Disclaimer: Sam, Foyle père et fils, Milner, Edith, Brooke, Dr Brindley, and a few minor characters whom I won't name here so as not to spoil the surprise are the creations of Anthony Horowitz. No profit is sought hereby, and no infringement of copyright is intended.
Caveat: Every time I encounter someone who doesn't like Foyle's War, I hear or read the same thing: "It's soooo sloooow!" A word to the wise, then: I've tried to recreate the experience of watching an episode here (albeit one without a major crime to be solved), and parts of this story are very leisurely. Also, if you're allergic to present-tense narrative, you might want to limit yourself to one chapter per day.
AUGUST 1942
Sam has lost track of the days but is sure that she has been in hospital for at least a week. No, says the day sister; today is the sixth day.
It is 12 August. She is out of danger.
That afternoon she is able to get out of bed and be pushed down the passage in an invalid's chair to Dr Brindley's consulting room. He tells her that she will have to remain here until every last scab has healed completely.
'Until then,' he explains, 'we have to take the precaution of assuming that you're contagious. So when you have visitors you mustn't touch them, nor let them touch you. If fact you should touch as few objects as you can. If you need to send any letters you can dictate them to one of the sisters. That's something you might want to do, by the by. I know that Sister Ashford has been a trifle concerned that no one from your family has been to see you.'
He tells her, as well, that she should tell her visitors only that she has been suffering from 'a bacterial infection – which is true,' he explains, 'but we don't want to risk creating a panic.'
He doesn't tell Sam what she's actually had, however, and his manner, though courteous, forbids her from asking. She wonders if he actually knows.
Back in the ward Sam decides that she ought be more specific, so that with any luck she won't have to answer too many questions. Bronchitis doesn't usually involve dark grey sores on one's skin, but it is a bacterial infection and it can send one to hospital.
So that's what Sam tells Mrs Hardcastle, her landlady, and some of the other girls from the billet. And her parents, when she dictates a letter to them for Sister Ashford to write down. And, to her astonishment, Mrs Bradley, her commanding officer, who stays for two minutes and doesn't sit down, but does seem slightly less hostile than usual.
And Joe.
Joe has been to see her here before. She's quite certain of that, although her memories of the first few days are hazy at best. She suspects that she was delirious the last time she saw him. She thought that he was somebody else.
Better not to think about that at all, she tells herself.
Mercifully, Joe doesn't mention this, but when she tells him that she has an answer now to the question he asked her before she fell ill, he seems to know what it will be. He takes it well.
Mr Foyle comes to see her as well, bringing newspapers and, once, a tin of pineapple. Milner visits two or three times – always just before Sister Ashford's shift ends, Sam observes. (He calls her Edith.) None of them feels any need to discuss why she's here.
On the morning of 17 August Sister Ashford escorts Sam back to Dr. Brindley's consulting room.
To Sam's surprise Mr Foyle and Milner are waiting there with him. Sister Ashford shuts the door behind them and remains standing there as though she were guarding it.
Dr Brindley tells Sam that when this conference – that is the word he uses – is completed Sister Ashford will examine her for any remaining unhealed sores. If there are none then it can be safely assumed that Sam is no longer contagious and she will be discharged. She is to convalesce for a fortnight and then he will examine her to see whether she is fit to go back to work. He has arranged for her to be on sick rations through the middle of September.
'Is there somewhere quiet, perhaps in the countryside, where you could go during that time, Miss Stewart?' Sister Ashford asks.
'I really think that I would be most comfortable at my billet,' Sam answers after a moment.
In fact that's the least of several possible evils. Visiting her parents so soon after this misadventure would be disastrous, Sam is certain, and for once a trip to Uncle Aubrey's wouldn't be much better.
Aunt Amy and Uncle Michael – there's a pleasant idea, but they live a bit too far from Hastings for it to be a practical one, it seems to Sam.
'There's another matter that we must discuss,' Dr Brindley goes on, 'but before we can do so, we have to attend to this.' He opens a drawer in his desk and removes a folder. 'Each of you will need to sign one of these.'
'I've already done so,' Mr Foyle points out. 'More than once, in fact.'
'So have I,' Milner adds.
'I'm afraid that's immaterial,' says Dr Brindley.
'I haven't,' Sam says, although she has no idea what she is being asked to sign.
Sister Ashford, who seems to have been expecting this, says nothing and signs one of the papers with a small frown.
The paper turns out to be a copy of the Official Secrets Act. Having been advised at some point by one relation or another never to sign anything without reading it first, Sam starts to do so. She is only part of the way through when Mr Foyle interrupts her.
'Signing it is merely symbolic, Sam,' he tells her. 'It's a law, and it applies to everyone whether they've signed it or not.'
'Now then, Miss Stewart,' Dr Brindley says, after they have each signed a paper and he has collected them, 'the illness that brought you here was cutaneous anthrax, resulting from your accidental exposure to an Army Intelligence experiment gone awry. Thus, it's been necessary to report this incident to the Defence Ministry, and all records of it are protected under the law that you've just signed.'
Sam looks confused; Mr Foyle looks resigned; Edith looks disgusted. None of them says anything.
'For practical purposes, Doctor, what does that mean?' Milner asks.
'Well, if Miss Stewart were to request a look at the hospital's file on her case, for example, I'd have to refuse.'
'How long will this remain in effect?' Mr Foyle asks.
'Until the Official Secrets Act expires, I would imagine,' Dr Brindley tells him. '"Indefinitely" would be another way of putting it. If it's of any consolation to you, Miss Stewart, you're being treated in exactly the same manner as servicemen injured in the course of certain types of training exercises.'
'Well, Sam, there you are,' says Mr Foyle, with a small, tight smile. 'Didn't you tell me once that when the war began you wanted to join the WAAF?'
'However, this raises another point,' the doctor continues. 'When I instructed Miss Stewart to tell visitors that she's simply had an infection, I was concerned not only about avoiding a violation of the law, but also with preserving public calm. All by itself, though, "an infection" is too vague an explanation for general use. We need to come up with something more specific.'
'I've told several people that I've had bronchitis,' Sam replies at once, 'but I rather think pneumonia would be more convincing. With bronchitis one doesn't need to be taken to hospital unless it's very serious, but with pneumonia the patient always needs hospital care. And one can get pneumonia at this time of year, even if it is more common in winter.'
'How do you happen to know that, Sam?' asks Milner.
'My mother has had bronchitis three times that I can remember, and pneumonia twice,' Sam explains matter-of-factly, ignoring first the annoyed expression that Mr Foyle shoots at Milner and then a round of startled looks from everyone in the room. 'She only had to go into hospital with one case of bronchitis – the second time – but both times when she had pneumonia. And of course bronchitis can turn into pneumonia. So you see it's really quite plausible.'
'Well, I was going to suggest staphylococcus,' Dr Brindley says, 'but now that you suggest it, pneumonia sounds like a good idea – not literally, to be sure, but in this context! Very well, then, we'll say that you're convalescing from bacterial pneumonia. Your hospital record, of course, won't be altered.'
'Not that it matters, in this case,' Mr Foyle says, irritably.
Sam is discharged that afternoon.
Dr. Brindley has told Sam to do as little as possible over the next fortnight. She tries to comply. A friend volunteers to go round to the shops for her so that Sam won't have to queue.
On 20 August Sam visits the Hastings Library, where she searches the card file for a book that might tell her more about what sickened her.
She finds one – the fifth volume of A System of Bacteriology in Relation to Medicine. She is not permitted to charge it out, only to look at it in the reading room. The librarian asks her why she wants to see it.
'Are you a nurse? Are you studying nursing?' she wants to know.
Sam is tempted to say that she is, but decides to be cautious and stay closer to the truth.
'No, but I'm sometimes called upon to administer first aid as part of my job and I'm trying to learn how to recognise signs of illness or infection in injured people.'
The woman accepts this, but searches Sam's haversack for writing materials, which she tells Sam she can have back when she returns the book.
Sam wishes for more schooling or perhaps just a dictionary, but by the time she is finished she knows what anthrax is and understands that she has actually been quite lucky: had she inhaled the bacteria rather than absorbing it through that scratch on her wrist she would have died before being able to get herself to the hospital.
She also understands why she, or anyone else, is being prevented from making any notes on the subject.
The librarian looks at Sam's signature when Sam hands the book back to her.
'Detective fiction, the R.A.F., bacterial agents – your interests are quite wide-ranging, aren't they, Miss Stewart?'
On the afternoon of 22 August there is an air raid, the first that Hastings has seen in several months. No bombs fall near Mrs Harcastle's and the whole experience strikes Sam as dull.
The next day she learns, with a guilty pang, that the bombs fell around the East Hill and northeast of town, where Joe and his comrades-at-arms are billeted. Three dozen people have been injured and nearly as many have lost their homes.
By the middle of the second week she is climbing the walls.
On 26 August Dr Brindley's secretary telephones Mrs Hardcastle's and tells Sam that the doctor would like to see her tomorrow at five o'clock in the afternoon.
Thursday, 27 August 1942
Have just returned from appointment with Dr Brindley at hospital – told me to rest tomorrow and during week-end, but can go back to work on Monday! Huzzah! A bit late now, don't quite know about telephoning Mr F at home so will call station tomorrow morning.
Noticed Dr B seemed preoccupied. Rather odd – due to late hour? Saw me after teatime, probably wanted to go home for the night.
Author's notes:
I am presenting abbreviations in this story according to the way I have heard them said aloud: for example, WAAF seems to be most often pronounced as a word, while R.A.F. and A.T.S. are pronounced as letters. MTC, on the other hand, can't be pronounced as a word, so it seems to need no punctuation.
A System of Bacteriology in Relation to Medicine is a nine-volume work by the Medical Research Council of Great Britain; it was published by His Majesty's Stationery Office (London) over a three-year period beginning in 1929. Pages 439-478 of volume 5 give a detailed description of what was known about anthrax at the time, including options for treatment of anthrax in humans, but unfortunately the book doesn't deal with convalescence or recovery. What you'll be reading here on that subject, therefore, is my own speculation.
Nathan Dylan Goodwin, in Hastings at War, 1939-1945 (Andover, England: Phillimore, 2005), mentions an air raid there on 22 August 1942 that led to 36 casualties and the destruction of eight houses in the city's East Hill area. He quotes a survivor whose recollections imply that the attack took place during the daylight hours, but I have been unable to find any further details.