‘Look,’ Scarlet said, distracted at the sight of more women running down the road towards them. The trucks slowed and Scarlet realised it wasn’t just women, but children, too. ‘Are they running for us?’
‘Look over there!’ the nurse on her other side said. ‘They’re all waving, even from the fields!’
Scarlet admired all the women working on the farms, keeping the crops growing while the men were away. ‘Are they Women’s Land Army, do you think?’
‘I’m certain they are. Hello!’ the other nurse called out, waving back excitedly.
As some of the open-sided trucks slowly moved closer to one group of women, Scarlet could hear what they were shouting.
‘It’s our girls in there! Our girls are in the convoy!’
‘It is our girls!’
Her heart leapt. She didn’t know these people, but they were so excited to see them. Now she knew why they’d come running, because surely they were used to the sight of army convoys by now. She could see now that many of the older women had tears streaming down their cheeks; strong women who’d probably never shed tears so openly before were now weeping along the roadside.
‘God bless!’ someone called.
God bless us all, Scarlet thought. A thrill passed through her, but there was definitely terror building up inside of her as well. Terror at the unknown, excitement at what was to come, hope that she might find Thomas, or at least some clue to his location, and fear of what she might be faced with. Of the truth.
‘I miss my mother so badly, seeing all these women,’ Ellie murmured from beside her.
Scarlet sat back and shut her eyes for a moment, overwhelmed.
‘I miss everything about home,’ she whispered.
She reached for Ellie’s hand and the nurse beside her suddenly clutched her other hand. They all sat in silence as they eventually passed all the well-wishers, the truck speeding up and taking them closer and closer to Sussex.
Scarlet looked up as the sun filtered through the clouds above, before turning her attention to the neatly packed tent on the ground in front of her. Watching someone else put it up had looked simple, but doing it herself was another matter entirely.
‘We’re going to freeze,’ she announced.
Ellie pulled a face. ‘I know. And to think I’ll have to cuddle up to you in the night when I get cold!’
Scarlet laughed. Trust Ellie to lighten the mood when she was feeling dismal.
‘I’m not Doctor Black, but I promise I don’t snore,’ Scarlet teased her back.
Ellie pretended to swoon. ‘Oh, well if you were Doctor Handsome . . .’ She burst out laughing, but the laughter only lasted until Scarlet held up part of the tent, trying to figure it out.
‘Come on, let’s get this over with.’
They fumbled their way through putting up the tent, helped by an orderly who was going around assisting all the nurses. Then they climbed inside and hauled in their things behind them. Scarlet sat in one corner and undid the straps on her camp bed.
‘Do you think we can do anything to make these comfortable?’ she muttered.
‘We can only try,’ Ellie replied with a sigh.
‘I’d love to go exploring, walk around the farms nearby and just . . .’
‘Forget the war?’ Ellie asked softly.
Scarlet blinked away the tears that took her by surprise. ‘Yes. That’s exactly what I want to do.’ She’d been having fun with Ellie, despite the hard work and conditions, had enjoyed having a friend so happy and positive about life, but then her thoughts would turn to Thomas and she’d wonder where he was all over again. Was he dead? His body lying grey and lifeless in a ditch? Or was he alive? Captured by the enemy and facing unimaginable horrors? Or injured? Was a nurse like her, somewhere out there, holding his hand and tending his wounds? Keeping him alive so that one day he’d make it home?
‘Do you think about him an awful lot?’ Ellie asked.
‘Is it that obvious I’m thinking about Thomas?’ Scarlet asked.
Ellie nodded.
‘All the time,’ Scarlet confessed. ‘I think about him, worry about him – and then I’ll become preoccupied with what we’re doing, or talk to you and feel happy, and then when I stop, it all comes back again. It makes me feel so guilty, being happy and forgetting about him even for a moment.’
‘Wouldn’t he want you to be happy, though? No man wants to think of his sweetheart back home being miserable. He’ll be remembering your beautiful smile, the smell of your hair, all the lovely, happy things about you, if he’s still . . .’
Scarlet gulped when Ellie’s voice halted, her sentence left unfinished, her dark eyes round as saucers.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Ellie whispered.
‘If he’s still alive,’ Scarlet finished for her. ‘That’s what you were going to say, wasn’t it?’
Ellie hung her head but Scarlet shuffled closer to her in the small tent, not wanting her to feel bad for simply stating the truth.
‘I didn’t mean it like that.’
‘But you’re right, Ellie. He might be dead.’ It was a truth she had to admit, even if she didn’t want to believe it.
‘I don’t want you to think that, though. I was—’
‘Please, don’t say anything more. If I don’t find him, then at least I’ve done my best. I need to believe he could be alive, that’s all.’
Ellie looked up, eyes brimming and making a fresh wave of tears fill Scarlet’s.
‘I believe in you. If anyone is going to find out where that man is, it’s you,’ Ellie said.
The sound of the bustling camp outside was getting louder, the activity of so many women setting up camp and moving around the area impossible to ignore.
‘How about we sneak away as soon as we can?’ Ellie said, rubbing Scarlet’s arm before crawling back out of the tent. ‘It might be the last time we get to have fun in a long while.’
Scarlet followed her, crawling out and emerging into the sunlight. She tilted her face up to the sky, eyes shut, breathed deep and simply enjoyed the feel of the sun’s rays on her skin. He was alive. She had to believe it, otherwise she’d fall to the ground and never be able to stand.
The constant noise of women talking all around them was overpowering:
‘Fetch water from the big kitchen Soyer stoves!’
‘How long are we here for?’
‘Someone said there’s a farm nearby offering hot baths!’
‘Did you see those new doctors?’
‘I want to go home! I can’t live here! It’s disgusting!’
‘Have you heard about the Forgotten Army? They’re stuck in Burma and they’re getting eaten alive by insects in that heat!’
It filled Scarlet’s head even though she tried hard to block it out. But then she opened her eyes, straightened her shoulders and took a big breath that filled her lungs almost to bursting before slowly letting it go. She couldn’t let it get to her. She had to push through and be strong.
‘Come on,’ she said to Ellie, who’d been standing behind her. ‘Let’s go.’