It is a letter that starts tenderly if somewhat matter-of-factly: “My dearest, sorry this is in pencil but I’ve run out of ink.”
By the end, however, the author’s feelings are fully on show. “Oh darling,” he writes, “I’m so lonely without you.”
The anguished admission is contained withinin the letters of two wartime sweethearts discovered under the floorboards of a seaside hotel.
The handwritten notes were found along with a handful of other objects dating back to the Second World War during renovations at the Esplanade Hotel in Scarborough, North Yorkshire.
“Time doesn’t seem to go so quickly up here and the days drag,” the man – thought to be a soldier – writes in one. “And I suppose they’ll fly when I get home again.”
His beloved replies: “Wherever you may go, my darling, don’t forget that I love you more than anything else on earth.”
Handwritten poems, ticket stubs, cigarette packets and chocolate wrappers were also discovered under the venue’s utility floor.
Now historians are attempting to identify who exactly the loving couple were.
Scarborough Archaeological and Historical Society has been researching the material and said it dates back to between 1941 and 1944.
During that time, the hotel had been requisitioned by the military as accommodation for soldiers in training or between postings.
The only clue to the pair's names is an M where the woman had signed one letter – but the rest has been eaten by mice.
A return address on another note gave her address as 50 Dellburn Street in Motherwell, Lanarkshire.
Marie Woods, from the society, said: "When I first started going through the material and realised exactly what it contained I thought 'Oh my life these are stories about real people'. It's a real treasure trove find.”
She told the BBC: "The letters are extremely evocative and bring home the personal emotions of people who experienced the traumas brought about as a result of war.
"It would be truly wonderful, if by some miracle, we were able to find out more about these wartime sweethearts and their lives after the war."
