by Sarah Jio
Like his bravado. His philandering with the island women. His smug attitude. “Yes,” I said instead. “So many.”
“Anne,” Kitty said, a little shyly. “I haven’t had a chance to tell you, but on the night of the dance, Colonel Donahue—”
We both looked up, startled, when we heard a loud, rapid knocking at the door.
“Yes,” I said, turning the knob.
Liz stood outside, panting and out of breath. “It’s Mary,” she said. “In the infirmary. Come quick.”
We followed Liz down the stairs and out the barracks door, picking up a brisk pace once we reached the pathway outside. The infirmary wasn’t far, but we arrived at its entrance wheezing from the sprint.
Inside, Nurse Hildebrand hovered over Mary’s bed alongside Dr. Livingston, a middle-aged physician with thinning hair and spectacles. Mary looked unnaturally pale. Her eyes were closed, but the shallow rise of her chest told us she was still breathing.
“Dear Lord,” I whispered. “What happened?”
The doctor produced a syringe and injected a clear liquid into Mary’s arm; she didn’t flinch when the needle pricked her skin.
“One of the women found her in her room,” Nurse Hildebrand said, “collapsed by the bed. She’d been there at least sixteen hours. Malaria. Must have contracted it on her first day on the island.”
“Malaria,” I repeated. The word sounded so foreign, and yet the disease was right here, threatening to take the life of a terrific girl, one we’d just begun to know, a girl who had her whole future ahead of her, who had come to the South Pacific to start over, not to die.
“The fever broke,” Dr. Livingston said, “but I’m afraid it weakened her heart. The only thing we can do now is wait.”
My hands trembled. “But she’s going to make it,” I said. “She’s going to pull through. She has to pull through.”
Dr. Livingston looked away.
I thought of Mary, poor Mary. Tall, perhaps a little too tall. Teeth a bit crooked. Heart broken. Her fiancé had left her and she had felt alone; she’d told us so. No, I will not let her die alone.
“Kitty,” I said, “will you run back to the barracks and fetch my reading glasses and anything you can find to read? Bring the damn War Digest, if that’s all there is—whatever you can find.”
Kitty nodded.
“We’re going to hold vigil,” I said. “May I pull up a bed and stay next to her tonight?” I asked Nurse Hildebrand.
She nodded in approval.
Kitty returned with two magazines, three books—two from Liz and another from Stella—a copy of the War Digest, and a nursing textbook, just in case.
“Good,” I said, examining a book with a tattered spine. “We’ll take shifts reading to her. We won’t stop until she regains consciousness, or . . .”
Kitty reached for my hand. “Anne, you can’t save her if she’s—”
“I won’t let her die alone,” I said, wiping away a tear. “Nobody deserves that.”
Kitty nodded.
I set down the book and picked up a copy of Vogue with Rita Hayworth on the cover. I turned to the first page, and began reading an advertisement: “Why not get a lovely figure for spring? If you want to dress inexpensively, and be able to wear standard fittings with charm and distinction, start now to get rid of that accumulated winter fat. With the help of nightly Bile Beans you can ‘slim while you sleep’ safely and gradually . . .”
I read for four hours, every word on every page in front of me, until my eyes began to blur. Kitty read next, turning on a little lamp on the table next to the gurney when the sun set, then passing the torch back to me a few hours later after her voice became hoarse.
We’d covered three magazines and three quarters of a novel by the time the sun’s morning rays first shone through the infirmary windows, which is when Mary’s eyes began to flutter.
She opened them slowly, then shut them again, and we watched with great anticipation as the next minute passed, and then the next, before she moved her arm, and then her legs, and then her eyes again, this time opening them and looking straight at me.
“Where am I?” she said weakly.
“In the infirmary,” I replied, tucking a strand of her blond, straw-like hair behind her ear. “You’ve been stricken with malaria, dear,” I continued, choking back tears. “But you’re going to be fine now.”
Mary looked around the room, then at Kitty and back to me. “I had the strangest dream,” she said. “I kept trying to walk toward a bright light, and there was this voice always there. It kept luring me back.”
“Did you turn around?”
“I didn’t want to,” she said. “I wanted to keep walking, but every time I took a step, the voice beckoned.”
“Good,” I said, holding a glass of water to her lips before tucking her cold arms back under the blanket. “Dear, we have all the time in the world to talk about it, but you need your rest now.”
Our care of Mary didn’t compel Nurse Hildebrand to congratulate us on our nursing skills, but she did excuse us from duty that day, and Kitty and I welcomed the opportunity to rest.
I slept until noon, when the sound of the lunch bell ringing from the mess hall woke me. My stomach growled, yet my exhaustion persisted and I was tempted to stay in bed.
“Kitty?” I said, without lifting my head. “Are you awake?”
I turned my heavy head expecting to see her fast asleep, and instead found her coverlet pulled tightly up over her bed and the two pillows fluffed and neatly stacked against the headboard.
Where is she? I sat up and stretched, then noticed a note on the dressing table.
Anne,
I didn’t want to wake you. I left at 10 to go canoeing with Lance. I’ll be back this afternoon.
Love,
Kitty
Boating with Lance. Of course, it was a perfectly normal thing for her to do, and yet I felt uneasy. We were granted the day off only hours ago, so when did she have time to make plans with Lance? I thought of the bungalow, and realized our little dormitory room was already thick with secrets.
The lunch bell rang a second time—the last call. If I dressed and ran quickly I could make it in time. But I saw a shiny red apple on the nightstand and thought of a much better idea.
I slung over my shoulder a knapsack packed with the apple, a bit of bread Kitty had brought back from the mess hall, and a canteen filled with water, then I snuck past the entrance to the infirmary, stopping briefly to glance through an open window to where Stella and Liz and a few of the other nurses were working. They looked bored, at best. A few fussed over a lightbulb that needed changing, and a small group hovered over the only patient in the building, a man who looked like he had nothing more than a skinned knee. His smile indicated his enjoyment.
This wasn’t the wartime life I’d expected. And yet, change was coming. I’d heard a rumor that Colonel Donahue had an operation planned, something big. I wondered how it might affect our work, our world.
I made my way to the path that led to the beach. Westry had said the bungalow was just a half mile north of the base. I hoped he was right.
I walked fast, and looked over my shoulder more than a few times. What would people think of me sneaking away from the base like this, alone? It didn’t feel like something Anne Calloway would do.
Just around the bend, I began to make out the thatched roof of the bungalow, nestled in the thicket, just as we’d left it. As I grew nearer, I could hear the sound of a saw zigzagging.
My heart pounded in my chest. Westry is here.
“Hello,” I said, knocking ceremoniously on the place where the door had once hung precariously. “Anyone home?”
Westry looked up, wiping his brow before brushing sawdust off his hands. “Oh, hi,” he said. “Are you real or a mirage? I’ve been out here all morning without water, and I can’t tell if I’m hallucinating or if there’s really a beautiful woman standing in the doorway. Please tell me it’s the latter.”
Westry took a long gulp, then exhaled, handing the canteen back to me. “I’ve almost got the door in working order,” he said. “It didn’t fit on the doorframe. The weather must have warped it. I had to take an inch off the side. See? I rustled up some old hinges from the supply yard.” He held up the hardware proudly, as if it were treasure. “Our bungalow needs a proper, working door.”
I smiled. I liked to think of it as our bungalow.
I pulled a box of Borax and some rags from my bag. “I thought I’d give the place a shine,” I said.
“Glad you could join the work party,” Westry said, turning back to his saw.
By three, the floors were fit to eat from, and Westry had the door fastened in place.
“I almost forgot,” he said, plucking a scuffed brass doorknob from his knapsack. “It will just take me a second to fit it.”
I watched him attach the knob, carefully fastening the screws in their holes.
“Our key,” he said, holding up a shiny piece of steel. “Now, if we can just find the right hiding place for it.”
I pointed to the open-air windows. “But anyone who wants in can just climb on through.”
Westry nodded. “Sure. We’ll get the windows installed soon enough. Besides, every home needs a proper, working lock. But where to hide the key, that’s the question.”
I followed him outside the hut, and we looked around near the front step. “How about here?” I suggested, pointing to a spot in the sand. “We could bury it.”
Westry shook his head. “It’s the first place someone would look. It’s like the welcome mat—every crook knows to go there first.” He paused as an idea struck. “Wait,” he continued, running back inside and returning with a book he’d pulled from his bag. “We’ll use this.”
“A book?”
“Yeah,” he replied, pulling out the ribbon attached to the spine. Its purpose might have been to mark the page for a reader, but Westry had other plans. He tied the ribbon securely around the lip of the key, tucking it into the book. “There,” he said, sliding the book below the step. “Our secret spot.”
The waves were crashing loudly now. “The tide’s coming in,” he said. “Want to watch it with me?”
I hesitated. “I probably should be thinking about walking back.” I hadn’t left a note for Kitty, and I worried that she could be concerned.
“C’mon,” Westry said. “You can stay a few more minutes.”
“All right,” I said, caving. “Just a few.”
“There,” he said, pointing to a piece of driftwood a few paces ahead on the beach. “Our perch.”
He grabbed the wine bottle he’d found in the bungalow the day before and a tin cup from his knapsack and sat down next to me in the sand, our heads resting comfortably on the driftwood that had been smoothed into submission by the pulverizing surf. “A toast,” he said, pouring the ancient wine into the cup. “To the lady of the bungalow.”
He extended the cup to me, and I took a cautious sip, my face involuntarily contorting. “To sour hundred-year-old wine.”
A bird sang in the distance as we sat together, mesmerized by the waves.
“I don’t know anything about you,” I said, turning to him a little abruptly.
“And I don’t know anything about you,” he retorted.
“You start.”
Westry nodded and sat up. “I was born in Ohio,” he began. “Didn’t stay there long. Mother died of scarlet fever, and I moved west with my father, to San Francisco. He was an engineer, worked on the railroads. I tagged along with him, attending a different school every month.”
“Far from a proper education,” I said.
Westry shrugged. “I got a better one than most. I saw the country. I learned the way of the railways.”
“And now what? After all of this, you said you wanted to come back here, to the island, but surely you have other aspirations, other things to attend to first?”
Westry’s eyes were big and full of life, full of possibility.
“I’m not sure, exactly,” he said. “I may go back to school, become an engineer, like Pop. Or maybe go to France, and learn to paint like the great impressionists. Or maybe I’ll just stay here,” he said, motioning with his head toward the bungalow.
“Oh, you can’t do that,” I said. “What a lonely life that would be!”
“Why would you call it lonely?” he countered. “I’d have everything I could possibly want. A roof over my head. A bed. The most beautiful scenery in the world. Some might call that paradise.”
I thought about what he’d said about settling down and raising a family right there on the stretch of beach before us. “But what about companionship?” I said a little shyly. “What about . . . love?”
Westry grinned. “Easy for you to say. You already have that.”
I looked at my feet, burrowing the tip of my shoe into the sand, which was so hot I could feel it radiating beneath the leather.
“Well,” he continued, “I suppose I’ll find her. Out there somewhere.”
“What if you don’t?” I asked.
“I will,” he said, smiling at me confidently.
I turned away quickly.
“Now,” he said, “let’s hear about you.”
I tugged at a loose thread on my bag until the silence felt strange. “Well, there isn’t much to tell.”
“I’m sure there is,” Westry said with a leading smile. “Everyone has a story.”
I shook my head. “I was born in Seattle. I lived there all my life. I got my nursing license, and now I’m here.”
“And there you have it,” he said dramatically. “An entire lifetime in three sentences.”
I felt my cheeks get hot. “Sorry,” I said. “I guess my life isn’t quite as exciting as yours.”
“I think you’re bluffing,” he said, sizing me up with his eyes. “The man you’re engaged to,” he continued, pointing to the ring on my hand, “why didn’t you marry him before you left?”
How dare he ask me such a question? “Because I . . .” My voice trailed off without an answer. I thought of all the practical reasons: I didn’t want to rush things; because Mother wanted a big affair at the Olympic Hotel; because . . . ; and yet, none were satisfactory. If I’d wanted, I could have marched down to City Hall, just like Gerard had suggested, and made it official. I could have become Mrs. Gerard Godfrey without a yearlong odyssey to the South Pacific as a hurdle that stood between us. Why didn’t I?
“See?” Westry continued. “You do have a story.”
“I assure you,” I retorted, “you’ve created drama where there is none.”
Westry winked. “We’ll see.”
Kitty wasn’t in the room when I returned, so when the mess hall bell rang, announcing dinner, I walked out of the barracks alone, making a quick stop in the infirmary to check on Mary, whom I was happy to find sitting up and sipping orange juice through a straw.
“Hi, Anne,” she muttered from her bed. Her voice, still quite weak, had perked up. There was strength in it that hadn’t been there this morning.
“Hi,” I said. “I’m headed to dinner. I was just wondering if I could bring you anything. You must be tiring of the liquid diet.”
“I am,” she replied. “A roll and a few packages of butter would be divine.”
“I’ll take care of it,” I said, smiling.
I walked back out to the path that led to the mess hall, passing the hibiscus bush where Kitty and I had plucked flowers that first night. I kept walking until I could see the recreation dock. A dozen canoes bound by rope tethers bobbed on the water, waiting for off-duty soldiers to take them out to sea. Few did, even though Bora-Bora was a relative safe haven from enemy attack—so far.
I looked closer and spotted two figures climbing out of a canoe. The tousled curls could have belonged to no other but Kitty, but the man helping her
onto the dock wasn’t Lance. I gasped when I saw instead the face of Colonel Donahue. She smiled sweetly at him as he stowed the paddles inside the canoe. They walked together, arm in arm, back up to the lawn, where he bid her adieu, and Kitty hurried along the trail back to the women’s barracks.
Should I run after her? I decided not to; after all, she hadn’t told me the truth about her date, and it was most likely because she thought I’d disapprove, and I did. But I couldn’t have her thinking I was spying on her. No, she’d tell me in her own time. Instead, I turned back to the mess hall and spoke to the cook about getting a tray made up for Mary.
“How’s Lance?” Stella coyly asked Kitty at breakfast. Did she see her with the Colonel too?
“Fine,” Kitty said, picking at her scrambled eggs and grits, both the consistency of rubber. “We’re seeing each other tonight.”
Stella shook her head jealously, a gesture that might have put me on the defensive the day we met, but I had come to learn quickly that it was merely Stella’s way. “My, do you have luck with men,” she said, before sighing in defeat. “I’ve given up on Elliot. His head is much too tangled up with that woman from back home. He’s either by himself taking photographs on the beach or holed up in the barracks writing poetry about her. She must be something else, that woman. Anyway, I met an airman last night. His name is Will, and he isn’t half bad.”
Liz approached our table with a tray and set it down. “Is Mary still on the mend?”
“Yes, thank God,” I said. “She’s much stronger today.”
Liz gazed intently at an envelope she held in her hand. “This came for her today,” she said cautiously. “And I can’t help but notice the name on the return address. Didn’t she say her ex-fiancé’s name was Edward?”
I nodded. “Let me see it.”
I held the envelope up to the light, unable to make out anything significant, just that the sender was indeed Edward. Edward Naughton, with a return address in Paris.
“Anne!” Kitty scolded. “You shouldn’t read her mail. It’s private.”
“I will if I think it’s going to compromise her recovery,” I said. “Listen, if this man could leave her, almost at the altar, and send her into such a tailspin that she banished herself to a far-flung island on the other side of the world, imagine what a letter from him could do to her.”