Poppy in the Field

by Mary Hooper

‘That’s as maybe, but I’m afraid that excuse won’t wash with the War Office,’ Nurse Hunt said, shaking her head. ‘ “Not made for fighting” might apply to a lot of boys in the trenches.’

  ‘I know,’ Poppy said. ‘And Private Casey wasn’t even called up. He enlisted early and lied about his age. It was only when he got here that he realised he should never have done it.’

  Nurse sighed wearily. ‘The times I hear that.’

  She and Poppy moved on to the next bed, which contained the most serious case on the ward at this time: young Sergeant Miller, who’d suffered a severe wound to the stomach wall, which had left some of his vital organs exposed. He wasn’t expected to survive, but was in hospital to be kept comfortable and be helped towards as peaceful an end as possible. Ideally he would have gone home to England, but it wasn’t thought that he’d survive the sea journey. So, with his father serving in Gallipoli, his mother had been told of his plight and asked to come to Boulogne quickly to say her last goodbyes. Under Sister’s instructions, Poppy had written to her a week or so back, telling her as gently as possible that her son was not expected to live and giving her the address of the nearest relatives’ hostel.

  Poppy, who liked Sergeant Miller very much and had helped with his bandaging before, was nonetheless relieved when Nurse Hunt decided that it might be better for Sister Gradley to help her with the dressings rather than Poppy. This was because his wound was particularly ghastly and Sister, who was much quicker and defter than anyone else, was able to trim a full eight minutes off the painful re-dressing time that he had to endure.

  Later that morning, Poppy went downstairs to see if the post from Blighty had arrived. She was feeling rather anxious, as it was over a week ago that she’d written to her mother telling her about Billy, and so far she’d had no reply.

  She collected Ward 5’s letters and parcels and took them back upstairs (to the usual mighty cheer from the ward), where she found three letters with her name on. Each of these had the sender’s address on the back, however, and none was from her mother. One was from Matthews, another from Tibs and a third from Sergeant Miller’s mother.

  Poppy distributed the post and the parcels to the boys, tried to cheer up those who hadn’t received anything, and opened the letter from Tibs and his new wife. This contained a note thanking everyone for their good wishes, and a photograph presumably taken outside their local town hall, showing Tibs in uniform, proud as a peacock, with the new Mrs Burroughs resting, heavily pregnant, on his arm.

  Poppy pinned the photograph up on the noticeboard and opened the letter from Sergeant Miller’s mother. Mrs Miller would need to get over here soon, Poppy thought, for the sergeant had lost – and continued to lose – a considerable amount of blood. He was also in the early stages of septicaemia and, one by one, his major organs were failing.

  She pulled out the card inside the envelope. It was black-edged with four printed words: His will be done. Handwritten, underneath, were the words Norman Miller, RIP.

  Poppy opened the envelope wider and tapped it on the table, wondering if a sheet of notepaper had somehow got stuck inside, but there was nothing else. She went over to Sister and showed her the card.

  ‘There was just this. No message, just Mrs Miller’s name and address on the back of the envelope.’

  ‘How very odd – and how shocking. The poor chap isn’t even dead yet and she’s RIP-ing him.’

  ‘He asks a lot when his mother’s coming . . .’

  Sister nodded. ‘I know. He asked me again just now when I was bandaging him.’ She picked up the card. ‘RIP – ripped in pieces, as the boys say. I’m afraid in his case it’s most appropriate.’

  ‘Perhaps his people are very religious – that’s all I can think. Or perhaps they don’t believe in medical intervention,’ Poppy said.

  ‘Not that we are intervening, because there’s nothing that can be done for him, apart from keeping him comfortable.’ Sister put the card in a drawer in her desk. ‘I’ll write to her again, emphasise that he hasn’t got much time left and say he’s asking for her.’ She tutted. ‘He’s barely twenty, of course he’s asking for his mother.’

  Poppy picked up the letter with Matthews’s address on the back. From the cardboard squareness of it, she thought it must contain a photograph of Billy’s grave, and not feeling up to opening it right then, put it in her apron pocket to look at later.

  Private Casey’s parents had only been written to a few days before, but his mother arrived on a boat that afternoon and was at the hospital by two o’clock. She stood at Sister’s desk, looking rather odd in a heavy winter overcoat, knitted scarf and old-fashioned hat with a feather. Sister, who was in the middle of a doctors’ round, asked Poppy to take her over to see her son.

  As they walked through the rows of beds, with Mrs Casey gasping and sighing at every turn about the numbers of men and the multitude of injuries, Poppy told her that her son’s wound was healing well and there was no cause to be concerned just because she’d been invited over.

  ‘Sister thought he could just do with a bit of a boost,’ Poppy said. ‘We often get a lad’s parents over. It doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s anything very wrong.’

  ‘My husband wanted to come as well, but there’s the herd to look after and the milk to deliver,’ said Mrs Casey.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And just between you and me . . . Are you Nurse Pearson?’ Mrs Casey asked, looking at Poppy eagerly from under the brim of her hat.

  Poppy nodded. ‘Well, actually, I’m a VAD and not a nurse. But the boys call us all nurses.’

  ‘Well, whatever you call yourself, Miss Pearson, I must tell you, my boy thinks the world of you. Writes about you all the time, he does: what you’ve said to him, what you’ve done.’

  ‘Does he? That’s nice,’ Poppy said, wondering if it was nice.

  ‘He says he gets special treatment from you . . . that you sit and talk to him in the afternoons and make him drinks when he gets upset.’

  ‘Well, we do that for a lot of our boys,’ Poppy said, wondering where this was all heading and fearing she knew. ‘I try not to have favourites. Sister likes us to treat everyone the same.’

  ‘Ah, but they’re not all the same, are they?’ Mrs Casey said, giving Poppy a look which was almost a wink, and Poppy began to feel rather uneasy.

  On seeing her son, Mrs Casey burst into tears. Poppy gave her a handkerchief and went into the little kitchen to get her a cup of tea and give her time to settle herself. When she went back, Mrs Casey insisted that it should be Poppy who should sit down on the stool beside her son’s bed. ‘Do take the weight off your feet for a while. I know how hard you nurses work!’

  Poppy, apprehensive now, sat down for a moment rather than cause a stir.

  ‘Tell Nurse about our farm, Ma,’ Private Casey said.

  ‘Oh, it’s a glorious spot. A hundred acres, we’ve got,’ said his mother. ‘And our own herd of Jersey cows.’

  ‘How lovely,’ Poppy said automatically.

  ‘We’ve got a big farmhouse with lots of outbuildings, but you must see them for yourself. My husband and I were thinking that one of the barns could be converted into living accommodation.’

  Poppy wasn’t sure whether or not she’d heard right, or – if she had – what the woman could possibly mean. She stood up hastily, saying she must get on with the boys’ tea, but that Mrs Casey was welcome to stay as long as she liked, and even take Private Casey out for a short walk if she wished. ‘Anything he’d like to do, really,’ Poppy added.

  ‘Until he gets his ticket back home to England?’

  Poppy shook her head. ‘The news – the good news – is that your son’s injury is quite a minor one and certainly not bad enough to get him sent home.’

  ‘But you can help get him home, can’t you? You can tell the doctors he’s not well enough to fight – that he’s a sensitive lad.’

  ‘They wouldn’t take any notice of me, I’m afraid,’ Poppy said. �
��I expect Private Casey will move on to convalesce for a couple of weeks and then, when he’s quite well enough, will rejoin his regiment.’

  ‘But I thought . . .’

  Poppy busied herself tucking the sheet more tightly about Private Casey and brushing imaginary crumbs from the coverlet. ‘Let Sister know if you want to go out for a walk,’ she said briskly, ‘and she’ll ask one of the orderlies to help get him dressed.’

  ‘And you’ll come, too?’

  ‘I’m afraid I wouldn’t be able to do that,’ Poppy said, panicking a little by then. ‘I’ve too many other duties.’

  ‘But surely they’ll make an exception. I’ve come all the way from England to meet you – my son talks about you all the time.’

  Poppy glanced at Private Casey, who was studying the counterpane intently. She shook her head. ‘Mrs Casey, we have several boys on the ward who have their people over here visiting them, but we’re not allowed to go out with them.’ She gave a false laugh. ‘Goodness, we’d never get our chores done if we were flitting about Boulogne all the time!’

  Mrs Casey frowned at Poppy.

  ‘If you like, I’m sure one of the orderlies would come out with you and show you around,’ Poppy said.

  ‘But I thought you and my son had an understanding. We don’t want an orderly! If I speak to Sister and tell her that you and my son are –’

  ‘Mother!’ Private Casey suddenly interrupted, his face ruddy. ‘I wrote and told you those things in secret. I said don’t tell anyone else. I didn’t know you were going to come over here.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Mrs Casey, ‘but a lad wants to know where he stands with a girl, doesn’t he? And that lad’s mother has a right to know, too.’

  Poppy smiled, bright and efficient, but secretly horrified. ‘If you don’t mind me saying,’ she said, ‘I believe you’ve got the wrong end of the stick.’

  Mrs Casey stared at her, affronted.

  ‘Of course I enjoy talking to your son, Mrs Casey, but I’ve never been any more than his nurse – one of his nurses. If, somehow, he’s got it into his head that I . . . Well, that’s quite impossible. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I really must get the boys’ afternoon tea.’

  Mortified, Poppy went into the kitchen and started laying up the trays for tea, crossly crashing the spoons and bread knives down so that one of the orderlies came up and asked who’d been ruffling her feathers.

  How had that happened? She was perfectly sure that she hadn’t, in any way, encouraged Private Casey. He was just a kid! But she would certainly tell Sister Gradley about this before anyone else did.

  Later, at a quiet meeting with Sister, Poppy explained that somehow wires had got crossed.

  ‘I don’t know what Private Casey told his mother, or if it was her who got the wrong idea, but I think she only came over here to give me the once-over and decide if I’d make a suitable daughter-in-law. She was even talking about converting one of their farm buildings into a house for us!’

  Sister frowned. ‘And are you quite sure you –’

  ‘Honestly, Sister! Not at all. I made a bit of a pet of him, but only because you asked me to. He’s a nice lad, but – really!’

  Sister shrugged. ‘I’m afraid this sort of thing happens. Some of these young lads, homesick and frightened, haven’t seen an English girl for several months, and when one shows any interest . . .’ she put her hand up to ward off any protests from Poppy, ‘even though it may be in the most innocent way, he thinks he’s hit the jackpot. A pretty nurse of his own! What boy wouldn’t like that?’

  ‘What shall I do?’ Poppy asked, relieved that Sister understood.

  ‘Absolutely nothing. Be friendly, be professional, and wait for him to go back to his regiment – which he’ll certainly have to do, because they’re gathering up as many men as they possibly can.’

  ‘The trouble is, he’s just not cut out to be a soldier,’ Poppy said.

  ‘Our job is to patch him up and ship him out again,’ Sister said. ‘It’s his regiment’s job to make him into a soldier.’

  ‘Yes, Sister Gradley.’

  Poppy met Tilly and Dot in the canteen after work and was just about to tell them about Private Casey when she got a message saying that Sister wanted to see her.

  ‘Would you mind sitting with Sergeant Miller for a couple of hours?’ she asked when Poppy went back into Ward 5. ‘He’s very poorly indeed. One of the doctors has been down and says he’s near the end. I’d stay myself, but I have an appointment with Matron and two majors – and the night staff don’t know him like we do.’

  ‘Of course I’ll help,’ said Poppy, saddened at the news, but pleased to be given the responsibility.

  ‘I don’t think he’s got much longer,’ Sister said, ‘but if you’re still at his bedside and it’s past midnight, the night nurses will take over.’

  Poppy dashed down to the canteen again and told Tilly and Dot she’d see them the following day, then went back to the ward. Mrs Casey was sitting by her son’s bedside, knitting; the wave Poppy gave her wasn’t returned.

  Poppy put screens around Sergeant Miller’s bed and pulled up a chair beside him.

  Slowly, the daylight faded and several lanterns were lit, giving the ward a softer, kinder light. Mrs Casey went back to her guest house, patients settled themselves or asked for sleeping draughts, dozed fitfully or chatted to whoever was in the next bed. Some reread the latest letter they’d got from their sweethearts, holding up the pages in order to catch the nearest light.

  Sergeant Miller, his breathing laboured and jagged, lay quite still. Sister had chosen not to tell him about the card from his mother, just that Mrs Miller hoped to be with him soon. For her part, Poppy found a cushion to sit on and a pile of socks to darn, and prepared herself for a long night.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  ‘Mother? Are you here, Ma?’ Sergeant Miller croaked.

  ‘She’ll be here soon,’ Poppy said.

  She had a sponge and a bowl of tepid water and she wiped Sergeant Miller’s forehead and sponged down his arms to cool him. It was a stuffy, humid night, and though the doors leading to the balcony were open, there wasn’t a trace of a breeze.

  ‘Ma?’ he said again, more faintly. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘She won’t be long,’ Poppy said, hoping that Mrs Miller, wherever she was, had a decent excuse for not being at her son’s bedside when he was dying.

  After a couple of hours, Poppy walked around the ward to have a few words with the night staff and stretch her legs. Her ‘stroll’ took her past Private Casey’s bed and, though from a distance she’d seen that he was awake, when she tiptoed up to him, his eyelids were shut tight.

  ‘Private Casey,’ she whispered. ‘I’d like to speak to you for a moment.’

  He didn’t move.

  ‘Private Casey,’ she said again. ‘I know you’re awake.’

  A moment went by and she looked anxiously across the ward towards Sergeant Miller’s bed. How terrible if he died when she wasn’t there! Imagine if Sister discovered that she’d been speaking to Private Casey at the time.

  ‘Private Casey, I’ve allowed myself exactly one minute to speak to you.’

  His eyes opened. ‘You want to get back to the sergeant across the way, do you?’ he said petulantly. ‘Why are you still fussing over him?’

  ‘Sergeant Miller is dying,’ Poppy said in a low voice. ‘If you were dying, you might hope that someone sat beside you in your final hours.’

  Private Casey’s expression didn’t change. ‘I thought you were bothered about me.’

  ‘I was – I am,’ Poppy said. ‘I’m bothered about all our patients.’

  ‘But me especially . . .’

  ‘Look, you’re a very nice boy,’ Poppy said, ‘but so are most of the boys in here. Sister said that if I had time I should come and talk to you and I was happy enough to do it, but I certainly didn’t mean you to read anything into it. For one thing, we’re not allowed to socialise with our pat
ients in that sort of way.’

  He didn’t reply.

  ‘You should never have told your mother that I was singling you out for special attention.’

  There was a silence and Poppy glanced back to Sergeant Miller’s bed once again.

  ‘You want to go back over there, don’t you?’ Private Casey muttered.

  ‘Yes, I do. It’s my job and it’s what Sister asked me to do.’ Poppy could feel herself becoming irritated and tried to soften her next words. ‘It’s what nurses are here for – to give comfort. You wouldn’t like to die alone, would you, with no one to hear your last words?’

  There was another, longer silence, and then he mumbled, ‘I expect you hate me now.’

  ‘Of course I don’t. I think you’re a very nice boy who’s rather out of place in the army.’

  ‘I’m that, all right.’

  ‘Well, there’s a big offensive coming so perhaps that will fix things and the war will be over sooner than anyone thinks.’ She managed to force a smile. ‘And now I really must go back to my post. Goodnight, Private Casey.’

  ‘G’night,’ came the rather sullen reply.

  It was half past eleven and Poppy, still at Sergeant Miller’s bedside, had finished all the darning she’d brought with her and her eyes were aching with tiredness. Because of his severe stomach injury, her patient had had to stay on his back, but was now moving his legs constantly and restlessly, groaning as he tried to turn over and found himself unable to do so.

  ‘Sergeant Miller, calm yourself,’ Poppy kept saying, rather ineffectually. ‘Try and rest.’

  Another half-hour went by.

  ‘Are you there, Ma?’ he asked again and again, and Poppy, roundly cursing Mrs Miller, reassured him as much as she could.

  The night sister came round and said there was no more that could be done for him, that he’d had all the pain relief they could give.

  ‘Do you want to go to bed?’ she asked Poppy. ‘We can take over if you like.’

  Poppy shook her head. ‘I’ve been here so long I’d like to see the job through now. Thanks all the same.’

  She thought about the letter from Matthews in her apron pocket. She’d been aware of its presence all day but, knowing what it must contain, had been putting off opening it. Now, nearing midnight and sitting beside a dying man, it seemed appropriate to look at a photograph of her brother’s grave.