A Rose in No-Man's Land

by Margaret Tanner

  He cried out in pain but with her help managed to get to his feet.

  “I’ll never be able to climb out.”

  “Yes you will, with my help.” She scrambled out of the hole and stretched out flat on her stomach. “Catch hold of my hands.” She reached down, but as their fingers touched, his slipped away because the hole was too deep.

  She slid back into the dugout. “Off you go, lassie, I’ll be all right.” He slumped to the ground again.

  “I’m not leaving you out here. It would be murder.”

  He was built like a jockey and not very tall. Amy looked about in desperation. Dear God, could she do it?

  “We need something to give you added height.” His gaze followed hers to the bodies. It couldn’t be wrong, because these soldiers had passed beyond earthly help.

  With her teeth clenched together so she would not scream at the foulness of it all, and blinded not only by the darkness but tear-filled eyes, Amy started dragging the bodies into position. Of all the dreadful things she had endured in the war, this would have to be the most frightful.

  The sergeant couldn’t help, so she tugged and dragged the corpses into a pile on her own, in an endeavor to fashion a stairway. It was the most revolting and upsetting thing she had ever done.

  The darkness made it impossible to see the mangled state of the bodies, but they felt stiff, lifeless. Only yesterday they were laughing, vibrant young men. Vomit rose up into her throat and spewed out her mouth, but she dared not stop her gruesome task.

  At last the human pyramid was ready. She started climbing out, with the sergeant’s good arm wrapped around her neck. The bodies felt rock hard under her boots. The sergeant almost strangled her because of his tight grip, yet with strength born of desperation, and with the Scotsman using his less wounded leg, they eventually scrambled out of their tomb.

  Across no-man’s land they staggered, bent almost double. The sergeant moaned with agony as he put weight on his wounded legs.

  A strange silence settled momentarily over this section of the battlefield. “Help us someone, please.” She panted with exertion now, but had to keep going. If she faltered, they were doomed. English voices broke through the mist of exhaustion and fear.

  “We’re over here,” she called out frantically. “Don’t shoot, I’ve got Sergeant McLeod.” He slumped against her, an absolute dead weight. Amy’s legs started to buckle.

  “Cor blimey, it’s a woman.”

  The cockney exclamation sounded like a sweet symphony in her ears. “Quick, see to Sergeant McLeod. He’s badly wounded.” Thankfully she handed her charge over. “I’ll be all right,” she assured them, stumbling along behind.

  Dawn, like a ribbon of pink, colored the night sky before Amy and Sergeant McLeod made it to safety behind the English lines. They had run into a forward scouting party trying to ascertain the strength of the fortified German positions.

  At battalion headquarters, over a mug of tea, she told the English major of her experiences.

  “You mean you actually nursed Germans! My dear young woman, if you were a soldier, I’d have you court-martialed.” His moustache bristled with indignation.

  “They were wounded and needed help,” she said, thinking of Ernst Kruger. “I’m a nurse. I only did what I’m trained for.”

  “Maybe so, but are you certain you can’t help us regarding troop numbers or trench positions?”

  “No, I’m sorry, sir. I’ve told you everything I can.”

  “It will be best if we get you back to your own hospital.”

  “I was on the verge of being sent to England before the Germans captured me.”

  “That complicates things a little.”

  “Major, are there any Australian battalions near here?”

  Before answering, he exchanged looks with a young captain who had written down her report. “The Australians are preparing to launch an attack on Mouquet Farm.”

  Would Mark be there? “Captain Mark Tremayne, do you know him?”

  “By reputation only.” He gave her a speculative look. Surely Ella hadn’t spread her poison up and down the allied trenches?

  “I’ll arrange transport to the nearest field hospital. In other words, Sister, I’m passing you over to the Medical Corps. They can decide what to do with you. Can we offer you some food? You must be starving.”

  “Sir.” An Australian private came up and saluted. “I’m here to pick up Sister Smithfield.”

  “Already?” The major whistled his surprise. “Well, there you are, Sister. You won’t have to stay the night with us after all.”

  Amy followed the soldier outside and saw a staff car waiting. Relief surged through her as she climbed into the cabin with the driver.

  “Plucky thing you did, Sister.”

  “What’s an Aussie doing here?” She couldn’t hide her delight at seeing a fellow countryman.

  “Come to collect you, orders of Captain Tremayne.”

  “You’ve seen Mark—I mean, Captain Tremayne? He knows I’m alive?”

  “Yes, there’s hardly a soldier on this section of the Somme who hasn’t heard what you did. Spread through the trenches like wildfire.”

  “I didn’t do anything much.”

  “That’s not how we heard it. Talk is, you should get a medal.”

  “What rubbish. I feel so weary. I can’t remember when I last slept.”

  As they drove off, Amy closed her eyes. Bad enough Mark should see her in such a filthy state, but she didn’t want to be collapsing from fatigue, as well.

  Chapter 10

  Only by pure chance had Mark heard about Amy being found. While he waited in Albert to deliver some battle plans for his commander, a signal came through from the English lines near Thiepval. An Australian army nurse had escaped from the Germans and saved a wounded soldier on her way to freedom. No woman but Amy could have accomplished a feat fraught with such danger.

  The last few weeks had been absolute hell because he’d thought her lost to him. He’d thrown himself into the thick of battle, not caring whether he lived or died, because nothing mattered anymore.

  He blamed Ella for what happened. God alone knew why he hadn’t put his hands around her neck and choked all the obscenity out of her. Now, to hear Amy had survived, it felt like being reborn.

  I’ll make arrangements to have her sent to England, away from all this carnage.

  He had pulled every string he could, used connections he hadn’t even thought about in years, to wangle a twenty-four-hour leave pass in Amiens, and he had illegally authorized a staff car to pick her up. There would be hell to pay later on, but he didn’t give a damn.

  His gut clenched as he waited just off the Rue des Trois Cailloux in Amiens. Six o’clock. Where the hell was that staff car? He lit a cigarette and paced the foyer of the hotel where he had booked two rooms. Would she be all right? What if the Germans had violated her? The thought was a sword thrust through his heart.

  “Mark?” The one husky word, sounding as if it had been dredged from deep within her soul, caused him to swing around.

  “Amy!” She looked so little and frail standing there in a stained and muddied German uniform, her beautiful hair a tangled mass about her shoulders. “I thought I’d never see you again.” He took a step forward, then abruptly stopped.

  Tears welled up in Amy’s eyes. She looked frightful, while Mark was freshly bathed and shaved, his uniform immaculate, boots shined to a glossy finish.

  “What’s the matter, darling? What is it?” He opened his arms to her, but she did not run into them as she usually did.

  “I’m so dirty,” she sobbed.

  “Amy, you little fool.” He pulled her close. “After the hell you’ve been through? Oh, God, how like a woman to worry about her appearance.”

  “You’re so clean,” she blubbered, burrowing her face into his chest.

  “I had to tidy up before going to Headquarters.”

  She raised her head. “If it hadn’t been for lov
ing you so much and wanting to see you again, I wouldn’t have survived.”

  “I heard how you brought that wounded man in. Dear God, most men couldn’t have performed such a feat.”

  “It was awful.” Tears glistened on her lashes. “He lay in a deep shell hole. I piled all the dead bodies on top of each other so I could climb up and drag him out.”

  “Shh, don’t talk about it yet.” It felt good to have her softness back in his arms again. “I’ve arranged for Madame here to organize a hot bath for you.”

  “Oh, Mark, clean towels?”

  “Of course.”

  “Except for this uniform, I don’t have any clothes.”

  How pitiful for her to be in such a state. “I took the liberty of buying you a few things this afternoon.”

  She made no argument about him spending money on her, as she once would have done. When she slipped her hand into his, the gesture seemed almost childlike. Dear God, her eyes mirrored such trauma he could hardly bear to look into them. He was a bastard, yet he could not stop himself from uttering the words he knew would inflict even more pain.

  “I have to know. Did the Germans touch you?”

  She pushed herself away from him, her stricken eyes full of reproach. “Would it make any difference if they had?”

  He hesitated a little too long. “No.”

  “I’d like to have a bath now.” Her shoulders slumped.

  “Amy, I’m sorry.”

  “They didn’t touch me. Dr. Heinrich looked after me. He was a decent man.” The words tumbled out over each other. “Ernst was badly wounded, and I sang to him all one night so he wouldn’t die. He was so young, and it wasn’t fair.”

  “Amy, please, I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” she told him in a frozen little voice. “Major Schwartz tried to rape me, but I fought him off.” In a low, staccato voice she relayed to him the last few hours of her captivity, and he groaned with mortification.

  “I love you, Mark. I would have died rather than let another man touch me. You should have known that.”

  “I do love you.” He made to step forward, but she moved away. “I’m sorry. I’m despicable for thinking this way, but don’t you see? I love you so desperately I can’t bear to think of any man looking at you, let alone putting his hands on you. When I thought you were lost to me, I volunteered for all the most dangerous missions, took unnecessary risks, because I didn’t care whether I survived or not.”

  “Oh, Mark.”

  “Amy.” His voice sounded raw with emotion. “When you disappeared, the light went out of my life. The day after you went missing they found only Millie’s body, so I dared to hope.” He crushed her so close she could hardly breathe, yet she welcomed such agony.

  “At first I thought we might find you alive, but as the days passed without news, my hopes faded. Dear God, I prayed that we would at least find your body, so when I was denied even that, I decided to follow you to the grave.”

  “Mark!” The bitter hopelessness of him knifed her heart to shreds.

  “I took such risks it bordered on suicidal. I threw away my Saint Christopher medal. I didn’t need a good luck charm any more, because I didn’t want to survive.”

  “You mustn’t speak this way. It’s wrong. God helped me escape. You must believe that.”

  “Your God. I don’t have one anymore.” His face looked as if it had been hewn from white marble. Cobalt blue, his eyes burned fiercely. She shivered in the cold aura that engulfed them. Mark had suffered almost as much as she had over the last few terrible weeks. She wondered with a bewildered fear whether things would ever be quite the same between them.

  “I’ll ring Madame to take you to your room.” He did not speak again until a jovial, middle-aged matron trotted toward them.

  “Ah, Mademoiselle.” She gabbled something in French and Mark answered her. “Come theese way.”

  “I’ll wait here. When you’re ready, I’ll escort you to dinner, unless you’re too fatigued.” He spoke in the stiff, over-correct tones of an aristocratic stranger.

  Upstairs, Madame took Amy to a large airy room where a number of boxes were laid out on an enormous four-poster bed. “The Capitaine has been shopping,” the woman said with a deep chuckle. “He is a very handsome man, chérie.”

  “Yes, Madame, he’s been kind,” she answered stiltedly, trying to avoid the French woman’s knowing look.

  “He is a jealous lover, that one, I can tell.” She wagged a bejeweled finger in the air. “His eyes, they will not leave you alone, chérie. Marie has your bath ready. Come, wash from your body the stench of those German pigs.”

  Amy followed Madame into an adjoining room dominated by an enormous tub. A young maid hovered nearby. This was obviously Marie. Feeling more than a little red-faced, she let the girl help her out of the filthy German uniform.

  “Burn everything, please. I don’t want to see those awful clothes again.”

  Oh, the luxury of warm, scented water. She started to relax as Marie washed her hair. Such bliss! She closed her eyes and debated staying there forever.

  “Mademoiselle, your clothes, I shall pick?”

  “Yes, Marie, thank you.” So this is how the idle rich lived, wallowing in luxury without a care in the world. A sudden picture of Sergeant McLeod and the pyramid of bodies shattered her dream, and she jackknifed out of the water. After wrapping herself in a warm, soft towel, she reached for another one to dry her hair, just as Marie returned.

  She let the maid help her dress in delicate silk underwear and slip a soft pink satin gown over her head. It had long hanging sleeves draped with lace.

  “You like, Mademoiselle?”

  “Yes, it’s beautiful, Marie.”

  How many other women had Mark dressed over the years? She certainly wouldn’t be the first. Jealousy corroded Amy’s stomach until her insides felt raw. Marie dried her hair, lifting up the strands and letting them fall down again.

  After thanking the girl, Amy went into the bedroom and sat down at the dresser. Viciously dragging her hair back and pinning it up in a roll, she convinced herself the severity emphasized the pale hollows in her cheeks and enlarged her already enormous eyes. By the time she descended the staircase and started moving slowly toward Mark, she truly believed she looked as wretched as she felt.

  From the moment Amy stepped into view, Mark could not tear his gaze away, and a lump constricted his throat. She appeared ethereal tonight, surrounded by an intangible aura that had fear of losing her clawing at his guts.

  God, why did he blurt out such a cruel question, when she had suffered so much—especially with his own sullied history? I’m not prepared to share any part of her, he realized with a sudden, savage honesty. I want all of her beauty and decency for myself.

  “I’m sorry if I kept you waiting.” Her voice sounded hesitant, her shadowed eyes held a bewildered hurt. How young and vulnerable she seemed. He inwardly wept for his actions just a short while ago. Instead of giving an emphatic no when she asked if it would make any difference if the Germans had violated her, he had hesitated for too long before answering.

  “Amy, I’m sorry about before.” Only he wasn’t, not really, because he couldn’t live without knowing. The thought of some other man’s hand defiling her body caused an acid-like pain to eat into his soul.

  “No, you aren’t,” she said huskily as they walked side by side, with a foot or more separating them.

  “I’m a jealous bastard.” He swung around to face her. “I love you, Amy. All your beauty and decency—I want to keep it for myself. I think I’d kill you before I shared you with another man.”

  “Mark!” All the warmth left her body as she stared into his burning eyes.

  “You’re mine. You were always mine. From the moment we first saw each other I loved you. I fought it. Through Gallipoli I kept on denying my feelings, right up until Pozieres. Having you in my arms made the hell I’d been through bearable. Those couple of days we spent in Paris were the h
appiest of my whole life.”

  In the restaurant they chose a corner table as far away from everyone else as possible. “You can have anything you wish, but I thought something simple, like chips and eggs. You told me once they were your favorite food.”

  “Yes, that sounds good. I’m starving.”

  “For dessert, we’ll have tinned peaches and chocolate biscuits from Fortnum and Mason in London.”

  She ravenously ate the crisp golden chips, stopping only to take a mouthful of wine every now and again. They spoke very little until they were sipping the rich French coffee Madame served them.

  “I don’t think I could eat another bite.” Amy patted her stomach.

  “I’m glad you enjoyed it.” He gnawed his lower lip. “I’ve been thinking. Under the circumstances, it might be best if you go to England.”

  “No, I don’t want to leave you.” She grabbed his hand and held it in a death grip.

  “Why the hell didn’t you apply for a leave pass?”

  “I did. Ella gave me permission, I swear, but no one will believe me. I just didn’t get it in writing.” Her voice took on a bitter, self-deprecating edge. “Fool that I was for trusting her word.”

  “There’s nothing here for you now. That vicious bitch has made sure no British hospital will let you work for them.”

  “I don’t care. I’ll stay here in Amiens or Albert with you.”

  “Oh, Amy, if only you could, but don’t you see? It wouldn’t do.” He sighed heavily.

  “Why not?” She snatched her hand away. “Frightened of having your name linked with a fallen woman?”

  He thrust his fingers through his hair. “You’re being ridiculous. I’m thinking of you. In England, you could start off fresh. I have a little influence in certain quarters.”

  Once again it occurred to her that Mark did not come from an ordinary working class English background. He was wealthy. This became increasingly obvious the more time they spent together, but he seemed well connected with the British Headquarters hierarchy, as well. He had known half the officers staying at the Ritz.

  “Who are you, really?” she blurted out, hoping to catch him off guard.