Liverpool Angels by Lyn Andrews

Author:Lyn Andrews [Andrews, Lyn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Headline
Published: 2013-12-05T00:00:00+00:00

Later that week Mae was summoned to Sister Allinson’s office. She wondered why but she quickly found out.

‘Nurse Strickland, I have to inform you that you are being transferred,’ Sister announced.

Mae was surprised and prayed it wasn’t going to be somewhere further away. ‘Where to, Sister?’

‘General Camp Hospital Number Twenty-four, one of the hospitals that have been erected on the coast behind the dunes and the railway line. You will be replaced on the train by a nurse coming over from England.’

Mae nodded. There was a terrible shortage of hospitals in France and as no one had envisaged or planned for the scale of the casualties things had become so desperate that new hospitals had had to be hastily erected. They consisted of bell tents and marquees which served as wards, operating theatres and accommodation for the medical staff. ‘When do I go, please, Sister?’

‘Tomorrow, Nurse Strickland, and Nurse Lawson is also being transferred.’

Again Mae nodded; it would be good to be working with Lizzie again, she thought as she was dismissed, but she wondered whether life would now be harder than on the hospital train.

Mae read Alice’s letter as soon as it arrived. When her cousin had first written asking her for a brutally truthful description of conditions Alice had told her that she intended to use it to help persuade Sister Forshaw to let her come out to nurse. Mae had wondered about the advisability of it all at first but knowing of Alice’s determination and the desperate need for nurses she had overcome her doubts. Now Alice was to join her, she thought, and that thought made her feel more cheerful than she had been since Pip had gone. She did miss him; out of habit when the ambulances arrived she found herself looking for him. They’d only ever exchanged a few words on those occasions but just to see him had somehow been the highlight of her day. She’d received one scribbled note, telling her he was fine but exhausted as there was barely time to sleep or eat, and she’d written back with her news, hoping that somehow in the confusion he would receive her letter.

She hoped Alice would be sent to one of the hospitals here in Boulogne; although the conditions were still very basic at least the air was fresh – if cold, as it came in off the sea. Of course there was no running water, it all had to be brought in in buckets, and the wards were lit by hurricane lamps. The tents, Mae had to admit, were always gloomy in these dark winter days for the beds were covered by red or brown blankets, white cotton counterpanes being out of the question. When a convoy of wounded arrived – which happened day and night – the bugle would sound for ‘Fall In’; it was a sound she was becoming very familiar with. It was all very different from the hospital trains; only the suffering of the wounded remained the same.

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