by Lizzie Page
Elsie pushed on. ‘How long has it been since you saw them?’
I wanted to lie – it really was a terribly long time – but I didn’t lie. I don’t know why. I didn’t usually feel the need to confide in people – I had Louis for that – but I did then.
‘Fifteen months…’
Elsie put her hand on mine and we sat there in silence, drinking in the pain. I was telling myself, don’t cry, not now, don’t.
Finally, she spoke. ‘Did you know I have a son, May?’
I didn’t. I stared at her; I don’t know why this came as a shock, but it did.
‘His name is Kenneth. He is ten now.’
‘I had no idea.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Not many people do.’
I wanted to know the story behind it. Were they estranged? How, what…? But she just repeated, ‘Not many people know about him,’ and I realised she was sharing this with me to make me feel better and I should just try to accept that gift for what it was.
* * *
Elsie said it was time to make a move. At the door, I had a feeling that we might not see each other for a long time. It was silly and I knew better than to trust it. People were talking about intuition a lot recently. Where had my intuition been when it came to Elizabeth? Death comes like a bolt out of the blue, it doesn’t announce itself with calling cards.
‘I’ll see you again.’ I felt as though if I said it, it had to happen: an oath to fate.
Elsie tipped her beret at me, then firmly put it back in place as she walked out backwards onto the street. A cyclist nearly rode into her. Wobbling, he almost lost his balance, but he hung on gamely. Once straight, he shouted at her, a screech lost in the wind, but Elsie being Elsie shouted merrily back, ‘Fou!’ with a hand gesture for good measure. Then she waved at me again, quite delighted with herself.
* * *
Now Louis wanted a dog. He was partial to Alsatians. He said, ‘Being around Delia has reminded me that, actually, I’m a dog person.’
At night we would lie in bed wrapped up in each other and argue which were better: cats or dogs. Cats for their beauty, their elegance, their nonchalance. Dogs for their warmth, their fidelity. I was glad Louis was a dog person though. Sometimes he slung his leg over mine, and I had never felt so loved.
Christmas dinner
(Enough for four adults, one child.)
Turkey – Stuffing – Gravy.
Potatoes – cook French style, bien sûr!
Pudding – speak with Jeanne for more ideas?
Apples – is it time to try new French apples?
57
Little Freddie’s favourite game was hide-and-seek. Unusually, I think, he liked being the seeker best. Louis was crouched, cramped, under the desk – if he developed neckache later, here was the reason why. I slid behind the sofa. Bonnie, giggling, was by the window, only half covered by the drapes. Freddie didn’t have a clue. He kept looking behind the Christmas tree as though he couldn’t believe none of us had used such a prime hiding spot.
When I watched Louis play like this, I felt such an ache in my heart. If only he were the one who’d fallen down the steps of the church that fall morning of 1902. If only he were the father of my girls. How simple my life would have been then! George was intent on destroying me. I would never admit it to anyone but Louis, but he had half-succeeded.
In 1914, I was a shell of myself. Now, four years later, this shell was strong and unbreakable. But it was still a shell. My lawyer’s letters – all twelve of them – had been nothing but scraps of paper to George. Nothing could fix it. I knew the saying that time was a great healer, but what does that mean? Go to bed, get up, go to bed, get up and one day you find it doesn’t hurt so much?
‘I see you!’ Freddie screeched, pulling at Louis. Louis hauled himself out, threw Freddie up in the air. ‘You rascal, how did you know I was there?’
The presents under the tree were mostly things for Freddie that Louis had enjoyed choosing in the flea markets. There were a couple for me. I think, or rather I hoped, they would be jewellery. Louis had intimated that I needed some good pieces. We were mixing with some fine company and sometimes you were blinded by the gems on their fingers. I had been enticed by shopfronts where necklaces and pretty rings were coming out of the safes, back on display after having been hidden for years. Sometimes I felt guilty for my magpie attraction to shiny things, but Louis said, ‘Why should we take up like monks? Could you blame anyone for wanting parties and jewels after what we’ve been through?’
Louis took Freddie for another walk along the road. The plan was to tire the boy out (and Louis too!) and to allow me and Bonnie to catch up without interruption. Louis also liked to show off Freddie to the restaurant and shop workers who were his friends.
‘Any news from your girls?’ Bonnie asked.
‘Nothing. It seems I must wait. Four more years.’
‘Why four?’
‘They’ll be of age then and they will be able to come and find me, whether George approves or not. That is… if they want to.’
‘They will want to, May,’ Bonnie said kindly.
I doubted it.
* * *
‘What time are we expecting Matron?’ Bonnie asked for what felt like the umpteenth time.
‘Not sure.’
I explained that I’d offered to meet her train, but she had stubbornly insisted on walking.
‘Typical Matron! Always has to do everything the hard way.’
‘She’ll never change,’ I said fondly. It had been over a year since we’d seen Matron, and, like Bonnie, I was impatient for us to be together again. Matron had been such a huge part of my life over the last few years.
Bonnie told me about Billy. He didn’t go to work on the machines with Bonnie’s pa. He had chosen to stay in the Army and was now somewhere near Turkey, she said vaguely. Bonnie was never good at geography.
‘So, you’re alone in London?’ I asked her.
She nodded. ‘Makes no difference really.’
She took it in her stride like she did everything. Uncomplicated.
‘And now that I’ve got the money from Percy Milhouse’s drawing,’ she said with a smile, ‘thanks to you, May, the world is my oyster.’
* * *
Louis was agitated. I supposed he wanted to go and get on with his work as usual. He kept looking at his watch and out the window or over at Bonnie. It was a dark night; the moon was high. The Eiffel Tower was a dark silhouette at the corner of one window. I liked it – it had something of a protective mascot or talisman about it.
Louis drummed his fingers on the card table. Laughing, I told him he was worse than Freddie.
‘I just hope she didn’t miss her train,’ he said, pacing around the room again.
‘I didn’t think you’d mind.’
Louis had never been Matron’s greatest fan. I had a sudden memory of us jumping over her invisible line in the tent, snorting with laughter.
‘What are you so excited about anyway?’ I nudged him in the ribs playfully.
‘Supper,’ he said promptly.
Games I used to play at Christmas with my Grandma Leonora
I Spy
Spinacles
What’s the Time, Mr Wolf?
The Memory Game or ‘What is missing?’
58
It was pitch-black outside by the time the doorbell chimed. I had drawn the curtains, a job I enjoyed all the more for having been without them for so long. After a long day of food preparation, Jeanne had gone home to her brothers in Pigalle. Freddie was having his story; Bonnie was reading Kitty’s old copy of Peter Pan to him. It made me smile to see the little notes Kitty had diligently written in the margin:
The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.
Freddie had refused to go up until he received promises of more hide-and-seek tomorrow. Louis was a pushover and submitted easily. Bonnie and I made jokes about Freddie’s superior negotiating s
kills.
* * *
Our doorbell was loud and jolly. (I remembered the gloom that used to come over me when the doorbell went in my and George’s house in London.) I ran downstairs, smiling. I couldn’t wait to open the door. And there she was: Matron. The woman who’d been both the bane and the saviour of my life. My old enemy, my old friend. And she was grinning impishly at me. I had certainly never seen an expression like this in all our time in France. Her hair was greyer, her eyes were lit up with excitement and she was wrapped in a long winter coat. It took maybe three, four seconds before I realised that she wasn’t alone. Behind her in the darkness there were two shadowy figures. My first reaction was irritation: What a cheek! Why hadn’t she told us she was bringing people?
‘Who’s here?’ I tried to be polite but it came out quite abruptly.
Suddenly the figures ran at me. ‘Mummy, Mummy!’ It was my girls, my daughters. Leona and Joy. Joy and Leona were here. I gripped them tightly, almost afraid I was dreaming. My girls. We must have stood like that for some time, on the porch, in the porch-light. I heard Louis, next to me, warmly greet Matron. I heard Bonnie dashing down the stairs. I heard excitement and squeals. My daughters. I wouldn’t let go of them. I kissed their damp heads and then led them in, up to the living room. This gave me time to catch my breath and to relearn how to speak.
‘How on earth…?’
I had tried everything, hadn’t I? Lawyers’ letters, Winston’s intervention, appealing to George’s ‘better’ nature, pleading… How could Matron have succeeded where all other efforts had failed?
‘Don’t ask,’ said Matron with her stern expression, before breaking into a massive smile. She was barely recognisable to me as my tent-sharing nemesis.
‘Did George…?’ I began, confused. ‘Did George actually agree to this?’
Matron gave Louis a knowing look. ‘Not exactly, May…’
Leona had put her soft hand in mine. My girl. Joy, more cautious, more critical, was wandering around, looking at our bookshelves, Gordon’s typewriter on the desk, the tree. She suddenly squealed: ‘Mummy, you can see the Eiffel Tower from here!’ Her eyes were shiny with pleasure.
‘Then how?’ I insisted, gazing at Matron.
‘We war nurses have secret powers,’ she said.
‘No, really.’ Matron wouldn’t fob me off with this fairy-tale nonsense, I needed to know. ‘How did you do this?’
‘George trusts his governess…’ She shrugged happily at me. Her face said, voilà!
‘No! How? When?!’
‘Only since November,’ Matron explained. Happiness was written all over her face. ‘The last one got fed up with him.’ She lowered her voice. ‘“Too frisky” apparently.’ (No surprises there!) ‘There was a vacancy, I went for the interview and I got the job. No fear that he’ll get frisky with me!’
Matron hoiked up her bosom in the way I’d seen her do more than a few times in the tent we shared in the Somme.
‘I picked the girls up from school and we came straight out here. Joy was a bit wobbly on the boat, but we got our sea-legs soon enough.’
I couldn’t believe it. Matron was the new governess?
‘How long have we got?’
‘Until term starts. Seventh of January, although I understand George might condescend to meet them for supper on the sixth.’
Three weeks. Three whole weeks with my girls! This was unimaginably wonderful. They squeezed in close to me and I inhaled them. My darling Joy was my height now, and little Leona was up to my chest, and clutching me tight as though she too wasn’t quite sure this was really happening. My daughters were home.
I could no longer hold back the tears. Tears that had been waiting for years to break through now had their way.
‘You wait until you hear what we’ve got planned for Easter break!’ Matron smiled tenderly at me as I covered my snotty face with my sleeve. ‘Girls, girls… I think Mummy needs a handkerchief.’
We pulled away from each other, smiling. I ruffled Leona’s hair and gazed at Joy’s pretty face. How had she got so grown-up? Where did those womanly features come from?
I grabbed Matron again and hugged her, tears pouring down my face.
‘Thank you, thank you so much.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Thank you. Eternally…’
I stared at the face I had hated and loved and felt the emotions churn inside me.
‘You crossed the line this time, Matron.’
‘Oh, I did, I did,’ she said, and we embraced once more.
* * *
I didn’t want to overwhelm the girls with my crying and since it seemed I couldn’t stop, I excused myself for just a few moments to escape to the privacy of the bathroom. The dam holding back the tears had well and truly burst. I wept and wept with my whole body. I blew my nose, then wept some more.
I had suppressed it, I had suppressed so much of myself. I had consoled myself, at least they are not dead, at least they live on while so many others do not. They might not be by my side, hand in hand, but at least they exist. But even that was agony; it had been torture, and only now that it was over could I finally admit that to myself.
It had been a wound so deep that I had dared not to look at it – I had pretended it was nothing, I had minimised my own pain, just ploughed on. Now I could look at it. I had missed my daughters, but I had them back.
* * *
Louis evacuated to his study so the three of us could cuddle up in our bed. I dropped him in some blankets and a pillow, but he was already working at his desk and planning to stay there at least until midnight. He was on mission ‘Rein in the French’, or as I called it, ‘Mission Impossible’. He had started wearing spectacles recently – I thought he looked more handsome than ever. He took them off now and rubbed his eyes. Then he went back to his file. He put his hand over mine, patted it absently.
‘Happy, my darling?’
I nodded but this was not mere happiness, no simple flash of light, this was the warm glow of contentment. I felt like the universe had finally righted itself, as though everything was in alignment. I was who I wanted to be – nurse and poet May Turner; I was where I wanted to be – Paris; and I was with who I wanted to be – my two darling daughters and the love of my life, Louis Spears (not forgetting my very dear friends). In a few moments, I would go to my room and find Delia prowling across the covers and the girls insisting she must be allowed to stay. And of course I would relent! We would spend the night telling each other stories, planning and plotting. We would whisper, cuddle, tickle and laugh until dawn broke in the Paris sky and only then would we let ourselves sleep.
Did you love May Turner’s beautiful story of courage in wartime? Then don’t miss the first in the series, The War Nurses, which tells Elsie Knocker’s story. Elsie is a brilliant nurse, doing everything she can to help the injured soldiers in her care, but will her secret past threaten her new life?
* * *
Order it here!
The War Nurses
The War Nurses Series Book 1
Order it here!
* * *
‘A beautiful, heart-warming story of friendship and love... one of the best books set during the war that I have had the pleasure of reading.’ Renita D’Silva
* * *
‘Completely spellbinding – I absolutely loved it.’ Elizabeth Gill
* * *
As war takes its toll, the love and care of two brave young nurses will become everything to the wounded soldiers they tend. A gritty, emotional read inspired by an amazing true story.
* * *
1914 – Two young nurses pledge to help the war effort: Mairi, a wholesome idealist hoping to leave behind her past and Elsie, a glamorous single mother with a weakness for handsome soldiers. Despite their differences, the pair become firm friends.
* * *
At the emergency medical shelter where they’re based, Elsie and Mairi work around the clock to treat wounded soldiers. It’s heart-breaking work and th
ey are at constant risk from shelling, fire and disease. But there are also happier times… parties, trips and letters. And maybe even the possibility of love with an attractive officer in their care…
* * *
But as the war continues and the stress of duty threatens to pull the two women apart, will Elsie and Mairi’s special nurses’ bond be strong enough to see them through?
* * *
A powerfully moving wartime saga – you won’t want to put it down!
Hear more from Lizzie Page
Want to keep up to date with Lizzie’s latest releases? Sign up here!
* * *
We promise to never share your email with anyone else, and we’ll only contact you when there’s a new book out.
Also by Lizzie Page
The War Nurses
Daughters of War
A Letter From Lizzie
Hello,
Firstly, and most importantly, I want to say how much I appreciate your choosing to read Daughters of War. Of all the books in the world, you had to walk into mine! Thank you so much. I do hope you enjoyed it.