Home for Christmas (7 page)

The very moment they came to a halt an indignant ambulance driver came rushing over to the lorry.

‘You can’t park here, mate. This is for ambulances only.’

‘This is an emergency,’ Sally could hear the ARP warden telling him from the passenger window of the driver’s cab. ‘Take a look in the back and see for yourself.’

The next minute an ambulance driver’s head appeared over the side of the lorry, his eyes widening as he took in the scene at a glance.

‘Cor blimey,’ he exclaimed, then called out to his partner, ‘Frank, get some porters here, will you, mate?’

Once again all the men studiously avoided looking at Sally as she was lifted out of the lorry along with her patient, and it was with great relief that she found Sister Casualty waiting to take over the minute they got inside the hospital.

Sister Casualty’s sharp knowledgeable eyes took in the situation at a glance, her voice calm and modulated into the tone that Sally remembered being taught to use in extreme emergencies so as not to frighten the patients, as she instructed the porters, ‘Straight to the top of the queue for this one, I think, please,’ before giving Sally a brisk nod of her head and asking almost casually, ‘Would you like someone else to take over there for you, Nurse?’

‘I’ll hang on, if that’s all right, Sister. Might as well see it through,’ Sally responded in the same almost off-hand tone, as though there were no emergency at all.

Despite the heaviness of the Casualty staff’s workload, within seconds – or so it seemed to Sally, who was beginning to feel slightly light-headed – Eric was in a hospital bed with her still holding both his arm and the piece of glass, the curtains had been pulled round the bed and the senior registrar was bending over Eric’s arm.

‘Did you see what happened, and if so, any idea how deep it’s gone in, Nurse?’ he asked her.

‘At least as far as the bone, I think,’ Sally responded. ‘Definitely deep enough to cut an arterial vein.’

‘Mmm. If you can hang on we’ll give him a shot of morphine and then take a proper look.’

Sally nodded.

‘Not one of these nurses that is likely to faint on me are you?’

‘Nurse Johnson is a theatre nurse, Mr Pargiter. I doubt anything is likely to make her faint,’ Sister Casualty’s voice came to Sally’s rescue, leaving Sally to marvel at Sister Casualty’s knowledge – until she caught a glimpse of George standing behind her.

‘Come and have a look at this, Laidlaw,’ the senior registrar told George. ‘Damn near sliced the whole arm off, by the looks of it. But for the quick thinking of this nurse, the chap wouldn’t be here now.’

‘It was nothing. I just happened to be passing when the glass fell. He and some other men were demolishing a burned-out building.’

Sister Casualty herself administered the morphine. She had arrived accompanied by a slightly green and very round-eyed nurse – still a probationer, Sally saw from her uniform – and a more senior nurse pushing an instrument trolley.

‘Heart’s beating a bit too fast for my liking,’ the senior registrar told George. ‘What we’ve got to hope is that we can get the glass out without it breaking. Didn’t happen to see what it looked like before it went in, did you, Nurse?’

‘Long and sharply pointed V-shape,’ Sally responded.

‘Mmm, well, at least that means that it isn’t likely to have splintered already on impact with the bone, but we’ll be lucky if the tip doesn’t break off when we remove it. What I want you to do, Nurse, is to keep holding the glass steady but move your hands up a little so that I can get hold of it.’

Sally could see the look Sister Casualty was giving her. A look that said she would be letting all Barts’ nurses down if she misjudged things. George, on the other hand, was giving her a look of total reassurance. She just hoped his faith in her was justified. She could almost feel the silence in the small curtain-enclosed area as she very slowly and carefully moved one hand and then the other further up the glass. Her whole body felt as though it were trembling inside, but she knew she must not allow that tremor to get into her hands.

Even when Mr Pargiter had placed his hands on the glass below her own, Sally hardly dare so much as exhale in case she jarred the glass.

‘Come over here, Laidlaw, and see if you can tell just what we’re dealing with,’ the senior registrar instructed George.

Watching her boyfriend carefully exploring the site of the wound with one of the instruments from the trolley, his whole concentration on his task and the patient, Sally was filled with fresh admiration and respect, not just for George but for the hospital that had trained him.

‘One side’s pressed up close to the bone. Hitting it must have deflected the glass.’

‘What I want you to do now is get under the tip of the glass and support it, but first we’ll need you and Nurse Johnson to hold his forearms steady, if you please, Sister.’

At a brief nod from Sister Casualty, Sally went to Eric’s injured arm whilst Sister Casualty took the other arm.

Now Sally really was holding her breath. Eric was still unconscious, now thanks to the morphine, but it was still possible that he might jerk his body – with potentially fatal consequences – under the exploration George had to carry out unless they held him still.

George leaned over the patient. Sally clenched her teeth when she heard the sound of the metal instrument grating against the glass.

‘Got it?’ Mr Pargiter asked.

‘Yes,’ George confirmed.

‘Right.’

Slowly and carefully the senior registrar started to lift the glass from Eric’s arm, the involuntary flinch Sally could feel gripping the muscles of his upper arm automatically causing her to press down on it more firmly.

‘Got it.’

There was a note of quiet satisfaction in the senior registrar’s voice, and a good deal of pride in Sally’s heart when he added, ‘Nice work, Laidlaw. Now we need to get him cleaned up. Not sure whether or not he’ll be able to keep his arm, mind you. Still, he’s a lucky blighter that you were around, Nurse.’

A little later, setting off for the second time in one morning for number 13 and her bed, Sally promised herself that this time she would go straight back without taking any diversions. She was so tired that she dare not even blink in case she fell asleep.

Chapter Five

‘Hello, Kit. I haven’t seen you all week. Are you going to St John Ambulance tonight?’ Tilly asked Christopher Long, catching up with him when she saw him walking down the Row in front of her, no doubt making his way to work.

Kit, who lived with his recently widowed mother at number 49, was in the civil service. He was also a conscientious objector, something that Nancy in particular was inclined to make disparaging remarks about. Tilly felt sorry for Mrs Long, but more so for Kit, with his awkward uncoordinated walk, and his introverted nature.

‘I won’t be there tonight,’ he answered her. ‘I won’t be able to make it.’

‘You aren’t not, not coming because one of the girls was so silly and mean the other week, are you?’ Tilly asked, remembering how unkind another member of their group had been to Kit when he had first joined.

‘No,’ he answered her shortly, increasing his pace.

‘Then why aren’t you coming?’ Tilly persisted, hurrying to keep up with him. ‘I wanted to practise my bandaging on you,’ she teased him, hoping to bring a smile to his face, but, if anything, he looked even more miserable.

‘If you must know, I can’t come. You’ll have to find someone else to bandage, because I’ve got to go to enlist for bomb disposal training.’

Tilly couldn’t contain either her gasp of shock or her disbelief. ‘But you’re a conscientious objector,’ she protested.

‘That means I don’t believe in wounding or killing other people. According to the Government, that doesn’t include not wanting to be wounded or killed myself,’ he informed her bitterly, ‘which is why I have to report tonight to enlist. Enlistment, medical check, uniform collection . . .’ he ticked them off on thin trembling fingers, ‘. . . and then I’ll be off somewhere to be trained in how ultimately to kill myself, seeing as that’s what seems to happen to bomb disposal men.’

He was right, Tilly knew. It had been in the papers how many men were killed when the bombs they were trying to make safe exploded.

‘I don’t understand. Why are you doing it if you don’t want to? You’re in a reserved occupation,’ Tilly pointed out.

‘You mean I was. We’ve got a new boss in our department. He doesn’t like me and he’s moved me to a non-reserved job, just because his own son has joined up and he thinks everyone else should do the same.’

Tilly didn’t know what to say. It was plain to her that Kit was very upset. His Adam’s apple wobbled when he spoke and his naturally pale face looked whiter than ever.

‘It might be better than you think,’ she tried to console him, biting her lip when he turned to her with a burning look in his eyes and demanded, ‘How?’ before walking away at a speed that told her that he didn’t want her to catch up with him.

‘Dulcie, you’ve got a visitor,’ Olive told her lodger. ‘A Lizzie Walters. She said she’s come from Selfridges to see how you are. I’ve put her in the front room. You go in and I’ll bring you each a cup of tea.’

It was half-past two, just about an hour since the all clear had sounded after a daylight air raid, during which Olive, Dulcie and Sally had all had to take refuge in the garden shelter.

‘Another blinking raid, that’s all we need,’ Dulcie had huffed in complaint, before adding darkly, ‘Mind you, it is Friday the thirteenth.’

‘I didn’t have you down as superstitious, Dulcie,’ Sally laughed.

‘I’m not,’ Dulcie defended herself with her customary smartness, pointing out, ‘’Cos if I was I wouldn’t be living here at number thirteen would I?’

Now they were back in the house, Sally had returned to bed, after the quick soup lunch. Olive was a firm believer in the efficacious effect of a warming bowl of soup, as comforting as it was nutritious. Her soup had been made from the last of the summer’s home-grown tomatoes. Dulcie had been reading
Picture Post
when she and Olive had heard the knock on the front door.

Putting down the copy of
Picture Post
, Dulcie now stood up and leaned against the kitchen table to reach for her crutches.

Olive had gone to Selfridges to tell Dulcie’s manager what had happened, and had come back with a message that Dulcie was to stay off work until she could walk properly, so that was exactly what Dulcie intended to do. She hadn’t really been expecting a visit from any of her work colleagues, even Lizzie, who worked on the counter closest to her own, Lizzie being on bath salts and the like, and Dulcie being on a much more glamorous makeup and scent counter.

Small, homely-looking and now engaged to her long-term boyfriend, who was in the army, Lizzie was kind-hearted enough – not like Dulcie’s arch enemies at Selfridges, Arlene on one of the other makeup counters, and Lydia, the ultra-snooty daughter of one of the store’s directors. Not that they saw much of Lydia in the store since she had married her barrister and now RAF fiancé, David. Even so, Dulcie didn’t want Lizzie getting the impression that she was not suffering with her broken ankle, so she wasn’t at all pleased when the first thing Lizzie said to her when Dulcie hobbled into Olive’s front room was an envious, ‘Well, aren’t you the lucky one?’

‘Lucky? With me ankle in plaster and being on crutches?’ Dulcie scoffed. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘I certainly wouldn’t mind a bit of time off work right now, with all these bombs falling,’ Lizzie told her. ‘It took me nearly two hours to get into work this morning, the trains were running that slow, and there’s me worrying myself sick about the bombs.’

‘Never mind being off work,’ Dulcie retorted in typical fashion, ‘what about not getting my wages, and ruining my best shoes? I suppose Selfridges have sent you to spy on me, have they, to make sure that I’m not swinging the lead?’

‘Of course they haven’t, and if they had asked me to I wouldn’t,’ Lizzie responded indignantly. ‘I was worried about you. Mind you, it looks as though you’ve got yourself a really nice billet here.’

‘Of course it’s nice. You don’t think I’d stay anywhere that wasn’t, do you?’

Dulcie had never told anyone at work that she came from the East End. Some of the girls were so snooty they’d have refused to have anything to do with her or, worse, made fun of her, and now she was glad that it was here in Olive’s house that Lizzie had come to see her.

‘Everyone was really shocked when they heard what happened.’

‘Everyone?’ Dulcie raised an eyebrow. ‘What, you mean including Arlene?’

‘She’s leaving. She said so this morning. She said that her parents don’t think it’s safe for her to come in to London to work any more and they certainly don’t approve of her having to do fire duty up on the roof, like Mr Selfridge had us all trained to do, before he stepped down and retired.’

‘That’s typical of Arlene, running home to her mum and dad. Not that I’m going to miss her. Got right up my nose, she did, always making out she was something special.’

‘She’s not the only one who’s left.’ Lizzie stopped speaking when Olive opened the door and came in with cups of tea on a tray for them both.

‘I’m just off out now to the WVS, I don’t know when I’ll be back,’ she told Dulcie.

‘None of us know if we’re even going to get back at all these days,’ Dulcie pointed out truthfully, which made Lizzie shiver slightly.

‘I wish you hadn’t said that,’ she complained, as the door closed behind Olive. ‘It’s made me start worrying about my Ralph all over again. I still can’t believe I’m actually going to be marrying him in three weeks’ time.’

A dreamy look came over her face and Dulcie eyed her with irritation. Lizzie was supposed to be here asking after her, not mooning over her fiancé and their wedding.

‘Of course, I’ll be staying at home with my parents, with him being in the army, but like he says, it will be company for me. Oh, I nearly forgot! Arlene said this morning that she’d heard that Lydia’s husband, who joined the RAF, has been shot down and is in hospital, badly injured. I know you never liked Lydia, Dulcie, but you can’t help feeling sorry for her.’

Dulcie, who had just picked up her teacup, put it down again abruptly, keeping her face averted from Lizzie as she told her in a sharp voice, ‘If I were to feel sorry for anyone it would be for him, for being married to her.’

‘That’s typical of you, Dulcie, it really is, making a remark like that. Of course you always did have a bit of a soft spot for him, I seem to remember,’ Lizzie scolded her good-naturedly.

‘Well, you remember wrong,’ Dulcie snapped rudely.

‘You wanted him to take you out dancing,’ Lizzie reminded her, holding her ground.

‘Only because of her – Miss Smarty Pants – and the way she carried on like we were all beneath her and she was something special, that was all. It had nothing to do with him,’ Dulcie retaliated swiftly.

David – shot down and badly injured. David, with his thick well-groomed head of hair, his knowing and amused hazel eyes. Somehow it didn’t seem possible. That was the kind of thing that happened to ordinary men, not posh men with double-barrelled names and a title to look forward to, like handsome, charming David James-Thompson, whose sense of entitlement to be what he was through birth and upbringing had secretly been one of the things that had attracted Dulcie to him.

Attracted her to him? He had meant nothing like that to her, she reminded herself. She had just flirted with him, that was all, and only then to annoy Lydia. After all, she had turned him down when he had offered her a bit of fun on the side, hadn’t she? Sent him packing straight off! David . . . Dulcie could see him now striding in through the doors of Selfridges and smiling at
her
, even though it had been Lydia he had been walking out with. Dulcie had known then from the look in his eye that he liked her. She could have taken him off Lydia good and proper if she had really wanted him.

‘What do you mean, badly injured. How badly injured?’ Somehow the words had been uttered through her dry lips and throat without her being able to stop them.

Lizzie gave her a shrewd look.

‘I’m only asking,’ Dulcie defended herself, shrugging angrily. ‘Can’t a girl ask? Only a couple of minutes ago you were accusing me of being unfeeling and now when I show some feelings you’re giving me that kind of look.’

‘I don’t know how bad his injuries are,’ Lizzie answered, her expression softening.

Lizzie liked Dulcie even though she knew that she wasn’t very popular with some of the other girls. That was because Dulcie, with her long blond hair, her big brown eyes and her curvaceous figure was so very, very pretty. Dulcie being so very pretty and so very forward and flirtatious didn’t worry Lizzie. Her husband-to-be was the steady, serious type who would run a mile from a girl like Dulcie, but some of the girls they both worked with excluded Dulcie because, Lizzie suspected, they felt that if they welcomed her into their groups she would cast them into the shade. And knowing Dulcie, she probably would, Lizzie thought ruefully. She had certainly made it plain when she had first seen David James-Thompson that she wasn’t going to let the fact that he was virtually engaged to Lydia Whittingham stop her from flirting with him.

Remembering that, Lizzie felt bound to remind Dulcie warningly, ‘It’s Lydia, his wife, who’ll be most concerned about that and about him, especially with them not being married all that long.’

‘She certainly won’t be pleased if it means there’s not going to be any little James-Thompson heirs coming along,’ Dulcie said frankly. ‘And neither will that snobby mother of his. She was the one who was desperate for him to marry Lydia, not David himself.’

Lizzie was scandalised. ‘You can’t know that, Dulcie, and it’s a mean thing to say.’

‘It’s the truth and I do know it,’ Dulcie retaliated. ‘David told me himself that his mother is a snob.’

‘I thought you said you barely knew him. Him telling you things like that doesn’t sound much like you barely knew him to me.’

Lizzie had caught her out and Dulcie knew it. But Dulcie wasn’t the kind to give in – over anything.

‘So him and me just got talking to one another – that doesn’t mean anything.’

Only, of course, they had done far more than just talk. David had kissed her and she had let him. Dulcie would never let her heart rule her head, but there had been something in that kiss that had left her feeling unexpectedly vulnerable.

‘Not to you, perhaps,’ Lizzie agreed, ‘but I dare say that Lydia wouldn’t like it very much if she knew that her husband had been exchanging confidences with you. I wouldn’t like it myself . . .

‘Oh, did I tell you that we’ve managed to book an hotel for our honeymoon?’ she demanded, her own upcoming marriage pushing everything else out of the way. ‘It’s only for the one night, ’cos my Ralph can only get a forty-eight-hour pass, but we’ve managed to get booked in at this hotel in Southend, although heaven knows how long it will take us to get there, the trains being as slow as they are right now and filled with troops. I can’t wait . . .’ she sighed, that dreamy look on her face again.

‘What for?’ Dulcie said scathingly. ‘To start slaving away for a man? You’d never catch me doing that. And that’s what men expect once you marry them. A girl’s better off single, and being treated like she’s special.’