Secrets of the Frontline Nurses

by Holly Green

  That evening Leo felt the symptoms she had been dreading. Her temperature went up in a sudden peak and she began to cough and find it difficult to breathe. She had nursed enough sufferers to know what that meant. The complications mentioned by Leseaux had set in. She was suffering from bronchitis, which might easily turn into pneumonia.

  For two weeks Leo fought for her life, and Leseaux and the rest of the staff fought with her. There were times when she felt she was sinking into a bottomless well, from which she would never surface; but at those moments a vision came to her to call her back – a vision of a small, chubby-cheeked girl with amber hair. She had never seen her daughter but she was convinced that in some mysterious way the child had been sent to keep her alive and she struggled to live for her sake. And eventually the fever lost its hold on her and she began the slow process of recovery.

  One morning Leseaux came into her room and after he had carried out his usual checks he said, ‘Well, today is a great day. Do you know what the date is?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘It is November first and today the Serbs will re-enter Belgrade. For us, the war is over.’

  ‘Oh, praise God!’ Leo exclaimed weakly. ‘But how I wish I could be there to see it!’

  ‘Well, you are well on the way now. I think today you could get up for a while and sit in a chair. Tomorrow you can walk round the room. Soon you will be well enough to travel. But are you sure you want to go to Belgrade? You told me your child has been taken by her father’s family. I do not think it will be easy to persuade them to give her up.’

  ‘I should never forgive myself if I didn’t try,’ Leo said. ‘At least … at the very least … I must see her. And then, if it seems she is happy and being well cared for …’

  She faded into silence. In the last few days the thought had dogged her that Alexandra might be better off with her own people, speaking the language she had learned at her foster mother’s knee and with the wealth and prestige that came with her father’s rank. Even if she could persuade or force the countess to hand her over, would she be doing the child a favour? She had been roughly transplanted from one home to another already. Would it not be cruel to inflict another upheaval on her? But Leo could not forget the vision that had sustained her through her illness. She knew that she could not give up until she had at least seen the real child.

  Ten days later Leo was on the train to Belgrade. Before leaving she had had to say farewell to the people she had lived and worked with for months. The field hospital was no longer needed. The patients had either been discharged or moved to other hospitals and the staff were going back to the various countries from which they had come. Pierre Leseaux was returning to Paris, to pick up the threads of his former medical practice. Saying goodbye to him had been hardest of all and Leo felt she had lost her last close friend. Sitting on the train as it rattled through the war-devastated countryside she thought that she had never been so alone. Even the prospect of returning to England held no comfort. Tom was no longer there, waiting for her. Ralph and her grandmother were both dead and she had no other family. Her mail had caught up with her just before she left Skopje but the few letters had only served to remind her of her isolation. She had never endeared herself to what was called ‘society’ and her only close friends before the war had been the women who trained with her in the FANY, but her decision to leave Lamarck in favour of joining Mabel Stobart in Serbia had not been popular and in the upheaval of the following months it had been hard to keep in touch with anyone. Then, when she’d eventually returned to England after the birth of her child she had been too depressed to make an effort to renew contacts so long left dormant. Her letters consisted of statements from her bank, a couple of reports from her estate manager at Bramwell and a long letter from Victoria, which only served to emphasise the distance between them.

  To pass the time on the journey, Leo took the letter out of her handbag and re-read it. Victoria wrote in enthusiastic terms about the beauties of the New Zealand landscape and the warmth of the welcome she had been given by Luke’s family. She went on:

  Of course it was a bit daunting to find myself with a ready-made family, not just in-laws but children as well. But I must say they seem to have accepted me more easily than I had any right to expect. Anton is a fine lad. He will be six next birthday and is very independent and gallops around on his pony as if he was born in the saddle. He even sounds like a New Zealander, except that he still speaks Macedonian Serb with his great grandmother. She is a magnificent old girl, and determined to keep her Macedonian heritage alive. Of course, she isn’t his real grandmother. I still find it hard to to remember that he is Sophie and Iannis’s son and so no blood relation to Luke or anyone else here. Poor Sophie! When I think back to those far-off days at the hospital in Adrianople I remember how much in love she and Iannis were. I think she probably came to love Luke just as much, but they had so little time together before he was sent back to Europe. Just long enough for her to conceive little Nadia but not enough for him to see his baby daughter.

  She’s a beautiful child but likes to have her own way and creates hell when she doesn’t get it. I think Luke’s mother is quite relieved to hand over the reins to someone else, but I don’t want to become the wicked step-mother who only wields the big stick (metaphorically, of course) so I’m trying to strike a balance between spoiling her and instilling some discipline. (Not easy.)

  So family life has its complications but I find I enjoy it much more than I thought I would. Perhaps that’s because of my last and best bit of news. I’m pregnant! It must have happened on the boat home because the baby is due in January. I can’t get over it because I honestly thought I should never be able to have a child, after what happened. [Leo had read that sentence over several times, but without finding any explanation. She had no recollection of anything happening to her friend that might have given rise to such fears.] So we shall be a triple-decker family! And in a wonderful way it seems to bring together all the things that have happened to us over the last six years – Bulgaria, you and me and Luke; Adrianople, with Sophie and Iannis; Luke and Sophie, then Luke and me again. There’s only one thing missing. Darling, forgive me for rambling on like this. I don’t know if you have managed to find Alexandra or not. I hope and pray that you have. All I need now to be completely happy is to see you with your own little girl. Please write! And if you possibly can, come out to stay with us. There will always be a warm welcome for you here and I know you’d love the place.

  All my love

  Victoria

  Leo refolded the letter. Perhaps there was one gleam of hope on the horizon. If she had to leave Alexandra with the Malkovic family maybe she could sell up all her property in England and start a new life in New Zealand.

  It was dark by the time the train drew into the terminus. Leo hailed a taxi and asked to be taken to the Hotel Moscow, the only name she could remember. The sight of the hotel’s green and white art nouveau frontage brought back a flood of memories. This was where Ralph had brought her when he had dragged her back in disgrace from Adrianople; where she had at first been incarcerated, forbidden to go out without her grim chaperone, and then liberated to be the toast of Belgrade society. This was where she had dressed to go to the ball where Sasha had first seen her as a woman, and the place to which she had returned heart-broken, a few weeks later, when he had told her that they could never marry. Five years and a war had passed since then and she hardly recognised the girl she had been in those days, but checking in to the hotel gave her an uncanny sensation that time had somehow folded back on itself.

  Her first impulse the next morning was to set out for the Malkovics’ town house and demand to see the countess, but a look in the mirror made her change her mind. She had brought very few clothes with her on her return to Salonika and most of those had been left behind when she rejoined the field hospital. For months she had worn nothing but her nurse’s dress and apron or the serviceable tweed breeches and tunic, wit
h or without the accompanying skirt, which had constituted her FANY uniform. Now, looking at herself, she saw how shabby and dirty they were. Moreover she had lost weight during her illness and they now hung on her as if they had been made for a much larger woman. It was months since she had been to a hairdresser and, though she had refrained this time from chopping her auburn locks short, her hair now resembled an untidy bird’s nest. Her face was weather-beaten and her hands were rough and her nails broken. If she was going to present herself as a suitable person to care for any child she realised she would have to smarten herself up.

  She found the dressmaker who had made clothes for her all those years ago, still in business and delighted to see her. Customers were few and far between now and the woman promised to have something ready by the next morning. Leo went to the post office and telegraphed to her bank to make arrangements for her to draw money and then to a beauty parlour where she had her hair done and had a facial and a manicure. She bought new underwear and shoes. That done, she had time on her hands to wander round the city. It was a very different place from the lively metropolis that she remembered. Four years of enemy occupation had left the streets shabby and many of the shops shuttered; but there was a sense of optimism and excitement among the people. Only a few days before King Peter had made a ceremonial return to the city and there were still national flags in many windows and traces of the bunting that had welcomed him.

  Leo’s steps took her inevitably to the area where the great houses of the nobility stood. In some there were signs of occupation but many were empty, their windows shuttered and their paint peeling, their owners either killed in the war or fled to their country estates or abroad. Her heart beat quickened as she approached the Malkovic house, but it too was closed and neglected. It was clear that if she wanted to find the family who had taken charge of her child she would have to make her way to their country estate.

  Chapter 20

  Next morning, dressed in a jade-green wool suit and feeling slightly exposed round the ankles in the new shorter skirt, she hired a car and set off for the Malkovic estate. She had only been there once, on that never-to-be-forgotten occasion of Sasha’s ‘Slava day’ six years ago; but even if she had known the route better it would have been hard to recognise. The roads had been torn up by lorries and gun carriages and the surrounding fields were criss-crossed by trenches. Orchards, which she remembered dropping blossom as they passed, were now reduced to blackened stumps by shell-fire. Nevertheless, after stopping two or three times to ask directions, she found herself at last driving up to the house. On her previous visit it had been decked with flags in celebration and the gardens had been full of spring flowers. Now surrounded by bare branches and drifts of autumn leaves it looked melancholy and neglected; but she was relieved to see there were definite signs of occupation. Smoke rose from the chimneys and lamplight in one window brightened the autumnal afternoon.

  Leo stopped the car outside the front door and sat for a moment, breathing deeply and rehearsing in her mind what she planned to say. In her handbag she had the letter which Sasha had written just before he was killed and which she had carried with her ever since like a talisman. She knew it by heart but she took it out now and read it over to bolster her courage. ‘I have rewritten my will in the last few hours and had it duly witnessed. In it, I repudiate my marriage to Eudoxie on the grounds of non-consummation and declare you to be my affianced bride. If I should die here, my estate is to go to our son, or daughter.’ She folded the letter and put it back in her bag. Then she got out of the car and rang the doorbell.

  She had to wait so long that she almost rang again but then the door was opened by a young girl in a maid’s cap and apron who regarded her with wide eyes, as if any visitor was a cause for alarm. Leo held out a visiting card.

  ‘My name is Leonora Malham Brown. I should like to speak to the countess.’

  The girl took the little square of pasteboard and scuttled off towards the back of the house, but as she did so a door opened further along the hall and a small child toddled into view pulling a toy horse on wheels and crowing with mischievous laughter. Leo froze in disbelief. This was the chubby-cheeked, auburn haired infant of her feverish visions. The likeness was so uncanny that she feared she might be hallucinating and wondered for an instant if the sickness had returned.

  ‘Alexandra?’ She took two unsteady steps towards the child, then halted again as a man’s voice spoke from the room beyond the door.

  ‘No, Lexi, not out there. Come back.’

  Leo’s head swam. She had walked into a world of fantasy. First the child, now this. The voice was Sasha’s.

  A figure appeared in the doorway, silhouetted against the lamplight beyond.

  ‘Lexi, come …’ The words broke off abruptly. For an instant neither of them spoke. Then he said, ‘Leonora? Is it possible?’

  Her hands were at her mouth, suppressing a sound that was half scream, half cry of joy. ‘Sasha? They told me you were dead.’

  He came towards her and she was able to see his face for the first time. It was thinner and there were deep creases around his mouth, and his dark hair was liberally streaked with grey. She saw with a jolt that his left sleeve was empty and pinned to his jacket.

  ‘Leo? I can’t believe it. They said you had died when the child was born.’

  ‘No! No! I was unconscious. They took her away because I couldn’t feed her. I’ve been looking for her ever since. But you … where have you been?’

  He reached out then and laid his hand on her arm and at the warmth of his touch something gave way within her and she began to weep. He swept her to him with his good arm and held her close and she burrowed her face into his shoulder and breathed in the unforgettable smell of him and knew that he was, truly, alive.

  ‘Oh, my darling, my darling!’ he whispered. ‘I have been so alone! So bereft! I thought I had lost you.’

  ‘So have I,’ she gulped. ‘Oh, Sasha, I can’t tell you how lonely I’ve been.’

  She felt a hand tugging her skirt and a small body tried to insert itself between her legs and his. Looking down she saw Alexandra gazing up, her thumb in her mouth, eyes wide and puzzled.

  Sasha said softly, ‘Darling, you know who this is, don’t you?’

  Leo knelt beside the child. ‘Of course I know. I’ve seen her in my dreams for nearly two years.’ She touched the delicate skin of her baby’s face and a quiver of delight ran through all her nerves. ‘Alexandra, darling, I’ve wanted to see you for such a long time. I’m so happy to have found you.’

  Sasha knelt with her. ‘Lexi, this is your mama. We thought we had lost her, didn’t we? But here she is after all. And now we shall all be very, very happy together.’

  Leo heard footsteps and the swish of a skirt and looked up, expecting to confront Eudoxie; but it was the Dowager Countess, Sasha’s mother, who held out her arms in joyful welcome.

  ‘Leonora, my dear child! What a wonderful surprise. God is good indeed!’

  Leo got up and embraced her. ‘Dear Lady Malkovic! It’s wonderful to see you, too. How are you?’

  ‘Oh, I am as well as anyone of my age can expect to be. But you … you are so thin! You have been ill?’

  ‘Yes, I have. But I’m better now. And … the Countess Eudoxie? How is she?’

  Sasha’s mother squeezed her hand. ‘Eudoxie died a year ago, in Athens. You remember her chest was weak. When she caught the flu it was all over very quickly.’

  ‘Oh, I’m …’ Leo was about to make the conventional reply but closed her mouth on it. She was not sorry and they would all know it was a lie. Instead she turned to Sasha. ‘But you … Where? How …?’

  He put his arm round her. ‘It’s too long a tale to be told in a sentence. Come in and sit down by the fire.’

  ‘I’ll take Alexandra to the nursery and play with her,’ the countess said. ‘You two have so much to say to each other.’ She took the child’s hand. ‘Come, Lexi. Let’s see if Cook had made any more of t
hose nice biscuits, shall we?’

  Alexandra allowed herself to be led away and Leo almost ran after her but Sasha recognised the impulse and held her back. ‘There will be plenty of time later. Come and sit down.’

  The countess looked over her shoulder. ‘I’ll tell them to send in some refreshments. I’m sure Leonora must be hungry.’

  Sasha led her into a room lined with bookshelves and they sat side by side on a couch in front of a wood fire.

  ‘Now, tell me, please!’ Leo begged. ‘When I saw you just now I thought I was dreaming.’

  ‘I understand,’ he replied. ‘I hadn’t prayed, exactly, because I thought it was pointless, but when I saw you standing there it felt like a miracle.’

  ‘But who told you I was dead?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s all part of the long story I have to tell you. Please, try not to blame me for letting you suffer for so long. Not only did I not know you were alive, I didn’t know myself for months.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘What were you told about my supposed death?’

  ‘That you had been mortally wounded in a battle near Lavci and that the fighting was so fierce they couldn’t even bring your body back.’

  He nodded. ‘That makes sense, but I remember nothing. My first recollection is of coming round in a Bulgarian hospital and not knowing who I was or how I got there. Does that seem possible to you?’

  ‘Perfectly possible. I’ve nursed enough badly wounded men to know that it can happen. But memory usually comes back in a day or two.’

  ‘It didn’t for me. But what made it worse was that I had been stripped of everything that might have identified me.’