Amy

by Peggy Savage

  She sat alone in their hut. Helen’s coat hung on the nail, her little possessions scattered about. Helen was gone, her cheerfulness and affection and sympathy were gone from a world that needed them so badly.

  Dan broke the rules and sat with her often in the hut, just being there, or holding her while she cried. There was little that he could say. Peter, wild eyed and distraught, insisted on being transferred to a forward First Aid Post, as near to the fighting as he could get. Helen was gone.

  Slowly, haltingly, the tide turned. American troops, fresh and eager, poured in. The Germans were driven back. They had played their last hand, and they had failed.

  At long last Amy began to believe that the end might be near. ‘It’s over, surely,’ she said to Dan. ‘Why don’t they just stop? Why don’t they stop the killing?’

  At last they knew that the end was coming. The armistice was signed on the morning of 11 November, and at eleven o’clock, the killing stopped. The war was over.

  *

  They stood outside among the men in fitful, drizzling rain. The minutes and the seconds ticked by. Then, on the moment of eleven o’clock, somewhere in the camp, a bugler played the slow, melancholy notes of the Last Post. The men listened in silence, their heads bowed, and then, when it was over, there were a few spasmodic cheers. It was as if no one could believe it, as if they thought it was some kind of evil German hoax. Then the normal sounds began again, the shouted orders, the rumbling of traffic on the road.

  Amy watched the ambulances coming in. It seemed an extraordinary thought that these would be the last of the wounded, that slowly the numbers would diminish, and then stop. All the men would be going home. Now the ambulances were also bringing in more and more men who were sick with influenza, the dreadful strain of the disease that was beginning to kill people all over Europe, and even, she had heard, in America. She felt a dreadful sense of inevitability, as if death would not give up, as if it would not be satisfied with mere human folly, but would want to display its own overwhelming power, devouring more and more.

  ‘It’s over, Amy,’ Dan said softly. ‘We can go home.’

  It will never be over, she thought. Johnny and Helen and all the dead men will never come back. It will never be over.

  She turned to him and forced a smile. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Home.’

  ‘We still have work to do,’ he said. ‘I expect we will have for some time.’ They began to walk back to the theatre.

  ‘What now, I wonder?’ Dan said.

  ‘At least it will stop,’ Amy said, ‘the carnage. We should get all the remaining wounded in the next few weeks.’

  ‘This influenza worries me.’ Dan looked sombre. ‘It’s killing people just as effectively as the war and it’s just as relentless, just as mindless.’

  ‘What’s happened to us, Dan?’ The war’s end hadn’t brought what Amy had hoped – a true feeling of evil conquered, a new beginning. She had an unaccountable feeling of dread, as if something dark had merely been covered over, not rooted out for ever. She sighed. Perhaps these thoughts were just the result of years of a horror that could never have been predicted or imagined.

  ‘I think the world has fallen into a kind of pit,’ he said. ‘We’ll just have to pull ourselves out of it.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I suppose,’ he said, ‘by leading good lives.’ He paused. ‘That sounds really pompous, doesn’t it, but I don’t mean it that way.’ He frowned, searching for words. ‘I don’t mean simply not doing deliberate harm. I mean looking after other people; our countrymen for a start. Some of these boys got better food, even in the trenches, than they did at home.’

  ‘I think you are absolutely right,’ she said. His words gave her a kind of warmth, a sense of purpose for the future.

  The wounded still came. The fighting had apparently gone on until the very last moment. One of the officers told her that the Germans had continued to fire on them till the very end – a German officer had seen to that. Then at eleven o’clock he had stood up, taken off his helmet, bowed, and led his men away. His own men had been reluctant, fearing that it was some kind of trick. Then, slowly, they began to stand up in the trenches, amazed that they could do so without getting shot.

  Slowly, the stream of wounded slowed to a trickle. They were replaced by men sick with the influenza, and slowly they were repatriated home. The camp began to disband, the Americans and Canadians and Anzacs and all the other Empire troops going home.

  Dan was sent back to England, to work in one of the military hospitals in London. They said goodbye in the lane at the edge of the camp.

  ‘Let me know as soon as you are back home,’ he said. ‘I’ll come to see you. I’ll write to you till then.’

  She nodded, her eyes filling. He took her hands and then bent his head and kissed her gently on the cheek. ‘I won’t say goodbye. Just au revoir.’

  She found herself in a personal no-man’s land. Officially she wasn’t there at all, except perhaps as a VAD. Very soon she would have to go home and face the future. She wondered if Major Barnes would remember his promise, if Sir Henry could ever do anything, if her work at the camp would stand her in good stead, or if it would count against her.

  She plucked up her courage and went to see Major Barnes. ‘Of course I remember, Miss Osborne,’ he said. ‘Or perhaps I should call you Dr Richmond now. I shall approach the General Medical Council as soon as I can.’

  That, at least, was comforting. Her work at the camp was finishing. Perhaps her whole career was finishing. She would just have to wait.

  Eventually, together with most of the other female staff, she was sent home. She took the train and the boat, and then the train again. Once more they were packed with soldiers going home, this time for good. She had expected that the men would be different, laughing, joking, larking about. To her surprise they were not. They were as quiet and subdued as the last time she had travelled, smoking incessantly, eyes hooded, withdrawn. She saw the same in London, men standing on the streets alone or in small groups, smoking, looking into the distance with empty eyes.

  Her father greeted her with his arms open wide. He looks older, she thought, much more than four years older.

  ‘Here I am, Father,’ she said. ‘Home again, safe and sound.’

  He led her into the sitting-room, weeping. ‘Thank God,’ he said, his voice breaking. They sat together beside the fire, the unaccustomed warmth glowing on her face. ‘I don’t know what to say to you, Amy,’ he said. ‘I can’t imagine what you have been through. I only thank God that you are home.’

  She found that it wasn’t possible to talk to her father about the war. She could see his concern, his eagerness to help her put it behind her, but no words would come. There were no words to describe the wounds, the filth, the horror and the pain, the danger and the death. She knew that he was waiting for her to tell him, but she could not. No matter how often she tried, the words would not come. She thought of the soldiers on the train, their eyes far away. She recognized their new battle.

  She felt totally lost, confused and empty. She woke in the night, every night, disturbed and startled by the unnatural quiet, and found it hard to go to sleep again. She woke every morning, facing another day with nothing to do, nothing to distract her from her memories.

  She wrote to Dan to tell him that she was home and a few days later he came to the house. She was so glad to see him that she almost cried, clutching his hands. She introduced him to her father and then took him out to walk, to be alone with him.

  ‘You’re still in uniform,’ she said.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I should be demobbed soon.’

  ‘What will you do then?’

  ‘I’ve been offered a job at St Bartholomew’s – on the surgical staff.’ He said it almost apologetically.

  ‘How wonderful,’ she said. ‘I’m so happy for you Dan.’

  ‘What are you doing, Amy?’

  ‘Waiting,’ she said. ‘Just waiting.’

&nb
sp; ‘I’ve been to the GMC,’ he said.

  ‘Oh Dan!’

  ‘And they told me unofficially that they’d heard from Major Barnes. They also told me that they’d had a letter from Sir Henry Maddox.’

  She looked away for a moment, a lump in her throat.

  He took her hand. ‘Do you think you might ever get over it, Amy? I don’t mean forget him, I know you can never do that.’ He paused. ‘I don’t really know what I mean. Am I being insensitive?’

  She looked up at him. His face was filled with caring and concern.

  ‘He’s dead, Dan, and Helen’s dead. I’ll never forget them but I’ve accepted it now. I’ve had to. I can’t look around me without seeing what has happened here. God knows, I’m not the only one.’ She squeezed his hand gently. ‘It’s so good to see you, Dan. I don’t have to say anything to you or explain anything. You know.’

  ‘I know,’ he said. He walked home with her. ‘I’ll see you soon.’

  Two weeks later a letter arrived, inviting her to call at the GMC offices in London.

  ‘I’m frightened, Father,’ she said.

  ‘Do you want me to come with you, Amy?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, dear.’ She gave a wry smile. ‘If I’m going to have a nervous breakdown I’ll be better alone.’

  She was shown into a small office and shortly afterwards one man came in, the one she remembered, the only man on the committee who’d shown her some sympathy.

  He smiled at her. ‘Sit down, Dr Richmond.’ He sat down beside her, not behind a desk, this time, she noted.

  He looked, she thought, slightly embarrassed. ‘We have had several letters,’ he said, ‘on your behalf, concerning your fitness to practise.’ She waited. ‘We have also received a letter from Sir Henry Maddox, a character reference it would be hard to ignore.’ She waited again, her heart thumping. ‘There is something more,’ he said. He looked even more embarrassed. ‘We have had another – shall we say – complaint, from the theatre sister at the hospital where you used to work.’ She stared at him, puzzled. ‘I will merely say,’ he went on, ‘that William Bulford has taken early retirement.’ He coloured. ‘I am sure you will understand me.’

  She could not stop a look of disgust. ‘I do.’

  ‘Therefore,’ he said, ‘the General Medical Council have withdrawn unreservedly their decision of four years ago and your name has been restored to the Medical Register without any mark against you.’ He smiled. ‘I am sure that your surgical experience in France has far exceeded anything that you could have gained here at home, and will stand you and your patients in very good stead.’

  He stood up and held out his hand and she shook it until he laughed and stopped her. ‘Goodbye, Dr Richmond. You will be getting a letter of confirmation very shortly.’

  She left the office on air. She travelled home and flew into the house, calling for her father. He ran out of the sitting-room, his face strained with worry.

  She threw her arms around him. ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘They’ve taken it all back. I’m a doctor again.’

  She wrote to Dan, and to Major Barnes and Sir Henry. She thought it best not to contact the sister, even if she had known where to find her. Dan sent a telegram to say that he would be with her at the weekend when he was off duty.

  ‘I think we must get a telephone put in,’ her father said with a smile, ‘now that you are home again and people want to see you.’

  She waited for Dan with impatience. She wanted to celebrate with him. He was the only person now who had been with her through it all. He was the only one who had worked beside her, the only one with whom she could face the past in healing silence, who understood. She didn’t know if he still felt the same way about her. Too much had happened. Perhaps he was content to be just a good friend. But she missed him when he wasn’t there; she trusted and admired him, she felt safe and content with him.

  I love him, she thought, almost surprised. I want him. But there was one more obstacle. She would have to tell him about Johnny. She walked about the garden and about the town, worried and undecided. Things had changed in the war; attitudes to morality had been stretched, but they were still there, and there was, as in most things, one law for men and another for women. She had slept with Johnny. She didn’t have to tell Dan, and he need never know, but she knew that she couldn’t do that. She couldn’t start a marriage with secrets. She might never marry; she would have her career. But she knew now that she wanted Dan. She shrank away from telling him, but if he wanted her, she would have to do it.

  He arrived on Saturday afternoon. She had no doubt now that he felt the same, his face glowing with pleasure and yes – with love. Her father took one look at him and disappeared into his study with his pipe.

  She took him into the sitting-room.

  ‘I’m so glad, Amy,’ he said. ‘It’s wonderful news. Not that I ever doubted it.’

  She looked at him, unable to conceal her feeling for him. He took her in his arms, his cheek against her hair. ‘You know I’m in love with you, Amy, don’t you? I’ve loved you since I first saw you. That’s a terrible old cliché, but it’s true.’ He drew back and looked down at her. ‘Could you love me, Amy?’

  ‘I do love you,’ she said. He went to take her in his arms again but she held him back. ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’

  She met his eyes. ‘It’s Johnny,’ she said. He opened his mouth to speak but she stopped him. ‘I slept with him,’ she said. ‘Once. I loved him and I slept with him.’

  He was silent for a moment. It’s over, she thought. He won’t want me now.

  ‘I assumed that you had,’ he said. ‘I’m not blind, Amy. Is that what you wanted to tell me?’

  She nodded. He took her face in his hands. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s like the war, it’s past and gone. Marry me, Amy.’

  ‘Yes!’ she almost shouted, and threw her arms around him. ‘Yes, yes, yes!’

  He swung her round, laughing. ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes. As long as you are happy for me to work.’

  He smiled. ‘I’d be cross with you if you didn’t. It would be such a waste.’

  They sat down on the sofa together. ‘I should tell you,’ he said, ‘that I would like to have children. It would mean a lot to me.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I want them too. We’ve lost so much. There is so much to put back.’

  She looked around the tranquil room, with all its memories of her childhood. ‘At least we know,’ she said, ‘that our children will never have to go through that hell. That madness will never happen again, will it?’

  He took her in his arms and held her close, saying nothing.

  Copyright

  © Peggy Savage 2009

  First published in Great Britain 2009

  This edition 2011

  ISBN978 0 7090 9441 8 (ebook)

  ISBN978 0 7090 9442 5 (mobi)

  ISBN978 0 7090 9443 2 (pdf)

  ISBN978 0 7090 8816 5 (print)

  Robert Hale Limited

  Clerkenwell House

  Clerkenwell Green

  London EC1R 0HT

  www.halebooks.com

  The right of Peggy Savage to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988