August 25th, 1918
Vecquemont, France – Villers-Bretonneux, France
All this was gallant to be seen
I close my letter to Shirley and put it on a small stack of finished letters, already including those to Ken, Colette, Mum and Dad.
The British Army Postal Service struggles not a little bit the get our letters sent after the train. Often enough, we don't get any mail for days, only to be then handed a whole bundle of it the next time we stop. Some letters take mere days to reach us, others are sent on any odyssey throughout France beforehand. Yesterday though, we were in Le Havre, and, accordingly, my haul is nothing to snub at.
I reach for the two letters that have yet to be answered and ponder whether to write first to Faith or to Persis, when the door to our mess cabin is ripped open to reveal Miller.
"Good morning", I greet kindly and have to suppress a smile at the sight of her, all rumpled and crinkly. Miller is no morning person.
"Morning," Miller grunts back and throws herself down on the bench seat. "How long have you been up?" she asks, eyeing my pile of letters.
"Hmm… two or three hours?" I guess. "Since half past four, I think. I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep. I'm afraid I will never have a proper sleep cycle ever again."
We sleep when we have the opportunity to do so, and we only get opportunity when we have no patients on board. Whenever the train is empty, we sleep, be it noon or midnight, brightest day or deepest night. Whether day or night, I can only tell nowadays by looking out of the train window anyway. My sense of time left me weeks ago.
Miller pulls a sympathetic face. "We're almost there," she remarks. "Dr Hunter told me."
"Oh? Did he also tell you where we're actually going?" I ask, because we usually only learn our exact destination shortly before arrival.
Miller rolls her eyes. "Vecquemont. Again", she retorts.
Vecquemont is a tiny village to the east of Amiens, where they set up several CCS after the last battles. We already picked up patients there the day before yesterday and therefore, I know very well what has caused Miller's eye roll. There's simply nothing to do in Vecquemont! Often, several hours pass between our arrival and the loading of the patients, and thus, it is much preferable to us when we stop somewhere where we can take a stroll or get some shopping done. Le Havre and Rouen do offer plenty such opportunities and during a halt in Étaples some time ago I was even able to surprise Persis and Tim. In Vecquemont, however, there is about nothing to do but to while away the time.
"I'm sure we'll find a way to keep ourselves occupied," I announce with more optimism than I feel while collecting my letters. Persis and Faith will have to wait.
Miller snorts in disbelief. "How so?" she demands to know.
I raise my shoulders in a shrug. "If all else fails, we can ask in one of the CCS if we can lend them a hand?" I suggest.
This, at least, serves to coax a loud laugh from Miller. "You're unbelievable, Blythe!" she announces. "As if we weren't already working hard enough!"
"At least it would be something to do," I defend myself, feeling a little embarrassed.
My colleague, however, just shakes her head decidedly. "And let the English nurses treat us as if we're liable to throttle their patient at any second, seeing as we're only unwashed savages from the colonies? Thanks, but I'll pass," she remarks drily.
She has a point, I have to give her that. The great majority of English nurses are quite alright, but there are also those among them who are very reluctant to admit that we Canadians possess even the tiniest bit of competence. We're colonials and in the eyes of some English nurses, we are unfit to keep up with the high standard of the British motherland. Those two stars on our shoulders and our significantly higher earnings do not help either in getting them to view us with more benevolence.
"I once got asked by an English nurse if we had ever heard about the difference between antiseptic and aseptic in Canada," I tell Miller and have to bite back a smile at the memory.
Miller eyes me curiously. "And what did you answer?"
"Well… I explained to her that we don't take that as seriously. A little bit of dirt has never yet harmed anyone after all, and those that die of it anyway were obviously simply not fit to survive the Canadian wilderness. Natural selection and all that. You should have seen her face!" I have to giggle as I remember the consternated look of the English sister.
Miller smirks. "If she was foolish enough to believe that nonsense, she didn't deserve any better," she decides, sounding very pleased.
With a shudder and a screaming sound, the train chooses that moment to come to a halt. I cast one look out of the window before getting up. "Next stop: Vecquemont" I announce in my best conductor's voice and laugh at Miller's withering glare.
I leave Miller behind in the cabin to glower some more, and find my way onto the platform instead, which is still almost devoid of people this early on the morning. The air, however, is as warm as can be expected in late August and I decide to take the opportunity to stretch my legs a little. A little further down the platform I spy Matron White and Dr Hunter in conversation with two young, awfully posh looking lieutenants. When the matron notices me, she motions for me to come closer and, curiously, I do so.
"Miss Blythe, these are Lieutenant Stowe and Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion", Matron White introduces the two officers.
Mutely, I blink at Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion. How can any person be called that?
"The lieutenants are attached to Fourth Army Headquarters," Matron continues in her matter-of-fact way. "They have offered to accompany you and Miss Miller to Amiens today. We won't start loading patients until late in the afternoon at the earliest."
"That is, if you and Miss Miller want to drive to Amiens at all," Dr Hunter adds with a kind smile. The two lieutenants, meanwhile, remain politely silent, but I can feel them looking at me with interest.
Truth to be told, I wouldn't have minded spending my day writing letters and reading and maybe taking a nice nap, but I can imagine very well what Miller would have to say to me if I were to decline this particular offer, so I nod.
My nod, slight and unwilling as it may have been, decides it and so it doesn't take long for Miller and me to take our places in the back of a very fancy, open-topped automobile, which Lieutenant Stowe then proceeds to steer through the Picard countryside with a surprisingly steady touch.
"Do the ladies have a wish as to what they want to see in Amiens?" asks Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion while turning around towards us, one arm slung casually over the backrest of his seat. I frown slightly. There's something about him that irritates me, though I can't quite put my finger on what it is.
Miller just shrugs, clearly unimpressed. "What would the lieutenant recommend?" she returns the question and I'm fairly sure the lieutenant doesn't even realize he's being made fun of.
"I would recommend a visit to the cathedral. You must have heard of the Weeping Angel of Amiens, surely?" says Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion, raising both eyebrows in question.
Miller, in turn, raises her own eyebrows to mirror him. "You're talking about that hideously ugly putto that they have printed on postcards with such frequency in the past years that the only possible explanation for it is a collective lapse of taste?" she retorts sharply. "Thank you, but no. We've already had the pleasure."
The lieutenant just stares at her, obviously speechless. I, meanwhile, suppress a grin. We stopped in Amiens proper some days ago and Miller and I did indeed go to see the cathedral then. Miller had no kinder words for the angel sculpture then than she did just now.
"Not the cathedral then", Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion murmurs finally before turning back to the front of the car. Miller has evidently robbed him of his words, which she is well aware of, seeing as she is just now winking at me in amusement. I smile back at her.
I have no qualms admitting that I have grown very fond of Miller in the past two months. She can be very… straightforward sometimes, but she doesn't allow me to brood too much and that's important because brooding has become second nature to me (as fifteen-year old me would be shocked to hear). How much Miller supports me became strikingly clear back when we were parked in Creil and news of the Battle of Amiens reached us.
What I had feared has come to pass. The generals remembered the Canadian troops and brought them in so that they could spearhead a major attack alongside the Australians. The colonial troops, called in to accomplish where the motherland had failed. There would be a poetic irony to it, if it weren't so dreadful in every other sense.
And they delivered, the boys from the colonies. It was a great victory, carrying our troops many miles to the east, close to the old lines of 1916, undoing at least in part the enemy's land gains of those awful weeks in March. It was the greatest success in many, many months and it was impossible to miss how news of it served to kindle a new flame of hope in the people around me.
I, however, was filled with nothing but fearful dread. For the knowledge that the Canadian Crops had attacked brought with it the realization that three of the men I love most in the world were involved in the fighting. Shirley, digging trenches and restoring streets and building bridges, ever under fire. Walter, everywhere, even right in the thick of things, in an attempt to comfort and console the soldiers around him. And Ken, leading his men into battle with nary a thought for his own safety.
To sum it up – I was a nervous wreck. If I had thought that Vimy Ridge or Passchendaele would have been enough to prepare me for what I was to feel in the days of Amiens, I couldn't have been more wrong. Maybe there's nothing that could have prepared me. It is just thanks to Miller's steadfastness and the quiet perseverance of Matron that I, stuck in Creil, didn't go stark mad with worry.
When Ken's telegram came through, informing me that he was fine and, as far as he knew, the other two as well, I fell on my knees and cried for minutes. Miller stood next to me, patting my head and murmuring "there, there" and I suppose it's proof of how I must have grown on her as well that she suffered my openly exhibited emotion with such patience.
With a jolt the automobile passes over a bridge, thus jolting me from my thoughts. Absent-mindedly, I look down at the river below us.
"The Somme," Lieutenant Stowe remarks from the front. When I turn my head I see him watching me in the rear mirror. Our eyes meet and he smiles shyly.
It is… curious. The Somme is not a very imposing river. It is wide enough, I suppose, but pretty shallow. It wouldn't be remarkable in any way but for the fact that we humans decided to name one of the largest battles in our history for it. Now the name will be connected with death and suffering and spilt blood for a very long time – and all the while, the river just continues flowing, calmly and patiently as it has always done. The river doesn't mind that we dyed its waters red, but how many generations must pass before people will look at these quiet waters once more without being reminded of the horror we misused its name for?
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion turning around towards us once more. There's a glint in his eyes that is slightly alarming. It reminds me of the day when Jem explained to us the rules of a new game called 'The Burning of a Witch". Di was the witch and the burning part was meant quite literally.
Thank God for Susan, is all I can say.
"If the cathedral is too boring for the ladies, would they consider visiting a trench instead?" the lieutenant suggests and suddenly, I am not quite certain if it weren't better if Susan were here to put her foot down once again.
I mean… a trench?
"Are you mad, man?" Lieutenant Stowe asks his fellow officer quietly, but he just grins, obviously unimpressed. When I turn my head to look at Miller, the look on her face is not one of disdain as I had expected. Instead, she almost appears to be… interested?
"Isn't that dangerous?" I ask tentatively. I feel someone should be asking that.
Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion brushes my concern aside with a wave of his hand. "Nonsense! We can't go up front, of course, but we can show you the old trenches alright. They're miles behind the proper frontline. What could possibly happen?"
In the rear mirror, I can see Lieutenant Stowe purse his lips, but he doesn't say anything. I, for my part, am torn. Of course it would interest me to finally see with my own eyes how my husband and my brothers live at the front. As close as we get to all this as nurses, the front itself remains a mystery to us as well. The thought of getting to see it myself is – well, intriguing. But I can also imagine very well what my brothers and my husband would have to say to this.
"Well, Blythe? What do you think?" asks Miller and I know she's leaving the decision up to me.
I take a deep breath. Curiosity and unease pull at me. I would like to see it, if I am being honest. Ken, naturally, would be livid at me even entertaining the thought, as I am well aware, but… on the other hand, no one has ever said that our marriage gives him the right to suddenly decide every one of my steps, right?
Hesitantly, I meet the challenging gaze of Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion. "If it's really not dangerous…" I begin and that decides it.
Lieutenant Stowe turns the automobile without another word and as he gets it moving once more, we have the sun in our eyes. We're driving eastwards.
The farther we come, the fuller the street is. Lorries drive alongside horse-drawn carts, ambulances pass by heavy artillery and in-between, two steady columns of soldiers march on. Those coming into our direction look tired, dirty, some of them even wounded, but regardless of which way they are going, they all share a certain expression in their eyes. It is a kind of wariness, a caginess and something I recognizes as the type of tiredness that makes the bones ache and the mind become indifferent.
Some raise their heads as we pass, but there's not even curiosity registering in their eyes. We don't belong here, Miller and I, but the soldiers don't even seem surprised at our presence. It's as if they have seen too much to even question it. It might be madness, two nurses this close to the front, but they have learned to live with mad orders and know enough to realize the futility of attempting to question it.
The sight of these men makes me realize what irks me about Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion. It's not his self-confidence, not his too casual demeanour, not even his name. It's merely that fact that he has never seen what these men see on a daily basis. He's one of the Red Tabs, officers from headquarters, easily recognizable by the red gorget patches and red cap bands they wear, and the truth is that he doesn't belong here anymore than Miller and I do. He's one of those sitting miles behind the lines and moving around tin soldiers on a map.
I wonder if he has a wife. I wonder if she is ashamed of him.
A shadow falls upon me and as I raise my head, I am confronted by a monster that instinctively makes me gasp for air. Seconds later I recognise it as a tank and slowly let go of my breath again. Even with that knowledge, however, I keep my head pulled down slightly between my shoulders when the tank stops next to us. A blockade further forwards on the road forces us into a standstill as well and, as if by magnets, my gaze is drawn towards the dark steel monstrosity, looming just inches away from me. They say that tanks played a pivotal part on the successful battles of the past weeks and yet… there might not be anything else to symbolize the destructiveness of this war as effectively as a tank.
My eyes move along the body of steel, finally fixing on its tracks, a continuous band of treads that moves the tank forward and that crushes everything standing in its way. There's dirt in between the treads and on the side of the tank, dust and lumps of earth and something else that I probably wouldn't have recognized had I not been this close and, at the same time, so awfully experienced in recognizing this substance in particular, be it shockingly red or dried to a rusty brown as it is here.
It's blood. There's blood on the tank's tracks.
I rip my eyes away. I don't, don't, don't want to know how blood got onto this tank. I do not want to know!
A jolt and our automobile starts moving once more, leaving the shadow of the tank. I press a hand to my forehead. I feel sick.
We gather speed once more, but I don't raise my head again. In front of my eyes, the tank keeps appearing, despite how desperately I try to push away the image. I didn't think the sight of blood could serve to shock me ever again and yet… I swallow hard.
For several minutes, we drive on in silence, before Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion loudly announces, "Villers-Bretonneux." Somewhat unwillingly I raise my head, expecting to see a village – and get the second shock of the day.
This is no village. This is a place of ruins.
Not houses but ruins line the wide street, only poorly cleared from stone and rubble. They are half-collapsed, devoid of roofs, the window openings like wounds in broken facades, looming against the sky in bizarre forms. Through holes in the exterior walls, furniture can be seen, belongings, scraps of wallpaper. In the middle of the village, there is a small tower, like the carcass of a tooth, and above it all loom the ruins of what must have once been the church. Not even God's house is safe in this war.
As if through a haze, I hear the voice of our many-named companion. "The Germans attacked here twice in the spring, aiming to fight their way to Amiens, but the Diggers stopped them. Good men, the Diggers, same as your Kanadoos. Fight like devils. That's why we had to bring in the Canadians in secret before the last offensive. Had the Boches realized that we were moving the Canadians into the line right beside the Australians, they would have smelled a rat," he explains, laughing.
Hate bubbles up within me like bile. How dare he laugh, in the face of this destruction? People lived here once. It was their home and now… When I imagine my beloved Glen could ever look like this…
"The trenches from where we started the offensive two weeks ago are over there," the lieutenant continues cheerfully. "They were built rather hastily and besides, the French held this area up until a short while ago, so please don't think all our trenches look like this. Normally, we have up to three trenches behind each other, connected by communication trenches, and everything built very sturdily. Certainly much niftier than anything you will see here. Usually, we try to make the trenches as home-like as possible for the soldiers. They get quite comfortable dug-outs for their relaxation, though you won't see these here."
Instinctively, I search for Miller's gaze. She frowns, softly clicking her tongue. So I'm not the only one struggling to imagine 'comfortable dug-outs' and 'relaxation' on the frontline.
We have left the last ruins of Villers-Bretonneux behind us and Lieutenant Stowe turns the automobile sharply to the right. It's not the muddy No Man's Land of Flanders that surrounds us, but what must have been a peaceful countryside once is riddled by countless of craters. Like pock marks they perforate the meadows and fields.
"The Canadians attacked on this line, on a front of about five miles, stretching between Villers-Bretonneux in the north and Hourges in the south. The Australians were directly to the north of it," Lieutenant Wilmington-Conyers-Trevanion states, gesturing to all sides. Then, he elbows our driver into the ribs, demanding, "Stop here, will you?" I think I can see Lieutenant Stowe roll his eyes in the rear mirror, but he stops the automobile on a farm lane, just as ordered.
We climb out of the automobile, with me accepting Lieutenant Stowe's hand gratefully while Miller studiously ignores the hand our other companion offers her. It is quieter here, further from the main road, and we walk over the field quite unhindered. After some yards, Lieutenant Stowe halts suddenly, raising a hand to signal me to stop as well.
If I hadn't known this to be a trench, I probably wouldn't have recognized it. There might be other, better trenches somewhere else – dug deeper, built more sturdily – but this one reminds me more of an irrigation ditch than anything else. I look down its side and am certain that not even I would be able to stand upright in there, it's that shallow. The sides are made of nothing but raw earth, poorly stacked up. The ground isn't paved or even covered, just partly tramped down.
As I look more closely, I can see remnants of life. A crudely timbered ladder leaning against the side of the trench. A forgotten metal bowl on a corner. A piece of cloth, fluttering in the wind. Even a pile of shells, stacked up and forgotten. A shoe sticks out of a small mound of earth not far away. I dare not wonder if the foot is still inside it.
"Do you see the dug-out over there?" Lieutenant Stowe asks quietly, stretching out a hand to point. I follow the gesture with my eyes and yet, I have to take a double-take before I see what he's trying to show me. It's a hole dug into the side of the trench, about three feet high, barely six feet deep, with a thin plate for a roof, to carry the pile of earth above it. I wouldn't keep an animal there, to say nothing of a human, and yet, for some of the soldiers this might have been the only sleeping place they had.
The mere thought of them vegetating for days in these holes, always under fire, the enemy just a few dozen yards away, with Death breathing down their necks… I take a shaky breath.
"The Boches had their trenches over there," Lieutenant Stowe adds, nodding towards the other side of the field. I tear away my eyes from the trench, look at where he indicates. It doesn't seem far enough away to me.
I turn back to the trench and, all of a sudden, I can see shadowy figures there. Men in uniforms, their faces dirty, the eyes tired. Some sit with their backs to the side of the trench, dozing or staring ahead with unseeing eyes. Others scurry about, head bent low. With raw, ghostly voices they call out orders to one another, through the distant explosions of shells and the staccato of the machine gun. When one of the shadow figures suddenly raises his head, I think I know his face, but then there's a gust of wind, blowing away the ghostly figures as fast as they have appeared. The trench is empty once more.
I shiver.
The truth is, I thought I knew a good deal about the soldiers at the front. I thought I knew what their lives are like because I treated their wounds and listened to what they had to say and because I thought my imagination would suffice to picture their reality.
I had no idea.
The title of this chapter is taken from the song 'Greensleeves' from the 16th century, first published in 1580 (source unknown).
