‘Remember your training, Nurse. Assess the patient, label and then move on.’
‘But the shelling. I can’t stand the shelling. It’s too close.’ The woman raised a hand to her nose, leaving a streak of blood on her pale skin as she passed the remnants of Francois’ kit and uniform to a waiting orderly.
‘Anna, remember your position here.’
The nurse sniffed and began to cut at his rotting boots, before the scissors sliced away at his trousers.
‘He may make it,’ the doctor deliberated, dressing the chest wound quickly. ‘Attach a chest label and – no don’t. Look at his leg: gas gangrene. Mark him urgent.’
‘And the head wound?’ the nurse asked as she pinned a label to Francois’ chest bandage.
‘Superficial by the looks of it and . . . What on earth is that? Are those teeth marks on his shoulder?’
The nurse leaned over Francois. He felt her breath on him and smelled the sweet scent of her. Flowers, spring flowers; he had been saved by a woman who smelled of flowers.
The nurse shook her head. ‘I have seen others with this mark. The men talk of a dog rescuing them.’ Her fingers traced the deep purple bruising that surrounded the bite mark.
The doctor raised an eyebrow, peering at the puncture marks. ‘The Red Cross uses dogs to find the fallen, and of course the German dogs are trained to locate the wounded. But I have not heard of the French having a dog that would drag a man to safety. No, no, there must be another explanation. Give him some brandy and then get some orderlies and clear this space.’
The nurse poured a measure of brandy into a tin cup and, lifting Francois’ head, forced the burning liquid down his throat.
Francois swallowed. ‘Where am I?’ he murmured.
‘A casualty clearing station, soldier. Next,’ the doctor called.
Francois felt his body lift upwards. The tent opening revealed neat lines of bodies, some bandaged, some partially naked. Why had they been left out in the cold? He craned his head towards the scene outside, but his view was quickly obscured. A hard coldness seeped into him as feet pounded by his head. Black boots, brown boots, lace-ups, thick-heeled hiking boots, boots being dragged. He gazed into the glassy eyes of a soldier clutching at the stump where his arm should have been and watched as dollops of blood dripped onto the duckboards covering the earth beneath. Wounded were resting in every available space, both in cots and on the ground. When the familiar stab of pain coursed through his body, Francois began to weep.
‘Move him out of the way.’
The air rushed.
‘Have you seen all the ambulances?’ The voice belonged to one of the men carrying him. The fair-skinned youngster’s features moved in and out of focus. Francois squinted and tried to concentrate.
‘The brass have given the doctors two days,’ the orderly continued. ‘Those who haven’t been moved on to a base hospital by then will be dead.’
Nurses weaved to and fro between the wounded, as doctors yelled for assistance.
‘Those three are dead,’ a nurse called out.
Francois felt a whoosh of air and then the grey of the sky pressed down on him. Overhead, planes buzzed and the firecracker zip of artillery fractured the atmosphere. A work detail of four men flicked cigarettes on the ground and picked up shovels leaning against munitions crates. A shell sped over the clearing hospital to land a mile away. The boom was deafening.
‘That was close,’ the fair-skinned orderly commented. ‘I don’t go much on working only nine miles from the front.’
‘Any further away, Andre,’ his assistant at the other end of the stretcher commented, ‘and most of these poor men would already be dead.’
Francois felt the steady creep of hurt readying itself for attack. Why would they not give him anything for the pain? Orderlies rushed past carrying empty stretchers. They were in some form of queue; a woman was giving instructions. He stared at the boggy ground, at a single spray of greenery that edged its way up from beneath the wet soil. Further away, two men walked to the line of prone soldiers. They hesitated for a moment and then picked one up. The body sagged in the middle as the men carried the soldier away.
‘Nurse Valois is back,’ the one called Andre said. ‘She arrived last night.’
‘She’s too old for you, my friend, too much of a woman for you.’
‘Rubbish,’ Andre retorted. ‘Age makes little difference to me. All that long brown hair and those dark eyes. We would be a good match.’
His friend laughed.
Francois felt the palpitations grow in his chest. They passed a row of tents fanning out in a circle and for a minute he thought he was to be laid with the dead. ‘Don’t put me there with them. I’m alive, I’m still alive.’ Did the words leave his lips? He couldn’t be sure.
‘He’s in shock,’ Andre’s friend explained. ‘Look how much he’s shaking. You’ll be all right,’ the orderly said to Francois. ‘You’re being sent to a base hospital. Bloody hell!’ His attention returned to his friend. ‘Have you seen his shoulder? Look at it. Bite marks.’
The orderlies ducked their heads as they walked into another tent. Francois floated above occupied cots before being deposited on the floor. The jolt caused a shocking pain to ripple through his body and the tent went dark.
‘See that: those teeth have gone clean through his uniform.’ The excitement was evident in Andre’s voice. ‘That’s the third I’ve seen. And that dead captain. He had marks on both shoulders. One lot appeared to be healed. I heard one of the field medics talking about a mongrel dog that rescued thirty wounded men during the night.’
‘That’s enough nonsense.’ Nurse Valois waited for the orderlies to move out of the way. With a strange calmness she wiped bloody hands on her apron. ‘You should be too busy for gossip.’ Screams sounded outside the tent. ‘Well, go on, someone needs help.’
The orderlies stood to one side of the tent flap as more stretchers were carried in, the occupants deposited hurriedly on the floor.
‘All hell’s broken loose in the marquee – there’s a wild animal in there,’ one of the orderlies told Nurse Valois as he placed a patient on the ground.
At the other end of the tent, which housed forty cots, a second nurse, Nurse Duval, suggested he concentrate on the task at hand.
Nurse Valois agreed, waving the young man away. ‘I’ve enough to contend with here,’ she replied with obvious irritation as she washed her hands in a basin of bloody water. ‘Wild animals? Ridiculous.’
‘It’s true,’ a soldier with a bandaged head said croakily. ‘The dog’s name is Roland.’
‘Delirious,’ she muttered. Nurse Valois found those cases the hardest to deal with. The gaping wounds she could attend to, but the mad ranting caused by wound shock and a poor reaction to morphine – for those fortunate enough to receive it – bordered on the unbearable. Next to Francois’ stretcher she set up a frame upon which hung a saline solution. ‘Now, let’s see if we can’t get this tube into one of those veins of yours,’ she said softly, kneeling beside him. With the task completed, she began to clean the chest wound. The shrapnel appeared to have missed his heart, but the three crescent-shaped gashes were bleeding. Nurse Valois pressed a bandage to the injury and then turned to attend to three other patients. Two were the victims of machine-gun fire through their thighs. Amputation appeared unavoidable for both young men, while the third was already dead from a stomach wound. How was it possible, she wondered, for men to inflict such wounds on each other? How was it possible for human beings to sit behind polished desks and make decisions that led to such carnage?
‘Where are the ambulances?’ she heard her voice cry out. ‘These men need to be moved immediately.’
Nurse Duval lifted her head from the man she was bandaging. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine, and you?’
The younger woman continued
to stitch up a gash on an arm. Nurse Valois observed the precise way in which Duval drew the surgical cotton through the wound, her wrist giving a little flick as she tightened each stitch. They were like machines, she reasoned. Trained and then conditioned to the terrors of war, they were just one tiny cog in this great horror created by mankind. There was nothing to do but continue. When she swallowed, the acrid taste of bile rose unbidden. At twenty-eight she had witnessed far too much suffering. For two years she had served at the front; during the past twelve months she had been rotated through the casualty clearing stations eight times. Doctors praised her for the meticulous approach with which she went about her duties and for the display of steady nerves so vital when they carried out such bloody work under shell-fire. Few nurses could sustain such continued exposure to the horrors of war, particularly when they were working so close to the fighting.
‘Which ones?’
An ambulance driver stood before her. His tunic was patterned with dark stains and an arcing scar down the side of his face showed at least forty stitches.
‘You should have that wound covered,’ she said. ‘Let me bandage it for you.’
‘Nurse, which ones?’ he asked again, ignoring her concern. ‘I can take only eight from this ward. Two of the horse-drawn ambulances were hit by shell-fire, so now we are even more short-handed.’ When no answer came he cleared his throat. ‘I’m sorry, it’s the best I can do.’
Nurse Duval appeared and with a slight cough of interruption led the driver away by the arm and began to point out the men who were to be transferred immediately. Nurse Valois observed this random selection with weary detachment. It was the same out on the battlefield. The stretcher-bearers were ordered to bring in the least badly injured, with the critically wounded left until last, often to die in the cold from infected, unattended wounds. Trenches could not afford to be clogged up by the movement of the wounded. Priority was given to moving the dead, the troops and the munitions.
As those who were deemed to have the greatest chance of survival were stretchered out of the tent, Nurse Valois resumed her ministrations. The young man with the crescent-shaped shrapnel wounds was shivering. Draping a blanket over him, she checked Francois’ pulse. His breaths were interspersed with soft moans. ‘Rest,’ she soothed. There was further damage to his body to attend to, namely a bulbous foot with a seeping wound. Her brow furrowed briefly before smoothing into a practised smile of comfort. From a table she selected swabs and disinfectant and slowly began to clean the leg, before irrigating the suppurating wound. The stink of rotting flesh was hard to ignore. There were two phials of morphine in the tray on the bench behind her. They were continually running out of morphine and she knew she should save it for the more critical patients, but as she reached for the hypodermic needle and administered the painkiller she was conscious only of the suffering she would ease in that moment. The man on the ground was so young and Nurse Valois was certain he would not survive. She glanced at the second phial of morphine. By ending this soldier’s pain forever would she not in fact be saving him?
A Red Cross volunteer appeared in the tent with a crate. ‘The plasma has arrived. And one of the doctors said to tell you he is beginning to disperse nurses from the receiving marquee to the different wards now the initial rush has passed.’
‘Thank heavens.’ Nurse Valois dropped the second phial of morphine into the pocket of her uniform and, taking the box of plasma, placed it on a table. ‘Help me set this up. I have fifteen patients who need plasma immediately.’ When she turned around the volunteer was gone. Very slowly she began to unpack the crate; gradually her practised speed increased. ‘Plasma,’ she called over her shoulder to Nurse Duval. The younger woman joined her and together they swiftly hung plasma bags on frames next to the neediest patients and attached tubes to veins.
‘You should take some leave,’ her friend suggested. ‘You are exhausted.’
Nurse Valois waved away her concern.
‘Why do you not go and see your family in Paris?’
‘Why do you not visit your mother?’ Nurse Valois countered.
They were joined by three more nurses, who quickly turned to the as yet unattended patients. Habit made Nurse Valois check each plasma recipient until she was back at Francois’ side. He was young, too young. ‘Right,’ she said as she squeezed the plasma bag and checked the tubing running into Francois’ arm. ‘Let’s have a look at that head wound of yours. And what is that?’ She glanced thoughtfully towards the tent opening before calling out to Nurse Duval. ‘I have another with those strange marks.’
‘And I,’ the younger nurse replied.
Nurse Valois resumed her task. ‘Well, we might try to get you into a cot, my lad; displace one of your companions who haven’t got quite so many wounds to contend with.’ The nurse rose wearily, holding a hand to the small of her back. ‘I’m sorry I cannot do more for you.’
A massive animal stood in the tent’s doorway. Matted with blood and mud, it lifted its wolf-like head and sniffed the air.
The nurse scanned the surrounds for anything she could use as a weapon. ‘Marianne?’ she called out to Nurse Duval at the far end of the tent.
The second nurse caught sight of the animal and backed away. ‘What is it?’
‘Keep still.’ Nurse Valois stood rigidly by Francois’ side and, with a stay of her hand, bade the three new nurses do the same.
The creature padded into the tent and began to walk to each cot. He sniffed briefly at every occupant before finally turning in the senior nurse’s direction.
She stood firm by Francois’ side, a hypodermic clutched between her fingers as if a stabbing knife.
‘He won’t hurt you.’ An ambulance driver filled the tent’s entrance. ‘That dog chased us nearly halfway here from the front.’
The nurse backed away as the dog sprang to Francois’ side. He sniffed him from head to foot, circled his prone body and then stretched out by his side and howled.
‘I knew it,’ the ambulance driver stated.
Nurse Valois looked at the dog and then turned back to the man before her. ‘What do you mean by allowing him in here? This is a hospital not a –’
The ambulance driver walked towards the nurse and held out his hand. In his palm lay a set of identity discs. Intrigued, the nurse picked them up and examined the owner’s name.
‘They were in the dog’s mouth when the ambulance picked him up.’
The nurse stared at the name written on the discs. Antoine Chessy. The exhausted dog snored at her feet, his great pink tongue strung out across his paws, his hips angular and lean beneath the matted hair.
‘But how did –’ Nurse Valois turned to the sleeping dog, then looked in confusion back to the driver, who smiled and nodded.
‘No one thought it possible,’ he said, ‘but that’s because we’re not out there, with them.’ He gestured to the men lying in the cots and scattered on the floor. ‘We can’t contemplate the horrors nor the possibilities, and so we don’t believe. Check his identity discs,’ the ambulance driver suggested, tilting his neck to where Francois lay. ‘Apparently the dog belonged to two brothers.’
The nurse leaned over and tentatively lifted the discs from Francois’ neck. The dog raised his head and then, assured the woman meant no harm, lowered his shaggy muzzle onto the floor.
‘They –’ She looked at the ambulance driver. ‘They say Francois Chessy.’ She double-checked the discs she still held.
The ambulance driver nodded again. ‘And that is their dog.’ Taking Antoine’s identity discs from the nurse, he hung them around the great animal’s neck. The bite marks were clearly visible on the soldier at her feet. Despite her disciplined, scientific training, Nurse Valois’s eyes grew blurry. This was not the first time such marks had been presented to her. There was no other explanation. Kneeling at Francois’ head, she studied the puncture wound. The shape of it was
indeed representative of a deep bite, and the surrounding bruising and tearing of skin suggested that the creator had latched on forcefully. Her cheeks burned with the enormity of the realisation. ‘So, this animal, he dragged them to safety?’ Confirmation was important to her. Such a feat conjured a word lost in a world at war: hope.
The ambulance driver nodded. ‘The men say his name is Roland.’
Nurse Valois stared at the war-weary dog at her feet. The animal’s hair was coarse, crusty with mud, his long muzzle bloody. Beneath the plain garb of her uniform a cross nestled in the soft indentation at the base of her throat. She reached for it now. The boy at her feet was dying and his dog was by his side.
Sunset Ridge, south-west Queensland, Australia
February 2000
They were driving back from the western boundary. Every time Madeleine got out of the utility to close a gate the sun bit at her skin. The land lay heavy and silent in the afternoon heat, glazed silver by the sun’s rays, as if some other-worldly potter had slipped the earth into a giant furnace, turning the land into a ceramic rendering of silver-strewn browns and beiges. The sun moved to rest momentarily on a distant tree line, sending tendrils of red across both sky and landscape. She slid back into the vehicle, relishing the airconditioning yet aware that she was becoming more attuned to the environment around her.
George was still processing everything the woman at the museum had shared earlier that morning, and Madeleine could tell he wasn’t happy. Neither of them was. After the excitement of discovering their grandfather’s two hidden sketches, a further search of the homestead had proved futile. They both knew they were lucky to find anything at all, and they believed that the location of the sketches showed that David Harrow’s talent was far from appreciated in the homestead when he was growing up – an important fact that would create interest at any exhibition. The idea of an artist suffering either mentally or physically or both in the creation of their work was a powerful image.
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