Summerset Abbey: Spring Awakening (Summerset Abbey Trilogy) (18 page)

Gladys shook her head. “No. They’ll be reassigning us every day. I don’t want Dame Furse to think I can’t deal with the work. If we work out well, then they’ll be bringing in more VADs to help the nurses. From what I’ve seen, they can use all the help they can get out here.”

“I’ve noticed that, too. They do seem to be shorthanded.” Victoria prayed she, also, could handle all the jobs she was assigned, physically as well as psychologically. So far she’d survived a grueling morning without so much as a sign of a breathing episode, but she knew that some of the horrors these nurses were exposed to left mental scars much deeper than any physical wound ever could.

She was given the opportunity to prove that she could rise to any challenge the next morning when she was assigned to triage. According to the nurse in charge, the fighting had slowed because of the bad weather, but was heating up again as both sides wanted to get their last licks in before the holiday. Horror crawled over Victoria’s skin like spiders as a wave of wounded were brought in. These men had not only been injured but had suffered from exposure to some kind of poisonous gas that Victoria was unfamiliar with.

“It’s xylyl bromide,” one nurse said grimly. “The Germans have started shooting grenades loaded with it into the trenches. It burns the skin, as well as the eyes and throat. So far, the blindness it causes has been temporary. Treat the skin like you would any burn, and place cold compresses over the eyes.”

Horrified, Victoria swallowed hard and did as she was instructed. Her mind could hardly fathom a world where men would toss canisters of poison gas at one another.

Victoria was aghast at the steady stream of casualties that passed through the triage tent, but she soon tucked her shock—and
her modesty—into the far reaches of her mind as she cut clothes off men and washed their open wounds. At moments, though, she couldn’t keep her revulsion at bay and had to retch into a bedpan set to one side just for that purpose.

She soon forgot if she had even washed her hands between one patient and the next, and in all the filth she wondered if it would make much of a difference anyway. What was an actual field hospital like if the patients were coming to her in this condition?

One man was so still she wondered if he was even alive. His face was black with dirt and smoke and his leg was missing below the knee. Pieces of shrapnel peppered his ribs.

The nurse took one look and shook her head. “I don’t know how these men survive. They have to really want to live to endure this. Wash him up, and if he’s still alive when the doctors are ready for him, we’ll take him into surgery.” She nodded toward the pack that had come in with the solider. “See if you can find out who he is and fill out some of the paperwork before we take him in, all right?”

Victoria nodded. She cut his pants off his body, her stomach churning at the look of his leg. Helplessness swept over her. She poured alcohol over the wound and he didn’t even flinch. As she sponged off his face, she frowned. He looked familiar. Could he be a member of the Clever Coterie she hadn’t known very well? Her cousin Colin had so many friends . . .

Once she’d done everything she could for him, she knelt next to his cot and rummaged through his pack. Most of it was army issue, but then she found a picture that had been folded and creased. She unfolded it and stared, confused, at the pretty, dark-haired woman who stared back at her so somberly. It took her a moment, but then she cried out and clapped a hand to mouth.

Prudence.

Victoria stared at the man who lay so still before her. Andrew. It was her best friend’s husband whose life was ebbing away.

No. Oh, no
.

She leaned close, her heart pounding in her ears. “Andrew, you must hear me. It’s Victoria. You are going to make it. I am going to take you to Prudence, I swear. You have to hold on.”

She took his hand in hers and called for the nurse. “This is my sister’s husband,” she cried out, her voice cracking in her frantic desperation. “We have to get him into surgery right away.”

The nurse put a hand on her shoulder. “As soon as the doctors are finished with the surgery they are working on, we will get him in.”

Victoria nodded shakily. She knew they couldn’t get him in any quicker. She only prayed it would be quick enough.

*  *  *

Rowena grabbed her satchel from the motorcar and waved her driver on. If she was to be truly independent, she would have to learn how to drive. But Mr. Dirkes had kept her so busy she hadn’t had the time. He had opened another plant near Surrey, and both factories were now running at full capacity. She was making aeroplane runs all over England. She hadn’t run into Jonathon again, but heard about him via the military grapevine. According to gossip, which was surely as popular a pastime among soldiers as it was with Aunt Charlotte and her set, he was known for his fearless flying, and between him and his gunner, they had shot down four German aeroplanes. Rowena tried not to think of what else the gossips said—that as reckless as Jonathon Wells was, he would either become an ace or get killed before the spring.

She waved to a couple of the other pilots coming out the door. Mr. Dirkes was right. As more military and political heads saw for themselves just how valuable aeroplanes were to the war effort, demand had increased. They were sending their own pilots to pick them up because Rowena and the other pilots couldn’t keep up with demand.

“Where are you headed?” she called as they passed.

“Across the Channel,” one of them called back, and Rowena frowned. That was new. They usually flew the planes to the main naval ports and the boats ferried them across. The fighting must be heating up if they were flying them directly into France.

Mr. Dirkes was on the telephone when she walked into the office, and he waved at her to sit. She took the wooden seat across from his large, cluttered desk. Photographs and pencil drawings of aeroplanes in various stages of production decorated the walls. Books of all sorts were stacked haphazardly on every available surface. His office might look cluttered and disorganized, but Rowena would bet that he knew where everything was.

He hung up and smiled. “You’re always a sight for sore eyes, Miss Rowena. Like a breath of fresh air.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You’re being especially nice today. Why?”

“I’m always nice to you, my dear. Besides, I feel bad to have called you out on Christmas Eve. You should be at home attending balls or whatever you posh bastards do on high holidays.”

Rowena smiled at his jovial bluster. “Christmas is a sad affair this year, I’m afraid. No one is much in the mood for making merry with Victoria and Colin and most of our friends gone.” She changed the subject. “Where are you sending me now?” She held her breath praying he wanted her to fly across the Channel.
She had yet to fly over water and longed for an opportunity. For Rowena, flying over the Channel had become a personal test of her piloting skills. It was also an indicator of Mr. Dirkes’s confidence in her.

His tone changed from teasing to brisk. “I’m actually going to need you to make several runs in a very short amount of time. You’ll get Christmas and the day after off, of course. But we’re going to be running you nonstop after that.”

She straightened. “Where to?”

“Here.”

Her eyes flew open. “What? I’m confused.”

“The German’s have been putting a great deal of pressure on our transport ships. They’ve sunk two in the last several weeks—both were transporting aeroplanes to France. We’re bringing aeroplanes from our western naval bases back here and then flying them to France. As you know, pilots are in short supply so I am going to need to step up your schedule.”

She nodded, excitement running through her. “Of course. When will I be taking them across the Channel? When we have them all assembled here?”

He shook his head. “No, lass. I’m not sending you into France. The crossing is too dangerous.”

She stiffened. “What do you mean it’s too dangerous? I’m one of the most experienced pilots you have left.”

“That’s not the point.”

“Then what is the point? You’re always saying adapt or die—”

“It won’t do you any good to use my words against me! I’m not about to risk your life.”

“But you’ll risk the life of other pilots? And you know very well I’m risking my life every time I fly.”

He shook his head, and Rowena’s chest hollowed with disappointment.
“I’ll not do it. I believe in women’s suffrage more than most men and you know it, but I’m drawing the line and there’s nothing you can say.”

She knew there was no use in arguing. He wasn’t going to let her cross the Channel. Even though she knew it was childish, she crossed her arms and glared. She couldn’t help it.
She’d proven her worth and her skill, and yet she was still being held back because of her sex. She’d never been as militant about suffrage as Victoria, but for the first time she had a real grasp on where the anger stemmed from.

Rowena knew she could cross the Channel. She’d even flown over Ben Nevis once. The air currents of the Channel couldn’t be any trickier than those of that mountain, for God’s sake.

“I’m going to have Albert pilot you to Liverpool. It’ll be faster than driving. Of course, you won’t be able to sleep much this way . . .”

His voice held a question and she nodded firmly. “I’ll be fine.”

He sent her to their navigation man, who already had the flight charted for her. “You shouldn’t have a problem as long as the weather holds,” he said in a thick cockney accent. “Be careful crossing the Central Plains. The wind could get tricky.”

She nodded and joined Albert, who was preparing for their flight.

“You got everything?” he asked.

She nodded and tucked her hair back into her flight jacket before putting on her leather helmet and goggles. He helped her up into the plane, touching her no more than necessary, reminding her of those fools back at the barn who had given her such a hard time. She’d never told anyone how they’d treated her. Somehow the entire incident shamed her, as if it were her fault,
even though logically she knew it wasn’t. It just seemed best if she tried to put it out of her mind.

The aeroplane took off smoothly, and Rowena found herself relaxing in a way she couldn’t when she was doing the flying. Albert turned the nose of the aeroplane in the direction they would be going for almost four hours. The iciness of the wind took her breath away, and she was doubly glad for the thick wool that lined her leather jacket and the scarf she had wrapped securely around her neck. Rowena wasn’t often in the front of the aeroplane as a passenger, and she settled back to enjoy the novelty of flying without responsibility.

Albert kept below cloud cover for quite some time, so Rowena watched as the artificial shapes of London gradually changed to a patchwork quilt of fallow fields, farms, and villages. When a strong wind caused the aeroplane to pitch, Albert climbed upward, and Rowena’s view of the world turned gray and misty. Her anticipation built as they climbed, and when the mist began to sparkle and clear, she wanted to cry out in exultation. She would never tire of the miraculous moment of clearing the cloud cover into the wide-open blue. The experience reinforced why she loved to fly.

The rest of the flight passed quickly, and she was soon getting ready for her own flight back. She’d never been to the Liverpool Naval Base before, so Albert stuck close to her, and no one gave her any trouble. She was both grateful for and annoyed by his presence—grateful that no one dared to question handing a valuable BE2 over to a woman and annoyed that she needed a man by her side to do a job she was fully qualified for.

Rowena did a quick inspection of the BE2 and nodded at the soldiers helping her. Albert had just taken off and she didn’t want to linger. If the weather was going to change, it would do
so in the late afternoon, and she wished to be as close to Kent as possible. She didn’t want to be out after dark anyway. She’d done it once before, but didn’t much like it. Landing almost blind was dangerous.

By the time she finally got the aeroplane in the air, Albert was a speck in the sky. She shrugged. Fine, if he wanted to race so badly, she would just let him win; she wasn’t used to the BE2 but she liked the way it felt. The wing warping gave it positive control, but its response time was a bit slower than that of the SPAD. But what it lacked in acrobatic prowess, it more than made up for in solid grace.

She hoped the winds would remain calm. Flying a new aeroplane through a storm would be perilous, even for her.

The first leg of the trip went smoothly. She kept the aeroplane low, unsure as to how it would perform at higher altitudes and unwilling to take a chance with the weather so erratic.

The wind picked up over the Central Plains, and worry knotted in the center of Rowena’s stomach. By her calculations, she wasn’t even halfway to Kent and the sun was sinking fast. Either that or the clouds that had blown up were obscuring it. It began to sprinkle, and soon the rain was whipping her face. She was going to have to land somewhere soon. . . . She kept wiping her goggles, but still had trouble seeing. It looked much as it did when she would go bathing at the shore as a child. She had to land immediately.

Afraid that she was going to run into a hill if she flew straight along the ground, she kept the aeroplane going in smaller and smaller circles until she wound her way to the ground. Her visibility increased and she breathed a sigh of relief. She could see no trees.

The wind was worse the closer she was to the ground, and
it buffeted her aeroplane back and forth. She fought to keep the machine from overturning. This close to the ground, if she caught the wind under a wing wrong, she could be slammed into the earth. Sweat trickled down her forehead in spite of the chill creeping through her body and numbing her fingers and toes.

Rowena had always known in the back of her mind that flying was dangerous. Aeroplane crashes were common, though in many cases the pilot was able to glide the machine close enough to the ground so as to avoid sustaining life-threatening injury.

But not always.