DEATH ON WINTER'S EVE

by Doug Dollard

  It was just a dream she scolded herself impatiently. But as always she was both terrified and yet strangely drawn to him as if her will to resist was powerless against her desire to be possessed by him. The lingering memory of him even now caused her body to tingle with excitement tinged with fear as if he were at once her savior and mortal enemy. Embarrassed she had confided in no one of her nightly visitor.

  Rising before dawn she slipped into her robe and padded down the hallway to the bathroom that served the four flats on her floor. As she expected it was unoccupied at so early an hour. The water in the pipes was frigid which only served to speed her morning ritual. She noted her figure in the polished metal that served as the bathroom mirror. At twenty-five her five foot seven, one hundred twenty-three pounds, shoulder length brown hair and a well developed figure were attributes of which she was well aware but unpretentious.

  Back in her room she dressed quickly, donning her wool scarf and cloth coat. Outside the sun had not yet risen above the horizon and the evening chill still hung oppressively in the air. This morning she was intent on getting in queue for some sweets she intended as a treat for little boy whom the wardens had dug from the rubble of a bombed out building the previous day.

  The boy’s brothers and sister had long ago been sent off to the countryside, out of danger of the bombing. But the boy suffered from Scarlet fever and had remained behind with his parents. His injuries were severe and the doctors at Queen Anne’s did not expect him to live out the week. His parents had died in the building where he was found, crushed by falling debris. The boy did not cry nor had he spoken since his rescue. He only lay quietly as the staff did their best to make him comfortable.

  It had been months since Londoners had felt the need to spend their nights in the underground, sheltered from the relentless bombing. In 40 and 41 the German bombers came twice a day without letup. The wail of air raid sirens blared incessantly while squadrons of RAF Hurricanes and Spitfires rallied to the defense of Britain’s cities, factories, airfields and ports.

  Things were better now. The air raids were less frequent and less destructive. Shortages of nearly everything were still pervasive, rubble from destroyed buildings and homes still lay in piles on nearly every street and civilians still died each time the German bombers came. But the Americans had come in force with their seemingly endless supply of material and men and spirit of invincibility.

  American soldiers and airmen were seen everywhere now, spending their money as if there were no end to it, laughing and good hearted. She admired the Americans, liked them for their adventurous spirit and natural good nature. But improvements in the lives of British citizens did not extinguish the memories of suffering and loss. Loved ones were off to war and families were separated. It was too much at times to contemplate without risking falling into a malaise of doubt and depression.

  Diverting her train of thought to the task at hand Mary concentrated on walking briskly the eight blocks to the general store arriving just before six AM. In mid January the cold in London was made more intense by occasional gusts of wind bursting down the narrow streets. Intermittent flurries of snow floated in the air like bits of white cotton.

  Reaching her destination she took her place at the end of the line. The queue was already half a block long and the store would not open for another hour and a half.

  Housewives, grandmothers and old men formed up in a long line stretching back along the sidewalk hoping the coupons in their ration books would be enough for a few ounces of butter or bacon or sugar.

  Arms folded tightly across her chest Mary stamped her feet in a vain attempt to stay warm. In the bitter cold the cloth coat she wore did little to retain her body heat or prevent gusts of wind from penetrating through to her skin.

  Two hours later she used the last of her remaining coupons to purchase several biscuits and a few cream filled éclairs before hurrying off to catch the tram. The tram was twenty minutes late but already a large crowd had pushed and shoved its way aboard, forcing her to take the handrail on the steps just outside the car.

  Though the tram moved slowly the crisp morning air cut through the thin material of her coat, chilling her to her bones. Occasionally she would glance upward to catch glimpses of silver barrage balloons swaying from their long tethers. Along many of the streets rubble from damaged buildings was piled high in front of burnt out cellars. In places black smoke drifted from collapsed structures.

  Here and there downed telephone lines lay haphazardly in the streets like strands of dark pasta. Water from ruptured mains had run onto the streets where it froze into great thick sheets of black ice. Along many streets she saw city workers picking their way over a weave of fire hoses and rubble on their way to workplaces that no longer existed. In places firemen covered in filth, their eyes reddened by smoke were disconsolately sitting in the streets pouring frigid water out of their tall black boots.

  Occasionally passers by dumbstruck by the devastation would take food from their lunch pails and wordlessly hand it to the exhausted firemen before trudging on. Along the side streets and in vacant lots and wherever there were a few square feet of earth sticks abounded with little signs attached marking the type of vegetable planted there.

  England was a small, highly populated island mortally vulnerable to its diminishing stock of food supplies. After January 1940 the government imposed strict rationing. Housewives were issued ration books from which they snipped coupons needed to buy rationed food items. The coupons entitled each family member to a weekly allowance of four ounces of bacon, four ounces of butter and twelve ounces of sugar. Londoners went to every possible length to increase their reserves of food by cultivating areas such as sports fields and public parks.

  Now in 1944 with the bombing not nearly so bad food rationing had actually grown more stringent. German U Boats were responsible for that. Now meat, clothing and petrol as well as most necessities of life were rationed as well.

  Holding tightly to her package Mary nearly lost her grip as the tram bumped over a rail coupling that had worked loose during the previous night’s raid. Trundling on they passed a school where a small group of children huddled together with their teachers awaiting evacuation to the country, away from the bombing. The children wore large white nametags tied to their clothing. Over their shoulders hung cardboard boxes in which they carried gas masks made especially for their small faces.

  Many of the children had already been sent to farms where they worked helping with the harvests and tending to the animals. Some children who had never been out of the city before were petrified of the farm animals and others were surprised to see that apples grew on trees. Children from the slums were often surprised to find the houses in which they were staying had inside toilets and carpets.

  The saddest sights Mary noted were of the devastation done to private homes. Firemen and street wardens did their best to rescue civilians trapped in the debris after each raid, but more often than not their task was grim as only the crushed and disfigured bodies of the dead rewarded their efforts. Viewing these sights was painful and she turned away preferring to burrow her face into the upturned collar of her coat. Her daily confrontation with death and the pain of the injured and the dying was burden enough. The tram delivered her within a few blocks of the hospital and Mary rushed across the intervening distance in anticipation of the warmth that awaited her inside.

  Reaching Queen Anne’s Hospital just before eight she immediately began her morning rounds. On her way to the second ward she passed by the outpatient surgery where several firemen caught in the previous nights firebombing were having their eyes irrigated. Smoke and burning embers from London’s firestorms were a constant threat to the firefighters who stood day and night directing their water cannons up into the flaming inferno of firebombed buildings.

  Several hours later she had completed all but one of her patient visits. Last on her list was a German prisoner of war listed only by his POW number. He had been brought in for surg
ery the previous evening. She did not find him among the many injured although this was not unusual.

  During her two years at Queen Anne’s Hospital she had treated several German prisoners of war before they were sent off to internment camps for the duration. These men were typically segregated from wounded British soldiers for both security reasons and for fear their presence might create tensions among many of the wounded.

  Suspecting he had been placed at the far end of the less congested second ward she made her way there where she found him sequestered in an alcove behind a partition. The armed soldier standing guard a few meters away nodded as she approached.

  Moving closer she immediately sensed something was wrong. The patient’s bed sheets and blanket were soaked through, his face flushed and glistening with sweat. His body was trembling, his head spastically jerking as he mumbled incoherently.

  Placing the back of her wrist against his forehead she felt heat radiating from his body. He was in high fever and already delirious. Immediately she spun about and raced off to return a few minutes later with a cart stacked with trays of ice and linen pillowcases. Signaling to the armed soldier she snapped at him.

  “Give me a hand with him private.” Hesitantly, uncertain of his role the soldier came reluctantly to her side.

  “Help me strip the bed,” she instructed him, tearing the sodden bedding and discarding it on the floor. Stripped of his sheet and blanket she was shocked to discover a chain around the German’s ankle securing him to the base of the bed frame. Damn them, she cursed the military louts who had done this.

  “What is this?” she demanded, staring angrily across at the hapless guard who stood on the opposite side of the bed. Seemingly embarrassed the young soldier could only shrug.

  “Orders miss,” he said resignedly.

  “It’s lieutenant, private,” she corrected him sternly. “He’s barely alive. Did you think he was going to attempt an escape in his condition?” Again the soldier only shrugged.

  “Take it off him,” she demanded. When the soldier hesitated, clearly conflicted by his orders Wellington quickly realized she would be better served by appealing to the soldier’s generosity of spirit and softened her request.

  “I can’t treat his wounds while he’s chained to the bed,” she explained calmly.

  Reluctantly the soldier dug into his pants pocket and withdrew a key that he used to unlock the chain around the airman’s ankle.

  “Help me fill these pillowcases with ice,” she directed him, shifting her attention to her patient’s immediate danger. With the help of the young soldier they quickly filled several pillowcases with ice packing them against the patients torso, groin and legs.

  Filling a towel with shards of ice she placed this around his forehead and temples. Pinching his skin and watched it sag back into position slowly. The airman’s high fever and profuse sweating had dangerously depleted his body of fluids. The bottle of saline solution hanging from the pole was nearly empty so she replaced it.

  Taking his right wrist in her hand she held it with her fingers resting lightly across his radial artery, timing his pulse using the watch pinned to her blouse. She counted forty-two beats per minute.

  There was little more she could do now. The rest was up to the airman. She dismissed the soldier back to his post along the far wall.

  “Thank you private,” she said kindly. She knew the guard was not complicit in the prisoner’s unattended condition. Her anger now was reserved for the medical staff from the previous shift that had disgracefully ignored their responsibility to an injured patient. It was evident from his condition he had not been attended since returning from surgery the previous evening and she suspected his status as a POW was the reason.

  Nearly everyone on staff had a relative, neighbor or friend who had been killed or injured in the Blitz. It was easy to understand their animosity towards all Germans though it did not excuse their dereliction of duty. The war had affected them all but it was not an excuse to abandon a patient charged to their care.

  But this was not the time to allow her anger to become a distraction. She returned her attention to her patient. Gradually as the minutes ticked by the airman’s temperature slowly began to drop, his skin color returning to a healthy hue.

  With his temperature returning to normal she removed the ice filled pillowcases and stripped the bed of its remaining sheet. The airman’s gown was completely soaked as was the mattress beneath him.

  Quickly rounding up two resident orderlies they stripped the remaining sheet from the bed, exchanged the airman’s gown and replaced the mattress and bedding. While he was naked she noted the German’s injuries were extensive and serious. In addition to his head, abdomen and knee injuries the airman had suffered numerous lacerations, bruises and burns over much of his body. What was most disconcerting were the bandages covering his wounds had not been replaced and were now seeping blood.

  “Orderly,” she snapped to one of the men assisting her with the airman.

  “Yes lieutenant?”

  “Who attended this patient during the night?” The orderly frowned and shook his head.

  “I don’t think he was released from postop until early this morning,” he deflected.

  Realizing it was pointless to reprimand the two for something over which they had no control she relented.

  “Bring me dressing and bandages,” she ordered. As the orderlies hurried off Wellington carefully began to remove the blood soaked bandaging from around the airman’s abdomen.

  The abdominal wound appeared quite serious but the sutures were holding and the wound was free of infection. Bandaging the sutured area with clean dressing she completed her task with practiced expertise.

  Rehydrated from the saline solution drip the airman seemed to rouse. His eyes fluttered and his lips attempted to form unintelligible sounds. For a moment Mary thought he might regain consciousness but then he quieted, his face loosing its taunt restlessness.

  As he lie there she could not help but notice there was something vaguely familiar about him. Despite the bruises and bandages partially obscuring his face there was something strangely disquieting about his appearance. It wasn’t his injuries. She had long ago inured her emotions to the sight of butchered flesh.

  As she moved closer to examine him she could feel the heat rising in her as beads of perspiration broke out across her brow. Just being in close proximity to him caused her heart rate to quicken. It was a feeling that was at once disturbing and yet enticingly exhilarating. Frightened by these strange feelings she attempted to back away but found herself being irresistibly drawn closer to him.

  It was disturbing because she found her emotions stimulated in a way she had never before experienced. She could feel her pulse quicken and she grew uncomfortably warm, her skin taking on a distinct tinge of pink as her sympathetic nervous system rushed blood into her capillaries.

  Scolding herself Mary struggled to regain her composure. After all, he was just another German POW bound for the internment camps as soon as his wounds permitted. Forcibly she managed to break the spell and cautiously backed away from his bedside, her heart racing wildly.

  With the airman now stabilized she took note of her patient, careful to keep her inspection clinical. He was not as young as the German prisoners brought in for treatment these past few months. The airman was likely in his late twenties or perhaps even his early thirties. His hair was dark and cut short. A thin stubble of light brown beard appeared on his chin and upper lip though it was likely he was normally cleanly shaven. His nose was straight, his cheekbones sturdy, his jaw strong.

  Despite his wounds he seemed unusually fit, his body lean and muscular, his skin curiously tanned for the time of year. It was the body of a man who spent time out of doors in rigorous physical activity.

  Among his many cuts and bruises she noted raised white braids of old scar tissue. On the upper thigh of his right leg was a thumbnail sized scar she immediately recognized as an old wound from a
small caliber weapon.

  No sooner had she completed cleaning and redressing the injured airman’s other injuries than the frightening shrill wail of air raid sirens broke the stillness of the evening.

  “Damn it!” she swore angrily as London’s ring of anti-aircraft batteries began a terrific cacophony of thunderous shelling. As the sirens fell into their rhythmic pattern of high to low pitched wailing the terrifying drone of aircraft engines grew steadily in intensity.

  Reacting quickly she began moving methodically down each side of the ward drawing anti-splinter blinds across blacked out windows to shield the more severely wounded patients who could not be moved.

  While she completed her task members of the hospital staff instantly appeared in a well-rehearsed ballet of activity, hurriedly shepherding ambulatory patients down to the safety of the Hospital’s basement.

  She was pleased to note the young soldier who had been guarding the German airman had abandoned his post to assist with the evacuation of the patients to the basement. Within minutes the ward lay nearly empty with fewer than a dozen of the most seriously injured remanded to their beds. These patients had purposely been aggregated near the end of the ward for closer monitoring in the event of just such an attack. Lieutenant Wellington knew the danger an errant rack of bombs could fall on Queen Anne’s but remained on the ward never the less, attending to those too ill to be moved.

  Moving from bed to bed she smiled and joked with each of the injured, exuding a confidence she hardly felt. As was protocol staff members would shelter in the basement with their patients. The now incessant wail of the air raid sirens terrified her and she fought to retain her calm demeanor.