With Love, Wherever You Are

by Dandi Daley Mackall

  Jack narrowed his eyes at Frank. “Don’t tell me you’ve had a foxhole conversion. Bombs overhead, bullets flying, prayers shooting up from trenches?”

  Frank had to work to keep in his frustration. “Don’t you ever think about God, Jack? Honestly, if I do end up in a foxhole, with bombs and bullets flying, I’d like to believe God was in there with me.”

  “Like that psalm about shepherds!” Jack exclaimed, as if he’d come up with the right answer on a radio quiz show. “And the valley of the shadow of death?” he added, in a dramatic radio voice.

  Frank nodded. “And fearing no evil.” The words were coming back to him. They’d had to memorize that psalm to be confirmed in the church.

  Jack’s grin widened. “Remember that alley behind the old shoe factory? I’d talk you into running through it with me after dark. And we’d race, shouting out, ‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death!’”

  Frank joined in. “‘I will fear no evil: for thou art with me.’”

  “Don’t forget the bit about a rod and staff comforting me, although I think I’d rather have a gun.”

  Frank shook his head. “I can’t believe that alley scared you like it did me. I would have bet you’d never been afraid in your whole life.”

  “And you would have won that bet, little brother. I knew that alley scared you. You were just a kid.” Jack fixed his gaze on Frank. “But you’re not a kid anymore.”

  Frank turned away and saw flashes of lightning, or artillery fire, in the distance. He wasn’t a kid anymore. But unlike his brother, he wasn’t fearless. Not by a long shot.

  Jack dropped him off in front of the tent hospital. They shook hands, and Frank got out. “Don’t be a stranger, Jack.” He watched his brother disappear into the darkness, hand raised in a victory wave.

  Frank was still waving when he heard someone shout, “Doctor! We need help here!”

  He turned to see a British soldier and a GI escorting three captured soldiers. The GI explained, “These three came running out of the forest with their hands up, yelling, ‘Me Polish!’ We don’t know what to do with them, but they don’t look so good.”

  He was right about that. Before Frank could say anything, Lartz took command. “We’ll take them,” he said with an authority that surprised Frank. They freed up three cots and directed the captives there.

  “Should we leave a guard?” the GI asked.

  “That’s not necessary,” Lartz answered.

  Frank wasn’t convinced. “You sure about that, ol’ buddy?”

  Lartz was already inspecting a head wound on the frailest captive. “I talked to two soldiers last week who told me that the Germans force Polish boys between the ages of sixteen and nineteen into battle, then position them on the front lines as shields. These boys won’t hurt us.”

  As if he understood, one of the boys nodded vigorously.

  They treated the Polish patients, who had bruises and cuts over their entire torsos. The youngest had been blinded in one eye, and the oldest could barely hear, a condition Lartz diagnosed as rifle trauma. “I think he’s been beaten, pounded in both ears with the end of a rifle. Maybe two rifles.”

  That night, Frank dug out his Army Bible and read the inscription from the president of the United States encouraging every soldier to read the Bible and pray. A week ago in triage a GI had asked for a Bible. He’d been so desperate for one that when a nurse brought him a New Testament, he’d hugged it to his chest and wept. And it wasn’t just the Allies who prayed. Frank had seen more crosses than swastikas on his German POW patients.

  He dug out his flashlight and read the Twenty-Third Psalm over and over until he fell asleep.

  Frank woke to the thunder of combat boots. His first thought was that they were being overrun by storm troopers. Instead, British infantry soldiers had entered the camp. “Everybody out! All medical personnel are hereby ordered to evacuate!”

  From what little Frank could gather while pulling on his uniform and packing up, the Germans were pushing back in an all-out offensive against the western front. Lartz said somebody had dubbed it the Battle of the Bulge because the Jerries had taken the American front line and bowed it backward. And Lartz ought to know. He quizzed every soldier and every patient about battles and captives.

  The ground shook as Frank joined in the dash to the transports. Bombs had never sounded so close. He hoped he was hearing Allied bombs, but a bomb was a bomb no matter who dropped it. Their tent hospital was now part of the battlefield.

  “Where are we going?” Anderson directed his question to anyone who might have an answer.

  One of the GIs called back, “Trains. Sending you south, I think.”

  They didn’t have time to ask more because two minutes later, the trucks ground to a halt. A big open sedan drove alongside, and Colonel Croane stood up in the back to make the announcement: “This is war, soldiers!”

  “Say it isn’t so,” Frank muttered.

  “News to me,” Andy said.

  “All medical personnel vital to the war effort will now be required to join mobile units farther south,” Croane continued.

  “Mobile units?” Anderson repeated, several decibels louder than Croane.

  Colonel Croane ignored him. “You’ve no doubt heard of the direct hit from a German bombing on Verviers and the aircraft strike on medical installations in Liège. We believe the Jerries are sensing defeat and doing their all to deliver their best blows now.”

  “Over by New Year’s,” Frank whispered to Anderson.

  “Not a good bet,” Lartz chimed in.

  Frank knew Lartz was right, but he could still hope, couldn’t he?

  Thirty minutes later, he was squeezing into a boxcar with Lartz, Mort, and Andy. The cattle car had never been meant for humans. It smelled like rotten sheep dung . . . and blood. They were in the next-to-last car, a good move by Mort. Although they had to share it with seven other guys, most of the other cars were standing room only. The train jerked forward before they managed to slide the door shut.

  Mort moved to a pile of hay at one end of the car. Frank and Andy joined him, along with a doctor from San Francisco, to speculate on where they were really heading. They sat close together in the dark, the only light two glowing circles from the smokers’ cigarettes.

  “I heard that the push into Germany is costing the western Allies heavy casualties,” Mort said. Frank had heard that too. “A guy I know,” Mort continued, “he said doctors and nurses in those units have to work under gunfire that never quits.”

  The San Francisco doctor, Greg, was the only one who had firsthand information. “I left my last evac hospital two days ago. Talk about under the gun. We admitted thirteen hundred casualties during a fifty-six-hour period. Nobody could go back and sleep. We were all on duty nonstop.”

  Frank kept an eye on Lartz, who seemed more withdrawn than ever. He moved to the boxcar door and pushed it open a crack, breathing in as if he had to get fresh air or drown.

  “Lartz! It’s already freezing in here!” Andy complained.

  Lartz pressed his head to the doorframe, then banged his forehead against it—once, twice, three times.

  “Hey, buddy! You okay?” one of the doctors from another unit shouted.

  Frank started for Lartz and almost toppled over when the car jerked. Moonlight seeped through the cracks and illuminated Lartz’s face—the stubble at his chin, the bags under his eyes. “Tell me what’s wrong, Lartz.”

  When Lartz finally turned to him, Frank felt sure he had never seen more sorrow. “It’s this place,” Lartz said, his voice as rough as his unshaven face.

  “This ain’t so bad,” one of the other doctors said.

  Anderson chimed in. “Don’t tell me you’re going to let a little ol’ cattle car get you down.”

  Lartz turned his back to them. Then in words only Frank could hear, he said, “This isn’t a cattle car.” He touched a stain on the doorframe. “And this isn’t cow blood.”

 
“What do you mean? We don’t even know if it’s blood.”

  “I know. We’re on a German train. What do you think this boxcar carried before the Allies took it over?”

  “I don’t know,” Frank admitted.

  “Jews.”

  Frank didn’t know what to say.

  “They herd the ‘impure’ races onto trains, crush them in until nobody can breathe. And if some are unlucky enough to live, they’re taken to camps and forced into slavery.”

  “Lartz . . . do you know what’s happened to your mother? Maybe there’s something we can—”

  “I want to be alone, Frank.” Lartz stuck his head so far out of the boxcar that Frank feared he might fall. Or jump.

  Frank waited a few minutes, but Lartz was done talking.

  “Is he giving you the spiel about Jewish slaves?” Anderson asked.

  Frank sat down again. “He says this boxcar carried Jews to labor camps.”

  “He’s probably not wrong,” Greg said. He twisted what was left of his cigarette into the floorboard.

  Nobody spoke for a long time. Frank was too busy watching his friend and preparing to leap to his rescue, if necessary. For as much as Frank didn’t want to believe everything Lartz said, he did.

  ÉTRETAT, FRANCE

  “We’re bugging out.” Bill whispered this news flash to Helen as she dug into the flesh of a squirmy private who’d gotten too close to a land mine. Every inch of his tall, skinny body was layered in shrapnel.

  “When?” She dropped a chunk of metal into the basin. It clanked against a pile of shrapnel that could have been melted into a good-sized statue.

  Bill shrugged. “Tonight? Today?”

  “Why the rush?”

  “Top secret, I guess. Just count your lucky stars we’re not farther east. That crazy general Gerd von Rundstedt doesn’t know when to quit. He’s launched an all-out offensive against the western front and bowed the American line almost to the Meuse River. I know a fella in a medical unit on the Belgian border. They had to evacuate under fire.”

  Gunfire had kept Helen awake all night, though she didn’t know who was doing the shooting. “What about our patients?”

  “If we can’t take them with us, the Army will move them to safety. They’ll be all right, Nurse.” Bill always sounded so sure.

  Helen knew it was egotistical to think her patients couldn’t get along without her, but without a buffer of nurses, these boys would be shipped back to the war before they were ready, if anybody ever was ready. Patch ’em up; ship ’em out. That was the Army’s motto. She shot up a quick prayer for Frank, for Eugene, for all of her brothers, and for the rest of her boys in this place.

  Bill had been right, and that night the 199th boarded a cold train that smelled like sweat and cigarettes. They traveled deeper into the French countryside, and Helen imagined rolling hills and quaint, red-roofed buildings, though she couldn’t see a thing out of the frosted window. She had no idea how far it was from Étretat to Rennes. How was Frank going to find her now?

  “These are officially the slowest trains in the world.” Bill plunked himself down between Helen and Peggy. He had to curl his legs to fit. “I could walk faster than this.”

  Only Lydia laughed. Helen was glad to see her doing something other than crying about her unfaithful husband. Two “friends” from home had written Liddy that they’d spotted her husband out on the town with a “gorgeous blonde.”

  Peggy sighed. “Well, I for one am glad we’re finally on our way to Rennes.”

  “Me too,” Naomi said.

  “I didn’t say I’m not happy to leave Étretat,” Bill said. “That old Frenchie nurse had me pulling guard duty on top of my regular duties. I had to walk the perimeter most nights. I didn’t mind that so much, except nobody would give us guards firearms. I suppose if I’d met up with a Nazi, I’d just talk him to death before he could shoot me.”

  “You should have complained to Colonel Pugh.” Helen had developed a respect for Pugh as a leader and as a doctor in Étretat. She’d assisted him in several tricky surgeries, and he’d remained calm and confident, even when he’d opened up a sergeant and found two bullets they hadn’t anticipated, both close to the heart. She appreciated his bedside manner, the respect he accorded his patients and his nurses. He had a full head of hair, and Helen detected the start of graying temples. It made him look distinguished, but friendlier too, as if he’d almost been a rogue but something had changed his mind. Pugh had gone on ahead of them to Rennes, and Helen was glad he’d remain in their unit.

  “I complained to Duty Nurse Simpson,” Bill continued, “who pointed out that, although I hadn’t been issued a gun, I’d received an identity card like the rest of y’all.” Bill pulled his personnel card from his wallet. “You suppose she thought my picture would scare off the enemy?” He fingered his description: 6’3”, 170 pounds. Then he pointed to the statement in large letters, the same line that appeared on nurses’ cards, explaining that the holder was protected personnel under the Geneva Convention. “I ain’t so sure the Jerries would check my card before shooting me. And even if they did, they’d have to be able to read English. And if they did, they’d have to care about that Geneva Convention.”

  Helen squirmed in her seat. “How can they make a train with no bathroom?”

  “There’s one at most every station and stopover,” Bill said.

  “Yeah,” Peggy said. “But the last one was hours ago.”

  Victoria turned around from the seat in front. “I have to go too.”

  Helen gave her a sympathetic smile. Victoria was such an odd duck. Even bundled up, she was pretty as a starlet.

  “I think the train’s slowing down,” Peggy said.

  “How could you tell?” Bill quipped.

  Helen peered out the smudged window, hoping to see a station. She saw nothing but wide-open spaces and barren ground, with a few tufts of weeds. “Where are we?”

  “The middle of nowhere,” Bill answered. “Probably a French outpost. Maybe just for mail passing through.” He pointed to a tiny, worn-out shack with half its shingles missing.

  “Think I’ll wait here,” Naomi said, frowning at the shack.

  Lydia pressed her tiny nose to the glass, making Helen think of a kid at Christmas. “I’m fine here too.”

  Peggy stood up. “Well, I’m skipping to the loo, whether there is one or not.”

  “Same here!” Helen scooted out, followed by Victoria and Bill.

  They weren’t the only ones who needed to skip to the loo. Several GIs beat them to the tiny station, where a long metal arm hung over the tracks, ready to catch a bag of mail. Nobody manned the shack, but there was a bathroom inside, and soldiers were lining up inside and out. Luck of the draw that Helen was at the wrong end of the train, putting her little group last in line. And gents were no gents when it came to lining up in this man’s Army.

  After standing outside forever, Helen’s group made it inside, where it was marginally warmer.

  “Shut the door, will ya?” Victoria shouted. She’d managed to weave her way in front of them. She’d be the next one in.

  Bill shut the door behind Helen, and she had to admit it was an improvement. Then he went back to chatting with the GI ahead of them, a private on his way to Rennes to report in.

  “What’s taking Victoria so long?” Peggy whispered.

  Helen was too stressed to be polite. Victoria had been in the bathroom for at least five minutes. “Follow me and we’ll find out.” They moved up, and Helen banged on the door. “Hurry up, Vic!”

  “Almost out!” came the reply.

  More minutes passed. The GI chatting with Bill turned back to join in shouting at Victoria to hurry. “You sure she’s all right in there?”

  “Her?” Peggy replied. “That gal ain’t been all right since George Washington died.”

  “Hold your horses!” Victoria opened the door, sporting a new hairdo and red lipstick.

  “You little—!” Peggy started
.

  “Ladies first,” said the GI with an eastern accent. “But please, don’t take so long.”

  They didn’t. They took turns, all in less time than it had taken Victoria.

  Helen, Peggy, and Victoria waited for the guys in the relative warmth of the outpost. Then Bill led the way out of the station and back onto the platform.

  The first thing that struck Helen was how cold it was. And the second thing . . . their train was gone.

  BETWEEN ÉTRETAT AND RENNES, FRANCE

  “I can’t believe they just left us here to die!” Victoria whined for the umpteenth time.

  “It’s going to be fine.” Helen felt more like throwing a punch than throwing a fit. At least Victoria had her boots and helmet. Helen had left both on the train.

  “Can trains back up?” Victoria asked.

  “Not a chance, sweetheart.” Peggy, too, had her boots and helmet.

  Helen stepped ahead, not knowing if anyone would follow her. “We can’t get lost if we keep to the railroad tracks. They went thataway, and so will we.”

  “Aw, we’ll probably catch up and pass those slowpokes before they know we’re missing,” Bill offered, joining Helen.

  The rest fell in. The GI shuffled a few paces ahead, then turned to walk backward as he talked. “Private First Class Nelson, fresh out of Albany. So, what are nice girls like you doing in a place like this?”

  That, at least, gave them something to talk about. Nelson came from a long line of military men, so there’d been no question about his enlisting. Victoria, through tears, admitted that she’d signed up on a whim because her then-boyfriend enlisted. But when they broke up, the stupid Army still expected her to keep her commitment.

  Bill took a turn. “I’ve been a farmer, a cowboy, a short-order cook, and a coal miner. I liked every job but never settled. I became a ward boy because I liked helping out at the Red Cross in my town. And now, here I am, ward master of the 199th.” Then he told them all about his gal, Jennie, waiting for him across the sea.

  Helen and Peggy already knew each other’s story, but they gave the highlights. Peggy had gotten fired up reading the war news every day, until she couldn’t stand it. One day, she tossed the paper and ran—literally—to the nearest enlistment center and signed up.