In the Shadow of the Lamp

by Susanne Dunlap

  While I waited and thought, the worst jobs in the Barrack Hospital fell to me. I supposed it was only fair. I had to clean the linens when men soiled them and shovel up the bodies of rats that ate the poison put out for them. I was more like an orderly than a nurse, but the work felt good. It stopped me from thinking and brooding, my mind going in circles like a dog chasing its tail.

  Since no one talked to me, I didn’t get much news either, about the war or what was happening outside the hospital wards. I was surprised, then, when one afternoon Miss Nightingale walked into the common room. A few of the nurses—the Sellonites mostly—got her a nosegay, picked from the spring flowers that had already started poking up in the mud of the parade ground. I sat by myself in the corner, working my way through a pile of socks to darn.

  “Molly! You’re still here?”

  I stood and curtsied. “Yes, Miss Nightingale. There were storms and no room on the one steamer that left. Mrs. Bracebridge says I’ll go next week.”

  She looked upset, more upset than I thought she would at finding me still there. I wasn’t causing any trouble. No one could say a word against me since I’d been back at the Barrack Hospital.

  I didn’t find out what made her act so oddly to me until the next day, when I was on the wards cleaning up as usual, and I overheard two orderlies talking.

  “Seems funny to have a doctor as a patient. They say he wanted to stay, in Balaclava, but Miss Nightingale convinced him to come here for care.”

  My ears burned. I continued what I was doing as best as I could, but I kept tucking in the sheets around one soldier so long he likely thought I was sweet on him.

  “Aye. He wasn’t no favorite with Dr. Menzies, though. Bet he’s sorry he’s got to care for him!” The two men laughed.

  I knew right away they were talking about Dr. Maclean.

  He was there. In the Barrack Hospital. Only walls and stairs separated me from him. My palms tingled. The sick men around me faded from my sight. Where was he? I wanted to go to him. That was what Miss Nightingale feared. That’s why she didn’t want me to be here still. What was she afraid of? He hated me, I was sure, after the business with Will. But then why did I feel this tug, like a rope was tied to my heart and he was at the other end of it?

  I didn’t dare just go and find him. I was only permitted to do the tasks Mrs. Bracebridge gave me, then go back to our quarters. But I’d already ruined everything, and would be going home with my head hanging soon enough. What worse could come of it?

  Worse would be if somebody stopped me from finding him. So I’d make sure they wouldn’t.

  I finished up as quickly as I could in the wards, then went back for tea. No one talked to me, as usual. Mrs. Clarke slammed my plate down in front of me, which was also usual. Anyone who did something to upset Miss Nightingale was in her bad books for good and all.

  I went to bed, just like nothing had changed. Only I planned to use the tricks Emma taught me to sneak away. I knew Miss Nightingale might be up, since she went around the wards at night checking on the men. But I had to take that chance.

  As soon as I heard the other nurses snoring or just breathing slow and regular, I quickly slipped out from beneath my sheets, balled up my covers so it looked like I was still there, and stole out into the corridor.

  Trouble was, I had no idea where to find Dr. Maclean. I knew at least that he wasn’t in any of the wards I’d been in that day. That left the sick wards, and two or three where the newly wounded came in. I guessed it would be one of those. But the longer I was out, the more chance someone would see me and I wouldn’t get to him. There must be a way to find him faster, I thought.

  The wards were quiet. Only the occasional moan or the soft sound of a man crying held back during the day so the others wouldn’t hear. The rats weren’t scrambling. It seemed that Miss Nightingale’s presence in the hospital was enough to put everyone—even the vermin—on their best behavior.

  I found what I thought was nearest to the center of all the wards, on the ground floor. Then I closed my eyes and tried to imagine Dr. Maclean. At first, all the little night noises distracted me. The dream murmurs of the soldiers, starting out indistinct, became louder and louder, and I could hear all of them, all at once—just as I’d heard the whispers on the battlefield in Balaclava. “My poor wife.” “The lads at home won’t believe this.” “Where is the nurse? I need water!” “I wish I could see my boy Tommy …” The words piled up on each other and jumbled together until I couldn’t tell anything. None of them sounded like Dr. Maclean. Perhaps I was wrong. Imagining things again, just as I had imagined Mrs. Drake after she was already dead and gone. But I had to keep trying, just a little while longer. I squeezed my eyes shut so tightly a tear trickled out of the corner of one of them.

  “Molly.”

  I heard it. Plain as day. It was the only word I could hear distinctly over the noise inside my head. I willed him to say it again. I put my hands over my heart.

  “Molly.”

  Now the word came from a direction. From the left, up higher. I didn’t want to break the spell I’d put myself under to hear it, but I had to move. I had to hurry to wherever Dr. Maclean was. I opened my eyes.

  The ward was there, just as before. But now, a soft, pinkish glow seemed to spread out in front of me, like a road of light. It was leading me, I knew it. I glanced at the men, asleep or unconscious in their beds, to see if they noticed it. There was no sign that anything disturbed them. I moved forward toward the glow. Each step I took made it retreat. It was like trying to follow a rainbow, only it gets farther and farther away the more you run toward it, and then it disappears. I didn’t want this pathway to disappear, but I had to continue and try.

  I walked carefully. It was torture, because I wanted to run. The light led me up the stairs to the third floor, through a ward to a room in one of the towers. It wasn’t the tower that contained the medical offices. It was in the opposite corner to the tower we lived in. I thought that tower was dilapidated and not used for anything but storage. But that’s where the light told me to go and every now and then I heard his voice saying “Molly.”

  I didn’t dare call out in answer, not wanting anyone to know I was there, so I just concentrated on answering him with my heart.

  At last I reached the entrance to the tower. The glow didn’t stop, but instead of a narrow path in front of me, I could see it outlining the closed door. I found I was breathless, as if I’d run all the way, but I knew I hadn’t.

  My heart pounded. I no longer heard the call of “Molly.” I reached my hand out to grasp the doorknob. What if someone else was in there? What if I had been fooling myself and I wouldn’t find Dr. Maclean at all, but some other poor soul?

  It was too late to change my course. I pulled the door open, prepared for nothing and everything.

  The bright light I had seen around the door vanished as soon as I opened it fully. Inside, there was only a single lamp on the table next to the bed. I forced myself to look at who was in that bed.

  “Molly.”

  This time, it was only just above a whisper, not the cry that had brought me there. I walked to Dr. Maclean’s bedside. They had shaved off his long beard. He was very thin. “I had to find you,” I said. This was no time to waste words.

  “I’m glad. I wanted to see you one more time.”

  Talking apparently pained him. “What happened? I thought they said you would recover?”

  He smiled weakly. His brown eyes had lost the depth I once saw in them, as if everything he ever was now sat on the surface. I reached out to touch his hand, lying on the covers like a lifeless thing. “They told me what you did. It was very brave. I would have died within hours if you hadn’t.”

  “But … Why aren’t you well?” My cheeks were wet, but it didn’t feel as if I was crying.

  “They want to try another surgery. I don’t think I’m strong enough to survive it.”

  I squeezed his hand. He gave the smallest answering pressure.
“No!” I said. “This can’t be everything. What is it worth then?”

  “What is what worth?” He shifted and winced. I immediately adjusted his pillow, my nursing habits too hard to shake off.

  “This feeling, this love I have for you. And all you taught me to do. And in the end, I couldn’t save you.”

  “It’s worth all the world, Molly. And you did save me.”

  “But here you are, and you’re—”

  “Dying. Yes. Don’t cry, Molly. There’s nothing anyone can do. But I did want to tell you one thing before it’s too late.” He lifted his head. I helped him, since it clearly cost him great effort. “I would have asked you to marry me. We have a connection, you and I.”

  I couldn’t speak. Tears locked my throat so I could hardly breathe. Finally I took in a raw, rasping breath that was more like a sob and cried, “No! You can’t leave! What will I do without you?” Pinpoints of light danced in front of my eyes. I forced myself to take a slow breath. “Take … me … with you! Take me with you!”

  If anyone saw what I did next they would have thought I’d gone mad. I reached my arms out and spread myself over Dr. Maclean like a human blanket, touching every part of him I could, as if I could transfer the life I felt coursing through me into him, as if he could draw upon my strength and live.

  “Ah, Molly!” Dr. Maclean said, and gently moved me so that I lay next to him instead of on top. His arm wrapped around me, and he lightly stroked the side of my hip with his hand. “I always wanted to hold you like this. But now … Stay with me. I can pretend. I can imagine what might have been, with you at my side.”

  Now tears flowed down his cheeks. They weren’t hot, like my tears, but cold. They sparkled in the lamplight. “Let me keep you warm,” I said, and put my arm around his shoulders. He nestled his cheek against my hair.

  “Thank you,” he said. “You have beautiful hair. I’ve not seen much of it until now.” Then he turned his head and kissed me, so lightly I might not have known, except that I wished for it so much.

  “Just be quiet. Lie still. All will be well yet, you’ll see,” I said, murmuring to him as if he were my child and just wanted soothing to go to sleep.

  I don’t know how long we stayed like that, what time it was when I awoke, and what time it was when I finally realized that Dr. Maclean had died in my arms.

  Chapter 30

  I went back to the nurses’ quarters. I didn’t try to hide or pretend I’d been there all along. What good would that have done? I didn’t try to find a doctor either. It was too late for Dr. Maclean. They’d find him soon enough.

  No one would expect me to be at his burial. I had already said my good-byes, and it was time to face the future without him. But had I ever really imagined a future with him?

  I felt hollow, like someone had tipped me and poured the life out of me and into the Bosporus. I went through the motions of the day in a daze. I’d done those things so often I didn’t have to think about them. No one mentioned anything about me not being in my bed come morning, nor said anything to me they didn’t have to.

  I sat eating by myself in the common room. I’d taken to waiting for the others to finish and go to their rooms so no one would have to feel awkward. I was a little surprised when Miss Nightingale came in and sat down across from me at the table.

  “There’s a steamer leaving this evening for Marseille. I’ve managed to get you passage on it, Molly.” She talked to me quiet, like somehow she knew about Dr. Maclean and me and didn’t want to upset me. All I could do was nod. I was ready to travel at a moment’s notice. I’d have time on the boat and the train to figure out where to go, what to do when I got back to London. I said nothing, and Miss Nightingale left me to myself.

  I didn’t expect anyone to see me off. Early in the evening I walked to the landing where the caiques waited to take passengers across to Istanbul to board the steamers that went to Marseille, to Arabia, to Africa. It was only then I had a single moment’s regret about having to leave. My life had changed so much in Scutari and at Balaclava. Not all the memories were bad. I had Emma, after all. In spite of everything that happened, she was a true friend. I decided to write to her when I got back.

  I was already half gone from there, so I nearly jumped when someone tapped me on the shoulder as I stood staring across at the minarets against the sunset. I turned and clutched my coat closed, thinking perhaps it was a beggar looking for coins.

  “Molly, I wanted to give you this to take with you.”

  I was so shocked to see Miss Nightingale standing there that I hardly realized she was holding something out to me. A letter. As soon as I came to my senses I said, “Thank you, Miss Nightingale,” and curtsied. I turned the letter this way and that, thinking it must have come from Emma, since Will was surely done with me. But it wasn’t for me. It had a name on it, someone I didn’t know. Perhaps Miss Nightingale wanted me to post it in England for her, the mail being rather unreliable from here. But it didn’t have a frank on it for postage, and no direction for the address. “Excuse me, but what is it?” I asked.

  “It’s a recommendation, from me to St. Thomas’s Hospital, saying that they should employ you as a nurse, as you have proven yourself very able, but the climate of Turkey disagreed with your health.”

  I took the letter in its crisp, white envelope and pressed it to my heart. “But … why?” I had broken rules. I had been as disobedient as any of the other nurses she sent away. I didn’t deserve a recommendation.

  “I’m not entirely sure myself,” she said, looking off into the distance. “You were rash and gullible. But you’re also one of the best nurses I have ever known. You understand healing. You understand the need for cleanliness, air, and good food. I have watched you around the patients and see that you know the essential truths of nursing care. You take your job seriously. I can only hope that when you are a little older and wiser, your faults will be smoothed away.”

  She didn’t smile when she said any of this. I was sorry I’d not been more perfect—and yet I wasn’t at the same time. I wouldn’t have helped Dr. Maclean save a life. I wouldn’t have given him a second chance to survive. But now that I knew my life ahead would include caring for the sick, I was happier than I had ever been. I didn’t have to worry what I would do when I got back to London. I would go straight to St. Thomas’s. I owed that—and so much more—to Miss Nightingale. I knew I would miss her when I was home as much as I missed my mum while I was here.

  We didn’t shake hands, although my heart was so full I could have kissed her. I just thanked her and waved. She watched my caique go until I was nearly across to the other side, then turned away. That’s the last time I ever saw Miss Nightingale.

  The journey home was easier than the way there. The season for storms was over, so the Mediterranean crossing was smooth, and I didn’t stop in Paris, so although the train ride was long it seemed faster. How different it felt to hand an actual ticket to the purser on the Boulogne Packet and take my place in a deck chair for the short channel crossing.

  I had tea in the tavern where I’d waited outside for Mrs. Bracebridge and the nurses five months before. I paid for my hot scone knowing I had plenty left to take home to my mum, then boarded the London train—third class, to save money, in spite of the fact Miss Nightingale had given me plenty of money for the journey.

  But I’d already decided I wouldn’t go home first when I arrived in London. And St. Thomas’s would have to wait a bit too. I owed it to Will at least to visit Lucy and bring her news of her brother. I’d give her the rest of the money I didn’t have for Will when he came to visit me in Scutari. It was supposed to have been hers anyway.

  I don’t know how I remembered the way to her house but as soon as I saw the door, I knew I’d found the right place. I hoped Jim was at work so I could talk to Lucy without holding anything back. I knocked.

  I heard a baby’s cry somewhere inside coming closer to the door, and in a moment Lucy cracked it open to look out. “May I
help you?”

  “It’s me, Molly,” I said. “I’m home from Turkey.”

  She opened the door a little wider. “Molly! I didn’t expect … Come in.” She pulled the door all the way open and motioned me in with her free hand. Her other arm was occupied with her baby, whose red cheeks and teary face made it obvious she was cutting teeth. The little thing stopped crying in a trice when she saw me, no doubt stunned by my unfamiliar face.

  I put down my valise and reached out for her. “I was with your mum when you came into the world!” I said. She squirmed and stuffed her fist in her mouth.

  “Let me make some tea,” Lucy said, handing her little girl over to me. Something about her had changed. She was reserved toward me. Although she didn’t turn me away, she seemed hesitant about me being there.

  I waited in the parlor, bouncing the baby on my knee, who didn’t once take her round blue eyes off mine. Soon Arthur came in carrying a wooden top. He looked taller than I remembered, but then in five months he must’ve grown some. “My daddy made this for me,” he said.

  “How clever! Can you show me how it works?” I asked.

  There was something so normal, so quiet, so sweet about the modest house that it made me want to cry. When I thought back over the past several months of my life and how much I’d seen that was the opposite, how men blew each other to bits and suffered terrible disease and hunger on the other side of the world—for what?—I couldn’t make sense of it all. But I’d have to think about a life here, living in a hospital and caring for people, with half days off to visit my family and bring them money. I wondered what my mum would say. Now, with Miss Nightingale’s recommendation, she would have a good reason to be proud of me. I would not shame her again.

  Lucy came back with the tea. She looked as though she’d recovered herself a little and had something all ready to say to me. “I didn’t expect you to come here. Will told us you were going to marry a doctor in the east. I’m glad you came, though, so I can wish you joy in person.”