Apple Blossom Time (28 page)

‘Laura?’ The MT sergeant put his head round my tent door. ‘Are you busy?’

‘As ever, Stan,’ I answered with a smile. ‘Who isn’t?’

He was a decent man, quiet and hardworking, the best sort of NCO, always coaxing more out of his engines and their drivers than they thought they could give, always ready to take the snaps of his family out of his pocket and pass them round. I knew them all by name. Ivy, who worked shifts in an aircraft factory and still managed to keep the family together. Little Valerie, with straggly pigtails tied with floppy bows. Barry, who just couldn’t seem to get the hang of reading, somehow. Clive, who was almost old enough to be called up, God forbid.

‘Can we talk?’

‘Of course. Do you mind if I come out to you? I’m afraid I can’t ask you in. There’s paper all over the place. It seems to multiply every night.’ I slipped out of the tent, away from the clacking machines, but their noise followed me out, tireless, voracious for information, clattering night and day.

‘I’d rather stand anyway, if you don’t mind.’ He stood by the flap of the tent entrance, almost at attention, thumbs in line with the seams of his trousers, as though he were on a charge. ‘There’s bad news, I’m afraid. Private Westonbirt – she’s a friend of yours, isn’t she?’

I nodded. Knowing. Funny how you always know.

‘There’s been an accident. Her tanker went up. She’s asking for you.’

I didn’t stop to ask for permission. I ran and, as I went, I heard him say, ‘I’m sorry, love.’

*   *   *

Out of their grey and scarlet, in khaki shirts and slacks, with their hair tied up in turbans, the nurses looked much more approachable than they did in England. I stopped one and asked where I’d find Grace.

‘The ATS driver? Down there. She’s in a side tent off the main burns ward.’

‘May I see her?’

‘Any time,’ she said, with a smile that told me more about Grace’s condition than I had asked.

It was a long walk down the length of the marquee. My right boot squeaked with every step. I’m sure it didn’t usually do that. The brailings were rolled up to allow a breeze to pass through, but the smell was still there. It reminded me of the smell in Martin’s darkroom, but underneath the cleanness of chemicals was the whiff of decaying flesh. Scarlet-covered beds lined each side, several with drip stands by their sides, two completely curtained. I didn’t know whether to look and smile at the occupants or whether they’d think I was gawping.

One lad raised his bandaged hands in a clumsy wave. ‘Hello, gorgeous, come to visit me?’

Nineteen, was he? Twenty? Sunken eyes in bruised sockets. A wire cage lifted the bedclothes off his legs. I smiled. ‘Not today, I’m afraid.’

‘Don’t leave it too long. I might have my clothes back on by then!’

Whistles and waves followed me down the ward.

‘Over here, sarge.’

‘Blow us a kiss, darling.’

But some were silent and motionless, their eyes turned towards the canvas ceiling. And in the side ward, a swathed body, long and bulky and shapeless.

I stood by the bed, hesitating and helpless, sick with selfish fear of what I might be forced to see. She was my friend and I was afraid to look at her. No need. There wasn’t very much of Grace to see.

The mummies in Cairo museum looked like that, human but not human, mutely self-contained, set apart, untouchable. But this one was wrapped in cleaner bandages. It was breathing, slowly, painfully, the air rasping through passages seared by heat. Saline mixture dripped from a bottle, down a tube and through a needle inserted into the only patch of visible Grace.

A nurse looked through the curtains. ‘She’s just had a hefty shot of morphine, I’m afraid. She’ll be out for the count for a long time.’

‘I hope so,’ I whispered.

The nurse came in and drew the curtains closed behind her. She put her hand on my shoulder. ‘It’s marvellous what they can do with burns these days, you know,’ she said brightly, in answer to a question I hadn’t asked. ‘They’re learning all the time. Look at all those poor burned pilots at East Grinstead. They’re almost…’

‘… almost normal. I’m not sure that Grace would like that very much.’

Grace without eyelids. Grace without nostrils, without lips. Beautiful Grace.

‘We’ll do our best to stabilize her condition here,’ the nurse continued. ‘If she does well, she’ll be flown back home.’

‘May I touch her?’ My throat felt tight, my voice wobbling out of control, like a growing boy’s.

‘She won’t feel anything, dear. We’ve knocked her out for a good, long sleep.’

‘I see. Of course … Do you know what happened?’

‘Sorry, no. An accident, a crash, I think. That’s all. Well – this won’t get a wardful of dressings changed. No peace for the wicked. I must get on. Stay as long as you like, dear.’

And that told me all I needed to know.

I put my hand on the place where Grace’s ought to be. I had expected it to be soft. The firmness of the dressings surprised me. She felt like a well-upholstered sofa. Braver, I began to stroke the hand.

‘Grace,’ I whispered. ‘I know you can’t hear me, but I’m here anyway.’

I’d like to imagine she heard me. I could pretend that there was the faintest twitch of recognition, a sign, anything. But I’d be fooling myself. There was nothing. Just as well, really.

I had to go back to work, but I slipped back again to the hospital just after dark. Tilley lamps hung, hissing, from the ridge of the marquee. They cast bright pools of light that turned the beds into shadowy, painful mysteries. Moths batted against the lamps, fizzed, flared and dropped to the ground. The smell of paraffin was added to all the unnameable hospital smells and the heat from the lamps hung in a dense layer below the canvas. A soldier behind drawn curtains was making a faint, repetitive sound. I couldn’t tell if he was groaning or weeping or laughing.

The night nurse sat at a table at the end of the ward. The lamp lit up the forms she was filling in, her hands – red and rough, with clipped, clean nails – and a fringe of fuzzy fair hair.

‘Hello,’ she said with a smile. ‘You can go on through, if you like.’

Nothing had changed. As far as I could see, Grace had neither moved nor been moved, but a new bottle of saline dripped into her veins. I pulled a chair closer to the bed. I leaned forward and stroked where her forehead would be. What had happened, I wondered. Had she hit a mine? Taken a bend too fast with a laden tanker? Had she finally risked that cigarette she’d always said she was gasping for?

‘Hello, Grace,’ I said softly. ‘I’m back again.’

And she twitched. I swear she twitched. Then – nothing.

Far away, much farther than when I’d first landed in France, I could hear the sound of guns, a sort of background mutter, like soldiers on parade complaining beneath their breath. The battle was moving on, deeper into France, towards Paris, towards Germany. Soon the headquarters would pack up again and follow.

Behind the curtains it was very quiet, but it wasn’t peaceful. There was a struggle going on. I could sense it, almost feel it, but I had no part to play in it. Grace had to fight alone. She loved company, adored crowds, but she was on her own in this. All I could do was be with her and try not to think of the body beneath the wrappings, skinless and raw, a carcass.

James had taken three days to die. Please God, please God, let Grace go quicker than that.

I sat with my hand on hers, listening to her breathing – so shallow, how could she draw enough air into her lungs? – until the night nurse came to change the drip bottle. She threw me out, but kindly.

*   *   *

Next day, there was a minor flap on. Signals flew backwards and forwards, all to be encoded or decoded and interpreted. It was late afternoon before I got a moment to slip over to the hospital.

There was still a bandaged body in the bed, but enough was visible to show me that it was a man. I smiled at him, a thin, unkind smile that he was too sick to return. ‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘wrong place.’

The nurses on duty were busy, going from bed to bed doling out medicine. I hung around until the ward sister reached the place where I was standing.

‘Grace … my friend … Private Westonbirt … has she…?’ Of course, I knew the answer. I wasn’t stupid. All the same, I had to ask, I had to be certain. I cleared my throat and tried again. ‘Has she been transferred back to England?’

The woman turned to me and I could see how tired she was. Her nose was pinched round the nostrils and her lips were pale. A wisp of greasy hair had escaped from her khaki turban. Her shirt was patched with damp under her arms and across her collarbone and in a line down her spine. You’d think she would have run out of compassion by now, but she hadn’t. Her eyes were still kind.

‘I’m so sorry. We made her comfortable. That’s all we could do.’

I nodded and turned away. ‘Thank you.’

She caught my arm as I went. ‘It was the best thing for her. Really.’

‘I know.’

As I walked back down the ward, a lad whistled. From the next bed, a voice said, ‘Shut up, you. Show a bit of respect.’

I ducked through the canvas door flap and into Martin’s arms.

‘I’ve been looking for you,’ he said. He took my hand and led me away.

*   *   *

There was so little privacy in camp that we walked towards the little wood, in the opposite direction from the village. From a distance, the wood looked ravaged. Trees were splintered and tanks had gouged tracks where none had been before.

Now that we were closer, I could see that the wood survived, no matter what had been done to it. The tank tracks were edged with growing grass. Shattered stumps were already putting out fresh shoots. While the top growth had been destroyed, all the low-growing, creeping, humble plants carried on in the way they always had done. A blackbird was sending out its silly, evening message that told every predator exactly where he was going to roost. The sounds of the camp were a very long way away.

I think I’d have walked off the edge of the earth with him that day, if he had only taken my hand and asked me to follow.

‘I’m sorry I wasn’t in time,’ said Martin softly. ‘I wanted to be with you.’

I didn’t feel much like talking, but just to be near him was comforting.

‘I ought to write to her parents,’ I said, trying to be practical. ‘I know the army will notify them officially, but I ought to write. They have a right to know what happened, what it was like.’

‘Don’t be too hard on them,’ Martin warned me. ‘Write if you must, but don’t tell them … everything. What good would that do?’

I nodded. He was right, of course. Their daughter was dead. Why add to their grief by telling them how? ‘Then what can I say?’

‘Tell them about your friendship, about the four of you and what you mean to each other. Tell them why Grace was special. Tell them about the laughter and the mischief. Tell them that she was beautiful and funny and that she made everyone feel good.’

‘I remember…’ I smiled. ‘I remember she read the whole of
Gone with the Wind,
hidden under a truck, with her boots sticking out. It took her a week and everyone who passed thought she was working on the engine. She was under there snivelling over Bonnie Blue’s death and no-one noticed.’

Martin laughed. ‘Typical army – no-one worries where you’re going or what you’re doing, as long as you march smartly, salute everything and carry a broom.’

It was good to laugh. It was good to remember the funny things, the happy moments. With Grace, there had been so many. ‘But Martin … oh, Martin, every time I close my eyes, I see Grace in flames…’ I began to shiver again.

He put his arms around me. ‘Sssh. Sssh. It’s all right. I’m here.’

What he said didn’t make sense, but I didn’t care. His being there didn’t make things all right, but it made them bearable. Just. His khaki tunic was rough beneath my cheek. The buttons pressed their pattern into my skin. His arms were hard and strong, their grip fierce. It was what I wanted, what I needed. They made me feel safe and, at the same time, very vulnerable.

‘You know that I want to look after you, don’t you?’ Martin went on, softly. He laid his cheek against my hair. I was cold and his breath was warm. ‘Always.’

‘There doesn’t seem to be much of an always to look forward to.’

‘Things will change.’

‘I know. It just doesn’t feel that way just now.’

‘It will get better. I promise you.’

I looked up into his face, that dear, disfigured face that had been part of my life for as long as I could remember. When had I not been able to turn to Martin for safety? I reached up and touched his cheek, his nose, his strongly marked eyebrows. He was warm. His skin was supple. He was so alive.

‘Oh Martin,’ I sighed and shuddered. ‘Touch me. Love me. I need you so much.’

*   *   *

For the second time in my life, I woke up in the same bed as someone else. I lay with my eyes still closed and felt the unaccustomed warmth of another human body pressed against mine. The ornate iron bed sagged in the middle and rolled us as close together as we could be. We lay in the dip in the mattress, tumbled together like a pair of puppies. Martin’s legs, long and muscular, were entwined with mine. His arm lay heavily across my waist, awkwardly comforting.

I knew what I would see when I opened my eyes. Not a stranger. My friend. His dark hair would be tousled, sticking up in startled peaks, in the way it used to be when he’d towelled it dry after a swim. His eyes would still be closed, fringed by dark half-moons of lashes, but when they opened I knew they’d be bright as China tea with lemon, like dry sherry in firelight, like last year’s leaves on a woodland floor dappled by sunlight.

*   *   *

‘Un lit de mariage?’
the landlady had asked coyly. She’d looked down at my hand, quite openly. I still wore a wedding ring, James’s ring. It had nestled comfortably into the flesh of my finger over the years. No curtain ring donned for one night only, she could see that.

She’d shown us up winding stairs, along a corridor that sloped at an angle that threw you into the opposite wall.
‘Le lavabo,’
she’d announced, throwing open a door that seemed to lead into a black box.
‘Et voilà…’