Frontline Nurses

by Holly Green

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Also by Holly Green

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Author’s Note

  PART ONE – BAPTISM OF FIRE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Copyright

  About the Book

  The trenches are no place for a woman…

  It is 1914 and after training with the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry, Leonora Malham Brown sets off to Europe with her new friend, Victoria. They’re determined to do their bit for the war effort, caring for soldiers wounded on the battlefield.

  At the Front, Leonora cuts her hair short and swaps her skirts for trousers to better cope with the demanding duties of a frontline nurse. Dressed like a boy she meets the dashing Colonel Malkovic and while their friendship grows, Leonora continues to disguise her true identity.

  But she cannot keep this a secret forever. She faces a battle of her own and must choose between her duty and her heart…

  About the Author

  Holly Green writes historical sagas about love and war, and her books are inspired by the stories she heard from her parents when she was a child. Her father was a professional singer with a fine baritone voice and her mother was a dancer, but they hd to give up their professions at the outbreak of World War II.

  Holly is from Liverpool and is a trained actress and teacher – her claim to fame being that she gave Daniel Craig his first acting experience!

  Holly is married, and enjoys spending time with her two delightful grandchildren.

  ALSO BY HOLLY GREEN

  Workhouse series:

  Workhouse Orphans

  Workhouse Angel

  Workhouse Nightingale

  Frontline Nurses series:

  Frontline Nurses

  Frontline Nurses On Duty

  Secrets of the Frontline Nurses

  I am grateful to Lynette Beardwood, archivist for the FANY and Fellow of Liverpool John Moores University, for drawing my attention to the stories of Mabel Stobart and Flora Sands, and for providing me with invaluable source material about the FANY during World War One.

  Author’s Note

  These books are not romantic fantasies but are based on solid historical fact. They were inspired by the lives of two remarkable women, Mabel St Clair Stobart and Flora Sands. Stobart, who features as a character in this book, was the founder of the Women’s Sick and Wounded Convoy in 1912. She led a group of nurses to care for Bulgarian soldiers during the First Balkan War and returned to help the Serbs during World War One. She gave an account of her experiences in her books Miracles and Adventures and The Flaming Sword in Serbia and Elsewhere.

  Flora Sands was the daughter of a clergyman and an early member of the FANY – the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry. In 1915 she volunteered to go to Serbia with Stobart, was separated from her unit and joined up with a company of Serbian soldiers, with whom she endured the terrible hardships of the retreat through the mountains of Albania. She later returned with them to Salonika and took part in the final advance which ended the war. She was the first women ever to be accepted as a fighting soldier and ended the war with the rank of sergeant. Though she does not appear as a character in these books, much of the action is derived from her experiences, which are recorded in her own memoir An English Woman Sergeant in the Serbian Army and by Alan Burgess in The Lovely Sergeant.

  PART ONE – BAPTISM OF FIRE

  Chapter 1

  The leaves on the trees in Hyde Park were drooping in the summer heat. The Bayswater Road was busy with hansom cabs and tradesmen’s vans, and in the middle of the throng one or two motorcars honked and spluttered. The air was heavy with dust and the smell of horse dung. Leonora stood aside to allow a nursemaid pushing a perambulator to pass and almost collided with a small boy bowling a hoop. Children in the charge of nannies or governesses were heading home for afternoon tea after their walk in the park. To escape the crowd and the smell Leo turned into Albion Gate and paused in the shade of a tree, gazing down across the grass to where the Serpentine glittered in the sun.

  Raucous voices drew her attention to Rotten Row, where the elite of London Society were accustomed to ride or drive.

  ‘Call yourselves women? You’re a bloody disgrace!’

  ‘Gallivanting about in uniform. Who do you think you are?’

  ‘They’re not women, they’re bleeding suffragettes!’

  Coming towards her was a curious little cavalcade: half a dozen mounted women in scarlet tunics and peaked caps, followed by a horse-drawn wagon with a Red Cross painted on the side. The jeers were coming from a group of workmen on the far side of the track, but, as she stood watching, Leo heard a well-dressed lady nearby remark to her companion, ‘Riding astride, like men! Really, it’s shameful.’

  At that moment a sudden movement caught Leo’s attention. One of the men stooped and picked something up from the ground, then his arm went back and a missile flew through the air. One of the horses, a nervy-looking grey, let out a squeal of pain, reared up and sent its rider crashing to the ground. Panicked, the horse broke into a canter, heading directly towards the gate where Leo stood. She realised instantly that if it galloped out into the crowded road there could be a serious accident. Acting on instinct, she stepped directly into the path of the careering beast. The horse shied violently and flung up its head but with a leap Leo grabbed the reins and used her body weight to drag it to a standstill. It stood shuddering and snorting and she caressed the sweating neck and murmured to it in a language not her own, which seemed to rise unbidden from the depths of some childhood memory.

  Shouts and cries of alarm erupted around her, and above the general hubbub she heard one voice raised in fury. The rider had scrambled to her feet and turned on the man who had thrown the stone.

  ‘You brute! If you wanted to hurt someone, why didn’t you aim at me instead of the poor bloody animal?’

  The language was coarse but the diction was refined and Leo found herself smiling at the contrast. The girl who had spoken was running towards her. She had lost her hat and her dark hair was coming down around her neck. Her face was flushed and her eyes glittered, but with anger rather than embarrassment.

  ‘Well done you!’ she exclaimed breathlessly as she reached Leonora. ‘I must say it takes guts to face a bolting horse like that.’

  ‘Oh well.’ Leo shrugged self-deprecatingly. ‘I didn’t stop to think. I’m used to horses. Are you hurt?’

  ‘Only in my self-esteem. I shall be ribbed mercilessly for coming off like that.’

  ‘Now then, miss—’ a police constable had appeared at Leo’s shoulder ‘—better let the young woman be on her way. You did very well there to stop the horse, but we don’t want any more incidents.’

  Leo looked at him. ‘Aren’t you going to arrest the man who threw the stone? He’s the cause of all the trouble.’

  The constable turned his gaze to the little knot of workmen, who stared back belligerently. ‘If young women who ought to know better choose to disport themselves in unsuitable clothing,’ he said ponderously, ‘they have only themselves to blame for the consequences.’

  ‘But that’s not …’ Leo began a
ngrily but the policeman had already turned away.

  Her companion reached out and gripped her wrist. ‘Let it go. No point in making a fuss.’ She smiled, and Leo found herself looking into deep blue eyes that sparkled with vitality. ‘By the way, I’m Victoria Langford.’

  Leo took the offered hand. ‘I’m Leonora Malham Brown. How do you do?’

  Victoria gathered up the reins of the now docile horse. ‘I’d better get going. The others are waiting for me. She placed one foot in the stirrup, then turned back to Leo. ‘It would be nice to meet again. Would you care for that?’

  Leo answered without needing to think. ‘Yes, I should, very much.’

  Victoria swung herself into the saddle with an ease that Leo could only envy. She caught a glimpse of riding breeches under the divided skirt and was aware of the frustrating impediment of her own petticoats.

  ‘Tomorrow? How about tea at the Grosvenor?’

  ‘That would be lovely.’

  ‘Four o’clock then?’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll look forward to it.’

  ‘Thank you! You saved a lot of people a lot of trouble. See you tomorrow.’

  She turned the horse’s head towards the spot where her companions were waiting and cantered away, and as she did so a church clock nearby struck the hour. Leo started. Four o’clock! It was her grandma’s At Home afternoon and she was expected to put in an appearance. The last thing she wanted was an inquisition into where she had been. She began to walk briskly towards Sussex Gardens.

  No. 31 Sussex Gardens was one of a terrace of elegant Georgian houses. When Beavis, her grandma’s butler, opened the door to her, Leo could tell from his expression that she was both late and looking dishevelled.

  ‘Madam is in the drawing room,’ he announced, ‘and she has been asking for you.’

  ‘Does she have guests with her?’ Leo asked.

  ‘Yes, miss. Lady Stevenage and Mrs Fawcett have called.’

  ‘I’ll just go up and take off my hat,’ Leo said.

  Beavis made a small bow and withdrew through the green baize door to the servants’ quarters. As Leo crossed to the stairs she heard her grandma’s voice from the drawing room.

  ‘Marriage? Oh dear, I’m afraid there’s very little prospect of that. The girl is too tall, too clever and too arrogant.’

  Leo had no doubt that she was the girl in question. Up in her bedroom she interrogated her reflection in the dressing-table mirror. Wide amber eyes flecked with green looked back at her. There was a trace of moisture on the lashes, which she hastily brushed away. She had resolved long ago that she would not let her grandma make her cry. She had been fifteen when her father sent her back to live with the old lady and she had sensed at once that she disapproved of her. She guessed that her father had been a disappointment because, instead of staying at home and going into business to increase the family fortune, he had squandered it on an inexplicable, to his mother, passion for archaeology. Then he had compounded his sins by marrying a foreigner, a Greek woman without any social credentials. As a final dereliction of duty, when his wife died he had kept Leo with him instead of sending her back to be educated in England like her brother, Ralph, with the result that when she finally arrived at Sussex Gardens she was, in her grandma’s words, a hoyden with no idea of how to behave in good society.

  Too tall? Leo considered her reflection. It was true that she could look most men straight in the eye, rather than gazing up at them as they seemed to prefer. And it was true that she didn’t have much of a figure. In fact she was so lacking in feminine curves that her brother had long ago nicknamed her ‘beanpole’. But she was not bad-looking, even if her strong chin and well-marked cheekbones were not quite what contemporary fashion regarded as beautiful. In fact, her brother had told her that one of his friends had referred to her as ‘a devilish handsome gel’. Too clever? Was she to blame for the fact that her father had kept her with him on his travels and educated her himself? So that now she could not only read Latin and Greek, she also had a good understanding of mathematics and history. She spoke French and German, which might be expected, and in addition she was fluent in demotic Greek and Turkish and could make herself understood in Italian and Arabic, though possibly not in terms suitable for a young lady. Too arrogant? It was true that she did not suffer fools gladly and had never reconciled herself to the notion that well brought-up young women were not expected to express opinions on religion or philosophy, and certainly not on politics. But she did try to keep a guard on her tongue and look suitably demure and admiring when men were talking rubbish.

  She secured the last wayward strand of heavy chestnut hair with a stab of a hairpin. Anyway, what her grandma had said was untrue in one respect, at least. Tom Devenish would propose to her tomorrow, if she gave him the slightest encouragement. She stood up, straightened her dress and went downstairs. Outside the drawing room door she paused, drew as deep a breath as her corset would allow, lifted her chin and went in.

  The room was furnished in the heavy Victorian style of her grandma’s social heyday. Thick plush curtains in faded puce kept back the sunlight and the visitors sat on overstuffed chairs upholstered in a similar colour. An occasional table covered with a velvet cloth was loaded with china ornaments and an arrangement of dried flowers under a glass dome, while the mantelpiece bore two large ormolu vases. Above it was an oil-painting of the old lady as a young woman of twenty. Amelia Malham Brown was over sixty but she still retained traces of the delicate, fair-haired beauty that had captivated the upstart engineer, William Brown, when she was simply Amelia Malham and he was building a railway line across her father’s land. It was her beauty and his money that had made her the toast of London society and her land-owning pedigree that had caused him to add her surname to his own more plebeian Brown. Now a widow of many years she had to hold court in a rather depleted fashion but Leo was well aware that she was expected to rectify that by making a good marriage.

  Her grandma turned an imperious, heavy-lidded gaze towards Leo as she entered. ‘Leonora, you know today is my At Home day. Where have you been?’

  Leo decided that the earlier incident, suitably edited, would provide her with the cover story she needed. Hopefully, it would give the ladies enough to talk about and prevent any further probing. If her grandma were ever to uncover the fact that she had been attending one of Emmeline Pankhurst’s public meetings she would be summarily dispatched to Bramwell Hall, the family home in Cheshire, where her activities would be even more circumscribed. Though there were times when she thought it might even be preferable to London. At least there she could have a horse saddled up and go for a good gallop.

  ‘I’m sorry, Grandma,’ she said. ‘I was walking in the park and there was an incident – a horse bolted and for a while there was so much turmoil around the gate that I couldn’t get through.’ She turned to shake hands with her grandma’s guests.

  ‘Bolted, you say?’ Lady Stevenage exclaimed. ‘How did that occur?’

  ‘One of those infernal machines, I expect,’ Amelia put in sharply.

  ‘They don’t allow motor cars in the park, Grandma,’ Leo pointed out.

  Her grandma snorted. Motor cars were her favourite bête noir. ‘Out on the road. Near enough to frighten the poor beasts with their noise.’

  Leo was saved from further questions by the appearance of Beavis.

  ‘Lieutenant Malham Brown and Mr Devenish, madam.’

  The appearance of her brother aroused in Leo a familiar mixture of emotions. Ralph might have been born to wear uniform. He had gone into the Guards straight from school and had found his perfect setting, and the fact was apparent from the top of his glossy chestnut head to the shining toes of his boots. He looked, Leo thought, like a thoroughbred horse in the peak of condition and it was not lost on her that they were so much alike that people had been known to mistake them for twins, although he was the elder by two years. The sight of him always induced a thrill of admiration and pride but combined with that
was another, bitterer sensation, which she was forced to admit as jealousy. Try as she might to suppress it, she could not help envying his freedom of choice and his luck at finding a destiny that suited him so perfectly, while she was so constrained and limited by circumstance and convention.

  Tom Devenish provoked a different set of emotions altogether. He was handsome, independently wealthy and the heir to a baronetcy, which made him in her grandma’s eyes – and those of many other society matrons – the perfect catch, and Leo knew that most people thought she was mad not to encourage him. He and Ralph had been at school together and had remained close friends, but it was an attraction of opposites. Whereas Ralph was all dash and activity, unable to stay still for more than five minutes together, Tom behaved with a restraint that Leo found disturbing. She sensed that behind the mask of gentlemanly good manners simmered emotions that he was afraid to unleash. He had a good brain, and had read Classics at Oxford, but had left with a disappointing Lower Second when all his tutors had expected a First. Since then, as far as Leo could tell, he had done nothing but hang around the fringes of the Bohemian world in London. His one interest was in art and he had shown her some exquisite sketches and watercolours, but when she had suggested he might exhibit and even sell some he had reacted with horror. ‘I shouldn’t dream of setting myself up against the professionals. And anyway, people don’t want my kind of pictures these days.’ He was charming and courteous but his courting lacking any sense of passion or urgency. Leo knew that if she married him she could look forward to a life of ease and comfort – and the prospect made her want to scream with boredom. It was only occasionally, when he and Ralph were alone together in the billiard room and she heard them laughing, that it struck her that she was hearing the real Tom Devenish.

  Ralph greeted his grandma and the other ladies, then turned to Leo. ‘How are you, sis?’ he asked, kissing her cheek. ‘Behaving yourself, I hope.’