The Girl Under the Olive Tree

by Leah Fleming

  Yolanda was a good influence, her head forever stuck in the newspaper, gleaning information about the international situation with her own slant on politics, making Penny feel lazy and slack on current affairs. She’d not picked up a book for months; one glance at a page and she fell asleep.

  Yolanda insisted they made tours of the museums and art galleries on their precious days off. ‘When war comes, all this will disappear,’ she warned.

  Penny wished Yolanda’s influence could be brought to bear in her revision. Penny had never sat an examination in her life before she began her nursing training and she found the tests hard. There was so much to mug up on: anatomical details, drug regimes and chemistry. Yolanda seemed merely to glance through her notes and passed everything effortlessly, blessed with a good memory. It wasn’t fair. Penny, however, had more stamina for walking around the city. Yolanda was hopeless at hill walking, complaining about the steep paths, wanting to sit down and rest every five minutes. She’d never hiked or ridden a horse or swam in the sea. Her parents preferred to keep her close to heel and out of view. They usually met up in the city, never at Rabbi Israel’s house.

  ‘I’m sorry, but they are stricter in observance than my family,’ Yolanda explained. ‘They don’t approve of unmarried women working out of the home, let alone working with Gentiles. They’re kind but old-fashioned. Any time soon I expect them to produce a nice Jewish man for me to marry, but I’m not ready for the chuppah yet.’ She laughed as Penny looked blank ‘It’s the canopy under which we get married in the synagogue. Perhaps one day, but not yet . . .’

  There was so much for Penny to learn about Yolanda’s way of life. One of the things she loved about Athens was the melting pot of different peoples, religions, costumes and languages in the bustling streets and markets.

  It was a glorious hot summer, with languorous nights spent sitting under the stars watching the swifts wheeling over the rooftops. The news from England, according to Margery, was dire. France had fallen and the army had been evacuated from Dunkirk. The post was not so reliable now that war had come to the Mediterranean so Penny didn’t know whether Zan was safe.

  The expats had to register their presence with the embassy, then were given papers and instructions on evacuation procedures, but Penny, turning up in her uniform, found no one bothered much with her presence. Effy’s news, when it came, was worrying too.

  Zan’s home at Stokencourt wounded. He shuffled in with a tattered uniform like a tramp, in shock from Dunkirk. Poor boy was stunned at how quickly they had been defeated and how many men and arms they’d lost en route. He slept for three days solid. ‘Only the Channel and RAF separate us now from defeat,’ he keeps telling us. I’ve never seen him so cut up. So stay where you are. At least one of us will be safe. You promised us you’d come home but no one expects it of you now, though I do miss you. Walter’s been shipped out to Egypt for the duration and Diana keeps asking after you. She’s joined the FANYs, the nursing corps. No point you coming home unless you want to join up too.

  But Penny knew she had joined up in the fight for justice and compassion by taking on further training. There were now troops of every nation stationed around the city, the port was heaving with ships and Greek troops were on manoeuvres outside the city, gathered up as if waiting for something to happen. It could be only a matter of time before she was needed here.

  2001

  I felt myself shivering, and woke to find myself sitting in my chair, stiff, staring at the cluster of silver-framed photographs. How long had I been dreaming?

  For a second I panicked. Where am I? Have I packed? Have I missed the plane? Is this all still a dream?

  Trojan was restless at my feet, pawing me to open the French windows and let him out, so I pulled my limbs back into shape, stretched my arms out, feeling the night air cooling my cheeks, the scent of the night-scented stocks heady with allure. A fox barked from the spinney.

  Now I was leaving I didn’t want to move from the comfort of my own fireside. Here I was safe, known and relaxed. What would be waiting for me out there on the island? What ghosts from the misty mountain tops would come down to haunt me?

  With relief I saw my cases were packed, everything in order. I mixed a malt whisky and walked down the path to call the dog back. It was so peaceful, so very English; flowers like silver ghosts in the moonlight brushed my arms. How could I have ever thought of leaving here on some wild-goose chase? But a promise is a promise, and I couldn’t let Lois down at this late hour.

  I sat under the cedar tree and sipped the whisky with a sigh. The last time I’d seen Athens it lay in ruins, a broken filthy place fit only for rats and cockroaches to live in. It would be good to see how it had risen from those ashes. Besides, what I learned there made me who I am today, taught me how to survive and showed me just how tough I could be. But more than that, it had given me one of the best friends of my life.

  I made my way back slowly to the open door and resumed my place in the chair. Tomorrow I would sleep far away, but as dawn was breaking I would keep a vigil, relive those memories of olive days and remember.

  December 1940

  Penny shivered under her cloak, trying to forget the numbness in her fingers as she fumbled to cut away the frozen sleeve of the soldier’s uniform. Infection was his enemy now. The bullets had done their worst, but the journey back from the field clearing station to the train, carrying the casualties on makeshift shelves full of stretchers, had taken so long in the snow that there would be only hours before gangrene would claim its due on his flesh.

  She looked down on his ashen face, knowing his life was in her hands.

  She sighed, recalling how proudly the Greek army had marched through Athens on its way north to defend the country from invasion. Was he one of the young gods paraded through the streets, girls throwing flowers at their trucks, waving and blowing kisses just as they had lauded Papa’s troops on their way to the Somme all those years ago? Now this youthful soldier lay wasted by frostbite and shock as they worked on him, a pitiable sight with blackened fingers, in a flimsy uniform not fit for the treacherous terrain of the Pindus Mountains during one of the worst winters for years.

  All those Athenians who’d danced until dawn, fired bullets into the air in joy at Prime Minister Metaxas’s stand against Mussolini in October when he said ‘óhi’ to his demands, would weep now. Death was gathering up the best of their youth. The bells might be ringing there for a string of victories against the enemy – and one as badly equipped as themselves, thank God – but the cost in lives was high.

  It was a shock see what mud and ice could do to the human body on top of the injuries. Men frozen into a stupor were brought back to life with warm soup or hot drinks when they could find enough water to melt and enough fuel to fire up the stoves. Frostbite was eased with oil of turpentine, wrapping the wound in cotton wool and gently heating the limb. Infections were soaked in Lysol solution and liquid paraffin, the doctors amputating as best they could.

  Yet, enduring this, the men would smile at the nurses, call them angels of mercy, grateful for any attention. Sometimes Penny wanted to weep with frustration when the light went out of a boy’s young eyes. For weeks the medical teams struggled under makeshift light and heat, trying to keep their patients alive long enough to get back to one of the major hospitals. Many did not survive even the journey from the front to the clearing stations.

  Now attached to the military wing of the Red Cross, Penny was glad of Sister McGrath’s lecture all those months ago, though nothing could prepare her for the reality: those feelings of helplessness and fury when they ran out of dressings, ether and all the essentials of medical care. It was hard, learning to walk through the lines of stretchers, marking those who would get priority treatment, a chance of life, and those who could only be made comfortable and allowed to die. She knew the lucky ones would be patched up, given leave, perhaps, and then returned to this hell of bitter winds and barren unforgiving terrain.

  Yet
the intensity of each day’s new challenges – cleaning the men, delousing them and preparing food – gave Penny an electric charge of satisfaction that she’d never known before in her young life. Here I am needed, saving lives, she thought. She was alive in a way she’d never experienced before, busy, exhausted, but satisfied that her existence was suddenly worthwhile.

  Yolanda was out there somewhere doing the same work. It was so good to have a close friend who knew exactly what you were enduring. There was such a camaraderie within the team; doctors, nurses, aides and orderlies with no time for petty jealousies. They tried to snatch sleep when they could, lived on the most basic of meals, and tried to ward off the fleas by warming stone hot-water bottles under their covers. It was a losing battle but the chill had at least discouraged the larger insect life, which was a blessing.

  Where they set up, villagers came out offering coats, socks and scarves for the soldiers at the front, thick blankets and food they could hardly spare. Everyone was making sacrifices in this war. Sometimes they were stranded by blizzards and ice on the tracks, but they kept on nursing, cleaning, feeding right through January and into February 1941.

  It was good that there were fresh troops from the islands coming to relieve the poor Greek army, who battled on, overwhelming the Italians, pushing them ever backwards into Albania. But the price was high. There was a victory at Ioaninna, but then came the prisoners of war, streaming in for treatment, pathetic bundles of rags, starving, defeat etched on their faces. Some were grateful to be fed and sheltered in tents, others needed to be guarded. There was so little fresh food to go round that men began to suffer from lack of vitamins as they were shipped down to camps in the south.

  There were no enemies in a Red Cross hospital, just frightened exhausted men at the end of their hope, grateful for any act of kindness. Penny learned that there were no winners in this campaign. Only losers.

  It was with relief she was granted leave. The girl who had gone north in all innocence was returning to Athens a woman bloodied by battle. She arrived with only one thought on her mind: to find the deepest warmest oil-scented bath where she could try to soak away all the horrors she’d witnessed.

  The city was buzzing with British troops being sent north to enforce the new borders, to show the Axis powers that Greece was not standing alone. There were boys in blue stationed at Royal Air Force bases in Tatoi and Eleusis. Once again the city was full of excitement and confidence that it had seen off the enemy for good. Yet Penny felt an outsider in all this celebration, knowing the people of Athens had no idea of the tensions in the north. If Italy had failed to conquer its neighbours would Germany come to its aid?

  There was a course on theatre nursing that she must attend. In emergencies she’d been forced to give a helping hand when the hospital was short-staffed, but there were huge gaps in her knowledge. Now she knew she had the stomach for the work she felt good about learning more advanced skills for theatre surgery.

  She kept asking around if anyone had seen Yolanda but no one knew anything until she met a young doctor who pointed her in the direction of a hospital ward. ‘They’ve put her in there.’

  ‘She’s wounded? Oh, no!’ Penny fast-walked down the corridor in panic, only to see Yolanda coming in the opposite direction with a bandaged arm in a sling.

  ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you. Praise the Lord, you’re here, but I’ve just heard you’re injured. What happened?’ Penny greeted her.

  ‘Nothing but a scratch that went septic,’ Yolanda fobbed off her concern, but Penny noticed she looked more tired and drawn than usual. ‘I’ve got a week off

  ‘It’s more than a scratch then.’ Penny eyed her carefully. ‘Let’s go to out and celebrate your leave.’

  ‘I couldn’t . . . I’m broke . . .’ Yolanda hesitated. Penny guessed most of her pay was going to her parents on Crete.

  ‘The treat’s on me. I’ve had a windfall,’ she lied, though there were still some drachmas left in the kitty from when Papa shoved a wallet of notes into her bag before he left. She had kept this dwindling little reserve for emergencies. ‘Come on, pastries at Zonar’s and then onto the Argentina. I feel like dancing the night away. Time we had some fun.’

  ‘But I’ve nothing to wear and, besides, what would I tell Rabbi Israel. I’ve only just returned.’

  ‘What they don’t know won’t hurt them. Let’s treat ourselves. We should dress up, forget our nun’s robes and have a ball. If anyone deserves it we do.’ Penny felt she needed to decide for both of them. They’d seen so much suffering of late, she just wanted to forget it all for these few precious days.

  ‘Weren’t you glad of Sister McGrath’s slide show?’ Yolanda began.

  ‘No talking shop, I forbid it!’ Penny shouted. ‘We dance till dawn tonight.’

  ‘You’ve changed,’ Yolanda laughed.

  ‘We’ve lived with death all these months, let’s see a bit of life. Who knows where we’ll be sent next? Come on, the shops are calling me . . .’

  They arrived back at Margery’s rooms laden with parcels: a dress for Yolanda and some pretty shoes for Penny, rose-scented soaps and toiletries and perfume. They lunched on tiropita – cheese pastries – and Sachertorte, giggling and relaxed for the first time in months.

  ‘Let’s try everything on again. This is so decadent,’ said Yolanda, inspecting her new outfit with delight. ‘What will Momma say to such a short dress?’ It was long-sleeved, made of navy-and-white spotted silk and gathered in at the waist.

  ‘You look better already,’ Penny said, noting the flush in Yolanda’s cheeks. ‘Let me change the dressing on your arm first.’ When she undid the bandage she saw how raw and blistered was the wound. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘It’s nothing, just a burn It’s healing now.’

  ‘Is there a story to this?’ Penny asked, curious.

  ‘Not really, just a soldier crazed with fever, who brandished a hot poker and lashed out at us. He didn’t mean it, poor chap and he died later. They think it was rabies.’

  The wound was deep and ugly and would leave a scar. Penny was angry that Yolanda would be branded for life by the madman.

  ‘We’re going out on the town tonight, Margery, don’t expect us back until the heels of our shoes are worn down with dancing. I’ve got my key.’

  Margery sniffed in response, settling down for the evening with one of her beloved Agatha Christies.

  The Argentina was busy, tables taken by officers and their girlfriends, but Penny was a regular from her days as a student and was seated by the bar. She recognized familiar faces from the legation, old friends who waved the young nurses over and found them chairs at their tables. The band was on fine form and the officers were soon up to dance, swirling the young women round the floor. Drinks were ordered for them, especially when the soldiers found out they’d been at the front. Everyone wanted to know how bad it was. This was not on Penny’s agenda so she suggested they find another table if they wanted to talk shop. Where had all this new-found social confidence come from? Months ago she wouldn’t have dared to come into a place like this without a man to take her arm, but things were changing, and for the better. She was recognizing a little more of her own worth in surviving the rigours of life at the front. She and Yolanda deserved time off to relax and not feel guilty. Yolanda was not so easily convinced.

  ‘If anyone recognizes me, I’ll be in trouble,’ Yolanda whispered. ‘This is not what single girls do in my community. I hope no one tells the Israels and they write to Momma. We don’t go out without a chaperone. I think I should go now.’

  ‘No, don’t. Why shouldn’t you have a life of your own? If anyone deserves a break, you do.’ Soon a procession of dashing young army and air force officers were again escorting them onto the floor. No one pestered them, but as the men got drunker they started holding the girls tighter, asking for their addresses. Soon it was time to head back to Margery’s lodgings, weary but relaxed. Yolanda was to stay over so as not to disturb the
Israels.

  To Penny’s surprise Margery was waiting up, a pained look on her face. ‘You’ve had a visitor,’ she announced as Penny flung off her new shoes with relief. ‘One of the BSA boys . . . a Captain Jardine.’

  ‘Bruce? Bruce Jardine? He’s here in Athens?’ Penny was stunned for a second. She’d been so busy, she’d not thought of Bruce for weeks.

  ‘He heard you were still here and wanted to catch up with you. He’s brought letters from your sister,’ Margery said, plonking a pile of envelopes on the table.

  ‘How long is he here? Which regiment?’ Penny felt excited that he’d looked her up after all this time, but a little deflated now she’d missed him.

  ‘Steady on, the young man was three sheets to the wind, but they all are, these days. He did leave a number. You can give him a call tomorrow, not now; it’s one o’clock and I need my beauty sleep.’

  ‘Sorry for keeping you up, you are so kind,’ said Penny, now flushed with excitement.

  ‘I couldn’t sleep. There’s been unsettling news on the wireless. Hitler’s massing troops in Romania. It looks as if he’s going to finish what the Eyeties couldn’t . . . He’ll be in Athens by Easter, mark my words. Time for us to pack our bags.’

  ‘Looks as if we’ll be on the march again then,’ Yolanda looked to Penny with concern.

  ‘That’s why the troops are here. If Hitler thinks the British are a walkover, he’s another think coming,’ Penny replied with a confidence she didn’t quite feel.