by Val Wood
She looked up as she felt Oswald’s hand on her shoulder. He gently patted it and she wondered how long he’d been standing there.
‘I thought I’d walk across to see Max Glover’s family,’ she told him, ‘and then Dolly Morris. Would you like to come?’
They were interrupted by Mary, who bustled into the kitchen. ‘Sorry I’m so late,’ she said breathlessly. ‘I’ve just seen somebody who told me about another of ’Hull Pals being killed. I don’t know him, but then she went on to say …’ She raised her eyebrows and went on quickly. ‘Well, she’s a proper bearer of bad news is Mrs Thompson, but she told me that Dr Warrington’s son-in-law – Miss Elizabeth’s husband, I don’t remember his name – is missing.’
They all three put a hand on their chests; all had thought for a split second that she was going to say Henry’s name.
‘It upsets everyone, doesn’t it?’ Nora murmured. ‘Especially those with loved ones fighting.’ She gazed at Oswald and then turned away as if to busy herself.
‘Yes,’ Oswald said quietly to Lucy. ‘I’ll come with you, though I might not be welcome. People expect every man they meet to be in uniform.’
They passed by the Warrington house but did not call, thinking that it was perhaps too soon. The blinds at the windows were drawn closed.
‘I don’t know if Elizabeth and her husband ever lived here,’ Lucy said as they passed by. ‘He’s from somewhere in the south, I seem to recall.’
‘Let’s take a detour,’ Oswald said, steering her across the road towards Bond Street. ‘Let’s go to the old town and see the Zeppelin damage for ourselves.’
‘We’ll go to Holy Trinity,’ she agreed, ‘and see how badly it was hit. Mary told me that it was going to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to repair it. Thank goodness she moved out to Mason Street when she did. She told me the old properties along High Street have been badly damaged and that there was a huge crater in the middle of the street.’
The ancient church was covered in scaffolding and the stained glass windows were boarded up; random damage had been done to other buildings and a bomb had fallen on a nearby store, causing a great conflagration that had damaged nearby properties.
Oswald gazed around Market Place; some of the shops were still in the process of repair. ‘There’s nowhere for people to shelter,’ he muttered. ‘And little warning is given until it’s too late.’
‘The Big Lizzie, the warning siren is called,’ Lucy said. ‘It can be heard all over the city, apparently.’
‘Yes, I dare say,’ Oswald said. ‘But where do you run to when you hear it? Hull is a sitting target.’ He contemplated. ‘Hundreds of people have been killed or injured. I’m just wondering if Ma and Pa would consider moving out to Pearson Park until the war is over.’
Lucy gasped. ‘Are you serious? Do you really believe that the bombing of civilian targets will worsen?’
‘I do and it will,’ he said fervently. ‘Hull and other east coast towns are prime objectives, not only when enemy aircraft are coming in to English air space but also when they leave. They don’t want to carry unnecessary weight when flying back home so they ditch their lethal cargo before they reach the sea. And besides,’ he said gloomily, ‘one of their aims is to terrorize the civilians, and they’re certainly succeeding in that!’
‘How is it that you know all these things?’ she asked.
He tapped the side of his nose and said wryly, ‘Can’t say, but I hear talk. Sometimes we have eminent scientists visiting us – I told you about Dr Haldane?’
Lucy nodded.
‘Well, for example,’ he went on, ‘some distinguished experts, including Haldane, come to discuss the properties of different types of poison gas, or the type of respirator that the military should carry.’
He could have told her more, but he didn’t. For one thing, much of the research he was working on was top secret, and for another it would be grossly repugnant to anyone, even an intelligent, professional young woman like Lucy, to comprehend that any nation would choose to inflict such a grotesque weapon of war on another. He struggled with the understanding of it himself.
‘Did I tell you,’ he said, as an afterthought, ‘that I met the king?’
‘No!’ she said in astonishment. ‘Really? How?’
‘King George gets about a bit you know,’ he teased. ‘He likes to know what’s happening. I forgot to tell my mother, too.’ He grinned again. ‘Remind me when we get back, will you? I know she’ll be impressed!’
They walked on towards Queen Street, and he suggested they stopped for coffee before moving on towards the pier to have a look at the Humber before turning back. Lucy recommended the café she had been to with Edie, where they could have a slice of delicious cake too.
As they waited for the coffee, Oswald tried to decide whether to tell Lucy what he had decided to do after talking it over with William. Perhaps it would be better to wait until she’d left for France and then tell her by letter. He was going to apply to the RAMC, and would be almost certain to be sent abroad if he were accepted. There would be no certainty, of course, but if I put in a request to be with the Hull Pals who I know are in France … but then they’re in Flanders too, and of course Lucy herself could be sent anywhere … He let out a breath of frustration. Life was so uncertain.
He saw the questioning look on Lucy’s face, as if she knew he was chewing something over, but fortunately the coffee and cake were brought just then and he forced a big smile to avoid any questions; and, he thought with some relief, at least she didn’t seem at all embarrassed about being caught in his arms and about to be kissed most inappropriately. A lapse of judgement on my part, and what a blessing that my mother walked in when she did. Though heaven knows what she made of it.
They walked to the pier after finishing their coffee, past the boarded up damaged buildings, and then turned to head back through High Street and across town to Charles Street.
They soon found the Glovers’ grocery shop, where a queue of women with shopping baskets were waiting patiently to be served. Lucy saw Jenny behind the counter and a woman whom she took to be her mother; both were pale-faced and there was no banter between them and the customers, but she noticed that after handing over their money many of the women gave Jenny and her mother a gentle pat on their hands; a small demonstration of understanding.
They waited in the queue until they reached the front. Mrs Glover had gone into the back room so it was Jenny who looked up. ‘Yes, miss?’
‘Do you remember me, Jenny? I’m Lucy Thornbury, Edie’s friend.’
‘Oh.’ Jenny’s face lifted in a hesitant smile. ‘Of course! Sorry. It’s been ages.’
‘It has.’ Lucy was relieved not to have to explain herself. She turned to introduce Oswald. ‘This is my cousin Oswald. I don’t think you’ve met. We – we heard about Max and are so terribly sorry. We both wanted to come and give you our …’ She suddenly felt the tears begin to fall and put her hand to her mouth, unable to express the words of comfort that she wanted to give. Childhood memories came to the fore and they would be all that was left; there was no chance of Max’s fulfilling any dreams or ambitions that he might have had; no long life with a wife and family. Everything gone.
‘Thank you.’ Jenny took out a handkerchief to stem her own tears. ‘We are finding it so hard, my mother and me; my father won’t talk about it. He’s hardly said a word since we heard the news, but he insists we keep the shops open as if nothing’s happened.’
‘It’s his way of coping,’ Oswald said softly, putting his hand on Lucy’s shoulder. ‘He doesn’t want to acknowledge it; and deep down he’s angry and hurt. Sooner or later it will hit him hard and he’ll need your comfort.’
‘That’s what Mam says.’ Jenny choked back her tears. ‘But we need time to grieve, and think about what we’ll do without our Max, not keep on serving groceries.’
Just then her mother came back into the shop and looked at them all. ‘What’s this?’
&nb
sp; ‘Lucy Thornbury,’ Lucy introduced herself. ‘And this is my cousin Oswald. We’re friends of Edie and Josh and Stanley, and we both knew Max when we were children.’
She hesitated and Oswald took over. ‘We heard about Max, Mrs Glover, and came to say how sorry we were.’ He shook his head. ‘I didn’t know him well, but I remember being jealous of him when we were children, because he was so positive and amiable. A very special person.’
‘He was, wasn’t he?’ Susan Glover gave a wistful smile. ‘Nothing daunted him; he was very confident.’ She swallowed. ‘Edie wrote to us. She was with him at the end, you know. It’s as if it was fate that she was in the hospital where he was taken. She said how lovely it was, clean sheets and blankets an’ that, and ’sound of ’sea outside ’windows, cos that was worrying me.’ There was a catch in her voice. ‘That he would be comfortable at the end and not lost somewhere in all that mud that we keep hearing about.’
‘He would have been comfortable, Mrs Glover.’ Lucy strived to retain her professional demeanour. ‘I understand that Edie sat with him all night, as soon as she was told he was there. She would have cheered him up. You know Edie!’
Mrs Glover nodded. ‘That’s something we can hang on to, isn’t it?’ She began to weep. ‘Knowing that he wasn’t alone.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Both William and Nora were busy with various activities. William was on several hospital committees and Nora had joined the Voluntary Aid Detachment organized by Lady Nunburnholme. The headquarters were in Peel Street on Spring Bank, within easy walking distance for Nora. She didn’t train as a VAD nurse but was involved in fundraising, clerical work and dispatching parcels and gifts to the troops of East Yorkshire units.
‘At last I feel as if I’m helping to make a difference and bringing some small comfort to our soldiers,’ she told Lucy. ‘We’ve raised money for thousands of parcels.’
‘How wonderful!’ Lucy said. ‘They’ll know that they haven’t been forgotten when they open a parcel sent from their own county; their own people.’
‘That’s what everyone is hoping,’ Nora agreed. ‘There are hundreds of little cottage industries all over Hull, women knitting socks and scarves or sewing handkerchiefs or making up something they call a housewife; it’s a kind of fabric package that contains needles and thread, darning wool and scissors, and goes into the parcels with sweets and chocolate and biscuits for the soldiers.’
Everyone is trying to do something, Lucy thought. Doing their bit, as we all say. But the news constantly filtering through wasn’t good. The enemy had committed further atrocities in Ypres and thousands of men had been killed or injured, including many of the Hull Pals. Everyone had heard about the sinking of the Lusitania when she had been packed with American and British passengers, but not everyone knew that she was also carrying a secret cargo of munitions for the British war effort. The hope had been that America might now come in to the war, but so far no commitment had been agreed.
Oswald returned to London the next day, relieved to think that he and Lucy had got back to something like their normal relationship. He’d asked her if she’d try persuading William and Nora to move to Pearson Park; she’d said that she would but didn’t think they’d agree to it.
‘Perhaps Eleanor could stay there, though,’ Lucy had suggested. ‘Sally might stay with her so she wouldn’t be alone.’
‘Good idea,’ he enthused, ‘and maybe Ma and Pa would go at the weekends; that would be a compromise, at least. I think Pa’s worried about leaving the Baker Street house empty.’
‘Perhaps he is,’ Lucy said thoughtfully. ‘But the Zeppelins have dropped bombs all over the city, not just the centre.’
‘This is just a taste of what’s to come,’ he said. ‘Those in the know are saying that this is the war to end all wars.’
Which sounds very ominous, she considered as she travelled back to London a few days later. She hadn’t been successful in persuading her uncle and aunt to move to the Pearson Park house; Eleanor had wanted to and had asked Sally if she would join her, but that hadn’t been allowed either. ‘Certainly not,’ Nora had said. ‘Two young women on their own! I’d never have a minute’s peace.’
Before Lucy left, she’d told her uncle and aunt that she doubted she would get home again for some time. Nora had put her arms round her and held her close. ‘Take great care, Lucy,’ she’d whispered. ‘You know, don’t you, that you are very precious to us? Our much loved eldest daughter?’
Lucy gave her a hug, and then, with an unsteady voice and a quavering smile that embraced them both, murmured, ‘And you have both cared for me as well as any parent would have.’ She kissed William on his whiskery cheek. ‘Take care, Pa,’ she said, using Oswald’s chosen name for his adoptive father, which seemed so fitting for her too; he had been her father in practically every sense of the term. ‘Of yourself, as much as everyone else,’ she added, and with tears in his eyes, and too choked with worry for words, he’d simply nodded.
When she arrived back at the Endell Street hospital she found that everyone was in a sombre mood. News had been released of the execution for treason of Nurse Edith Cavell by a German firing squad, despite appeals by international voices, including Americans, for a reprieve. They had also had a huge influx of injured personnel, and this, along with the news of Cavell’s death, made her feel guilty for having been away.
‘Nonsense,’ Rose said when she told her this. ‘You need respite as much as anyone else; no point in having a sick doctor.’
She too had taken a few days off and had been to see Olive Spence. ‘It seemed odd calling her Olive instead of Olga,’ she said, ‘but she said she’d got used to it now.’
‘How was she?’ Lucy asked.
‘Very well. She seemed quite happy, and said the work was less stressful than at Endell Street. The men they are treating, those who will be going home at least, are pleased to be out of the war, but of course there are many who will be going back to join their units once their injuries have healed.’
Then she shook her head and lowered her voice. ‘But some have injuries that can’t be seen. They’ve been affected mentally by what they’ve gone through, and if the authorities think that a few weeks’ convalescence is going to make them fit to be sent back to the front again, then I’m afraid they are very much mistaken!’
Lucy wondered how she would cope in France nearer the battlefields. She voiced her fears to Rose.
‘We’ll cope, Lucy,’ the older woman said. ‘But if you have any real fears, then you don’t have to go.’
‘It’s not that I don’t want to,’ Lucy explained. ‘It’s whether or not I’ll be found wanting, whether or not I’ll be good enough.’ Rose smiled. ‘You will be good enough. Do not doubt yourself, Dr Thornbury. We all have great faith in you.’
It was March 1916 before they were given orders to prepare to leave in three days’ time. They were given a day off to go back to their lodging house to pack what they needed, write home and give notice to their landlady.
Neither had much to take: a valise with changes of clothing, a spare jacket and two extra plain skirts, two white coats, and their medical bags. They had been told there would be facilities for washing laundry within the unit.
Lucy wrote a quick postcard to Oswald as soon as she heard to advise him that their orders had come, and then wrote a letter to William and Nora to say that she would write once she was in France and give them her address. She sent her love to all of them, especially Eleanor. Please try not to worry about me, she wrote. I will not be near the front line and the casualty clearing station – it’s called a CCS – is a well-equipped medical facility. I am so pleased to be going at last.
I love you all very much. Lucy.
She looked round the room that had been only a temporary home, a mere resting place. She was leaving nothing behind. She heard someone banging on the front door, and then raised voices and someone running up the stairs.
It was Oswald. ‘Thank God
you haven’t left.’ He was breathless. ‘I thought I might be too late!’
She opened her door wider to let him in. She realized that her landlady must have been shouting at him for coming upstairs.
He put his arms on her shoulders and held her away from him. ‘That dragon downstairs said I couldn’t come up and I’m afraid I was rather rude to her.’
She gave a little chuckle. ‘Really?’
‘Yes. I asked her if she knew there was a war on and that people were fighting for the likes of her and she wasn’t going to stop me from coming up when I might never see you again. That shut her up.’ He kissed her cheek. ‘I didn’t mean that, of course; it was a small white lie.’ He looked down at her. ‘In fact, Lucy, there’s a chance that we might meet again sooner than you expect.’
‘What do you mean? We’re leaving now. I don’t know when I’ll be home again.’
‘You’ll be mad at me when I tell you!’ He gave her a bashful grin. ‘I’ve enlisted. I’m joining the RAMC.’
‘What! But you’re needed here – your research!’
‘My research will be just as important over there. I’ll see at first hand what’s required and can report back. I’ve done it, Lucy: there’s no going back, and no arguing.’ He gave her a wry grin. ‘Because I’ll probably have the rank of an officer.’
‘And I won’t, of course, being a female doctor! But I don’t understand why, Oswald.’
‘I’ve said for long enough that I was unsure about whether to enlist, but by joining the RAMC I don’t have to carry a weapon, or at least if I do I’ll only be expected to use it in self-defence. You know that I’m a pacifist. I could never kill anyone.’
He gazed at her so pleadingly, clearly desperate for her to understand his reasoning, that she was relieved in a way, because she had had the fleeting thought that perhaps he was doing it in order to be near her, to protect her.