by Jana Petken
“Like my ear?”
“Yes, but so much worse than that. We have young soldiers not yet twenty years old who have lost their limbs and others who have been blinded by gas attacks and shrapnel. Raising a man’s spirits when he’s in dire need of comfort is a worthwhile job. It’s a terribly important part of nursing.”
Jenny had seen both men and women from various organisations doing just what he described. “Isn’t that what the British Red Cross do?” she asked.
“Yes, but many have volunteered for the front, and the situation is going to get worse as more and more nurses are called into a more active role on the continent. We’re in dire need for hospital staff here at home, and you will be a wonderful example of how a person can recover from dreadful wounds.”
Jenny was going to decline the offer outright, but then she thought about how the job might benefit her, apart from the obvious, which was having more money in her pocket. Freedom and independence from a house that felt more and more like a prison was a tempting proposition indeed. The opportunity to meet people who did not live in Minnie’s street was enticing too. She was tired of the tedious discussions about the same subjects and the endless gossiping about the same people. Damn, at times she thought her brain might fall asleep, never to awaken again. But most importantly, this could be a chance to get away from her mother’s constant reminders about how awful life was going to be for her disfigured spinster daughter.
So what if she didn’t like looking at blood. Who did? She was certainly not as squeamish as she had been before her injuries. She could empathise with men who were damaged and with those who desperately wanted to get out of the hospital and go home to their loved ones. She might be able to encourage them, as Danny had encouraged her, and in return, the patients could help her to understand the inner workings of a man’s mind, something she had never really cared about or had the opportunity to learn about until Kevin’s mysterious disappearance from her life. And there was Anna. She hadn’t remained unemployed for long.
Only three days after her arrival in London, she had accompanied Jenny to the hospital, and whilst having a stroll in the gardens, she had met someone who worked in the laundry rooms. They were looking for drivers, and as Anna had already driven her father’s truck, she was offered a position collecting and delivering laundry for this very hospital.
“Please continue, Doctor,” Jenny finally said. “I can’t promise that I’ll say yes, but I would like to hear more about your proposal.”
After a lengthy discussion, Thackery handed her the piece of paper. “Please take this home with you. I’ve written down a rough list of duties, such as the ones I’ve already mentioned. And, Jenny, from now on please call me Duncan.”
Jenny rose to leave. “Thank you. I will.”
“This job really would do you a world of good.”
Jenny folded the paper and put it in her purse. “You might be right, but leaving my mother is a big decision. She won’t take it well.”
She shook his hand, and he held on to it for longer than was appropriate.
“I have a very rare day off this Saturday,” he said. “I would love to discuss this further with you … over dinner.”
Jenny bit her lip, aware that he was waiting for an answer. Where was the harm in that? she thought. Going out to dinner sounded like a lovely idea.
Chapter Fifty-One
Patrick met Anna for the first time four days after saying goodbye to Danny in Southampton. Opening Minnie’s front door to him, she stood on the threshold dressed in some sort of uniform, with a dry biscuit in her hand. He was instantly impressed by the open and friendly expression on her face, which was both pretty and arresting. She had the biggest eyes he had ever seen on a person, and they seemed to be devouring him without any timidity whatsoever.
“Hello,” he said.
“Oh my God, you’re Patrick!” she almost sang. “I’m Anna, your sister-in-law. Mam, Minnie, you’ll never believe it! It’s your Patrick. He’s home!”
One hour later, Patrick was still answering questions about the short time he had spent with Danny. Anna was overjoyed after hearing that he was well and had sent her his love. Susan wanted to know if he looked respectable in uniform, and Minnie seemed to be more interested in finding out exactly where he was going and in what unit he was serving.
Patrick kept his thoughts to himself throughout the long conversation. He had asked about Jenny’s whereabouts the moment he arrived and had been told that she was having dinner with Dr Thackery. That surprised him, but he was delighted at the thought of his sister enjoying herself. His mother was also enthusiastic about the date and made no bones about how it could be the beginning of a romance which might develop and eventually solve all Jenny’s problems. Minnie was unusually silent. Patrick, quietly biding his time and hiding his pent-up anger, wondered what was on her mind. She had an uncanny knack of sensing a person’s mood. Had he given anything away earlier, when his mam had asked if he had received a letter from Kevin?
After dinner, which was eaten later than usual, Anna went up the stairs to bed. It had been decided earlier that she would sleep in Jenny’s room, giving Patrick her bed.
Patrick waited at the bottom of the stairs, and when he heard the bedroom door close, he strode back into the parlour, unable to hide his anger any longer.
“Right, you two, I’ll get straight to the point.” His tone was harsh, and it would remain so, he thought, glaring at his mother.
“I want to know how many letters you wrote to Kevin, when you wrote them, what you put in them, and if you are still writing to him, pretending to be Jenny.”
He stood before his mother and grandmother, legs slightly apart, fists clenched at his sides, and with a steely gaze that alternated between the two women.
“Whatever are you talking about?” Susan asked.
“No! No, Mam, you’re not going to wiggle your way out of this one. Danny told me everything, and I’ll bloody stand here all night if I have to, but neither one of you is going to your bed until you tell me what you did. Out with it!”
“Please, Patrick, you’re scaring me.” Susan’s face was grey. Minnie appeared to be lost for words.
“Minnie, will you tell me?”
Susan said, “Mother, not a word. I will not be bullied by him.”
Patrick went to the door, opened it, and pointed up the stairs. “We’ll let your new daughter-in-law listen to what I’ve got to say, then, shall we? I’m sure she’ll be interested to know what a devious couple of scoundrels her new mother-in-law and granny are.”
“No, don’t,” Susan said hurriedly. “I’ll tell you, but for goodness’ sake, just keep your voice down. There is no need to cause a scene.”
Minnie said, “Sit down, Patrick. You’re making me nervous, and you know how I get when I’m breathless.”
“We wrote five letters. We did what we thought was best for your sister,” Susan said. “After what happened with John at the hospital, we thought that Kevin was her best chance. We were just going to send the one letter to him and then tell Jenny what we had done when she felt better. We thought she’d thank us for keeping his interest going. But then Kevin kept writing, and we felt obligated to reply. There was no harm done, really.”
“No harm?”
“Not at first.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t have composed that final letter,” Minnie suggested.
“What did you say in it?” Patrick slumped in a chair, unable to look at his mother.
Susan answered gently, as though that effort would soften the blow. “When we heard that John was coming back for a visit and that he was going to propose again, we wrote one final letter to Kevin, telling him that Jenny was sorry for hurting him, but that she had decided to marry John after all.”
“We let him down very delicately,” Minnie said.
Susan began to cry.
Patrick’s anger was boiling over from thinking about Kevin’s hopes being up and then dashed by a letter
while he faced death in that terrible place. “Stop crying, Mam. Your tears won’t work on me this time.”
“I don’t like your tone, son …”
“Delicate? You let him down delicately? The both of you should be ashamed of yourselves. Not only have you ruined Jenny’s chance of happiness but you also have let Kevin down completely. He may have gone to his death feeling miserable and betrayed, not to mention confused.”
“Is he dead?” Susan asked.
“I don’t bloody know; he hasn’t replied to any of my letters! I don’t know where he is or what state he’s in. Now I suspect this is the reason he’s not writing to me.”
“I’m sure he’s all right, and it’s probably all for the best now. Jenny seems happy. She never mentions him, and as far as I know, she’s quite taken with Dr Thackery.”
“A doctor, Patrick,” Minnie reminded him.
“Well, you’re both mistaken there, if that’s what you think. Duncan Thackery is very much in love with his wife. I’ve met her. I imagine he took Jenny to dinner because he’s a good man, and his wife probably went with him.”
“Oh my Gawd! He’s married?” Minnie asked, looking disappointed.
Patrick ignored the question. Thackery’s life was none of their business. He had never felt so disgusted at the coldness and blatant manipulation that had taken place. Turning around, he banged his fist on the table and then, in a rare display of temper, knocked over a chair. “I’m telling Jenny everything. Everything!”
Hearing his mother gasp, he turned. Jenny stood at the door, tears running down her face. She stared at her mother, hands clamped over her mouth and disbelief flashing in her eyes.
“There’s no need to tell me, Patrick. I heard enough from the hallway.” Pivoting, she ran back into the hallway and then up the stairs. Patrick ran after her. She slammed the bedroom door shut. For a while, he waited, periodically knocking, hoping that she would reappear. When she did, she was dragging a bag. Patrick looked at her and then at Anna, standing in her nightgown, white-faced and crying.
Patrick took the bag and then held Jenny by her shoulders. “Darlin’ where are you going?” he asked.
“Out of this house and I’m not coming back.”
“Don’t be daft. Let’s talk about this. We’ll sort it out.”
“It’s too late. There’s nothing to talk about.”
Patrick could feel her entire body shaking. God help her, he thought, where did she think she was going to go?
“Jenny, do you want to go for a wee walk with me?”
For a brief moment, she looked perfectly calm. “No, I want you to take me to Shooters Hill Hospital, and if you say no, I’ll go alone.”
“Are you sick?”
“No, I’m not sick. I accepted a position there, and it comes with accommodation. That’s why I went out for dinner with Dr Thackery.”
Susan and Minnie stood sobbing arm in arm at the bottom of the stairs. Jenny walked down to meet them. Patrick followed in silence. Whatever was going to be said now was between the women.
Jenny stared at Susan. “I’ve taken employment at the hospital. I was going to leave in the morning, but I’ll not stay another night in this house. I’ll be living there and working there, and you needn’t worry about me. Dr Thackery will look after me.”
“No, Jenny. No, don’t go. I’ll make things right,” Susan cried.
“You? When have you ever made things right for me? You’ve only ever been concerned about what you want. You locked me up like a china doll and stopped me from having friends and ambitions and dreams of meeting a man that I could fall in love with. You chose John for me because you were impressed by his parents’ wealth and position. You tied him up and wrapped him in a bow, keeping every other man away until he was my one and only suitor.”
“No, Jenny. That’s not true,” Susan said.
“It is true! And the worst thing about it is that had we not come to London, I would still be that stupid and naive girl you raised me to be. What happened to you, Mam? Were you so unhappy, bored, and twisted by Dad’s abandonment all those years that you had to live your life through me? You needed a companion, someone you could manipulate, a captive audience forced to listen to your constant complaining. I could forgive you for all that, but I will never trust or respect you ever again for what you did to Kevin – I loved him! I really loved him, Mam!”
Susan’s face crumpled in a fit of tears that left her gasping for breath. Minnie staggered into the parlour and flopped into her chair, looking devastated.
Patrick said, “That’s enough, Jenny. You’re being cruel. We’re all upset and need time to get over this. Come on now, I’ll take you to the hospital.”
Susan gripped Jenny’s arm. “I didn’t know. What can I do?”
“You can give me the letters Kevin sent to me.”
“I can’t. I tore them up.”
Jenny gazed at her mother with contempt for a brief moment, walked passed her, and then left the house.
Patrick put on his coat and went after her. As he left, he said, “Mam, I’ll be back soon. Have a cup of tea with Minnie and calm yourself. I’ll talk to Jenny and sort this out.”
He’d talk to her all night if he had to, he thought, running after her. He’d listen to her, help her if he could, and he’d come back here and console his mam and granny, who seemed to be suffering for their sins. Then somehow, he’d find out what had happened to Kevin, and when he did, he’d tell him the truth.
Chapter Fifty-Two
November 1917
The order to stand down came at dusk. Finishing their week’s rotation on the front line’s deep lightly manned trenches, Danny and Jack moved back to the second line support trench in a state of mental and physical exhaustion. Sitting one hundred yards behind the major defensive line, the secondary trench was where the men and officers spent most of their time and gathered before each attack.
Arriving in the trench just in time for Maconochie stew, Jack unpacked his satchel, got out his mess tin and cup, and headed straight for the mess area for a ration while it was still reasonably warm. Danny, however, declined dinner, preferring to find an empty funk hole where he’d be able to curl up without being rained on. Getting one of those holes dug into the trench wall was a rare treat. Soldiers who outranked him and those who’d been in the army longer guarded the funks with their lives, giving them up only when they went to the front or to the communication trenches. But occasionally at dinnertime, holes became vacant, and although the stomach craved food, his body desired a decent rest even more.
For a moment, he watched the field workers setting up the mess station and the soldiers heading towards it with tired bodies slightly stooped over. He was surprised that they were not all deformed with bent spines. Woe betide any man who walked tall in a trench with head held high or who was nosy and peeked over the parapet. Showing the tip of your helmet to the enemy above the sandbags was like sending them a written invitation to shoot you. It was instant death in most cases, and he should know – he was an expert sniper and had shot enough German heads across no man’s land to their lines.
When Danny found the funk hole, he slithered in and reached for a piece of paper and pencil that he always kept in his jacket pocket. Squashed like a tomato, he found the most comfortable position in the hole, far enough back from the opening but with still enough brightness to see the page. What could he write about? Should he tell Anna about the horror of his world yet again? Should he say that it still shocked him every time a friend stood beside him and in the next minute was dead? How could anyone in Britain understand what that felt like? Would it be fair to let her know that he had almost died one week earlier and that he still felt, saw, and smelled what had surrounded him that day? He’d experienced close calls before. In the five months of trench life, he couldn’t recall a single day when he hadn’t thought it might be his last. But on that day, he actually believed that his final moment had come.
Shuddering with surging m
emories, he reluctantly relived the assault once again. It had been a quiet day, he remembered, with no attacks, as though it were a Sunday morning, when the only things men did was read a newspaper, have a beer, make love to their wives, and forget their humdrum daily work routines. He’d gone with a message to the third line, and later, on his way back to the second line, the only thought in his mind had been dinner.
The communication lines he’d used were like veins running laterally through the three major lines. They were a constant hive of activity from dawn to dusk. Messages ran to and from the front lines. Returning battalions being relieved or new ones going up the line sometimes caused traffic jams with mailmen as well as field workers delivering newspapers, food and drink, or fresh rolls of barbwire, in addition to the medical core evacuating the wounded and sick.
The communication trenches were nowhere near the front, so the shock of that first volley of enemy artillery and shrapnel, which had swept the five hundred yards of communication rampart leading up to the front line, had rendered his brain useless. A solid wall of shells seemed to be everywhere. Heavy German rifle fire was as thick as a blanket overhead. He recalled keeping his body curled in a ball under the parapet, but it had seemed impossible to him that he’d ever get out of there alive. In front of him, the wounded were crawling about in the passage, and the dead were innumerable. They lay two or three deep. A man who’d been tied to an old wagon wheel as a punishment for something or other was miraculously still alive, but minus his legs. He hung there, torso writhing, face screwed up in torturous pain, and screaming for someone to shoot him. Jesus, he’d never be able to wipe that sight from his mind.
Crumpling up the piece of paper, Danny angrily shoved it back into his pocket. He didn’t have it in him to tell Anna what that day had been like, or all the other days spent digging into the floor of the trench to make it deeper, or emptying out the top layer of mud that ran through fingers. And she wouldn’t want to know what it was like to stand on the fire step waiting for an attack or a shot that would kill you and to be on the front line with his helmet permanently stuck to his head and his bayonet fixed for twelve hours a day. She wouldn’t and shouldn’t have to imagine any of it. He looked at his fingers trembling with the cold and an anxiety that he wouldn’t be able to shift for as long as he sat there with those images still running rampant through his brain. So much for peace in the funk hole, he thought.