“How can you walk in them shoes?” Bill stared at Helen’s low, square-toed heels. “What happened to your boots?”
“I thought I hated those boots because they’re so ugly,” Helen admitted. “But if my boots walked up to me right now, I’d kiss them on their soles.”
Suddenly Nelson wheeled back around and drew his gun. He signaled them to shut up. Helen heard it too—a shuffle, and something else. Why had they talked so loudly? Most cities in France had declared themselves liberated, but that wasn’t how the Germans saw it. Pockets of soldiers could be hiding out anywhere, doing whatever damage they could. Waiting . . .
And here they were, three nurses, one private, and an unarmed ward master. Helen felt her A-fib kick in, making her short of breath. It was her fault that they were all out in the open. She was the one who made everyone follow her on the train tracks. She should have kept her big mouth shut.
Victoria began wailing. “We’re all going to die! I don’t want to be captured. I want to go ho—!” The last word was muffled by Peggy’s gloved hand across Vic’s mouth.
“Down on the ground!” Nelson ordered.
Everybody except Helen obeyed. She strained to see where the noise was coming from.
“Nurse!” Bill took her wrist and tried to pull her down with the rest of them.
She shook him off. She could see someone stand up from behind a bush. One person, tall and lean. He had a rifle, but she recognized the uniform. An Aussie—she’d patched up a couple of them in Liverpool. “Over here!” she shouted.
“Helen!” Peggy cried.
The lone soldier jogged toward them. “G’day, mates!”
“See?” Helen pulled Peggy to her feet. “He’s one of us.”
Harold, a downed pilot from the Royal Australian Air Force, talked nonstop as he joined their troop. “I was in the first wave in June. Bounced those Jerries at Normandy with your American lads. Ah, you should have been there!” He described the battle from his perspective in the air, where soldiers swimming and fighting and dying looked like ants, hundreds and hundreds of ants. Helen didn’t even know if any of her brothers had been part of the invasion. She glanced into the black night behind them and felt watched, targeted. They really were sitting ducks.
“So I told me mates I’d be back,” Harold explained. “And there I was, doing an overfly, when me engine stopped, and down we went. My best mate died on impact—rightest bloke you’d ever meet. . . . And here I am, not a scratch on me.”
He did have a scratch on him. Helen could see that his left forearm was wrapped in what looked like the sleeve to his uniform, or his mate’s. He’d started out jolly, like the Aussie patients in Liverpool. But as they walked and he related his losses, the strain crept onto his face until he lapsed into silence.
“What say we take a break, gents?” Helen suggested. “I don’t know about you, but I could use a breather.” What she really wanted was to get a better look at the Aussie’s wound.
Nelson frowned, his gaze taking in the dark forest on both sides. “I don’t know how safe it is out here, Nurse. The Germans gave up most of this area, but not all of it. And not all of them.”
Trying to hide how scared she was, Helen answered, “Well, if they’re going to capture us, we might as well go on a full stomach. I’ve got sandwiches.” She dug in her pocket, where she’d stashed two peanut butter sandwiches before they boarded. Her pack had candy bars, but it was still on the stupid train. She divided the sandwiches, giving Harold the biggest piece and herself the smallest.
“I’m a lot hungrier than this,” Victoria complained.
“You’re lucky Helen’s sharing,” Peggy snapped. She took one of the smaller pieces and walked to a fallen log a few feet away. “Anybody care to join me?”
The others headed for the log, but Helen touched the Aussie’s shoulder. “Mind if I take a Captain Hook at that arm?” She’d learned the art of rhyming phrases from a patient who hailed from Sydney.
When he hesitated, she added, “We nurses have to keep in practice. Don’t want to lose my touch.” He let her remove the soiled bandage, which stuck to the wound. When she pulled it away, a mixture of pus and blood oozed.
“It’s no grand thing,” Harold said.
“We need to clean it, or it will be a very grand thing, soldier.” She turned to the others, seated on the felled log like children at a church picnic. “Anybody have clean water? I could use ointment, too—whatever you’ve got.”
Bill handed over a roll of sterile bandages. “Like I tell Jennie, you’ll never be sorry for carrying bandages, especially during wartime.” He squinted at Harold’s forehead. “That’s a nasty bump. Is that from the crash?”
“It is.”
“You didn’t pass out, did you?” Helen asked as she began to wrap his wound. He was so tall she hadn’t noticed the bump on his forehead.
“I did pass out, I think, though I can’t tell you for how long, as I don’t know myself.”
“Dizziness? Headache?”
He shook his head, then winced.
“You should get a good checkup when you’re back with your mates.”
He nodded, then joined Nelson, probably to get away from her nursing.
“Give me that!” Peggy was pulling on Victoria’s purse.
“Let go!” Victoria shouted. “It’s just my makeup.”
Peggy stood up and yanked the large purse, nearly pulling Victoria off the log. A strap snapped, and the contents of the bag spilled onto the muddy ground. “I knew it!” Peggy cried. “Candy bars!” She looked at Victoria as if seeing her for the first time. “You’ve been hoarding a dozen candy bars and half a dozen sandwiches, all the while complaining about your too-small piece of Helen’s peanut butter? What is wrong with you?”
Victoria put on her pouty face. “You broke my purse!”
“That does it! I’m appointing myself head of food service.” Peggy and Bill gathered the goods and stuffed them into Peggy’s pack.
“You can’t do that! Just because you didn’t bring any food doesn’t mean you can take mine,” Victoria whined. “If anybody is head of food service, it should be me.”
“You? No.” Peggy loaded the last chocolate into her pack and closed it. “You, Victoria, are as of this moment head of latrine service.”
They walked as fast as the slowest soldier, which was usually Victoria. Helen tried hard not to slow the group herself—if only she’d worn her boots! It might have helped to have a longer stride. Every extra minute in this wilderness put them in greater danger. A few times, they stopped and listened to a flurry of gunfire—Allied or enemy, or both. She wondered if her husband had learned to identify gunfire as he had planes.
It had been dark and freezing for quite a while when Victoria announced, “I quit! I quit the Army. I quit this stupid walk. If you want me to go on, you’ll have to carry me.” She sat down in the middle of the railroad tracks.
“Look up there.” Bill, ignoring Victoria’s antics, pointed off to the right. “See that speck of light?”
Helen wasn’t sure she saw it. “What is it, Bill?”
“Why don’t I go find out?” He jogged off, his long legs taking him into the darkness and out of sight.
“Shouldn’t you go with him?” Helen asked Nelson. “He doesn’t have a weapon.”
Out of the pure black night came a yelp worthy of a cowboy stampede: “Yeee-haw! Yanks!”
Helen ran toward the sound and was soon passed up by Peggy and Nelson. Harold hung back with her. A barn came into view, and as she got closer, Helen saw something else—a tiny American flag.
They passed a surreal night in the barn with two GIs separated—“not lost”—from their unit after a fierce battle near the coast. When the haggard members of Helen’s little troop limped into Rennes, they were minus the Aussie, who’d veered off on foot to Paris after Bill convinced him he’d have a better chance of finding his mates there. The kindly farmer who had sheltered them in his barn had been forced t
o turn around when one of the horses picked up a stone and a painful limp. But he’d gotten them close enough to Rennes that they’d finished the journey on foot.
Cold, hungry, and suffering from blisters on her blisters, Helen staggered into the Allied base. She glanced around her, happier than she’d ever been to see so many US soldiers.
Naomi and Lydia came running up to her, nearly knocking her over. Naomi couldn’t stop crying. “We were so frightened for you! At first, I thought you must have gotten on the wrong car. But when you didn’t come back to your seat, I walked the length of that train over and over. I nearly lost it when I finally accepted the fact that you weren’t on board. That’s when Liddy and I started screaming at them to stop the train.”
“We almost got ourselves arrested,” Liddy said, sounding proud of herself.
Naomi continued, “But the Army brass refused to stop. They had orders not to. I’ve been trying to get them to send out searching parties ever since we got here.”
“Me too!” Lydia chimed in.
By this time, they’d attracted quite a crowd of soldiers and nurses. Helen introduced her traveling companions to Lydia and Naomi.
“Is my major upset?” Private Nelson asked.
“Everybody’s upset,” a baby-faced GI answered. He was chewing on something that might have been a candy bar, and it was all Helen could do not to grab it from him.
“Step aside!” A middle-aged captain shoved into the circle. “General McNeal wants you in his office this minute.”
“Can we get something to eat first?” Victoria asked.
“Now!” The captain turned on his heels, expecting them to follow.
“He’s nice,” Helen whispered to Peggy. She turned to Naomi. “Where’s Colonel Pugh?” She’d kind of thought he’d be the one to send out a searching party.
“He got sent out before we arrived. Pugh doesn’t know about any of this yet,” Naomi answered.
Peggy looked as worried as Victoria. “Do you think they’ll throw us in the brig, or whatever they call prison in the Army?”
Before Helen could answer, Nelson did. “They could court-martial us. I’ve seen it happen.”
Peggy wheeled on him. “But it wasn’t our fault! That’s not fair.”
Bill shook his head. “In my experience, the Army isn’t known for its fairness.”
RENNES, FRANCE
Helen and the others were ushered into a surprisingly warm building. It might have been considered a shack back home, but here, it was palatial. She stomped her feet to get the feeling back in her toes. At the far side of the room an aging general sat behind a small desk. With his head bent over his work, he presented an odd-shaped skull, hairless except for a grayish ring, not unlike a bald eagle. His bulbous nose was pink at the tip, and what she could see of his face looked like he’d had a rough time with acne when young.
Since there were plenty of chairs to go around, Helen took one and began prying off her shoes.
“Attention!” the captain barked.
Nelson straightened. Bill leaned against the wall and raised his hand in what might have been a head scratch or a salute.
The general stood up so fast his chair scraped the concrete floor. “Stand at attention! You soldiers have caused me and the entire United States Army more trouble than you’re worth! Your orders were to stay with your unit.”
Victoria’s sniveling turned into sobs.
“We’re sorry, General,” Peggy said, saluting as if an afterthought.
“Did I ask you to speak, Nurse? Your negligence not only endangered your lives, but your capture would have put the Army in an untenable position. I don’t care if you’re medical personnel or frontline soldiers. When I give an order, I expect it to be followed. Do I make myself clear?” He glared around at them until his fiery gaze rested on Helen.
Helen was still seated. She had her shoes off and couldn’t imagine standing up on her blisters. She glanced around at the others. Even Peggy had tears in her eyes. Bill and Nelson looked ready to bolt. She forced herself to stand, shoes dangling from one hand. “Unbelievable,” she muttered. She must have been louder than she thought. Peggy’s eyes got big, a signal for Helen to shut up.
“Did you say something, Nurse?” the general roared.
Peggy was probably right. Helen should keep her mouth shut. On the other hand, she needed to think of some way to get them out of this mess. “Sir, permission to speak?” Helen had never used those words before, but she’d heard them often enough.
The general seemed to be thinking it over. “Make it brief.”
“Thanks. It’s just that this whole thing isn’t what I’d expected. When we volunteered, everybody told us how desperately the Army needed nurses, how happy they’d be to see us.”
“That’s not untrue. If you had remained on the train, none of this would have transpired.” Helen thought she detected a slight softening in the general’s tone.
“The train left without us! Sir. How could they desert us like that? You’re right. We could have been captured or killed. We were so scared!”
Victoria’s sobbing grew louder.
Helen set her shoes down and brushed her hands together. “This would never happen in Chicago, a gentleman abandoning a lady to the worst that city might have to offer. I thought the Army was here to protect and defend, but nobody came to our rescue.”
Behind her was pure silence, except for a muffled laugh she’d have bet belonged to Bill. An idea was forming in her head, and against her better judgment, Helen decided to give it a shot. “I can’t even imagine what my uncle will say when he hears about this.”
The general definitely looked like a candidate for a heart attack. “I couldn’t give a rat’s backside what your uncle—”
“Not to mention what all the Trib’s readers will think,” Helen continued, as if merely reflecting.
“Trib?” Peggy repeated. “As in the Chicago Tribune?”
“Uncle Jim writes for the Trib.” Helen turned back to the general. “I wonder what people back home will think once they hear how the Army treats nurses who volunteer.”
The general swallowed so hard his Adam’s apple looked in danger of bursting through his neck. Helen couldn’t tell whether he believed her or not. “Let’s all calm down. We value our medical personnel. Of course we do.” He eyed the three nurses in the room. “I suppose I may have been a bit hasty.”
“Hasty?” Bill said. “No, sir. I don’t think I felt a bit of haste when we were dodging bullets, running through forests and open fields to get here.”
General McNeal propped his elbows on his desk and tented his fingertips. “For now, we’ll consider that what you nurses went through may have been ample punishment. For now. The captain here can show you to the mess tent, and to your quarters.”
Helen felt the flush of victory but tried not to show it as they followed the captain out. Bill fell in behind her.
She was still in the doorway when McNeal shouted, “As you were, men!”
Helen turned around. “But, General, they shouldn’t have to—”
“Dismissed, Nurses!”
Helen tried again. “Sir, Bill is medical personnel. He’s—”
“Get out while the getting’s good, Nurse,” Bill whispered before lining up with Nelson and the others.
Peggy reached back and nearly dragged Helen through the doorway as the captain shut the door. Even in the hallway, Helen could still hear General McNeal reading them the riot act.
Victoria hugged Helen. “That was wonderful! Why didn’t you tell us you have an uncle writing for the Chicago Tribune?”
Helen felt like crying. “Peggy, what have I done?”
“You don’t really have an uncle at the Trib, do you!” Peggy’s question wasn’t really a question.
Victoria gasped.
“Do you think General McNeal figured that out too?” Helen asked.
Peggy shrugged. “Probably.”
“Do you think it would help if
I went back in there and apologized for making it all up?” She’d do it, too. She didn’t care what he’d do to her.
Victoria grabbed Helen by the shoulders and shook her. “Helen! Don’t you dare go back there! He’ll throw us all in jail.”
Peggy lifted Victoria’s hands from Helen’s shoulders, then put her arm around Helen. “Come on. We need to get something to eat.”
“Bill and the others,” Helen said as they walked faster to catch up with the captain, “will they be getting something to eat?” But she knew the answer to that one. They’d be starving wherever they were.
And it was all her fault.
EN ROUTE TO MARSEILLE, FRANCE
Spending the night in a boxcar was nothing like riding in a real train. The car swayed and jerked. A guy from Indiana said hobos called boxcar trains “rattlers,” and it wasn’t hard to figure out why. When they pulled into the yards, Frank jumped out before the train came to a stop, then breathed in the frigid air and waited for the nausea to fade. He eyed Lartz, who had to lean into the wind to make his way over.
Anderson angled himself between Lartz and Frank, turning them into windbreaks. “Where are we?”
“Marseille?” Lartz ventured.
Frank surveyed the yards and wondered if they could really be close to any city—no lights, no buildings in sight. They’d been dumped in what looked like a parking lot for rusty trains. Scores of soldiers poured from boxcars, and Frank’s company fell in with a unit comprised of GIs who looked like they’d seen too much action already. Together they set out in the dark, marching for miles before seeing any proof of human existence, and then only a farmhouse, abandoned. Although the night didn’t seem to get warmer, the ground thawed, leaving ankle-deep mud. Each step felt like tugging a plunger out of the muck.
Anderson dropped back to chat with the men in the beleaguered unit. When he returned, he was overflowing with information. “We should reach Marseille in an hour. No snow in the forecast, but lots of rain.” He lowered his voice. “They lost over half of their unit in some godforsaken French or Belgian forest. Now they’re headed into battle again. Makes me glad I finished med school. I just want to settle into one place for the rest of the war. Marseille is as good a place as any. They must have a decent hospital. I shouldn’t mind waiting out the end of the war with the charming women of Marseille.”
With Love, Wherever You Are Page 24
