An Unwilling Accomplice (7 page)

I was very hungry, although I ate politely and listened as Mrs. Jackson went on about her son and his Polly, obviously terribly fond of her daughter-in-law, and then gave me a little history of the house.

“It’s very old. Sixteenth century, and added to several times. My husband’s grandfather made it habitable for generations to come, and I have always been grateful for his foresight.”

By the time I’d finished my own dinner, we could hear Captain Jackson clattering down the stairs.

“Warm milk, and she promises to sleep. That looks delectable. Any chance there’s more?”

After his mother took the warm milk up to Polly, she showed me to a guest bedroom just down the passage from her own room. “It’s comfortable,” she said, “and the sheets are clean, the bed well aired.”

It was all of that, and I was grateful. I fell asleep at once and didn’t stir until tea was brought to me at seven, and then I came down to breakfast at eight.

The Jacksons insisted I couldn’t be allowed to walk to Lovering Hall, and so Mrs. Jackson drove me there after the meal.

She said, taking her place behind the wheel, “I’ve had to learn to drive, you know. My husband, God rest his soul, would have been shocked, but what were we to do when the chauffeur was called up, and there was no one else?”

I nodded in understanding, adding that my mother had also learned to drive with the start of the war.

“Yes, well, we’ve done many things since August of ’14 that we never expected to do. Or see. I don’t need to tell you that after four years in France.”

It was a pleasant drive, and then we were turning into the gates at Lovering Hall. The house was larger than the Jacksons’ home but had seen greater changes over the generations. It was ideally suited as a convalescent clinic, as far as I could see, with its wings and extensions.

Mrs. Jackson was reluctant to leave me on my own. I assured her that I would be fine, that I could easily find a way into Shrewsbury with one of the staff, and at length she let me go. I waved as she reversed the motorcar and drove back the way we’d come.

Then, squaring my shoulders, I walked into the hospital, a smile pinned to my face, and asked to speak to Matron.

C
HAPTER
S
IX

I’
D GIVEN SOME
thought to my approach here at Lovering Hall. And I’d decided the best way to begin was to speak to Matron. I wasn’t sure how she would receive me, and I wasn’t sure what access I’d have to the house and staff. But it was the only open way I could think of.

Two minutes in her company, and I was certain I’d made the wrong decision.

She’d been affable enough when I came in and introduced myself. And then I mentioned Sergeant Wilkins, and the fact that I had accompanied him to the Palace.

Her face changed, her manner as well.

“I should like to know what you have to say for yourself, Sister,” she demanded coldly.

I found myself wishing I’d brought Mrs. Jackson in with me.

One didn’t argue with Matron. Or contradict her. But she was asking me to explain myself, and I’d have only one chance to do that. Concisely and to the point, if possible.

“What I have to say is this: Sergeant Wilkins tricked me just as he tricked Medical Orderly Thompson and Medical Orderly Grimsley. He had intended from the start to leave the hotel without our knowledge or consent, and he did just that. What I’d like very much to know is, how severe were his wounds at the time he was given leave to travel to London? Did he require help in his escape? And if so where did he find it? Or was he able to leave the hotel under his own power?”

She stared at me. It wasn’t at all what she’d expected to hear.

“You deserted your post,” she said tartly.

“Did I? I looked in on him before I went downstairs to dinner and again before I returned to my room. Short of staying the night in his room with him, I had no other way of making certain he was all right. I believe that’s precisely why he requested a Sister—an orderly would have shared his room. I couldn’t.”

“The Army said—” she began.

It was rude to interrupt, but I had no choice. “The Army, when his disappearance was first discovered, was as shocked as we were, Grimsley and I. They interviewed me at length, believing I must have been involved. They’ve searched everywhere and even enlisted the help of Scotland Yard to find Sergeant Wilkins, hoping to apprehend him before news of his desertion reaches the newspapers. But now it’s a police matter, because it appears the sergeant committed a crime while he was at large. A serious one.”

She hadn’t heard that. I didn’t think she had.

“And so my reputation—and the reputation of this hospital—rests on just how capable the sergeant was to leave his room and disappear.”

She stared at me. “Are you suggesting that we allowed the sergeant to malinger?”

“Matron, no. What I’ve come to believe is this. The sergeant began planning his escape as soon as he knew he was to be awarded that medal by the King himself. It would mean traveling to London, away from watchful eyes here. He truly wasn’t well enough to be allowed to make the journey alone. And so he decided he must have two things—an invalid chair and a nursing Sister to push it. That meant trying to seem slower than most to recover. No one would mistake that for malingering, not from a hero. But it
would
require a sympathetic ear.”

Taking that in, she said nothing. After a moment, she asked, “And why do you feel that it’s your responsibility to ask these questions?”

“I’ve had a long and respected relationship with the Nursing Service, and I don’t believe it’s fair that one man’s scheming should change that. It hurts to be accused of something you didn’t do. Even you took it for granted that I was involved in what the sergeant has done.”

She began to see, finally, that I might be innocent.
And
that the hospital might soon come under fire for not realizing that Sergeant Wilkins was farther along in his recovery than anyone knew. I’d worked in such a hospital. I knew how meticulously records were kept to prevent malingering. When a man was well enough to return to duty, the Army must be informed.

“I remember when Sergeant Wilkins requested a Sister Crawford to attend him during the ceremony,” Matron began slowly. “I asked him if there was anything personal between you. He replied that you’d tended his wounds at the forward aid station and saved his leg. He felt it was fitting for you to be there when he received his medal.”

“I was told the same thing. But when I met Sergeant Wilkins, I couldn’t place his name, his wounds, or his face. I put that down to someone guessing who was on duty at the forward aid station that day. And he took the guess as fact.”

“Or he believed that whether you remembered him or not, you would have no knowledge of his present condition. Whereas a Sister from Lovering Hall would know such details and take a different view of his abilities.”

“Thompson was the MO who brought him to London.”

“Yes, a good man. He’d just received his orders to go to France. We asked him to accompany the sergeant because we’d have been shorthanded if we’d had to send someone else. But now that I think about it . . .” She paused. Looking into the past, she said, “Thompson was assigned to the shoulder cases. Not the limbs. He knew Wilkins by sight of course, but he didn’t work with him daily on exercises and the like. He didn’t change his bandages, for instance.”

“I believe he did a cursory job on the morning before the audience with the King.”

“Yes, we had decided that the outer layer should be changed, but the dressings closest to the wound shouldn’t be removed. They were clean when the sergeant was driven to the station, and we felt that by not touching them they would be a barrier against new infection in an hotel room or on a train.”

It was good thinking on her part, especially if the wound was draining. But it shouldn’t be, surely, if he was allowed to leave Lovering Hall in the first place?

“Who was his nurse?”

“Sister Hammond. She’s young, but she came here from another hospital and was well recommended.”

I’d never encountered her. “Is Sister Murray still here?”

“She left five weeks ago. And Sister Hammond took over the sergeant’s care.”

I’d done the right thing after all, speaking first to Matron.

She was rising, on her way to the door. “I’ll summon Sister Hammond.”

“Don’t you think—” I began, and she stopped, her face set.

“If you call her in here, she’ll know something is wrong, that something has happened, perhaps even concerning the sergeant. Would it be better if I talked to her quietly to see what we could learn?”

“How do I know I can trust you?”

Stung, I said, “You don’t. And if you don’t, then perhaps you should summon her.”

Debating with herself, she said finally, “For your sake as well as my own, I think it best.”

She opened the door and asked someone passing by to find Sister Hammond and send her to Matron’s office.

We waited in a stiff silence for that someone to locate her.

After a time, there was a light tap on the door. Matron went back to her desk, sat down, then said, “Come.”

Sister Hammond stepped into the room. “You wished to see me, Matron?”

I could tell at once that she had never served in France. I never really understood what it was that set Sisters who had served in aid stations near the front lines apart from those who had not. But I could read that difference in Sister Hammond’s face. The wounds she had seen had already been treated, or were surgical cases that were addressing infection or stubborn problems with incisions and healing. She had never plunged her hands into a torn leg looking for the artery that was bleeding, or probed a chest wound for a shell fragment that was perilously near the heart, or cleaned a head where part of the skull was missing.

I wondered what she could read in mine.

“Sit down, Sister. This is Sister Crawford. She’s come from London to ask you about Sergeant Wilkins’s wounds.”

Sister Hammond blinked. “His wounds?”

“Yes,” I said pleasantly. “I was concerned about the head wound, for instance.”

Her face cleared. “That was his little joke,” she said, smiling. “He never talked about what he’d done. In France, I mean. He said it could have been any one of half a dozen men named in that dispatch. That he was no braver than they were, and he really felt it would be difficult for him to stand there—or in his case, to sit—and listen to his name being called and hear the Palace praise him.”

He’d said something along those lines to me.

“And so you wrapped his
head,
even though he had no head wound?” Matron asked, striving to keep her reaction out of her voice.

“He said it wouldn’t matter, that it would just make it easier for him to seem like one of many wounded men. Anonymous. ‘The King won’t be affronted, and I won’t have to face the photographers and the other guests.’ I didn’t think it was wrong to help him.”

After a moment, Matron said, “He also told me that the award should have gone to braver men than he. I thought perhaps he’d refuse to accept it. But later, when he was told he was invited to come to London, he seemed quite pleased.”

“Yes, that’s right,” Sister Hammond replied, happy that Matron was agreeing with her.

“And you told MO Thompson that he should completely remove only the sergeant’s outer bandages?” Matron went on.

“For fear he might see there was no head wound. It would do no
harm
to leave them—the leg wound is healing well, although the scar is still quite tender and the muscles aren’t very strong yet. That’s why we decided that splints and bandaging would help support the leg and protect the scar from being rubbed by his uniform. We were trying to be practical, you see.”

And Thompson had followed instructions. It must have seemed quite logical to him not to take risks.

But I knew—and so must Matron—that judging how tender a scar might be or how strong the leg muscles had grown was dependent on the patient’s responses.

“And his arm,” I said. “How badly was that draining?”

She blushed. “Well, actually, it wasn’t draining at all. In fact, he didn’t need bandaging or a sling. Still, it wasn’t strong enough to allow him to use crutches. That morning—when he was about to leave for London—he told me his arm was aching again. He thought the exercises might have been too much and he was worried about it. And so I wrapped it and gave him a sling. I saw no problem with that. If it made him feel uncomfortable, it could come off again. He was planning to remove the sling anyway, for the ceremony, so that he could salute the King.”

But he hadn’t removed the sling. Nor had he saluted the King. He had given everyone to believe that he was an invalid.

I was stunned at how easily Sister Hammond had been manipulated. And yet that was hindsight. At the time she must have believed she was trying to do her best for her patient. Goodness knows, I was in no position to cast the first stone.

“What worries me,” she went on earnestly, “is that he can’t be taking care of himself now. He could do serious damage to his leg if he doesn’t rest it often. He’s not used to long walks or standing about. And if he should reopen the incision from his surgery, anything could happen. The same could be said of his arm. He mustn’t overuse it. Please, Matron, this is the truth.”

Matron, listening to her without interrupting, glanced at me before saying, “Yes, I must agree with you, Sister. He will need to be very careful. He ought to be using a cane. But I must ask if you had any inkling of what he was planning to do? If you think he might have been farther along in his treatment than we thought?”

“No, Matron. I was as shocked as anyone else. And I don’t see how he could have concealed his progress from us.” She was upset now, close to tears as it began to sink in that she may have been led down the garden path.

I said, “Sister. What sort of man is Sergeant Wilkins? I must admit I saw him very briefly, when all was said and done. We couldn’t converse during the audience with the King, and he was very tired when we returned to the hotel several hours later.”