Dishonoring Jack

Chapter Three

 "Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry," Corrie murmured, touching Jack's arm and pausing in their promenade. "I know what Roy used to mean to you."

Jack forced herself out of her reverie--this wasn't like her, to be so lost in the clouds, and she rather hated it. "That's not what bothers me, Corrie. I mean, of course I'm saddened. He was not always so reprobate as in recent years, and I don't wish to see anyone die in the Great War."

"Of course not."

"At least it wasn't David."

Corrie sighed, thinking certainly, of her recently infirm sister with the beau fighting in France. "At least it wasn't David."

If David were to be killed in the conflict, Both Jack and Corrie feared that the demise of Christina's beloved would bring an irreversible recurrence of the dreaded pneumonia that had previously threatened her life.

"But what is it that weighs so heavily on your mind, Jack?" Corrie inquired.

"Oh, it's just the musings of a half-crazed spinster, I suppose," Jack said with a sigh. "When I ended the engagement, I suppose I thought I would lead a life of wild adventure and meaning and purpose, but I can hardly see that life when I look back now. I ended the engagement for this very purpose, but what have I done? What have I seen of the world?"

"Jack, you've traveled all over the East Coast!" said Corrie. "And you know more about animals and birds and plants than most scientists, I would imagine. You've done far more in your life than many."

"But that's not--it's not enough!" Jack cried in frustration, balling her small hands into fists. "Perhaps it would be enough for a lesser woman with smaller ambitions and a meaner imagination, but not for me."

"What is there to be done?" Corrie asked, her realism expressed in the frown of her small, delicate features. "I'm sorry, Jack, but I can't imagine a solution."

"There's nothing to be done now," Jack confessed. "I haven't the means or the opportunity to travel with the War, and I can't abandon my post at the factory. But someday--perhaps when this blasted war ends--maybe I'll go somewhere, do something, have some great adventure."

Corrie smiled at the fantastical ravings of her aunt. "Why, that would be grand, Jack. And I'm relieved to know you are not too grieved by Roy's death."

Jack sighed and looked down at her boots as she walked--of course she grieved for him, but her thoughts did not long dwell on the past when the present was so sunny and strong. "Yes, well, there's nothing to be done for him now though his sister blames me for his illegalities."

"Margaret?" Corrie asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Indeed. She nearly shot my hat off when I went to deliver the letter!"

"Oh, Jack, you should have left the task for Mr. Blackaby. You know those Hunts hate you. They all say that you thought you were to good for the likes of them when you ended the engagement."

Jack laughed--her reputation for having unsavory friends must have soon demolished that argument. Everyone in Irvington knew that Jack would befriend whomever she so desired, regardless of race, reputation, or social standing.

"Perhaps it wasn't my wisest decision to venture to the Hunt homestead alone, but I couldn't break protocol. The letter needed to be delivered, and I was the one to do it, so I did."

"And you could have died," Corrie said, one hand on her hip. Though the young woman was only in her early twenties, she had the wisdom, pragmatism, and forbearance of a woman much her elder.

"I also could have died when that half-crazed lunatic nearly ran me over in the street," Jack exclaimed, flinging her arm towards the main road.