by Doug Dollard
The explosion that followed was so horrific she did not hear it as much as feel the concussion compress her body, stealing the very breath from her lungs.
The impact was so close it shattered windows and sent the metal frames of hospital beds to stuttering. The building shuddered as windows exploded into tiny shards of glass that were immediately absorbed by the splinter shields. Lights exploded, their tungsten filaments flaring briefly before fading into glowing red pinpoints of anger. Masonry and shards of debris rained down from the ceiling crashing onto the floor where she had stood only moments before. Thick dust drifted down from the ceiling in great swirling clouds sending the ward into an impenetrable darkness. Chocking dust stifled every attempt to draw breath.
She lie half under the body of the man who had tackled her moments before the explosion. Above them the bed sagged from the weight of debris crashing down from the ceiling. The man’s face was pressed closely against hers but volumes of soot and dust obscured his identity.
Though she could not discern his features she noted the bandages and wounds matched those of the German Airman. Somehow he had risen from his bed and forced her out from beneath falling masonry that would surely have killed her. Too frightened to be grateful she held the airman’s head against her face as a painful roaring filled her ears.
Thick clouds of dust continued to drift down from the ceiling. The few remaining lights flickered, dimmed and finally went out sending the ward into an impenetrable darkness. She lay there completely immobile, taking short, choppy breaths and listening intently for the sound of more explosions.
The German Airman lay with his body protectively positioned across hers. Cautiously she reached out, placing her forefingers against his throat. Beneath her fingers she felt a pulse, faint but steady. Wheezing she struggled to free herself but the weight of the airman kept her pinned beneath him. The lights high overhead flickered again and came to life.
“Thank God,” she whispered though the sensation of not hearing her own voice felt strangely odd. In the dimness she saw shadows moving about. Someone was kneeling down beside her. She could see it was one of the interns who had escorted patients down to the safety of the basement just before the bombing began.
He had placed his face close to hers and appeared to be shouting something. Although his lips were moving no sound came from them. Finally she nodded and held out her arm to signal she was uninjured. The intern grasped her arm and pulled, sliding both her and the German airman out from beneath the bed together. A few of the surviving overhead lights still shown dimly through a haze of descending dust, casting the scene beneath in a shadowy, ethereal glow.
“Can you help me get him back into bed?” Mary shouted at the young intern, unaware his hearing had not been impaired. The sound of her voice echoed in her brain, the ringing in her ears completely overpowering the chaos surrounding her.
The intern stared at her quizzically.
“I can’t hear,” she indicated by pointing to her ears and shaking her head. The intern nodded his understanding and following her lead lifted the unconscious airman to his feet. Together they half carried, half dragged the airman to an empty bed. He was covered in soot and plaster dust. She noted with dismay a growing stain of blood was soaking into his soot stained bandages.
Quickly Mary removed the sodden bandages and examined the wound. The orderly stared at her disapprovingly before moving off to assist other patients. Mary knew instinctively her first duty was to her own people, but she could not bring herself to abandon the injured airman, allowing him to bleed to death. To her relief she found the German had caused himself no serious damage though his exertions had reopened his wounds.
Sterilizing the wound Mary wrapped his injuries in fresh gauze before proceeding to clean his body of the dust and soot caused by the bombing. Only when she was satisfied he was out of danger did she leave his side to attend other patients.
The other wards suffered far less damage so the injured were moved to new beds and triaged for treatment. The more seriously injured were arranged in a queue according to the seriousness of their injuries.
In one of the beds lay a boy of twelve who had been injured in a previous air raid. He was the lad for whom she had stood in queue that morning. His lungs had been crushed under debris from a falling building and his left leg had been amputated below the knee. He sustained a severe head injury and lost the sight in his left eye. She stumbled into the foot of his bed and nearly fell across him.
“Are you okay?” she shouted at him. He was covered in a black rain of soot but she could see his lips move and mouth the words “I’m okay” though she could not hear.
Moving from one bed to another she checked each patient until satisfied that despite their covering of soot they were all uninjured. The heavy particles of dust floating in the air made it painful to breath. Through the haze of dust she could see her patients coughing and wiping soot from their faces and eyes. Air circulating through the shattered windows brought in a welcome exchange of fresh air.
Her ears were ringing painfully now though her hearing had begun to improve slightly. Sounds were badly muffled and seemed to come from great distances. There was so much to do in the wake of the bombing she had little time to dwell on her injuries.
All of those patients who had survived the raid without injury had to be moved down the dusty corridor onto a ward where the bombing had done the least damage. In the distance the all clear sirens began their peculiar wail. With practiced efficiency the hospital staff began returning their patients to the ward. Quickly they mopped the floors, exchanged soiled bedding for clean sheets and blankets and attended to the needs of their patients.
Several workmen appeared to begin the repair of the shattered windows. Peeking through one of the broken windows Mary spotted a huge black crater in the hospital’s courtyard. Smoke still poured from its depths. It was a miracle the bomb had done so little damage to the hospital.
The spot where she had been standing moments before the bomb exploded was littered with broken bricks and shattered masonry. Had she been under it she would surly have been crushed. The airman had risked his life to save hers. The thought she owed her life to a German soldier made her uncomfortable and she attempted to banish it from her mind. Suddenly she remembered the treats she had bought for the injured boy. How odd she thought, in the midst of such carnage to recall something so mundane as sweets.
Chapter 17
AFTERMATH
Lieutenant Wellington stayed the night caring for her patients. There was no point in attempting to travel home in any case as the trams would not be running in this part of London while fires were still raging.
By ten AM the hospital staff had brought the last of the patients up from the basement and returned them to their beds. Soot covered sheets and blankets had been exchanged for fresh bedding and the floors had been mopped clean of the dust and dirt that had rained down from the walls and ceilings.
Patients who had suffered injuries in the evacuation were triaged and treated. Firemen and street wardens injured in the bombing were brought into the ward and treated for smoke inhalation and an assortment of burns and broken bones. The severely injured were prepped and treated in surgery. Attempts were made to make those who had suffered severe burns comfortable, but there was little anyone could do for them. Sometime during the rush to return the hospital to its normal operating routine Wellington checked in on the wounded German airman who she found mercifully perhaps, still unconscious.
By one in the afternoon everything seemed back to normal and Mary took a few minutes to herself. Since the bombing had begun in early 1940 the staff lounge had been set up with cots and blankets where doctors and hospital staff could catch a few hours sleep between shifts. During times such as these Mary considered that while London was suffering from the daily barrage of high explosives and incendiaries so too were Liverpool, Birmingham, Plymouth, Bristol, Southampton, Glasgow and Portsmouth.
During the Bli
tz the raids had come twice a day and the hospital had moved the operating theaters into the basement and even buried radium used in medical treatments to protect against radiation leaks in the event of a direct hit. No one would be safe until the Germans had been crushed and their frightful regime brought to an ignominious end.
Outside masons were already at work laying new brick and replacing shattered masonry. Suddenly Mary remembered the boy and the sweets she had purchased for him. Retrieving the box of pastries from her closet she rushed to the boy’s ward to deliver her delicacies and found his bed occupied by an elderly man with a crushed left foot. Quietly she went in search of the boy, confident he had been moved during the confusion after the bombing. None of the hospital staff knew of the boy or where he might be located. Finally she found one of the nurses who had treaded the lad.
“I’m sorry Mary,” the nurse said, her eyes expressing what her lips would not.
“Oh God!” Mary gasped, dropping her box of pastries and bringing her arms across her stomach.
During the past four years she had carefully crafted a wall between her emotions and the patients she treated. But the boy had been different. She had allowed him to slip past her defenses and now she reeled under the pain of his loss.
The nurse reached out to her but Mary waved her away and retreated from the ward. There was no comfort adequate for such a loss. It was a wound as real as any suffered by her patients and it would, in time heal just as their wounds healed, leaving a scar of remembrance.
Exhausted by more than thirty hours on her feet Mary needed desperately to lie down. Reaching the staff lounge she found exhausted staff already occupied many of the cots. Finding an empty one she lay down, covering herself with a blanket and immediately fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
Chapter 18
A NEW DAWN
As if awoken by an alarm Mary sat up abruptly. Disoriented it took her a moment to recall she was not in her flat but still at Queen Anne’s Hospital. Because of the blackout it was impossible to discern night from day but she had a sense she had slept through the morning and it was already late afternoon.
Though notoriously uncomfortable Mary had barely noticed the cot’s coarse and restrictive webbing. Rising she made her way to the loo where she could wash her face and hands and adjust her disheveled uniform. There were bathing areas for the patients but these were in short supply and constantly in use.
After she had refreshed herself she returned to her duties on the ward. Someone had turned on the BBC radio perhaps with the intension of relieving some of the tension from the previous night. The soft sounds of strings and brass drifted throughout the ward.
Her first instinct on returning to duty was to check on the German airman who had saved her life. As she approached she noted the armed soldier had returned to his post, guarding the unconscious airman. Though it was common to see military personnel, some in full battle dress roaming the hospital wards Mary was uncomfortable seeing an armed soldier posted to guard the injured German. German POWs had been treated at Queen Anne’s on several occasions in the past and although they were always under constant guard there hadn’t been an instance where the army had felt it necessary to place an unconscious prisoner under guard.
She would have thought the restraint on his ankle would have been more than enough to insure he made no attempt to escape, not that he was in any condition for such an attempt. In any event there was an army intelligence officer on duty ready to interview the patient as soon as he regained consciousness. It was really none of her affair. Dozens of German prisoners had been treated at Queen Anne’s before being transported to POW camps. In a few days when he was well enough to travel this one would be taken away as well.
Chapter 19
INTERROGATION
I awoke to the sound of a radio playing softly in the background. The music was vaguely familiar reminding me of the soundtrack from an old black and white movie. The combination of strings and brass tugged playfully at my memory until I finally recognized the tune as an old Glenn Miller song, big band music from the thirties.
In the distance, intermittently breaking through the music I could hear muffled voices but could not make out individual words. I wondered where I was. It felt like I was coming up from a long way down.
I opened my eyes to a blur of ill-defined shapes and shadows. There was an unmistakable smell of antiseptic permeating the air. Slowly shades of dark and light solidified into identifiable objects.
I lay in an old, white metal frame single bed with the upper portion slightly inclined placing me in a half upright position. My head rested on a thick pillow that felt like down. Covering me was a white sheet over which lay a dark green blanket tucked in on either side. On my right within arms length was a small stand on which sat a porcelain bowl in the shape of a half moon along with a tall pitcher.
To my left was a tall metal pole from which hung an inverted glass bottle about a third filled with a clear liquid I assumed was plasma. Threaded into the bottom of the glass bottle was a brown rubber tube that extended down to my left side where it was attached to the crux of my arm under strips of white tape.
In the ceiling directly above my head at the end of a long metal pole hung a fan, its large copper colored paddles slowly churning the air. Light came from several large, clear glass bowls stuck in green metal disks the size of garbage can lids and hung from ceiling on long silver poles.
The space around me was cavernous, the floor covered with dark hardwood boards discolored and worn in the center from years of foot traffic. The ceilings were tall and sculpted in white plaster. Directly across from me about four feet from the floor was a long row of what appeared to be large windows divided into multiple square panes each of which was painted over in black.
The walls were covered in thick white plaster. Ten feet to my left a pale white curtain hung from a metal frame was drawn across the entire width of the room blocking my view. The corridor ended in a white plaster wall about fifteen feet to my right. In the center of this wall was a dark green wooden door with a wire mesh window in the middle. Next to the door seated on a wooden chair was a man dressed in a tan military uniform with corporal’s chevrons on his sleeves. He seemed to be staring directly at me.
The fear was subsiding. I wiggled the fingers on my right hand in a weak attempt at a wave but the soldier did not return the greeting nor make any attempt to speak.
From beyond the white curtain came the staccato echo of leather soles scuffling over wooden floorboards and the muffled voices of people talking. Occasionally I could see shadows of people moving beyond the curtain. I surmised I was at the end of a long corridor that stretched several hundred feet.
It occurred to me I was on a hospital ward but an old one that lacked the stainless veneer of twenty-first century technology. I was grateful to be alive but I wondered why I wasn’t in a room hooked to a vital signs monitor. Occasionally I thought I heard the sound of a car engine coming from somewhere outside but I could not be certain.
My body ached but the pain lacked the sharp edges I expected. I felt a dull but persistent pain in my groin and a much sharper pain in my left leg. With my right hand I reached up to feel a thick wad of gauze bandaging wrapped around my head. The slight pressure from my fingers against my forehead immediately ignited a sharp pain that reverberated into my skull.
Reflexively my hand snapped away as waves of nausea washed over me. When the swirling dizziness subsided I committed to making only calculated movements and began taking inventory of my condition. The soldier by the wall continued to observe me but otherwise gave no sign of recognition.
My left knee and lower abdomen ached in the way only serious injuries could. The pain in my knee had a deep sharp edge to it overlaid by a tightness that I knew from experience came with swelling. The pain in my abdomen burned, radiating heat outward in a pattern of bruised tenderness. My throat was raw and it hurt just to swallow. The residual fuzziness in my head made me suspect
I had been given something to ease my pain, never a good idea for a patient with a head injury. These thoughts were interrupted by the approaching sound of heels clicking against wooden floorboards.
Emerging from behind the partition curtain came a tall, dark haired woman dressed in a white apron and long-sleeved blue cotton blouse with white buttons down the front. On her head she wore a white cap that rose into peaks on either side. Her legs were sheathed in white stockings that ended in white-laced shoes with block heels. The trim of her skirt hung just below her knees.
She looked to be in her early twenties; about five foot eight, one hundred and twenty pounds. Her eyes were light brown, her face pale as if she were seldom exposed to the sun. On her lips she wore dark red lipstick accenting their fullness.
As she approached she suddenly became aware I was conscious. This was apparently not something she had anticipated. I attempted a smile that resulted in bringing her to a halt in mid stride a few feet from my bedside.
Immediately one of her delicate hands shot up to cover her surprise and the involuntary gasp escaping her slightly parted lips. I noted her fingernails were painted a bright, raspberry red. She paused momentarily, seemingly frozen in indecision.
Before I could formulate the appropriate words of reassurance she dropped her arm down to her side, turned slowly on her heel and disappeared back behind the partition. I listened to the dissipating patter of her footsteps as she retreated down the corridor.
“Now what?” I wondered.
It didn’t take long to discover the answer. When I looked over to my right the corporal was on his feet watching me but made no attempt to move in my direction.
