by Leda Swann
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” another girl ventured quietly. “He might come looking for you when he gets back home. Do you want to be courted by a poor soldier on half-pay?”
The first girl’s enthusiasm wasn’t quenched. “I’m sure I wouldn’t mind if he did want to court me.”
Beatrice was silent as the argument raged around her, lost in thought. Should she send a picture of herself to Captain Carterton, as he had asked her to? On the whole, she didn’t think so. She was still walking out with Dr. Hyde. Not that you could call him her sweetheart, exactly, their relationship was too rational and platonic for such an emotional term. Still, she didn’t want the captain to know her as anything other than words on a piece of prettily scented stationery. He was her fantasy; he had no place in the reality of her life. She wasn’t sure why she balked at the thought of sending him a picture, except that it would make their correspondence seem too real.
It was a pity that her relationship with the captain, if you could call an exchange of letters a relationship, was a hundred times more affectionate than Dr. Hyde’s tepid courtship. The captain’s letters were so much more intelligent and full of personal insight than Dr. Hyde’s conversation. So much warmer and more loving. So much more appreciative of her as a woman. And so much more inclined to make her think of deliciously intimate pleasures.
Captain Carterton had turned out to be a man of more substance than she had thought at first. He was clearly well educated and interesting, with a turn of phrase that could heat any young woman’s blood. If she were to meet him in society, they might even become friends. Or more…
“Of course you should send him a photograph if you want to,” Mrs. Bettina said stoutly, putting an end to the argument. “There’s nothing wrong with writing to a lonely soldier, and no harm in sending him a picture. A modest picture, of course.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” one of the others said darkly. “Don’t we all know what he wants to do with a photograph of a pretty girl. The saucier it is, the better he’ll like it.” She made an obscene gesture with one of her hands to make it quite clear to what she was referring.
The girls all laughed, and some of them, Beatrice among them, blushed. It seemed somehow wrong to think of the soldiers off fighting for their country as…as doing that, just as if they were grubby schoolboys.
But when Captain Carterton described it to her in his letters, he made it sound so delightful, as if bringing himself to orgasm while thinking of her was an act of love for her. She liked to imagine him lying in his tent, one hand stroking his stiff cock while the other held a picture of her. It made her want to do just the same, only with a picture of him.
Maybe she would send him a photograph of herself after all.
A saucy one. And ask him to send her his likeness in return. What Dr. Hyde didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.
“They are all alone by themselves out in South Africa, after all,” one of the girls pointed out. “Without any English girls to keep them company.”
“Not that we’d help them out in that regard, even if we were there with them,” another said, her voice a bit tart. She had a reputation on the ward as being a bit of a tease. “A prick-tease,” Beatrice had heard her referred to as once by a disgruntled patient, a vulgar young bricklayer who’d wanted more from her than nursing.
“They can’t have much else to do, stuck in a dusty, hot place without any society.”
“We’d be doing a public service by helping them out. And it’s not as if it will hurt us. Or our reputations. We can’t help that men have baser needs.”
“Let’s all get tintypes done. We can ask the photographer man to come by when he is finished at the park. A few photos of each of us will make it worth his while. And keep the soldiers as happy as pigs in mud.”
Mrs. Bettina was the only one who demurred at the suggestion. “I do not think the sergeant-major would appreciate a photo of an old widow.” She heaved a sigh that spoke of wasted opportunities and regrets. “He would not be interested in my letters if he were to know how old I am.”
“You are not yet forty,” Beatrice protested. “And by his own account he is nearing fifty.”
Mrs. Bettina wasn’t convinced. “Women lose their looks sooner than men do. I am past being able to find another husband even were I to want one, but if he were to start looking for a wife he’d find himself a young girl of twenty who’d be glad to take him. Respectable men with an honorable profession are not two a penny.”
“He’s not looking for a wife—just a letter,” Lenora pointed out with unassailable logic.
“If it matters so much to you, send him a photograph of one of us instead,” one of the other girls put in. “As you said yourself, there’s no harm in innocently keeping a man happy.”
Mrs. Bettina allowed herself to be persuaded to at least consider the idea, and a couple of the girls ran off to the park to beg the photographer to pay them a visit on the promise of at least a score of tintypes to be taken.
In the resultant shuffle, Beatrice found herself sitting on the couch with Lenora.
“What has your soldier written to you this week?” Lenora asked with a smile of complicity at the game they were playing. “Mine writes of nothing interesting, except that he wishes I was there to keep him company. I doubt it would do him much good if I was—he is not the most articulate of correspondents and would doubtless be a dull companion. He’s not educated like Dr. Hyde, and he has no idea of wit or humor. But he was grateful for the socks I knitted him, so I am glad to be of some use.”
Beatrice shifted uneasily in her seat. Poor Lenora was too unworldly to hide her feelings. She was happily oblivious to the fact that all of the hospital knew of and pitied her for her unrequited affection for the doctor. Everyone liked Lenora too much to embarrass her by telling her that her secret was common knowledge.
Beatrice did not want to rub her friend’s nose in the doctor’s clearly expressed partiality for her. “You could liven your soldier up a bit,” she suggested, partly to take Lenora’s mind—and her conversation—off the doctor for once. “Get him thinking about you in a whole new way, and see what flights of fancy you can inspire him to.”
Her forehead creased into a frown and she crinkled her freckled nose with puzzlement. “But how?”
Beatrice sighed. Lenora did not have a single coquettish bone in her body. Everything about her was completely open and honest. Which was all very well except when it came to the male sex. They liked a little mystery in their women—it added to the allure. “Maybe just a little hint of how lonely you are without him. How you lie awake in bed at night thinking of him.”
“But I don’t. Not of him,” she added, giving away her ill-kept secret all over again.
“I didn’t say you had to write him the truth. Embellish it a little. Be just a little bit saucy and see how he responds.” It wouldn’t hurt to give Lenora a few tips on how to flirt with a young man. If anyone needed them, Lenora did.
Lenora worried her bottom lip with her teeth. “I am not sure that I know how to be saucy. I’m not sure I even want to know.”
“Of course you do. Every woman does. That’s how we get men to be interested in us. They like to be led on just a little, and then have us draw back. Show them that we want to be caught, but refuse to come to their bait. It’s the not knowing whether we are serious or not that keeps them dangling.”
“Is that how you attracted Dr. Hyde?”
Beatrice nodded. One of these days she would have to hint to Lenora that her interest in the doctor was horribly, painfully, obvious. She wasn’t in the slightest jealous of the doctor’s attention, but she did not want anyone poking fun at her friend for her undisguised adoration of a man who was so clearly indifferent to her. “Of course.”
Lenora squared her shoulders. “I shall try, then. But what shall I say?”
Beatrice turned to the rest of the girls in the room. “Ideas, please. What should Lenora say to entice her soldier?�
��
“Not too much,” Lenora added hastily. “Just a little bit. So he doesn’t think I am a dry stick.”
“Pretend you are in love with him and say what comes naturally.”
“But I am not in love with him. Not at all.”
“That’s why I said pretend, silly.”
Lenora’s face splotched with fiery red. “Oh, I see,” she mumbled. “But even if I were in love with him, which I’m not, I still don’t know what I should say.”
“Oh heavens, have you never whispered silly nothings into a man’s ear at night, after he has taken you to a show? Nonsense stuff that you don’t mean and which means nothing, but which he wants to hear?”
“Like what?”
“Like how his nearness makes your heart beat faster.”
“Or how his kiss makes you go weak at the knees.”
“That you will count every second until you can see him again.”
“And if you live to be one hundred, you will not forget him.”
“He’ll be eating out of your hand and begging you for more in no time.”
Still Lenora hesitated. “It hardly seems fair to the poor man, writing words that I do not mean.”
Myrtle, a hard-bitten woman who wore a look of perpetual disappointment like a badge of honor, let out a burst of bitter laughter. “What’s sauce for the goose, dearie. What’s sauce for the goose. You don’t think that any of them mean a word of what they write to us, now?”
Just then the other girls came back, photographer in tow. “Photograph time,” they cried in unison. “Line up for a photograph to send to your sweetheart.”
The photographer set up his camera and tripod at one end of the bay window, where the light was best, and placed a chair at the other end. “Now then, ladies,” he called out in his cheerful salesman patter, “who’s first?”
Myrtle was the first to plump herself down in the chair. “Now then, dearie,” she said to the photographer, “make me look pretty, or I shan’t pay up.” There was enough steel in her voice to make the threat real.
The photographer opened his eyes wide in mock horror. “How could I make you look anything else,” he exclaimed, quickly taking an exposure while Myrtle’s mouth was still curved in a genuine smile.
She looked critically at the image as it appeared on the thin sheet of japanned iron. “I like it. Take another one.”
As he varnished the first print with a few deft brushes, Myrtle removed the black fichu from her bodice and tugged it down to expose her ample bosom. Then she arranged herself in the chair, artfully pulled up her skirts to show her petticoats and more than a hint of ankle, and leaned forward with a pout.
The photographer took another exposure, and the grinning Myrtle gave her place to the next in line.
“You’re not going to send that one to your soldier friend, are you?” Mrs. Bettina asked anxiously as the photograph was developed.
“Never you mind what I want it for,” Myrtle snapped back. “That’s my business.”
Beatrice and the others peeped at the image to see what Mrs. Bettina was fussing about. There was a chorus of oohs and aahs as they saw the finished tintype. Myrtle, hard-faced Myrtle, looked like a siren.
“You look so glamorous,” Lenora breathed. “So worldly and sophisticated. Do you think he could take one of me looking like that?”
“You look quite improper,” Mrs. Bettina said with a sniff. “You don’t look like the sort of lady who works as a nurse in London’s best hospital.”
Myrtle tucked the finished tintypes away in her pocketbook with a smug look on her face. “Good. I don’t want to look like a nurse.”
Neither did Beatrice, if the alternative was looking as good as Myrtle. She vowed to show off as much bosom and ankle as Myrtle had, or more. If Captain Carterton was going to get an illicit thrill out of looking at her, she may as well give him an eyeful.
One by one, all the girls copied Myrtle’s pose, getting more and more outrageous with every photograph that was taken, until Myrtle crowned the joke by pulling her skirts so high to show off her garter, and her bodice so low as to expose one dusky nipple.
“That’s quite enough.” Mrs. Bettina clapped her hands together and shoed the photographer out the front door as soon as the last tintype was developed and varnished. “You have gone too far.”
Myrtle just gave her a saucy wink. “I did this one especially for you, dearie. To send to your sergeant-major. You can pretend it’s you, and he’ll never know the difference. See if he doesn’t write back to you a hundred times over with that sort of promise to keep him dangling.”
“I shall do no such thing,” Mrs. Bettina huffed. “It would be quite scandalous.”
But Beatrice was almost certain she could see the glint of excited temptation lurking in the corner of their landlady’s eye.
Nancy Bettina stayed in the parlor long after the younger girls had gone to bed. The coal fire had long since died down into a heap of embers. Though the glowing red coals had dulled into a mass of crumbling gray, they still gave off a pleasant warmth. She drew her chair closer to the fire, pulled up her skirts a little ways and stuck her toes close to the fire to catch every last bit of heat.
From her pocket she drew out the letter she had received from Sergeant-Major Tofts. She had not shared it with the other girls. They were so much younger than she was, and might look oddly at her if they knew how strongly a woman’s heart beat under her bodice.
Dear Mrs. Bettina,
Thank you so much for your letter, and your kind thoughts. I must say I was dashed surprised to get a parcel from England, yours is the first I have received since stepping ashore in this place so far from home.
The socks fit me wonderfully and are very comfortable in both the heat of the day and in the chill of the night. You are indeed a generous soul to put so much effort into a gift for a complete stranger.
Allow me to allay your fears of large carnivores gobbling men at every opportunity. I have yet to see a lion or a jaguar, although I do hear them at night on occasion. They are nocturnal hunters you know, but do not bother us as long as we remain in our tents. As for spiders, I too have a slight aversion to them. Nasty creatures, why ever God put them on this earth is beyond me. I pray of you, keep this information to yourself, if ever my men discovered this weakness I am sure they would think the lesser of me.
I believe I would have got on famously with your sadly departed husband, George. When it comes to a man’s weapon, cleanliness is next to godliness. I shudder to think of my trusty Martini Henry misfiring at an inopportune moment, just when my life depended on it. Sand and grit are the real enemy here and I, along with my men, spend several hours each day cleaning and oiling our rifles. Not too much oil, mind, as oil is a dirt-magnet. But just enough to keep the parts sliding smoothly and the rust at bay.
You are right in your letter that we are of similar occupation, as I also have the welfare of my men at heart. I find I have to run a tight operation, with the maintenance of discipline being paramount to our survival in this hostile place so far from home. Despite my men considering me a gruff old soldier I feel we must be of closer spirit than you suspect.
I would be honored if you would write again, and if fate and chance permit maybe one day we shall meet in person and I will be able to thank you in person for your uncommon kindness. If I may be so bold, I will hold you in my mind as a strong and intelligent woman, as having a vision helps me get through the long days. And nights.
Warmest regards,
Sgt. Maj. Bartholomew Tofts, V.C.
She put it aside again with a sigh. Though she had been widowed for the better part of a decade, she was only thirty-eight. She still had so much life to live, and it made her weep to think she would spend it all alone. It wasn’t fair that the sergeant-major was considered in the prime of his life, ripe for marriage and a family, while she was considered too old. And she and her first husband had never been blessed with children of their own.
; She wiped a melancholy tear away. It was too late for her now. Best that she simply accept it and move on with her life. The young nurses that boarded with her were her family. They would have to suffice her.
In a letter, though, she could pretend she was still a young woman. She could pretend that the sergeant-major was her sweetheart and that he was courting her. His letters gave her something to look forward to, something extra to live for, a reason to keep on with the struggle instead of giving up and letting the cares of the world overwhelm her.
They had so much in common, and he wrote so sensibly of matters. Sometimes he reminded her quite forcibly of her late husband. He had the same forthright spirit. The same manly strength and the same uncomplaining nature.
Or maybe it was the loneliness of her heart that made her cling to the first respectable man who had shown any interest in her for a very long time.
She had had her fair share of offers from less than respectable men. The young rag-and-bone man who tried his best to flirt with her every week was one such. Dirty and ill-educated, he clearly saw her—an older woman presumably desperate for a husband—as an easy route to a comfortable bed every night and plenty of hot water.
The sergeant-major wasn’t interested in her comfortable boardinghouse or the nest egg she had saved for her later years. He didn’t know she was comfortably off, that her dear George had left her so. He wrote to her because he enjoyed her conversation.
If he were to lose interest in their correspondence, her heart would be shattered all over again.
Myrtle’s naughty tintype lay on the side table where she had deliberately left it to tempt Mrs. Bettina into sending it to her sergeant-major.
She picked it up and examined it carefully. Myrtle looked very enticing, but she was clearly not in the first flush of youth. Would the sergeant-major be more tempted to carry on their correspondence if he thought she looked like young Myrtle?