Blasted Things Read online

  Dennis wants to hire a nursemaid and have me return to the Beeches, but I am happy in the cottage, near Stan’s family, who are a marvellous help. I know Dennis considers the Burkes utterly déclassé but he can go and soak his head.

  He’s terrifically hurt, you know. He’s been in the most colossal sulk since you ran off. He must still be thoroughly gone on you – after all, he’s an eligible type and there are plenty of eligible types around . . . Don’t worry though. He may be sowing a few wild oats but he still very much expects you to return to the fold.

  Perhaps you could write soothingly to him, a few words of love would go a long way – or better still come back for a visit? Surely you must have leave now and again? This request is also selfish, of course – you know me! I miss you most frightfully. I understand what you’re doing and applaud you for it, but I did miss you in the first terrible weeks after I got the telegram. And I want you to meet the girls. After all, as soon as you’re married you will be their favourite aunt. I have called them Phyllis and Claris, both names from Stan’s family – I think that would have pleased him and it’s certainly a great comfort to his mother who has taken to grandmotherhood with enormous gusto!

  Till soon, I hope.

  How I do look forward to calling you sister!

  Affectionate wishes,

  Harri

  Clem folded and unfolded the letter. How disappointed Harri was going to be. Before the war, she’d been sweet on Stanley, a joiner, much to the disapproval of her father – and of Dennis. In 1916, when Stanley was home on leave from Africa, defiant against her family’s snobbishness, she’d eloped with him. And now here she was, a widow, mother of twins.

  Clem put the letter between the pages of her sketchbook, unable to resist as she did so the temptation to gaze at the last few pages: Powell, Powell, Powell, done not from life but memory. There had not yet been time for him to sit for her. One day would come that enormous luxury. Here was the angle of his head as he bent over a patient; the tight intensity of his brow above the mask; a serious expression, the pale eyes wide, the sudden comical width of his grin.

  Naturally she must write to Dennis and to Harri. After this shift, she resolved. Although she burned with love, the thought of what she must write was a terrible blast of cold and she stood up quickly, reaching for her overcoat.

  On that shift two boys in succession died on the operating table. Both high femur amputations, both with smashed pelvises. One lost his genitals and part of his large intestine. Better off dead, of course. Some part of her must have become cauterised because behind the immediate horror and sorrow, revulsion and compassion, there nagged the knowledge that after this, and somehow harder than this, there were the words she must write to Dennis. And even behind that, a tiny spark stayed lit, a tiny point of excitement. She thought of peat fires that for years burn invisibly underground, minute filaments of conflagration.

  Later she went to seek out Powell, but he was working and there was no chance to speak to or – what she really craved – to touch him. She watched him from the door of the theatre hut, back bent, profile intent, over the table under the weak, guttering light. She could see the feet of the patient, white and loose, the wide hips of a nurse whose name she didn’t know.

  *

  The walls of the canteen tent flapped in the breeze and any warmth generated by the stove wisped away. An orderly was doling out greyish lumps of scrambled egg.

  ‘Only a little of that, please, with bread and coffee.’ Clem stretched out her plate.

  ‘You’ve blood on your forehead, pet,’ the orderly said.

  Clem felt a crusty patch on her brow and picked at it with her nail.

  ‘You look dead beat,’ he said and offered her the box of Red Cross cigarettes. Thin, mean ciggies made of sweepings, but better than nothing. Clem put a few in her coat pocket. The scrambled egg was grim but necessary, and she forced it down and smoked a cigarette before taking out paper and pen. But half an hour later, with head nodding and eyes closing, she had got no further than Dearest Dennis on one sheet and Darling Harri on another.

  4

  January 1918

  DAWN, AND THE incongruously fresh sound of a blackbird nearby, and through chinks round the door, a gleam of primrose. Clem woke sandy-eyed, tipped from a cloud of dream into the sound of birdsong and then shelling. She lay listening, rather detached. There was no fear, or not much of it, though today it was closer than ever. Where was the fear? She searched herself as she listened: sometimes the rat-tat-tat of gunfire, rapid and snippy like the keys of two vast, duelling typewriters battering out threats to each other on a paper sky; crumpings like oil drums being crushed by massive fists; a whistling followed by the soft whoomph of a missile striking, then virtual silence, then the battering of the typewriters again.

  She forced herself out of the blanket, stood in the cold damp, stretched and yawned. She opened the door and looked up at the sky, half expecting to see it full of flying words – English, French, Walloon and German – but there were only distant wisps of smoke smudging the creamy yellow.

  The Front was shifting north; the Clearing Station would soon be moved in accordance. Clem shivered through washing and dressing, and hurried to get to her coffee. She sat deliberately alone at a rickety table in the canteen, dipping stale baguette in sweet black coffee and sucking the stimulating mush. She lit one of the Red Cross gaspers, longing for one of Powell’s Lucky Strikes. But still, this moment was luxury and she would take a few moments over it, blocking from her mind what she might see and do today, what she saw and did yesterday. Thinking of nothing but the taste of the coffee and stale crumbs, noticing the way the bread’s structure broke down immediately so that you had to rush the sopping, darkened stuff to your mouth before it disintegrated.

  Iris stomped over and indicated the chair opposite. ‘Mind?’ She sat down, crunching an apple. Her knuckles were swollen and rough, specs smudged and askew, complexion grey with fatigue, but still there was the cheery, snaggle-toothed smile.

  ‘Just up?’ she said. ‘Me, I’m off to kip for a bit. Quieter now.’ As she spoke a shell whistled and exploded, and they both ducked involuntarily, then grinned.

  ‘Getting too close for comfort,’ Iris remarked, biting into the withered little apple.

  ‘Comfort!’ said Clem.

  ‘Take your point.’ Iris took another crunch. ‘Right, that’s me off to the Land of Nod.’ She hauled herself up.

  ‘Wait,’ said Clem.

  Iris sat again, tilting her head quizzically.

  ‘Had a letter lately?’ Clem asked. ‘How’s Sidney?’

  ‘So-so.’ Iris wobbled her hand. ‘Poor old stick. He’s got his problems and he wants me home. And I want to be with him, of course, but . . .’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘This is what I have to do.’

  ‘I know.’

  They shrugged at each other.

  ‘Eh, this’ll sound queer,’ Iris’s face crinkled mischievously, ‘but do you know, I just want to smell him. Just bury my nose in him and smell and smell and smell.’

  Clem blinked.

  Iris was watching her face. ‘I expect you feel the same about your Dennis,’ she said. ‘Barmy, isn’t it!’

  ‘Sounds like true love to me, proper love,’ Clem said. A morsel of bread sank into the murk in her cup and she tried to fish it out with a spoon but it dissolved to nothing.

  ‘Proper love?’ Iris inclined her head. ‘Funny way of putting it. But yes, proper all right, except when it’s being improper – but then, you need a bit of spice, don’t you?’

  Clem tried to imagine Iris’s husband, a big-bellied whiskery professor twenty years her senior, being improper. Rather a queasy picture it made, but if Iris was happy . . . It really does take all sorts.

  ‘I’m thinking of ending things with Dennis,’ came out of Clem’s mouth.

  ‘Oh, my dear.’ Iris gulped and grasped her hand. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, gushing away like that. Did you get a
letter?’

  ‘No . . . I simply feel different.’

  ‘Well, your feelings might change again once you’re home. I shouldn’t be hasty if I were you.’

  ‘Iris,’ Clem leaned towards her. ‘Don’t tell Gwen, will you? Don’t tell anyone, but there’s someone here.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Oh, I shouldn’t say.’ Clem hid her face in her hands.

  ‘Who?’ Iris took off her specs, polished them on her apron, as if for a better look. ‘A doctor I’m guessing?’

  ‘Please don’t tease,’ Clem said.

  ‘Why not tell Gwen?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know! She’s always so sarcastic about everything I do. She mocked me for getting engaged . . . and now . . .’

  Iris smothered another yawn as she stood. ‘Sorry. Beddy-byes for me.’ She patted Clem’s shoulder before she left. ‘Good luck to you.’

  Clem sat a moment longer, eyes closed, wishing she hadn’t spoken. How indiscreet exhaustion rendered one. But still, how lovely to say it. To bring it out into the light of day.

  Her shift was starting but still she sat there, eyes closed, thinking of the lovely whiff of Powell’s neck, his hair, even the fabric of his greatcoat. He still awaited her answer – but she couldn’t, in good conscience, say yes until she’d written to Dennis.

  At Christmas she’d dropped him a line in a card, but that had hardly been the occasion. And he’d sent a parcel with ridiculously dainty handkerchiefs, silk stockings and violet creams, and included a hand-painted card from Harri with a photograph of her chubby-faced twins. When she’d opened these, Clem’s heart had flailed guiltily and her resolve had wavered. After all, there was a life back home, a safe, respectable life, waiting for her. A fine home, a handsome and devoted husband. Did she really have the strength to turn her back on all of that?

  5

  March 1918

  CLEM BEGAN TO drift off over her coffee. Her back ached from bending awkwardly for more than an hour to assist a severe cranial – who bought it anyway. The atmosphere, always tense but sometimes laced with a febrile humour, had darkened when the chap, a captain, died. The surgeon, Lennox in this case, turned away in despair at this failure, the others tasked with a sketchy sewing-up before the body was wheeled away. Lennox, Clem had come to respect enormously. He was a man of few words, his ferocious frown a sign of concentration, of how much he cared, rather than of bad temper.

  Death was so commonplace it had become almost banal. She had to remind herself that each one would cause devastation in the hearts of some, ripple through the lives of many. Someone had given birth to each of these men and boys, cradled his newborn head against her breast, wanting only to keep him safe and warm.

  She noticed with mild interest that the hand was on the table, a gold ring winking on one finger, pale clicking nails . . . Her head dropped forward and she woke with a start. Must stand, must put one foot in front of the other, must . . . a paler hand now, smaller – was it a child, was it female?

  ‘Armstrong!’ Clem jerked her head up and blinked. It was Sister Fitch’s hand. ‘Get to bed now. You’re no use to man nor beast in that state. Up, now . . .’ She pointed to the door and Clem stood. Shellfire – rattety-tattety.

  ‘Sorry, Sister.’ She dragged herself outside where it was surprisingly light. What time of day was it? She’d lost track. And then Powell was there, dear man: pale, dark rings under his eyes, an angry spot on his chin; they all had them, bites and pimples, cold sores, red chapped patches.

  He raised his hand in a weary salute.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, and as the corners of her mouth lifted, something seemed to lift inside her and she felt a quickening despite her exhaustion. ‘Dead on my feet.’

  ‘Any progress?’ he asked. He tapped his wedding finger. A sudden wide hopeful grin, big healthy teeth. He needed a shave; she could see the bristles peppery on his chin.

  ‘Oh . . . that.’ She paused, still half in a dream. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said, amazed as the words floated from her mouth. ‘I’ll come to Canada. I’ll marry you.’

  He blinked. ‘That, baby, is entirely the right answer!’ He pressed his lips against her brow and her eyes clicked shut like a doll’s. ‘Now, go get some sleep.’ He shoved her gently towards her hut.

  Clem skidded on the slippery boards, regained her balance and went on, looking over her shoulder at his retreating back. She kicked off her shoes, climbed the ladder to her bunk and plummeted into a pit of deep, astonishing sleep.

  From which she was woken, only minutes later, by Iris. ‘Up, you’re wanted,’ she said.

  Must move, though it was dark and every atom of her mind and being clung to sleep. She dragged herself up, stumbled through her ablutions; something niggled, something from a dream or . . . She dropped her hairbrush on the soggy wooden floor of the wash tent – no, not a dream. That long pale serious face, those silvery eyes. She had, hadn’t she? She had said yes.

  Orders had come through and it was official. Casualty Clearing Station 94 was to be moved five miles north-east. In the meantime, the nurses and volunteers would be employed in treating patients at stations along the roads and railways. Powell had been granted furlough, as he called it, but Clem, though she applied, was unable to get leave until the new station had been established, after which she was promised three weeks. Then, she’d go home and break the news to Dennis. Better that way. How cowardly, after all, to do it by letter.

  The move was underway; they’d ceased receiving casualties. Most of the medical staff had been shifted to their temporary postings and teams of British and French volunteers had begun the process of dismantling the huts and tents. Clem, Iris and Gwen, with three other VADs under the command of Sister Fitch, were left behind to disinfect and pack medical and surgical equipment in preparation for transport. They did this to an accompaniment of rumbles and shellfire that had become so normal now they scarcely flinched.

  Clem and Iris were finishing up in the theatre, hurried intermittently by Sister Fitch who kept coming in – ‘The Hun won’t wait till you finish larking and gossiping’ – though in fact there was no ’larking’ and they worked mostly in silence. Iris was a rare person, Clem thought, with whom one could be comfortable without the need for constant chatter. Clem watched her friend’s busy fingers. She’d developed some kind of arthritis in them and had chilblains too; they looked awfully bent and sore. Clem examined her own – not much better, though at least her chilblains were limited to her toes.

  Iris never complained about anything. The Professor was lucky, really very lucky. There was a beauty in Iris, not obvious at first, with her sturdy shape, her specs and snaggled teeth. One had to know her to see how she shone with a soft steady brightness. A child’s hymn came to mind – Like a little candle burning in the night – and with it a deep squirm of memory. Maybe her mother had leant over her cot and sung it? If ever I have a child I will too, she decided; such a pretty tune. You in your small corner, and me in mine. And with the thought of a child, the suspicion she’d been suppressing for the past two weeks returned and she paused to rest her hand on her hollow, hungry belly.

  ‘Hello! Anyone at home?’ Clem realised Iris was laughing and clicking her fingers. ‘Look at her! Miles away! You’ve a visitor,’ she said, lifting a pair of forceps from the steriliser. And there was Powell. Iris lifted her eyebrows with a look of amused comprehension. ‘Get on with you then,’ she said.

  ‘Just two minutes. If Sister comes back, tell her a call of nature or something.’ Clem followed Powell out into the frostiness of late morning. She was groping for something to say, something about the relative peace of the day now that the camp was almost deserted when a shell exploded nearby, shaking the duckboards. He put his arms around her and they clung for the moment it took to realise they were still standing.

  ‘I’m all packed,’ he said. ‘Won’t be seeing you again for who knows how long. Who knows where they’ll send me.’

  ‘We can write.’


  ‘Well, of course!’ He looked at her thirstily as if he wished to drink her with his eyes. ‘Will you say it again?’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That you’ll marry me.’

  A shadow flitted across her heart as she smiled and said, ‘I will.’

  ‘Don’t look so worried, baby.’ How she loved it when he called her baby.

  ‘Actually, I might have to marry you,’ she said and watched his expression change as he grasped her meaning.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ she said.

  He blinked, shook his head, a slow grin stretching his lips. ‘Oh, Clem.’

  She looked around, no sign of Sister. There was activity at the far side, the dismantling of huts and tents, but no one was taking a blind bit of notice of them. She tilted up her chin and they kissed, just a cool brush of dry lips but it set up a detonation inside her and inside him too, judging by the flaring of his pupils, the way his breath came harder.

  ‘Can we be alone, just for a minute, before I go?’ he breathed against her neck.

  ‘I don’t know. I really shouldn’t.’ Legs gone soft, she leant against him. ‘I’ll try to sort something out.’

  ‘Armstrong!’ shouted Sister, coming round a corner. ‘Haven’t you got enough to do?’

  Clem hurried back into the hut.

  Iris raised her eyebrows and grinned. ‘Well, he’s certainly a dish. Is it serious?’

  ‘Yes, it is. Actually, he’s proposed.’

  ‘No!’ Iris dropped a pair of sterilised tweezers. ‘Damn, now I’ll have to do them again.’ She stooped to retrieve them. ‘And?’

  ‘I’ve accepted!’ Clem laughed, a little incredulous herself.

  ‘Oh, my word! Oh, goodness me!’ Iris threw the tweezers into the steriliser and they hugged, hands held out for hygiene’s sake so that the embrace was a bosomy apron rub. A shell whistled overhead and they ducked and waited for the explosion, which rattled the corrugated roof, shaking down a shower of dust.