by Emma Fraser
Throughout the day rumours had circulated: the Germans had entered Warsaw; the Germans had been beaten back. Krakow was obliterated; Krakow was fighting back.
It was impossible to know what was true and what wasn’t. Whenever she thought about Aleksy and Piotr, her chest tightened.
Were they still alive? As the vice-grip around her chest increased she pushed the thoughts away. She mustn’t think of anything except what she had to do here. Sister Radwanska had allocated her to the surgical ward and instructed her to keep an eye on the post-operative patients. All the doctors and most of the nurses were in theatre or in the reception area dealing with the casualties that had flooded in.
During a lull she’d grabbed an opportunity to slip away to check up on the child she’d brought in yesterday. Luckily the bullet had gone all the way through the leg, narrowly missing the femoral artery, and the doctors had successfully stopped the bleeding in theatre. But she wasn’t out of danger yet: she’d lost a great deal of blood and sepsis was a real possibility. No one knew her name and, as yet, no relative had come to claim her. Hopefully someone would soon.
Irena reached for the little girl’s hand. Her fingers were soft and limp, the nails bitten to the quick. She had the same blond hair as her dead brother, still streaked with blood, and although she was as pale as the cream hospital walls, she was pretty.
If she and Piotr ever had a daughter, she might look like this.
She closed her eyes as the image of the last time she’d seen Piotr played in her head. They’d been spending the weekend with other guests at his parents’ house in the country. After a day spent picnicking, they’d changed into evening dress and danced to a five-piece band. Piotr, in his officer’s uniform, his sword at his waist, looked noble and handsome and she’d ached with love for him.
‘You are so beautiful, my love,’ he whispered in her ear as he twirled her around. ‘When we are married I’m going to keep you all to myself for at least a month. Preferably permanently in my bed.’
She’d smiled up at him. ‘Only a month? Shame on me for not making you want me more.’
‘Let’s not wait,’ he said, no longer smiling. ‘We could get married tomorrow. I’ll find a priest and persuade him to marry us. With the tip of my sabre if I have to.’
‘But we agreed to wait until I’ve finished my studies.’
‘Two years, Irena. I’m not sure I can wait that long. It’s different now. I think there will be a war and we’re not as well prepared as everyone says we are. We should get married now. We don’t have to tell anyone except my parents and your father. I can support you. And when I’m away you can live with Mama and Tata. They love you almost as much as I do.’
Why hadn’t she said yes? If she’d known that less than a month later she could be facing a life without him, she would have.
A hand fell on her shoulder, rousing her from her reverie.
‘My dear, I’ve been looking for you.’ It was her father, his face slack with fatigue. She’d known he’d eventually find his way to the hospital – and to her. Seeing him brought the tears perilously close. She took a deep breath and blinked them away. Even in these circumstances, Tata wouldn’t like it if she became emotional in front of patients. He squeezed her shoulder. ‘Why are you still here?’
‘The nurses told me you were in theatre. I couldn’t leave. Not until I had seen you.’
‘They let me know you were here but we’ve been so busy I couldn’t come before now.’ His face tightened. ‘So many terrible injuries. How can they do this to children?’
Irena used her free hand to cover his. When they’d spoken about the possibility of war in the past, her father had been calm. ‘I was in Warsaw during the last occupation,’ he’d said. ‘If they come again – if they occupy us again, God forbid – they will be arrogant and aggressive. There will be killing and they will take everything we have, but they are Europeans. They will act like an occupying army but they will behave with restraint.’
No one could believe it now. The German pilot who had killed the girl’s family must have known they were civilians. Yet he had shot them anyway. And throughout the hours there had been similar reports. Other trains had been targeted and many more civilians killed as they tried to flee from the wreckage. There were whispers of mounds of bodies piled high by the side of the roads. She wished she could tell her father what she’d witnessed but she knew she would break down if she did.
‘Any word of Aleksy or Piotr?’ she asked instead.
‘No. And we mustn’t expect to hear anything for a while. It will take time for news to get through to us. Don’t give up hope.’ He pulled up a chair and sat down next to her, taking his glasses off to rub the lenses. ‘Now, Irena, I want you to listen to me. You must leave Poland.’
‘Leave?’
He leaned closer and lowered his voice. ‘I have an address. The Baron, your godfather, gave it to me last year when we met in Austria. Remember the medical convention I attended?’
Irena nodded. She’d only met her godfather once, when he’d come to visit them in Krakow. She’d been a child then, no more than ten, but she remembered a tall man with blond hair and blue eyes who’d treated her as if she were a young lady instead of a little girl still in short dresses.
‘It’s the address of someone he knows well – a man of importance who lives in England and who will help you. Maximilian must have suspected something might happen to Poland. Perhaps he knew more than he let on?’ He shrugged. ‘Who knows? Things have been tense between our two countries for so long I think we Poles have been guilty of ignoring what was inevitable. We should have taken it as a warning when the Reich invaded Czechoslovakia and no one raised even a whisper of protest.’ He shook his head. ‘But that is in the past. We must look to the future now. I have no doubt that the Nazis will enter Warsaw. Perhaps not this month, or the next, but they will come. Our army is too small, too poor and too ill-equipped to hold them back for ever.’
‘But the British and the French! They will come to our aid. They promised and once they come, the Germans will be beaten back.’
Although her father smiled, his eyes stayed bleak. ‘I hope you’re right. In which case, as soon as the Germans are no longer a threat, you could return.’
‘My place is here, Tata – with you and Piotr and Aleksy and everyone else! I can’t – I won’t – run away.’
‘It is what your mother would have wanted. It is what I want.’
She looked around the ward. The beds, most of which had two patients in them arranged head to toe, had been pushed together to make room for more. Even the space in the centre of the ward had been utilised. Still there weren’t enough beds for everyone and many patients had to make do with a mattress on the floor. It was worse in the corridors outside. There the injured lay, in pain, confused, bloodied and unwashed, waiting for the doctors to operate or for a bed to become vacant.
A nurse, grey with fatigue and shock, moved between the beds, stepping over patients, checking bandages and taking temperatures and pulses. Some of nurses had been about to go off night duty when the attack had started, but they were still here.
‘I can’t go, Tata. I’m needed here. There aren’t enough doctors and nurses to care for the injured as it is.’ She held up her hand as he started to protest. ‘I know I’m only a student but I can be useful.’ She made herself smile. ‘Besides, who will make sure you rest if I am not around to keep an eye on you?’
Her father rose to his feet, stifling a groan as his stiff legs complained. ‘You take after your mother. She was stubborn too.’ He held out an envelope. ‘Here’s the address. Hide it but never lose it. I have also written the details of my bank account in case you ever need money. Perhaps you are right and the English and French will help us put an end to this. But I still think you should go now. If the Germans occupy our country you will not find it so easy to leave then. Now go home and get some rest and we will talk again tomorrow.’
The little orphan g
irl’s eyes fluttered and she moaned softly. Irena squeezed her hand. ‘You go, Tata. I’ll stay a little longer.’
Chapter 4
‘Britain and France have declared war on Germany!’ Januz, one of Irena’s fellow medical students, rushed into the ward with a huge grin on his face. ‘We’re saved!’
‘Not soon enough to help him,’ Irena said softly. She closed the eyes of her patient, a middle-aged man with terrible burns, who had been admitted yesterday to the hopeless ward. She’d given him as much morphine as she’d dared, but he’d moaned in pain almost right to the last. At least his suffering was at an end now.
‘Aren’t you happy?’ Januz said when she didn’t reply.
She was relieved, of course, but happy? She doubted she’d ever be able to get the images of what she’d seen these last days out of her head. ‘I’m pleased if it means that this war will be over soon.’ Especially if it meant that Piotr and Aleksy would be coming back to her.
Through the opened window they heard the sound of cheering and went across to look.
The street in front of the hospital was filled with people – more than Irena had seen in one place since the Germans had first attacked. Some were attempting to sing ‘God Save the King’, even though it was clear they didn’t know the words, others ‘La Marseillaise’. As people danced in the street, cars trundled by, joyously tooting their horns. In the hospital forecourt, nurses and doctors paused to hug each other.
Irena closed her eyes and murmured a prayer: ‘Mother Mary, let it be over. Please send Piotr and Aleksy home.’
But three days after Britain and France declared war on Germany, there was still no sign of them coming to their aid. Krakow had been occupied and, if anything, the sound of gunfire had intensified. Irena was at home and getting ready for bed when her father called up to her.
‘Renia, come quickly.’
She rushed downstairs and her heart almost stopped beating when she saw Piotr standing in the hall. Her prayers had been answered. She ran over to him and flung herself into his arms. ‘You’re alive!’ She was crying and laughing at the same time. ‘Are you all right? You’re not hurt, are you?’
‘I’m fine, my love,’ Piotr said, holding her tight. He smelled of smoke and sweat and blood. ‘We’re passing through Warsaw on our way east. We’re moving out at first light but I had to see you.’
‘Come and sit. Are you hungry? Tata, could you ask Krystiana to bring some bread and soup?’ Krystiana came in once a day to see to Irena’s apartment. Although she had boys of her own in the Polish army, and had to be desperately worried about them, she’d told Irena she’d go mad with nothing to do at home but wait for news of her sons.
‘Is it going badly?’ she asked when Piotr was seated.
‘It could be better. We keep waiting for the British or French to attack the Germans but so far they haven’t. Perhaps tomorrow.’
‘Have you seen Aleksy?’
‘No, I’m afraid not, but I’ve heard he’s all right.’
‘Thank God,’ Irena whispered. ‘We’ve been so worried.’
He leaned across and took her hand. ‘Sweetheart, it doesn’t look good. Our regiments don’t seem to know what the others are doing. We’ve lost almost three-quarters of our planes and we are running out of petrol to fly the ones we have left. What little remains of the Pursuit Brigade is being sent to Lublin in case what’s left of our air force is destroyed by the Luftwaffe. If help doesn’t come soon then we’ll be in real trouble. Our pilots may have to get out – most likely to France where they can regroup.’ His voice was dull. ‘Try not to worry too much if you don’t hear from Aleksy for a while.’
‘Do we have a chance?’ Irena whispered.
He squeezed her hand. ‘Of course. We’re not ready to give up.’
It was difficult to absorb what he was telling her. He sounded defeated.
Piotr rubbed a hand across his face. His usually immaculate fingernails were encrusted with dirt. ‘I used to think there was glory in war. I was wrong. And it’s not just the Germans who are doing the killing. A mob of Poles set upon a village of ethnic Germans and massacred them. These people were their neighbours, their friends. It’s madness.’
‘My God, Piotr! What is happening to us?’ Only a week ago she would have found it impossible to believe.
At that moment Irena’s father came in carrying a tray, Krystiana following close on his heels. ‘You should let me carry that, Doctor,’ she scolded. When she saw Piotr a smile spread across her wrinkled cheeks and she went to hug him.
‘Krystiana, you’ve no idea how I’ve longed for a bowl of your soup,’ Piotr said, taking the tray from Irena’s father. As she watched him eat, Irena noticed how thin he looked. Wasn’t the army able to feed its soldiers?
When he’d finished, Krystiana took the tray from him and headed back out of the room. At the door she turned. ‘Come back when you can. In the meantime, I shall pray for you and all our young men.’
‘I have to get back to the hospital, so I’ll leave you two alone,’ Tata said. He held out his hand. ‘May God bless and protect you, son.’
Irena wanted to hold back time. She had a sick feeling that this might well be the last time she saw Piotr. She wanted to beg him not to rejoin his regiment, to stay here with her, but Piotr would hate that. So she would behave with the dignity and courage expected of her.
‘Don’t cry, sweetheart,’ the man she’d hoped to spend the rest of her life with said, rubbing the pad of his thumb gently across her cheek. She hadn’t even realised she was crying.
‘We should have married when we could,’ she whispered. ‘We should have been together as man and wife. I should have lain in your arms and let you make love to me.’
‘Irena!’ Piotr pretended to be scandalised. ‘Ladies don’t talk of such things.’
‘This lady does. I only wish we had time now.’
He pulled her into his arms and held her so tightly she could barely breathe. ‘I don’t have to be back until dawn,’ he murmured.
She could feel his heart beating against hers. She knew what he was asking and how could she refuse? Tata had left and Krystiana would be returning to her small flat once she’d finished tidying the kitchen. Even if she hadn’t been, Irena wouldn’t have cared.
She took Piotr by the hand and led him to her bedroom. Her heart was pumping so hard she thought it might burst.
She closed the door and turned to face him.
‘Are you sure, my love?’ he asked.
She was. These could be the last hours they had together and she wanted to spend every moment as close to him as she could get. She wanted to feel his hands on her body, his naked skin against hers. She wanted to know what it was to be loved by him, something she had imagined several times but always thought they would have years and years to experience.
Her fingers were trembling as she started to undo the buttons of his tunic. ‘I have never been so sure of anything. But you will have to show me what to do. I don’t want to make a mistake.’ She dipped her head as colour rushed to her cheeks.
‘And you a doctor?’ he teased. He lifted her chin until she was looking him in the eyes. ‘This is not how I imagined it. I wanted it to be perfect.’
She had come to the last button and opened his shirt, feeling for his skin under the vest he wore. He sucked in a breath as her fingers skimmed over his stomach. She stepped away from him and his eyes glittered in the light from the moon as she slipped her dress over her head. Next she undid her bra and unclipped her stockings from her suspenders, acutely aware of him watching her every movement. When at last she stood naked in front of him she raised her chin. Although she was tempted to cover her nakedness with her hands she wanted no shame or embarrassment to spoil this first time.
‘My beautiful love,’ he murmured. He moved towards her and picked her up in his arms, holding her against him for a moment before lowering her gently onto the bed. He undressed quickly; his trousers and vest joining his shirt
in an untidy heap on the floor. All the time he kept his eyes fixed on hers. The bed sagged under his weight as he lay down beside her. He placed his hand on her hip and turned her towards him, running his hand along her side, and hot flames shot through her body. He cupped her face and when he kissed her she let the feel of his mouth and hands wipe away the terror of the last few days.
Later, as he slept, she raised herself on her elbow and looked down at him. So that was what all the fuss was about? No wonder. It had hurt a little but he had been so gentle, almost too much, so that she had wrapped her legs around his hips and pulled him close. She hadn’t wanted gentleness, that would come later, she had wanted to be possessed, she had wanted to obliterate the past and future, and making love with him had done that.