Iris Hawke hesitated as she opened her battered leather suitcase. It had once belonged to her father, who had used it when he had had to travel for his work; that now seemed like a lifetime ago. Iris had never had cause to pack it before. She had rarely gone far from her home town – while she was younger there had never been the need. Then, when she had become an independent woman, practising her chosen career of nursing, the war had come along and put paid to any ideas she might have had of glamorous foreign holidays. Not that anybody she knew ever went on such things. She’d seen them in the cinema – that was as close as she had come.
She sat down on her creaking bed, with its sagging mattress and scratchy quilt, wondering for the hundredth time if she was doing the right thing. It was such a big leap – from rural Devon to the East End of London. She was accustomed to the green hills, the open moorland, the wild weather, the sound of the birds; all of these had been a welcome balm in the past few years. Then there was the fact that everybody knew everyone else. To go where nobody could pick her out in a crowd was at once a terrifying prospect and a relief.
As a district nurse, she had her own tiny bungalow, nestled behind a stone wall for protection from the westerly gales, with a view over the moors, and a bike that she could safely leave outside without anyone threatening to steal it.
‘It won’t be like that where you’re going,’ Mrs Bassett, the local shopkeeper, had warned her. ‘My nephew went up there – didn’t last more than six weeks. Robbers got into his lodgings, took everything but the clothes he stood up in. Horrible place. You’ll be back before you know it.’
‘Maybe,’ Iris had said politely, wondering how much truth there was in the woman’s words. She had been known to exaggerate and loved a good gossip.
Well, that was one more reason to go. Iris would never live it down if she backed out now; Mrs Bassett and her cronies would never shut up about it. How they would love to point out her failures as she cycled past them. They wouldn’t say anything to her face if she called on them on her rounds, but they would raise their eyebrows and that would be enough. She’d know what was on their minds.
Pushing herself off the old mattress, she returned to the task in hand. It wasn’t as if she had much to pack. Most of her clothes were sturdy and serviceable, many of them darned over and over again, and there was little that would count as fancy. It didn’t matter. She wasn’t going away to live the high life. She was more likely to need a warm woollen vest than a lacy camisole.
Nursing was nursing, after all. People still had accidents, grew sick, suffered injuries, the same in London as they did in Devon. Babies were born in the same way and mothers needed her help. Iris would never have got the position of district nurse in such a cut-off rural area if she hadn’t been able to prove her midwifery skills.
She bit her lip as she folded the one item in her wardrobe that could be described as frivolous. It was a delicate cream frock, its front decorated with piping and pale rosebuds embroidered in silk thread around the neckline and cuffs. She packed it lovingly in old tissue paper, which had faded and grown frayed at the edges.
It had belonged to her mother, but her mother wouldn’t be wearing it any more, not after her final stroke. Iris sighed, but knew that deep down it had come as a blessing. Her doughty, strong-minded mother, who had thought nothing of walking on the moors in all weathers, would never have borne the indignity of a long-drawn-out death. All the same, Iris could not bear the idea of remaining here without her. While in some ways they had been too similar, Iris had drawn upon her mother’s strength for comfort when she’d needed it most and had never begrudged the time she had spent nursing her when she’d become ill, even though it had been in addition to her actual nursing duties. Now she was left only with memories and they were altogether too painful, every street corner, every outcrop of rocks bringing them flooding back.
It wasn’t as if she’d never lived elsewhere. It felt like a long time ago now, when she’d been younger and more optimistic, waving her parents goodbye as she set off for Plymouth, thrilled to be moving into the big hospital after being accepted for training. The world had been at her feet, back then, but the war had changed everything, delivering exhausting hardship but also adventure – before it plunged her into heartbreak. She had turned her back on the bombed-out shell of the city centre and set her sights on becoming the best district nurse this village near her home town had ever known, a demanding role to absorb her and blot out what had happened. When the painful memories plagued her, she could always turn to her mother. However, that comfort had now gone and she could not stand to stay here without her.
It was time to fly the nest again. Here she was, the wrong side of thirty, and with no reason to stay. The new position might have been designed exactly for her: experienced district nurse, trained as a midwife, must be available for immediate start. The notice in the nursing magazine had caught her eye at once. ‘Are you ready to take on a new challenge?’ It was exactly what she wanted: a total and complete change. Besides, Iris had never shirked a challenge in her life. The transfer had been a formality. They had an urgent vacancy, and she was willing to go, her replacement, a widow whose children had both left home, eager to take up the reins of her former career.
Iris carefully rolled her once-peach dressing gown and fitted it down the side of the case. She’d grown used to having her own bathroom and kitchen; she hoped she would be able to adapt to sharing again. Well, she’d have to.
Victory Walk in Dalston needed her. The question she refused to consider, however, was: did she need them even more?
Alice stared out of her attic window, trying to be calm. She hated being in limbo like this. If there was a problem she liked to work out a way to solve it and then act upon it. That wasn’t possible now though.
She had known Joe Banham from the summer before war broke out. To begin with she had found him infuriating, but for most of the time since then she had called him a very special friend. She had been determined it would not be anything more than that – she’d had her heart broken once before when she first trained as a nurse back home in Liverpool, and had had no intention of ever allowing that to happen again. She wouldn’t even come close.
Yet, bit by bit, Joe had got under her skin. He knew her better than anybody, shared the same tastes and ideas, didn’t laugh at her for always having her head in a book or a newspaper, didn’t blame her for not going out dancing like the other nurses and she could tell him anything. Gradually he’d confided in her too – or as much as he could. She knew he was no run-of-the-mill engineer on his ship. Before enlisting in the navy he’d been a post office engineer and he’d become a vital part of the ship’s communications team, handling top-secret messages. At least, that was as much as he’d allowed her to piece together.
Alice could work out that the D-day landings must have had clear instructions relayed from naval vessels just offshore, taking messages to and from the command centres back in mainland Britain and the forces on the ground. The trouble was, she didn’t know which ship he was on and if it was safe. If he was safe.
Just before he’d been summoned back, cutting his brief leave short, they had confessed what had been obvious for a long time, if only they could have admitted it: that they loved each other. Alice knew that what she felt for Joe was of a different order to that which she had known with the young doctor who’d claimed he loved her years ago. This was a full and adult love and Joe had felt the same. He’d asked her to wait for him, knowing that the big onslaught was imminent, and she had promised to let him know the next day. But by then he had been ordered back on duty and had had to set off at once. She had missed him by a few short hours.
Alice had no way of knowing if the letter she had written would have reached him in time. In it, she had told him what she should have said long before: she loved him beyond doubt, she was his, heart and soul. Did he realise that she was on tenterhooks, desperately needing to hear back? She had faith that he wouldn’t change his mind, would reply as soon as he was able – as long as he received the letter. Yet in the chaos of D-day, one little envelope could have gone anywhere.
She had no choice but to sit it out. During the daytime there was more than enough to occupy her mind, with so many patients to see to. It was in the evenings that the thoughts assailed her. She told herself not to imagine what might have happened to him, but it was useless. Earlier in the war he’d been on a ship that was attacked and, even though he had tried to downplay the danger, the details that he’d let slip kept flashing into her mind. The screams, the cold water, the injuries … No, stop that right now, she told herself, gripping onto the window frame, as the sun set behind the rooftops of East London.
Normally Alice would have confided everything to her best friend Edith but these days, since the birth of her new daughter, Edith had other concerns. Edith had been Alice’s constant companion ever since they’d taken their specialist district nurse training together and they’d even met the Banham brothers on the same day. Edith was now married to Harry, the younger one, and had finally hung up her nurse’s cloak when she was too heavily pregnant to manage the cumbersome old bikes they all rode on their rounds. Little Teresa had arrived right before D-day and for a while had driven every other worry from their minds, as it had been touch and go whether mother and baby would survive. Survive they did – but Alice felt she couldn’t really burden Edie with her anxieties. The Banham household would be worried enough for their eldest son’s safety.
Alice turned away from the little window and began to lay out the clothes she would wear the next day. The uniform dress, in strict utility design, was already showing signs of wear and tear. Still, Alice thought wryly, her patients weren’t expecting a fashion show. Just as well.
She could go downstairs and make herself a last cup of something hot, cocoa or that coffee substitute they all did their best to pretend they liked. Then again, the mood was often sombre after Ellen’s death. They were still trying to come to terms with it, to accept they’d never hear her merry laugh echoing down the corridor or her gentle teasing for not agreeing about a popular film. It didn’t seem possible. The two Irish nurses had become part of the framework, fitting into the home so easily that it beggared belief. Now, everyone was extremely careful what they said in front of Bridget, who had kept working but whose face frequently bore the signs of deep grief. Yet to say nothing did not feel right either.
Alice decided she’d finish her rounds tomorrow and then go and see Edith. No matter what else was happening in the world, that was something to look forward to.