Cherry Ames Boxed Set 1-4

by Helen Wells

  “Uh-huh.” Vivian yawned, and fished in her pocket. “Tired as I am, I stopped off at the PX to get this. Look. It’s priceless.”

  She held out a snapshot of Sergeant Deake. There he was as Vivian had snapped him in the midst of an anti-female rage, arms upheld, mouth open, his cap crooked.

  Cherry looked at the snapshot speculatively for a while. The corners of her red mouth began to turn up. “Do you suppose we could get sixty copies of this made by Saturday morning?”

  “I guess so. But why?”

  “Wait,” Cherry said. With a supreme effort, she rolled herself off the bed and made for the door. “Council of war. Our platoon vs. Woman-hater Lovey,” she explained briefly to Vivian. “Come on!”

  They started down the hall, knocking on each door. As Cherry confided her plan, the girls forgot their fatigue and the third floor of Nurses’ Quarters whooped with laughter long after lights out.

  They needed laughter, for the last few days of Sergeant Deake’s field training grew tougher and tougher. The worst, the infiltration course, came on Friday. Sergeant Deake led them to a muddy exposed field, without trees or shelter of any kind, strung with barbed wire, full of shell holes and ditches.

  “You’ve got to get across that field with full first-aid musette bag,” he ordered them. “There are wounded soldiers on the other side and they need you. Look out for the machine-gun bullets!” There was an ominous whining sound and a crash. Sergeant Deake jumped close to the truck, the girls threw themselves flat. He added, yelling over the biting rat-tat-tat of thirty-caliber machine guns from the woods:

  “Those are live bullets! Now get across that field!” It was an order and a dare.

  Cherry lay flat on her stomach, petrified with fear. Then she started to crawl, cautiously, hugging the ground, as she had been taught. Bullets sprayed only thirty inches above her. She dared not raise her head. She slipped and rolled into a shell hole. For a moment, she lay there taut, face down, fingers and toes dug into the mud.

  Cherry listened breathlessly to TNT charges heavily exploding on the course. Mortar and cannon shells would blast like that in actual battle. Her stomach sank as the control tower detonated dynamite—right to the side of her! The earth shook, smoke whirled in the shaken air.

  She was quivering and clammy and exhausted and clung flat to the earth, trembling with fright. She was so scared her legs would not go. But here came the sickening rat-tat-tat of machine-gun bullets pursuing her. Panic-stricken, Cherry suddenly wanted to stand up and run. But bullets would surely hit her if she stood up! In fright she started to crawl again, to crawl away from that whistle of bullets slashing through the air. She was gasping and her heart was pounding, but she did move forward! More TNT roared and thundered as it exploded. She had gained two yards.

  She had to get to those imaginary wounded soldiers. Every second counted if their lives were to be saved. Cherry crawled, getting her coveralls caught in barbed wire once, once cutting her hand on a stone, but she crawled. After a lifetime under a staring sun, as nakedly exposed as a fly, she crawled under the final barbed wire. She had made it!

  Not even when every last girl successfully had crossed that terrible barrier did Lovey have a kind word for them. Lieutenant Graham later that day publicly complimented Cherry’s platoon on crossing the field under fire, and in a shorter time than men soldiers at the same stage of training. The Commanding Officer—the Old Man himself—sent her platoon a commendation.

  “But not Lovey! Oh, no, not Lovey!” Cherry said at supper, half-amused, half-exasperated. “Just wait till tomorrow morning inspection!”

  Saturday morning came, and with it came tough Sergeant Deake to Nurses’ Quarters for the rigid weekly inspection. Preceding Sergeant Deake were Colonel Wylie, Captain Endicott, and Lieutenant Graham. Sergeant Deake and Captain Endicott wore white cotton gloves with which to run a finger along shelves and under beds to find any trace of dust. Usually any soldier in his right mind dreads inspection. But this Saturday morning the girls lined up happily, each before the opened door of her room. Cherry had a hard time making her face behave. Sergeant Deake and the officers stepped into the first room. It was quiet little Mai Lee’s room.

  There was a grunt, then a pause. Sergeant Deake’s eye apparently had fallen on the raging snapshot of himself, pinned up over Mai Lee’s dresser. The faces of the other three men were carefully expressionless. Sergeant Deake stepped into the room across the hall, past dignified Marie Swift. Cherry heard another peculiar noise. No doubt Sergeant Lovey had seen the same snapshot of himself, tacked up over Marie’s dresser. Sergeant Deake and his party progressed down the hall. His leathery face grew redder and redder. In each of the sixty girls’ rooms that awful snapshot of himself hung loyally over the dresser. In Cherry’s room, it was further adorned by a fresh red rose sentimentally draped over it.

  Colonel Wylie looked stern. Young Lieutenant Graham’s expression was stern, too, but obviously controlled. Captain Endicott, stiff as a martinet, glowered disapproval. At the end of the hall, Sergeant Deake looked as if he wanted to flee.

  “Nurses!” Colonel Wylie’s shout broke the uncomfortable silence. “What is the meaning of this impertinence? Explain!”

  The girls stood at beautiful attention. Colonel Wylie’s angry eye fell, by force of habit, on Cherry.

  “Lieutenant Ames! What did you have to do with this… this slander?”

  Cherry replied respectfully, “We prefer not to think of it as slander, sir. In fact, sir, we think of it as a tribute. Sergeant Deake is our standard of a soldier and a man!”

  This time Sergeant Deake turned pale. Lieutenant Graham hastily disappeared. Colonel Wylie gave the girls a rapid bawling-out. Then he turned and marched out in disgust, with Captain Endicott at his heels, and Sergeant Deake bringing up the rear.

  The girls relaxed and melted into giggles. Everyone immediately tried to crowd into Cherry’s room. She was hanging precariously out the window, making frantic motions for them to keep still. Down on the porch, Sergeant Deake was talking to Lieutenant Graham. The men’s flustered voices floated up to the eavesdropping girls.

  “Do you really think,” Lovey was asking hoarsely and earnestly, “that they really admire me and look up to me?”

  “Er—why—” it was Lieutenant Graham’s embarrassed voice now, “why, of course they do! There’s not a doubt of it!”

  “Well, what do you know about that!” They heard Sergeant Deake’s low, gratified whistle. “And after the hard-boiled way I treated them! And I’m their ideal of a soldier and a man! I guess women aren’t so bad at that!”

  The girls doubled up and clasped their hands over their mouths, nearly exploding with suppressed mirth. Cherry almost fell out the window as she watched Sergeant Deake strut away across the Post, his tough wiry figure stiff and pompous with pride.

  Cherry turned back into the room, choking with laughter. “We cured him, all right! But I think—” she collapsed onto a chair and gasped out, “—I think—the joke’s—on us!”

  CHAPTER IV

  Cherry Meets Bunce

  CHERRY APPRECIATED HER OLIVE DRAB CAPE THIS CRISP October morning. She drew it more closely about her as she trotted across the windy Post toward the station hospital, one hand hanging on to her starched white nurse’s cap. This was the morning she braved Army wards, soldier patients, corpsmen, and any other brand-new terrors which might turn up. She already was halfway through her month’s training, a two weeks’ veteran. But as she hastened down the quiet hospital street, hoping to arrive at Ward 2 approximately on time, Cherry’s assurance melted away like ice cream under a puppy’s tongue. After all, this was her very first professional nursing!

  She wandered into a sort of tunnel connecting the twelve ward buildings, then into an anteroom marked W–2. There was no one in the room; a wall clock ticked loudly and accusingly.

  “Lieutenant Ames, you’re late!” Cherry jumped and saw the Ward Officer striding toward her. “Lateness is not tolerated i
n the Army! Sign in in red.”

  Cherry knew her face was as red as the ink. “This is a pretty start,” she thought. “Here’s where I reform.”

  Just then an extraordinarily tall and youthful soldier, wearing a Red Cross arm band, ambled in. “Clock’s fast, sir,” he said. He reached up and nonchalantly shoved the minute hand back five minutes. He grinned amiably at Cherry and shuffled past her. Cherry dared not smile back, for the Ward Officer, consulting his own wrist watch, was rather crossly holding out the book for her to sign in in black. Saved! Who was that tall youngster?

  She found him a few moments later when the night nurse showed her around. There was no mistaking, even at a distance, that tall stumbling figure whose khaki clothes hung loosely. The boy—he was a corpsman—was bending over a patient with clumsy tenderness. Cherry whispered to the nurse, “Who’s that?”

  The nurse followed Cherry’s dark gaze. “Bunce Smith. He’s my best corpsman, but he just got off scrubbing detail again. Now, the ward is laid out like this——”

  “Why was he on scrubbing detail?” Cherry persisted in a whisper.

  “Oh, Bunce can’t keep out of trouble. This time he referred to one of the superior officers as an underdone egg and when they put him on K.P. for punishment, he carved his initials into all the potatoes. The ward is arranged,” the nurse said firmly, “on this plan—” And Cherry obediently followed her.

  Along this short wooden corridor were several tiny service rooms: kitchen, utility room, lavatories, doctor’s examining room, and nurses’ office. This led them directly into the ward itself—a big, long, low room with rough wood walls, lots of windows, and rows and rows of white iron beds. Thirty pairs of inquisitive masculine eyes turned on Cherry. She grinned back uncertainly as the nurse swept her down the row of beds to show her the two sun porches. The soldiers watched the new nurse with interest. Cherry suspected that the moment she was left here alone their teasing would begin. But the nurse was describing the various cases and showing her the charts: colds, a sore throat, poison ivy, two badly upset stomachs, a burn.

  “The corpsmen will tell you the details and give you any help you want.” The nurse mentioned Cherry’s name and the corpsmen’s names. Half a dozen young men looked up from their bedside tasks to smile at Cherry. Cherry smiled back at the corpsmen hopefully and rather desperately. Bunce beamed.

  “Good-by, Lieutenant Ames,” the nurse said. “And—er—good luck.” She went off, leaving Cherry on her own, with thirty-six lively young men to cope with. “Good luck, huh?” Cherry thought. “I’ll need it!”

  Assuming her most professional air, Cherry looked down at her record book for guidance. It read:

  7:30 A.M. Arrive on duty. Check temperatures, order diets, check foods sent over from mess kitchen, visit any new or very ill patient before doctor’s sick call.

  Cherry decided to plunge into these tasks at once to forestall the teasing. Armed with her thermometer, she started with the first bed.

  “We already took temperatures, ma’am,” proudly said a quiet-looking corpsman. “And see, we dusted and got the beds in alignment and the floor’s just been washed.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said another corpsmen, coming up eagerly, “everything’s all done for you!”

  Cherry tried to look official as she put away her thermometer. The whole ward was listening. “I’ll just go check up in the kitchen,” she said hastily.

  “Oh, that’s okay, ma’am,” said Bunce, stumbling over his own feet. “We checked. The fluids for the day came over and we’ve got the other food in the hot water tables. Breakfast was an hour ago. Don’t you bother. We’ll do things for you.”

  “Well, thank you, and in that case,” Cherry said uncertainly, “I’ll have a look at the more seriously ill patients.”

  “Shucks,” said Bunce, vigorously chewing a wad of gum, “no one seriously sick here.”

  Cherry looked desperate. She could not just stand around before these three dozen pairs of eyes, not knowing where to start on her job! From one of the beds, a boy sang out:

  “I’ll tell you what you can do, Nurse! Come and hold my hand!”

  Cherry flushed. The teasing was good-humored but, as nurse in charge, she had to maintain discipline.

  “The hand-holding department is out to lunch!” she retorted.

  There was a roar of approving laughter. Another boy sat up against his pillow and teased, “Oh, Nurse! I’m so-o-o sick! Please help me!”

  “Why, certainly,” Cherry said and started briskly for his bed, snatching up an ominous-looking bottle of medicine and some rubber tubing on her way. The boy abruptly sobered. There was another wave of laughter.

  “Okay, Nurse,” someone said good-naturedly. “Now we know who’s boss!”

  “And a good thing for you that you learn fast,” Cherry joked back. The boys were smiling at her now, to her great relief. One of the corpsmen came to her further rescue by saying:

  “There’s a burn here… we don’t know exactly how to… I mean, would you…?”

  Cherry took charge of the burn. Then there were throats to be swabbed. The soldiers were both game and grateful for the smallest help. It was almost time for the ward doctor’s visit when Cherry reached the last bed. A sharp-eyed young man with a sickly mustache caught Cherry’s hand.

  “Got a minue to talk to me, Beautiful?” he inquired. Cherry did not like his cocky manner.

  “What do you want?” she asked. She glanced at him professionally, then at his chart. The corpsmen seemed to be taking proper care of him.

  “I’m lonesome, Beautiful.” He hung onto her hand.

  “The name is Lieutenant Ames. And I’m busy.” Cherry tried to tug free but he held on, very much pleased with himself. She could see angry glances from the near-by beds. “Let go!” she said, annoyed.

  The young man with the mustache laughed. Cherry felt her cheeks growing redder than ever.

  Just then big Bunce lumbered up with a threatening look on his face. The patient let go of Cherry’s hand in a hurry.

  “I’ll smack you from here to Oshkosh,” Bunce muttered.

  “Bunce!” Cherry remonstrated under her breath, drawing the boy into the corridor out of sight of curious eyes. “You must never smack—er, hit a patient!”

  “I’m sorry, sir—I mean, ma’am—Lieuten—Miss Ames—oh, gosh! Out of every five hundred nice guys in the Army, there’s only about one lug. And,” he said firmly, from his lanky six-foot-three, “I wish I could smack this one!”

  Cherry repressed a smile. Bunce was very earnest, big and awkward, and so young she wondered how this “kid brother” had got into the Army. His light brown hair curled up at the ends, and his slow grin and that chewing gum apparently were perpetual. She said as sternly as she could:

  “Didn’t you have any training for ward nursing?”

  Bunce shifted from one large foot to the other and hitched up his trousers. “ ’Course I had training. Best corpsman in the class. Take a pride in my work. As a matter of fact, I used to want to be a doctor.” His voice was so plaintive it made Cherry curious.

  “Don’t you want to be a doctor any more?”

  “Well, you see, ma’am, after my father died I took care of Mom and my two kid brothers. Worked on farms around my town, mostly. I finished high school, but a doctor needs—oh, darn. Might as well forget it.”

  Cherry looked at him with sympathy in her big dark eyes. She understood about that deep and exciting urge to save lives. To cheer him up, she asked, “Where’d you get your name, Bunce?”

  The grin returned. He took another chew on his gum and yanked his khaki shirt into place. “Well, I expect I was such a bouncin’ baby they just had to call me Bounce. Bounce—Bunce—you know, two for a nickel, four for a dime”—his feet had started of their own accord to beat out a tap rhythm—“Bunce got a haircut just, like mine!” he wound up joyously. “Say, Miss Cherry, you just let me know when you want anyone smacked!”

  Cherry gravely agreed to n
otify him. Just then a door flew open, and an attractive nurse in crisp white hurried in.

  “Lieutenant Ames? I’m the head nurse on these wards. The doctor’s coming right in. He’s new. And I hear,” her voice dropped to a warning whisper, “that he’s a terror! His name is Captain Upham.” She suddenly assumed a dazzling smile and held the door open for Lex.

  Lex gave her a shrewd, distrustful look as he marched in. The head nurse left with a shrug. Then Lex saw Cherry and relaxed.

  “Where in thunder have you been these last two weeks?” he said happily under his breath. Lex looked imposing in his uniform, solid, and very capable. His golden-brown eyes, under the strikingly dark, decided brows, swept around the ward, seeing everything. His purposeful face tightened a little. “Any complications with Private D’Agostino? Are you keeping Lane on isolation?” he shot at her. “How are the colds coming along? There’s an epidemic of virus pneumonia in a near-by city, watch those colds, Cherry—Nurse.”

  “Yes, sir,” Cherry said, happy to be working with Lex again. They went from bed to bed. Lex demanded reports, examined, prescribed, ordered new diets. Lex might be a brilliant terror to the staff, but to the patients he was kindness and gentleness itself. Cherry could see that the boys liked and trusted him.

  Just as Cherry and Lex were helping a soldier back into bed after a treatment, Captain Endicott entered. He swung down the ward, a sleek stiff figure beside the casually clad soldiers in their gray Army pajamas and maroon robes. When he saw who the nurse was, he smiled in surprise.

  “Good morning, Lieutenant Ames! I’ve been wondering when I’d see you.”

  “I’ve been wondering the same thing,” Lex said in a faintly warning tone.

  “Hope you don’t mind my barging in on your precincts like this,” Captain Endicott said. “I’ve come to see Private Trent from L Company.”