It was still raining when we reached Rouen, but the worst had passed. A driver was waiting for me, and I was glad to see as he came forward to take my valise that his eyes were a very Cornish brown, his name Trelawney. He was also a member of my father’s old regiment, and he said as he escorted me to the motorcar, “Your father’s daughter is safe with me, Sister.”
I thanked him, and we slipped and slid out of Rouen on the mud-slick roads, and headed west.
It took a day and a half to reach the forward lines approaching Ypres, and I slept that night in a nearly roofless shed that smelled of horses. Trelawney brought me tea at first light, and then we were on our way once more.
The first aid station on the top of my list was small, hastily set up, and overrun with wounded from a breach in the line that had mercifully held. I dropped all pretense of being there to observe and was busy sorting the cases as they came in and then doing duty in the operating theater.
There had been a gas attack as well, and the scent of new-mown hay lingered on the air as men gasped for breath and we did our best to lavage the burned areas of skin and mouths. We all carried gas masks with us every hour of the day and night, but there had been no time for some men to react to the first conspicuous low cloud coming toward them.
We loaded the ambulances lined up behind the station and sent stretcher cases back for more extensive care, then turned our attention to the walking wounded. It was late in the evening before we could draw a breath, and the nursing sister in charge thanked me for my help.
I stayed for the rest of the night and spent most of the morning there as well, until the wounded were no more than a trickle. The guns were silent, and it seemed that both sides were trying to recoup their losses. A few more cases were brought in from a flag-of-truce collection from No Man’s Land, and then those who were not on duty went to their cots and slept deeply.
I sat drinking tea with Sister Mason, who ran this station with such courage.
“There’s not much choice,” she said grimly. “Dr. Beddoes was taken back a week ago with a burst appendix. He never mentioned feeling ill or told us what he suspected. I’ve had to carry on, and I don’t know when or if we’ll have another doctor sent to us.”
Somewhere nearby a soldier was playing a mouth organ, a haunting version of “Roses of Picardy.” I thought how homesick he must be, letting the instrument put into words what he couldn’t, that the war had lasted far too long and there was still no end in sight. He had lost heart, and I couldn’t fault him for that.
I made a note of Sister Mason’s concerns, and as she watched me, she said, “I thought when I first saw you that you were here to make trouble. But you worked as hard as any of us.”
“It isn’t trouble I’m after,” I replied. “I’ll report your need of a doctor, and it’s the best I can do at the moment. But you can be assured I won’t forget.”
She shrugged. “They say the war may end soon. Another year at most. I don’t know. We’ll all be dead by then, there will be no one left to fight.”
I asked if she had sufficient supplies. “We never have enough. But we manage. Every ambulance that goes back is under orders to bring forward what they can.”
Such conditions were common. But that didn’t make it any easier for those who had to work with first cases out of the trenches and knew supplies were running short. I had done it too often.
“The French hospitals are worse, they say,” she added. “I’ve heard tales. How true, I don’t know. But if I were dying, I’d rather come here and stand a chance than go to one of theirs.”
I smiled. I’d heard the same tales. Of men crying for water, and one overworked sister trying to save the worst of the wounded while the rest hung on grimly in the hope their turn would come.
Setting down my cup, I said as casually as I could, “One of my flatmates worked with a Dr. Percy in a station near Ypres. She asked me to say hello if I saw him.”
“Percy? I don’t think I’ve met him.”
Interesting. I said, “Perhaps he’s been reassigned,” and I left it at that.
An hour later, I set out for my next stop.
Trelawney-he’d never told me his rank-was always there, ready to drive me when I turned toward the motorcar. I don’t know where he’d found this vehicle, held together by the rust that was trying to destroy it. But the motor was sound and the tires were reliable, the two most important factors in transport out here.
While I was working with the wounded, the resourceful Trelawney had done a little scouting in the area. The Germans had reached this far south at the start of the war-there had been bloody fighting in this sector at one time-and he had told everyone he was hunting for souvenirs. They’d laughed at him but left him to it.
“Any luck?” I asked when we were out of earshot of the aid station.
Trelawney shook his head. “You couldn’t hide a wee mouse out there.”
He didn’t need to say anything more.
On our way to the next station, we quartered another area and were almost strafed by a German craft, which veered away at the last minute, having spotted something of greater interest down the line.
I could hear Trelawney swearing under his breath as he zigged and zagged across the ruts and dips, fearing for his tires and his suspension. We were conspicuous just here, where there were no convoys of ammunitions and supplies at the moment, no troops moving forward or ambulances rumbling back. What’s more, motorcars were usually driven by officers, always a tempting target. But it was necessary to be thorough, and we nearly paid dearly for it.
The only structure was so pitifully small in this blasted landscape that it couldn’t even provide shelter from a good rain. But we did discover two cellars, once part of a tiny village, their entrances partly blocked by rubble. Rat-infested-according to Trelawney, I didn’t go down to see-and filled with more rubble and water, they were unfit for human habitation.
Putting away his torch and his revolver, he said with disgust, “I daresay there are bones down there as well. I didn’t care to have a look.”
It was dawn when we reached the next station on my list, and I worked until dusk with the sisters there, doing what I could, wondering who would step in to help when I had to leave. And then it was quiet, the last of the wounded dealt with, including a head injury, and they found a cot for me. I fell asleep almost at once, glad for a place to rest.
We continued to move slowly east along the Western Front. And so far no one had tried to attack me. Nor had we learned anything that was useful. Except that there was no Dr. Percy in this sector. In another cellar we had found two German dead, wounded men who must have crawled in there long ago, their uniforms barely recognizable, their bones already disturbed by the ever-present rats. Trelawney searched for identification all the same, saying, “They’ll have families, and someone will want to know what happened to them.” Afterward he marked the location for a burial detail.
Another dawn, and we were nearly caught by surprise when a gas attack came, the mist moving silently across the ground, almost invisible in a light ground fog. I caught the faintest whiff of new-mown hay and fumbled for my ever-present gas mask, got it on quickly, tucked my limbs under my skirts and my arms under my cape, leaving no skin exposed. It passed over us, dissipating as quietly as it had appeared. We waited until we could hear a distant all clear, and then moved on. But ahead of us in the next station were men caught unprepared, asleep or nodding at their posts. I had heard tales of how the gas could creep across the ground and sink into the trenches, a killer that seemed to care nothing for either side, for if the wind shifted, it blew back to the German lines. We used gas as well. The cough of burned lungs was unmistakable to the trained ear.