Two Women Went to War

by L E Pembroke

  We were having afternoon tea in one of the nice little tea shops in Knightsbridge – one of my favourite haunts, especially since the death of my grandmother and the sale of the Eaton Square home.

  Once again, I worried aloud about whether or not I was doing the right thing, especially as it was only two years since Charlie was killed. I told Genevieve how unbearably lonely I was these days and asked her to be honest with me. Would she travel across the world to meet up with a chap and perhaps marry him when she knew full well she didn’t love him?

  She said she couldn’t possibly answer that as we were such very different people and she didn’t think our needs were at all similar. Genevieve said that I often complained that I needed a male protector, having grown up without a father.

  ‘My father was both loving and protective. He was a model father; I never felt the need of someone else to protect me. No, Madeleine, I wouldn’t even think of marrying someone I didn’t love. Madeleine, Tom loves you deeply. He will always care for you, and the least you can do is to give him a chance. Please do your best to put Charles out of your mind.’

  CHAPTER 18

  CHARLES

  ‘Let’s see what you remember, old chap. Speak to us with your hands. Tell us in your own time.’

  Slowly, I did my best to remember the sequence of events that began in April 1917 and translate that knowledge to my doctors with the help of my tutor in signing. Not being able to speak normally, I didn’t relish the thought of embarrassing them with my toneless grunting.

  *

  I am jolting along on a rough road aware of being freezing cold, although only half-aware that my body is cramped, confined in some sort of small cart and hurting badly.

  A woman bends her head towards me. I think she wears a black shawl – she throws it over me. I don’t remember what happens next. Unconscious, I suppose. Later, I am sentient enough to observe that we reach a small house with a high-pitched roof set in the midst of farmland. A big strong woman picks me up and carries me into a room. She puts me down on a mat on a stone floor in front of a hot stove. The heat helps. I don’t know how long I stay there.

  Sensations begin to permeate my consciousness – fragments of comprehension, heat, sweat, pain, inability to use my left leg, impossible to lift my right arm. Moving, attempting to turn, even wriggling, causes instantaneous sharp pain in the left side of my chest. I heed my basic instincts. I lie still to eliminate the hurt, almost cowering like a badly treated dog.

  A round impassive face looms above me. A woman cradles me in her arms. She is trying to make me drink. I am aware that I crave fluid, but I am unable to swallow. The water slides down my chin. I want only to rest on the soft quilt she has now placed under me. My fingers explore my unclothed body. I am wearing only a cotton loin cloth padded with grass or grain.

  Time passes. I am becoming more aware of my environment. I know now that I cannot move my left leg because it is compressed between two wood planks and tied with hemp. Coughing – will it ever stop? I try to subdue the eruption, knowing it will ignite that stabbing pain in the side of my chest.

  I make a frightening discovery. I cannot talk, unable to make a comprehensible sound. When I open my mouth to say simple words such as “hungry, thirsty”, I am like a small baby or a dog; incapable of expressing the word or describing the feeling that my brain understands. I make a noise, not the shrill cry of an infant, but a guttural discordant sound that shocks me. I try to deduce the reason for this alarming situation. The effort is extreme although unsuccessful.

  My brain tells me it is too early. Thank God I haven’t lost my wits. Nourish the body, be patient; that is the first priority. Then I will have the strength to concentrate on my mind, my voice, my semi-paralysis and my lack of recall; for, during these weeks, my whole existence is the here and now.

  I am mostly unaware of the chill in the environment. She has created for me a snug permanent bed, close to the stove, comprising planking upon which she has placed feathered quilts. When she leaves the room each morning a momentary blast of bleak raw air swirls around my bed, but soon dissipates. I have no curiosity. I am too weak to think. Like a wounded animal – almost empty-headed – I wait for time to heal my body.

  I don’t know how long I have been in this house but after either days or weeks I experience a growing sense of discomfort. Although I have eaten very little, I become aware that I have outgrown the loin cloth she fashioned for me. My torment is extreme. I try to tell her, but the noises issuing from my mouth are like the croak of a frog or the growl of a bear. I rub my abdomen and moan.

  She covers me by pinning a quilt around my shoulders and sets to work on the difficult task of getting me upright enough to take my first steps. I am too weak, I stumble. My leg is still in her home-made splints. She almost carries me outside to the deep hole surrounded with a rim of concrete.

  I am a creature unable to speak and lost in a strange world, but I still have feelings, specifically humiliation at being assisted to that deep hole in the ground and positioned above it, legs splayed out and right arm hanging uselessly. That is the sort of experience I don’t want to repeat too often. How mortifying it is to be totally dependent on others.

  I have little idea of the passage of time. My routine is immutable. Morning porridge while she supports me in a sitting position. And, again in the evening, she holds me so I can sip at the gruel which bubbles on the stove. The pain has lessened; the worst aspect of my life is that uncomfortable and embarrassing daily journey to the latrine.

  The days lengthen, the air mild. The break in my leg has repaired. I walk with a noticeable limp. First, just around the room, and soon I am strong enough to get out without help. I take in my environment and try to make sense of my primitive surroundings.

  I taste but do not enjoy our food. It bubbles on the black stove. It is a concoction of pulses, grain and vegetables simmering throughout the day until individual items soften, disintegrate, lose flavour and become a coagulated mess of pottage. We drink milk.

  I smell – the pulverised food, dirt, dust, staleness and body odour, both hers and mine.

  *

  Time passes. When I am able to limp about our habitat, I explore the barn, which is part of the house. I smell the malodorous emanations from the animals that sleep there. The ox, scrawny cow, under-sized goat, all barely sustained by an inadequate diet of grass lacking nutrition. And hens perched in dark corners, lacking vitality, sitting out each day, once in a while producing an egg – waiting for soothing death.

  A glint of memory emerges, but I can’t for the life of me lift the veil a little further. I know I have seen such pitiful sights before and smelt that stink of animals overworked and underfed.

  I can hear; not a lot to hear, though. I hear her muttering in the morning when she descends the ladder-like steps from her attic above our kitchen. I don’t go up there. I hear birdsong, the screech of a rooster greeting a new day, the discontented low of the ox.

  We have no neighbours. We are just two humans living together in a near-silent world. I try to communicate and have some success. I point at her and hope she sees the question in my facial expression. She is not unintelligent.

  ‘Berta’ or ‘Bertha’ – something like that, she says. I am unable to reciprocate. She climbs up to her bedroom and returns with an old Bible. I read on the fly leaf: ‘Henri Praat 1850; Pieter Praat 1881.’ There are other words, but I don’t understand their meaning.

  I deduce (because she wears a wide gold band on her sausage-like finger and because I think she must be about forty years old) that Pieter is or was her husband. Am I wearing his clothes? Both flannel shirt and woollen trousers are far too big for me – yet my boots fit perfectly. There’s a question.

  The onset of warmth coincides with the return of my physical health. My lack of memory, my limp, the cough and my hanging right arm are the obvious signs of the accident I do not remember. Every day I feel stronger. And, most important, I am thinking clearly, although I
am only thinking in the present. I try to assist her, simple jobs such as splitting wood with my left hand and mucking out the barn. I am now obsessed with my thoughts. Who am I? Why am I living with a woman who speaks a language unfamiliar to me? Are there other people about, and if not, why not?

  I cannot speak my thoughts so I decide to write them – clarify them – by taking a stick in my left hand and attempting to trace out, in the dirt, the simple question ‘Who am I?’ The stick travels over the ground like a pencil in the hand of an infant – leaving only indeterminate lines and whorls. Why are my thoughts not being translated to my voice or to my hands?

  One day she holds up a small mirror, and I see the ugly lumpy wound that I have felt running from my neck up to and beyond my left ear. Perhaps that is the explanation for my inability to talk, to use my right arm and to remember who and where I am. What sort of accident has left me a man with no past?

  I gesture, shrug, try to reveal my confusion. She points at me, grabs a straw broom, places it on her shoulder and marches around our room. I am unable to speak, but I am not dumb. I was a soldier. What soldier? From what country? I pull at my clothing; she understands I wish to see my uniform, which will reveal so much. She points to the stove; she has burnt my only means of identification.

  She then indicates by gesture and facial expression that away from my immediate surroundings there is danger. I understand that I should not leave this place for fear of my life. Why danger for me but not for her?

  I reach down and point to my well-fitting boots. She nods as if to say, ‘Yes, they are yours.’ I pull at the large-size clothing I wear. Once again she takes hold of the Bible and points to the name of Pieter Praat. I then point to his name and look in every direction. She straightens her back, once again places a broom on her shoulder and marches around our room. Her husband is a soldier, who might be dead or alive.

  Every two weeks or so she puts a sack of oats or beet into the handcart and disappears for a few hours. Her routine is immutable. She returns bringing potatoes, apples and other basic foodstuffs. Bartering, that’s what she is doing. What a simple life!

  *

  Again, bleak winter, dark at four. A lake of mud surrounds the house.

  Screeching sounds from outside pierce the silence of our kitchen. I know those sounds – squeal of brakes, slam of a car door. I hear a voice of authority. She rushes to the door, opens it a crack, peers out and quickly pushes it closed. She darts across the kitchen, throws my food (bowl and all) into the black pot. The body language and tone of her voice startle me. She indicates that I must get into the attic. I race, to the best of my ability, up the steps. Her bedroom is small and simply furnished – a bed and a cupboard beside it, hooks for clothes on the wall.

  Peering through a gap between the roughly hewn planks of the timber door, I see below a uniformed man striding into the kitchen. He sniffs at the contents of the pot on the stove, grimaces, then signals to Bertha to take a bowl of our broth outside. A clang of metal on metal resounds through the ice-cold evening. Someone trying to solve a problem with a motor? While she is outside he sits at our table; booted legs sprawl across its surface. He eats our bread and cheese and drinks from his flask of whisky. He has a pistol, which he has placed on the table.

  I think, ‘Arrogant Hun.’ I feel a coughing fit coming on. I move as far away from the door as possible, try to smother it. I hear those booted legs racing up the steps. I have nowhere to go. I stand mutely as he bursts through the door, pistol in hand.

  ‘Wie heisen sie?’ I suspect he is asking me who I am. A brief grunting sound emerges from my throat. He repeats his question. Bertha has arrived. She pulls at his arm, points to me, thumps her mouth and shakes her head.

  He hesitates. His eyes narrow; he inspects me from head to toe. ‘Englander?’ he asks with a rising inflexion, then ‘Nein’.

  ‘Belgian, Belgian!’ Bertha shrieks.

  I suppose he decides his suspicions are unfounded. He retreats down the ladder and strides from the house. Engine noise pierces the silence, and he is gone.

  Danger over. Together we stand at the bedroom door. We listen until all is silent. I turn to her, the woman to whom I owe my life, the woman who for a year has sustained me, been my sole companion, my nurse, my protector. I kiss her on both cheeks. She smiles. Tears glisten in her eyes. I think, ‘Bertha is a good woman.’ When she smiles, her goodness touches me. She is more than good. She is selfless, thoughtful and like me, lonely and unfulfilled. We are both desperate for comfort.

  I touch her face, dry her eyes. She cups my face in her hands. Silent, as always, we gaze at one another. Gently, I lift her hands from my face. I lead her into her room. We comfort one another.

  *

  From that day on, so much to think about. ‘Belgian’, ‘Englander’ and who was that man? I remember my angry thought when I saw him at our table eating our supper: ‘Arrogant Hun.’ Why did I think that?

  It is obvious that some of the past is knocking on the door of my conscious mind and that knowledge fills me with exultation. My memory will come back soon, I am sure of it. That man was a trigger to past events in my life. I now realise that I need to get out and about – find more triggers.

  There are no more memory breakthroughs for me during the following winter months. I wonder whether fear or shock on the night of the intruder acted as a stimulus. When the weather is better I will venture out. She intimates that there is danger, but I am compelled to take the risk. I will explore the surrounding country while she is out, ideally when she goes on one of her bartering trips.

  Two weeks later Bertha departs early, pushing the handcart containing a sack of oats. I leave soon after and walk along beside the narrow, dirt-ridged road in the opposite direction to the one she has taken. For an hour I limp along exhilarated by my freedom and lulled into a false sense of safety by the spring sun already well above the horizon.

  Unaccustomed noise; my sense of euphoria dissipates. The sound of singing. I leap to the side of the road, crouch behind a straggly hedgerow. Then around the bend soldiers appear wearing field grey with rifles slung on their shoulders, marching four abreast, led by others on horseback. I remain there hidden for quite some time. I am scared of being discovered, at the same time excited as my brain absorbs the constantly changing scene. Endless columns of soldiers, some on horses, mixed with numerous horse-drawn wagons pulling large guns, mounted on wheels. As I ponder what I am seeing, images of other similar scenes come into my mind’s eye; words leap out – caissons, artillery pieces. I am overwhelmed, ecstatic at having that sort of recondite knowledge.

  Then, I really notice my boots. They assume crucial importance to my understanding. I rip them off; why didn’t I do so before? With great difficulty, I read the faded, almost indecipherable words stamped on their interior leather in a language I understand. ‘Size 10.’ There are several other numbers that might indicate pattern or style and finally ‘Made in England’.

  She returns before I do. I can see she is anxious. We do not communicate. I have so much to think about. At last I have grasped the essential facts. I am a British soldier. I was wounded. She is Belgian, she saved me. Germans are the enemy. They occupy her country. If these are the facts, it seems strange to me that I remember none of it.

  *

  Time passes. Frequently I leave our home, hide amid roadside scrub and watch troop movements. Again autumnal chill pervades the earth. A period of chaos and disorder follows. Troops head north-east going back to where they had come from. Motor and horse-driven ambulances choke the roads. Weary, despondent-looking soldiers follow. Now, others, Belgian residents, no longer timid, stand watching. Silent onlookers watching defeated soldiers withdraw.

  For three days in a row I stand by an empty road in the bitter cold and realise it is over. The danger is gone. I will now seek my identity. They travelled to the east. I will travel to the west.

  I believe she will expect me to go. She has saved my life, but I must save my sanity.
I feel pity that she will revert to a life alone. Perhaps that is not so. If her husband is alive he will return to her. I dread the act of parting from her. She is outwardly aloof and unemotional. I have learnt that is not so. Bertha is a warm-blooded, caring and lonely woman. I wish I had a gift for her, but I have nothing, not even my own clothing – just a pair of boots.

  Back in her home, I signal that I believe the war is over by miming weary men trudging east. She nods, looks me in the eye. I sense her loneliness, her fear that her husband will not return, her dread that I too am preparing to go, leaving her to a life of solitude.

  I want to express my gratitude. I want to explain how necessary it is for me to find my family. Surely she must understand that, but all the niceties of communication are denied to me. I simply take her hands in mine and squeeze them. I hope she understands this meagre expression of gratitude. Her eyes fill with tears. She turns away.

  The following morning she watches as I put together a small bundle of food to sustain me for a few days. Bread, cheese, a few potatoes, a pack of waxed matches and some salt, along with a bottle of water from her well. She goes to the peg near the door and takes down a heavy felted jacket and beret that must belong or had belonged to her husband. She thrusts them at me, then together we leave the house. For more than a mile we walk together slowly, on the beginning of my arduous journey to find myself. On a section of road she stops, indicates to me that there on that spot by the side of the road I had once lain unconscious. It was there she had found me. I vow that I will see to it that she is financially compensated if and when I find my home and family.

  She points along the road in a south-westerly direction. I put out my hand to shake hers, but she turns and walks away.

  I walk west towards the setting sun and then turn south. I bypass a ruined city. My leg aches, my pace slows. I am determined nothing will stop me. For four nights I lie within secluded blackened copses, cook a potato on my open fire, consume it together with a small piece of bread and cheese, then curl up in a ball adjacent to the warmth.