Nightingales Under the Mistletoe (37 page)

She didn't see fit to explain why, and Jess knew better than to argue. But she was still put out about it when she returned to the Female Medical ward.

‘That's not fair!' Effie was outraged on her behalf. ‘You only finished a stint there a few weeks ago. Why is she sending you there again?'

‘I don't know, do I? Ours is not to reason why, as they say. Although if you're that upset about it, you could always go to Matron and volunteer yourself?' Jess suggested.

That shut her up. Effie kept her sympathy to herself until Jess went off duty at twelve.

But for once, it seemed as if Miss Jenkins wasn't simply being deliberately spiteful. When Jess reported for duty that night, she found the ward in chaos. An epidemic of diphtheria had broken out in the village, and every bed was full.

‘We've had six new cases in the last two days,' Miss Tanner the Night Sister explained. ‘Then this morning the nurse on night duty started complaining of a headache and sore throat. It may be nothing, but she's been put into isolation for a couple of days to be on the safe side. I assume you've had a negative Schick test, as you've worked on this ward before?' she asked Jess.

‘Yes, Sister.'

‘All the same, you must take extra precautions. We don't want another nurse falling ill, do we?'

She gave Jess specific instructions about a couple of the worst cases, then left her alone.

Once again, she was struck by the hideous silence of the ward, with all the patients flat on their backs, too poorly to move. And the smell – the foul, sickly stench coated her own throat and nose every time she breathed.

She went around the ward, checking on the patients, swabbing throats with carbolic and administering serum. One of the patients seemed particularly weak and poorly, so Jess raised the end of his bed to help strengthen his heart.

Just before midnight, Dr Drake arrived to do his round. He seemed taken aback to see her.

‘Oh, Nurse Jago. I didn't realise you'd be here,' he said coolly.

They conducted the ward round even faster than Dr Drake's usual rapid speed. Jess had the distinct feeling he couldn't wait to get away from her.

She wasn't surprised; he had been offhand with her ever since the dance at the village hall.

How was she supposed to know he was going to turn up out of the blue like that? He hadn't given her any clue he was going to come to the dance. Exactly the opposite, in fact; from the contemptuous way he'd dismissed her invitation, she'd thought it was the last thing on his mind.

Of course she would have stayed at the village hall if she'd known he was going to be there. But as it was, he seemed to think she had set out to play another prank on him. As if she had the time or the energy to devote herself to humiliating him!

She tried to make amends by offering him a cup of tea after the round, but Dr Drake refused abruptly. Jess wanted to grab him by the lapels of his creased white coat and shake him. Why did he have to be so cold all the time? She understood he was shy, and she had even caught the odd glimpse of a nice man underneath that chilly exterior, but shyness was no excuse for rudeness in her book.

Midnight struck as he was leaving. Jess did another quick round of the ward, taking temperatures, checking pulses and swabbing throats. Then she made herself a cup of tea and went outside to catch her breath.

The cold February night air felt fresh and untainted after the cloying, sickly reek of the diphtheria ward. Jess wrapped her hands around her hot cup to keep herself warm as she stared up into the starry night sky. In the distance, she heard the heavy thrum of approaching planes as the bombers returned home from another mission. She found herself counting the planes as they passed overhead, the way Harry and his pals always did. He'd told her how they ran up to the roof of the manor house to watch them come home safely, no matter what time of day or night it was. Jess had no idea how many planes there were supposed to be, but she counted them anyway.

It was a quiet night, thank God. But by the time Jess had woken the patients, offered them their morning tea and done the bedpan round, she was wearily ready for her own bed.

Night duty took a lot of getting used to, she decided as she trudged the long path from the Fever Wards to the main hospital building in the grey dawn light. She hoped it wouldn't be too long before the night nurse came out of isolation and Jess could be allowed to return to the land of the living.

She turned the corner of the hospital building, hoping against hope that Sulley would be waiting at the gate with his horse and cart. Perhaps if he was he would be in a good mood and give her a lift back to the Nurses' Home. She didn't fancy the two mile trudge in cold, wet drizzle.

Her luck was in because Sulley was there. He'd just arrived with the last of the day nurses. Jess could see Effie and Daisy, one tall and dark, the other small and blonde, climbing down from the back of the cart.

‘Wait!' Jess hurried down the drive towards them, desperate to reach the cart before it left. ‘Don't go without me!'

At the sound of her voice Effie and Daisy both looked up. Then, suddenly, they were running towards her.

Jess stopped. This wasn't right. Nurses weren't allowed to run, except in case of fire and haemorrhages. They would catch it from Matron if she noticed them …

Then Jess saw their faces and forgot all about the cart she was supposed to be catching. Effie was as pale as milk, and Daisy's eyes were swollen and red-rimmed from crying.

‘What is it?' she said, staring into their stricken faces. ‘What's wrong?'

They looked at each other, then back at her. ‘Haven't you heard?' Daisy said.

‘Heard what?' A trickle of fear began to work its way down her spine. ‘What are you talking about?'

Effie reached out and put her hand on her friend's arm. ‘Oh, Jess,' she said, her voice barely above a whisper. ‘It's Harry …'

THE PLANE HAD
been on a training flight with others, but had encountered some flak over the French coast. The last the radio operator had heard was just after midnight when they had reported two of their engines out, and the loss of their tail fuselage and rear gunner. They were making their way home but two hours later still hadn't returned.

Millie had woken up in the early hours with a horrible sense of panic, knowing something was wrong. Without thinking, she had got up, put on her coat over her nightdress and slipped out of the Lodge.

Up at the airfield she had found dozens of people on the runway, scanning the skies, counting the planes as they came back. They all talked about the possibility of the crew escaping safely, using their parachutes, until the news they had been dreading came through just before dawn. The plane had crashed on the Kent coast with the loss of all crew.

Millie returned to the Lodge to dress, then went to look for William. She found him in the rear gunner's room, packing up the airman's belongings into a brown leather suitcase. The bed had already been stripped down to the iron frame, the mattress segments stacked neatly on top.

‘We have to get rid of everything quickly,' he explained in a quiet, flat voice that Millie scarcely recognised. ‘It's bad for morale otherwise. And the bed will have to be moved, too, so the men don't have to see it …'

He picked up a battered old cap from the chest of drawers and stared at it, lost in thought.

Millie took it from him gently and put it in the suitcase. ‘Let me help you,' she said.

Together they packed up the airman's belongings, moving in silence, unpacking drawers and folding clothes. In his bedside locker, Millie found a half-empty packet of Canadian cigarettes, a bundle of well-thumbed letters, and a photograph.

She stopped for a moment, staring at the pretty woman nursing a plump, smiling baby in her arms. Once upon a time, a stranger must have packed a similar photograph of her and little Henry, sending it back to her in a cardboard box with the rest of Seb's belongings.

‘Will you write to his wife?' she asked.

William nodded. ‘She'll be informed by telegram, of course, but I'll also write and explain exactly what happened.' He sighed. ‘I just wish I knew what to say.'

Millie thought about the letter that had come for her. It had been two weeks before she could bring herself to read it.

‘It doesn't matter what you write,' she said quietly. ‘It won't mean anything to her, except that her husband is dead and her world has fallen apart.'

William stared at her, realisation dawning on his face. ‘Oh, God, Millie, I'm so sorry. I didn't think.' He looked around at the room. ‘You shouldn't be doing this. You shouldn't have to see it.'

‘I want to,' Millie insisted. Unlikely as it seemed, she liked to think that another woman, a wife and a mother, had packed Seb's things for him. That someone had cared, even at the very end.

William ran his hand through his dark hair. ‘I know I should be used to doing this. God knows, I've done it enough times. But every time it's just so damn' hard …'

‘And so it should be,' Millie said. ‘This isn't just a death to be processed and packed away. This was a real person, someone with a life and a family. It's only right they should be mourned. The day you get used to it is the day you lose your compassion.'

‘You're right,' William said heavily. ‘It was the same when I was a doctor. I never got used to losing patients, either. But at least then I knew I'd tried to help them, not just sent them off to their death—'

He sank down on the iron bedframe, his head in his hands. ‘Oh, God, this is just such a waste, isn't it? Those young men going off to die, leaving their families behind. And I can't help feeling it's all my fault.'

Millie dropped the shirt she had been folding and went to sit beside him. ‘How can you say that?'

‘I was supposed to be training them. If they got into trouble it must mean I've failed them in some way …'

‘You can't think like that. You weren't responsible for what happened.'

‘Then perhaps I should have been there in their place?'

‘Then you would have been dead instead of them.'

‘But would it have mattered?' He took the photograph from her hands and stared down at it. ‘I don't have a wife or a child to leave behind. I don't have anyone—'

‘You have me,' Millie said. ‘You matter to me.'

William's eyes met hers. ‘Do I?' he said hoarsely.

Her gaze trailed over the angular planes of his face, with its straight dark brows and sharp cheekbones, then his mouth. The next moment she was kissing him, her hands buried in the silky thickness of his dark hair.

It took them both by surprise and afterwards they sprang apart, neither of them knowing what to do next. Millie stared into William's eyes. She had forgotten how the dark brown irises were flecked with so many colours, from amber to deepest black. Today they were red-rimmed from exhaustion.

‘Millie?'

There was a question in his voice that she couldn't answer with words. She put her hands up to his face, feeling the roughness of his unshaven jaw under her fingers. Then slowly, deliberately, she allowed her lips to meet his. She hoped that would be answer enough for him.

‘What did you think?' Daisy said, as they watched Jess walking away. She seemed unnaturally calm for someone who had just been told her friend was dead.

‘She didn't seem to take it in, did she?' Effie agreed. ‘Poor girl, she was closer to Harry than the rest of us were.'

‘Perhaps one of us should stay with her?' Daisy suggested. ‘In case shock sets in later?'

‘Better not. You know Jess, she likes to keep her feelings to herself.'

Daisy watched her friend climbing stiffly on to the back of Sulley's cart. She wasn't sure it was such a good idea to stifle emotions like that. Sooner or later they would have to come out.

‘I can't believe it,' Effie said as they climbed the stairs to their respective wards. ‘When I heard it was D-Dragon that had crashed, I was so sure—'

‘I know,' Daisy said. They'd talked about little else since they'd heard the news that morning.

She got to the ward, and the first person she met was Grace. She rushed up to her sister, white-faced.

‘They're all talking about a plane crashing,' she blurted out. ‘Is it true? Was it D-Dragon?'

Daisy nodded. Grace let out a moan of anguish.

‘Max … is he—?'

Daisy stared into her sister's pain-filled face. In spite of her anger, she couldn't help but feel compassion for her.

‘No,' she said. ‘Kit and Max were told to make way for a pair of rookie pilots.'

‘Oh, thank God.' Grace closed her eyes. Tears squeezed through her closed lids and spilled down her cheeks.

Daisy was about to open her mouth to speak when the doors opened and Miss Wallace arrived on the ward. Immediately they abandoned their conversation and hurried to gather around her desk.

Daisy watched her sister, surreptitiously wiping her cheeks with the sleeve of her dress. She realised with a shock that when she'd first heard about D-Dragon crashing, it hadn't occurred to her to think about Max.

What did that say about her love for him, she wondered.

Millie was shocked by how quickly things returned to normal after the aircraft crash. At dawn, everyone had been devastated. They had stumbled around, hollow-eyed with shock, barely able to speak. But by the time she returned to the house that evening, the daily routine had reasserted itself and people were going about their business as if nothing unusual had happened at all.

Perhaps that was the way they learned to cope with it, Millie thought. In the same way that nurses hardened themselves to the loss of patients, perhaps the crews had to close their minds to the risks that awaited them and their friends every day.