The German Woman

by Paul Griner

  “We all were. To have come this far. It seems at times that there will be no one left for the peace.”

  “What happened?”

  She breathed deeply. “Just after your Aldwych bomb hit, a dozen WAAFs leaned out a window to see where the noise came from. They were all sucked out by the blast wave. Those and the girls sunning on the roof. Madge was among them.”

  That explained why she was wearing the perfume. She was probably on her way back from the service. She didn’t stay long after that.

  The breeze blew up, carrying with it the lilac scent of linden trees after a rain, and then he heard Kate’s voice.

  “You’ll not get healthy, Major Walford, betting away your supper.”

  “Who says I’m going to lose?”

  “You’ve not eaten an entire meal in three days. Planning on better luck?”

  She was at his bedside. He did not want to give away the extent of his happiness. “Is this your hospital?”

  “It is now, I’m afraid. The Middlesex was hit rather badly. I’m not supposed to be here—I’m in surgery—but once I saw your name on the roster I had to come up. Are you all right? Are they taking good care of you?”

  “I think so,” he said.

  “You don’t know?”

  “I’m never sure what day it is, or if I’m dreaming.”

  “The concussion. You’ll be fine in a day or so, as long as you don’t move much. And you’re lucky it wasn’t the last war. We’d be pumping you full of caffeine”

  Something about her looked a bit odd. He stared until he had it. “Where’s your cap?” Without it she seemed half dressed. All of the other nurses wore them.

  She put her hand to the back of her hair just above her high, starched collar, where normally it would have rested. “A bit of excitement. A bomb blew in some windows and I lost it.”

  “But you’re all right?”

  “Yes. We all were luckier than you” She smiled at him. “Though perhaps not.”

  “I’m sorry?” he said.

  “I saw your visitor earlier. Another conquest?”

  Behind her joking tone he detected doubt, a twinge of jealousy. He felt an odd mixture of emotions, happiness to hear it, sorrow for Madge. “My superior.”

  “At the ministry?”

  “Wardens’ post.”

  “Gets to boss you around, does she?”

  “Yes. Though she doesn’t take advantage of the privilege very often. I’m afraid she had some rather bad news. A mutual friend died.”

  “Oh, Charles.” She touched his hand. “I’m sorry.”

  “Nurse?” It was the Australian in the next bed. “I’m in a bit of pain. Do you think you could do something for me?”

  “Certainly,” she said. “In a minute I’ll send your nurse down, or the doctor.”

  Normally the nurses would have been behind a central desk with the beds around them, but because of the recent spate of bombings Claus and the others were in a long, windowed corridor. All the glass had blast netting.

  Claus knew he couldn’t take her hand, and his frustration seemed disproportionate. He made an effort to overcome it. “You have to go?”

  “Yes. I’ll be back to check on you after eight. I’m off then.”

  “That would be good.” He didn’t look forward to the dark.

  She squeezed his arm and he watched her quick efficient steps, the pale bottoms of her shoes. As if time had warped, another woman came through the doors just after she’d left, older, gray-haired, stooped, but otherwise about the same size, carrying a package wrapped in brown paper. Her steps down the ward were so slow she might have been Death herself, weary of her rounds.

  She passed his bed and disappeared behind the screened bed beside him for several minutes, and when she came out she no longer had the package; he watched her make her slow way back down the ward. She was halfway to the door when he grew excited. How long had her entire trip taken? An hour? More, perhaps; perhaps for some of it he’d slept. Now he didn’t take his eyes off her, believing that if he watched her all the way without blinking Kate would come through the doors again right after she left, the mirror image of her first appearance, but it was no use. The older woman took so long he couldn’t help blinking. When she finally disappeared and Kate didn’t return he felt foolish.

  Because he’d been listening for her returning step so acutely—it was already nine thirty and she hadn’t yet arrived—he seemed to hear the buzz bomb before anyone else. Far off, but making its steady implacable way toward them, its engine note just audible under the wail of the sirens. Then it stopped. The Australian started coughing and Claus thought he might miss the sound of the explosion, but it came, dimly, along with a faint puff of air that rippled the yellowing curtains across the ward.

  “Did you hear that?” Claus asked.

  “Wasn’t for us, mate. Might as well relax. They’ll be falling short tonight.”

  Claus put his arms under the covers to grip the damp sheets unobserved. The man to his left made a muffled noise behind his screen. Had he heard it too? How much worse to be immobilized. Then another one started, this one much closer, its cranky clanking like someone beating on pipe with a hammer, and Claus forgot about anyone else. He worked his shoulders from side to side, trying to dig to safety through his own bed.

  Its tail fire brightened the room, trapping him in the open like a deer that had been dogged and jacklighted. Sweating, nauseated, with a nearly uncontrollable urge to go to the bathroom, all he could think of was escape. Then Kate’s soothing voice said, “Lie back,” and her cool hand was on his wrist.

  “Please,” she said. “It will help. You’re straining to hear them. It’s perfectly normal for concussion patients.”

  “Help what?”

  “Relax you.”

  “I don’t need to relax.”

  She touched his shoulder instead of arguing. “Just trust me.”

  Once he was lying flat she asked him to close his mouth. “Don’t worry,” she said, and smiled. “I’ll let you talk again soon.

  “There. That’s right. Now concentrate on deeper breaths. Good.”

  After a minute or two she said, softly, “Now, let go of the sheets.”

  He hadn’t known his hands were clenched, and the sudden embarrassed awareness made him breathe quickly once more. “No,” she said. “That’s all right. Now you’ve let go you can close your mouth again.”

  He did. The sweat in his hair began to dry. Soon his muscles were looser and his lungs seemed to get enough air.

  “There.” She let go of his wrist and patted his hand. “Your pulse has dropped back to normal. You see? I do know what I’m about. You just need to trust me.

  “Now,” she said, “I must be off. Other patients to attend to.”

  He started to sit up again and she pushed him back down. “Please.”

  When he was flat he said, “You’ll be back?”

  “As soon as I can.”

  “You were supposed to be here earlier.” He sounded petulant, and the Australian was watching him, but he didn’t care; his panic was rising again.

  “I know. I’m sorry. We had some dreadful cases.”

  “I thought you weren’t hit.” A shiny burn mark showed on her forearm.

  “I wasn’t.”

  “Then what’s that?” He pointed at the burn.

  “I went back in, after some of my patients” She shrugged. “Unsuccessfully, I might add. So you see, I have to go.”

  She squeezed his hand tightly before letting go.

  “Don’t be long.”

  All night he lay awake, listening to sirens and bombs and his snoring and moaning and farting ward mates. One bomb landed nearby. Some time after dawn he slept, only to be woken by another bang; whether real or remembered he couldn’t tell. He sat up, planning to leave, and found that his head wasn’t too bad and that the rocking motion in his stomach stilled when he did. If he didn’t move too quickly he’d be all right.

 
Beneath his sweaty feet, the floor was cool and slippery. He slid forward until he reached the screen, where he paused, as the smell of burned flesh was still strong, then breathed deeply and made himself step forward. His fears proved worse than reality: a mass of gauze enveloped the man’s hands and his swollen-looking head, hiding his injuries. A clothes package was at his feet. He had the pants on before Kate was suddenly beside him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Independence Day.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “July Fourth. Our Independence Day. An American holiday. My favorite.” Fishing, freshly made doughnuts, the high school fields where he and his friends gathered for fireworks, his first kiss. As a child he’d loved it, but now it seemed so long ago, from a different life, as if it were something he’d read about.

  “Really? Well, you’ve missed the date, I’m afraid. Weeks ago. And this seems to be the first time you’ve wanted to be an American.”

  “Nationalities do change, given the circumstances. You should know about that.”

  “Perhaps I do.” She seemed taken aback by his sharp tone, and he knew his anger was irrational. “But nonetheless you mustn’t go. I’ll call the doctor if you don’t get back into bed.”

  He regretted the jab but bile was rising in his throat and if he stayed he was likely to get sick. “Call him. I’ll be gone before he arrives.”

  “But you’re not fit to leave.”

  “I’ll decide that.”

  “Please,” Kate said. “Is this about your friend? It’s not as if you could have prevented the death.”

  “No. But I might prevent others.”

  “How? You’re in no shape to work as a warden.”

  He ignored her and kept dressing, though his fingers seemed stupid, slow and clumsy with the buttons.

  When he didn’t answer she said, “Wait a few minutes. I can walk you home.”

  “I’m fine.” He finished tightening the belt and bent to lace the shoes and lurched with dizziness, grabbing the bed to keep from falling.

  “You see,” she said, propping him up.

  “Yes. I do. Tying shoes isn’t smart.”

  She sighed. “All right, then. I’ll do it for you.” She knelt and began on the right one. “Is that tight enough?”

  “Yes,” he said, quietly, feeling like a little boy. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. But who will do this for you over the next few days?”

  “No one,” he said. “I’ll just shuffle around barefoot.”

  “Charles,” she said, and looked up at him. “Your anger is a sign of your concussion. All the more reason you shouldn’t leave.”

  “All the more reason I should” He forced a smile. “Otherwise you’ll not want to see me again.”

  The hallway was bright and smelled of witch hazel. Kate looked tired, the lines around her eyes more pronounced. He let her guide him as she chatted. “What a mess the day’s been. At the start, we didn’t have any running water, just a basin of cold water, and all the casualties showed up covered with dust and pierced with glass splinters.

  “After each dressing, we washed our hands in it, and by the end of the day, when the same water had been used more than fifty times, it was thick as soup.

  “When I finished, I was going to check on you, but I didn’t want to wake you. Then I fell asleep and someone roused me when they needed the bed, and after that I worked more. Now I’m nearly set to go home. I just have to tell another nurse that I’m going to walk with you instead. Can’t you wait five minutes?”

  Sirens were going and bombs coming over. “I’ve seen your five minutes.” Still, he made an effort. “Can you swear it will only be five?”

  “I can’t swear, Claus. Sylvie might need more time to finish her paperwork.”

  “That’s fine. But I can’t wait. I need to be at work.”

  “You’re in no state for that.”

  “Then I have to be home.”

  “You won’t be any safer there, Claus.” She breathed deeply. “This is perfectly normal after a bomb. Don’t you see? Won’t you be smart enough to stay?”

  “Please, Kate. We’ve discussed it.”

  “I give advice and you ignore it? Is that your idea of a discussion?”

  A passing gray-haired doctor glanced at them. “Is everything all right, Nurse?”

  “Fine, Doctor,” she said, though a blush rose up her neck the longer he watched.

  “Good.” Light flashed off his glasses when he turned his gaze on Claus. He looked at him for a few seconds before moving on.

  “See,” Claus said, making his unsteady way toward the door after he’d passed. “You’re causing trouble for me.”

  Her sigh sounded exasperated, but she held her tongue. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to snap. It’s just that I’m worried about you. Will you call?”

  “Yes. I promise. I’ll even stop by, if you’d like.”

  “I would.” She looked around, making sure no one was within hearing distance, and touched his arm. “Mein wenig Deutsch.” Her little German.

  “How long are you off?”

  “Today? Not very, I’m afraid. Until four. And you should sleep.”

  “Taking back your invitation?” Before she could respond, he squeezed her arm. “I’m kidding. Tomorrow then. How’s two o’clock?”

  “Good. I’ll be ready.”

  “Tea?” he said.

  “I was thinking more of pancakes.”

  “But it’s a weekday.”

  “I know.” She leaned in to kiss him. Her lips were soft, damp. “But I don’t care. Don’t you see? There’s no sense following rules now.”

  That made him smile. He returned her kiss and felt himself growing dizzy, so he broke it off and turned away, pushing the iron bar on the door and stepping outside, where the air cooled his forehead. He was so glad to be out that even the air-raid sirens didn’t bother him, though his headache began to worsen. Walking might cure it, which was just as well; there were no taxis around. He paused at the top of the stairs and didn’t look down, afraid he’d get dizzier. Instead he gripped the rail and took the steps as quickly as he could so he wouldn’t look like an invalid.

  THREE BLOCKS FROM the hospital he heard a V-1 and crouched on the sidewalk, staring up at its red nose cone. A young woman passed, holding a child by the hand, and both observed him neutrally, looking down, which shamed him; better if they had seemed angry or appalled. He felt his face flush and he waited until he could no longer see her green dress before standing. A minute later the ground shook from the explosion and he felt relieved; it had been close enough to fear.

  He wasn’t far from the MOI, and though Max had told him not to worry about the missed deadline, he wasn’t sure what that meant; he wanted to find out. At Whitfield Street he turned north. Halfway down the block a pipe-smoking man stood on the ruins beyond the police rope in violation of posted orders, looking down into the exposed basements of Tottenham Court. Claus recognized the ruined building as the Mercury Theatre that in ’41 had been bombed and burned, then collapsed. For some reason a statue of Sisyphus had once stood outside, and during the fire the flames had made a spectacle of his struggling form, blowing nearer and away, illuminating him and throwing him into shadow.

  Claus called out but the man didn’t respond, so he ducked under the rope and clambered over the wood and bricks, pausing when dizzy. The man didn’t bother turning at his noisy approach; he was looking at flowers. “Ragwort, lily of the valley, and lilac,” he said when Claus came up beside him, aiming his brown pipe stem at each bloom. The splash of pink growing near one charred wall was rosebay willow herb. “London hasn’t seen that since the great fire of 1666. It likes burned-out ground. And that,” he said, obviously having saved the best for last, “is mimosa.” A small blue-green bush, it looked like overgrown rosemary. “Brought back from China a hundred and fifty years ago and never seen in the wild. Only in the Natural History Museum. The bombing in ’41 must have sent up
seeds. Won’t bloom until winter.” The pipe stem clicked against his yellow teeth.

  The flowers infuriated Claus, nature taking advantage of brutality for its own ends. Had the man left, Claus would have uprooted them, but he was too obviously taken with the view, so Claus climbed down and dusted off his pants and kept going north, determined now to see where the bomb had landed. It would be all right. By the time he got there the first awful moments of silence, when dust was settling on everything, would be over.

  He had only to follow the crowd. Even this far into the war the disaster tourists were out, though others came from the practical desire to help or to reaffirm their luck; he knew because he often felt that himself. His first clue that the bomb had landed nearby was the cucumbery sweetness of flowering limes. A brick garden wall had been knocked down, and the limes’ glossy green foliage and white flowers lay tumbled into the street, already withered. Claus skirted them, his stomach heavy, to find the road ahead bright and busy: people darting to and fro and hoses snaking over the rubble and a few undamaged vehicles moving about the wet pavement. A bus lay on its side, dust-coated passengers still in their seats, and two houses were on fire. Worse was the rancid dust that clogged the air, making it almost foggy. They were breathing ashes; it might have been Pompeii.

  So it would have been at the Aldwych, only then he was one of the figures on the ground, like the man stretched over rubble, arms above his head as if killed diving for safety, or the laid-out dead. For the first time, he wondered why they were always placed face-up, something he himself had done dozens of times. What did they care that their faces should be turned to the sky? It was to assure the living that they too would be handled with respect. How gullible we were, to think that such a thing should matter.

  Hatless, as the recently bombed-out often were, men were beginning to pile the debris street side to make passage easier, and one woman wearing full-length gloves and a sleeveless dress had so many leaves and twigs in her hair she looked costumed for some peculiar stage drama. Dozens of terrace houses had been blown up, their brick walls pulverized, and hundreds of other houses had had their roofs torn off or their windows shattered; he passed one with its lone standing kitchen wall covered with jam. Beyond that, other houses were missing roof tiles, and with the rain their owners were going to return to sodden ruins, though on some, workers in boilersuits were already climbing about, tossing down damaged tiles and laying out canvas. Behind the acrid smell of pulverized houses was the more acrid smell of the explosives.