by Charles Todd
Simon took a turning to the left, up a twisting road that led to a knoll. And there before us was the church of St. Mary’s, set above its sloping churchyard overlooking the back gardens of houses below it. Nearer the lane a stretch of clipped grass offered a view of the Weald, crystal clear in the noon air.
The church was partly Saxon, and we went inside to look at their stonework in the tower, and then moved down the aisle. There had been a service here only this morning, the flowers at the altar not yet wilted, the air of sorrow still lingering in the dim silence.
Outside Simon spread our rugs on the grass by the view and brought out the large wicker basket provided by the hotel. Inside were sandwiches, bread and cheese, even Banbury buns. We ate in companionable silence, and there was a Thermos of tea for me, a bottle of wine for Simon, although I noticed that he didn’t open it.
We had just finished the last crumbs of the Banbury buns when he shattered the tranquil spell.
“Bess. Your parents have asked me to speak to you. They were already late starting for Somerset, but they wanted you to know that they fully understand your eagerness to return to nursing. After all, it’s what you’ve trained for, what you do so well.”
My heart leapt with joy. But he was still speaking.
“And so it’s been arranged for you to be posted to a clinic in Somerset, beginning at the end of next week. It shouldn’t try your strength too far. And you’ll be close enough to come home occasionally-”
I stared at him, then interrupted him, not wanting to hear any more. “But-I told Mother that I’m needed in France-” Not to belittle the demands of working in a clinic devoted to convalescents, but it wasn’t why I had trained to be a nurse. As long as the war lasted, I wanted to serve the men fighting and dying in the trenches.
Simon was examining the view, as if trying to memorize it, unwilling to meet my gaze. “You must understand, Bess. They came close to losing you twice. Once on Britannic, when she went down at sea, and again when you nearly died of the Spanish Influenza. And you came close, my dear girl, too close for our comfort.” His voice changed as he said the words, and it was a measure of how I’d frightened those I loved.
“Yes, I understand, of course I do. But if I were a soldier in my father’s regiment-as I could have been if I were his son and not his daughter-he would want me to return to my duty.”
“Third time’s unlucky, Bess. That’s how they see it.”
I bit my lip, then asked quietly, “Because I’m their daughter?”
“Essentially, yes. You’re all they have.”
“Vincent Carson was all that Julia had. He was her husband. No one made any effort to keep him in England.”
“That’s different, Bess, and you know it. I’m sure Julia would have tried, if she could.”
“Is it different, Simon?”
I got up and walked across the lane to stare up at the stonework of the Saxon church tower. Simon followed me after a moment, standing just behind me.
For the first time I could remember, I was furious with my father. And then with my mother for not taking my part in this argument. They had supported me from the beginning when I chose to go into nursing. Reluctantly, yes, but they had understood the call of duty. Why not now?
I knew why, of course. Simon was right, twice I’d had close calls. Nurses did die at the Front. Of illness, of gunshot wounds from aircraft that made it behind the lines-I’d had experience of that myself-of shells gone astray. Nurse Edith Cavell had died before a German firing squad. There were no guarantees. But I could have just as easily died of the influenza in Somerset, never having set foot in France.
Yes, I was their only child. But how many mothers had lost their only sons? How many wives had grieved for their husbands? How many children had lost their fathers? I needed to go back. I needed to do what I could for the torn bodies that came to the forward aid stations or to the hospitals just behind the lines. I couldn’t sit out the rest of the war in what amounted to the comfort of a Somerset clinic. It was unimaginable.
Had my parents given Simon this onerous task of breaking the news to me, rather than face up to it themselves?
“They must have thought you very brave to take on this charge for them,” I said over my shoulder, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice. It was almost as if Simon had betrayed me too.
“The Colonel and his lady had to leave for Somerset, Bess. Julia Carson particularly asked your father to deliver the eulogy.”
“It’s expecting too much,” I said, turning to him. In the sunlight, framed by the rolling green land of the Weald, he looked every inch the soldier. A tall, strong, very attractive man with more courage than most.
“Give it a try, Bess. You can save lives in a clinic, you know.”
“A handful. Compared to what’s happening in France. You’ve been to the Front, you know how they are dying.”
“I’ve seen it,” he said shortly. It was the first time he’d admitted that he’d been sent into the thick of the fighting for reasons he never spoke of.
He took a deep breath.
And I realized that for the first time in all the years he’d been close to my family that I was asking him to divide his loyalties. To go against my parents’ express wishes and help me do what they didn’t want me to do.
I stood there waiting, all the while knowing how cruel it was even to ask.
A choice between the Colonel Sahib and my mother on one side, and me on the other.
I knew I would remember the expression in his eyes for the rest of my life.
“Bess-” he began, and then choosing his words carefully, he gave me a name. “I make no promises that your appeal to this man will succeed. Your father has more authority than I ever will. But it’s worth a try.”
He turned away from me, looking down the sloping churchyard with its row after row of gravestones under shady trees, and on to the rooftops of the village beyond. “My head tells me you should go back to France. No one will ever know the number of men who owe their lives to you and women like you. At the same time my heart-Bess, call me superstitious, if you like. But I don’t wish to find out if the third time you come close to dying, we will lose you.” He moved his gaze to the window high in the Saxon tower, as if looking for answers there. “When I got to France, I was told you were dying. That there was nothing more to be done.”
And with that he turned on his heel and went to pack up the remains of the picnic basket, folding the rugs neatly and stowing the lot in the boot of the motorcar.
I stayed where I was, blindly looking at the church porch, wishing I could take back the words I’d spoken. Wishing I hadn’t had to make him choose.
And then he was calling to me, and I walked slowly across to the motorcar, and he helped me inside.
We drove in silence all the long distance to Eastbourne.
CHAPTER THREE
WHEN WE ARRIVED at the Grand Hotel, Simon passed the picnic basket to one of the staff, handed me down from the motorcar, and said as I prepared to go inside, “I’ll see what I can discover about Private Wilson. It may take several days.”
And then with a nod he was gone.
I watched him out of sight, knowing that he had left not for an hour or so but for days. There had been someone with me ever since I had reached England-my mother, my father, Simon. I felt suddenly alone, separated from those I loved. Separated by more than distance.
Turning, I went up to my room and sat down at the little white desk between the windows, intending to write my first letter requesting reinstatement at the Front.
And I found the words wouldn’t come.
Setting the sheets of hotel stationery to one side, I walked out to the balcony and for a while watched the sea, green and blue and, in the distance, almost black. There was a slight haze in the direction of the Seven Sisters, but toward Hastings and France the sky was clear. We were too far away to hear the guns. But I could imagine them. And imagine too the damage they were doing to flesh a
nd bone.
It was difficult to go against my parents’ wishes. We had always been of the same mind about important things. I could understand their feelings. I doubted that they could understand mine. Or was I being selfish and willful, where wiser heads knew better? I told myself that it was the wounded and dying who should be weighed in the balance, not my own wishes.
In the end I put the letter-or what was to be the letter but was now only a blank sheet-in the desk drawer and went down to take my tea in the enclosed veranda. Some hours later I dined alone. I couldn’t have said afterward what I had chosen from the menu or how it had tasted.
There was a woman at the next table. She sat there, staring into space as if her mind were a thousand miles away, picking at her food as if it had no more flavor than mine had had. Fair and rather pretty in an elegant way, she appeared to be older than I was, and I put her age at thirty.
I hadn’t noticed her here before this, whether because she had sat somewhere else or because she’d just arrived.
The headwaiter came over as she pushed her plate aside and asked, “Is everything to your liking, Mrs. Campbell?”
“Yes, it was lovely, I’ve no appetite, I’m afraid.”
“Not bad news, I hope,” he ventured, frowning. “You weren’t yourself last evening either.”
Bad news was more common than good these days. Yet he’d asked as if he knew her from another visit and felt free to inquire.
She laughed, but not convincingly. “No, nothing to worry about. Perhaps the sea air will improve my spirits and my appetite.”
He cajoled her into trying the pudding, although it was clear to me that she wasn’t hungry enough to care. And she ate a little of it stoically, then signaled the waiter again, rose, and left the dining room.
The Grand Hotel had an excellent reputation. It catered to people like my parents, and they had had no qualms about leaving me here to dine alone. I was well looked after, and so it wasn’t surprising to see another woman alone.
I walked through great doors leading out to the veranda and stopped by one of the vases of fern for a few minutes to watch the waves roll in. I could sympathize in a way with Mrs. Campbell. I too needed to make a decision.
I was just on the point of turning to go up to my room when I overheard someone mention her name. There were two women sitting together just by the balustrade. They couldn’t see me for that fern, but I could just glimpse Mrs. Campbell, a shawl over her shoulders, walking down to the drive and moving on to one of the benches set out beneath specimen trees. It was the one where Simon and I’d sat that morning.
“There she is,” one of the women said in a low voice. “I told you I thought it was she.”
“Yes, you’re right. Shocking that she should show her face in such a place as this. Not after all the publicity surrounding the petition for divorce.”
“Unfaithful, he said.”
“Yes. But it couldn’t be proved, could it?”
“Sordid, all of it. I mean to say, he’s at war. You’d think she could put aside her personal feelings and remember that.”
I turned and went indoors. I remembered too vividly Lieutenant Banner at Forward Aid Station No. 3, dying of his wounds and saying in a whisper that held a world of despair because time had run out, “She won’t have to go through the divorce now, will she? She’ll be a widow instead. I’ve made it easy for him, whoever he is. He’ll step into my shoes without a qualm. But if he mistreats her, by God, I’ll come back and haunt him!”
I shivered as I remembered his vehemence, but it had cost him his last breath, and he was gone. I wondered sometimes if Mrs. Banner’s new husband had ever looked over his shoulder and listened for a footstep.
The thought followed me into sleep.
The next morning I took my pride and my courage in my hands and wrote the letter to London.
I put the direction on the envelope, took it to the front desk for stamps, and when they offered to put it in the post bag for me, I thanked them and said no.
For in spite of everything, I felt that I was betraying Simon.
I paced the veranda before lunch and after tea, and happened to see Mrs. Campbell leave the hotel, the manager himself seeing her into her hired car. Had the whispers been too much for her?
Two days later I scolded myself for my reluctance to post that envelope. My parents would be returning to Eastbourne shortly, and I would surely lose my nerve altogether once they were there to persuade me in person. I was on my way down to Reception to see to it personally when I met Simon himself just coming through the hotel door.
It had been raining somewhere along the road, for the shoulders of his coat were wet. His face was grim, and I suddenly had a premonition of bad news.
Nodding to me, he took my arm and said, “Shall we walk along the seafront? It won’t rain for another hour or more. You won’t need a coat.”
“Yes, I- Simon, what’s wrong?”
“Not here.”
And so it was we walked down to the water and stopped halfway to the pier, standing for a moment to watch dark clouds building far out to sea. Lightning was playing in them, bright flickers against a gunmetal sky. The air was oppressively warm, even though the wind was just picking up.
We were out of hearing of anyone. Simon, leaning his shoulders on the parapet of the seawall, seemed lost in thought.
My mind was running through a mental list of our acquaintance. Who was dead? Why couldn’t he find the courage to tell me?
“Please,” I said baldly. “Don’t-I’d rather you didn’t try to find the right words to break the news.”
He straightened and looked down at me, as if he hadn’t realized that I was there. “No, it isn’t bad news, Bess… it’s… I don’t quite know what to make of it.” He turned and led me to a bench. After we’d sat down, he said, busy with his driving gloves, “I inquired of London where Private Wilson could be reached. I thought perhaps you could write to him, even if you couldn’t return to France. My contact was reluctant to tell me anything at first, and I had to use your father’s authority to pry the information out of him. Which was odd in itself. But then I understood why. The Army isn’t eager to give out such information. It seems- I was told that Private Gerald Wilson, who was an orderly in the hospital where you were working when you fell ill-a man close to forty-one years of age, just as you’d described him to me-was found hanged in the shed where bodies were left to await burial. The doctor who declared him dead felt that his work had turned the man’s mind. Fearful of falling victim to influenza himself, he’d decided to die by his own hand.”
I sat there aghast.
After a moment I said, “Are you sure you were given the correct information? There must be a dozen men by that name and of the same rank.” But looking at Simon’s face, I could already read the answer.
“I knew him, Simon,” I said earnestly. “I worked with him every day. He wasn’t the sort to kill himself. He recognized the sadness of his work, but he understood too that a man of his age was more useful as an orderly than at the Front. He handled the dead-wounded and influenza victims. He knew the risks.”
I realized that I had fallen into the past tense, as if I had already accepted the truth. But I refused to believe it.
“It’s in the official record, Bess.”
“Yes, but it’s wrong, I tell you. It must be wrong.”
We sat in silence while I dealt with the turmoil in my mind. Finally I said, “It isn’t true. Yes, it may well be that Private Wilson was found hanging, that part I can’t question because I wasn’t there. And, of course, someone had to cut him down, which means the record is correct-as far as it went. But it wasn’t suicide. He must have been killed because he’d seen that body in the shed. When I fell ill so suddenly, he must have had to speak to someone else. And so he had to die.”
“Bess, you’re assuming what you dreamed was real. The official report on Carson’s death was shrapnel wounds. I looked into that as well. They wouldn’t have
got that wrong either.”
“Very well. I won’t go on claiming it was Major Carson I saw. But part of my dream must have been real. I must have seen a body. I must have done. And there were no other wounds. Only a broken neck. Which means whoever he was, he was murdered. Why else would Private Wilson be killed? Simon, I was thought to be dying, and so I was no danger to anyone. But he was. Someone made certain that what he’d seen was never reported. The killer was still there, waiting to be sure the body was buried.”
It occurred to me just then that if I hadn’t fallen ill, I might also have been killed because I’d been in that shed. What’s more, the burial detail would have come and gone, and the fifty-seventh body would be well out of reach if by chance I did survive and remembered some wild and feverish tale.
Instead of relieving my mind, Private Wilson’s suicide seemed to confirm that what I thought I’d dreamed was true.
I thought about that kindly man who saw to the dead with such infinite gentleness. Could he have seen too many bodies, could he have been driven to killing himself to stop having nightmares about the rows and rows of dead that he dealt with day after day?
It was possible. Of course it was. But the two deaths in tandem?
All the more reason to hurry back to France and find out.
As if he’d followed my reasoning, Simon said quietly, “Even if you go back, you can’t be certain you’ll be sent to the same hospital.”
And that was true. Assignments were based on need, not personal preferences. Still, I’d be in France. I could eventually find out what I wanted to know about Private Wilson.
Again Simon followed my logic.
“It isn’t Wilson’s death that matters, is it?” he asked. “That’s to say, he wasn’t the primary target, was he? Carson appears to have been. If this is true, why should anyone kill him? He was a respected officer, and careful of his men.”
“I have no answer to that,” I said slowly.
“Who are his enemies?” Simon pressed. “Who stands to gain the most from his death?”