Miss Lily’s Lovely Ladies

by Jackie French

  ‘I … see.’

  ‘Unless I’m blind, of course,’ he added conversationally. ‘They can’t send back a blind man. Though, come to think of it, it would make precious little difference. Nothing but smoke and dark when you go over the top. And mud. Don’t need eyes for that.’

  She sat, unable to find words.

  The man across the room said, ‘Be kind to her, man. Pay no attention to him, miss.’

  ‘I …’ She took a breath. ‘No, he’s correct. You’ve faced all that for people like me. The least I can do is hear what it’s like.’

  Silence stretched through the room. She had said the wrong thing, though she had no idea why it had been wrong.

  At last the bandaged-face man said, ‘Don’t worry yourself, girl. We volunteered, each man in this room. If it’s not the war we thought it would be, it’s no fault of yours. And we fight it so you don’t have to see what it’s like.’ He reached out, searching for her hand. She gave it to him. ‘Feed me my rice pudding, and I’ll behave myself.’

  She held a spoonful up to the gap in his bandages, relieved when she saw he could open his mouth wider within them. The door opened and Alison came in carrying a tray with six glasses and the whisky decanter. Blaise sees everything, thought Sophie.

  ‘Ah, that’s the stuff to give the troops,’ said the man opposite admiringly.

  ‘Didn’t seem fair,’ said Alison.

  ‘Whisky for one and not for all.’ ‘Whisky now, or after the pudding?’ Sophie asked the man with the bandaged face.

  He was silent.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I really need the bedpan,’ he said reluctantly. ‘I don’t suppose you could ring for a VAD?’

  ‘We don’t have any VADs yet. I think the War Office is going to send some. I can handle a bedpan.’

  It wasn’t true. She had no idea how to hold a bedpan, how a wounded man would manage it. But somehow bedpans seemed … realer than spooning prunes and custard.

  ‘Just the bottle this time, not the pan.’

  She looked at the table by the bed and saw what he meant, a wide-mouthed pottery jar.

  What next? Just as she thought it, he pushed aside the bedclothes and rolled onto his side. Even without the lessons of Miss Lily’s book — and books at home — it was obvious where to hold the bottle. She waited till the trickling finished, was glad to see no wiping was necessary, then put the bottle back on the table for a maid to collect, covering it with its starched cloth.

  She stayed with him while he sipped the whisky.

  ‘More tomorrow,’ she promised.

  ‘For breakfast?’

  ‘Don’t push it, my lad.’ She tried to sound like Miss Thwaites.

  He chuckled. ‘How old are you?’

  ‘As old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth.’

  At least when she pushed the trolley from the room two of them were laughing.

  Chapter 42

  Now I lay me down to sleep.

  I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

  Sophie stared at the man in front of her. Lucky Doris, to only have to scrub.

  The man had no face.

  She had faced blood and wounds in the past month, but this man was beginning to heal.

  To what?

  His eyes were gone; they were a sheet of shiny tissue. Most of his nose had vanished too, though somehow his nostrils had been kept open. His scalp was a skull, hairless. No hair would ever grow there again.

  But he had a mouth, twisted, almost lipless. How had he survived? And then: Dear Lord, how will he live now?

  The man turned his stump of head towards her. One ear, she thought. At least he has an ear.

  I can’t do this, she thought. And then: He has to. Every day of every year, if he survives. He has no choice.

  She looked at the slate bearing his name and rank at the end of the bed.

  ‘Good morning, Sergeant Brandon.’ Her voice, she was glad to hear, wasn’t just steady. She had never worked so hard to make it even slightly flirtatious. My smile has to be in my voice, she thought. ‘I’m Miss Higgs.’

  She touched his hand lightly to let him know she had sat down by the bed. A fingertip stroke, reminding herself as well as him that he was still a man. His hands were scar-free: recent calluses, but not a manual labourer’s hands. ‘I know it’s most improper,’ she lowered her voice, ‘but call me Sophie.’

  ‘Yes, miss.’

  She had made him say ‘yes’, at least. She touched his hand lightly again. ‘Perhaps when we know each other better. Is there anything you’d like me to read to you? I brought a book. Three Men in a Boat. It’s very funny.’

  He hesitated. ‘If you don’t mind, miss, I’m not one for laughing at the moment.’

  ‘I … I’m sorry, I thought …’

  ‘Seeing as I’ll never see a boat again. Won’t see nothing, ever, will I?’

  ‘No, Sergeant Brandon.’ But he hadn’t drawn his hand away from hers.

  Try to be the other person.

  She asked desperately, ‘What did you do before the war?’

  ‘I did the accounts, miss, in my uncle’s factory.’

  ‘Really? My father has a factory.’ She didn’t mention that there was more than one. ‘He cans corned beef. What does your uncle make?’

  ‘Corsets, miss.’

  Was there the smallest hint of a smile in the twisted mouth?

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘Well, Sergeant, you may never see a corset again, but thank God you’ll still be able to feel what’s inside them.’

  She had shocked him, as she hoped. ‘Miss!’ His stumpy fingers touched the scar on his face. ‘Not like this, I won’t.’

  ‘No, not like that.’ Would the truth help every man? She doubted it. Yet she thought it was what this one needed. ‘But the scarring will fade in the end. And if you wear a cap pulled right down, it will be hidden.’

  ‘You think any woman would want a husband hidden in a cap? One who has no eyes?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Sophie steadily. ‘If that’s the worst you can offer them. I’ve known women to stand by men who beat them, who starved their children to pay for drink. You think your face is worse than that?’

  ‘You’re supposed to be cheering me up,’ said Sergeant Brandon.

  ‘Well, aren’t you smiling?’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘You know damn well you are. Pardon my French,’ she added. ‘That ain’t French. I been there.’

  ‘I know you have.’ She tightened her hold on his fingers. ‘Sergeant Brandon … forgive me … I’ve no idea how I’m supposed to talk to you. Thank you for telling me I was making a hash of it. I might have made an even worse hash if you hadn’t been honest with me now. Chattering away while —’

  ‘While we screamed inside and tried to smile?’

  ‘Yes. Sergeant, you said you did accounts. My governess once showed me a thing called an abacus.’

  ‘I seen an abacus once. Don’t know how they use it, but.’

  ‘I don’t either. But there must be books. Maybe if there’s one in the library here I could read it to you. It would be better than Three Men in a Boat.’

  ‘You think I could use an abacus?’ he asked. ‘Do the accounts, even if I can’t see?’

  ‘I don’t know. Someone would have to read out numbers to you, but anyone can do that. It takes experience to do a factory’s accounts. I know that much. Do you think it might work? Every factory in the land is crying out for help,’ she added. ‘Your uncle would be glad to have you back.’ Please, God, let that be right, she prayed. Don’t let me give this man hope then take it away.

  There was a moment’s silence, then: ‘Won’t know if I don’t try, will I, miss?’

  ‘No.’ She paused. ‘We’ll need to get you an abacus first. Some of the men are doing carpentry down in the ballroom. The rector is teaching them. Maybe they could make one if I can find a book about them.’

  ‘What doe
s a rector know about woodwork?’

  ‘About as much as I do about an abacus.’

  ‘Or them generals know about how to run a war.’

  20 November 1914

  Dear Dad and Miss Thwaites,

  I received your two cables. Please understand: I can’t come home right now. For the first time in my life I am truly needed.

  Her Grace is wonderful, but she is nearly seventy, and caring for hundreds of wounded men is so far beyond anything she has known. She has aged dreadfully in the last month, or maybe is so tired one sees how old she really is. Alison’s husband is overseas, as is His Grace.

  The army is supposed to have taken charge of the medical side, but the lord lieutenant has only managed to procure one medical officer, Major Tindal, and Lieutenant Gladders and Sergeant Morris, who do the paperwork. The doctor Mr Slithersole found is needed back at his own hospital — he is now the only doctor there. Lieutenant Gladders is recovering from a hit he took at Mons, and may be transferred back to the front when he is recovered. I think that without the intervention of the lieutenant colonel of the county we wouldn’t even have them.

  Mr Slithersole’s nurses are training four of the farmers’ daughters from the estate in how to dress wounds. I have persuaded Major Tindal not to sign off some of the men who have recovered and who are willing to help as orderlies, lifting patients and doing other heavy work. Any who wish to go back to the front of course we allow to return there.

  The family — I am included in the family now — has moved into the pensioners’ wing, along with the servants who are too old to help on the wards. Blaise the butler is most upset, as we have now far less sumptuous quarters than he and the cook and housekeeper do. But we have what they don’t have: privacy.

  The patients wear a sort of uniform now: ghastly blue suits with red ties that make them look like shoe salesmen. The enlisted men are in wards in the ballroom and hall and reception areas, and the officers are two to six per room in the upstairs bedrooms.

  Dad, thank you for your help. I know this costs a lot, and you know that I don’t just mean money. But please don’t ask me to come home again. The army seems to regard the wounded as just a nuisance, which I suppose they are to those who direct the battles. They ship them away from the front and then leave it to the Red Cross or volunteers to get them to where they need to go. We had a telegram two days ago, saying that two hundred and forty more men would arrive on the quarter past two train. Just that, no nurses or stretchers. Anyway, we were there to meet the train, but no men, two hundred and forty or otherwise. It was a good thing we waited, though, as a special came an hour later; I am sure the poor men it held would have simply been unloaded onto the last platform and left there until the stationmaster telephoned us, had we left.

  Please give my love to all at Thuringa, and my very best indeed to those who have enlisted. When you send them comfort parcels from home, which I’m sure Miss Thwaites has organised, could you say they are from me too? And truthfully, they are better with socks or balaclavas knitted by someone else. Her Grace knits whenever she has a spare moment, but the only sock I tried to knit had enough holes to put five feet into. Forgive me for staying here, but please understand.

  Your loving,

  Sophie

  Two letters for Sophie lay beside her place at breakfast: porridge and crumbly toast these days, with oats, bran or even potato added to the bread.

  The first letter had a Swiss postmark. She opened it, blinking back tears so the maid didn’t see. At least Hannelore was alive. The letter was brief, a paragraph talking about the autumn weather, and sending her love. There was no return address. Please let her be away from the Russians, Sophie thought. She almost certainly was not in neutral Switzerland, but had somehow managed to get a letter out from there. But please let her stay safe.

  The other letter was from James Lorrimer.

  4 December 1914

  My dear Miss Higgs,

  I hope you will forgive my tardiness in replying to your last letter. Please also forgive the brevity of this note — in truth I have been fifty-two hours without sleep already and there is another meeting before I might, with luck, find something resembling dinner.

  I am really writing to say that despite all, you have been in my thoughts. If it is at all possible, and if Her Grace has no objections, I would very much like to see you. (You will realise, I know, that I may not find the time to come.) I have heard of your sterling work at Wooten. I pray God that we have better news from France soon.

  Yours always,

  James Lorrimer

  Not a declaration of love, but one of respect, perhaps. You will realise.

  Yes, she thought. I realise.

  No letter from Miss Lily. She did not expect one: there had been none since war was declared, but even so every morning she felt a slight devastation to find that none had arrived.

  She wrote to her, nonetheless, at Shillings — day-by-day accounts of life at Wooten — hoping that wherever Miss Lily was the letters would still reach her. None said what she desperately needed to say …

  Dear Miss Lily, a few months ago I felt at the heart of everything. Now I don’t think there is any woman in England who has any power at all. Even the Queen is helpless, except to make speeches at munitions factories …

  Dear Miss Lily, I was a success, wasn’t I? And it was wonderful, for a time. Will there ever be a time as carefree as that again?

  Dear Miss Lily, we lost. War has come and sometimes I think it may never go away.

  But there would be Christmas at Shillings. She clung to that.

  She put the letter at Her Grace’s place for her to read — as Sophie’s chaperone, nominally at least, it was still her duty to read all Sophie’s letters except those from her father — and took a last gulp of tea before going back to work, but just then Alison came in, her face pale. Sophie looked at her. ‘Mouse, are you all right?’

  Alison glanced around to check they were alone. ‘I’m breeding.’

  For a second Sophie thought she meant dogs, and wondered at the waste of time. No! ‘You’re going to have a baby? Why didn’t you tell us before?! Oh, dear Mouse. I’m so very glad.’

  Alison was smiling. ‘I wanted to be sure. There was so much death and horror I felt as if a baby couldn’t be born. But I don’t feel like that now. It’s as though the child is meant to be, don’t you think? It means that Philip will be all right, that one day we will have a home and a normal life …’

  It meant none of those things; it meant nothing at all just yet, except that Sophie would have to make sure Alison rested, and was kept away from infection. She would need to find another woman to help too. One of the farmers’ daughters? But they were doing men’s jobs already.

  ‘I wrote to Philip this morning. I wish he hadn’t chosen to go to France, but I’m proud of him too. It’s so good that I can make him happy with this.’

  Sophie stood and hugged her. ‘I’m glad as well. Have you told your grandmother?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘It will be good news for her too,’ said Sophie softly. ‘Good news at last.’

  Her seventh week on the wards. Sergeant Brandon was pushing the beads on his abacus, his lips moving as he counted.

  ‘How is it going?’

  He knew her voice by now. ‘I think I’m getting it. Miss, I’ve had a letter. From my uncle, I think. Would you mind reading it to me?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  She shut her eyes briefly. Please let it be good news. She read through it quickly before she spoke.

  ‘What is it? Come on, I know you’ve read it by now.’

  ‘He … he says if you think you can still do the job, he’ll give you a go.’

  Silence. ‘Can’t say fairer than that, can he?’

  ‘You can do it,’ said Sophie. ‘He says there’s a girl who’ll read the figures out to you.’

  ‘As long as she don’t run screaming at the sight of me.’

  ‘She won�
��t if she wants to keep her job,’ said Sophie. She wondered if one of His Grace’s silk smoking caps would fit Sergeant Brandon.

  He snorted. ‘You don’t spare a man, do you?’

  ‘When she sees you the first time she’ll only see the scarring. When she sees you the second, you’ll be nice Mr Brandon with the scar. But the third time, if you play your cards right, you’ll just be nice Mr Brandon.’ Who had said something like that to her? Miss Lily, of course. Just over a year ago …

  Where was Miss Lily now? Her Grace might know.

  Christmas, remembered Sophie. I am going to Shillings for Christmas. They said the war would be over by then.

  She doubted it. You didn’t go through all this for a war that only lasted a few months.

  ‘I’ll read you the whole letter now,’ she said. ‘Dear Bertie …’

  Chapter 43

  Letters are always an adventure.

  Miss Lily, 1914

  Christmas: carol singers to organise for the men; the children would sing only outside the doors, in case a child looked at a soldier in horror, or even screamed. Puddings that were half carrot and parsnip, boiled in the same copper they used for cleaning bandages. Somehow they would give these men Christmas.

  Sophie sent a Christmas card to James Lorrimer and received a brief note within a card in return, signed Yours always by a man who obviously wasn’t, or not entirely, at least not just now. She also posted a cake to Dodders, and a letter to her father and Miss Thwaites, with a sketch that one of the patients had done of her, roughly framed. Her father sent hampers, via Mr Slithersole, of Harrods luxuries taken for granted before the war, and equally taken for granted as unnecessary now: crystallised fruit; giant hams; Gentleman’s Relish; marmalade — how had Mr Slithersole managed that, with both sugar and oranges no longer imported?; marzipan fancies … enough not just for the household, but also to share with the men.

  And then, a week before Christmas, a small parcel and two letters — one hand familiar, one not, the second with the Shillings seal on it.

  The earl. She picked his up, not Miss Lily’s, hands trembling. She could think of only two reasons why the earl might write to her: if Miss Lily had died after writing the letter that now lay in front of her; or if, just possibly, Miss Lily had been imprisoned as a spy, after Emily and Mr Porton between them had worked out that it was Miss Lily, not the missing valet, who had taken the plans for that unknown weapon.