.”
She shook her head, unable to let the words sink in. It couldn’t be…She’d been worried about him last night when he didn’t answer her call, but this?
“Bertie? You there? You okay?”
She closed her eyes and swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, Red, I didn’t—”
“Your father’s—he’s dead,” Red said. “I found him myself, out in the cattle lot behind the barn.”
She gasped, and her vision went dark for a moment. She became aware of someone standing beside her with a hand on her shoulder, placing a glass of water on the desk in front of her. She looked up to see her friend and roommate, Edith Frost, looking down at her, dark hair mussed, dark eyes narrowed in concern.
“What’s the water for? And what’re you doing here?” Edith should be home asleep. Her shift wouldn’t begin for a few more hours.
“Charlotte called me,” Edith whispered. “She wanted me to be here for you.”
“Bertie?” Red said, his voice growing gruffer. “You okay?”
“Yes, I’m…I’ll…”
“What’s happening out there?” he asked.
“Would you just…give me a minute?” She closed her eyes. “Oh, Dad,” she whispered.
It was true. It must be. But reality clashed hard against denial. “No, this can’t be,” she whispered. “Not Dad. He wasn’t fighting in the war.”
“He’s been fighting a war, all right,” Red said.
“How?” she asked. “What happened to him?”
“I wish I knew for sure.”
“What do you mean? Was he sick? What happened?”
“There looks to be a…an injury to the side of his head.”
She frowned. “And he was in the cattle