Women and War (22 page)

The driver killed the engine and the night was alive with the sounds of nature – the chirp of crickets, the hum of mosquitos, the croak of the frogs. Tara sat very still, feeling her tiredness and irritation melt away. At times like this the war and all its horrors and hardships seemed very distant; Red Maloney was an unreal character from another life. She tried to picture his face and failed; even his towering personality threw no shadow here on this enchanted land.

By the next morning, however, reality had once more intruded and daylight showed the camp for what it was – a hastily convened and incongruous hotchpotch of facilities which could only have sprung up in time of war. Tents provided most of the accommodation – ridge tents for wards, a bell tent for the Sisters' mess room, another for Matron Swift, even a tent for the CO, Colonel Adamson. What solid buildings there were were made of corrugated iron sheets, unlined, with tin roofs and shutters for windows – the operating theatre, the X-ray block and the huts that provided sleeping accommodation for the sisters and masseuses. Inside, the heat was stifling and the few fans, mounted on their long poles, made the kind of constant whirr that had the patients begging for them to be turned off for a few minutes' peace before the heat had them begging for them to be turned on once again.

A dirt track bisected the settlement, limping past orderly rooms and offices, canteen and kit store, but the recreation hut was placed at as safe a distance from the line of wards as was the isolation ward, and the water tanks – those ugly necessities – were situated on a slight rise on the river side of the hospital. Like much of the remainder of the hospital they were screened by trees, for all around was the bush – the paw-paws, the gums and the lush tropical vegetation.

To her own surprise Tara found her surroundings exhilarating. There was a feeling of freedom here on the banks of the river, a restless expansiveness which dreams could feed on. In Darwin she had begun to despair of ever getting the opportunity to make an impression on Richard. Their duties had rarely coincided and there had been no time for anything but working and sleeping. But here surely it would be different – this place was made for romance. This could be our special place, Tara thought, and the notion excited her strangely, making her yearn not only for Richard but to be a tiny part of this wild and beautiful country which stretched from here to the very heart of Australia, growing ever more desolate and awesome as the eucalyptus grew more stunted and the vegetation gave way first to open meadows, barren and uninhabited, and then to the parched red earth of the Never-Never, the dead centre where it could not rain.

How far away that seemed though! Here, the rain fell in the same torrents as it fell on Darwin, rushing down the slopes and rising as thick steam from the ground to gather as clouds once more. There were electric storms that made night into day and rent the sky with lightning, both forked and sheet. And the wildlife was as prolific as the vegetation. Creepy-crawlies of every imaginable type were everywhere – beetles and crickets, spiders and grasshoppers.

And the birds! Flocks of brilliant green budgies and dove-grey cockatiels, dumpy Dollar birds calling harshly as they performed their sunset aerobatic displays, sacred kingfishers diving for small fish in the river and swooping from their vantage points on the branch of a tree to gobble up some unsuspecting insect. There were bronzewings, too, normally running and hiding in the grass if disturbed, but occasionally taking to the air with a noisy clapping of their wings. They sometimes fed on the seeds of the box poison plant and though they did not harm the birds, the poison got into their bones and entrails so that any predatory animal eating them died in agony.

In this magic place tempers improved and petty irritations were forgotten – even Anastasia Bottomley seemed less sharp than she had done in Darwin. Tara struck up a friendship with Kate Harris who, unlike some of the sisters, tolerated her mistakes and helped her to learn the correct way of doing things. She was a Victorian girl, brought up on a small farm in the flat fertile valley between Bendigo and Echuka, a very private person who never mentioned her background nor pressed Tara to talk about hers. But Tara had the unmistakable feeling that Kate Harris nursed some secret sorrow – it was there in the shadows around her eyes and the expression on her face when she thought no one was watching her.

The hospital was as busy as ever it had been – busier – for now the Northern Territory was alive with servicemen, Yanks as well as Aussies, as reinforcements poured in to the Army, the RAAF and the US establishments, bomber and fighter strips were built and supply installations had sprung up.

There were aborigines, too, who had been rounded up and confined in control camps in the bush. Until she had come to Darwin Tara had scarcely set eyes on an aborigine, now it seemed they were everywhere. Each day, the men were bussed in to the hospital to help out with the manual jobs which soldiers could be ill spared to do – driving trucks and cutting timber, working on the sanitation and helping with the stores. One was even employed as a kitchen hand – Tara nicknamed him Spud because each morning he was to be seen sitting beside a huge pail in the bright sunshine peeling mountains of potatoes, his face split in the friendly, contented grin that was the trademark of the aborigine.

Busy as they were Tara saw little of Richard Allingham. He was friendly enough when their paths did cross, treating her to a smile and a wave or a friendly word. But the opportunity to be with him and to make some progress in their relationship seemed as distant as ever – while as an orderly Tara saw a great deal more than she would wish of the infuriating Sean Devlin.

Hospitalization had dampened him not one scrap – the moment his wounds began to heal he was as impossible as ever. One day, finding the ward suspiciously empty, Tara had discovered him running a card school for all the walking-wounded patients behind two judiciously arranged screens; another time she found a half-bottle of whisky which someone had smuggled in to him hidden beneath his bedclothes and was just able to conceal it behind a box of bandages before Sister Bottomley and Matron stalked into the ward to do their daily inspection. But though she tried to smooth his path for him, he still took every opportunity to tease her just as he had done in the days when he had been a patron of the Savalis' place and she had waited at table.

One morning, she was busy filling the boiler that was used for the sterilization of instruments when Kate Harris popped her head around the flap of the tent.

‘When you have finished here, Tara, perhaps you would give Mr Devlin a blanket bath.'

Tara pulled a face. ‘Surely he's fit enough to get up and wash himself.'

‘I don't know that he is,' Kate said seriously. ‘ Today he's complaining that his ribs are very painful still. He's well strapped up so there shouldn't be any problem, but I think I'm going to ask for another X-ray and until we get the results I don't want to take any chances.'

It was already hot in the tent-ward, the groaning fans making little impact on the heavy humid air. Tara collected a screen and arranged it around Dev's bed.

‘Well, well, what a beautiful morning this is turning out to be!' he remarked heartily.

‘For a man supposedly in great pain you seem very cheerful,' she returned tartly.

‘And who wouldn't be with the prospect of a blanket bath from the best looking girl in the hospital? Sorry –
nurse
I should say!'

Tara's suspicions hardened and she shot him a look under her lashes.

‘You'd better behave yourself now or I shall get one of the male orderlies to attend to your toilet.'

The still-swollen lips twisted into the semblance of a grin.

‘Oh, I promise to behave! How would a sick man like myself manage to do otherwise?'

Again she shot him a suspicious look, again he met her eyes with that same amusement. She slopped water into the basin and began washing him vigorously. At first he said nothing then grumbled a protest.

‘Ouch! You're very rough, Tara, with a man in pain.'

‘I'm sorry if you're feeling so tender. I'm doing my best.'

‘Are you indeed? Well, I wouldn't mind betting you would find it in you to be a little more gentle if the doctor was around!'

Her face flamed. The truth of it was impossible to deny but to have him say it like that …

‘If you must get into fights you must expect to get hurt,' she snapped.

‘Of all the gratitude when I got my wounds defending your honour!'

‘You most certainly did not!'

‘Well – as a result of.'

‘It was another day entirely. And in any case it was not my honour you were fighting for – it was your ute!'

‘Much good that did me. It's in their hands again now. No, a totally wasted exercise. Let's hope I was more successful where your honour was concerned.' He shot her a wicked look.

She stood back, glaring at him. ‘What do you know about my honour?'

‘More than you might expect! But don't worry, I won't tell the good doctor,' he said wryly. ‘No, not a word shall pass my lips!'

Her face was flaming again and she was as annoyed to think he would be able to see it as she was by his remarks. ‘ How dare you!' she flashed.

‘Ah, come on, Tara, there's no point in getting mad! I've seen the way you are when he's around. I just wish you'd put on an act like that for me! Not that you need to, mind you, when I know and love you just the way you are. But it would be good to think you felt like making the effort.'

She reached for the sponge and stood over him threateningly.

‘Perhaps I should point out that whilst you are incapacitated it would be wise of you not to try to antagonize me, Mr Devlin.'

He raised a hand in mocking surrender. ‘All right, all right, I'll say no more. I've too much respect for my own comfort. And my ribs are very painful. I'd be an easy victim for you, Tara.'

But his eyes were still full of laughter and he had touched on too many tender spots for her to be able to put the episode aside.

‘What's wrong, Tara? You don't look your usual merry self!' Kate said as she met Tara on her way to dispose of the basin of soap-scummed water. ‘ You've not had trouble with Mr Devlin, I hope?'

‘Humph!' Tara snorted so vigorously that water slopped over the rim of the basin and made wet stains on her uniform skirt.

‘Not worse, is he?' Kate asked anxiously.

‘Worse? I don't believe there's anything wrong with him!'

And with a lift of her chin and an angry sparkle in her eye, Tara stomped off across the rough ground.

Tara plodded resolutely up the gentle slope that rose behind the camp following the path of one of the numerous creeks that watered the hills. This early in the year it was still a sizeable flow; soon, as the dry weather took a hold, it would reduce to a mere trickle and eventually dry up altogether.

It was a beautiful March afternoon, the sky a clear rich blue above the myriad tropical greens and the ground firm enough to make for easy walking. But Tara did not like walking. In fact she disliked it intensely. Only the determined bullying of June Day, one of the masseuses, had persuaded her to join this afternoon's excursion and already, with the camp still in sight, she was regretting her moment's weakness.

Not only that – this morning before she had come off duty she had fallen foul of Anastasia Bottomley when she had been rash enough to disregard a ‘Nothing by mouth' sign on a patient's bed. She had felt sorry enough for him to allow him a sip of water; unfortunately, the patient had allowed his thirst to get the better of his good sense – he had snatched the glass and drunk half of it before she could stop him. The implications had been far reaching. The patient's operation had had to be delayed, Sister Bottomley had been furious and Richard Allingham had been detailed to reprimand her. Now, remembering his reproachful manner, Tara's cheeks burned dully once more. That sort of encounter was hardly calculated to make the impression she intended on Richard.

‘Oh, the hell with it!' Tara said crossly.

Kate Harris, walking alongside her, glanced at her curiously. ‘What's up with you?'

‘Oh nothing. I might well ask the same of you,' Tara said sharply. ‘You look as though you haven't slept properly for a week.'

It was true – the circles around Kate's eyes seemed to grow larger and darker every day and the distance Tara had sensed in her manner was more marked.

Kate did not reply and Tara shrugged. She, of all people, respected a person's right to privacy. They walked in silence some distance behind the rest of the party and Tara's mind was threatening to stray once more to her embarrassing interview with Richard Allingham when Kate said suddenly: ‘It's my fiancé.'

Tara turned, startled. ‘I beg your pardon?'

‘I'm worried to death about him,' Kate said. ‘He was in Singapore with the 2/4th Anti-Tank Regiment. I've heard nothing from him since the surrender.'

‘Oh, I see.' Tara could not avoid feeling gratified that she should be the one Kate had honoured with this confidence. ‘ Was he taken prisoner?'

‘That's just it. I don't know.' Now that she had begun talking about her private worry the words came tumbling out. ‘I don't know whether he's alive or dead or if he's been wounded. If he has, God alone knows what medical treatment he will have received. It will be tropical conditions there much like it is here in the Wet, I imagine, and you know what happens to wounds or even mosquito bites if they aren't treated properly. Tropical ulcers, gangrene, malaria, dysentery, fevers of every kind – you name it, our boys in Malaysia will have it.' She rubbed her face with her fingers. ‘That's the trouble with being a nurse. It makes you too damned aware of the worst possibilities.'

Tara was silent for a moment. Then she took Kate's hand urgently.