A Cruel Deception Read online

  “A lassie?” I repeated blankly. Somehow it had never occurred to me that Simon might have a life outside our family. “He was in the north often enough during the war, but I never quite imagined—” I shook my head. “Well, well.”

  My mother said nothing, appearing to concentrate on threading her way to the Strand. I could sense the tension in her, though. She wasn’t about to admit that she was worried.

  As we found a place to leave the motorcar close to the restaurant, she said lightly, “You know Iris. She’d marry the dog to the cat, just to attend the wedding.”

  I did. Outwardly the most practical of women, she secretly adored novels of romance and danger from Jane Austen to Jane Eyre, and still mourned her young man who was killed in the Boer War. Even though my father had said privately that Ronnie was completely unsuitable for her, his handsome photograph in uniform and his heroic death had endowed him with all the virtues a woman might hope for in a husband. And no one had had the heart to tell her otherwise. She had said to me once that she hoped I would find the love she’d known, however briefly. I had been touched.

  We had a remarkably good dinner, my mother and I, talking about everything from what was happening in Paris to what was poking up in the gardens at home, showing the first signs of spring. A few of the daffodils already had buds waiting for a warm day to open.

  And the ghost in the room, so to speak, was Simon away in Scotland, although neither of us mentioned him again.

  She took me back to Mrs. Hennessey’s, told me to write when I could, and left. I stood at the door, in spite of the chill wind, waving her out of sight. Back to Somerset and all the familiar things of my childhood.

  It brought home something I’d been avoiding thinking about. What was I to do in the months and years ahead? Continue in nursing, with gall bladders and kidney stones replacing the work I’d done at the Front, or find something else that I could love as much as I had my duties with the Queen Alexandra’s. Mrs. Hennessey had said that I would find my next step in due course.

  “Don’t rush the future, my dear. It’s best to let the war settle in your memory before you look ahead.”

  There had been some truth to that. I’d wanted to help bring the severely wounded back to England, I couldn’t leave the Service with that undone. I’d discovered since then that for too many of them there would never be much of a future. Medical care had saved their lives, but it couldn’t make them whole again.

  Trying to push aside gloomy thoughts that matched the gloomy day, I went inside and prepared to leave for France.

  The next morning I took the train to Dover. There I found a ferry waiting for half a dozen high-ranking officers coming down from London by motorcar, and was told there would be space for me as well. A light rain was beginning to fall, and I went to my quarters to put my valise inside. But it was stuffy in there, with that typical smell of salt and damp that was familiar from my many crossings during the war. And so I went to the bridge, taking shelter in a corner, out of the way. I was about to shut the door when I saw two staff motorcars draw up to the quay, and seven officers got out, shook hands, and three got back into the first vehicle. The others set out for the ship.

  I didn’t need field glasses to recognize the tallest of the four.

  It was the Colonel Sahib, my father.

  So much for all Matron’s careful instructions! This was to be a quiet journey, drawing as little attention as possible. And my father would surely want to know why I was not in Wiltshire, where he’d last seen me, and instead on my way to France. Would he believe that I was going to inspect the last of our clinics? He would probably know precisely how many there were, where they were located, and how soon they expected to be closed.

  I hadn’t been able to lie to my father since I was three. I’d have to think of a way of telling him the truth, just not all of it—and hope for the best.

  He looked up at that moment, as if he’d sensed my presence, and when I waved, he saw me, smiled, but kept on walking.

  Happy as I was to see him, I groaned inwardly and started down to what we euphemistically referred to as the salon, although it bore no resemblance to the elegant salons of the P&O. It had been converted to a canteen for troops crossing to France and seating for the walking wounded returning to England. The chairs had been mended several times, and the tabletops were scarred with initials and various insignia carved into the wood.

  I heard voices approaching, and then the door from the outer deck opened and my father stepped in. He smiled at me but to my surprise didn’t speak. Instead he continued his conversation with his companions.

  I could feel the ship beginning to move as we cast off and set out for Calais. One of the crew came to where I was sitting and asked if I would care for a cup of tea. I accepted his offer.

  I had almost finished my tea when the meeting ended and my father accompanied his companions as far as the salon door. When they had gone, he turned and came over to my table.

  “Fancy meeting you here,” he said with a grin, and pulled out the chair across from mine. “Does your mother know you’re on your way to France?”

  I returned his grin. “We had dinner together in London last night. I seem to remember I failed to mention it.”

  “Posted to a base hospital, are you?”

  I knew and he knew that most of them were being closed as patients were stabilized and beds were found in England for them.

  “Actually, I’m carrying out a survey for the Queen Alexandra’s.” Near enough to the truth to salve my conscience. “Mother seemed to think you might already be in Paris.”

  His good humor disappeared. Glancing over his shoulder to be sure we couldn’t be overheard, he said quietly, “The American president’s fourteen-point plan is causing trouble. The Canadians want to be represented, not just as part of the British Empire. So does Australia, but she’d like to have New Guinea as part of her territory. Both lost thousands of men, they feel they earned the right. Everyone seems to be here, wanting something. The biggest problem is the French position. She is set on punishing Germany. Heavy reparations. After all, Germany has crossed her borders before, in the lifetime of many who remember. But given the state of the German economy, this could cripple the country for years to come.”

  “Surely the point,” I commented.

  “Yes. A poverty-stricken Germany won’t rearm for a generation. But will they be angry enough to want to try again? I’m not comfortable with that thought. And there are other problems. The Arabs expect to be given part of the Turkish empire for their role in liberating it. German possessions in Africa are being divided up, and this new concept of Wilson’s, that a people should determine their own destiny, has set the cat amongst the pigeons, even for us—” He broke off as a member of the crew came in and filled a cup with tea, then took it with him. “At any rate, it’s clear that any number of parties are muddying the waters, and we’ll be lucky if we have a treaty by summer,” my father went on somberly, as soon as the door had closed behind the man. He sighed. “We’ve been in talks in London. I’m on my way back with new instructions. By the way, our old friend Captain Barkley is in Paris. You might want to look him up.”

  Captain Barkley and I had a checkered history. My father had sent him to keep an eye on me when there was the possibility that I was in danger. He was an American who had joined the Canadian Army well before his own country had entered the war. I quite liked him, although his irritating insistence that I was in need of protection often put us at loggerheads. My parents had brought me up to be independent and resourceful. And while his concern was charming in an old-fashioned way, it was difficult to make him see that I could take care of myself.

  “Yes, I’ll look forward to seeing him again,” I said, determined to avoid him at any cost.

  My father looked sharply at me, then changed the subject.

  Simon’s name never came up.

  I didn’t see the Colonel Sahib again except at a distance as he and the other offic
ers stepped into a waiting staff motorcar. But a burly man in a smock appeared as I left the ship, touched his cap, and gestured to my valise. Deciding that my father had sent him to assist me up hill from the docks, I nodded, and let him take my kit as well.

  I started up the sloping road to the town proper. Many of the houses at the top were still in ruinous conditions. Billets, bars, brief shelter for the worst of the wounded, ambulances waiting to offload and return to the Front, new officers looking for transport to their regiments, and refugees hoping for everything from a chance to earn a few sous to searching for relatives—Calais had been little short of chaos. Now it was almost quiet by comparison, although the Army was repatriating soldiers as quickly as possible.

  Still, the street was busy with people going about their business, and in the distance I could hear men marching. Looking over my shoulder I could see that another ship was coming in. It appeared to be a transport.

  Just then someone shouted, “Sister?”

  I turned to see a medical officer coming out of a now-derelict house that had once been used to store medical supplies as they were unloaded, until they could be sorted and sent on.

  His uniform was streaked with what appeared to be soot, and there was a dark smudge on one cheek. I stopped. “Sir?”

  “Over here. I need your help.”

  I called to the porter, who was still trudging ahead of me, and he reluctantly halted as I turned back toward the house.

  Frowning now, the officer stared at me. “I’d expected an orderly. Well, never mind, you’ll have to do.”

  I asked the porter to wait, but by that time the officer was already clambering through a doorway that appeared to be a black pit. As I followed him, I realized that this must lead down into the cellar of the house.

  Behind me the porter was calling to me, and I told him again to wait, that I would attend to him in a moment.

  Just then a tall, lanky man came up the road behind me and said, “Don’t worry, ma’am, I’ll keep an eye on him. You go ahead.”

  I recognized the colorful uniform. He was one of the pilots of the Lafayette Escadrille, the American flyers who had come to France early in the war, eager to do their part long before their country had entered the fighting in 1917. Instead of the traditional kepi, he wore a high-crown broad-brim hat. I didn’t know him.

  The medical officer had reappeared in the doorway, impatiently calling to me. I had no choice. I hastily thanked the man, and hurried toward the opening. A set of stairs disappeared down into the darkness, and as I started down, he held up a torch to guide me. Then he was walking back into the shadows, and I followed, nearly tripping over an overturned stool or an empty box, I couldn’t be sure which.

  The doctor was saying, his voice echoing, “I’d been told there were deserters living in some of these places. I almost missed these two, couldn’t see them at all even with my torch. But they’re in bad shape.”

  His light flicked over two men slumped on what appeared to be mattresses that had seen better days. One looked to me to have a fever. His face was flushed, even in this dim bit of light.

  The doctor set his torch on another overturned box, and knelt beside the sick man.

  “He’s wounded. Well, it’s half-healed. Or got infected, living in such conditions. Here, help me cut away his shirt.” He handed me a pair of scissors, and I began to work on the shirt as the officer searched in the satchel he must have brought with him. Together we got the shirt away from the wound, and he drew the torch closer as we examined it. It was along his ribs on the right side, raw, angry, and oozing fluids. The skin around it was scraped as well.

  “Infected,” the doctor said, rocking back on his heels. “We’ll have to get him to hospital. Then hand him over to the Foot Police.”

  “Here!” the other man in the shadows exclaimed. “We’re not deserters, we’ve got our papers.”

  “Then what are you doing here?” the doctor snapped.

  “There’s naught to go home to, is there? His wife died in the influenza, and mine’s left me. We’ve been doing whatever work we could find, then he took a fall trying to help a Frenchman repair a shutter, and the fool wouldn’t pay us then. There was no money for a doctor, and the landlord of the house where we’d been staying accused us of fighting, and kicked us out. I brought him here, but that cut got worse two nights ago. I tried to steal a bottle of wine, to clean it with, but the police chased me, and it wasn’t until last night I could circle around and come back.” He began to fumble in a bundle lying beside him, and finally found papers, waving them at the doctor.

  The man with the wound groaned, and tried to sit up. We got him back on the mattress, and the doctor said, “Small wonder he’s infected. Are those rat droppings? And God knows what’s on the mattress.” He began putting a clean dressing on the wound, and then as he held the man upright, I wound the tape around his chest to keep the dressings in place. He badly needed a bath.

  Satisfied, the doctor turned to the other man. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing,” he answered sullenly.

  “You’ve been favoring that arm. Let me see.”

  It took some persuading, but in the end, the man removed his shirt, glowering at us all the while.

  There was a large boil on the man’s shoulder, and the doctor set about lancing it and putting a dressing over it.

  Then he turned to me. “Go back and tell them we’ll need a stretcher and orderlies to get that one back. Our other friend here can walk.”

  “I’m afraid I just landed from England. I’m on a mission for Matron. I’m not attached to a clinic here.”

  Surprised, he said, “Then why did you come to help me?”

  “You didn’t give me much choice, sir.”

  “Damn it, then what became of the orderly I sent for?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He was on the brink of swearing again. “All right. Can you manage these two while I’m gone? There’s a clearing hospital, temporary, just down the road, where we treat whatever is brought to us. I won’t be long.” He stared at me, frowning. “What’s your name, Sister?”

  “Crawford, sir.”

  “Greene. Archie Greene.”

  I didn’t relish standing here in the dark with our two patients. “Leave me the torch, sir?”

  “Oh—yes, of course.” And then he was gone.

  I was just starting to question the second patient, when a shadow loomed in the brightness of the doorway, and the flyer who had promised to guard my luggage called, “Ma’am? Are you all right?”

  He had a slow way of speaking, almost a drawl.

  “Yes, I’m fine. We have two patients here, and the doctor has gone for a stretcher. It shouldn’t be very much longer.”

  “I don’t care for the fact that he left you in this cellar,” he said. “I’ll be right here, in the doorway, if you need me. I can see your porter from here as well. He’s not of a mind to go without you. Not now.”

  “What did you do to him?” I asked, alarmed.

  “Nothing,” he said in an aggrieved voice. “Just a little friendly reminder that we’d helped him when his country needed help most.”

  I heard a quiet chuckle from our second patient, the one with the boil. I didn’t find it quite as amusing as he did.

  Turning to him I said, “Where are you from?”

  He said, wariness in every word, “Begging your pardon, Sister, but do you really need to know?”

  “No,” I replied, but I rather thought his accent was from Shropshire. “How long have you known your friend, here?”

  “We were in the same company most of the war. He said he wasn’t going home, and I wasn’t in much of a hurry myself. So we didn’t. We’d tried to find work in Rouen, but there’s the language, you see. Neither of us can speak it very well. Just mam-zelle and mon-sewer, and parlay-voo. There was a woman in the bar who said she’d teach us, but she wanted more money than we could pay. Still, we were getting by well enough, until
Teddy here got hurt. It was a nasty fall.”

  And yet he’d stayed by his friend.

  He was adding anxiously, “If he’s taken to hospital, will they put us in prison for not going on the transport with the rest? We didn’t desert. We just didn’t go home.”

  “If you have your papers, you should be all right.” But I wasn’t sure the Army would see it that way.

  Just then I heard footsteps, men talking, and then Dr. Greene was back, this time with two orderlies and a stretcher.

  There was more argument about going to hospital, but in the end it was clear to Teddy’s defender—we had learned his name was Hank—that if they didn’t go, Teddy could be in far more serious trouble with that wound.

  The orderlies got Teddy onto the stretcher as I held the torch for them, and then we made our way through the clutter to the stairs. They managed the stairs with the skill of men used to trench walls, and the little party, led by the doctor, started off. He’d thanked me, and I’d been grateful that he hadn’t asked me questions too. I hadn’t wanted to explain about reviewing the clinics, for fear he’d demand that I start with his own.

  In the light of day, looking down at my boots, the hem of my skirts, and my cuffs, I could see that they were the worse for wear after kneeling on what must have been a filthy cellar floor. I sighed.

  The flyer who had kept my porter from deserting me said, “You might wish to go to hospital, where you can freshen up.”

  But it was the last place I wanted to go. “Is there a respectable hotel or lodging house where I could take a room for a few hours?”

  “Yes, ma’am. If you’ll allow me to guide you, I’ll take you there.”

  The difference in the town was astonishing. I could remember lines of wounded waiting on the road to the docks, ambulances moving back and forth, new recruits marching off troop vessels and climbing to the top of the cliffs in perfect order, some faces filled with excitement, others with dread. Refugees huddled in the railway station where officers and other ranks stood around awaiting transport as they went on leave. Now some semblance of normal life was stirring, although there were uniforms everywhere. Only the wounded were missing.