With Love, Wherever You Are

by Dandi Daley Mackall

  “Want me to send your wife a telegram to that effect?” Frank offered.

  It was morning when they finally stumbled into their assigned barracks, a dilapidated gymnasium filled with bunks. Frank tossed in his duffel, then headed for the post office. It would be too much to hope for mail from Helen here, but he could at least mail his letters to her.

  The small Army post office wasn’t far from the barracks. A light shone through the window, so he went in. A boy, who looked about twelve years old, manned the counter. Frank handed him eight letters, all to Helen. “These are important,” he warned.

  “Sure, Joe! V-mail super!” the boy answered in a thick French accent. He grinned, revealing a missing tooth. “I look for mail, Joe?”

  “For me? Why not?” He pointed to his name on one of the letters. “Lt. Frank Daley, MD.”

  “Doctor!” The boy sounded impressed.

  Frank waited so long that he suspected the kid had left by a back door. “You still there?”

  “Ah, oui!” A moment later, the boy returned waving two letters. “Voilà! You big shot?”

  “What? ’Fraid not.”

  “You . . . letter from president United States of America?”

  Frank took the letters—one was from Helen, thank goodness and hallelujah. The other came from the US Senate Committee on Military Affairs in Washington. Truman had answered. About time. “Thanks. I’ll be back.”

  Frank wanted privacy to read the letters, and he had to walk the length of the camp through puddles to get it. Andy’s travelogue said Marseille was a port, so maybe the Mediterranean had flooded.

  He settled onto a damp stone bench at the top of a hill. From his vantage point, he could see what must have been downtown Marseille. The sun shone dimly through the gray sky, and a civilian couple strolled past him without a glance as he unfolded the first letter.

  Truman or Helen? No contest.

  █████████████

  My dear Frankie,

  Have I told you lately how much I miss you and love you? I’m looking forward to a more permanent location (though, of course, I can’t tell you where that will be).

  Silly me! You know how I love to swim, but I forgot my swimsuit!

  Right now, we’re too busy to swim. Our patients suffer from bullet wounds, shrapnel, and burns, as well as diseases. Every time I meet a soldier, he reminds me of one of my brothers. I hope you’ve heard from Dotty and she’s heard from Boots by now.

  Never have I wished I spoke French, but I do now. Civilians seem lovely, and I wish I could get to know them better. Nonetheless, we are too busy.

  I am so sorry we are missing our first holidays together. Even now, I imagine us with Schnapps and Junior and perhaps Junior the Second and Third, cozy in front of a fireplace in our own home. Great picture!

  So, my love, shall it be.

  I pray that this New Year will bring peace to the world and us to each other.

  With love, wherever you are,

  Mrs. Daley

  Frank pictured tiny Helen curled onto her bunk, thinking of him, writing to him. He hadn’t thought it possible to miss his wife even more, but he had been wrong.

  Rennes. Clever Helen. He wasn’t sure where Rennes was in relation to Marseille, but he’d find out. He had to see her—soon.

  After rereading Helen’s letter, he opened Truman’s, which turned out to be a disappointment. Frank had written his old Missouri senator three times, lobbying for equal pay for married couples in the Army. Twice, Truman had written back, first agreeing that it seemed unfair, then promising to look into it. This letter didn’t even go that far. Senator Truman was regrettably tied up with war concerns in Washington, DC.

  Frank had trouble thinking of Truman as vice president instead of the stubborn Missouri senator he’d been for a decade. Truman would be sworn in on January 20. Well, Harry S. better watch out, or he might not get Frank’s vote again.

  Frank returned to the barracks only to discover that there was no bed for him. All top bunks were occupied. All bottom bunks . . . were underwater. He was still gazing at the absurd scene when the boy from the post office ran up.

  “Monsieur!” He removed his beret and twisted it in his hands. “Je vous en prie. Ma petite soeur?”

  Frank had no idea what he was saying. “English?”

  “Er . . . sick. Very sick. Marie, my sister.” He lowered his hand, and Frank thought he might be signaling that he was talking about a child.

  “A child, Marie, is sick?”

  “Oui! You come?”

  “Now?”

  “Oui! Merci!”

  Frank glanced back at his sleeping comrades and sighed. What the heck? He wouldn’t get any sleep anyway. He pulled his small doctor’s kit from his pack and left.

  He followed the boy out of the city and down a country path, now pure mud. In broken English, the kid, whose name was Michel LeBlanc, said his sister had something wrong with her legs and Michel considered it a tragedy because the family needed money from her work in the laundry. That, or something was on fire.

  By the time they reached Michel’s home, a tiny farmhouse that might have been quaint a hundred years earlier, the sky was a slab of slate. Frank tried to clean the mud from his boots as they stepped inside, but Michel took off his boots, so Frank did the same.

  A kerosene lantern gave the only light. The smell of wet wood and mold permeated the air. The house had little or no heat and no electricity. A gray-haired woman appeared in an arched doorway. She regarded Frank with suspicion while firing questions at her son, or maybe grandson. Frank couldn’t understand a word of the heated conversation. Under other circumstances, he might have appreciated the beauty of the French language. But right then, it sounded like gunfire.

  Michel gave Frank a crooked smile. “My mother.” He turned to her, and Frank was pretty sure he was being introduced as a doctor and a hero. If the kid only knew . . .

  Frank smiled. “Madame.” Then he said to Michel, “Where’s your sister?”

  The woman nodded for him to follow, then shuffled into a small kitchen with a cast-iron stove. Michel disappeared, and Frank warmed his hands over the stove. When Michel returned, he was accompanied by a pretty girl with braided hair and huge brown eyes. Thinner than her mother, the girl wore a long skirt, the color and pattern faded to a dull lavender gray. Two little boys peeked from behind her.

  Frank pointed to the empty chair at the wooden table, and Michel helped his sister sit. “You . . . Marie?” He’d been expecting a child, not this petite young woman.

  She nodded, and the hint of a smile passed over her face like a shadow, replaced by a wince of pain. When he knelt beside her, he understood. Her legs were covered in blisters, some red, others yellow with pus. The sores probably covered her torso as well, but the girl seemed so shy, Frank didn’t have the heart for a full examination. He’d have to get her to come in for a proper exam.

  The door flew open, and in walked a giant. That’s what he looked like, backed by pale light and ducking under the archway. He charged as if discovering his wife with a strange man, a man who now held his daughter’s leg, her skirt shoved to her thigh.

  Frank dropped the leg with a thump and stood to face the man, who was a head taller than he. “Me—Dr. Daley,” he stammered, sounding like a bad Tarzan movie.

  “You come to help Marie?” His accent was thick, but Frank had no trouble understanding him.

  “Yes!”

  “We try everything,” said Monsieur LeBlanc. “Our doctor, she give oil—no, lotion, yes?—for the peau, the skin, yes?”

  “May I see the lotion?” Frank had ointments in his bag, but ointments and lotions wouldn’t cure this, not if his hunch was right.

  LeBlanc shook his head. “Gone. Lotion no good. Marie still suffer. Three doctors, one American, they try. She no get better.”

  “You help her?” Michel asked, his eyes pleading.

  Frank grinned at the barefoot little boys, brave enough to
stand beside their mother now. “I think so.”

  “You too have lotion?” Her father frowned, his skepticism evident.

  Frank searched his bag for vitamins and found the small bottle he had for his own use. He set the bottle on the table. “One in the morning and one at night. I’ll bring more tomorrow if I can.”

  For the next hour, he did his best to clean the wounds. He applied ointment to help with the pain. The cure wouldn’t be easy, and he hoped they’d give it time. Malnutrition didn’t happen overnight, and neither did its cure.

  Michel’s mother urged him to eat with them, but he lied and said he’d already eaten. He didn’t want to take their food. This was a farm, but he hadn’t seen any animals. Marie needed protein. And fruit and vegetables. If the Army had any, he vowed to get some for them. At any rate, he could scare up more vitamins. He closed his bag and smiled at Marie, then her mother. He turned to the father. “I’ll come back with more vitamins.”

  He started to leave, but Madame shouted, “Non! Arretez!” She crossed the room and rattled French to her husband. Frank didn’t want to be around for another argument. He nodded again, then opened the door. The wind blew so strong it nearly forced him back inside. With the wind came sheets of rain. He’d never get back to camp in one piece.

  Monsieur LeBlanc shut the door. “You come.” He put on a jacket that wouldn’t have kept out a spring shower, much less this storm. Then he opened the door.

  Confused, Frank followed him. Maybe good manners dictated that Monsieur LeBlanc walk him back to base. The thought occurred to him that they might be headed to a sick neighbor’s. He’d be happy to try to help all their neighbors. Only he could barely keep his eyes open.

  “Vite!” LeBlanc led him around the back of the house to a stone barn that had seen better days. “You sleep!”

  Frank would love to sleep here. He didn’t have to report in until tomorrow. He knew there would have been no room in the house. But a barn?

  He trudged through the mud, hoping there would be a dry place for him to curl up in the barn. Monsieur LeBlanc swung open the barn door. No animals, and it seemed dry enough, though very dark. They walked the length of the barn. Then LeBlanc kicked aside a smattering of hay, leaned down, and opened a trapdoor. He held it up and nodded for Frank to climb down. Frank stepped onto the wooden ladder.

  “Résistance.” Monsieur LeBlanc handed him the lantern and left.

  Frank watched the man until his form disappeared into the black of the barn. There was a musty smell of old hay and even older manure. He climbed down the ladder and held up the lantern.

  Frank could hardly believe his eyes. He might have been entering a Paris hotel room. Okay, maybe not Paris. Maybe not a hotel. But the bed had clean sheets and two blankets. There was a table with a loaf of bread and two bottles of ale.

  Résistance. This family hid members of the French Resistance . . . and now, one American doctor.

  As he drifted to sleep in the best bed he’d had since his second honeymoon, Frank began to plot his next honeymoon. Helen would love it here.

  Cold, cold December

  My darling wife,

  I can’t wait to see you swim again, though I much prefer an oil tanker on the wild waves.

  My, but it’s great news that Danny has his prosthetics. He’ll get used to them, though it won’t be easy. And Hudy and Jimmy will help. They must all come for a visit when you and I are in our own home.

  Remember our starlight strolls at Battle Creek? How I wish we could walk together this evening! Schnapps could come along. Our little pet must miss us, as we do him.

  Everyone here understands my one goal is to see you again. But I no longer simply mark time as I did in Battle Creek. I cringe when I remember how content I was to get by with the least effort possible. Now I believe our contentment comes when we’re doing what God intends us to do.

  Lartz worries me more each day. I pray for him almost as much as I pray for my beautiful wife. Lartz knows so much about this war, and he’s an excellent doctor. Did you know his specialty will be delivering babies?

  Every letter from Dotty sounds more determined than ever to find Boots, in war or in peace. Remember Bradford, the major I’ve been wanting you to meet? He talks about peace more than he talks about war. Quite a unique fellow. I’m hoping I’ll run into him again.

  I miss you so. All New Year’s Resolutions point to us.

  With love,

  Your Frankie

  RENNES, FRANCE

  Marseille? As soon as Helen read Frank’s coded message, she’d searched for a map of France. Bill was the one who came through with one. Helen took it as a peace offering. She’d apologized a hundred times for getting him in trouble with the general, but he hadn’t seemed like the real Bill with her . . . until now.

  “That battered ol’ map looks like it survived the Blitz,” Bill said, “but there’s enough of it to figure out that Rennes is over a thousand kilometers from Marseille. I reckon you and your husband couldn’t be farther apart and still be in France.”

  “And he wants me there on New Year’s Day! I don’t know how I can pull it off, but I will.”

  They were on a rare break. Jeeps filled with GIs drove past, waving at her and at the Frenchwomen, who returned the greeting. Life may have started going back to normal for the civilians in Rennes, but their city had been reduced to rubble, first from three German bombs that blew up an ammunition train, killing over a thousand people, then from constant Allied bombing. Nearly every civilian had suffered from German occupation. Now, nearly as many German prisoners were crowded into POW camps as civilians living outside them. Bill said there were three or four camps scattered around the city. Yet Rennes had a medieval charm that Helen couldn’t wait to show her husband. She hoped he’d make the trip to Rennes one day.

  The hospital was a school transformed to meet the needs of patients, doctors, and nurses. Nurses slept in the dormitory, so Helen woke up on third, ate on second, and cared for patients on first. German prisoners had their own ward in the basement, where X-ray machines abandoned by German doctors had been commandeered by US troops.

  “I’d better get back to work,” Bill said. Helen still had time, though. She’d woken up well before dawn, thinking about being with Frank to start the New Year right. Since she hadn’t been able to fall back to sleep, she’d already checked on her patients. What she wanted to do now was walk and think. They’d been warned to go out in pairs, but nobody else was awake. Victoria was snoring, though the gal swore she’d never snored a night in her life. Peggy, Liddy, and Naomi had stayed on the ward with Helen until after midnight because a truckload of wounded GIs rolled in just as they’d been about to leave.

  Helen figured she’d walked through the toughest neighborhoods in Chicago alone. She could handle Rennes. Besides, she wouldn’t go far, and she’d turn back at the first sign of trouble. Bill had shown her on the map how two rivers—the Vilaine and the Ille—converged in Rennes, and that’s where she wanted to walk. She followed the scent of water and fish. Everywhere she walked, she stepped on broken glass and debris. Barren trees stretched to a gray sky that looked smoky, as if bombs had just done the damage that lay everywhere. Rennes had been the first town in France to be liberated, on the same day as Étretat, her wedding day. She imagined walking with Frank, her arm looped in his, her head on his broad shoulder.

  A deafening roar jarred her from her reverie. She looked up in time to see a tank turn onto the street and head straight for her. She didn’t move, couldn’t move. The tank kept rolling toward her, its firing arm swaying as if looking for a target. Finally, her brain got through to her legs, and she backed out of the way. The tank rolled beside her, and she saw the big white star painted on its side, along with the name Hitler’s Hearse. The lid popped up, and an Allied soldier stood from the belly of the tank, then two more behind him. They laughed as if out for a joyride. The guy in front reminded Helen of Eugene as he lit his cigarette and leaned against the open lid.
Helen felt a pang in her heart for Genie. She’d give anything to know where he was right now.

  A tall GI, his hair so short he might have been bald, stopped talking to the others in the tank and turned to stare down at Helen. He let out a wolf whistle. That was Helen’s cue to hightail it back to the hospital.

  Halfway there, Helen spotted Bill running toward her as if escaping a firestorm. “Oh, Nurse! I need help. The screaming! I don’t know what to do!”

  Helen ran past him, calling over her shoulder, “Let’s go!”

  The minute she stepped inside the hospital, she heard him. Helen thought she’d heard every scream of pain imaginable, but this didn’t sound human. And it wasn’t coming from the hospital ward. It emanated from the basement, the German POW ward. She glanced back at Bill, then headed down. Bill overtook her, taking the stairs two at a time.

  At the bottom, two MPs stood guard at the closed ward doors. One stepped to block Bill from entering. “Only medical personnel allowed in there.”

  “What do you think we are?” Bill demanded. “Turnips? Didn’t you see me run out of here a minute ago?”

  The MP squinted at Bill’s name tag. “You’re not cleared.”

  The unearthly shriek sounded again. Helen couldn’t stand it. “Are you deaf?” She pushed in front of Bill and tried to get past the MP. The other officer closed ranks to block her. She shoved them, but they didn’t budge. She forced a professionalism she didn’t feel. Her big brother was an MP, after all. Ed would be as immovable as these men. “There’s a man in extreme pain on the other side of these doors. Do you know if there’s a doctor in there?”

  “There’s no doctor,” Bill said.