Somewhere in France: A Novel of the Great War (15 page)

Chapter 28

T
hey walked in silence, mere inches apart, their fingertips almost touching, the din and chatter of the ceilidh fading with every step. Lilly could hardly breathe; surely someone would emerge from the reception marquee and call them back.

They reached the garage. She led him inside, instructed him to wait at the door, and inched carefully through the darkness until she was at the back wall of the hut. She pushed open the first shutter she found, then its neighbor. Moonlight streamed in, revealing the garage’s interior.

“Let’s sit there,” she suggested, pointing at the bench where the WAACs took their tea on rainy days. “I wish it were more comfortable—”

“It’s fine,” he interrupted, his beautiful face very serious now. “Where did we leave off, then, the night of the ball?”

“We’d just finished dancing, and were sitting in one of the drawing rooms.”

“So we were. What were we talking about?”

“What you would do when the war came. What I would do, too.”

“That’s all?” He sounded intrigued.

“We weren’t talking for long before Mama interrupted us.”

“I remember your mother’s arrival quite clearly. I don’t know what I would have said next, though.”

“Oh.” She couldn’t manage anything more.

“But I can tell you what I ought to have said.”

“Really?” she asked, her voice squeaking a bit.

“I should have said you were beautiful, and that it was impossible to think of you as a little girl any longer.”

Silence enveloped them. Would he say nothing more? Did he expect her to respond?

“May I?” he asked, and then he took hold of her right hand, his fingers easily encircling her narrow wrist. Then, shockingly, he unbuttoned the cuff of her blouse. Pushing her sleeve past her elbow, he began to massage her forearm with a sure and steady touch.

“Robbie, I—”

“I know. I’ve noticed you rubbing your wrists and arms. When you think no one is looking. It’s all that driving. And those heavy buckets of water.”

“This is . . . not what I expected,” she said.

“Hmm. I’m sorry. Do you want me to stop?”

She shook her head, wondering if he could see her in the gloom. “It’s only that . . .”

This was all she had dreamed of, for weeks and months and years. Why hold back now? “I can’t remember the last time someone touched me,” she confessed. “Apart from a handshake. Or a kiss on the cheek from Edward.”

Instead of answering, he busied himself with the buttons on her other cuff, then began to massage her left wrist and forearm. It was a minute or more before he spoke again.

“No kisses from ardent young admirers back home?”

“Not a one. I was rather a failure during my one Season.”

He looked up, his gaze shadowed in the ambulance’s dim interior. Just then, a moonbeam escaped the cloud cover above, its quicksilver gleam falling across his face. His eyes glittered jewel-bright, their blue the only point of color in her universe.

“Why count that one summer a failure? Unless you’d been hoping to end up married to a complete stranger.”

“I know,” she admitted. “And I am glad things happened as they did. It’s . . .”

“Go on.”

“It’s embarrassing. Twenty-four years old, and I’ve never been kissed.”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“You mean . . .”

“In the middle of Victoria Station. In front of all those Tommies.”

“But that was a mistake. You meant to kiss me on the cheek. And I moved. That’s all.”

“How do you know?”

“What? I mean . . . what?” He was serious now; she didn’t need to see his face to know it.

“How do you know I didn’t intend to kiss you?”

“But you’ve never—”

“Lilly, look at me,” he insisted. “I wanted to kiss you then. I do now.” And then, his voice hesitant, “Is that what you want?”

She nodded, incapable of saying anything more.

“I mean a proper kiss, you understand,” he explained. “Not some brotherly peck on the cheek.”

She nodded again, wondering if she would ever regain the power of speech.

“Close your eyes, Lilly,” he murmured, leaning closer. “You’re meant to close your eyes.”

“Is that all?”

“No. You’re meant to kiss me back.”

His mouth touched hers, gently at first, and then more insistently, until he was coaxing her lips apart and Lilly felt a rush of certainty that this was what a kiss was meant to be. She’d always wondered why poets and playwrights and artists were so preoccupied with kissing; she had even asked Charlotte, once, but her friend hadn’t seemed able to answer.

Now she understood.

She remembered, belatedly, that she was supposed to kiss him back. So she pressed her mouth more firmly against his, opened her lips a fraction wider, and prayed that she would not repel him with her ineptitude. His response was to deepen the kiss, his mouth pushing against hers with an urgency that was exciting and alarming at the same time.

His hands were at her waist now, and before she could protest, he had pulled her onto his lap, never breaking their kiss. Her hair had begun to fall around her shoulders, one heavy ringlet after another, and after a moment she realized that his hands, combing through her hair, were dislodging the pins that held it in place.

A sudden urge to touch him, while she could, rushed over her, and before she could think better of it, she reached up and swept her fingertips across his face. Breaking their kiss, he turned his head in the direction of her hand, pushing his face into her palm.

“What is that scent you’re wearing?”

“Lily of the valley.”

“I should have known,” he muttered, and she could feel the curve of his smile against her hand.

“Do you like it?”

“Yes. It smells like springtime. Like hope.”

She thought he would kiss her again, but instead his hands rose to her throat, and before she had quite realized what he was doing, he’d unfastened the top button of her blouse.

Lilly told herself she ought to protest, for allowing him such liberties only meant one thing, could only lead to one thing. So why could she not bring herself to stop him?

Another button popped open, then another. Robbie pulled her close, bending his head to drop fluttering kisses at the base of her throat. A fourth button came undone, then a fifth and a sixth, and she shivered as a flame of night air chilled her bared skin.

He pushed aside her blouse, a hand stealing beneath the stiff gabardine to trace the curve of her breast. Only the veil-thin cotton of her combinations separated her skin from his touch, and the knowledge and delight of it emboldened her.

She ran her hands through his close-cropped hair, wishing there were enough light to make out its color, marveling at how soft it felt beneath her fingers.

“Robbie, I—”

His hand covered her mouth an instant before she heard his whisper in her ear.

“Hush, Lilly. There’s someone outside.”

There it was—a rustling, shuffling noise. Someone was approaching the side door. And the someone was singing.

“ ‘When dosh a soldier grumble? When dosh he make a fuss,
hic
? No one issh more contented,
hic,
in all the world than ussssh . . .’ ”

“I think it’s Private Gillespie,” she whispered. “If he comes in . . .”

“Don’t panic. He might just be taking a shortcut to his quarters.”

Time stood still as they waited for Private Gillespie to move on. He’d paused just outside the side door of the garage, blocking their best avenue of escape, but after two more stanzas of “Oh, It’s a Lovely War” and a round of fruity burps, the private continued on his way, a fading chorus of hiccups marking his departure.

“Lilly? Are you all right?”

Acutely conscious of her unbuttoned blouse and disheveled hair, Lilly steeled herself to look Robbie in the eye. What must he be thinking?

But he only smiled at her, the same reassuring, wise smile he’d always had, then gathered her tenderly into his arms. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I let myself get carried away. I hope I didn’t upset you.”

Suddenly she became aware of how uncomfortable she was. She wriggled a little, trying to quell the pins and needles in her toes, and was alarmed when Robbie let out a soft groan.

“For the love of God, Lilly, please sit still.”

She complied, hardly daring to breathe, the seconds dragging by. At last he looked up, his eyes meeting hers readily, without a shadow of shame or regret. She felt a tug on her blouse and was amazed to see that he’d already done up her buttons.

His hands were at her waist again, but only so he could place her back on the bench at a respectable distance.

He was breathing deeply, his head in his hands now, and Lilly felt a flicker of alarm.

“Is something wrong, Robbie? Did I do something wrong? You must tell me—”

“You did nothing wrong.” He reached out, grasped her hand, and squeezed it to emphasize the truth of his words. “I’m fine. Uncomfortable, but fine. Just give me a moment.” And then, as he stood, he muttered something to himself.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I said, ‘Thank God I’m not wearing my kilt,’ ” he clarified.

“What on earth do you mean?” she asked, truly perplexed by his odd behavior.

“If you don’t know, Lilly, then I have no intention of telling you. At least not tonight.”

“Was it something I did?”

“Yes. And I mean that in a good way.” He reached out and hugged her tight, dropping a lingering kiss on the crown of her head.

“What shall we do now?” Lilly asked.

“I need to check on my patients, and I think you ought to go straight back to your tent.”

She nodded, her face buried in the scratchy wool of his uniform tunic.

“You leave first,” he suggested. “Go directly to your tent. Don’t rush; just walk normally. If you meet anyone, say your hair fell loose during the reels, and you’re on your way to fix it. I’ll follow in a minute.”

He bent his head to kiss her one last time, and before she knew it, she was navigating the maze of duckboard pathways that led to her tent, her lips stinging a little, her heart racing.

Everyone else seemed to be at the ceilidh, for she encountered no one as she returned to her quarters. None of her friends had returned from the dance, so she had time to change into her nightgown and brush out her hair without having to answer any awkward questions. She’d only just settled in her cot when the others returned.

“Where were you, Lilly?” Constance asked, her face flushed after the exertions of the final dances. “Without you we were short a woman for the reels. We had to ask Matron to join in!”

“I had a headache. I would have said something, but you were all dancing.”

“No harm done. Do you want a cool cloth for your forehead?”

Lilly nodded, feeling rather guilty for fibbing to her friend, but relieved that Constance seemed to believe her story.

It wasn’t long before the other women were in bed, the lantern was doused, and silence enveloped the tent, apart from scattered giggles and whispers from Bridget’s and Annie’s cots.

If only there were someone she could share this with, Lilly thought, some confidante she could tell. But her friends here wouldn’t understand, and Charlotte, despite her modern views on any number of subjects, would almost certainly disapprove.

No matter; she still had the memory of those moments. When she closed her eyes she could almost believe she was there again, in the uncomfortable and smelly confines of the garage, in darkness leavened only by stray moonbeams, with the man who had been at the heart of her dreams for so many long, lonely, solitary years.

And she had discovered he felt the same way. There, in that most unlikely of places, she had learned that he had missed her, had thought of her, and had yearned for her.

She knew then that she had been right to come here. The war would end soon, surely it would, and the day it was over, her life with Robbie would begin. It was simply a matter of time.

Chapter 29

T
onight she would try to break him down; he was certain of it. It had been a month and a half since the night of the ceilidh, and he was close to giving in.

The first time he’d asked her to come to the garage, he’d known he was playing with fire. He might tell himself that there was nothing improper in their meeting, and in so doing, he might convince Lilly, but it was a lie. He didn’t want to be friends and he didn’t want to talk. He wanted to make love to her, and the more time they spent together, the more difficult it was to resist.

At that first meeting, he’d sat at an entirely proper distance the entire time, had kept the conversation to suitably neutral topics, and then, after only a quarter hour had passed, had suggested she return to her tent.

“Is anything wrong?” she had asked him. “You haven’t . . .”

“And I won’t,” he had replied. “I can’t.
We
can’t. If only so I can honorably answer, if asked, that nothing improper has occurred between us. Not recently, at least.”

He hadn’t relented. Week after week, she sidled close; he moved away. She reached to touch him; he took her hand and set it on her lap. She stood on tiptoe as they said good night, and made to brush her lips against his; he turned his face so the kiss fell harmlessly on his cheek.

It was killing him slowly, a death of a thousand cuts. All it would take was one spark—the hint of her smile, the brush of her hand—and he would be consumed by his obsession with her.

The day crept by, hour after endless hour, as he tried and failed to focus his mind on the work at hand. In the main it consisted of sorting through the mountain of paperwork that had accumulated while his days were spent in surgery, rounds to assess the postoperative condition of the men in the ward tent, and an hour spent catching up with his case notes. He ate his supper in near silence, scarcely aware of the conversations at the table, then returned to his quarters with the thought of writing a few letters. He went so far as to pull out some writing paper and a pencil, but they sat untouched on the table, his thoughts elsewhere.

Finally it was time. He made his way to the garage, taking a roundabout route around the pre-op tent and supply huts. Private Gillespie had been given three days of leave in Saint-Omer, thank God, and wasn’t expected back until the morning.

He settled on one of the benches, in more or less the same place he’d sat with Lilly on the night of the ceilidh, and prepared to wait. Sometimes she was late, kept behind by requests from the wounded men in the ward tent: another letter written home, another chapter of
Sherlock Holmes
read aloud to leaven the tedium. So he sat in the still, cool half-light of the garage, hideously aware of the way his heart was pounding and his palms perspiring, and for the hundredth time that night he prayed he would find the strength to resist her.

Twelve minutes before nine. Eleven minutes. Ten minutes. Would she never come? And then, out of the darkness, careful footsteps on the duckboards outside, the door opening on hinges that he knew she kept well greased for just such a moment.

“Robbie?”

“I’m here. In the far corner.”

She sat down, close enough that he could hear her breathing, feel the heat of her leg where it almost touched his.

“How was your day?” he asked. “Did you enjoy the quiet?”

“I did,” she confirmed. “I hardly worked at all. How did you fare?”

“A good day. As days here go. But I missed you. I feel as if I haven’t seen you for ages.”

“We were in the mess tent at the same time yesterday,” she said.

“Were we? How was it I didn’t see you?”

“You were speaking with Nurse Ferguson. I gather you used to work together at the London.”

“We did. She was a nurse in the receiving room when I was there. Just the sort of person we need here now. Nothing fazes her. Matron’s already made a point of telling me how pleased she is with Edith.”

“She seems very capable,” Lilly said, her voice strained.

“She is that. A fine nurse.”

“And she’s a Scot, too, isn’t she?”

“She is,” he answered, mystified at the direction their conversation was taking. “From Edinburgh, though.”

“I see. She seems nice.”

“Aye, and she has a fine sense of humor, which seems to be a rare thing these days.”

“I hope this doesn’t sound silly, but I envy her. Having the chance to go to school. To make something of herself.”

“I sympathize, Lilly, I do. God knows what would have become of me if I hadn’t won that scholarship when I was a boy. But you did get a fine education from Miss Brown. You’re far better read than most of my colleagues, for a start.”

“Thank you. But it wasn’t the sort of education that can lead to anything
more
. I’m fortunate to even be working as a WAAC.”

“That’s ridiculous. They’re the ones who are lucky to have you. Look at what you do, day in and day out. It’s demanding work, physically and mentally. I know any number of men who wouldn’t last a day doing what you do.”

“All the same . . .”

And then he realized what was bothering her. It wasn’t a lack of self-confidence as such, for Lilly took real pride, justifiable pride, in her work. It was jealousy, and how could he blame her? He had been friendly with Edith, but only because he’d known her for so long. He certainly had never thought of her as anything more than a friend and colleague.

“Look at me, Lilly.” He pulled her close, holding her carefully, fraternally, and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “If you’d been given the opportunity to do so, I believe you would have made a fine nurse. Every bit as capable as Edith Ferguson or any of the other women here.”

“I doubt it. I still get queasy, sometimes, when I see the state of some of the men waiting for me at the ADS.”

“As would anyone. No one is born with a strong stomach for this kind of thing. You learn it, and sometimes it takes years. The first time we were allowed into theater, when I was a medical student, half the class was sick. I’d been warned by a friend in a higher year, so had skipped breakfast that morning. The others weren’t so lucky. And for what it’s worth—”

“Yes?”

“Edith is a friend, no more.”

“But you must wish . . . I mean, don’t you wish I were able to talk about your work with you?”

“We’ve talked about it many times. I don’t mean the mechanics of it, so to speak. That’s unimportant. That I can discuss with any of the surgeons or nurses here. What I want to talk about, with you, are the things that really matter.”

He paused, seeming to consider his words, weighing them before he spoke again. “The men I can’t save, the bodies I can’t mend. The misery of that, and how I can learn to bear it. I’ve never talked of it with anyone else.”

“Thank you, Robbie. You honor me. I only wish there were more I could do. To help, that is.”

“What you can do, now, is get back to your quarters before Miss Jeffries comes searching for us.”

“I suppose you’re right. But before I go, could you do one thing for me?”

“Yes?” he asked, keenly apprehensive of what she would say next.

“Kiss me. Like you did the night of the ceilidh. Just one kiss.”

Before he could say no, before he could move away, she grasped his collar and pulled his head toward hers. She touched her lips to his, lightly, tentatively, and when he didn’t respond she pushed her mouth more firmly against his.

He forced himself to do nothing, to simply sit there until she was finished, his hands resting lightly at her waist. Not pushing her away, yet not embracing her. Just waiting until she gave up.

“I must go,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “I’m so sorry.”

It was the catch in her voice that finished him off. His hands tangled in her hair, pulling her toward him almost roughly, and he was kissing her soundly, completely, his mouth pressing on hers so hard that he knew the stubble from his day-old beard must be rubbing her skin raw. There’d be no hiding what they’d been up to from her friends.

He pulled away, let his forehead rest against hers, and fought to regain the power of speech.

“This must . . . this must stop. Do you understand?” he said at last, his heartbeat sounding so loudly in his head that he could barely make out his own words.

She tried to embrace him, but he reached around and unclasped her hands, setting them firmly in her lap as he stood and walked to the far side of the garage.

“That was . . . it was my fault that happened.” He raked his hands through his hair, pulling at it, reveling in the pain, and took one deep, measured breath after another. “If we can’t control ourselves, we will have to stop these meetings. This is a matter of honor for me, and for you, too. Surely you understand.”

“I do. Though honor is cold comfort at the best of times.”

“I agree. But it’s better than your being sent home in disgrace, and my having to confess the truth to your brother.”

“I should go,” she said again.

“Of course. Good night, Lilly. I am sorry.” The garage door closed behind her. She was gone.

What was he to do? He had dug himself into a hole so deep, there was no getting out of it now. And this was all his fault, every last part of it.

He had encouraged her to join the WAAC, he had told her he was glad she had come to the 51st, and he had initiated their illicit correspondence. He had suggested they leave the ceilidh together and find somewhere private to talk. Had kissed her and would have happily done much more if Private Gillespie hadn’t come so close to barging in on them.

Tonight, he had kissed her again, though he had promised himself he would find the strength to resist.

Worst of all, he wouldn’t undo any of it, not a moment. He had dishonored both of them and would continue to do so as long as he was given the chance. That was the sordid truth of it.

That was what he had become, trapped by this war, mired in an existence that promised no escape, no respite, no release, only the gradual sapping away of every last grain of hope. And all that remained was a ghost, the ghost of the man he’d once hoped to be, one of millions of ghosts, both the living and the dead, who haunted the killing fields of Flanders and France.