On Distant Shores

by Sarah Sundin

  The pampering turned up the corners of her mouth. “May I drive?”

  “Oh, I don’t think so. I’m not even sure I can make this thing go. Now hush, or they’ll send a man to drive us.”

  After they climbed in, Lambert started the engine, and the sturdy olive drab vehicle lurched forward. Georgie grabbed the dashboard and held on tight. Each gearshift made the ladies bounce and laugh.

  They drove out of the tent complex surrounding Ponte Olivo Airfield and down a dirt road. Toasty golden hills encircled the plain, and olive trees graced the hills with touches of deep green.

  Artillery rumbled, and a putrid smell hit Georgie’s nose. By the side of the road lay a dead horse.

  She slammed her eyes shut and clapped her hand over her nose and mouth. Why did innocent animals have to pay for man’s violence?

  Lambert swung the jeep up to another large tent complex. “Be glad graves detail has already come this way.”

  Georgie nodded. As a nurse, she’d seen plenty of death, but not lying twisted and dismembered on the roadside.

  “Here we are.” Each tent bore a large red cross in a white circle on its roof to protect it from enemy air attack. A wooden sign with an arrow read “93 EH Information, Registrar.”

  They passed a clump of pyramidal tents in a neat grid. Living quarters, from the looks of it. A few nurses chatted and washed laundry. They gave Georgie and Lambert strange looks. While the hospital nurses wore belted khaki GI coveralls, the flight nurses wore dark blue trousers and crisp light blue blouses, their dark blue waist-length jackets abandoned due to the heat.

  Georgie waved. “Good afternoon, ladies!”

  The women smiled and waved back. Some nurses resented the “glamour girls” of medical air evacuation, so Georgie was determined to stamp a friendly face on the image.

  The jeep approached the large ward tents, set up like a typical four-hundred-bed evacuation hospital and labeled with wooden signs: two tents marked Receiving, then Bath; Dressing and Dental; Pharmacy and Laboratory; Headquarters and Registrar; and Officers’ and Nurses’ Mess.

  Lambert turned the jeep around and parked it between two olive drab ambulances across the road from Pharmacy and Laboratory. Medics hustled around, carrying stretchers and assisting ambulatory patients. The Americans had made significant progress, but the front lay a meager twelve miles from Gela.

  Lambert pointed to her left. “I’ll be in HQ. Tell the pharmacy staff to get the crates from the jeep. Ask if they have any aspirin while you’re at it.”

  “Good idea.” They had none at Ponte Olivo or at the hospitals in Tunisia.

  The tent flaps were tied back, and Georgie stepped in. “Hello?”

  A red-haired young man grinned. “Look, Dom. We got ourselves a girl. Tie her up and make her stay.”

  “I’ll get the rope.” A wiry, dark-haired man stepped around a makeshift counter of wooden crates and right up to Georgie. He sniffed. “Smells like a girl too.”

  She laughed. “I’m Lt. Georgie Taylor, one of the flight nurses at Ponte Olivo. Is this pharmacy or laboratory?”

  “Pharmacy.” The redhead extended his hand and bowed to Georgie. “Ralph O’Shea, Technician Fourth Grade.”

  “You can do better than him, toots. Dominic Bruno, Technician Third Grade.”

  Georgie shook both their hands. “You don’t get many women in here, do you?”

  “It’s the neighborhood.” By a counter filled with glass bottles, a third man stood, tall and dark-haired, his back to Georgie. He wore five stripes on the sleeve of his khaki shirt, identifying him as a technical sergeant, same as the men she flew with in her squadron.

  “That’s Hutch,” Dom said. “He thinks he’s in charge here.”

  “Maybe it’s because I’m the only one working.” He shifted glassware around, but a note of humor rang in his voice. He gave Georgie a quick nod, then went back to work.

  “I have three crates for you.”

  “Crates?” Hutch spun to face her, light in his dark eyes.

  “Now you’re speaking his language,” Ralph said.

  “What did you bring?” He strode to the tent entrance and leaned out. “Any aspirin?”

  “I wish.” Georgie led him to the jeep and motioned for the other men to follow. “I hoped you’d have some.”

  “Nope. I was about to compound some. Would you like me to double the batch?”

  “Compound? You can make it?”

  “Sure.” He stood a full foot taller than she, and he was quite good-looking when he smiled. “I learned a few things in pharmacy school.”

  Dom clapped Hutch on the back. “He’s a real, live, honest-to-goodness pharmacist.”

  Georgie patted the side of the jeep. “And you aren’t?”

  “Me?” Dom snorted and hefted up one of the crates. “I’m a grocer. Ralph’s a welder.”

  “How’d you end up in pharmacy?”

  “Simple.” Ralph’s face reddened as he wrestled out a crate. “The Army gave us tests, threw away the results, and sent us to training school.”

  Dom headed back to the tent. “Three months to try to teach us what college boy here learned in four years.”

  Georgie studied the stripes on Hutch’s sleeve as he lifted out the last crate. Most college graduates ended up as officers.

  He looked down at her, his face serious but still nice-looking. His jaw tightened. “The job of pharmacist is one of few in the Army that requires a college degree but doesn’t earn a commission.”

  Georgie frowned. “How strange. Why is that?”

  He marched back to the tent. “History, tradition, a system run by physicians who look down on my profession.”

  “We nurses have the same prob—” But she wore second lieutenant’s gold bars on the shoulders of her uniform. “Well, some doctors look down on us, but we do have commissions even though we don’t have college degrees. That’s strange, isn’t it?”

  “That’s the Army.” Hutch set the crate behind the counter. “They commission you ladies to protect you from the unwashed rabble of us enlisted men.”

  “Nonsense.” Georgie waved him off. “You seem like quite a gentleman for a Yankee.”

  His laugh had a rich rumble to it. “See? We Northerners aren’t all savage brutes, and you Southerners aren’t all uneducated hicks.”

  “Glad we got that straight.” Georgie leaned her forearms on the counter. “What does Hutch stand for?”

  “John Hutchinson. My best friend came up with the nickname.” He pried the lid off the crate. “Good. Ethanol. Dom, Ralph, after you stock that, please make the delivery to pre-op.”

  The three men bustled around. Hutch had a quiet confidence about him that reminded her of Daddy and Ward. While he wasn’t shy, he wasn’t flirtatious either. “Hutch, you have a sweetheart at home, don’t you?”

  Brown eyebrows rose. “How’d you know?”

  “I have a sweetheart of my own back home. I can tell these things.”

  He nodded to his technicians. “Thanks. Why don’t you make that delivery? I’ll get the aspirin started.”

  Georgie nestled her chin in her hand. “How do you make aspirin?”

  He pulled a bottle off the shelf. “Salicylic acid has the same properties as aspirin, but it’s hard on the stomach. Mix it with acetic anhydride and sulfuric acid, let it crystallize, and you get acetylsalicylic acid.”

  “Aspirin.”

  “Right. Then I put it in capsules. It takes awhile though. You don’t need to wait around.”

  “I have to wait for my chief anyway. But kick me out if I annoy you.”

  A slow grin. “I’ll do that.”

  “Tell me about your girlfriend.” Asking about a fellow’s sweetheart was the simplest way to assure him she wasn’t flirting.

  “Fiancée. Her name’s Phyllis.” He lined the pans of a scale with paper.

  “Where’d you meet her?”

  A pause while he checked something in a handbook. “My best friend introduced
us.”

  “Was it love at first sight?”

  Hutch selected weights from a box and set them in the left pan. One side of his mouth twitched. “That would require speed. I don’t do anything quickly.”

  “Slow and methodical. A good trait in a pharmacist.”

  “Yes.” He shot her a glance through lashes too thick for a man. “But not a good trait in a date. If it weren’t for Bergie, we wouldn’t be together.”

  “Your best friend?”

  “Yep. He’s a physician here.”

  “Right here? In the 93rd? That is so sweet.”

  “Sweet? We’re men.”

  She laughed and adjusted her elbow on the rough crate. “My best friend’s in my squadron, and it’s very sweet having her here.”

  “You’re girls.” Teasing warped the words.

  “You must have little sisters.”

  “I do.” He shook white crystals from the bottle into the right pan of the scale. “I thought you were a nurse, but apparently you’re a psychologist as well.”

  “Oh, I just like people. They’re infinitely fascinating. Which brings me back to my first question. Phyllis—what’s she like?”

  He spooned some crystals back into the bottle. “She’s pretty. Blonde. Kind of tall.”

  Georgie clucked her tongue at him. “That wasn’t what I meant. What’s she like? Shall I help you? I have a hunch she’s a social dynamo who pries your nose out of the books.”

  “Phyllis? She’s even quieter than I am.”

  “Really?” Ward said he needed Georgie’s spirit to coax him into society. “Well, you’ll have a peaceful home someday.”

  “That’s the idea.” Hutch lifted the paper filled with crystals, folded the edges together, and held it over an Erlenmeyer flask. The crystals slid down the paper chute into the flask.

  Georgie settled her chin into her other hand and watched the man pour some stinky fluid into a graduated cylinder. His home wouldn’t be peaceful. It would be dull. Too much seclusion wasn’t good for the soul.

  One of those two would have to become more social, and it would have to be Hutch.

  With her help, Rose had gone from school outcast to the girl named most likely to succeed. With her help, Mellie had gone from painfully shy to a well-liked member of the squadron.

  A tingly sensation filled her belly. She needed a new project, and John Hutchinson might be the one.

  4

  Gela

  July 20, 1943

  Hutch squinted through the eyepiece of his telescope. Only three days had passed since the full moon, so the night was brighter than he liked for stargazing, but Hutch never wasted an opportunity. The quiet ridge separating the 93rd Evac from the airfield had beckoned.

  The binary star Algieba in the constellation Leo winked at him, low on the western horizon.

  The cooler night air, the chirp of cicadas, and the stars in their familiar shifting patterns eased the twinges of pain in his stomach.

  On his way to the enlisted men’s mess for supper, he’d run into Bergie and they’d discussed the heavy patient load. Capt. Al Chadwick, one of Bergie’s tent mates, summoned Bergie for an emergency surgery. After Bergie left, Chadwick gave Hutch a long look. “Don’t you have anything to do, boy?”

  The pain flared, and Hutch pressed his hand against his rib cage. Dad had served as a pharmacist for almost thirty years, and no one had ever called him “boy.”

  Something rustled in the grass behind him.

  Hutch sucked in his breath. Like all medical personnel, he was unarmed. The Allies had made rapid advances the last few days, but the Germans were famous for leaving troops to wreak havoc behind the lines.

  More rustling. Someone walked straight toward him. What could he do? Whack him on the head with his telescope? And what was the parole and countersign for the Husky landings? That’s right—“George” and “Marshall” for the Army Chief of Staff. Hutch cleared his throat. “George!”

  Feminine laughter greeted him. “Close. My name’s Georgie. I’m a nurse.”

  A sigh rushed out. “Georgie Taylor? What are you doing out at night?”

  “Hutch? Is that you?”

  “Yeah.” He stifled a quick thrill that the cute nurse recognized his voice. “What are you doing out here? It isn’t safe.”

  “When I’m nervous, I can’t sleep. And when I can’t sleep, I have to walk. But I stay close, and I know they cleared the area of land mines. Is that a telescope?”

  “Yeah. It’s a hobby of mine.”

  “Mind if I join you?” She sat on the blanket next to him without waiting for an answer.

  A smile edged up. So much for his quiet evening. He looked into his telescope again. Algieba disappeared below the horizon. “Be my guest.”

  “Thanks again for the aspirin. I don’t know what we’d have done without it.”

  “You’re welcome.” She’d already thanked him profusely when he delivered it to the airfield the other day. He liked the way her Southern accent swirled “thank you” into “than-kee-you.”

  “What are you looking at?”

  “You’re interested? Or are you just making conversation?”

  Georgie hugged her knees. She seemed to be wearing pajamas and a bathrobe. “I always liked looking at the stars with Daddy. Orion’s my favorite.”

  “One of mine too, but he won’t be out until long after midnight.” He rotated the tripod so his telescope faced Cygnus. “You’ll like this.”

  “What is it?”

  “Let me get it focused. There we go.” He scooted to the side.

  She held back her hair and gazed through the eyepiece. “What am I—oh, isn’t that pretty? One’s blue, one’s yellow.”

  “That’s Albireo. It’s a double star that forms the head of Cygnus the Swan.”

  “That’s just about the most beautiful thing, isn’t it? God is so colorful and creative.”

  “Yep.” He motioned Georgie to the side and readjusted the telescope. “That’s one of the reasons I like stargazing. It also reminds me how big he is and how little I am.”

  “What are you showing me next?” Enthusiasm lit her voice.

  “You can see this without a telescope. If you want to see signs of God in the sky, you can’t get better than this.” He traced a pattern with his finger. “From Albireo, draw a straight line that way, through those two bright stars, then another line that way.”

  “It’s a cross.”

  “The Northern Cross. The Greeks called it Cygnus. They say Zeus disguised himself as a swan to make Leda fall in love with him.” He made a face. Not the best story to tell when he was alone with a girl at night.

  “Those Greek gods always made a mess of things, didn’t they?”

  Hutch chuckled, conscious of the feminine presence beside him. Would Phyllis believe this was innocent? What about Georgie’s boyfriend? What would the man think about his girl traipsing about at night?

  He readjusted the telescope. “You said you couldn’t sleep because you were nervous?”

  “I shouldn’t have said that.” A deep sigh. “I suppose I can tell you. You don’t seem like the kind of man who’d blab other people’s business.”

  “Never blabbed in my life.”

  Georgie didn’t speak, which seemed unusual for her, so Hutch tightened the screws on his tripod.

  “All right,” she said. “I’m a big ol’ fraidy-cat. I try to be brave, but I’ve never been so close to the front, and the flights are more dangerous here than over North Africa. Worst of all, I’m afraid something will happen, and I’ll freeze, and I won’t help my patients.”

  Hutch straightened. The moonlight illuminated anxiety on her face.

  She hugged her knees tighter. “I don’t know why I told you that. Mellie kind of knows, but she thinks I’m over it, and Lieutenant Lambert—she suspects—but I’ve never blurted it all out before.”

  He nodded. He had that effect on people. “I’m quiet. I’m safe.”

  Her sh
oulders lowered. “That must be it. My daddy’s the same way. He makes me talk more by saying nothing than Mama does with a million words.”

  Hutch turned his attention to the telescope. What was he going to show her again?

  “You must think I’m horrible.”

  “Horrible?” He snapped his gaze back to her. “Of course not. But I wonder . . .”

  “Wonder what?”

  “Well, flight nursing is voluntary. Like everything in the Army Air Forces. So how’d you end up in the program?”

  “Simple. I followed Rose.”

  “Rose?”

  “She’s my best friend. When she found out about medical air evacuation, she had to be a part of it, so I came along too.”

  Hutch leaned back on his hands, and his gaze followed the bright streak of the Milky Way. “So you did something you didn’t want to because of a friend.”

  “Yes, but it’s worth it. We need each other. And I’ll do fine. Sicily’s nerve-wracking, but I’ll adjust.”

  High overhead, the North Star sat immovable while all the constellations swung around, changing with the time and the season. “Do other people always make decisions for you?”

  “Excuse me?” Her voice tightened.

  That did sound rude. “It’s—you’re the baby of the family, aren’t you?”

  A small laugh. “And you accused me of playing psychologist.”

  “Well, are you?”

  “Yes.” She stretched the word around like a piece of elastic.

  “I thought so. You remind me of my youngest sister, Lizzie. Everyone’s always made decisions for her, and she likes it that way. She’s always running to Dad, Mom, me—‘What should I do, John? Tell me.’”

  “And you tell her like a good brother.”

  “I used to. Then I realized she had to grow up and make her own decisions. I give her advice, help her weigh her options, but I refuse to tell her what to do.”

  Georgie eased back. “Do you think I need to grow up too?”

  He’d stepped into that one, hadn’t he? “Wait a minute. First of all, I don’t know you that well. What’s important is—do you think you need to grow up?”

  “I am grown-up. I made the decision to come here on my own. Yes, I followed Rose, but my parents and Ward didn’t want me to come.”