A Promise Is for Keeping

by Felicity Hayle

  At first they were too exhausted to sleep. Nerves and faculties which had been stretched to breaking point for so many hours could not relax easily, and so they talked.

  "You remind me so much of an old friend of mine who died recently," Fay told her companion. "She was Italian too, and I think she must have been just like you when she was young."

  "Where was she, this friend of yours? What did she do?"

  "She married an Englishman and went to live in England where she had large numbers of children—grandchildren and great-grandchildren as well."

  "She was fortunate, this friend of yours. Great-grandchildren—Madonna!"

  "Haven't you any children?" The question was out before Fay could stop it. Had she been less tired she would have recognised from the tone of longing in the doctor's voice that it was a question best left unasked.

  "No, I was too bad to be given children."

  "Too bad?" Fay echoed, startled.

  "Yes," came back the reply out of the darkness, which was partly due to insufficient light but even more to the onset of sleep. "My mother died when I was fourteen, and as she was dying she said to me, 'Francesca, it has always been my dream for you that you should enter a convent and become a nun—one of the Sisters of Mercy perhaps.' The thought had been in my mind too, and from that moment it became my determination. When I was eighteen I went to see the Superior of a convent near my home, and I was accepted as a postulant. Before I retreated I went on a round of visits to

  say goodbye to my relations, and at the house of one of them I met Paolo Renati." She sighed. "And that, I am afraid, was the end of my religious profession. Paolo and I were married within three months—and in another two he was dead."

  Even amidst the scenes of death and tragedy in which she had passed the last twenty-four hours this seemed to Fay the paramount of all tragedies, and her sympathy was in her voice. "I am so sorry, but—" she hesitated a moment and then plunged on. "But you were young—didn't you ever think of marrying again?"

  Very quietly the other woman said, "No—you see I had to accept my punishment. I had broken my promise to dedicate myself to the service of God. So I did the next best thing, as it seemed to me, and dedicated myself to the service of man; and I studied to become a doctor. It is a good profession—" Francesca Renati's voice trailed away, and she slept.

  But Fay had been stung into wakefulness by her companion's story. There crept into her mind a kind of envy and she wished that she too had the kind of faith which could tinge the pain of self-sacrifice with its own light.

  But it was not an attitude of mind which could be achieved in ten minutes, and within that time Fay too slept.

  She woke suddenly, and for the moment was completely at a loss as to her surroundings. It seemed almost like the prolongation of some nightmare. There was a crescendo of activity all around her which for the moment passed her by. It was only a matter of seconds, however, before she too was caught up in it. Francesca was shaking her. "Wake up—wake up, Sister!"

  "W-what's happened?" Fay asked, confused still.

  "They've just found another fifty or so casualties. They must have been sheltering under the railway bridge. They were trapped when the bridge collapsed—and then the water rose. No one thought there would be anybody alive there—but some of them are, though what shape they'll be in the good God only knows. I wish I were not so tired—but if I take alcohol I get even more sleepy."

  "So do I," Fay confessed, "but I expect you'll be all right

  when the moment comes. I know it's easier for me—I haven't the same need for precision as you have. I don't know how you got through yesterday—but you'll do it again when the need comes."

  They were ready and waiting at their post when the casualties started to roll in. Perhaps because she was a woman, the first case they had to tackle was particularly difficult. It was a young woman, hardly more than a girl, pregnant, and with internal injuries which could only be guessed at since she was unconscious. Miraculously the child in her womb was still alive.

  The decision whether to try to save the mother or the child was a difficult and heartrending one, and Fay guessed that some of the men had shied from it and left it to the tired woman beside her.

  Francesca's eyes, so like Toni's, were tragic above her mask. "I can't save them both," she groaned. "I'm not sure that I can save either—"

  What her decision would have been Fay never knew, for at that moment a voice said, "Shall I take over, doctor? That's a sticky case you've got there, and I've only just flown in. I'm fresh, and you're tired."

  Fay was tired too—but not only that; it seemed to her that she must also be asleep and dreaming.

  The voice was English—and she knew it, could never mistake it. It was Mark's voice.

  "I thought I'd find you here," he said quietly, while all she could do was to stare at him as though stupefied. But after a moment her common sense came to her aid and she realised that this was no unexplainable miracle; there had been an international call for help, she knew, and Mark was the sort of man to answer such an appeal.

  "You know this doctor? He is good, eh?" Francesca's eyes were bright and questioning, even though tired.

  "We work at the same hospital—he's my chief. He's a

  very good surgeon," Fay told her.

  "We're a team at home," Mark put in. "Sister Gabriel is my other right hand."

  "Then I will gladly hand over to you," Francesca sighed exhaustedly. "I am not at my best at the moment, and this

  girl needs all the skill possible. You operate while I go to try and organise an incubator. We shall need to get the child into one at once if you can succeed in keeping it alive."

  "I'll do my best," Mark promised grimly. "We'll have to work here—she can't be moved anymore." He turned to Fay. "Ready, Sister?" he asked in his most professional voice. It spurred Fay on as no amount of friendly sympathy would have done, and her response was immediate and automatic alertness.

  "It'll be a Caesar, of course," Mark spoke to Fay, and called to the American anaesthetist, "How's things with you?"

  "B.P. and pulse good enough. But for Pete's sake be as quick as you can—supplies are still short."

  "Right." Mark wasted no time, and soon for Fay it was as though they were back in the theatre at St. Edith's. Mark did not appear to be hurrying and worked with all his usual skill and precision, but Fay realised soon that he was working under pressure. The sweat collected on his forehead and she wiped it away herself—there being no junior here to do it for him. There was no junior surgeon either—Mark had to be his own dresser.

  "I hope that woman comes back soon," he muttered as he

  worked. "I can't spare you to take over the child. Who is she?" "Her name's Francesca Renati," Fay told him. "She's good.

  She won't let you down."

  "Hope not—" He worked on for a while, then in a short pause while she wiped his forehead he asked, "How many does this place hold?"

  "I don't know—but there's supposed to be another bay coming, and the Americans get them up in next to no time."

  "Good. This girl's not going to be able to be moved over these damn roads when I've finished with her."

  The child, a boy, was brought alive and had nearly gone its full time. "He'll be O.K.," Mark stated jubilantly as a loud protesting wail indicated a lusty pair of lungs.

  Francesca was back in time to take the child from Mark, triumphant with her news. "I've found an incubator only ten miles away, and there's an ambulance waiting," she announced.

  "Good work," Mark commented. "I don't think by the

  looks of him that he'll need the incubator for long. Can you see to it—get him through into safe hands?"

  "Anything for His Majesty the Baby," Francesca agreed, her tired dark eyes sparkling.

  "I'm glad she's got that job," Fay remarked when she had gone. "I don't suppose I'll ever see her again—but I'll miss her. She reminds me so much of Toni. But she's had a great tragedy in her life.
"

  "Wonderful the way you get to know people in an emergency, isn't it?" Mark replied. "Something unleashes one's inhibitions, I suppose. Ships that pass in the dark."

  "Night," Fay corrected.

  "Night," he asserted as he bent to the much grimmer task of patching up the mother so that she should not merely survive, but that her life might be bearable. Fay stole a look at Mark's face—all that she could see of him were his eyes, but they told her enough. She knew of old how he hated to lose a patient and most of all a young patient—and she knew that he would use every ounce of his skill and determination to save this young mother.

  He was still working when the Commandant approached. "Mr. Osborne?"

  "Yes—I'm busy," Mark snapped, at a crucial point.

  "I can see that," the American drawled. "But we've got another bad one in the next cubicle. My men are tired and they say you're the best of the new bunch. Leave someone else to close up for you and come and see what you can do next door as soon as you can—time's pretty short for him."

  Mark swore under his breath. "What is it?" he asked.

  "Man about forty—splintered ribs, perforated lung—splinters all over the place and no one can get 'em out."

  "O.K. I'll be with you as soon as I can."

  That "soon" came far too quickly for Fay, for by the time Mark straightened his back and said "She'll do," no assistant had appeared to take over.

  "You can do the final closure, Sister—well, what are you staring at? You've seen it done often enough, and women are supposed to be better at needlework than men, aren't they?" And with that he disappeared.

  For a panic-stricken moment Fay stood with the needle

  she had prepared trembling in her hand. She looked at the anaesthetist, who was regarding her impatiently. He would have had more experience than she would, but then she could not take on his job, so she nerved herself to begin.

  As she did so Mark's head appeared for a brief instant round the partition. His eyes commended her, though he said nothing of that. "When you've finished that," he said, "go and get some rest. You look all in." He turned away, and then appeared again. "Oh, remind me that I've something to tell you some time."

  Before she had quite finished the Commandant was back. "How's it going?" he enquired. "I want this cubicle as soon as possible."

  "Practically finished," she replied. "Mr. Osborne said this patient ought not to go for transport."

  "Nowhere to transport her anyway. The orderlies are just coming—they'll squeeze her in somewhere here. Better knock off for a bit, Sister—you didn't nearly finish your rest period."

  This time Fay dropped asleep immediately and slept the deep, untroubled sleep of a child in spite of the discomfort and the noise of her surroundings. When she woke, roused by a voluble French Sister who wanted to take her place, she got up with zest, ready for another good day's—or was it night's?—work.

  This time she was allocated to one of the stolid German doctors, and in spite of language difficulties they got on well together.

  During the night the flow of fresh casualties ceased and word went round that there were not likely to be any more. But since only the most urgent of the cases had been dealt with so far there were still many more waiting for attention, since the effect of their shots of morphia was wearing off.

  There was still plenty of work to be done, but as the dawn was just coming the Commandant appeared and told Fay and the German doctor to knock off. "Everyone's getting tired," he said. "We'll have to work shorter shifts."

  Fay went outside to breathe the cool, clean air which was coming to them across the rolling foothills. Already above the tops of the mountains there was a pink glow which increased every moment as she watched.

  She had not seen Mark all that night. It had been enough to know that he was here, and that they were working together in the same cause. As she stood there she saw two stretcher-bearers come out of the hospital tent and make their way to the shed where the dead were housed until the bodies could be taken away, or perhaps buried in some communal grave on this quiet hillside. So many of the townspeople had been casualties that it was more than likely there would be no one to identify the dead, and they would go to a nameless grave.

  For the first time, relieved of the necessity of doing something actively to help, Fay felt the tragedy of it all, and was ashamed that she had felt her own troubles a burden. "After all," she thought, "Mark is alive, and I am alive, and we can still work together." What right had she to ask for more when others had so little, and some had lost all they had?

  She turned away from the glow to the east, her heart fractionally lighter. On her way she passed the Commandant, who growled, "Go and get your rest, Sister—we'll be needing you later on."

  "Yes, Commandant, I'm on my way," Fay smiled at the weary man. "Is Mr. Osborne off duty, d'you know?"

  "Osborne?" the man barked irritably, and swore under his breath. "Why are people such fools? Why didn't he stick to his job? One of the best men here, and the damn fool has to go and look at a case in the amblance and get his hand trapped in the door."

  Fay caught her breath. "His hand? Is it bad?" she asked. "His—his right hand?"

  "Plenty bad, I reckon. Can't cope with unnecessary casualties here, so he put himself aboard a plane that was going out. Guess he'll get it dealt with back home."

  The Commandant turned to walk off, but something in Fay's face made him pause. "Wasn't Osborne's fault," he said gruffly. "Faulty hinge on the ambulance door—those machines have taken a beating on these roads, I guess."

  "Which hand?" Fay's voice was almost inaudible, but in any event the Commandant had walked away. "Dear God, let it be the left!" she breathed ... suddenly the lovely morning had turned to night.

  -APIFK

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  FAY, slept the sleep of exhaustion, but it did not refresh her. When she woke, with a raging headache and a bewildered mind, she found herself repeating over and over again to herself, "Ships that pass in the night." And as she pulled herself together all the events of yesterday came back to her, and she remembered that it was Mark who had said that yesterday. Only he had not got it quite right. What was it he had said?—"Ships that pass in the dark." Yes, that was it —and she had corrected him.

  As she remembered that little incident which had seemed so insignificant at the time, something tugged at her brain. Someone else, she seemed to recall, had made the same misquotation of that saying. When and where had it been? It was not important—she had far more urgent things to trouble her now—but the half-recollection would let her have no peace. As she bathed her face in cold water, which did help to freshen her and clean her brain a little, the word "night" seemed to take on some special connection with whatever it was she was trying to remember.

  Then suddenly it came back. She paused for a moment, halted in mid-action as she was transported back in time and space—back to a darkened ward and the ringing of a telephone, startlingly loud in the silence. And a voice with a rather phony Scots accent—a voice which had used that very phrase, "Ships that pass in the dark."

  So the night caller—it had been Mark. The problem of the caller's identity had teased her for a time, but its solution did not help. It only presented her with another completely

  unanswerable question. Why should Mark have rung her on the night of the dance? Especially as just then they had been at daggers drawn ...

  Realising that this was a question which could not be answered at the best of times, and certainly not in her present exhausted state, Fay put it firmly from he: and reported to the Commandant's quarters. She found him just going off for rest and realised that he had hardly been off duty at all during the whole of the crisis, and it was small wonder that he had had scant sympathy for Mark's accident.

  "Ah, Sister Gabriel—just the woman I want," he greeted her.

  "Yes, Commandant. Where do you want me to report?" "In the first place I want to know—how long can your hospital spare you
?"

  "I was on leave at a place near Nice," she told him "I've another six days of leave yet, I think." She could not be sure, for truth to tell she had lost count of the days.

  "Right," he said brusquely. "I'd like to keep you here for a bit—probably longer than that—and you won't be fit for duty when we've finished with you!" For the first time Fay saw the glimmer of a twinkle in his eyes. "I want you to take over the hospital section here. The casualty work has pretty well stopped now. We've still a lot of people to move to homes or hostels of some kind—hand them over to the welfare services, in other words. But there remain the cases which we can't move. Most of them will die, poor devils, but they've got to be cared for in the meantime. Bit of a thankless task, I'm afraid, and I've only got the most motley crew of nurses to offer you, but you'll manage, I think."

  "Yes, Commandant," Fay agreed. "I had better get in touch with my hospital, though."

  "We'll do that for you," the man pulled a sheet of paper towards him. "St. Edith's, London—that right?"

  "Yes."

  If she would have said more he gave her no chance. "O.K. You have full authority. Arrange rotas—but you'll be the only qualified Sister. Spare yourself all you can. You're shockingly short of equipment, but we may be able to ease that in a day or so."

  The care of the sick, whether they were destined for death or recovery, was part of Fay's vocation, and she did not jib. But to be cut off from the outside world without contact, without news—without news of Mark, in particular—was hard indeed to bear. Nevertheless, as the interview seemed to be ended she turned to go and take up her duties in the hospital building. As she did so the Commandant halted her.

  "Oh, Sister—" he said, and she turned to find him regarding her with tired, sympathetic eyes in his rather podgy face. "You were asking about young Osborne, weren't you? Well, I'm sorry to say that it was his right hand. A great pity—he was a fine surgeon—"