The pilots piled into two of the base’s open-topped spring-powered autocars and raced off into the night at top speed for the short drive along the narrow Maltese roads to the capital.
They couldn’t get anywhere near the hospital, though, because the roads were blocked by a wide variety of vehicles bringing a steady stream of moaning and screaming casualties from the ships. It seemed that everything that could possibly carry the injured had been mobilised and, as the Misfits made their way along the narrow pavement towards the hospital, they passed horse-drawn carts, delivery wagons, a couple of luxury autocars and even a few of the pedal-powered vehicles the postal workers used.
The situation when they finally got to the hospital was chaotic, but it was an organised chaos. A large part of the local population had mobilised and were pulling stretchers from the vehicles as they arrived, carrying them to the small square in front of the hospital where white-coated doctors and blue uniformed nurses were triaging the wounded as they arrived, pinning tags on them before they were taken inside.
The Misfits made their way through the crowd and into the building, but then came to a halt. They stood to one side of the entrance hall, trying to stay out of the way while they gazed around at the multitude of people, almost all of them in dark blue naval uniforms, that were laid out on the floor in neat lines, not knowing where to start to find their friends, or whether they were even there yet.
Thankfully, before they’d been there even a minute, a middle aged woman in a soiled black dress, carrying an empty stretcher, caught sight of them and pointed towards the back of the hall. ‘Downstairs. Pilots in basement. Bottom floor.’
She hurried away before they could thank her and they moved across the room to a gaping door, through which a steady stream of the worst patients were being carried.
Beyond the door was a staircase, hewn into the rock, easily wide enough to accommodate six or eight people walking abreast. It spiralled down into the hill on which the hospital was built, winding its way around a pneumatic lift, which was being used to carry the worst patients up and down.
The hospital had been hit several times during the early weeks of the Italian bombardment and, while it hadn’t sustained much in the way of damage, it was deemed unsafe for the patients. Luckily there was a ready-made solution - an extensive system of passages beneath it, dating back hundreds of years, which had originally been a barracks for the warrior monks who had used the island as a waypoint to the Holy Land. It had been a matter of only a few weeks’ work to adapt the complex and now all of the patients were safely tucked away underground and the main building above was deserted.
They joined the long queue of locals carrying stretchers carefully downwards, around the outside of the staircase, leaving the middle for those who were coming up the stairs. At each floor, some of the wounded were taken into the adjoining corridors and by the time they reached the bottom, four floors down, they were alone.
It was immediately obvious that this lowest level was for the walking wounded, the non-urgent cases who could move about on their own, but nonetheless needed care. Two huge, open-plan rooms - sleeping quarters for the lowest-ranked monks - had been carved out of the rock on either side of the staircase and the pilots peered into them, wondering which way to go to find their friends.
A group of women were sitting just inside one of the wards, each of them with at least one part of their bodies bandaged or immobilised, and one of them, an older woman in her fifties with greying hair and her leg in plaster, waved them over.
‘There’s some Wreckers down at the back of this ward, luv. On the left. Can’t miss’em,’ she whispered. ‘Keep your voices down, though; people are tryin’ ter sleep.’
‘Thank you. We will.’ Abby smiled at her and nodded at the other women, then led the Misfits into the dimly lit room.
It was quiet in the ward, despite the pandemonium above, and most of the men and women were sleeping, exhausted after the events of the last few days. There were a fair few whimpers and half-cries of nightmares mixed in with the sounds of snoring echoing dully from the bare stone walls, though.
At the back, right where they’d been told, were the RAC personnel, including their fitters. Wendy Llewellyn and Dorothy Campbell were also there, but, unlike the others, they weren’t sleeping - they were actually arguing, Wendy sitting on her bed while the Sky Commodore stood over her with her hands on her hips.
‘He’s still going to be here tomorrow! Just get some sleep and when you’re feeling better I’ll take you to see him.’
‘I don’t want to wait until tomorrow. I’m going now!’ Wendy pushed herself up to her feet and stood unsteadily. She was taller than Campbell and far more corpulent, but the older woman didn’t back down.
‘Oh, just sit down before you fall down.’
Wendy glared at her as she continued to sway, but then her eyes crossed almost comically and she groaned as her legs gave way beneath her. Campbell was ready, though, and grabbed her under her arms and let her down gently.
The women had been too caught up in their disagreement that they hadn’t seen the Misfits coming, but when Campbell straightened up from laying Wendy down, they both realised they had company.
‘Abby!’ called Wendy, whispering loud enough to wake the dead. ‘Tell this old harridan to let me go up and see my husband, will you?’
Campbell shook her head. ‘He’s up on the top floor and the lift is off limits to patients. She’d never make it up there.’
Abby looked Wendy up and down. The whole of her upper body was swathed in bandages, as were her hands, there was a gauze taped to the side of her head and she had lost most of her hair, which she had thankfully been keeping short anyway. She looked dreadful and even if she hadn’t seen her collapse she wouldn’t have let her stand, let alone walk up a few flights of stairs. She smiled kindly at the big woman. ‘I’m afraid she’s right, Wendy. You’re in no shape to go anywhere and it’s a bit busy upstairs at the moment. You should wait until tomorrow, like the commodore says; things will have calmed down by then and you won’t fall over and crack your head open trying to get up the stairs.’
‘Bugger that, Abby! I want to see my husband!’
Wendy was getting more and more distressed as the conversation went on and her voice, not exactly soft at the best of times, was rising as well. They were in danger of disturbing patients who desperately needed their rest.
‘Uh, Abby? Why don’t we just carry her up the stairs? I’m sure between the lot of us we could manage even her.’
There were chuckles at Monty’s comment, but rather than taking offence at it, Wendy’s face lit up and she looked at Abby hopefully, beseechingly even.
Abby could see that Wendy wouldn’t rest until she saw Owen and would probably sneak off on her own as soon as Dot Campbell’s back was turned, hurting herself even more in the process, so she nodded in acquiescence. ‘Alright,’ she pointed a finger at Wendy, ‘but only ten minutes and then you’re down here to rest. Quietly. Agreed?’
Wendy nodded enthusiastically. ‘Agreed.’ She looked past Abby and scowled at the other pilots of the squadron. ‘Well? What are you waiting for, you big namby-pambies? We’re on the clock! Come and get me!’
There were only a few half-hearted chuckles at her taunting and she frowned. ‘What’s up with you lot?’ She searched the group. ‘And where’s Mac?’
Abby took a deep breath, making sure that she had her emotions in check before replying. ‘Mac died in the last sortie of the day, protecting the Arturo.’
‘Oh.’ All sign of Wendy’s defiant attitude disappeared at the news and she deflated, what could be seen of her face going grey, as if finally realising exactly how hurt she was.
‘We’ll say goodbye to him properly when we have a chance.’ Abby said softly, before waving the pilots forward. ‘For now, let’s just get you to your husband.’
Scarlet had slipped away as soon as the decision to take Wendy up to see Owen had been made and she had
managed to scout out a stretcher. She laid it down beside the bed and the Misfits took positions around Wendy.
Bruce groaned theatrically as they lifted her down. ‘Bloody hell! My back! What have they been feeding you?’
The big woman just gave him a scathing look, promising payback later and folded her arms, refusing to lie down.
Monty, Bruce, Derek and Chastity all lifted a corner of the stretcher and they started slowly down the narrow corridor between the beds.
Abby fell in behind her pilots, but Campbell took her arm and held her back.
Abby looked at her questioningly. ‘What’s up, Dot?’
Campbell just gave her a warning stare, then watched the rest of the pilots go. When she judged that they were out of earshot she started after them, keeping Abby pulled close against her so that she could speak as quietly as possible.
‘It’s bad, isn’t it?’ asked Abby, speaking out of the corner of her mouth while she smiled and nodded at a girl with her arm strapped to her chest, one of the few awake.
‘Worse than bad.’
Abby found her smile faltering and she quickly turned away from the young naval officer so that she wouldn’t be seen to be worried. ‘In what way?’
Campbell took a deep breath as if steeling herself. ‘Admiral Myerscough managed to get off the Heart of Oak before it sank and transferred his flag to the Arturo, but he lost so many of his staff that he asked me to help out. There wasn’t much we could do, though, except let every captain try to survive as best he could and wait out the Prussian raids, so we spent most of our time compiling lists of the losses.’
Campbell paused as they passed the group of women chatting at the entrance of the ward. ‘I thought you were going to sleep, girls?’
‘We were just about to, Dot.’ The same older woman who had directed the Misfits answered with a wide smile.
‘Goodnight, then.’
‘’Night!’
Campbell waited until they were on the stairs, away from the women, who showed no signs of moving from where they were, or stopping their gossiping, before continuing.
‘I won’t bore you with what we lost - suffice it to say it’s a long list, far longer than it should be.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘The War Ministry thought that between you and the Harridans on the Heart of Oak the convoy would be relatively safe. They’d expected losses, obviously, but not on this scale. Your being knocked to shreds on landing threw a bit of a spanner in the works.’
Abby nodded. ‘We should have been better prepared. There should have been something in place... I don’t know, something, anything, to prevent such a disaster.’
Campbell shrugged as the two of them paused briefly, flattening themselves against the column of the lift to allow two men carrying an unconscious sailor on a stretcher to go past and down one of the corridors on the third floor. ‘Believe me, I’ve been losing a lot of sleep, thinking what we could have done differently, but I just don’t know, beyond taking off later, but that had its own inherent risks and might well have had the same end result or worse.’
Abby nodded. ‘We heard about the attack on the Arturo and I think you’re right.’
‘Anyway. That’s all water under the bridge, what’s important is what we do from here.’
‘Did you see my request to borrow a few Spitsteams?’
‘That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.’
Abby frowned. ‘What? Tiffin doesn’t want us to have any? That berk! As if his squadron...’
‘It’s not that,’ said Campbell, interrupting. ‘The Spits are yours. All of them. The transport carrying the pilots went down in the first attack of the morning. Squadron Leader Tiffin is dead, along with his entire squadron and nine tenths of the Welsh regiment they were travelling with.’
Abby sighed, regretting her hasty words. ‘Poor sods, but at least we’ll put their aircraft to good use.’
‘Funny you should say that. Here. This came by undersea boat a couple of hours ago.’ Campbell handed over a rumpled slip of paper. ‘Read for yourself.’
Abby peered at the tiny writing on the telegraphic message.
BADGERS TO EQUIP ELLIPSES STOP REQUEST TO REBUILD DENIED STOP WARM
The signal was short, to the point and left no room for argument. However, Abby had to read it twice before she could quite believe it and even then she didn’t really understand it, not even of the War Ministry.
‘They know that we have the facilities we need, right? And plenty of materials to work with?’
‘I did tell them, yes, but as you can see, they have other ideas.’
Abby growled and screwed up the message angrily. ‘This is Cummerbund. He’s finally managed to get what he wanted.’
‘It looks that way. Sorry.’
Abby fell silent as they continued to plod up the stairs after the slow-moving Misfits. It was almost a full minute before she spoke again. ‘My people aren’t going to like this.’
‘No. But they’ll accept it. They have to.’
They found Charles “Chalky” Isaacs muttering to himself while he paced up and down the long corridor on the top floor of the underground facility, where the surgeries and intensive care wards were. The blonde man was looking even paler than he usually did, clutching his arm to his side and wincing with every step he took, but he still laughed when he saw his fellow pilots carrying Wendy like an Egyptian queen.
Wendy was in no mood to laugh, though. ‘Chalky, why are you out here? Where’s Owen?’
‘He’s in there.’ Chalky pointed to one of the doors further down the corridor and grinned. ‘They got sick of me hanging around and kicked me out.’
Abby pushed her way to the front of the group. ‘Let me go and find out what’s happening, you lot stay here for now.’
As she moved off, the pilots put Wendy on the floor to one side of the corridor, then sat down either side of her to wait, out of the way of the men and women who were still bringing in a never-ending stream of horribly-wounded sailors.
Gwen sat down next to Kitty and leaned her head against the American’s shoulder. The floor was hard, but her flightsuit was padded and her Muscovite greatcoat was warm and no matter how much she tried to keep her eyes open, she was finding it extremely difficult to do so.
Gwen woke to warm sunlight and smiled, turning her face towards it. She snuggled into the soft bedding, pulling it close around her and reached out towards Kitty. She didn’t find her, but that wasn’t unusual; the American was an early riser, even when there wasn’t a dawn patrol to be flown.
She gasped and bolted upright, throwing the covers off, and looked around with bleary eyes. She was in the room in the house in Birzebbuga and by the quality of the light shining on the mosquito netting it was mid-morning - not only was it well past the time when she should have been up in the air.
She swung her legs out of the bed, taking note of the fact that she was wearing the silk pyjamas they’d found in a closet, and staggered across the room to the door on unsteady legs. Before she got there it opened slowly and Kitty poked her head in.
The American smiled when she saw her. ‘Oh, hi there, Sleeping Beauty! How are you feeling?’
‘What’s going on? Why didn’t anyone wake me! I have to get in the air! The Prussians will be here any moment!’
Gwen started clawing at the buttons on her pyjamas while she scanned the room for her flightsuit. She was relieved to find it hanging on the wardrobe, where it always was.
She turn to go to it, but as she did the room spun around her.
She would have fallen if it hadn’t been for Kitty’s strong arms wrapping around her and holding her until the dizziness passed.
‘No playing with the Prussians for you today, darling,’ Kitty said, her voice soft in Gwen’s ear, her breath warm on her cheek.
‘What? Why? No! I have to!’
‘Shhh.’
Kitty started to push her across the room and she tried to resist, but her legs were like jelly and her arms wouldn�
�t obey her commands. In the end, she just had to give in and let her have her way.
She flopped onto the bed and looked up at Kitty. ‘I don’t remember coming home after the hospital, what happened?’
‘I thought you’d just gone to sleep when we sat down in the corridor, but when we all got up to leave I couldn’t wake you.’
‘Leave? What about Owen?’
‘That’s my girl, always worrying about others before herself...’
Kitty smiled and stroked Gwen’s cheek. She bent down to kiss her and Gwen’s head swam momentarily, but for quite another reason. All too soon the American was pulling back again, though.
‘The doctors wouldn’t let us in to see him because the burns make him too susceptible to infection or something. They let Wendy in for a few minutes with a mask and a gown on, but that was it. We were going to take her back down afterwards and come home, but then we realised you were out cold.’
‘What’s wrong with me?’
‘Oh, nothing much - just exhaustion, overwork and weakness from not eating enough.’
Gwen groaned. ‘I’m such a wimp! Abby’s done just as much as me, but I bet she’s up in the air, isn’t she?’
Kitty nodded. ‘Of course, but she’s a hell of a lot more experienced than you and she’s better at pacing herself. You don’t, darling, you give everything you have and more every time you go up.’
Gwen groaned again. ‘So she’s gone up on her own against all those Fleas?’
Kitty shrugged. ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but she’s not on her own; Bruce took Excalibur up with her.’
‘You let Bruce fly my aircraft?!?’ The protest was out of her mouth before Gwen even realised, but she stopped herself before she said anything else; every aircraft was needed in the air and if she couldn’t fly it was only natural that she give way to somebody else. She settled for crossing her arms grumpily. ‘Hmph. Well, I hope he doesn’t adjust the seat; it took me ages to get it right.’
The Maltese Defence Page 11