Authors: Irene Carr
LONDON. FEBRUARY 1918.
The
drivers were told when a hospital train loaded with wounded was due to come in from Flanders. This was the fourth such train Katy had attended with her ambulance on this tour, which had started in the evening. Now it was close to morning and she had been on duty for nearly ten hours. She was both hungry and thirsty, but when the shattered men arrived they had to be cared for. She was a member of the Women’s Legion and attached to the London Ambulance Column.
Katy
drove the Ford up from the Embankment, through the tunnel, and emerged into Charing Cross Station. There she braked behind another ambulance, a queue of them stretching ahead of her onto the platform. They were seen as silhouettes in the half-dark of the blackout now enforced because of the air raids on the city. A pall of smoke smelling of soot hung around her, and mixed with that the sickly sweet, acrid stench of poison gas and gangrene; the hospital train had arrived. She could see it now, as the line of vehicles edged forward, the panting locomotive at its head breathing steam, a red cross painted on the side of each carriage. Katy got down from the cab for a moment to stretch her legs as the queue was briefly halted. She wore her Army pattern greatcoat over her neat brown jacket and skirt, the soft brown felt hat tipped slightly rakishly on one side. She breathed in the tainted air and shuddered in anticipation, bracing herself. This was her life now.
Katy
had walked to the Labour Exchange and joined the Women’s Legion the day after she parted from Charles Ashleigh. She yearned for Louise but could not go to Germany to search for her until peace came, and that seemed far distant in 1917. She had signed on for a year or the duration of the war. Annie had agreed, needed no persuasion, to care for Beatrice but Katy had found it hard to part from them when the time came. She had written to Matt, telling him how the business had finished — and why. She had wished him well and told him she was going where women were needed to drive, but she did not know where. She sent it to the only address she had, the one he had sent her when he went abroad early in 1915. She could not ask Fleur for his more recent address, knew she would receive a poisonous tirade of accusations — and no address. Katy did not know how long the letter would take to reach Matt. She had never heard from him. She did write to Fleur, a short note in businesslike terms, advising her that Ballard’s had ceased trading but there was money in the firm’s account to pay her allowance up to the end of February, when it would finish.
The
line of ambulances was moving again and Katy jumped up into the cab of the Ford to keep her place in it. She drove out onto the platform and halted. A crocodile of men bearing stretchers was heading towards her with a nurse in the lead. Katy saw it was Sybil Northcote, a Fany — First Aid Nursing Yeomanry. She trotted up to Katy, a small, slight girl, her fluffy blonde hair escaping from her cap, her grey eyes wide with nervousness. Sybil had travelled with Katy several times before, and once already this day. She said, ‘I say, Katy, I’ve got one serious chap and I have to come with you, but I have two other ambulances to watch out for.’
Katy
got down from the Ford: ‘So we’ll bring up the rear.’ That was standard procedure when one nurse had to tend the inmates of more than one ambulance: she would ride in the last with the most seriously injured. If any of the other wounded needed her assistance their ambulance stopped and waited until she came up.
Sybil
said, ‘Oh, thanks.’ Then with a quick, relieved smile, ‘I like being with you.’ She was barely nineteen, a veteran with a year’s service, but glad of the company of the older Katy.
‘
Here y’are, miss.’ That came from the first stretcher bearers with their burden. There were four bunks in each ambulance and the stretchers slid into them on rollers. The bunks were filled with rapid efficiency. As the bearers did their work, Sybil had a moment to spare to whisper, ‘They’re all from field hospitals. We’re going to be busy.’
The
field hospitals were always emptied before an attack. When the attack went in, the cases on the ambulance trains were not only from field or base hospitals. Many of the wounded came straight from the battlefield, still in their muddied and blood-soaked clothing. Katy had that hollow feeling inside again. At times like these she pictured Matt on a stretcher like these men. Or worse.
The
bunks were full and so were the other two ambulances in their party. Sybil said, ‘The Commandant said this was the last train. We’re stood down after this run.’ And then: ‘I’m starving. And there won’t be anything at my hostel at this time of night.’ Nor would there be at Katy’s. Worse still, because of food shortages at this stage of the war, they would not find a cafe able to serve them anything but a slice of toast. Sybil climbed into the back of Katy’s Ford and perched on the little seat behind the driver, but by the head of the seriously injured soldier and looking out of the rear. The backs of the ambulances were all open, draughty and chill. Katy checked that the stretchers were lashed in so that they could not slide out, then she cranked the Ford and drove out of the station, following the other two. And now, prompted by her fear for Matt, she feared for Louise. Was her daughter starving in Germany?
As
the Ford wound through the streets of London she thought about them, and Annie and Beatrice. Katy had shut up the flat and the office and put the key in its hiding place between door and step. She had padlocked the gates of the yard and given the key to Annie to keep. Beatrice had cried when Katy had left, Annie had sniffed and wiped her eyes and Katy herself had done her weeping in the train carrying her south. She wrote once a week at least and sent money for Beatrice’s keep. Katy still had some money in the bank, what was left of her share of the profits when the firm ceased trading. Matt’s share — and some of Katy’s — had gone to Fleur. But that little sum of money, now in a bank in London, was sometimes increased by a few shillings, but never drawn. That was Katy’s last, fragile bulwark against penury. The money sent to Beatrice came out of Katy’s pay of forty-five shillings a week.
Katy
braked the Ford at the doors of the hospital in Hampstead just before dawn. She was aware of her hunger again. Was Louise going hungry at this moment? The stretcher bearers were waiting for them and came hurrying out. Katy went round to the rear of the Ford and found Sybil still inside, holding the hand of the seriously wounded man. She held on to it awkwardly as his stretcher was eased out of the ambulance by the bearers, biting her lip. Katy saw him in the first grey light, his face drawn and ashen, eyes closed. She could just make out the label tied to him: ‘MGW’ — Multiple Gunshot Wounds. She knew now that was probably due to a machinegun. Another nurse came hurrying down the hospital steps to take charge of him from Sybil. She gripped his hand instead and Sybil leaned back against the side of the Ford, tears on her cheeks. Katy wrapped her arms around the girl, comforting.
The
last of the stretchers had been carried into the hospital. Katy and Sybil climbed into the front of the Ford and Katy drove them back into London as the day grew. She stopped outside a building that had once been a theatre — there were billboards with faded posters each side of the entrance — but now a sign above the door said it was a canteen.
Sybil,
dozing in her seat, woke and asked blearily, ‘What have we stopped for?’
‘
Breakfast, I hope,’ Katy told her. ‘I found this place a few nights ago. Come on.’
They
got down and entered the building. The stage was lit and the canteen was set up there like a cafe. The floor between door and canteen, where once there had been rows of seats, lay in darkness and was covered by sleeping soldiers. Katy and Sybil picked their way through them and were served with poached egg on toast and strong tea by a girl no older than Sybil. As they ate, seated at a trestle table, the sleeping men were behind them and out of sight. But with the little meal over they rose and turned to leave. The soldiers still lay in their ragged rows, unmoving, and Sybil shivered arid whispered, ‘They look like corpses.’
Katy
nodded agreement, and now the awful thought came: Did Matt lie thus, dead on some distant field? She tried to banish the picture from her mind but failed. She crawled into her narrow bed in the hostel but lay awake for a long time despite her weariness. When she finally slept it was to dream of Matt lying dead, Louise crying for bread and her father, Howard Ross, laughing madly.
*
Ivor Spargo sidled into the public house on Newcastle’s dockside. He paused just inside the door, eyes flicking over the crowd of drinkers. When he saw no police, military or civil, he moved in further, bought a pint of beer and sat down at a small round table with a marble top. The old suit he wore, with a scarf knotted around his neck, was in tune with the workmen and seamen around him. He had not shaved for over a month but he had trimmed the resultant beard. The former thin moustache was now a ragged, drooping walrus.
He
sat at the table for a half-hour before the man he waited for came in. He looked more prosperous than the others, with a collar and tie, and smiled about him. Ivor waited until the newcomer had bought a drink and settled at a table, then crossed the room to join him. Ivor said, ‘Any luck, Mac?’
The
other man was a steward on a merchant ship, with a profitable sideline in smuggling contraband — or people. He shrugged, then said in a thick Glaswegian accent, ‘It depends. I’ve found a berth for you.’
Ivor
said eagerly, ‘Well done!’
‘
He wants fifty quid.’ Mac sipped at his beer. ‘Fifty—’ Ivor gaped at him. ‘I can’t pay
that
! I can’t pay
half
that!’ I’ve already given you five quid!’
Mac
pointed out, ‘That was for me finding you a berth. I’ve done that.’
‘
You —! Ivor stifled the imprecation; he dared not antagonise Mac because the Scot could be his salvation. With Mac’s cold eye on him he pleaded, ‘Where am I going to get fifty quid?’
Mac
shrugged, ‘That’s none of my business. But if you want a passage, unofficial-like, on a ship to Holland, that’s what it will cost ye.’
Ivor
stared ahead of him, fuming inside — and frightened too. He was no stranger to fear now. He had run from home to avoid conscription into the Army and now knew he would be hunted as a deserter. He believed his only hope was to escape to neutral Holland and hide himself there. He could not go home for money because he would not find any there. He knew who to blame for that . . .
He
saw the man walk in off the street, thought he was familiar — and then remembered. This man was tall, blond and well-dressed in a good suit. He carried a Homburg hat and kid gloves in one hand, leaned on the bar and called for a whisky. Ivor stood up and Mac asked, ‘What about it, then?’
Ivor
glanced at him and asked, ‘Who’s that just come in?’ Mac warned, ‘You keep clear of him if you don’t want to be cut up.’ He went on to answer Ivor’s questions.
At
the end Ivor grinned at him, ‘I know where to get the money. How long have I got?’
‘
How the hell should I know?’ Mac told him curtly. ‘This isn’t bloody P and O. There are convoys running across to Holland all the time but you never know whether some feller will slip you aboard on the quiet. You just get the money and I’ll fix the rest.’
Ivor
made for the door. The blond man still leaned on the bar and sipped at his whisky. Ivor whispered to himself, ‘And I’ll pay you off as well.’
When
Annie Scanlon answered the knock on her door an hour or two later she did not recognise Ivor Spargo. She had heard about him from Katy but never met him. She eyed the bearded, moustachioed stranger in his shabby, old clothes and asked, ‘Aye?’
Ivor
smiled, ‘I saw the notice on the gate of the yard. It said Mrs Scanlon had the keys and gave this address.’
Annie
repeated cautiously, ‘Aye? What do you want with them?’
Ivor
shook his head, ‘I don’t. I was looking for Katy Merrick. I’m a friend of hers, of the family, like — Freddie Tait. My ship has docked here and I thought it would be a chance to see her again after all these years.’
‘
Freddie Tait?’ Annie frowned. ‘She never mentioned that name to me.’
Ivor
shrugged carelessly, ‘That’s not surprising. I’ve not seen her in years. I only got the address of the yard from her father before the war — Barney, that is. Though he wasn’t good to her as I remember.’
That
was a name Annie recognised, and now she recalled the North Country demands of hospitality and opened the door wide. ‘You’d better come in and have a cup o’ tea.’ She sat Ivor down in an armchair by the fire and put the kettle on the glowing coals to boil. ‘Won’t be long.’ Then she warned Ivor, ‘I can’t give you her address without asking her, but I’ll write to her and tell her how she can get in touch with you. How about that?’
Ivor
said enthusiastically, ‘That’ll be fine, Missus. Very kind o’ you.’ And thought, Bloody suspicious old cow!
Annie
beamed at him, ‘Right y’are, then. I’ll make us both a cup o’ tea in a minute. I’ve just got to see to the dinner.’ And as she went out to the scullery, where she prepared her vegetables: ‘I’ve got a bairn coming in to be fed in half-an-hour . . She disappeared from his sight but chattered on. Ivor did not listen. He had spotted the sheaf of envelopes behind the clock on the mantelpiece. With one eye on the door to the scullery he stood up and plucked out the letters. He did not recognise the hand but did not need to, nor did he need to look into the envelopes. Katy had written her name, and the address of the hostel where she was living, on the back of each envelope, as was common at the time. He read it, then stuffed the letters back in their place and was in his seat when Annie returned.