On Distant Shores

by Sarah Sundin

  The patient lay on a cot, and he turned his mahogany face to Georgie. “Good morning, ma’am.”

  He was . . . colored. And an officer. “Good—good morning.” She was supposed to say “sir,” wasn’t she? But to a colored man? What a strange war this was.

  “You’re from the South, ma’am.” His accent hailed from the North. A slight smile, and he turned his gaze to Lieutenant Lambert. “Looks like I’m waiting another day. That’s fine. I’m in no rush, ma’am.”

  Georgie pulled herself together and closed her dangling jaw. “Lieutenant Lambert, may I speak with you in private?”

  She nodded and returned to the tent entrance. “You don’t have to explain. I saw your face. I know the Army is supposed to have segregated facilities, but with the small number of colored patients, evacuation poses problems since we don’t have colored nurses.”

  Mama used to have a colored girl help with the cleaning and cooking, and Daddy hired the men as farmhands. Georgie had associated with Negroes all her life, but never as equals. “He—he’s a pilot, you said?”

  “Yes, with the 99th Fighter Squadron. The Tuskegee Airmen.”

  “I’ve heard of them.”

  Lambert crossed her arms and tapped long fingers on her upper arm. “They had to fight for recognition, for acceptance, for respect. The Army didn’t think black men could fly—just like they didn’t think women could handle the rigors of air evacuation.”

  The man’s legs came to an abrupt end. So had his dreams. “Is it true what they say about the Tuskegee Airmen over Anzio?”

  “Why ask me? You can ask him.”

  Georgie nudged her feet back in his direction. What would Daddy say? Segregation had always worked. It was best. Mixing the races wasn’t natural.

  A woman in a combat zone wasn’t natural either.

  She stood at the foot of his cot and twisted her hands together. “Excuse me. I have a question.”

  “Yes, ma’am?” His eyes twitched.

  “Is it true what they say you fellows did over Anzio?”

  “Depends. What do they say?”

  “That you shot down thirteen German Fw 190s in two days.”

  “Yes, ma’am. That’s true. Claimed one myself.”

  She tried not to glance to the collapsed blankets where his feet should have been. “Those German planes—they’re the ones who strafe our troops and bomb our hospitals.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “You colored boys are flying to protect white boys?”

  His deep brown eyes flashed with understanding. “Ma’am, I don’t care what color they are, as long as they fight for freedom.”

  She swallowed hard and spun to face the rest of the ward. “Excuse me, gentlemen. Which of y’all don’t want to fly with Lieutenant Cassidy here?”

  Four hands went up.

  A patient across the aisle sat up in bed. “It isn’t right, ma’am. I’m sure you agree.”

  “I do. It isn’t right at all.” She put on her best Southern belle smile. “It isn’t right that Lieutenant Cassidy lost his legs saving the lives of men who can’t see fit to share an airplane with him.”

  The patient blanched even whiter.

  Georgie looked each man in the eye. “If y’all don’t want to fly with Lieutenant Cassidy, then I don’t want to fly with you.”

  “Ma’am!”

  “That’s my decision.” She met Lambert’s gaze. “I’ll take Lieutenant Cassidy on my flight. Any of these fine gentlemen who wish to join us are more than welcome. If they don’t wish to, they can fly out another day, and Lieutenant Cassidy will enjoy a private flight.”

  “Hey! Since when do girls get to make the decisions?”

  “This war turned our world upside down, didn’t it?” She faced Lieutenant Cassidy and saluted him, her throat suddenly tight. “Thank you for your service . . . sir.”

  “You—you’re welcome, ma’am.”

  Georgie crossed the tent to where Lambert stood. “Shall we load?”

  “Yes. Captain Zimmerman has the flight manifest. You can scratch out certain names.” Lambert’s eyes crinkled around the edges. “A fine decision, Georgie.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” Her shoulders felt lighter and straighter. She’d made lots of decisions lately, and this one was wise. But were all of them?

  Georgie took the flight manifest from Captain Zimmerman and followed him around the tent as he relayed each patient’s condition and medical needs. She took careful notes.

  Returning overseas was right, but she doubted some of her other decisions.

  A romance with Hutch had not been smart at all. Yet for some reason she didn’t regret their short time together, the sweet taste of what love could be. Even if it ended badly.

  Sadness swamped her. It ended so badly. She really had acted in a childish manner, hadn’t she? Demanding Hutch be cheerful on a bad day? Now he was at Anzio. Under fire. With a broken heart.

  What on earth had she done?

  Tonight. Tonight she’d write him.

  Georgie finished her notes on her patients. Two men still refused to fly, and she crossed their names off the manifest.

  No, she would not write Hutch. Twice lately she’d lifted her pen to do so, twice she’d prayed, and twice the Lord stilled her hand.

  Georgie sighed and flipped the pages into place on her clipboard. What would be the cost of her next decision?

  42

  Nettuno, Italy

  February 10, 1944

  Hardly a good time to take an afternoon off, but orders were orders.

  Hutch sat on the shore and glanced behind him to the beachhead that had earned nicknames too impolite to mention in his letters home.

  In the distance, artillery boomed and American B-17s and B-24s roared. Each day the Germans inched closer, compressing US and British forces into less space.

  The hospital’s location by the pier in Anzio lasted only six days until enemy artillery drove them out, to a site south of Nettuno, where all four American hospitals clustered by the sea.

  The rumble of jeeps and ambulances, the cries of the wounded, and the hum of generators—Hutch was supposed to get away from all this, Kaz said. An order came from high up that all the hospital personnel needed regular days off so they wouldn’t join the ranks of patients with “Anzio anxiety” and “Nettuno neurosis.” Today was Hutch’s turn.

  The brass kept a close eye on Hutch since Sgt. Bob Knecht with the 95th Evacuation Hospital had been killed on February 7. Hutch had met him just a few days earlier—another pharmacist serving as an enlisted man, a graduate of the Cincinnati College of Pharmacy, an instant friend. And he was dead.

  Hutch was supposed to get away? How could he get away when he had no place to go?

  He faced the bay. American ships floated the cold gray waters under a cold gray sky. He hadn’t seen the sun in ages, and he couldn’t remember when he’d last seen the stars, much less watched them. The telescope sat in its case with all mementos from Georgie, including the embroidered handkerchief. He should enclose it in his next letter to Lucia, but that would mean opening the case and remembering Georgie.

  He groaned and rested his elbows on his knees, his Bible in hand. Every time he saw that telescope case, he saw Georgie providing for him because he couldn’t provide for himself, Chadwick kissing her hand, Kaz reprimanding him for fraternization, Georgie calling him obsessed and bitter.

  Hutch flipped open his Bible to Romans, which he’d been trying to read since landing almost three weeks earlier. Finally in chapter 5.

  Down to the third verse. “We glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope.”

  Air from his nostrils curled into steam in the cold air. He’d had plenty of tribulations. He’d been patient for three and a half years. Didn’t he have enough experience? Where was his hope?

  He slammed the Bible closed and bowed his head. “Lord . . .”

  But prayer wouldn�
�t come. Just like the Bible didn’t bring him peace. It only irked him. As if God didn’t understand what he was going through, as if he wanted Hutch on a different path.

  Why? God started him on this path in the first place. Prayer and Bible reading helped him decide to take a pharmacy position and work hard to establish the Corps.

  Look what that got him.

  Hutch stood and checked his watch—four thirty. Too early for dinner, too early to retire, but Kaz promised to write him up if he went to Pharmacy.

  Anzio didn’t have recreational facilities. The first time hospital personnel had tried to organize a baseball game, they drew enemy fire. Looked like a rest camp apparently, and rest camps were fair military targets.

  Hutch unbuttoned his mackinaw and stuffed his Bible inside his field jacket, layered underneath the mackinaw.

  A loud whistle overhead.

  He jammed on his helmet and dropped to the ground, curled up as small as possible.

  A thump to the north, another, and another. Not too close. The ground barely shook. But definitely in the hospital area.

  He pushed up on his elbows and glanced up the beach. A flickering glow lit the sky, and columns of smoke drifted inland.

  “Stinking Nazis.” On February 7 when Bob was killed, a Luftwaffe pilot jettisoned his bombs under fighter attack. An accident. But this artillery attack was on purpose, targeted to tents marked with enormous red crosses.

  A shell whined to the north and sent up a geyser of sand near the 33rd Field Hospital.

  Hutch’s survival instincts told him to find a hole and hide, but something deeper told him to go help.

  He scrambled to his feet and ran up the beach. The closer he got, the louder the shouts, the cries, and the thunder of falling Nazi shells.

  Dozens of fires rose from the hospital site. How many had been killed this time? How many wounded? How could he help? The top priorities were to aid the wounded and put out the fires that served as beacons to German artillery spotters.

  He dashed into the complex for the 33rd Field Hospital. A tent lay crumpled, in flames, and cries rang out underneath. Men swung at the flaming canvas with tent poles. Hutch grabbed a pole, tugged it free from its loop, and joined in, heaving scraps of canvas to the side, off the wounded and dying.

  He stomped on the smoking scraps, kicked sand on them.

  Men screamed, their blankets and clothing on fire. Hutch flung off the blanket from the patient closest to him, whipped off his mackinaw, and pressed it over the flames. “You’ll be all right.”

  Wild eyes stared up at him, but Hutch didn’t have time to comfort, only to save. After he extinguished the flames, he went to the next victim—a man beyond help.

  A sergeant ran up. “Take the wounded to the 56th. We can’t deal with them here. Too much damage. Move them right on their mattresses.”

  Medics grabbed mattresses. Hutch turned to find a patient to transport, but all were taken.

  He jogged down the pathway, looking for another way to help. He passed two nurses in embrace, in tears.

  “She was so young, so full of life,” one said.

  Another nurse killed? Embers burned in Hutch’s chest. This war stank. It stank, it stank, it stank.

  He dodged medics and doctors and nurses, heading for the next fire. He turned a corner and slammed into someone.

  “Sorry.” He noted the surgeon’s garb. “Sir.”

  The man wheeled to face him. Captain Chadwick, fire in his gray eyes. “You? What do you think you’re doing here, boy?”

  “I’m helping, sir.”

  “You’re a druggist.” His words spat into Hutch’s face. “Go rearrange the cosmetics display or something, but get out of here. You’re in the way—again.”

  The embers in Hutch’s chest sent off dangerous sparks. “Don’t need to be a physician to put out fires and save lives.”

  “Save lives?” His whole face twitched, shot through with pain. “Druggists are better at taking lives. Get out of here before you kill someone.”

  Hutch stared, dumbfounded. Taking lives? What on earth was this man’s problem?

  “Did you hear me, jerk? Get out of here.”

  “Yes, sir.” Hutch saluted, his hand banging his helmet. Jerk? Chadwick was the jerk, but he wasn’t allowed to say that.

  He wheeled away, his stomach in flames no bicarb could put out. He was forbidden from returning the insults, from refuting the lies, from defending himself and his profession.

  Stupid, stinking Army. Stupid, stinking war.

  He strode toward the road that connected the hospitals and he passed the pharmacy tent, shredded by shrapnel.

  Hutch paused, checked behind him for Chad-jerk, and stepped into Pharmacy.

  One of the shelving units had fallen off the counter. Broken glass and powders and liquids covered the dirt floor. Three technicians looked up at Hutch.

  “John Hutchinson from the 93rd Evac. I’m a pharmacist. May I help?”

  “Yes!” A tech sprang forward and pumped Hutch’s hand. “Lloyd Parker. Two tents down, Receiving took a direct hit. The concussion—you see what it did. We need to get this place up and running.”

  “Sure do.” Hutch tossed aside his charred mackinaw and assessed the situation. First they had to clear out the broken glass and the worst of the spills so they could work safely. Then they could prepare burn solutions for the wounded and take an inventory of the damage so they could order. The 93rd could help in the interim.

  Supplying the beachhead presented a continual challenge, with cargo planes unable to land on the battered airstrip and ships shelled at sea.

  “All right. Let’s clear out the glass.” Hutch grabbed an empty crate, wrapped a rag around his hand, and picked up shards of glass. “Lloyd, why don’t you find a shovel? We can dig a hole and bury the spilled meds.”

  The hard work quenched the sparks in his stomach. Pharmacy wasn’t flashy, but it had worth. He healed with chemicals rather than the scalpel, but he still healed.

  If only the Army agreed.

  43

  Outside Naples, Italy

  February 14, 1944

  Miss Carpino, the Red Cross worker, held open the orphanage door and motioned in the flight nurses with their boxes full of goodies. “It’s so kind of you to come. The children are excited to have a party.”

  Mellie hefted up her box and smiled at Georgie. “Great idea.”

  “Thank you.” Throwing a party for orphans seemed a more noble use of her skills than her usual birthday parties for the nurses.

  Spartan but clean, just as Hutch described the orphanage. What would he think about her visit? Would he be grateful she’d thought of Lucia or would he think she’d disrespectfully usurped his place in the child’s life? The way he’d been acting before they broke up, who knew? Sometimes she was glad to be rid of him, and sometimes the pain of missing him ripped her up inside.

  The Red Cross girl led them into a dining hall with two long tables and benches. Several dozen dark-haired boys and girls sat at the tables, supervised by two nuns in long black habits.

  “Buongiorno.” Georgie grinned and waved.

  “Buongiorno.” The children wiggled in their seats. If the nuns hadn’t been present, Georgie had a hunch the nurses would have been mobbed.

  The Red Cross girl, an American with Italian heritage, made an introduction in Italian, complete with swooping airplane hand motions.

  Georgie scanned the orphans until she found Lucia at the end of the far table with crutches propped next to her. She wore a shabby brown dress, and Georgie’s next sewing idea zipped into her mind. Why, all the children looked like they could use a new dress or shirt or sweater. If Georgie had her way, no hands in the 802nd MAETS would be idle for some time to come.

  The Red Cross girl turned to the six nurses. “Go ahead and introduce yourselves. ‘Mi chiamo’ means ‘my name is,’ and ‘tenante’ means ‘lieutenant.’”

  The ladies went down the line ending with “Tenante Tayl
or.”

  “Signorina Giorgiana?” Even from across the room, the light in Lucia’s eyes shone.

  A nun gave the girl a soft reprimand, and Lucia responded in excited Italian. At the mention of “Signor Ucce,” Georgie’s heart jolted.

  Before Lucia could get in trouble for talking back, Georgie approached the nun. “It’s all right, Sister. I know her.”

  The Red Cross girl translated, and the nun nodded to Georgie and stepped back.

  Lucia stretched out her hand. “Signorina! Signorina! Signor Ucce ask you come?”

  “No.” Georgie squatted by the table and took Lucia’s hand, smiling over her pain. How could she tell the girl Hutch hadn’t asked or told her anything for a month? A month and two days. “But he would come himself if he could. I know he’d like you to have a party. Do you understand?”

  “Yeah.” She turned a grin toward the Red Cross girl. “Signorina Carpino teach me English.”

  “Good. Let me get the party started, and I’ll come back to talk to you.”

  The nurses passed out a square of fudge for each child. After they finished, Mellie, Kay, and Louise took the more active children outside to play baseball.

  Grief stole the breath from Georgie’s lungs. Rose would have organized the baseball game if she were here. She would have loved this outing.

  But Rose wasn’t here. And the purpose of the party was to cheer up the children, so she pulled herself tall and helped Vera and Alice set up paper and paint and scissors for the quieter children and those who couldn’t walk.

  She gave Alice a smile. “Thanks again for giving up your paint set. I know you planned to capture the landscape.”

  “I can get more sent from home.” A fall of blonde hair concealed her expression. “These children don’t have a—a home.”

  Most of the children seemed chipper, but one little girl sat alone, rocking back and forth, a red roof tile clutched to her chest. And a boy around nine painted a picture of a house—with a swastika-bearing tank barreling into it. These children had seen things no child should see.

  “Signorina! Tenante Taylor. See me walk.” Leaning heavily on her crutches, Lucia edged forward with short uneasy steps.