War Girls

by Adele Geras

  On a fine spring morning two weeks later they received an order to move the ambulance base to Amiens. They were expected there the next day. The girls were beginning to check the engines and load the vans with supplies when George’s truck hurtled into the yard.

  ‘Albert has fallen! You must leave immediately!’

  Supervisor Thomson was a calm, practical woman. Within minutes the unit was lined up to go. ‘Keep as close as possible to the vehicle in front and only sound the horn if absolutely necessary. I will be in the lead ambulance. Captain Taylor, would you like to travel at the rear?’

  ‘I cannot go with you,’ said George. ‘There’s a hospital train on its way down here. I need to drive to the unmanned signal box at Fernaut and change the points to re-route it north-west.’

  ‘But that means driving towards Albert!’ Merle could not keep the concern from her voice.

  George was already walking towards his truck. Supervisor Thomson called after him. ‘Captain Taylor, I suppose you are aware that Fernaut is directly in the path of the enemy advance?’

  ‘I am aware of that fact. But I am also aware of my duty to try to protect the hospital train. Your ambulances don’t move as fast as my truck. I’ll wager I can change the points at Fernaut and catch up with you before you reach Amiens.’

  ‘He shouldn’t go alone.’ Merle turned to her supervisor. ‘I’d like to go with Captain Taylor.’

  ‘You certainly will not.’ George’s reply was abrupt.

  ‘Why do you say that?’ Mrs Thomson asked him. ‘Common sense dictates that two people are more likely to succeed.’

  ‘We don’t put our women in the Front Line …’

  ‘War has put us where we are, and we women must also do our duty as we see it. This is an emergency situation. Miss Stevenson is an experienced motor driver with some medical qualifications, who has shown she can operate in extreme conditions. She’d be an asset on your mission. The personal documents carried by Miss Stevenson identify her as Red Cross personnel. If captured, her safety is guaranteed by International Law.’

  Merle rushed to hug Grace and was in the passenger seat of the truck as her supervisor finished speaking. Silently George got in beside her and drove away from the base.

  It was only when the signal box came into view that George eventually spoke to her. In a tight voice he said, ‘You are a very determined woman, Miss Stevenson.’

  Merle thought it best not to reply.

  ‘And brave too.’

  At Fernaut, George parked the truck and they crossed the railway tracks and climbed up to the box. The crash of artillery was the loudest Merle had ever heard – and it was coming closer. From their vantage point they could see the sky in the east livid with flame. They could also see the train snaking its way towards them.

  George had been given a set of written instructions by the manager of the railway depot, who had elected to remain behind to facilitate any Allied retreat movements. George moved the levers as Merle read the instructions aloud.

  ‘The train should come past us and then veer right towards Abbeville,’ George told her. ‘We’ll get back in the truck and watch it go.’

  The sniper caught them as they were re-crossing the railway line. A flick of wind and a double snap of sound. George’s body jerked. He staggered and fell. Merle flung herself flat on the ground. The bullet had entered above his right elbow and exited through his hand. His fingers were a pulp of blood and broken bone. Merle pulled out the emergency dressing she kept in her pocket and tied it round his wound.

  Beneath them the tracks were vibrating with the approach of the train, but he made no attempt to move. She looked at him. Blood was oozing from a tear in his trouser leg. There had been two rifle reports. He’d been shot twice and couldn’t stand up. He was grimacing in pain, but still lucid. ‘Go!’ he ordered her.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Please.’

  ‘No,’ she said again. The rails were thrumming all along the line.

  ‘I can’t get on my feet.’

  ‘You can crawl.’ She spoke in the firm, encouraging tone she’d heard nurses use with patients half mad with shell shock. ‘Together we can crawl off this track.’

  He put his arm round her shoulder and pushed down with his unharmed foot to help her as she hauled him over the first rail. ‘One more and we’re there,’ she said. ‘Come on!’ With a huge effort she heaved him up and onto the cinder at the edge of the track.

  The train was upon them, their faces inches from the wheels as it roared past.

  ‘We have to hurry!’ Merle shouted in his ear. The sniper was on the signal-box side of the track. The passing train was shielding them from him – but only for another few seconds.

  Half dragging him, she got to the truck and hefted him up inside. She started the engine. The last carriage went past and the train veered off on its altered course towards the north. She engaged the clutch and they rocketed forwards onto the road to Amiens.

  The Germans must be moving forward very fast, she thought. The air shook as the shells flew overhead, followed by a resounding crump and a shudder. Where were they landing? There had been talk that the enemy had a gun with enough power to hit Paris. They had sent snipers on ahead … and what else? Merle forced the thought of flamethrowers from her mind. She positioned the truck in the middle of the road and vowed nothing would stop her.

  She kept talking to George to keep him awake and conscious. He was propped against the passenger door, but she knew that he was losing blood and probably going into shock. She gabbled on about her life. She asked him questions about his own. Now she could see the outskirts of the town, the sandbagged defences. Almost there!

  Then she heard the buzz of an aeroplane above and behind her.

  Merle guessed what the pilot was doing – signalling to his own artillery the location of the Amiens gun emplacements. He swooped low so that she would see him. She’d heard that the airmen were disinclined to strafe running men and if she got out he’d see that she wasn’t a combatant. She glanced at George. His head was slumped on his chest. He couldn’t run anywhere, and even if she could help him down from the cab in time, he wouldn’t be capable of walking to Amiens. His only chance was if she could reach the city in the truck. She put her foot on the accelerator pedal and pressed it to the floor.

  The pilot gained height to bank, change direction and line himself up with his target.

  Merle watched the plane begin its manoeuvre and saw the pilot’s intention. On an impulse she swung the truck over to one side of the road. Not much of an edge, but better than nothing.

  The pilot centred the crosshairs and began his run in. The plane came screaming towards the truck. Merle held her nerve. As the pilot opened fire she spun the wheel and slewed across the road. The windscreen cracked, bullets battered the outside plating. But she was still driving. She was still driving! It would take the plane several minutes to return, but there was the city and the outward defence posts, and there were soldiers – Allied soldiers, waving frantically at her. She was clear. She had made it through. She was close enough now to hear them yelling, to hear what they were saying: ‘Incoming shells! Incoming shells! Get off the road! Get off the road!’

  Merle wrenched the wheel round.

  Twenty seconds too late.

  She awoke to find Grace sitting by her bed, holding her hand.

  ‘You’ve been out for almost ten days,’ she said. ‘Concussion, broken ribs, multiple abrasions.’

  Merle had no memory of what had happened. Her only recollection was of a blinding white light, and then utter darkness. ‘And George?’ She was frightened to say his name. ‘How is George?’

  ‘He’s alive.’

  Merle began to cry. Grace stroked her forehead until she fell asleep.

  Weeks passed while Merle slowly became fully aware of the world around her and could absorb the information Grace brought. The Allies had stopped the enemy advance outside Amiens. The German supply line was so far to their
rear that it could no longer support their forward troops. Although Albert was still being looted, they were running out of food and ammunition.

  ‘Intelligence reports say that the ordinary soldier wants peace,’ said Grace. ‘It’s estimated that, by summer, their commanders will ask to agree an armistice.’

  They were back in Calais where George was having specialist dental surgery.

  ‘The right side of his face, his cheek and jaw, are smashed,’ Grace told Merle. ‘He’s lost the three middle digits from his right hand. And …’ She hesitated.

  ‘And, what?’ Merle looked at her friend. ‘We’ve been through so much together. Please tell me the truth.’

  ‘Between operations he’s being treated by a psychiatrist,’ said Grace. ‘He’s very depressed. He doesn’t sleep well, barely eats.’

  When she was well enough to walk, Merle collected her drawing satchel from Grace and went to visit George.

  ‘They tell me that you’re in a sorry state,’ she said as she sat down beside his bed.

  The nurse drew in her breath and gave Merle a sharp look before she left them.

  ‘Not a pretty sight,’ George joked, but there were tears in his eyes.

  ‘You did say that you found shaving tiresome.’ Merle gestured with her hand. ‘You must grow a beard.’

  ‘And that takes care of things, does it?’ he asked. ‘You think I’ll look as good as new with a beard?’

  Merle studied his face. ‘You might look even better, if it’s the same colour as your hair,’ she said softly. ‘I’ve always wanted to capture that particular shade of gold.’

  There was a silence in the room. Merle held George’s gaze.

  ‘And this?’ He held up his right hand, which had only a little finger and thumb. ‘What do I do with this?’

  Merle opened her satchel. She took out her drawing chalks and scattered them over his bedcovers. Then, one by one, she began to snap them in half.

  Ghost Story

  by Matt Whyman

  Ghost Story

  In 1915, with the Western Front in stalemate, the Allies turned their attention to the Black Sea. This largely landlocked ocean is linked to the Aegean Sea, and the Atlantic beyond, by a narrow strait through Turkey. By taking out the Turks as they prepared to back Germany in the war effort, the Allies believed they could free up access to vital grain stores mounting in the Russian ports of Odessa, Sevastopol and Feodosia.

  The Gallipoli peninsula forms one side of the strait. Despite the rough and inhospitable terrain, where beaches fronted steep ridges, the Allies believed that victory here would be easy. What they underestimated was the fierce determination of the Turkish army.

  Despite the aid of naval bombardments, the Australian, New Zealand and British troops were forced, on landing, into a siege that proved impossible to break. As a consequence, the campaign proved to be one of the greatest disasters of the First World War. Over half a million soldiers from both sides lost their lives in the nine months before the Allies finally withdrew, with many dying from disease.

  On their return from Gallipoli, some Allied soldiers claimed that they had come under fire from female snipers. Their testimonies are heartfelt and compelling, even if historians counter that the facts have been lost to the fog of war. With no evidence beyond eyewitness accounts, we can only imagine what might have led a markswoman to emerge on the front line.

  We are like birds perched in the pine trees. Unlike the sparrows and the siskins, however, we are silent. When we sing, we will do so with a bullet.

  My fellow sniper, up here in the branches, is more of a boy than a man. I am old enough to be his mother. Not that I can say for sure Timur knows the truth about me. Through his eyes, I might be just another soldier in an army that will fight to the death to protect Turkish land. Defeat is not in our nature. Sacrifice is all, and I have already crossed that line.

  ‘They are close,’ he whispers urgently, and then gestures at the farmhouse in the clearing beyond the trees. ‘You were right!’

  I do not reply. Timur can see that I have heard him because I peer down the sights of my rifle. The dwelling has been shelled. It used to be a secure and comfortable place to live. I know this for a fact because once it was my home. Not any more. To lose one family member in battle is a tragedy. To lose two means war. So now I look at the place in a different light. Through enemy eyes, those of the soldiers seeking to push inland. I have no doubt that they will be drawn inside. After months of existing in a rat run of trenches and channels, even a derelict building will appear enticing. It also provides me with the perfect lure to bring them into my crosshair.

  Before the first figure emerges from the thicket on the far side of the clearing, the crackle of twigs gives away his position. I find the soldier in my sights as he crawls into the sunshine, but do not shoot. My companion and I have agreed a procedure to ensure the highest kill count. The Allies took the lives of my husband and then my son in the space of a month. They did not leave behind a widow, however. They awakened a warrior.

  I had been staying with my cousin, some miles from the front line, when news arrived that there was nothing more for me to lose. She collapsed on hearing that my dear boy had fallen, just as I had when I learned that his father had died. This time, I felt nothing. I had already been through every emotion within the spectrum of grief. My heart and soul had perished with my family, which is when I made the decision to return home.

  When the Allies landed on our shores, and looked up the scarps, it seemed they thought the climb would be their greatest challenge. Instead, our troops have been courageous in keeping them pinned to the slopes and the beach. Of course, the enemy reacted like a trapped wildcat. For months they have fought to break through, probing every gulley and gorge, and then mounting assaults through day and night, but we continue to hound them ferociously.

  The crackle of gunfire grew more intense as I drifted back. It was chaos, with the walking wounded urging me to turn around. The front line was no place for a woman, they said. It was no place for anyone, I thought to myself, and continued on my way. I could have claimed to be delivering munitions and supplies like so many other girls who refused to stay away. Instead, I just ignored such questioning and drifted on. Quite simply, I was compelled to be in the place where my family once felt safe. I didn’t flinch or cower at the howl of mortars launching. I was already dead in my mind. Among those who witnessed me as I floated by, always looking straight ahead, some would’ve been forgiven for thinking they had witnessed a wraith.

  By early afternoon, I had reached forested slopes. It was cooler under the canopy of branches and leaves, while the moths and dragonflies that flitted through the beams of light were at odds with the din. From the other side of the ridge, the crackle of traded shots told me just how close I had come to the front line. Here, the two sides had dug in, facing one another in a ragged ribbon that ran for mile upon mile along the peninsula. Death had come to dwell here, striking as mercilessly as the mosquitoes, and yet I gave no thought to my welfare. I just followed a path through the trees that I knew would take me to the farmhouse. My determination to reach home grew stronger with every step. Despite the dangers, it was all I wanted. I had no plans beyond this, until something stopped me in my tracks as if presented from on high.

  The body, when I came across it, was enshrouded by blowflies. The way the soldier was sprawled under the tree, with his limbs at odds with their joints and his cap some distance across the forest floor, made it quite clear that he had fallen from the branches. The bullet wound to his neck told me what had prompted him to drop. That the blood was still slick suggested that this had happened only recently. His nose and mouth were obscured by a cotton scarf but I could see through the glaze in his eyes that this was just a boy. Another son now lost to us all, and I looked upon him as a mother in spirit. For the first time since I had left my cousin’s home, I sensed an emotion rise within me; an anger that lifted the hairs on the back of my neck.

  T
he soldier wore a tunic fashioned from a rough green blanket, daubed in mud just like his face and tied round his waist with a belt. A sniper rifle lay just beyond his reach, bound in filthy strips of cotton to dull the gleam. I peered up and around. The trees overlooked a ravine with a narrow view of the sea beyond. From the canopy, it offered a clear shot at the enemy should they seek to push forward from the shoreline. I returned my attention to the ground. Slowly, despite the malevolent buzzing all around, I dropped to my knees and prepared to honour the boy by laying him to rest.

  When I finally continued on my way, I left behind a mound of dried leaves and twigs that I had swept together using my hands. It was the best I could do under the circumstances. I carried the rifle over my shoulder. In the pocket of the tunic, which I had pulled on, I found a box of bullets. With the scarf around my nose and mouth, and my hair tucked tightly under the cap, I didn’t just feel different in my appearance. Where there had been nothing in my mind beyond an instinct to go home, I walked now with a sense of determination. The boots were too big for me, of course, but I refused to falter. With the blanket, scarf and rifle, even the soil I had scrubbed across my face to complete my camouflage, it felt as if I carried the soul not just of the fallen soldier but all those who had died for this cause, including my husband and son. It meant I had memories for company, which served as both a torment and a blessing.

  My poor boy was uppermost in my mind when I heard sobbing. The sound was clear despite the gunfire over the ridge, and evidently close by. Immediately, I dropped out of sight in the bracken. When I heard it again, someone trying hard to stifle their emotions, I crawled towards the source. In a glade to my right, I saw a young soldier sitting with his back to a tree and a long rifle across his lap. He kept rubbing his face with both hands; angered, it seemed, by his loss of composure. Like the boy I had buried not thirty yards back, he used a muddy green blanket to blend into the foliage. Straight away, I knew he had just lost a companion.