Jack spouted a string of angry German words. Frank wished he’d taken his high school German classes more seriously.
Someone’s hand smacked the side of the jeep, and more German followed. A lively exchange ensued, with Jack growing louder, and the other voices weaker.
Finally, Jack put the jeep in gear, and Frank couldn’t stop himself from peeking.
The slap came so fast, Frank never saw it coming. Blood trickled down his face, and it felt like his nose might be broken. Confused, he waited for whatever else was coming.
Jack shouted something in German. Then he laughed, and the jeep jerked forward and sped away. After an agonizing minute, Frank risked a glance behind him. The Germans were driving away.
“Sorry about that sucker punch,” Jack said.
Frank wheeled around, confused. “Wait. That was you?” Automatically, he lunged toward his brother.
“Easy, sport. Not yet. Never know who’s watching.”
Right. Frank settled back to POW position but kept a lookout for more trouble. He didn’t release his grip on the gun until they were well out of the city. “Here. You better take this back before I shoot you.” He wiped his bloody nose with the sleeve of his uniform, which was already ruined.
Jack took back the pistol and tucked it into his boot. “You all right?”
He felt the bones in his nose. It was going to hurt and leave him a couple of shiners, but it wasn’t broken. “What went on back there?”
“Just a little territorial squabbling with my fellow SS officers. They wanted to take charge of you since you were caught in their city. We’re pretty sure they’re going to try to kill all prisoners of war.”
“How did you convince them to let you keep me?”
“Threats and promises,” Jack answered, cryptic as ever.
Finally, Frank felt free to stretch. His arms and neck ached, and his nose, which had stopped bleeding, was starting up again. “I owe you.”
“Aw, I know. It’s nothin’.”
Frank started to tell him that wasn’t what he meant. He’d meant he owed Jack for the slap. That was how he and his brother had always operated. Frank would have repaid with one of his own slaps, delivered when least expected. But things were different now. They weren’t kids anymore.
It was morning when they drove into the battalion aid station. Major Bradford listened to Jack’s condensed version of their adventures. When he stopped laughing, he urged Jack to stay for a few days until he could rest up.
Jack didn’t even stay the night. Frank suspected he might have been headed back into Heidelberg, but this time he was on his own. The war would be over before long. The bigwigs were already meeting, dividing countries like pieces of pie, Jack had said. Frank and Jack said their good-byes with their customary handshake and arm punches. Then Frank hugged his brother.
Frank fell into his cot, exhausted. But sleep wouldn’t come until he could write Helen and tell her how much he loved her. He fell asleep with the pen in his hand, gripped tight as a gun.
My darling Helen,
Jack just paid me a visit, one I’ll save to relate to you when we’re together again. About this time a year ago, you came into my life and changed my world. Life is better, richer, deeper because of you. Easter means so much more now. I want you to know that no matter what, I will always love you, wherever you are, wherever I am, wherever we are.
Love,
Your Frankie
P.S. Thanks for the April Fool’s card—same day as Easter this year, I think. (If I’m wrong, April Fool’s!)
RENNES, FRANCE
It was Helen’s second day back on the ward after nearly a week flat on her back as a patient instead of a nurse. She still felt weak, and her cough lingered a bit. The only reason Colonel Pugh had okayed her return to duty was their need for every able-bodied nurse to help handle the truckloads of German POWs that arrived next to truckloads of wounded GIs.
A week had passed since they’d learned of President Roosevelt’s death, and every doctor and nurse still hashed over medical details of his cerebral hemorrhage and how so much about his medical condition had been kept secret. Yet to Helen, Roosevelt’s death didn’t seem real. Neither did her life.
Physically, she was almost back to health. She’d done triage all day, then worked long hours in the basement. But even as she forced herself to smile at patients, there were things she couldn’t get out of her mind. Liddy’s accident, Lem’s death, along with so many others she’d tried to save. Everything was spinning out of control, even—maybe especially—her own thoughts.
At the end of the day, all she wanted to do was curl up on her bunk and try to shut out the conversations all around her.
Naomi came and sat on her bunk. “You okay, gal? Lookin’ mighty glum.”
Helen didn’t have the energy to deny it. “I was just thinking. Dad used to tell us, ‘God helps those who help themselves.’ Well, I’ve tried—and failed—to help myself. To help my patients. But my patients die. And I couldn’t even keep myself well.”
Naomi smiled. “You do know that line about God helping those who help themselves isn’t in the Bible, don’t you?”
“Are you sure?”
Naomi nodded. “It’s more like, ‘God helps most when you admit you can’t do it on your own.’”
“Huh.”
“What are you gals whispering about?” Peggy joined them on Helen’s bunk. “Are you two keeping secrets?”
“Of course not,” Helen said. But she didn’t want their conversation broadcast either.
As always, Naomi came to the rescue. “Helen was wondering if she and Frank might end up in the same unit if Germany ever gives up.”
Naomi wasn’t lying. Helen did ask herself that a hundred times a day. “Peggy, do you think there’s a chance?” she asked.
“Germany will never give up,” Victoria said. She’d taken the bed next to Helen’s, and Helen was convinced she’d done it to drive her crazy. It was working. “I heard that if German soldiers lose a battle, they run to the woods. They’re getting ready for years of guerrilla warfare.”
“Well, I won’t be around to see it,” Naomi said. “Soon as I get my marriage certificate, I’m putting my name at the head of the go-home-to-hubby list.”
“What’s the holdup on the certificate, Naomi?” Helen asked, glad her Frankie had seen to it that they both had a copy of their marriage license overseas.
“I’m not sure. Ralph has to find it and mail it to me.”
“So your husband is the holdup?” Victoria made it sound like a taunt. “Wonder what that means.”
Helen was the only one Naomi had confided in about her husband troubles. She rarely talked about lazy Ralph. Helen suspected that half the gals didn’t even know Naomi was married. “Mail has been so slow from the States,” Helen said. “Bet you get that certificate before Hitler says, ‘I quit.’”
Naomi yawned, signaling the end of this conversation. “I need sleep. I’ll never get used to the DBST.” Double British Summer Time may have saved the armies daylight, but it sure did rob everyone of sleep.
Naomi returned to her bunk, and Helen stretched out on her own. She wanted to sleep too, but it was no use trying, not with Victoria’s radio blaring. Vic turned it up. The music, which hadn’t been bad, faded, and somebody began pontificating: “Attention, GIs and all Allied servicemen and women!”
Victoria shushed everyone, adding, “Helen, are you listening?”
It was the usual diatribe about fraternization with the enemy. Victoria glared at Helen during each warning, as if she knew the words were meant for the German in the room, and friendship with her equaled fraternization with the enemy.
Helen didn’t move her gaze from Frank’s photo, the one of him standing in an open boxcar, a three-day beard making her husband look virile and wonderful.
“Be vigilant as our victory comes to completion! Do not be taken in by the enemy out of uniform. Do not sympathize with German civilians.”
/> “Hear that, Helen? You really do need this,” Victoria said.
“And you don’t, Victoria, since you never sympathize with anyone anyway.”
“. . . these people, whose goal it is to conquer and subjugate Americans and our allies.”
Finally, the music resumed—a lovely, sad song, “My Buddy.”
But of course, Victoria couldn’t let the music reign. “I just think you need to be careful with those Germans in the basement. Who knows what they might be plotting the minute the war’s over?”
“You certainly wouldn’t know, since you only nurse the easy patients,” Helen said evenly.
“At least I will never be accused of sympathizing with those . . . Germans!” Victoria glanced around as if waiting for applause.
“Most of them are just kids,” Naomi said. Helen felt a surge of affection for her friend. An only child, Naomi had grown up hating conflict and avoiding arguments, a luxury never afforded in Helen’s family.
“Don’t tell me we have another sympathizer in our midst,” Victoria muttered.
Peggy hopped from her bunk and charged Victoria. “The last I heard, Nurse, good nurses are supposed to sympathize with their patients!”
Victoria opened her mouth to argue, but Peggy wouldn’t let her. “That’s the last I want to hear about it! Do you hear me?” Peggy eyed their fellow nurses, daring anyone to object.
“I think we all hear you,” Naomi put in, shutting off the radio and returning to her own bunk.
Instead of trying to sleep, Helen took out her last blank V-mail.
H. E. D.
Dear Frankie,
I want you to know that I’m back on my feet again and feeling fine. You mustn’t worry about me. I can almost feel the war grinding to an end, can’t you?
You must let me know if you hear so much as a whisper about the Pacific. Promise? Remember we said we’d never keep secrets from each other. Everyone here says Army doctors still in Europe when the war ends will be shipped off to the Pacific. They’re the ones who’ll get first pick of transport, leaving us nurses stranded. If you and I don’t find each other the minute the war ends, it could be months, or even years, before we’re together again. But I know that my loving husband will move heaven and earth for another rendezvous. Soon!
With love, wherever you are,
Your loving wife
STRASBOURG, ALSACE-LORRAINE
Major Bradford, Frank had discovered, could pull some powerful strings when he wanted to. He’d managed to arrange passes to attend a memorial service for Roosevelt in Strasbourg. And he suggested they pay a visit to Lartz, who had undergone two surgeries on his hands. Plans were in motion to get him shipped back to the States for a major operation that could improve finger mobility.
Since they’d arrived in Strasbourg hours before the memorial, they made the hospital their first stop. Lartz wasn’t the only doctor-turned-patient. Anderson had been admitted with stomach pains and liver distress. Frank heard Andy’s booming laughter before they found the room. “Andy, how did you arrange bed and breakfast during wartime?”
“If it isn’t Captain Daley!” Andy hadn’t forgiven the Army for promoting Frank and leaving him a lieutenant. “How’s the war going, Captain?” He turned to Bradford. “Major! I am honored! Ladies—” this he addressed to the two French nurses—“we are in the presence of real soldiers, fresh from the battlefield. To what do I owe the honor?”
“Major Bradford and I are attending Roosevelt’s memorial service,” Frank explained. “Thought we’d drop in on you and Lartz first.”
For the next hour, Anderson did most of the talking. He pumped Bradford for information that might help him get a good assignment when the war ended. Andy was dead set on returning to the States and skipping the Pacific.
Frank checked his watch. “We need to go see Lartz now. But tell me the truth, Andy. Have they convinced you to give your liver a rest and quit drinking?”
“Nothing of the kind! You’ve mixed up the cart and the horse, sport. I drink purely for medicinal purposes.”
“And on that note,” Frank said, “we’re off.”
Lartz’s ward was so quiet Frank felt guilty for the squeak of his dress boots. Lartz was trying to turn the page of the book he was reading, but his bandaged hands might as well have been sporting mittens.
“Read any good books lately?” Frank asked.
“Frank!” Lartz looked genuinely pleased to see him. He closed the book and set it aside. “You look good. Hey! Congratulations on that promotion, Captain Daley! Well deserved and high time.”
“Thanks, buddy.”
“And you, Major Bradford—thanks for coming. Are you going to the memorial service?”
Bradford nodded. “So, Lieutenant, are they treating you well?”
“No complaints.”
Frank didn’t know what to say. His friend did not look well. An awkward silence passed. Then he picked up the book Lartz had been reading. “The Robe? Helen really liked it.”
“How is Helen? Have you two been able to work out another meet?”
“Helen is wonderful. Still in Rennes. The Army’s doing its best to keep us apart, but we’re determined to see each other the minute the war’s over. What about you? When are you scheduled to go home?”
Lartz sighed. “It’s day-to-day. I don’t think I’m at the top of the list any longer. They think I must have handled some kind of chemical-warfare gas residue. They’re not sure surgery is the way to go.” He turned to Bradford. “Major, what are your postwar plans?”
“I’ll move on to the CBI,” Bradford said.
Lartz nodded. “You’ve been fighting a lot longer than we have. Doesn’t quite seem fair that they’d make you go so far away and keep fighting.”
“Actually, I volunteered to go. I’ve had enough of warfare and fighting. I want to go to the Pacific and work as hard at peace as we have at war. I don’t just want to occupy territory. I want to help build peace in the region.”
“Good for you,” Lartz said. “I’d join you if I could. Which is it, Major? China, Burma, or India?”
“Or Japan.” Bradford took off his hat and set it on the foot of the bed. “Probably China. I’d like to keep my unit together.” He shot Frank a grin. “Except I suppose we could do without a Yank or two.”
Lartz turned back to Frank. “Do you think they’ll send you to the Pacific?”
“Not if I can help it. But I probably can’t help it.” He glanced at Bradford. “Right now, all I can think of is starting a new life with Helen in the USA.”
Frank listened as Lartz, sick as he was, drew out Bradford on why he was doing what he was doing.
Bradford surprised Frank by sitting on the edge of Lartz’s bed and lowering his voice. “Lartz, your friend here asked me for a favor. He requested that I do what I could to locate relatives you suspect might be in Germany, and in peril.” He glanced back at Frank. “I chose to wait until I could tell you face-to-face what I’ve found out.”
“Did you find them?” Frank asked, afraid to look at Lartz.
“No. Or, rather, not exactly. I wish I had better news, Lieutenant. Of your brother, I have no news at all, except that I believe he succeeded in denying the presence of Jewish blood in his veins.”
Lartz nodded, as if he already expected this. “And my mother?”
“I am very sorry, Lieutenant. Your mother was arrested and sent to a slave camp inside Germany. Ravensbrück.”
Lartz didn’t look away, but his eyes filled with silent tears.
“She died there,” Bradford said. “We believe she died three years ago, soon after her arrival.”
Lartz stared down at his hands. A tear escaped and landed on the bandaged fist. For a full minute, he said nothing. Then he looked to Bradford. “Major, thank you. I don’t know how you did it. I’ve been trying to get news of them ever since I got here. Now that I know, I . . . well, it helps.”
It was time to go, and not just because of the memorial se
rvice. Frank could tell that his friend needed to be alone. There were so many things Frank wanted to say to him. He still considered Lartz the best doctor, best artist, best friend a guy could have. “Take care, my friend,” he said, reaching for a handshake, but turning it into a shoulder pat at the last minute. Lartz’s hands didn’t need shaking. “We’ll visit you again soon. Or better yet, get well and come help us out.” Then he leaned down and gave Lartz as firm a hug as he felt the man could handle.
Once they were outside, Frank thanked Bradford. “Do you think Lartz will ever get back to obstetrics?”
Bradford shook his head. “Not with those hands.”
“It doesn’t seem fair, does it?”
“He could, however, acquire a specialty which doesn’t require precision hands—psychiatry, dermatology, X-ray.”
Knowing Lartz, Frank believed he’d do just that. But he also knew his friend would miss bringing babies into the world.
Frank wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but the memorial service for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, although simple, was impressive. Crowds of soldiers and civilians, French, English, and American, overflowed into the streets for blocks and filled the square. Most spectators couldn’t have heard a word of the tribute, and even fewer could understand. But they remained reverent and attentive. Frank would have given anything to have Helen with him. And now, Harry S. Truman, a fellow Missourian, sat in the president’s chair, making decisions that would affect the world.
As for Frank, he had one goal: Get himself and his wife home to the USA. Maybe it was time to write another letter to Harry.
████████████████████
17 April 1945, 11 p.m.
My dearest Helen,
Surely this war must end soon. I have written Truman and requested to be assigned with my wife in the USA. I feel it is the least one Missourian can do for another.
With Love, Wherever You Are Page 34