A Wartime Nurse

by Maggie Hope

  A crash! Theda jumped out of bed and ran to the window. There was nothing to see, nothing at all. No, wait, there was a glow over by the football field. Hurriedly she pulled on her clothes. Surely someone was hurt, and extra staff would be needed. She paused as she was lacing up her shoes. There was the sound of the ambulance revving up and going out of the gates.

  She was the first of the off-duty staff to get to Outpatients and Admissions but as she opened the door Major Collins caught up with her. Sister Brown, who was doubling as Night Sister, was talking into the telephone.

  ‘Three, you say? Oh, well, that’s not too bad. Oh, here’s Major Collins now.’ She handed over the phone to him.

  ‘Am I needed, Sister?’ Theda stepped forward.

  Sister Brown turned to her. ‘Yes, Staff Nurse. A Canadian plane has come down by Bracks Wood, on the grammar school field, thank goodness. Three hurt, we think. You can go up to Block Two and see that beds are prepared and everything ready. It’s Nurse Atkinson on there, she’s on her own.’

  ‘Yes, Sister.’

  Theda went out of the back door of the block and crossed over to the next one. Both the blocks had formed part of the old workhouse hospital and the upstairs ward of Block Two was used for British officers. Nurse Atkinson was an Assistant Nurse of some years’ experience and they soon had the beds ready and stone hot water bottles put in them for the Canadians.

  ‘I don’t suppose we’ll have them for long,’ commented Nurse Atkinson as she switched on the steriliser to boil up the surgical instruments, just in case. ‘We haven’t had any Canadians before, I suppose they go to Darlington Memorial. No doubt these will be transferred as soon as they can be. I wonder what the plane was doing so far off course?’

  ‘Only eleven miles,’ Theda replied. ‘The way the engine sounded, I’m surprised it got back at all.’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  A querulous voice came from the row of beds and Nurse Atkinson hurried towards it. There was nothing else to be done in the ward now until the patients arrived so Theda went back to Outpatients.

  Only one airman was there, laid on a stretcher with Ken Collins bending over him. Theda caught her breath as she recognised the smell of scorched cloth and burnt flesh, a smell she had encountered two or three times before – once when a child had crossed a smouldering pit heap and his leg had gone through the crust, and once when fire damp set coal dust alight down a mine and two miners had been burnt.

  In all her nursing years she had never got used to that smell and hesitated now before crossing over to the stretcher, for she had to steel herself against what she might see.

  ‘Hold this, Staff,’ said Ken. ‘Come on, come closer, do.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  The answer was automatic as she sprang to do as he asked, hold the collar of the man’s flying jacket away as the doctor moved his head so that he could more closely examine the burns on the neck. Theda looked down at the airman. His eyes were closed, the lashes and eyebrows singed, but thankfully his facial burns seemed to be first degree. It was his neck and chest which appeared to be the worst. He must have had his flying jacket open. And his hands . . . how on earth had he managed to pilot the plane home with his hands in that state? Parts of them were already black. He must have used them to beat out the flames.

  ‘Right, Staff, see that theatre is notified, will you? I will have to clean him up there. We won’t try to take off any of his clothes – not until he’s under anaesthetic anyway.’

  Ken was business-like as he covered the man’s neck with gauze soaked in saline. The pilot moaned and moved his head and the moan became a cry of pain and his eyes flew open, causing a tiny drop of blood to appear in the corner where his lashes had fused together. But he didn’t seem to notice. His eyes had locked on Theda’s and they were the bluest eyes she had ever seen. Then the lids drooped and closed again and she looked at his dog tags before turning away to telephone theatre. Eugene Ridley, date of birth January 1921, followed by his service number. He was the same age as Alan had been.

  Ken was in the smaller treatment room and as Theda passed she saw Sister Brown was in there too, pulling the blanket over the head of another airman. She came out shaking her head.

  ‘He hadn’t a chance, shot in the abdomen,’ she said sadly. ‘The other one is dead too, poor lad, he didn’t look more than nineteen.’ She nodded to the stretcher which was just being taken out of the door by a porter. ‘He’s for theatre?’

  ‘Yes, Sister, I’ve just notified them.’

  ‘He’s a lucky man. If you can call it lucky. Well, Staff Nurse, you may as well go back to bed, we can manage fine now. Thank you for your help.’

  Wearily Theda went back to her room and threw off her clothes. Suddenly she felt deathly cold and tired to her core, every muscle aching, especially her ribs. It was half-past three in the morning; another two and a half hours and she would be called to begin her day duty. She was too tired to think, sure she was too tired to sleep, but within a minute or two she did. And her dreams were confused and incomprehensible and dominated by a pair of astonishing blue eyes.

  The next morning there was an air of suppressed excitement on the ward amongst the younger prisoners. Those who were ambulant huddled together in groups, clustering round one of the stoves, casting glances at the nurses as they went about their duties.

  ‘No doubt they are talking about the plane that came down,’ commented Nurse Harris. ‘They’ll think of it as a triumph.’ She was polishing the table in the middle of the ward as Theda got out the medicine glasses from the drawer at the side. ‘Have you heard how that pilot is? You were there when they brought him in, weren’t you?’

  ‘I was. But I haven’t heard anything this morning.’ Theda lined up the glasses on the medicine trolley and took it back to the end of the ward to begin the round. Johann was off his sulphur tablets now; he was much better, his shoulder almost healed. After Christmas he would be allowed up on crutches. Now he smiled at her as she measured out his dose of iron tonic. But it was a cold smile, full of hatred.

  Theda sighed. ‘Come on now, drink it up. You should have it as soon as possible after breakfast.’

  He took the medicine and tossed it down his throat before handing the glass back to her without a word of thanks. Then he lay back on his pillows and began to whistle. Badly, almost tunelessly, but nevertheless she could recognise ‘Deutschland, Deutschland Uber Allës’. Ignoring it, she went on to the next bed.

  ‘You will see, we will push the Americans into the sea and you British will be finished.’ He had been unable to contain himself, as she turned back to him she could see that. But the ambulant patients were surrounding him, talking to him rapidly in his own language.

  The incident soon passed over and nothing else was said by any of the other patients. It was not until Theda went to the dining-room for her break that she found out what he had been so excited about.

  ‘The Germans have mounted an assault in the forest of Ardennes. Took the Yanks by surprise an’ all, or so I gather,’ Nurse Jenkins said gloomily. ‘Mebbe the war’s not going to be over so soon after all.’

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘Merry Christmas, Staff Nurse,’ said Tom, the guard on the gate. ‘Merry Christmas, Sister.’

  ‘Christmas 1944,’ Sister Smith commented to Theda as they walked down the ramp to Hut K. ‘Do you think it will be the last of the war?’

  Theda pushed her pass into the pocket of her uniform dress and considered the question. ‘It all depends,’ she said, ‘whether the Germans do still have enough reserves to break out.’ Bleakly she thought of Joss. He must be somewhere over there and still fighting, even if it was the Americans who were taking the brunt of this push.

  ‘If it had been against the British they wouldn’t have got so far,’ Chuck declared the last time she had seen him. ‘The Yanks thought it would be just like the pictures.’

  ‘Howay, Chuck, they’re just soldiers doing their best like all of them.
They came over here and joined in, didn’t they? They could have stayed at home, you know,’ Matt had argued.

  ‘Aye. An’ I feel sorry for them, poor lads, all that way from home. Their mothers must be going through it, I can tell you.’

  Bea had closed the oven door on the dish of panhagelty she was making for supper and hung the oven cloth on the brass rail under the mantelpiece. She had stood there for a moment or two, staring into the fire, and Theda knew she was thinking about Joss.

  ‘They took their time about it though, didn’t they? Late for everything, the Yanks.’ Chuck had nodded his head sagely.

  ‘You look as though you’re in a brown study,’ said Sister Smith now as Theda pushed the door open and they went in.

  The ward was festive with greenery and paper chains the men had made – goodness knows where they had got the coloured paper from. Theda took off her cloak in the tiny cloakroom, pinned her cap on to her hair and tied a clean white apron crackling with starch over her dress. She stared at her image in the looking glass. Her face was pale and her mouth drooped.

  Other years she had not minded doing twelve hours on Christmas Day, eight in the morning until eight at night. But other years her patients had been English, and the last couple of years she had been on Children’s Ward. Oh, well. Pushing the corners of her mouth up with her forefingers, she grinned at herself and went out to start the day.

  Dodging the bunches of mistletoe hung by the few Italians left on the ward, just in case one of them was lurking about, she went into Sister’s office to hear the night report.

  ‘After the dressings have been done, I want you to go with the choir,’ said Sister. The report had been read, the night staff had departed. ‘There are plenty of nurses on today for a change and no patient dangerously ill.’

  ‘Oh, I thought the choir went over the other side last night?’ said Theda. She was pleasantly surprised. She would see the children all excited about their presents, maybe even be there when Santa Claus came. ‘Thanks, Sister, I’ll enjoy that.’

  In the ward the men were jovial, even Johann muttered something which Theda took to be Happy Christmas. And the men had assembled toys on the table in the middle, wooden dolls and tops and soldiers and cars. No guns – they had been stopped from carving guns or tanks. But there were circus clowns tumbling on ladders when a string was pulled, and jointed cows and sheep. Now they were all wrapped up in bright paper the prisoners had painted themselves, pink for girls and blue for boys.

  They were waiting for the guards who were detailed to go with them, and of course Major Koestler who was the choir master. But at last they were through the doors and joining the group from the other wards. Major Koestler fell in beside Theda.

  ‘Good morning, Staff Nurse,’ he said. ‘Happy Christmas to you.’ He bent slightly, his head going down and up in a stiff little bow, his face solemn. ‘I trust you had a good Christmas Eve with your family? I think you were with your family, for you were not with us, were you?’

  Theda agreed that she was not. She hadn’t been home either. She had spent the evening in her room, washing her hair and generally relaxing. But she didn’t feel like going into details.

  ‘We had a good time, you know. You should have been there,’ said the major. ‘We sang carols to the children and then we went to see the new mothers and their babies and sang for them too.’

  ‘Lovely,’ said Theda for want of anything else to say. She was glad when one of the sergeants fell back beside the Major and asked respectfully if he could speak to him. Koestler looked annoyed but slowed his pace a little and Theda drew ahead.

  They were speaking in German, she heard the name ‘Von Runstedt’, but of course couldn’t make head nor tail of it anyway. Von Runstedt, she mused as she followed the rest of the prisoners through the main door into the old part of the hospital, hadn’t she heard that name mentioned. Oh, yes, the commander of the German troops in Belgium, that was it.

  The choir stood in the middle of the children’s ward and sang ‘Stille Nacht, Heilige Nachf’, and the children listened dutifully though their eyes were straying to the parcels that the singers had put round the tree when they entered the ward. They sang another, a beautiful lullaby but with the words still incomprehensible to the children, and then Laura Jenkins led her small charges, at least those fit enough to sing, in ‘Away in a Manger’.

  Millie and the other two disabled children, Jean and Mary, from the side ward, were pushed into the main ward in their cots, all ready for Father Christmas’s visit. Millie’s normally pale face was flushed with excitement and her eyes sparkled as Theda propped an extra pillow behind her to support her twisted spine.

  ‘What do you want from Father Christmas?’ asked Theda, and Millie shook her head.

  ‘It doesn’t matter, Staff, anything. But do you think he will remember me?’ The smile slipped from her face and an anxious look came into her eyes. Poor Millie, thought Theda, she expected little and little was what she usually got.

  ‘I’m sure he’ll have something special for you,’ she said, and at that moment looked up and caught one of the Germans, a young boy of no more than eighteen, smirking as he looked at Millie’s twisted body, outlined under the sheet only too plainly as the blanket had slipped down. He said something in his own language to a group of prisoners and they all looked at her and there was some giggling.

  Theda bent over the child and drew up the blanket to cover her. Her own face was flushed with anger as she looked at the child to see if she knew what was going on. But Millie hadn’t noticed. She was gazing at the door, watching for Santa Claus. Theda moved closer to the group of prisoners and they looked at her, surprised.

  ‘You’re not making fun of disabled children, are you?’ she demanded. The men looked at each other and there was a chorus of dissent. Theda felt sick, her face hot and her hands clenched and sweaty as she glared at them and they gazed blandly back, though one looked away, blushing.

  ‘In Germany we would keep them separate. No one should have to look at them.’ It was the one who had first drawn the others’ attention to the deformed children. He sounded unabashed now.

  ‘Oh? And there was I thinking, you being the master race, that all your children would be strong and healthy and you wouldn’t have any to hide away so that ordinary people would not be disturbed.’

  Theda was keeping her voice to little above a whisper, she could not be heard by anyone apart from this group and kept her back turned to the rest of the ward. But there must have been something about her which showed her anger for the next moment Major Koestler was beside her, speaking rapidly to the men before taking hold of her elbow and drawing her into the small passageway which led to the side wards.

  ‘I hope the boys have not said something to upset you, Staff Nurse? They are young, sometimes a little exuberant.’

  Theda looked up at him. He was standing very close to her and still holding her arm. What could she say? Nothing, not now. She couldn’t say anything that would cause ill feeling, not on Christmas morning and certainly not on the Children’s Ward. But, by heck, she would later. Oh, yes, indeed she would. She would tell those louts what she thought of them. The first time she had Ward K to herself, they would feel the edge of her tongue.

  ‘Nurse?’

  Theda swallowed hard. ‘Nothing, it was nothing.’

  ‘They made you angry?’ Major Koestler persisted. He moved close to her, his strangely light eyes glinting in the gloom of the passage.

  ‘It was—’ Luckily at that moment there was a commotion at the door of the main ward. The children began to cheer and the two-year-old in the coat by the door to scream in fright as a man in a red suit and white beard with a sack on his back strode into the ward. In another moment she would have told him, he was so insistent. ‘Leave go of my arm, please Major,’ she said instead, and his hand dropped immediately.

  Theda hurried down the ward to where Laura was picking up the screaming toddler and cuddling him and Santa Claus was
wisely turning away to speak to some of the older children.

  ‘I’ll take him, if you like. You go and help him dish out the presents,’ said Theda, and took the child to the rocking chair where she rocked him against her shoulder until his sobs began to ease. ‘He’s a nice man,’ she whispered in his ear. ‘A grand man, just like your daddy.’

  ‘What was all that about? I mean with the German officer, what’s his name, Koestler?’ asked Laura Jenkins. ‘Oh, never mind, you can tell me after when the pandemonium dies down a bit.’ She went over to join Santa Claus.

  It was Ken Collins playing Santa Claus, Theda realised, as she rocked back and forth, back and forth. She had thought Mr Kent was coming as he usually did the honours. Ken was good with the children, she noticed. They were eager to see what he had in his sack for them and when he had been round all the beds, he helped Major Koestler hand out the parcels that the prisoners had made.

  But soon it was time to move on. There were the other wards to go to, and in any case the children had had enough excitement, they needed to be quiet again.

  Theda helped push Millie and the other two back into their side ward, Millie lying quietly now, clutching a wooden clown in a befrilled outfit with enormous red spots all over it and painted blue eyes under huge, black, surprised eyebrows. And a knitted horse with improbable legs sticking out at the corners, no doubt knitted by a Hospital Friend. Theda said goodbye to them and hurried on after the choir, though somehow for her the magic had gone out of their singing. Taking her watch out of her pocket, she saw it was already eleven-thirty. Oh, good, she would have to go back to the ward soon to help serve dinners anyway.

  She caught up with them on Block Two, upstairs in the ward which had been designated for British Officers at the beginning of the war. There weren’t many of them in at the moment, just half a dozen, overspill from the military hospital at Catterick.

  The choir was giving their rendering of ‘Stille Nachf’ yet again and the officers were politely listening. But afterwards little was said and the choir shuffled out, a guard in front and one behind.