The Nurse's War Page 6

  Her heart was jumping, but at least she was out of the building. She’d escaped. Soon she could lose herself among the crowds. She’d given no name; she was anonymous and untraceable. But she had gone barely three yards along the road when the sirens began their interminable wailing. High above she heard the roar of Spitfires as they began their chase of enemy planes. Today the Luftwaffe had not waited for night to fall and, when she looked back, a shroud of grey was already rising into the sky from the east of the city. An ambulance tore along Baker Street, its bell ringing furiously, closely followed by several fire engines. Black coils of stinking smoke chased through the sky and billowed overhead, while fragments of what seemed to be charred paper showered groundwards. Her ears were zinging from the noise of blasts coming ever closer. She looked up and saw in the distance English planes darting from side to side in the sky, like little silver fish in a great, grey pond. And, amid the mayhem, a German fleet of bombers flying in majestic order, laying waste to the city below them.

  The underground station had to be the nearest shelter. It was considered bad form to run, but she walked very quickly towards it. The authorities had been reluctant to allow stations to be used, but the public had taken the matter into its own hands and they were now London’s largest air raid shelters, with miles of platforms and tunnels put to use. People felt safer under the ground, though in reality that wasn’t always so. Marble Arch had suffered a direct hit earlier this year and at the Bank, the bomb had fallen right into the station and carried with it tarmac from the road, burning dreadfully hundreds of people. There was risk everywhere.

  Even if the underground was marginally safer, it was not a place she wanted to be. The platforms would be overcrowded, she knew, fetid with the smell of unventilated bodies packed as close as sardines. But she had no choice, and could only hope that her patients were right when they’d said that stations had become more civilised over the last year, with sanitary closets and washing facilities installed. There was even talk that at some mobile canteens had been set up to offer hot food and drink. At the entrance, a queue had already formed and, as she waited, a small scuffle broke out at the front—a few men already merry from an hour spent in a nearby public house—but otherwise an orderly trail of people were making their way down into the depths of the oldest underground station in the world. It looked it too, she thought. The Victorian tiling was dull and dirty, left uncleaned since the war began, and the grind of ancient escalators was no more comforting, jammed as they were from top to tail with people scurrying towards what they hoped was safety.

  When she finally reached the platform, there were already hundreds crammed into the small space and more streaming in with every minute. A mix of people, caught together in this flash of time, sharing the irritation, the defiance, the camaraderie, the fear. By the look of them, there were a large number of locals, people who spent every night here and who Daisy could see were trying to organise the shelter into some kind of order. They had an almost impossible job. Some families had brought what appeared to be their entire household and were already setting up makeshift bunks, surrounded by their most valuable possessions. There were large numbers of women with small children; a few suburban housewives caught out by the sirens before they could get home; and several men in dinner jackets, the ladies on their arms flashing jewels, detained on their way to an evening on the town. Old people, their faces lined and weary, young shop girls and typists, a smattering of men in uniform. All wartime life, in fact.

  The atmosphere was already thick and the noise intense. The trains would continue running until eleven o’clock that night and their constant rumble melded with the clatter of people shifting possessions, calming children, nursing babies, chattering over thermos flasks. One or two noisy disputes temporarily topped the ceaseless buzz, people quarrelling over what cramped space there was left. She tried to pick her way through to a small area she’d spied at the very end of the platform. It was a mere postage stamp of a space, but, with luck, she might find fresh air funnelled from the surface. Inching forward, trying to keep her feet, she hardly noticed the people she moved through. They were simply bodies to negotiate, elbows to avoid, legs not to stumble against. She was concentrating so hard that it came as pure shock when she felt herself pushed forcibly to one side. A man, her mind told her in the instant before she felt herself losing balance, it was a man who’d pushed her. She teetered dangerously on the edge of the platform, hovering for a moment in the air above the live rail. Then, out of nowhere, a pair of strong hands took hold of her arms and held her tightly. There was a voice from what seemed a long way away, but she could make no sense of it.

  ‘Daisy?’ it questioned. Then, ‘It was you!’

  She was finding it difficult to understand what had just happened. The push had almost certainly been deliberate, but why? And who had done it? There had barely been time to register a face—a blurred outline only. Now she felt herself being steadied and looked up into a pair of deep blue eyes, eyes that she knew well.

  ‘It was you at my office?’ he asked, and this time his question needed an answer.

  She drew a deep breath before she said, ‘Yes.’ The mysterious attacker was forgotten. It was almost a relief to own up to her visit.

  ‘On a matter of national importance?’

  The crinkle at the corner of his eyes and the familiar wide smile encouraged confession. She felt oddly light as the tension trickled away. ‘I’m afraid I lied. How did you know it was me?’

  ‘Miss Strachan gave me a detailed description. You made an impression on her.’

  Miss Strachan had not been slow in making her own impression, Daisy thought, but perhaps now wasn’t the time to mention it.

  ‘She said you appeared agitated and hadn’t wanted to wait. It takes some time to come from the fifth floor, you know. I was on my way.’ His tone was only slightly reproving.

  ‘It wasn’t that. I would have waited, but … I couldn’t go through with it.’ The words came out in a rush, ill suited and too dramatic.

  ‘Is calling on an old friend such an ordeal?’

  He made it sound so easy and she wished it were. She reached up to push the damp curls from her face and her hand pulled at first one strand of hair and then another. ‘It didn’t feel right, that’s all. I was there under false pretences.’

  He didn’t respond to this confession and his gaze remained steady. Then he took hold of her hand and, before she could protest, led her through the maze of family groups, towards the empty space she had spied earlier. ‘This is where you were making for, I think. We can talk here.’

  Other people had been quick to spot the same refuge and it had now shrunk to even smaller proportions. They settled themselves as best they could, squashed against the furthermost corner of the tiling before it lost itself along the tunnel. She was uncomfortable, hemmed in on all sides, and swamped by his physical presence. She’d forgotten how cool and fresh his skin smelt. It was distracting at a time when she needed her wits about her.

  ‘So why the pretence?’

  ‘I had to see you and she—Miss Strachan—was insistent that I must have an appointment. But today is my only free day. I’m on duty for the rest of the week.’

  ‘It sounds as though it might be something of national importance after all.’

  ‘It’s a personal matter,’ she murmured. So personal that now she’d arrived at the moment the impossibility of conveying Gerald’s demand hit her with an unforeseen force. She felt her breath stutter and words go missing.

  ‘Tell me,’ he urged. His hand rested lightly on her forearm, a gesture of friendship, of solidarity. ‘You’ve braved meeting me again, so it must be serious.’

  Daisy looked down at her hands and noticed they were clenching and unclenching. He must have noticed, too, and realised how hard this was for her.

  ‘It was about your work,’ she managed to say at last. At least that was true, but far too vague. It was the best she could do though.

&nb
sp; ‘My work?’

  ‘How is it going?’ She’d ducked the question she should be asking.

  ‘Fine.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘It’s going fine.’ An uneasy silence opened between them and in her mind it filled the entire station, blotting out the chatter, the laughter, the raised voices.

  ‘Did I tell you I’d jumped horses?’ He was trying to fill the yawning gap and she was grateful. ‘Not exactly jumped,’ he continued, ‘more of a sideways manoeuvre.’

  ‘You said something about new colleagues, I think. I don’t remember the details.’

  ‘That’s hardly surprising. Anyway, I’m working for Special Operations now. What’s left of the SIS after last year’s split is still with the Foreign Office, but I got lucky.’

  ‘Why lucky?’

  ‘The SOE is far less demure—it can even be a tad exciting. The Foreign Office seems positively staid by comparison.’

  She’d always felt that Grayson was cut out for adventure, and it looked as though he’d finally found it. His masquerade as a district officer in Jasirapur had never quite rung true.

  ‘What do you do there?’

  ‘Guerilla stuff—getting operations going in occupied countries. Or at least, we try to.’

  She forced herself to concentrate on what he was saying but her mind refused to obey. Somehow she was having to hold one kind of conversation, while at the same time working to escape the one that really mattered. And, all the time, she was conscious of his warmth infiltrating the length of her body.

  In a daze she heard herself say, ‘But I thought your work was with India.’

  ‘It is. SOE is divided up, each section assigned to a single country and naturally I got to join the Indian sector. We set up the India Mission late last year. It’s too distant for London to control directly but I’m the liaison officer.’

  ‘And that’s exciting?’

  ‘By proxy. We’re building local resistance, helping groups in Japanese occupied territory. The station’s due to move to Ceylon, to be closer to South-east Asia Command, but I’ll still be the liaison.’ He paused for a moment and then with a slight awkwardness, ‘Here, I’m rambling on far too long. You can’t possibly be interested in all of this. Tell me, how’s the training going?’

  Her ploy appeared to have worked. In his enthusiasm, he’d forgotten the urgent matter she wanted to discuss. She was being a coward, she knew, but with luck, the all-clear would sound before he remembered it. And if she could talk about her own work as engagingly, it might distract him a while longer.

  ‘The training’s going well. Studying isn’t always easy, especially after a long day or night on the wards. But since I passed the Preliminary Exam, it’s been better. I’m trusted now with quite difficult procedures, though I don’t escape the drudgery—and bedpans are beginning to lose their allure.’

  She gave a rare smile and he smiled back. ‘Only beginning! But you must be gaining an immense amount of experience. And once the war is over, you’ll find that invaluable. I can see you making matron in no time.’

  She didn’t reply, but felt his eyes resting on her, and when he spoke again, his voice was gentle. ‘Sorry, that sounded callous. I can imagine the experience has come at a price. Some of your days must be very distressing.’

  She felt herself being tugged towards his sympathy. Don’t look at him, she told herself, don’t look into his face, into his eyes. She must not allow old feelings to surface. Not when they could be dashed at any moment, severed absolutely, if she was forced to admit the outrageous request she had come with.

  ‘Some of the work is painful,’ she agreed. ‘Barts still operates as a casualty clearing station and the stream of bomb victims is pretty constant. But you’re right. With local emergencies as well, the nursing is intensive, particularly as we’ve only a skeleton staff. Most of the nurses have been sent to Hill End but I’ve been lucky. I was one of the few asked to stay in London.’

  ‘And when the war ends, where to?’

  He seemed as eager as she to keep the conversation going, so she obliged. ‘I should be an SRN by then. I think I’d like to specialise in surgical nursing. I actually made it into the theatre the other day. One of the third year nurses had to go home—her mother is extremely ill—and I took her place. Operations are done in the basement now. They’ve moved all the linen, but it’s still quite cramped. I found it so interesting, though, that I forgot how hot and crowded it was.’

  He nodded almost absently and she felt his eyes fix anew on her face. He was thinking and that was dangerous. He was trying to read her, she could see. He hadn’t forgotten the urgent mission she’d come on after all, and she couldn’t imagine why she’d thought he would. He was an intelligence officer, wasn’t he? It was his job to get to the bottom of things. She strained her ears; the all-clear was a long time coming, but it could still save her. If it sounded, she would say a swift goodbye and tell Gerald that she’d met Grayson as he’d asked, and had done her best to persuade, but without success. It was a lie, but then how many times had her husband lied to her?

  She crossed and uncrossed her legs, then glanced down at her watch. The second hand seemed hardly to have moved. Time was slowing down and she felt trapped. The people immediately around her had begun to settle themselves more securely. They must have decided the raid would be protracted or simply one among a series and resigned themselves to spending most of the night away from home. Limbs were spread more widely, shoes removed, coats bunched as pillows or tucked into the body as protection from the ferocious draughts that sailed in from either side of the tunnel.

  Grayson watched these preparations with an indifferent eye, but when he turned back to her, his gaze was sharp and the quiet voice had become unyielding. ‘It’s been good to catch up with each other’s lives, Daisy, but I don’t think you came all the way from the City on your one free day to talk about my work or yours. What’s going on?’

  There was to be no escape then. When she dared look at him, she felt her eyes drawn to his and saw determination there, but kindness too, and something a good deal deeper and warmer. What she had to say would anger him for sure. It might even hurt him and that was the last thing she wanted. But the confusion, the wretchedness she’d felt these past few days had reached a crescendo and, in a moment, it had toppled and burst through the flimsy defence she had built.

  ‘Gerald is alive,’ she blurted out.

  CHAPTER 5

  She felt Grayson’s body tense against her, saw his face become stone.

  ‘Gerald is alive,’ she repeated. She still hardly believed it herself.

  ‘Gerald? Gerald Mortimer?’ His bark of laughter was ugly, forced.

  ‘Yes. Gerald—my husband.’

  ‘But that’s crazy. Why on earth would you think that?’

  ‘I don’t think it, I know. He’s here in London. He came to see me.’ It was getting easier now. Her breath was still catching, but she was managing to put one word after another.

  Grayson wasn’t so adept. ‘But … But how can he be?’ he stuttered.

  ‘He didn’t drown. He was rescued by villagers downstream.’

  ‘That’s impossible. The river that day … you saw the river, Daisy. You stood on its brink. No one could have survived that torrent.’

  ‘He did,’ she said flatly. ‘Somehow he managed to hang on to wreckage from one of the festival floats. He was pushed into the bank some miles from Jasirapur, and the villagers found him and looked after him until his injuries were mended. Then he made his way back to England.’

  ‘Just like that.’ Grayson still seemed stunned, but there was a sour edge to his voice.

  ‘I don’t think it was quite that easy. He hasn’t told me much about the journey except that it took months. He begged his way out of India, and then through Turkey and across Europe. He found a job in France, but then war was declared. And here he is.’

  Grayson’s legs twitched. He looked as though he would give anything to jump to his feet and disappear
down one of the tunnels. Instead, his hands harrowed through the brown sweep of his hair until it almost stood to attention. His mouth was tight and his forehead creased; beneath its rigid lines Daisy could see a whole encyclopedia of questions forming.

  ‘But why? Why come to England, why not return to Jasirapur?’

  ‘If he’d gone back, he would have been arrested. You would have arrested him.’

  Grayson glared furiously at her, as though her remark was so self-evident it wasn’t worth uttering.

  ‘And he still can be arrested,’ he was keen to remind her. ‘The Indian Army will want a court martial for certain. He’s brought dishonour on his regiment. But he’s also guilty of a criminal act. He should stand trial for theft, even treason.’

  Daisy nodded dumbly. He was not saying anything she’d not already told herself a thousand times.

  ‘And now, of course, he can add desertion to the charge sheet.’ Grayson was angry, very angry. ‘Not to mention his treatment of you.’

  ‘He did try to save my life,’ she said in a small voice. ‘You once reminded me of that.’

  ‘That was when I thought he was dead.’ His voice was savage. ‘What possessed him to desert? Couldn’t he for once have acted like a man, owned up to his crimes, taken his punishment? Evidently not.’

  She didn’t know whether he was consumed by fury at Gerald’s criminal follies, or whether it was simple jealousy of the man who’d returned to claim his wife. But, whatever the reason, he couldn’t be much angrier. Why not then take her chance?