Wheels of Grace

by Crosse, Tania

  Grace’s forehead had ruched into a frown of sympathy. She knew from her own experience that it didn’t matter what anyone said, or how kind people were. You just had to deal with it in your own way. Inside yourself. On your own. And so she had kept her thoughts to herself. Time enough for her to support Martha when the official letter came.

  Now she pushed open the door of the Wedlake cottage, her disquiet deepened by the beaming smile on Martha’s face. Dear Lord, the truth was going to hit her so hard when it came. But then, to her astonishment, the woman thrust a telegram into her hand.

  ‘Just arrived it has. Barry don’t even know yet.’

  Bewildered, Grace took the paper from her good friend’s trembling hand, and her jaw dropped a mile as her gaze took in the words at a glance.

  NOT ON DEFENCE STOP ALIVE AND WELL STOP HORACE.

  Oh. Grace snatched in her breath. Oh, God, it was a miracle!

  ‘Oh, Martha, that’s … wonderful!’ she squealed in delight, and wrapped her arms around the other woman’s rotund form. They danced about in a circle, tears of joy coursing down both their cheeks. Grace glanced over her shoulder at her mother and little Maggie who were both smiling at their antics, but thankfully neither of them understood the reason for their elation. For if they could, wouldn’t they have wanted Stephen to come back from the dead as well?

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  GRACE HURRIED INTO the village, anxious to arrive promptly at the wheelwright’s yard. It was a pleasant September morning, overcast but warm and still, with a promise of the cloud breaking later. There should have been a spring in Grace’s step as she breathed in the sweet fragrance of the countryside. But like everyone who kept abreast of events, an insidious grey fog dampened her every thought.

  Since the beginning of July, the country had been receiving news of a massive attempt by the Allies to break the deadlock in France in an area along the River Somme. So Geoffrey and Farmer Snell’s conjecture had been proved correct. But things weren’t going to plan. Published casualty lists were growing longer and longer, running into hundreds of thousands now, Larry had reported gloomily. Grace knew what was gnawing at the back of his mind – because it was gnawing at hers, too. Martin.

  Somewhere, out in the terrifying mayhem of the battlefield, was Martin. Perhaps, at any instant, while Grace was drinking a cup of tea, chasing timber suppliers or soothing her mother as she caught up with the neglected household chores, Martin had just been blown to smithereens, was choking to death on poisoned gas, or was lying, riddled with bullets, as he breathed his last.

  If there was bad news, would Grace try to work out what she had been doing when it had happened? She somehow had a feeling that she would. A morbid despondency seemed to pervade everything she did, however hard she tried to throw it off. It wasn’t as if there was anything more between them than Martin being like another brother to her. But if the worst happened, it would be like losing Stephen all over again, and she wasn’t sure she could bear that. She even wondered wryly if she had been wrong to interrupt Martin and Aggie down by the stepping stones after all. Or whether Stephen had ever succumbed to the dusky charms of some beautiful maiden out in India before he had died. She almost hoped that he had.

  Oh, she must stop thinking as if she were the only person in the world who was suffering this agony. God alone knew how many soldiers and their worried relatives were involved. The fighting wasn’t confined to France. There were theatres of war also playing out in Egypt and Palestine, Salonika and Mesopotamia where the fall of Kut to the Turks back in the spring had been an appalling blow. With Larry’s help and the aid of an old atlas, Grace had followed it all, but lately she hadn’t been so keen to do so. There was clearly no end in sight, and the more she knew, the more depressed she became.

  ‘Morning, all,’ she called with false brightness as she entered the workshop. And seeing that not everyone was there, she enquired, ‘Where are Gladys and Elsie?’ Certainly the two young women who had been employed to take John’s place were nowhere to be seen. To Nan’s dismay, John had been called up only weeks after the second conscription act had come into force, and Geoffrey had needed to fill the gap pretty quickly. He sometimes wondered if he had made too hasty a decision and taken on the wrong applicants!

  ‘Hurrump,’ he answered Grace’s question, the twist of his mouth portraying his displeasure. ‘Gone up to the field with Derek to catch the horses and tack them up. You’d have thought they could manage on their own by now.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Dad. Neither of them had been near a horse before. And they’re mighty willing and able about the place. And they brighten things up a bit.’

  Geoffrey threw his son a grudging glance, making Grace smile to herself. Gladys and Elsie were indeed a pair, having worked in service together in Tavistock. Higher wages and a sense of freedom had drawn them to apply for the advertised posts, and both being strapping young girls, their combined strength made up for the loss of John’s brawn. Between them, they managed to lug heavy timber to wherever it was needed, and their antics brought some amusement to the hardworking atmosphere in the yard and workshop.

  ‘Talk of the devil,’ Bob put in, jabbing his head towards the open doors.

  ‘Aw, stop, you bloody girt animal!’ Gladys’s strident voice jangled from outside. ‘Just missed my foot, you did! An’ now you’ve got to go a few steps assards!’

  ‘I told you to give ’em a wider turning circle,’ Derek corrected her. ‘Anyways, now you two can bring the wagon up an’ see if you can get the horses to back up to the shafts.’

  Grace chuckled as she walked over to the office, hearing the disgruntled snorting of the horses as the two girls tried to persuade them to step backwards up to the wagon. Grace knew a line of wheelbarrows was waiting to be taken for despatch up at Dousland Station, and she could imagine the colourful language Gladys in particular would use as they pushed the heavy handcarts up the ramp and into the wagon. Geoffrey would frown in disapproval but the rest of them would hide a smile. It was yet another way the war had changed their lives, Grace mused as she closed the office door. Two years ago, she would have been disgusted at the swearing that tripped so easily from Gladys’s tongue. But now she wondered with amusement how the girl had managed to contain her natural means of expression while she was in service. No wonder she had jumped at the chance of employment in what she had imagined would be an entirely male workplace!

  With the trace of a smile lingering on her lips, Grace got on with the business’s paperwork. She finished it in record time and was about to go and lend a hand in the workshop when she heard Verity Vencombe’s raised voice through the door. It was rare that the good lady did more than provide mugs of tea and plates of biscuits for their employees, although she was always ready with her kind smile to administer to their needs if anyone cut a finger or had any other mishap. So it seemed to Grace that something must be amiss, and she popped her head around the door. Verity was waving a sheet of paper in the air, her drained face taut with some unfathomable emotion. Grace was aware of her own pulse speeding up as she stared at the agitated woman, and a sudden fear stung into her mind, too.

  ‘It’s from Martin,’ Verity babbled, her voice almost a squeal. ‘He’s been wounded. He’s in a field hospital, but … they might be sending him home to recover.’

  Numbed shock sizzled about the workshop, followed by a chorus of voices as everyone tried to make sense of the news, bombarding poor Verity with questions.

  ‘What sort of wounds?’

  ‘Coming home? When? Home here? To a hospital?’

  ‘I-I don’t know,’ Verity stammered, ‘He doesn’t say.’

  ‘Well, he’s alive, thank God.’ Geoffrey stepped forward and took his wife’s trembling hands. ‘And he’ll be out of the fighting for a while, at least.’

  ‘It must be a relatively serious wound if they’re sending him home,’ Larry frowned, taking the letter from his mother. ‘More minor wounds they patch up somewhere behind the lines befo
re sending them back to the Front. On the other hand, he’s well enough to travel.’

  ‘Does he not say ort more?’ Grace eagerly grasped Larry’s arm and leant over it so that she could read the letter in his hand for herself. She felt strange, torn in two. Of course, it was dreadful that Martin had been hurt, but he had survived and might soon be safely home in England. Possibly for good. Oh, it would be so marvellous to see him! And the excitement flared inside her like a torch of flame, burning away the horror of what Martin might be suffering. They would find out the nature of his wounds soon enough. For now, she would bask in the knowledge that he was alive and safe, and the smile that crept onto her face was slowly echoed by those who stood around her.

  ‘Nan?’

  The front door to the cottage hadn’t been shut properly which was how Grace had caught the faint sobs coming from within. Her heart at once constricted with sympathy since poor Nan had been so distressed when John had been called up.

  Grace’s gaze travelled about the usually tidy room, for John was right in that Nan was a born home-maker. But the sight that met her eyes was one of chaos and disorder.

  ‘Give it me!’ little Billy was bawling at his big sister who, at just turned four years old, was fiercely clutching a worn and pathetic rag doll to her chest.

  ‘No, it’s mine! Aw, now look what you’ve done!’ Sally screamed and burst into passionate tears as she stared at the detached leg.

  Grace saw the fleeting horror on Billy’s face that was at once replaced by an obstinate pout. ‘Sally’s fault!’ he retorted, and promptly tripped backwards over the baby who was crawling on the floor and began howling when his older brother landed on top of him.

  Grace raised her concerned eyes to her friend. Nan was completely ignoring her off-spring as she knuckled the tears from her eyes. Grace stepped forward to lift Billy onto his feet and, sweeping the crying baby into one arm, retrieved the dismembered doll’s leg from the floor where Billy had now abandoned it.

  ‘Oh, we can soon sew dolly’s leg back on,’ she soothed, smiling down at Sally. ‘Now, why don’t you two go and play out the back while I talk to your mummy?’

  ‘So … will you mend it for me, Grace?’

  ‘Of course, I will. Now off you go, and play nicely.’ Grace watched with relief as the two little souls went out through the back door, evidently friends again. The infant in her arms was also calming down, deciding that pulling Grace’s hair from its neat bun was much more interesting than crying, and Grace turned her attention to Nan.

  ‘What’s the matter, Nan?’ she asked tentatively, and her heart swayed as Nan turned her tear-stained face to her. She was a picture of misery, her eyes red and swollen.

  ‘John … be on his way to France,’ the poor girl choked. ‘To the Front.’

  ‘Oh.’ A lead weight sank in Grace’s stomach. Of course. It was what every parent, spouse and child dreaded. To have a loved one in such terrible danger hundreds of miles away and there was nothing anyone could do about it. Just the awful sterility of waiting for news – one way or the other. What Grace couldn’t voice was the thought that, like all conscripts nowadays, John had been sent to the battlefield with so little training.

  ‘They gave him just enough time to come home for a few hours to say goodbye. Didn’t you see him yesterday afternoon?’

  Nan’s eyebrows knitted as if, in some obscure way, it might have helped her if Grace had. But Grace had to shake her head.

  ‘Worst of it is,’ Nan faltered as if she were about to break into tears again, ‘I’s pregnant again, and I had to hide it from him. I didn’t want him thinking that he could die and never see his next child!’

  Her homely figure trembled as she broke down once more and Grace put her free arm about the young woman’s shoulders, pain scratching at her own throat. She must be strong for poor Nan. Whatever she herself thought of John, he was Nan’s husband and she loved him. She was devastated without him. Grace bit her lip, and a curious sensation came over her. There was no one she loved as a woman loved a man, not in that sense. It was something she had mentally put out of her mind, concentrating on her work and her family until this horrific conflict was over.

  And she thanked God that she had.

  ‘Now, remember what Mum and Dad said after their visit yesterday,’ Larry warned. ‘He’s not quite his old self.’

  After some weeks of silence, Martin’s parents had been informed that their injured officer son had been returned not only to Devon, but to his nearest home town of Tavistock just outside of which Mount Tavy House had only recently been turned into an auxiliary military hospital. It was to receive injured soldiers mainly from the Devonshire Regiment whenever possible, and specializing in neurosis patients. Grace had read in the Gazette that the substantial residence had been left in trust to a local doctor and his wife to be used for the good of the community, and what better way could there be than to help the poor devils who had been wounded in defence of their country?

  And so, one early October afternoon, Grace and Larry had taken the train into Tavistock together. Grace had thought that she couldn’t possibly leave her mother for the afternoon as well, but dear Martha had insisted that she could take care of Temperance for the whole day. Grace was so pleased that she was able to accompany Larry that only now was she beginning to consider what the hospital visit might hold.

  Larry had seemed disinclined to talk during the short train journey and instead, Grace had enjoyed the magnificent views over the western edge of the moor. When they arrived in Tavistock, Grace had been surprised to see so many soldiers in the town, even though she had read how heavily garrisoned the area had become. Now, as she and Larry climbed the steep hill to the grand house on the way up onto the moor, Grace’s heart began to gallop. And it wasn’t just the exertion of conquering the soaring incline that was making her breathless. They couldn’t go so terribly fast anyway because of Larry’s leg. No. It was his subdued words that had set her mind, and consequently her pulse, racing.

  Grace gulped, her mouth suddenly as dry as desert sand. ‘Yes, I know,’ she replied, trying to make herself sound more confident than she felt. ‘But your parents said that he were really looking forward to seeing us both, so we must do our best to cheer him up.’

  ‘Exactly,’ Larry said forcefully, but the sombre expression on his face hardly looked encouraging.

  They turned in at the gates where the young lad who was manning the entrance asked their business and then directed them across a stone bridge and up the sweeping driveway. The house sat atop a hill, surrounded by stunning grounds whose grassy banks were dotted carefully with specimen trees so as not to spoil the glorious view over Tavistock and the green hills on the far side of the valley. Where the ground was not so steep, vegetables had been planted as part of the campaign, Grace surmised, to grow as much non-imported food as possible. She was enchanted. She had never seen anything so grandiose as the house and its grounds, but her rapture vanished as the reality of the situation struck home.

  The mild autumn afternoon had drawn the inhabitants of the house outdoors to sit on benches or wander across the grass. It was these people that made Grace falter in her steps, and beside her, she felt Larry hesitate as if he, too, were enveloped in the same tearing sensibility as she was.

  The grounds were wreathed in tranquillity, hardly a breath of breeze stirring the turning leaves on the trees or the autumn flowers in the neat borders. All was so calm, like a silent paradise, figures floating like gentle spirits in a sea of green. Yet there was sound, far away and muffled. Soothing voices, quiet laughter even. Women in white, ankle-length pinafores and head-dresses like starched scarves tied in intricate folds at the back so that they resembled angels’ wings. Each beside a man, bent over in an attitude of caring, holding a hand, helping the lame to limp forward. The men in shapeless, saxe-blue suits with wide lapels and finished with a scarlet tie. Bandages covered an eye, swathed an arm. An empty trouser-leg, a vacant sleeve pinned to the chest. Th
e crunch of gravel as one of the angels pushed a bath-chair past the young couple on the driveway. A blanket where there should have been two legs. The angel smiled at Grace so serenely as they passed. And Grace turned to watch, and felt her heart rupture.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  The kind, compassionate voice enlivened Grace’s senses, and the scene about her sprang back to reality, the players no longer moving in slow motion, sounds returning to normal levels. Grace blinked, aware suddenly of the moisture that was pooling in her eyes. Dear God. These poor, broken souls. Young lads turned into old men, their lives in tatters.

  ‘We’ve come to visit my brother, Second Lieutenant Vencombe,’ Grace heard Larry reply to the tall, slender figure in a scarlet nurse’s uniform who stood before them, a woman in her late forties, Grace would have guessed. ‘The boy on the gate directed us this way,’ Larry concluded by way of explanation.

  ‘Ah, Liam.’ The lady smiled affectionately. ‘A good lad. His mother’s a VAD nurse here.’ She lifted a wistful eyebrow. ‘We’ll be losing young Liam to the army, too, though, in a year or so if this dreadful business isn’t over by then. He already has two elder brothers out in France, poor devils. But, do come this way.’ She shook her head as if throwing her melancholy thoughts aside. ‘Your brother’s a little brighter this afternoon. The visit from his parents yesterday cheered him up no end.’

  ‘You know him personally, then?’ Larry sounded surprised.

  ‘We’ve only just opened so we’re not up to capacity yet, so I’ve learnt everyone’s name so far. But I intend to make it my business to know all of my patients individually.’ The woman turned her confident, sincere smile on them again. ‘I’m Ling Franfield, by the way. Officially the VAD Commandant, but I prefer to be called Matron. It were to me that dear Agnes left this place, and with so many poor souls returning from the Front with their nerves in pieces, well, my husband suggested we opened it as a sort of sanctuary for them. We couldn’t think of a better way to carry out Agnes’s wishes to do something for the town. Not that we’d turn any poor fellow away, but we do try to give priority to anyone from the Devonshire Regiment.’