Lorimers at War (16 page)

The situation she described sounded appalling to Margaret, who was accustomed to discipline and efficiency in hospital management, but the letter contained no hint of complaint. During the long retreat across the mountains Kate had obviously been depressed, facing problems far outside the ability of a single doctor to solve. At least now she was in a position to be of real help to those in need of medical care.

Margaret was glad on her behalf and looked forward to passing on the news. Alexa had been spending the week at Glanville House in Park Lane, taking her concert party to perform in the London hospitals. When the time came for her return in the evening Piers went to the station to meet her train. Glancing from the window of her office at the sound of the returning motor car, Margaret noticed how serious they both looked as they went into the house. The observation worried her and after a little while she went to look for them.

She found them in the nursery, beside their sleeping son. The day had been one of the hottest of the year and little Pirry had thrown off all his bed coverings. His soft and seemingly boneless body sprawled in total relaxation on the mattress. One hand stretched above his head; the thumb of the other was in his mouth. The door was open, but Margaret felt it would be an intrusion on the family group to go in. She paused in the doorway and the two adults, speaking quietly to each other while looking at
the sleeping child, were not aware of her presence behind them.

‘A vigorous offensive!' said Piers. He glanced down at the newspaper he was gripping. ‘Such an easy phrase to write, but what does it imply? Last week, Alexa, when the House rose, I went out on to the terrace and found myself standing next to Lord Falmouth. His two elder sons were both in the army and both killed in the first months of the war. He'd heard that morning that he'd lost his youngest son as well. The last. He hadn't been able to face his wife with the news. I think he told me just to see whether he was capable of speaking the words without breaking down. The boy was only nineteen. He'd been in France for five months. That made him fortunate in terms of statistics. Did you know, Alexa, that the average expectation of life of a nineteen-year-old second lieutenant is twelve weeks from the day he arrives at the front. How long can we go on like this? But how can we stop? I never thought I'd live to bless the fact that my son was born when I was already an old man. All my friends of my own age are either in mourning already or expecting the worst. I feel almost guilty that I'm so fortunate.'

He turned to embrace Alexa and caught sight of Margaret. There was no reason why Margaret should have felt guilty about her accidental eavesdropping, but equally there was no doubt from her brother-in-law's expression that he had not intended what he had been saying to be heard by her – as though she were not as well aware as he of the risks that faced her son. To reassure him, she smiled as though she had only just arrived.

‘Is there anything new in the paper?' she asked.

Piers handed her the copy of
The Star
which Alexa had brought from London. Underneath the black headlines which announced the opening of a British offensive came the brief official communiqué. ‘At half past seven this morning a vigorous offensive was launched by the British
Army. The front extends over twenty miles north of the Somme. The assault was preceded by a bombardment, lasting about an hour and a half.'

‘I heard the guns,' said Alexa. They moved away from the nursery, closing the door behind them. ‘I woke up at six o'clock this morning. There was no one about in Park Lane: no traffic. The air was very still. And I heard the guns.'

‘All the way from France? It's not possible, surely.'

‘I wouldn't have expected so. I can only tell you that it happened. And I wasn't the only one. From time to time throughout the day I've seen people standing motionless in the middle of London, not doing anything, just straining their ears. Everyone's been snappy and uneasy today. Partly because of the heat perhaps. But it's as though we've been having knowledge forced on us when we would have preferred not to know. And if we can hear the sound in England, what must it be like to be only a few yards away from the guns?'

‘Brinsley is somewhere near the Somme,' said Margaret. Both her son and her nephew were careful not to give anything away in their letters, but Brinsley had recently been on leave and had mentioned the names of villages near to the base town of Albert. Margaret had looked them up later on the
Daily Mail
map which hung in the library, and knew that she had reason to feel anxious. But to talk about her fear would do no good. The day was over now. If Brinsley and Robert were safe, there was nothing to worry about. If they had come to harm, it had happened already. Her own anguish could do nothing to help them and she had long ago ceased to believe in the power of prayer. She was frightened, but determined not to show it. In an attempt to talk of something more cheerful she asked Alexa how London was looking.

‘Drab and dowdy,' Alexa told her. ‘There are no flowers in the parks, no water in the lakes, no lights in
the buildings at night, no street lamps lit either, for fear of Zeppelin raids. The soldiers on leave are lively enough and there seem to be plenty of over-painted young women ready to go with them to the theatre or music hall. But there's no feeling of style any more. Hardly anyone wears evening dress to the theatre now, and a gentleman in a tall hat is almost a curiosity. To tell you the truth, there's hardly anyone I know left in London. The museums and galleries are closed, and the shops are so under-staffed and under-stocked that anyone who owns a house in the country has retired to live in it and to buy food from the nearest farm. If I didn't believe that our concert party brought a little glamour to men who deserve to be cheered up, I'd never stir from Blaize. As it is, I think we shall have to close Glanville House. It's becoming impossible to replace the servants as they leave to join up. Even the maids are going to work in factories. It doesn't seem to worry them that their skin will turn yellow from the munitions or that they may even blow themselves up. The last kitchen maid I employed had never been outside her own village before last Christmas and now she's gone off to sell tickets to omnibus passengers.'

Once Alexa embarked on the subject of servants there would be no stopping her for the next ten minutes. Margaret withdrew her attention, trying to calculate when she could expect to hear any personal news, and what value it would have – since a letter received today would only mean that the writer had been safe five days earlier.

In the event, she did not have to wait long. Piers was always the first to read the daily paper. He marked anything in it which he thought might be of special interest to his wife or sister-in-law, but when Margaret arrived for her own later breakfast after an hour spent in her office reading the nurses' overnight reports she always looked through the casualty lists for herself. They might contain names recognized by her but not known to Piers.
On Tuesday, however, there was a name which Piers neither overlooked nor marked. He brought the paper to her office and silently handed her the page which announced that Captain Brinsley Lorimer had been killed in action.

Margaret wept. Her life had not always been a happy one, but for almost the whole of her fifty-nine years she had been able to accept its setbacks without tears. Only within the last few months had each new blow seemed less supportable than the one before. And Brinsley, light-hearted and life-loving, had been a second son to her for ten years – ever since her brother had sent him to her in England at the age of thirteen for his education. She felt Piers' arm round her shoulder, but each of them knew as well as the other that there were no words which could bring comfort.

A long time passed before she was able to control herself. Then she looked again at the page. Her swollen eyes refused to focus on the tiny type, but she could see that the list of names continued for column after column. ‘Robert?' she asked.

‘I've been right through,' Piers said. ‘Not just the Royal Engineers but every single name, to make sure. He's not there.'

That was a comfort only in the sense that she could not have endured a double blow. She thanked Piers for staying with her, promised that she would be all right now, and was left with the task of writing to Kate and to Ralph. Brinsley's father would have had the official telegram of notification and so would know already of his son's death.

The morning post brought a letter from Robert. It had been written on Friday, before the battle began, so that the mere fact of its arrival gave no reassurance. And its casual mention of an unusual social occasion brought a new chill to Margaret's heart. If Robert had been near enough to Brinsley to share a meal with him, then Robert
was on the same section of the front. Her face was pale as she went out to do her morning round.

Pale enough, presumably, to be noticeable. In the long ward which had been converted from Alexa's little opera house, Margaret was aware of one of the VADs staring at her with an intensity which merited a reprimand. With some difficulty she focused her eyes and attention on the nervy face and recognized the young woman who had helped to get Robert off the train at the beginning of his last leave. Nurse Blakeney, wasn't it? The girl approached her, visibly summoning all her courage. A VAD was not expected to speak unless she was spoken to.

‘Dr Scott. Please forgive me – I know I shouldn't – but I have to ask. Doctor, have you had bad news?'

‘Yes,' said Margaret. She was aware that she spoke brusquely – it was because her tears were still not wholly under her control. Only after she had answered did she understand the question. This girl was not a friend of Brinsley's. She might have glimpsed him on his last leave, but she could have no real interest in his safety. It was Robert's welfare which concerned her. ‘Not about my son, though,' she said. ‘As far as I know, he's all right.'

The girl's relief showed on her face. ‘I had a letter yesterday,' she said. ‘But of course it was written last week, before he went into action. So I was afraid – I'm sorry, Doctor.'

Margaret remembered now that Robert had seen something of Jennifer Blakeney during that leave earlier in the year, but she had not realized that they were corresponding. Well, that was none of her business. She felt no need to stand on her dignity when it was possible to be kind.

‘That's all right, Nurse,' she said. ‘When I hear anything more up-to-date, I'll let you know.'

She moved on, forcing herself to keep her attention on her work. But it was impossible not to be edgy, not to feel frightened whenever she caught the sound of bicycle wheels on the gravel path in case it should prove to be
the telegraph boy and not some unimportant domestic delivery. Each morning the casualty lists were longer and more delayed, making it clear that the offensive had developed into a continuing full-scale battle and that the death roll was running into thousands. She had no interest in the communiqués which claimed that a few yards of ground had been won, but spent every free moment obsessively re-reading the lists of names. On Thursday she learned that Robert had been wounded.

This time Piers did attempt to comfort her. ‘It's a terrible thing to say, but a wound may prove to be the best way of saving his life,' he pointed out. ‘He'll be out of the battle. With any luck, he'll have been sent home.'

‘The Blighty one!' said Margaret. Every patient in the hospital at Blaize had had his own Blighty wound and it was true enough that some of them were grateful for the small hurt which had removed them from the scene of greater danger. But for many the price was a larger one than they could ever have wished to pay. Margaret could not afford to stop feeling frightened until she learned the details of Robert's injury. ‘There are too many wounds,' she said. ‘I've been warned to expect fifty acute surgical cases in the next two days. They know we haven't got the facilities, that we're only equipped for recuperative nursing and convalescence, but apparently there simply aren't enough hospital beds in England and France to cope with the numbers. Some of the men have been moved around for up to five days with nothing more than a bit of emergency attention. Five days! And there's gas gangrene in every wound!'

She realized that she was in danger of becoming hysterical and was not surprised at the firmness with which Piers addressed her.

‘I'm going to London to find him,' he said. ‘You concentrate on your job here, keeping other people's sons alive. I'll get on to the War Office and track him down. When I find him, do you want him here?'

The need to answer had a steadying effect, as no doubt he intended. Neither of them wasted words on the hypocrisy of pretending that they would hesitate to pull any official strings necessary to obtain special treatment for Robert.

‘If he's in need of major surgery, he must go somewhere equipped to do it,' Margaret said. ‘I'll give you the telephone number of someone who could advise you on the best specialist units. But as soon as he only needs nursing, yes, I want him here.'

Robert had no recollection of being carried from the crater. At the regimental aid post he had recovered consciousness briefly. His groan – whether of pain or merely despair that he was still alive after what had seemed to be the peace of dying – brought a nurse to his side. He felt the stab and pressure of an injection, the firm marking of a cross on his forehead. His eyes closed again.

When he was next able to look around him he was in a casualty clearing station, lying on a stretcher at the side of a tent. His hips were bandaged, but that part of his uniform which had not been cut away was stiff with dirt and blood. It was night, although presumably not the same night, and he could see a surgeon, his white smock soaked in blood, bending over a trestle table by the light of an acetylene lamp. It was the beginning of a new nightmare.