TWO
It was daylight by the time they had managed to find a bed or a corner for all the new arrivals and make sure their immediate concerns were dealt with. The medical staff never knew what time the trains would arrive at Bailleul hospital, even though it was less than a dozen miles from the front. An hour’s notice, if they were lucky. Ten minutes sometimes. This one came in at close to two in the morning with a half-hour’s warning and two hundred wounded. By the time they reached this stage of the medical evacuation chain, a conventional fixed hospital, the soldiers should have received good basic care and surgery where required, but sometimes the mobile medical units close to the front were overwhelmed and the wounded were simply shunted down the line with minimum intervention.
That had clearly been the case here, as there were still boots to be cut off feet that hadn’t been out of them for weeks, primitive field dressings to be changed, wounds to be irrigated, limbs to be amputated. And lice to be avoided. Which was nearly impossible. You even ran a risk of infestation if you handled the severed limbs – the greybacks seemed happy to wait their chance to jump ship from excised to living flesh.
Mrs Georgina Gregson had dumped the stiff calico over-dress they wore on top of their uniforms for dealing with lousy new arrivals – tight at the neck and tied at the sleeves – at the laundry. She was too exhausted to eat, however, and, after picking up a jug of hot water, had gone straight back to the tiny room she shared with Alice Pippery.
Her roommate was already in bed; the ill-fitting curtains meant she could make out her barrow-like shape beneath the blankets. She closed the door as softly as she could and began to undress. Two cot-beds, two lockers, one shared wardrobe, a mirror, a stool and, in the corner, a tiny and temperamental stove. She knew the position of everything in the room by heart, so undoing laces, rolling down stockings and pulling off her uniform and hanging it up in the half-light was easy.
She had just smoothed out her cape on its hanger when she heard a squeak. Mice, was her first thought. They infested the lower floors of the hospital. They weren’t as disgusting as the rats that sometimes ventured into the tented quarters, perhaps, but they would chew through anything in search of even a morsel of food. Many a nurse had found her camisole or knickers shredded because of a carelessly stored biscuit or chocolate.
There it was again.
It wasn’t a mouse. It was Alice.
Mrs Gregson moved over to the cot and laid a hand on the blankets. They were vibrating with a familiar rhythm. She came across it on a daily basis, but especially on the night shift. The men in her charge were past caring about any shame at showing any such weakness.
Miss Pippery was crying.
‘Alice?’ She threw back the blankets and squeezed herself in beside her. Alice shifted in the bed, spinning around and sliding her arms around Mrs Gregson. She responded in kind, careful not to squeeze too hard. She always felt it wouldn’t be difficult to crush Alice with one strong hug. She could feel her friend’s heart beating against her chest through her nightgown, as fast as a frightened rodent’s. Alice’s cross was digging into her collarbone, so she moved it to one side.
‘What is it, Alice?’
No reply. Just a long, ululating sob. They all had days like this. Days where you felt the dark waters of despair close over your head. The only surprise was that there weren’t more of them. She stroked Alice’s hair. It was straw-like to the touch. She ran a finger through her own red curls. Worse. Before the next shift, she decided she would take them both down to the bathhouse and bully, cajole and demand enough hot water to scrub them both and check they were free of any infestation.
‘Alice? What’s wrong, dear?’
‘Matron said I had to go on the cookery – ’ the sentence was punctuated by a catch in the throat – ‘roster. I can’t cook. You know that, George.’
‘I do. People still talk about your porridge pot.’
It was difficult to tell whether her response was another sob or a stifled giggle. It was true that Miss Alice Pippery had once made the worst porridge since Goldilocks picked up a ladle, but stirring a great vat of the stuff on a Soyer stove, without it sticking, was no easy task.
‘What did Matron say?’
‘That “can’t” shouldn’t be in a VAD’s vocabulary.’
They were both members of the Red Cross’s Voluntary Aid Detachment, which put them on the lowest rung of the nursing ladder. In fact, sometimes they weren’t even allowed to touch the ladder at all.
‘Remember that first hill climb? At Outersley? On your brother’s motor cycle?’
She felt Alice nod against her shoulder.
‘When you looked up that hill, saw how steep and muddy it was, what did you say?’
A mumble.
‘What was that?’
‘I can’t do it.’
‘And where did you come?’
‘Third.’
‘Third,’ Mrs Gregson said triumphantly. ‘And where did I come?’
‘Fifth.’
‘Fifth.’
‘But that was only because you put rocks over my rear wheels because I didn’t have the weight to get any traction, wasn’t it?’
Mrs Gregson laughed at the memory of the subterfuge. ‘Tactics.’
‘And then they disqualified me.’ Alice punched her lightly on the shoulder. ‘And my parents said you were a cheat.’
‘And a liar,’ she added proudly. ‘And I think “a malign influence” was mentioned.’
They lay in silence, still intertwined, considering this.
‘I never thought that, George, ever, even when we broke down in the Lake District and I almost caught pneumonia. If it wasn’t for you I wouldn’t be here.’
‘What, lying cold and dirty in a bed, scratching at your lice sores, not having slept properly for months, a lowly VAD who is about to start peeling potatoes as her contribution to the war effort? I hope you remember me in your prayers.’
‘I do, George,’ she said solemnly. ‘Of course I do.’
She had been teasing. She had momentarily forgotten that for Alice, levity and religion could never happily co-exist.
‘Do you miss him? Mr Gregson?’ Alice asked at last, her voice tremulous as she picked her words carefully. ‘At times like this?’
Mrs Gregson raised herself up on one elbow. ‘What really happened today, Alice? This isn’t about cooking, is it? Or how warm Mr Gregson used to make my bed. Come on, something breaks our hearts every day. I lost one I was fond of the other week. Private Hornby. Lancashire lad with an accent thicker than your porridge. He was fine when I went off shift, when I came back . . .’ She let it tail off. She didn’t want to recall too vividly the state the boy had been in.
‘Mine asked me to let him die,’ said Alice, then caught herself. Mrs Gregson felt her stiffen. ‘No, that’s not right. He asked me to kill him. Not in so many words, but that’s what he meant.’
She had heard of that before. A frightened lad, maimed beyond recognition, perhaps, or knowing he was going to die no matter what the doctors tried. Even heard tell there were some nurses who had acceded to the request. ‘And what did you say, Alice?’
The door opened with a loud squeal from the hinges and a hand reached in to turn on the light switch. The single, unshaded bulb flickered into reluctant light.
As she rolled over to see who was disturbing them, Mrs Gregson unbalanced on the edge of the mattress and crashed to the floor, crying out as the wind was driven from her body. ‘Jesus.’ She remembered herself. ‘Sorry, Alice. I mean, good grief.’
When she had finally lowered her legs and raised her head, she could see Elizabeth Challenger, their formidable matron, standing in the doorway, hands on generous hips.
‘Pippery. Gregson. What on earth are you doing?’
‘It’s my fault, Matron—’ Miss Pippery began.
‘I thought I felt a mouse in my bed,’ said Mrs Gregson. ‘I have a phobia of mice.’
The matron smirked at the thought of Mrs Gregson fleeing from any small furry creature. ‘Well, I wouldn’t worry too much about that, you’ve been asked to report to the Senior Medical Officer in Charge for reassignment.’
Now the matron had Mrs Gregson’s full attention. She sat bolt upright. ‘Where?’
Matron shook her head. ‘I have no idea. But wherever you are going, you’ll be going there with a Major Watson.’