Home for Christmas (31 page)

‘Turn up the gas,’ he said to the nurse, his voice cracking with tension.

Sister Ursula obliged, reaching out her long arm to pull the tiny cord that rotated on to the main gas mantle, causing it to light.

Picked out by the gaslight’s glow, a pair of rosebud lips moved weakly; the fact that they were moving at all, the child asking for a drink, was nothing short of a miracle. The fever had broken.

The world outside the hospital was dark and forbidding. Shop windows that were usually bright with lights until midnight, were now in almost total darkness. Not that Eric was too worried about that; his car was close by and he rather prided himself on being able to drive it.

He was even prouder that the sick child had pulled through and was glad he’d stayed.

Sister Ursula called goodnight in German from the top of the steps in front of the entrance. He wished her goodnight in German.

‘Hun,’ shouted a man on the other side of the road. He had obviously heard the exchange. Eric strode briskly away. He did not look back. Hopefully the man would stagger home without incident and he would get home too.

The sound of his footsteps echoed in the darkness along the wet pavements. Two hundred yards to his car that he’d left inside the iron gates to the side of the main hospital building.

As he made his way along, a smile of satisfaction on his face, he heard rowdy voices coming towards him.

Drunks, he thought, surprised that they were around at this time of the morning. The new wartime licensing laws required all public houses to close by ten-thirty at night in order that workers clocked in on time and not suffering from hangovers. Obviously, these men had acquired drink from somewhere. There were always those ready and able to break the law, he thought.

He heard the sound of their booted feet break into a run at the same time as he saw their shadows appear around the corner. Like some strange monster, they were black and bundled together, their size grotesquely exaggerated by the close proximity of a streetlamp.

The shadows diminished, men of flesh and blood emerging from the blackness.

Their faces were haggard; brawny arms and rolled-up shirtsleeves, waistcoats stretched to breaking point across their gross bellies.

Four of them, perhaps five.

‘Good evening,’ he said when it seemed obvious they were heading straight for him.

‘Good evening? Bloody Hun! Bloody German murderer!’

‘I am a doctor! I save lives.’

‘You’re bloody German! You’re a bloody murderer!’

He ducked the first blow, and skipping backwards, managed to avoid the second. Swiftly discarding his bag in which he carried the tools of his trade, and his jacket, he put up his fists and prepared to fight.

‘Queensberry rules?’ he said in his most superior English accent. It made sense to communicate in the hope of knocking aside their dubious patriotism. Most of all he had to stay on his feet. If he fell to the ground, he was finished. Their hobnail boots would see to that.

He landed a punch on one man’s jaw and stepped back sharply as another man stepped forward, running into a jab from Eric’s right hand. All the time he kept moving, hoping to keep the four of them at bay until help came.

A heavy fist grazed his cheek close to his eye, followed by another blow to his jaw. They surrounded him now, pounding him incessantly with their fists, their eyes full of hatred and all the most damning, most evil words coming out of their mouths.

The pounding continued unabated, hammering him to his knees.

Blood streaming into his eyes, he reached out, clinging on to the legs of one of his assailants, anything to stop from falling to the ground.

‘This is for all them babies you skewered on bayonets,’ shouted one of the men.

Eric tried to protest that he’d never done any such thing. That he was a doctor!

The blood streaming into his mouth drowned his words. He groaned as a heavy boot connected with his ribs.

The first Lydia knew of what had happened was when someone came hammering on the door of her room in the nurses’ hostel.

Her roommate Sally grumbled that it couldn’t be time to get up just yet.

Lydia glanced at the big old clock up on the wall before throwing back the bedclothes.

‘Four o’clock. I hope whoever it is has a very good reason for getting me out of bed now,’ she muttered as she threw on her dressing gown and flung open the door.

The last person she’d expected to see was the actress, Mrs Kate Mallory, her expression anxious.

‘Come quickly, Lydia. It’s your father. They’re dealing with him now. I said I would fetch you. It’s all right. He won’t die, but he’s hurt. He’s badly hurt.’

Lydia felt herself turning cold. ‘What happened?’

‘He was attacked. Please come. Now.’

Lydia pulled a cape over her dressing gown.

Her father was still in the hospital, bandages wreathed around his bare chest and another around his head, closing one eye. His bandaged hands shook when he looked up at her.

‘They called me bad names.’ He shook his head. ‘I couldn’t believe it of this country. I was so disgusted, it crossed my mind to leave her and go to Germany. It is still possible to get a boat to the Hook of Holland and travel by train from there.’

Lydia sat in a chair opposite him, leaning forward so that her worried face wasn’t far from his.

‘Is that really what you’re going to do?’ she enquired, the severity of the situation rearing up like a brick wall before her eyes.

He raised an eyebrow. He also raised his hand to cover Kate Mallory’s hand, which was presently resting on his shoulder.

‘I can’t leave. I have patients who depend on me and Kate is here. I will not leave her – unless she wants me to,’ he said quizzically, looking up at her for a response.

‘I want you here,’ she said, clenching her jaw, her hand more tightly gripping his bare shoulder.

‘Then I stay,’ he said. ‘I also must be here for when you get back, Lydia, that is if you are still determined to go?’

‘I applied in person, and they accepted me. I’ll be going soon, or I was, but with you like this … I’m sorry, Father. It wasn’t an easy decision. I leave at the end of the month.’

‘Does Robert know?’

‘No.’ She shook her head and sighed heavily. ‘Getting news to him is going to be something of a problem. And I haven’t received a letter from him.’ She sighed again, not wanting to voice her worst fears; that he’d forgotten her. She didn’t want to believe that. ‘I hear letters are taking a while to get through unless it’s through military channels or from somebody with influence. As you know, his parents are in Australia or Malaya.’

‘You’d think they would spend more time in England now the country is at war.’

Lydia shook her head. ‘It seems not.’

He waited patiently whilst she outlined her plan.

‘I thought I would call in on Lady Ravening. I hear she’s staying at the house in Belgravia. She loves Robert. I’m sure she’ll do her best to let him know.’

‘I’m sure she will,’ he said, and then stilled. He half closed his eyes as though he were thinking it over. ‘Yes,’ he said, nodding repeatedly. ‘I’m sure she will. I’m not sure how he’ll view you being over there, so close to the battlefront. Still, you have your own life to lead, Lydia. You want to be with Robert. I understand that. No need to worry about me.’

‘No need at all. I can look after your father very well,’ said Kate Mallory. ‘Would you mind very much if I moved in with him – in the spare bedroom of course – until he is recovered?’

Lydia studied the fine woman standing at her father’s bedside and the way they looked at each other. It wasn’t likely that Kate would remain in the spare bedroom for long, but they were both on their own and she couldn’t decry their actions – whatever those actions might be.

‘I much appreciate your offer. I think it’s a very good idea. I also think that we have to grab every precious moment we can whilst this war rages. Who knows what the future brings?’

Billboards invited men to recruit to fight the ugly monster that was devouring Europe. Wearing a German helmet, the monster drawn as some giant hairy ape was depicted feeding women and children into its ravenous mouth.

The people who thronged the London streets cheered the columns of soldiers, fresh recruits to replace those who had already died. Flags waved and people sang ‘Rule Britannia’, and ‘God Save the King’.

Lydia paused to watch, but found it impossible to sing along with the voices around her. One or two nudged her arm as though urging her to join in. It came as something of a relief when the soldiers themselves began singing ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’.

Anti-German feeling was high and so was support for the government. Lydia spotted women wearing the familiar sashes of the Suffragette movement waving flags and shouting their support for Mr David Lloyd George.

Although she had never been to a bull-baiting spectacle, or a cockfight, or even a boxing match between men, she believed they bayed for blood, just as these people were doing.

There were no crowds in Belgravia, no soldiers singing as they marched off to war. The dignified facades of elegant Georgian houses, and the horse-drawn and horseless transport, with people coming and going, seemed unchanged.

The door, behind which Lady Julieta Ravening lived in splendid isolation, was dust free and the brass knocker polished to perfection.

After knocking, Lydia stood on tiptoe in order to better appraise her reflection in the highly polished door knocker. What she saw pleased her.

Brown suede trim on hem and cuffs took the plainness off her grey suit. She’d deliberated for hours deciding what to wear; something plain but handsome, the grey suit and her brown velvet hat fitting the bill nicely, she thought.

Rogers, the under butler, opened the door, an odd rigidity coming to his face when he saw who was calling.

Lydia had met him once before when Lady Ravening had invited both her and Robert to tea, so she smiled warmly.

‘Good morning, Rogers,’ she said, remembering the butler’s name and supposing Quartermaster was having a day off. The old butler was suffering from poor health and now worked fewer hours.

‘Miss Miller, is it?’ he asked, a quiet and rather discomforting smile on his wide, languid mouth. Lydia felt an instant unease. On her last visit, he’d greeted her warmly and courteously. She was concerned but put on a brave face.

‘Yes it is,’ she said brightly. ‘I’ve come to see her ladyship.’

‘I’m sorry. Her ladyship isn’t receiving today.’

‘But I’m Lydia. She’ll surely see me. I’m marrying her nephew. You do remember me, don’t you?’ she asked, her face shining with amiability, her tone challenging.

‘Yes, Miss, I do. The fact is that her ladyship has given instructions that you are not to be received.’

Lydia’s amiable expression vanished. She shook her head vehemently, still smiling despite everything. ‘There must be some mistake. Not me. I’m Lydia Miller.’

‘There is no mistake, and under the circumstances …’

‘But I’m the daughter of her ladyship’s doctor.’ A sudden thought assailed her, chilling her to the bone. ‘Or has she given orders for him not to be received either?’ she added, her smile now completely absent.

Rogers regarded her from pale eyes either side of an aquiline nose.

‘That is so, Miss. Under the circumstances, Doctor Miller’s services as her personal physician are no longer required.’

She didn’t bother to ask what those circumstances might be. The implications were clear; Doctor Eric Miller hailed from Dresden, a lovely old town in Germany. No matter his considerable medical skills and compassion – staying all night with a sick child had almost cost him his life – or her relationship with Robert, they were no longer welcome.

Lydia bristled with anger. ‘I insist on seeing her.’

‘It’s quite impossible. I have my orders.’ Rogers was adamant, but Lydia was determined. Shooting forward, she shoved her foot in through the gap in the door.

‘If she doesn’t agree to see me, I’m going to sit out here on the step, telling a story to anyone that will listen of a family of Mexican refugees whose fortune was based on them scavenging around a battlefield. Robbing the dead, I shall say. Gathering the scrap metal and robbing the dead! How would that go down
under the circumstances
?’ she shouted, using the very same words he had used.

Rogers looked horrified. ‘Wait here.’

‘No. I will not!’

Flinging her arm wide so it slammed against his chest, she brushed past him into the splendid reception hall with its black and white tiles, its columned gallery and ornate staircase with swirling iron leaves sweeping up beneath the balustrade.

She was livid and prepared to do battle. All this privilege, she thought, looking around her and wanting to scream out how unfair things were.
Under the circumstances
, the war might bring out the best in people, but it would also bring out the worst, including bigotry, ignorance and the encouragement of hatred under the guise of patriotism.

Lady Julieta was huddled in front of a fire even though temperatures were above average for the time of year. The last time Lydia had seen the old woman, she’d looked shrivelled inside her fancy clothes and thick rugs. Today she looked even more so, her spine curved into a dowager’s hump so that her face poked forward, her sharp nose resembling that of a hedgehog about to spear a tasty grub.

‘Rogers,’ she shouted, looking beyond Lydia.

Rogers limped in, his arms held stiffly at his side. Funny, she hadn’t noticed that before. Well, that should keep him out of the fight, she thought, perhaps a little unfairly.

Newspaper headlines reported that the German army was poised on the borders of neutral Belgium. Already the war was spreading.

It occurred to her that she was about to fight her own battle in this elegant drawing room with its high ceilings, rich furnishings and portraits of long dead ancestors; the Ravenings were used to imposing their will.

Rogers apologised. ‘I couldn’t stop her, your ladyship.’

The old woman’s eyes glittered like chips of ice. ‘I’ll speak to you later, Rogers,’ she said coldly. ‘As for you,’ she said, turning her poker hard face to Lydia, ‘you are no longer welcome in this house. Neither is your father. The Ravenings have a long tradition of service to this country. They cannot be seen taking the enemy to their bosom as they might a viper …’