Chapter Eleven

FORTUNATELY FOR DIRK, his luck changed for the better after he’d been released by the French.

Back in the village after two days in his stinking, makeshift prison with virtually nothing to eat, he had a tip off that one of the British journalists at GHQ had suddenly taken ill. Losing no time, Dirk packed his things and got straight on a train, arriving at Amiens before there was a possibility of a replacement turning up on the scene. Then, using a combination of natural charm and impressive tales of his brush with death on The Sussex, he managed to inveigle his way into the group on a temporary basis.

“I rather think it was the fact that you didn’t turn toward the Hun after your experience with the Frogs that decided it,” Beacham of the Daily Post told him.

“That was my own stupid fault.” Dirk grinned. “I was green as hell; I deserved all I got.”

Beacham smirked at him. “When are you Yanks going to join the fray, anyway?”

“Not a moment too soon, as far as I’m concerned,” Dirk said. “But you know what politicians are like.”

“Slow off the mark, you mean? Well, they’re certainly fanatical about red tape and regulations. I suppose it makes them feel as if they’re in control of things when really—” Beacham broke off, pulling up his serge sleeve to look at his watch. “We generally partake of a little sherry at this hour, old man. Care to join us?”

“All right, thanks,” he said and followed the other man out of the room. Dirk was actually itching to start work after the frustration of his enforced false start, but it was too late to get anything done that day, so he might as well be sociable and get to know the others. They’d all been here awhile after all; he could learn a lot from them. And later on, before he went to sleep, he would write to Eleanor again. What was she doing right at this moment? Getting bossed around by the formidable Sister Palmer? Listening to one of Kit’s stories?

“Loreson?”

Dirk suddenly became aware that Beacham had been trying to get his attention for some time and clapped an apologetic hand on the other man’s shoulder. “Sorry, I was miles away.”

“That was obvious, old chap,” Beacham told him wryly. “I hope she’s as lovely as your expression suggested, but if you take my advice, you’ll put her from your mind when you’re out there. A sniper’s bullet isn’t awfully fussy, you know. It’ll pick off a correspondent every bit as happily as a corporal.”

Eleanor and Kit were working on the same shifts again, and this evening they were eating in the refectory together. With its dim lighting, arches, and pillars, it looked a lot like the morgue, but Eleanor successfully managed to put this unhappy thought from her mind. It had been a long shift, with no time to eat so much as a snack, and she was hungry.

Kit had worked just as hard, yet she was pushing her food around her plate, playing with it rather than really eating. Since this wasn’t entirely unusual for her, Eleanor didn’t think too much about it, running the events of the day through her mind as she ate. Until Kit mentioned Dirk’s name.

“Don’t you think it’s odd the way Dirk hasn’t written to us?” Kit said. “After the way you saved his life and everything?”

Oh dear. Eleanor’s appetite deserted her. Why hadn’t she told Kit about the letter straight away? It would have been so much easier. Now she would either have to explain her silence or lie, and neither course of action was very satisfactory.

A rickety wooden trolley squeaked its way across the stone floor as a flushed-faced VAD came to collect empty dishes.

“Goodness, Soames,” Kit called to her, momentarily distracted, “can’t you get Jenkins to apply his oilcan to that wheel? It really is a bit much!”

Tell her, Eleanor urged herself. Go on, tell her.

As the trolley squeaked away, Kit finally noticed Eleanor’s discomfort. “What on earth’s the matter?” she asked. “You look frightfully churned up about something.”

Eleanor licked her lips, coming to a decision to tell Kit the truth, but before she could do so, the other girl guessed.

“Goodness, he’s written to you, hasn’t he?”

Eleanor sighed. “Yes, last week. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. You were on duty and then…” She sighed again. “No, it wasn’t really that. You weren’t around when the letter came, it’s true, but…” She broke off, took a deep breath and plunged on. “Actually, I don’t think I’m very good at friendships. My instinct is to keep things to myself.”

Kit was listening quietly. “Jane and I tell each other absolutely everything. If she’d been in your position, she’d have positively brandished that letter at me, hoping I’d be insanely jealous.”

And are you? Eleanor wanted to ask. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about it,” she said, thinking that she hadn’t told Kit about her nightmares either. She was having at least two a week now, sometimes more than that.

Kit seemed to brush her apology aside. “I wouldn’t have had a tantrum,” she said. “I am capable of accepting the fact that a handsome, charming, interesting, and highly eligible young man is more attracted to you than he is to me. Well, just about capable, anyway.” She smiled.

Eleanor flushed. “It’s only because of what happened on The Sussex,” she said. What had Dirk called her? His Angel of Mercy?

“Hmm,” said Kit skeptically. “Anyway, what did he have to say for himself?”

So, Eleanor told Kit all about Dirk’s adventure with the French. It was pleasant to share it all with someone else. She was glad she’d told Kit now, and even though she felt like a beginner in terms of being a friend, she was determined to try harder. She wasn’t sure she could extend that to talking about the nightmares, though. She didn’t want to even think of them, let alone speak of them to someone else.

“Actually, I had a bit of news myself today that I haven’t told you about,” Kit said. “Remember I told you about my brother’s plan to visit us soon? Well, he’s coming sometime next week. Probably Wednesday.”

Eleanor made herself smile. “That’s nice.”

Kit pulled a face. “Yes. I don’t know how he’s going to take the news that you’re no longer available, though.”

Eleanor blushed, even though she knew Kit was teasing her. “I shouldn’t think it will affect him in the least, since he has never met me,” she said with dignity, then realized that in so saying, she was obliquely concurring with Kit’s view that there was more than simple friendship between herself and Dirk. “Not that it’s the case,” she said quickly, digging herself further in. “I mean, Dirk and myself aren’t…”

Kit began to laugh.

“Oh, do leave me alone, Kit.” Eleanor was flustered, but after a while she had to smile herself. Kit was impossible, but life was certainly livelier with her around.

In the end, Arthur Ballantine’s proposed visit was postponed because of action on the Front. Kit was devastated and complained constantly, only rallying when a second letter arrived from him giving a revised date for his visit. But by then, Eleanor had too many other things to occupy her mind to worry much about it.

One morning, she was summoned to the matron’s office where, instead of the ticking off she fully expected to receive for she knew not what, she was asked if she would be prepared to help out in the operating theater for a few weeks as they were short-staffed. Even though Eleanor knew she wouldn’t have been asked had there been a qualified nurse available, she was thrilled. Kit, of course, couldn’t understand her enthusiasm at all; she would have been horrified if anyone had asked her to do it. But Eleanor was too excited by the prospect for it to be spoiled by her friend’s negative reaction.

Then another letter arrived from Dirk, and her heart lifted still further at the sight of the dark, scrawled handwriting on the envelope. She was pleased he had written again, and she hurried out to the courtyard garden as soon as she could to enjoy the luxury of reading it on her own.

Somewhere in the garden, a blackbird began to sing, and Eleanor sat on her bench with Dirk’s unopened letter on her lap, listening to the sound, a feeling of cautious happiness taking her by surprise. People here thought she was worth knowing—Kit, Dirk, even Sister Palmer in her own way, since, to her great surprise, it had been she who had recommended her as a suitable candidate for theater work.

The cat suddenly leapt out of the bushes and straight onto her lap. “Hello, there,” she said, smiling at him and stroking his silky body. The cat responded by curling himself up into a purring ball on her lap. She stroked him some more, and then finally she took Dirk’s letter from her pocket and ripped it open. She would reply to him once she’d read it, tell him all about her duties here and her excitement about being chosen to assist in theater.