On Distant Shores (12 page)

Prestwick Air Base, Scotland
October 1, 1943

How sad to visit Scotland for the first time in her life and not enjoy it. Georgie’s eyes registered the green hills and rolling sand dunes, the wooly clouds and quaint stone houses, but her heart didn’t delight.

Everything dimmed in the gray haze of grief.

The five nurses followed Captain Maxwell and hauled their gear across the windy tarmac toward a C-54 Skymaster. The large four-engine transport plane would take them across the North Atlantic to Newfoundland, to Maine, and then to New York.

On board, Georgie stashed her barracks bag in the back and extracted her overcoat and blanket for the chilly flight. She found a seat toward the front of the plane beside Mellie, with Kay Jobson on Mellie’s other side. Vera and Alice sat across the aisle to the rear of the plane with Captain Maxwell.

The rest of the seats were occupied by Eighth Air Force flyboys who had survived their combat tours and were headed home. A couple of the airmen tried to flirt with the nurses as
they passed, but stopped short. The women’s slowed movements and dull expressions had to be as obvious as full black mourning clothes.

Georgie hugged her musette bag to her stomach. Almost a year of trials and triumphs failed to bring this group together, but Rose’s death united them. Would the unity last?

One by one, the four engines started, the sound foreign to her ears. So different from the familiar C-47.

She closed her eyes during taxiing and takeoff, her heart pounding. Perhaps it was best they were flying home instead of sailing, all these little hopping flights, all these takeoffs and landings. As an equestrienne, she firmly believed the adage about getting back on your horse.

Still, the sensations of the crash, the fire, the plume of vile black smoke before the volcano wouldn’t leave her, the mental image of Rose sitting on Clint’s lap, the engine plunging into the radio compartment, the instant of terror. The quick and horrible death.

Georgie’s eyes ached from tears, from dryness, from being squeezed shut too much for too long.

The plane leveled off for its long trek. In a few days she’d be home for a ten-day furlough before training started at the School of Air Evacuation. Home, where memories of Rose would assault her from every hill and dale.

Not so long ago, home promised safety. Now she knew the promise was false. Daddy and Mama couldn’t keep her safe. Ward couldn’t keep her safe. Even God wouldn’t necessarily keep her safe.

He allowed tragedy. For a reason. For a good, if unfathomable reason, but he allowed it.

All her life, safety and security had been her goal. Rose’s death showed her she shouldn’t aim for safety but for strength to stand in an unsafe world.

Through the khaki canvas of the musette bag, she felt the hard metal disc Hutch had given her. He believed she could change and be strong with God’s help, and that spurred her to believe it too.

In her mind she could hear the deep timbre of Hutch’s voice, see the kindness in his eyes, feel the strength of his embrace, smell the medicinal scent of his shirt, and taste his rough cheek under her lips.

Georgie shivered and wriggled into her overcoat. Thank goodness she’d meet Phyllis soon. Once she saw her as a human being and a friend, she’d be able to kill the silly crush she had on the woman’s fiancé. When she went home and savored Ward’s kisses, she could bury the crush forever.

Beside her, Mellie shifted, and her head slumped forward in sleep. Rose’s death had been hard on her. Rose had been one of her first friends ever.

And Rose had been Georgie’s best friend ever.

Although they’d parted on poor terms, truth drove away guilt. How many fights had she and Rose come through? They always made up. Always. Their love overpowered their differences. Rose knew how much Georgie loved her.

Georgie hugged the musette bag tighter. Perhaps it was her imagination, but she heard the letter crinkle. Rose’s last words to her.

When they’d arrived in Algeria in February, Lieutenant Lambert made the nurses write “just in case” letters to family and friends.

She hadn’t had the courage to read it yet. Two weeks had passed. It was time.

With a deep breath, she opened the flap of her bag and found the envelope. Rose never had pretty handwriting, but what did things like curlicues and frilly dresses and girly games matter? She was everything a friend should be.

Georgie had coaxed Rose from her shell. Rose had coaxed Georgie from her shelter.

She unfolded the letter.

Dear Georgie,

If you’re reading this letter, it means I beat you to heaven. No big surprise. I always beat you in footraces. Of course, you always beat me in horse races, but that’s more to the horse’s credit than yours. As always, you know I’m kidding. It takes great skill to be an equestrienne. See, I even used the prissy spelling.

Okay, now I’ll be serious, because that’s the purpose of these letters.

Since that first day of school, when you befriended the shy tomboy, you’ve been an anchor for me. You helped me make friends and even trained me to be a proper Southern lady. Yet you still loved me when I was quiet or had dirt on my knees. You helped me become a better version of me.

I’ve always loved your warm heart, your happy spirit, and your ability to turn any occasion into a party. Life without you would have been dull.

I hate that Lambert made us write these stupid letters because it makes me think of what I’d do without you—and what you’d do without me.

Now, listen. I know I’m the only reason you came to Africa. You hide your fear well, but I know you’re scared and you’d rather be home. I never said anything because adventure is good for you. That’s always been my job, to push you to push yourself.

But if God’s taken me home, it means I’ve finished my job and so have you. Go home, honey. Find some way and go home. We both know you belong in Virginia, close to your parents, in Ward’s farmhouse, with a sunny kitchen and lots of sewing projects and horses in the barn.

Please don’t mourn me. Well, maybe a little. Then get up and move on. Mellie needs you, and so do all the other lonely souls you can rescue. You’re so good at that.

Thank you for loving me, believing in me, and helping me grow.

All my love, Rose

A sob gurgled in Georgie’s throat, but she swallowed it back down.

She had permission to go home and seek the security she craved. Yet somehow Rose’s death was having the opposite effect on her, as if her friend had left behind a trace of her feistiness and determination.

Rose had been a great flight nurse, and her death left a hole in the squadron. Georgie wanted to do something in her memory. A new goal swelled in her chest—to do something big and brave and bold. To honor Rose by being a bit more like her.

Lieutenant Lambert had sent Georgie to Bowman Field to fail and exit gracefully.

But what if she applied herself at Bowman? What if she could learn to be an excellent flight nurse? What if she leaned on God for courage in crises and wisdom in decisions?

Georgie opened the musette bag and slipped the letter inside. Her fingers brushed the soft cloth of the little stuffed nightingale. The backbone of the group had departed, leaving wings and heart unsupported. Georgie would have to become backbone too.

“From Rose?” Kay Jobson stared at the musette bag.

“Pardon?”

“The letter? Was it from Rose?”

Georgie nodded. “She wrote me a ‘just in case’ letter.”

Kay let out a long breath. “I don’t understand.”

Irritation sparked. How could Kay understand deep friendship? All her relationships were superficial. She never mentioned her family, never exchanged any letters. She enjoyed the company of Vera and Alice, and she had a boyfriend on every air base. “Rose and I were best friends.” Her tone came out snippier than intended.

Kay flashed her a glare. “Not that. I understand that, believe it or not.”

What was it about this girl that rubbed her wrong? Oh, she knew perfectly well. While Georgie tried to be good, Kay seemed to try to be bad.

Yet, she sought out Mellie as a friend. And Georgie rarely gave her a chance. She might not understand the girl, but she could at least be kind. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions. What did you mean?”

Kay gave her a long hard look, and Georgie raised an encouraging smile.

With a flip of her wrists, Kay pulled her blanket over her
head like a peasant. For once, she looked small and ordinary. “I meant, why Rose?”

A question Georgie had asked herself a dozen times. “I don’t know.”

“It doesn’t make sense. Rose and Mellie and you—you’re so good.”

“And bad things don’t happen to good people?”

“They’re not supposed to. They’re supposed to happen to bad people.”

“They don’t always.”

Kay waved one blanket-encased hand. “Vera and Alice, they’re not good. And me—you know what I am.” Her words puffed up with her usual defiant pride, but something quivered in them. Fear. Hurt.

Georgie’s heart crushed. A dozen phrases came to mind, but she rejected them all. Too contrite. Too judgmental. Too naïve. But a question hovered in the corner of her mouth, and she let it slide out. “What are you, Kay?”

The blanket came up higher, obscuring the shiny strawberry blonde hair. “It should have been me. Not Rose.”

If Mellie weren’t sleeping in the seat between them, Georgie would have put her arm around the girl. “No, it shouldn’t have been you.”

Kay peeked around the edge of the brown Army blanket. “What? I’d think you of all people would agree.”

Georgie’s cheeks heated. Of course Kay would think that, not just because Georgie loved Rose but because she thought little of Kay—and Kay knew it. She had a lot of making up to do with Miss Kay. Perhaps the Lord was giving her a new project—her most challenging ever.

“You honestly think it’s better that Rose is dead rather than me?”

Georgie studied the curved ceiling of the fuselage. “I think
God took Rose home because he’d done everything he wanted to do with her on earth. But you—I think God has more he wants to do with you. Lots more.”

Kay shuddered and snapped her gaze to the side. “Why would he? He’s never wanted anything to do with me. And I certainly don’t want anything to do with
him
.”

Something quiet in Georgie’s head told her to let it go, to wait, and she obeyed and stifled her pretty words.

The temperature drop in the cabin made her shiver. She found Mellie’s blanket on the floor and tucked it around her friend’s lap and shoulders, and then she wrapped herself in her own blanket.

She sneaked a glance at Kay. Reaching the redhead would be far more difficult than teaching a tomboy to skip rope or a shy nurse to smile. But it might help her see God’s reason for Rose’s death.

93rd Evacuation Hospital, Montella, Italy
October 2, 1943

“Pitch tent!” Lieutenant Kazokov shouted.

As the other men from pharmacy and laboratory rolled out the tent, Hutch pulled eight short tent pins from a canvas bag and distributed them—one to each corner marker, and two for each door.

The air rang with calls of men at work, canvas flapping in the wind, and blunt ends of axes clanging on tent pins.

Rain pattered on Hutch’s helmet and mackinaw, and damp brown grasses squished underfoot. The field would be a muddy mess by the end of the day.

Behind the veil of rain, steep green mountains soared around him, capped by castles, convents, and tiny villages. Montella lay north of Paestum, east of Naples—which the Allies had entered the day before—and only ten miles south of the front. The way the Army charged for the Volturno River, the 93rd would soon be far to the rear.

“Hoods and storm guys out!” Kaz called as if the men hadn’t already done this seven times since arriving in the Mediterranean.

The men stretched out the canvas flaps and tossed the anchoring lines toward the front of the tent area.

Either Hutch or Technical Sergeant Paskun, the head laboratory technician, was supposed to supervise, but Kaz insisted on doing it, probably to ensure that Hutch and Paskun didn’t undo his “modernization.”

The reorganization irked the lab guys too.

“Keep your eyes open.” Ralph O’Shea shifted the ax closer and nodded to the crowd of locals watching.

“Mm-hmm.” Hutch pulled his corner of the tent taut and stretched the loop over the pin.

Theft was a serious problem in Italy, not that Hutch could cast blame. The country hadn’t been rich to begin with, and Mussolini had impoverished the nation with his foolhardy entry into the war. Now the Germans left a path of devastation in their retreat, slaughtering or stealing all the livestock, confiscating all vehicles, blowing up aqueducts, and ruining food supplies.

“Good afternoon, Lieutenant.” Why was Bergie talking to Kaz?

“Captain Bergstrom, what a pleasure. What brings you here?”

Bergie stood with his back to Hutch. “Thought I should pass on the good news. I overheard Colonel Currier talking about you.”

“You did?” Kaz’s voice lit up. “What did he say?”

“Didn’t hear much. Not polite to eavesdrop, you know. But I might have heard something about him looking for you.”

“Oh!” Kaz peered at the tent space next door for Headquarters.

“He’s not there. Saw him over by Morgue.” Bergie shot an imaginary basketball. Morgue sat at the far opposite corner of the hospital complex. “Say, I could take over here if you want to find him.”

“Could you? Thanks.” Kaz scurried away.

Bergie grinned at Hutch. “You can thank me now.”

“Liar.”

“Not a lie. I did hear Currier talk about him. Something about a report ten times longer than necessary. And I didn’t say the colonel
was
looking for him. Just that he
might
be.”

“Well, Captain, I’ll thank you.” Ralph stood and swept a deep bow. “We are forever in your debt, kind and gracious sir.”

“Hear, hear!” one of the lab guys shouted.

“See, Hutch?” Bergie clapped Ralph on the back. “That’s how you show gratitude.”

“Gratitude, huh?” Hutch stood, crossed his arms over his soggy mackinaw, and gave Bergie half a smile. “You said you’d take over. Ever pitch a tent before?”

“In Boy Scouts.” He raised a three-finger salute. “On my honor—”

“A big old Army ward tent?”

“Nope. But I’m willing to get dirty. What’s mud compared to the blood and guts I usually swim in?”

Hutch turned to Paskun. “Why don’t you supervise? Ralph can take your spot. I’ll put the captain on my team and mess up his pretty officer’s manicure.”

“Heavens to Betsy!” Bergie said in a falsetto, inspecting his fingernails. “I just had them done.”

Hutch let out a laugh. He gathered a fistful of short pins and handed them to Bergie. “Set one on the ground by each wall loop.”

“Just like Boy Scouts.”

Pitching a tent alongside his best friend did bring back scouting memories, mostly of extra KP duty as punishment for Bergie’s pranks.

Hutch took a long tent pin and measured off four and a half pin lengths from the wall. Paskun laid alignment ropes
between Hutch’s pin and Dom’s at the next corner to mark the placement of the guy ropes.

“How’s Phyllis?”

“Fine.” Hutch pointed to a short tent pin and picked up the ax. “Point it straight down. I’ll drive it in. We hook over the wall loops later.”

“Payback time, huh? Watch out for my precious surgeon’s fingers.”

“It’d be a shame if the ax slipped in the rain.” He pounded the stake into the ground with the butt of the ax.

Bergie set another in position. “Does Phyllis miss her Hutchy-poo?”

Thank goodness she never called him that. “Too much.”

“No such thing, buddy.”

Hutch shook his head and hammered away. Letters from home were supposed to raise your morale, not your blood pressure. How many stateside women were in the same position as Phyllis, with loved ones overseas? The vast majority bucked up and made do. If only Phyllis would do likewise. If only his words reassured her.

Maybe a hand-delivered package from Georgie would help.

But his stomach twisted. Phyllis had always been the jealous sort. What would she think when a female friend of Hutch’s showed up at her apartment door? A cute female friend.

Hutch drove in the last pin on his side. Why worry? Georgie had a way about her, friendly and disarming and engaging. By the end of the visit, those two would be fast friends, and Phyllis would be convinced of Hutch’s love.

Phyllis needed someone like Georgie in her life.

A parallel thought made him scrunch his eyes shut. No, he did not need someone like Georgie. He needed Phyllis. His fiancée. The beautiful willowy blonde who wore his ring and
pined for him, because she loved him so much she couldn’t imagine life without him.

“What’s next?” Bergie gave him a strange look.

“Long pins, right outside the alignment ropes, angled at thirty degrees toward the tent.” Hutch stepped behind the rope. “Speaking of women, how are things with your nurse?”

“Lillian’s the best thing that ever happened to me. Sweet and gentle and thoughtful. She’s the one.”

“She seems like a great girl.” Hutch hammered in a tent pin. He knew to stay out of Bergie’s love life. His pal specialized in the three-month romance, and he’d been dating Lillian Farley since he carried her to shore in Sicily. Heading on three months. Poor Lillian.

Bergie swiped rain off his face. “Remember how you always said the day would come when some gal would break through and make me think of forever? Lillian’s the one.”

Hutch paused to gaze into Bergie’s blue eyes. Serious for once. “We’ll talk in November.”

He cuffed him in the arm. “I’ll show you, and I’m looking forward to it.”

“Come on. Let’s finish before Kaz gets back and I’m in trouble.”

“Nonsense. I’d be the one in trouble, but I outrank him. Ha! The man’s blinded by the blazing glare of my rank.”

“Just hold the pin.”

He did so. “Giving me orders, Sarge?”

Hutch’s mouth tightened, and he pounded the stake deep into the ground.

“Relax. You’ll be an officer soon.”

“Dad’s not so sure.”

“Why not? He thinks you’re the hero of your profession.”

More pounding. “Got a letter this morning, right before
we left Paestum. More details on the Pharmacy Corps. Turns out Congress only authorized seventy-two officers.”

“Seventy-two? That wouldn’t staff a fraction of Army hospitals.”

“I know.” Hutch wiped his hands on his trousers, but they were just as wet as his hands. “They appeased us, offered a lollipop when we need steak and potatoes.”

“What are you going to do?”

Hutch stood and looked down at his friend. “I’m going to be one of the seventy-two.”

A grin. “If anyone will, you will.”

He stretched the guy ropes toward the long pins and showed Bergie how to loop them over the second notch. A sour feeling ached in his stomach. Dad said it might be harder to get in the Corps since he was overseas. But he’d fight. The Corps was the whole reason he went overseas in the first place.

Hutch inserted the front tent pole through the ring in the roof—still flat on the ground.

“Now’s the fun part.” He lifted the tent entrance, ducked under the damp canvas, and led Bergie to the number one pole. “Okay, Berg. You hold the bottom part in place. I raise it.”

Hutch tilted the pole up about four feet and gained relief from the weight of canvas on his back. Flecks of mud and grass drifted down around him. The rest of the men came inside and partially raised the other three poles. Now they’d wait for Paskun to check the hoods and guy wires at the top of the poles.

“Say, Hutch, I always wondered why you chose pharmacy.”

“Why?” He glanced down to his friend through the dim khaki-colored light. “Don’t you know? Saw what Dad did. Loved it. Wanted to do it too.”

Bergie put on his pensive face. “Sure. But I’m surprised
you didn’t go to med school with me. You got me through college, helped me with math, chem, bio.”

Hutch shrugged. “You’re smart enough. You just needed discipline.”

“That’s what I mean. You’re smarter than I am.”

“Don’t ever forget it.”

“All right, men,” Paskun called from outside. “Looks good. Are you ready?”

“Number one ready,” Hutch called.

“Number two ready.”

“Number three ready.”

“Number four ready.”

“Raise!” Paskun shouted.

As one, the four teams hefted their poles to the vertical. Canvas snapped and more grass rained down.

“Bergie, take my spot. Hold the pole.” After he did so, Hutch headed outside and tightened the corner guy ropes to hold the poles steady. Meanwhile, Paskun made sure the four central poles were aligned.

Bergie came out of the tent, brushing grass from his field jacket. “What’s next?”

“Pull the wall loops over the pins. I’ll tighten the guy ropes.” Hutch tugged the first one taut.

Bergie anchored a wall loop and glanced over his shoulder at Hutch. He still wore his pensive face. “I just never understood it. You’re smart enough to be a doctor.”

Hutch’s blood went chilly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just that. You could have been a physician.”

He took a couple of deep breaths, but the chill remained. “Why would anyone want to be a pharmacist when he could be a physician?”

“That’s not what I said.”

“Exactly what you said.”

Bergie snorted. “I just meant that in retrospect, it seems a shame. If you’d chosen medicine, now you’d have the commission you want so badly.”

Hutch tugged a rope too tight. “But if I had, I’d have to associate with arrogant jerks who think they’re better than everyone else because they have two extra letters after their names.”

“Are you calling me an arrogant jerk?” Fire crackled in Bergie’s voice.

“Not what I said.”

“That’s exactly what you said.”

Hutch faced his friend and raised one corner of his mouth.

Bergie rolled his eyes to the leaden sky. “All right. I maligned your profession, and you maligned mine. Are we even now?”

“Even.” He offered his hand. “Don’t do it again.”

“Same to you.” Bergie slapped his cold wet hand into Hutch’s cold wet hand.

In the distance, truck engines rumbled. The crowd of locals backed off the road.

Bergie cocked his head. “Ambulances coming. I’d better get to Receiving.”

“I can handle the rest. We’re almost done here. Go save lives.”

Bergie trotted away and tipped Hutch a salute. “You too.”

Hutch erected a pole to hold up the front corner of the tent, while the sourness in his stomach turned to burning pain.

The truce didn’t erase the truth. Deep inside, Bergie didn’t respect his work.