CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The soldier was staring up at her, his eyes boring into hers. Boring through her and beyond. The hastily applied bandage, heavy with congealed blood and other matter, had slipped from his head, revealing an open chasm from which something grey and unidentifiable had been oozing. Marianne answered his stare, helpless and overwhelmed.
‘No good.’ The haggard young medical officer shook his head and slung the stethoscope back around his neck. He pulled the filthy blanket over the mutilated head and moved on, leaving Marianne stunned with horror. There were people everywhere, orderlies carrying stretcher after stretcher from the barges that rocked on the black, icy water, army nurses and doctors, and the whole of FANY Unit Three scurrying about the canal-side, guiding stretcher poles onto the runners in the back of the ambulances and then struggling to negotiate the vehicles back up the steep, slippery slope to the road.
‘You there, FANY girl, stop dithering and hold this poor blighter’s guts in while I redo the bandage.’
Marianne’s brain clicked back into action. The other doctor meant her, didn’t he? Everyone else was occupied, and he wasn’t to know she had only just got off the ship for her first tour of duty and had never witnessed anything like this before. With every nerve stretched, she placed her hands over the thick, stained gauze, feeling the soft springiness beneath her touch, her own stomach sickened beyond belief.
‘Don’t worry. He’s up to his eyeballs in morphine. There. All done. Thanks, private.’
He turned away, obviously bone-weary, to the next mangled body. And the next.
Marianne stood, floundering in a quagmire of confusion and pain at the sea of broken bodies which only days before would have been strong, vibrant men. Her mind whirled in circles. People were calling to each other, the rumble of the car engines rose in a drowning cacophony and the cries and screams of the wounded swirled inside her head, ringing in her ears, ringing, ringing. . . .
Marianne dragged herself from sleep and reached out to turn off the alarm clock. She paused for just a second to rub her hand over her face. At least she had been rescued from her nightmare. Except that it hadn’t been a nightmare; her mind had been reliving the trip to the canal-side on her very first day, a sight she had witnessed over and over again in the two months she had been in Calais.
‘Come on, sleepy head,’ Stella chastized her, rubbing the sleep from her own eyes as she put her head around the cubicle door. ‘Once more unto the breach!’ she declared, theatrically raising her arm as if brandishing an imaginary sword.
Marianne chuckled as she pulled herself from her sleeping bag, fully clothed but for her boots and the thick fur coat she had purchased like many of the other FANY. It was said to be the coldest winter on record, and it certainly felt like it as the small troop who were on night duty traipsed out into the darkness yet again, trying not to slide on the frozen snow.
‘Every bally hour,’ Phyllis complained as they crunched along, the intense arctic air blasting against their cheeks. ‘Lucky Luce and the Bear are all tucked up—’
‘Their turn next week,’ Marianne reminded her curtly, since she didn’t exactly relish the duty herself. ‘We’ll soon warm up.’
It was a slight exaggeration to say the least, for it seemed that each time they ventured out, everyone risked frostbite. But cranking up each engine in the fleet and running it for a few minutes to stop it freezing solid certainly lessened the cold. The temperature was so low that anti-freeze was useless, as was draining the radiator and carburettor. The girls’ brains also seemed to freeze up, and they had to remind each other to be careful when winding the crank-handles and remember to jump clear when the engine caught, to avoid any backfire that could easily break a limb.
When every engine had been dealt with, the group slithered back toward the huts, managing to raise a laugh or two despite the desperate cold. Marianne hung back for a moment, since although chilled to the marrow, there was a certain magic about being out in the dead of night. There was no air-raid and, bar the fading voices of her comrades as they went inside for an hour’s rest before the next round, the quiet was thick and heavy. It reminded Marianne of home when frost encrusted Dartmoor in a crisp blanket of white and she liked to stand outside alone for a few minutes. She glanced up now at the clouds scudding across the moon, and thought of it glistening down on her distant home. And it wasn’t just the cutting wind that made her eyes water.
Somewhere deep in her mind, she knew she was stiff with cold, but there wasn’t room for it to register. This was her fifth trip down to the station, foot down on the accelerator, peering into the ink-dark, black-iced streets by the glimmer from the small, oil side-lights. Stella was hunched beside her, the small canvas roof above giving them little protection against the piercing sleet that drove into their faces like needles, victorious since there was no windscreen to halt it.
The whole unit had been woken. A message had come through that a hospital train with over four hundred wounded was approaching Calais.
‘Bet it has to stop down the line for troops going to the Front,’ Phyllis grumbled, ‘and we’ll be kept waiting for hours in the cold. Again,’ she concluded pointedly.
‘I don’t suppose the poor devils on board will appreciate any delays, either,’ Marianne retorted.
‘At least they’re inside. But no, you’re right. It’s just that I’ve actually forgotten what it’s like to be warm.’
‘You’ll probably complain it’s too hot in the summer,’ Marianne said with grim humour as she went off with Stella to crank the engine of the converted Napier which had been assigned to them. It was almost unrecognizable from Hal’s, but at least Marianne felt more at home driving it than some of the other vehicles in the fleet.
They had indeed been obliged to wait for the train, although not as long as sometimes. When it finally chugged in at the platform, it was spilling over with wounded. The walking were evacuated first, to be driven either to the main British Army hospital in the casino or other hospitals about the town, while others were to be taken direct to the docks. Marianne’s stomach cramped with nerves as she was given a human cargo destined for immediate shipping home. The quayside was dangerously narrow and with no room to turn round, had to be negotiated in reverse on the return journey. But with Stella outside yelling instructions at her in the pitch black, she had managed to go backwards up the icy slope without ending up in the water.
Relief overtook her when, on their second return to the station, the walking wounded had all been transported and the FANY were ferrying the stretcher cases to hospital. All they had to cope with now were aching backs, arms and shoulders as they backed the heavy vehicles up to the carriages, helped load on the stretchers and then drive as smoothly as possible through the dark, pot-holed, ice-covered streets. Again and again. For hours. Until the last soldier was safely in hospital.
Their utter exhaustion was however, always tempered with a certain excitement and sense of adventure. If it hadn’t been for the fact that they were conveying seriously wounded men and that there was always the danger of skidding on the ice and having an accident, it would have felt like fun. Tonight there was thankfully no air-raid and no enemy planes flying overhead although, as ever, the silvery beams from the searchlights constantly scanned the sable sweep of the sky, making the barrage balloons glow eerily like giant, floating ghosts.
‘At least it’s quiet tonight,’ Stella observed optimistically as they bumped along the road despite Marianne’s efforts to pick out and avoid the potholes in the darkened streets.
‘Don’t speak too soon,’ Marianne answered. ‘It seems dark down here but the sky’s lighter and there’s no wind. Perfect for a raid. Do you want to drive on the way back, by the way?’
‘I don’t mind. You know I prefer being in the back with the patients, but I’ll take over if you like.’
‘Thanks, Stell. My arm’s killing from this
wretched stiff gearbox. If I can just give it a short rest, we can swap back again.’
Marianne knew that Stella was more of a natural at nursing, while she herself had more confidence as a driver. They worked well as a team, not just on the ambulance runs but with all the other fatigues they had to do: chopping and carrying wood for the boiler, generally keeping the camp clean, taking their turn in the corrugated iron shed that was the cookhouse with its temperamental primus stove, and of course the mechanical care of the ambulance itself.
‘I can’t wait for the better weather to come,’ Stella renewed the conversation.
‘They say the fighting will get even worse again then, though, as if these operations along the Ancre haven’t produced enough cas–’
She didn’t have the chance to finish her words before a deafening whir shot over their heads and the next instant a blinding flash pierced the darkness before them. A roaring crash shattered the calm of the night and a horrible bang split their ears as the ambulance shook so violently that there was nothing Marianne could do to stop it slewing sideways. Both girls were thrown forward as it came to an abrupt halt, Marianne bracing herself on the steering-wheel and hearing Stella cry out as her tin hat was knocked off and her head slammed into the dashboard.
‘Crikey, Stell, are you all right?’ Marianne called out as Stella fell back with her hands over her forehead.
‘I . . . think so,’ Stella managed to gasp, stifling a squeal of pain. ‘You?’
‘Jarred my arm a bit, but—’
‘W-what h-happened?’
Stella’s voice sounded weak and dazed, but before Marianne could say or do anything, another explosion ripped through the night, making the ground shake. Both girls instinctively ducked, and Marianne was shot through with fear as she realized Stella was reeling on the seat, clearly far from all right. They had driven through air-raids before, but had never come so close to disaster. It was far from over as bombs began raining down on the town, but – Marianne thanked God – not quite so close.
‘Air-raid,’ she answered simply since she was so shocked herself she could barely speak. ‘I think we’ve been hit.’
‘But there were no planes,’ Stella mumbled through her hands which still covered her face.
‘No.’ Though her heart was frozen in terror, Marianne stood up and poked her head out from beneath the ambulance canopy. ‘It’s coming from the sea, I think. Hang on, Stell. I’m just going to check the ambulance and then I’m taking you straight to hospital.’
‘No, I’m all right.’
‘Let me be the judge of that. Two seconds now.’
Marianne’s knees were trembling as she climbed out, an icy sweat dampening her skin. Groping in the darkness, she found a huge shard of metal, probably from the shell-case, embedded in the side of the ambulance. Good God, they must have been that close! A foot or so’s difference and the shrapnel would have been embedded in her!
Struggling to hold her nerves together, she clambered back on board. The shell had exploded only yards away, blasting a crater in the road that had made it impassable. Marianne slammed the gears into reverse, her heart savage with panic as Stella slumped beside her. She managed to turn the vehicle round, setting off back towards the nearest hospital. As she peered into the shadows, she felt gripped with relief as she spied another ambulance coming towards them. She must warn the driver of the new crater, but also report her change of action.
But, just as she put her foot on the brake, a shower of sparks encompassed the approaching vehicle in a fluid, moving arc almost like a firework display. For a moment, Marianne frowned in confusion, almost mesmerized as she tried to work out what was happening. And then her heart bucked in her chest as she realized that the raid had brought down an electricity cable that was now twisting and writhing through the air like some wild, deranged serpent and was coiling itself around the other ambulance.
Dear God! If whoever was inside didn’t get out, they’d be electrocuted – if they hadn’t already been so! But it would be just as dangerous to get out as the heavy wire leapt and spiralled, hissing and spitting, and there was nothing Marianne could do. Saturated with horror, she put her hands to her head as her brain battled to make a split second decision as to what she should do.
The next instant, she had her answer. The dark shape of someone in a long coat sprang from the cab and ran for its life towards her. As the cable continued its macabre dance, a flash of flame wrapped itself about the figure which faltered and then staggered forward.
Marianne was suddenly released from her own leaden legs and without further thought, she rushed towards the other FANY driver. The woman collapsed into her arms, scarcely conscious, and Marianne half-dragged her to safety, falling to her knees with her burden onto the frozen ground.
Marianne sat there in the intense cold and dark, her mind fragmented with terror. Here she was, alone in a raid, with two semi-conscious patients, cut off by the crater in one direction and the live cable in the other, so that even if another ambulance came along the same route, it might turn back and not even see them. There was nothing else for it. She would have to abandon her own ambulance and the two injured girls, and set off alone for help.
As quickly as she could, she grabbed pillows and blankets from the back of the vehicle to make Stella and the other driver as comfortable as possible. And then, with a desperate prayer and her pulse battering against her temples, she hurried down the shell-pocked road through the blackness and the falling bombs.
‘You’re looking much better today,’ she told Stella a few days later. Her friend was propped up in a hospital bed, a bruised swelling the size of an egg on her forehead, but with a much better colour in her cheeks and looking altogether more alert. ‘The sister said another week and they’ll probably discharge you.’
‘Poppycock,’ Stella protested. ‘I’m taking a bed from someone who really needs it.’
‘No, you’re not. You were seriously concussed and you have as much right to be in a civilian hospital as anyone.’
‘Well, I’d rather not be here. The sister’s a harridan. Thank goodness I speak reasonable French or it would’ve been even worse. Mademoiselle, vous avez trôp d’impatience!’ Stella mimicked, and Marianne burst into laughter it was such a good impression of the hard-faced sister.
‘Ssh, she’ll hear you.’
‘Don’t care if she does.’ Stella’s pout softened and a translucent smile glowed in her eyes as she gazed at her friend. ‘Thank you for saving me,’ she said quietly.
‘I didn’t really do anything,’ Marianne shrugged, suddenly embarrassed. ‘We were incredibly lucky. If the shell had been any closer, we could’ve been killed by the concussion alone. And it wasn’t just that one big piece of shrapnel that stuck in the ambulance. The side was pitted all over and the radiator was caved in. It’s been replaced, so she’s serviceable again now.’
‘And what about the other FANY? Is she all right?’
‘You’ll never believe who it was,’ Marianne replied, her eyes stretching wide. ‘It was Mac.’
She waited patiently while the surprise registered on Stella’s face. ‘Mac? You mean Commanding Officer Grace Macdonald, our founder?’
‘The very same. I didn’t know she was in Calais. She’d borrowed an ambulance for some important business in Boulogne and was driving back. She heard about the hospital train and was on her way to help.’
‘Was she hurt?’ Stella asked, horrified to learn that her icon had been involved.
‘Stunned at the time, but perfectly all right. She was wearing a leather coat and rubber boots which they reckon saved her. She didn’t have a single burn and her heart was absolutely fine.’
Stella puffed out her cheeks. ‘I think we all had a miraculous escape, then. It hasn’t put you off, has it? I wouldn’t want to go on without you.’
‘Not a bit of it,’ Marianne grinned.
‘If the old Boche couldn’t see us off that night, they never will.’ And a warm sense of serenity rippled through her as Stella’s mouth spread into a relieved smile.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
‘You coming down to the strand for the races?’ Lucy asked. ‘Should be fun.’
‘I’m hoping I might be able to ride in one or two of them,’ Marianne told her excitedly. ‘I’m desperate to get on a horse again!’
‘So am I,’ Phyllis agreed. ‘I was thrilled when I heard about it.’
‘Jolly dee!’ Tanky declared boisterously, catching their conversation as she passed where they were seated at a table in the mess. ‘We could do with another couple of riders. All FANY were mounted when we were originally formed years before this ghastly war, but I’m sure you know that. But these races were spiffingly popular last year, so we couldn’t wait to start them again. Not that the weather’s improved much yet, but it was time we did something.’
‘Well, I’m really looking forward to it. I’ll bet on you both every time!’ Stella announced.
‘I wouldn’t do that,’ Marianne laughed, ‘not if you don’t want to lose your money.’
‘Let’s just hope there isn’t a raid, or that we don’t get a call,’ Ursula – the Bear – put in, ever the practical one.
‘We’d better all cross our fingers and toes, then! Are we ready?’
The merry group stood up in unison, some swallowing down the last of mugs of weak tea, before joining the general exodus. The winter had been hard. Four thousand cases had been transported by the FANY in February, and they had already exceeded that number for March, even though they were only three quarters of the way through the month. So the races along the beach were eagerly anticipated as a diversion from the strenuous toil and harsh conditions they continued to face.
Down on the sand, there was happy chaos. Marianne was amazed to see what she guessed must be a few hundred people: almost the whole of FANY Unit Three and the newly established Unit Five who were working for the Belgian Army, one or two cavalry officers who by some fluke happened to be in the vicinity with their fine horses, VADs and women from other nursing units, many other army personnel of one sort or another, and many French civilians. Several betting posts had been set up, and a course marked out on the firm, wet sand where the tide had retreated what seemed miles into the Channel.
Teardrops in the Moon Page 14