Angel of the Somme: The Great War, Book 1 (11 page)

Lily bit her lips, composing herself before responding. “I’m sure I’ve no idea, ma’am.”

The matron strode off toward the back door without a backward glance. Lily beamed a grin down at Sam. “I reckon that should buy you at least twenty minutes.”

“Miss Curtis!” Matron Marshall stood at the rear, one hand on the door. “Come along. I’ll need a description.”

“Certainly.” Lily wheeled around and walked toward the rear, taking unhurried steps.

The moment the door closed, Baden clapped his hands together. “Well done! Oh, I like that one, Sam.”

Of course Baden did. Who wouldn’t? Least of all his charming brother. And who was Sam kidding, really? Ten minutes in Baden’s company and he’d have her heart in a box.

“What’s her name?” Bad asked.

“Miss Curtis. Lily Curtis.”

“Well Miss Lily Curtis is certainly a force to be reckoned with. Pity she’s got such poor taste.”

“What are you on about, Bad?” Sam sat up in bed a little. He’d be damned if he’s listen to his brother say a disparaging word about Lily.

“She’s got an eye for you, hasn’t she, old man?” Baden grinned.

“Don’t know why you’d think that.” Sam tried to keep his voice severe, but something inside his chest felt so light that it was difficult to maintain his stiff upper lip.

“Falling on the hand grenade the way she just did. The way she smiled at you. Ooh, Sam. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were—”

“That’s exactly what I told him, but he wouldn’t listen to me,” Gordy called from behind Baden’s back. If Gordy could put his eavesdropping skills to use for the Allies, they’d win this war in under a week.

Baden turned around. “Oh, hello.” Then he turned back toward Sam and grinned widely. “I think I like this one too.”

Sam groaned. Gordy and Baden leap-frogging around in his love life? With any luck, they’d find the damned tree straightaway.

Chapter Fifteen

As it had turned out, Lily managed to keep the Matron searching for her tree for a good forty-five minutes before finding it beneath the old pile of straight jackets in the rear hall. Sam could only marvel that Lily had hit upon such a clever strategy. She never ceased amazing him.

Baden spent nearly all of his time lecturing his brother in the ways of wooing women, much to Sam’s extreme discomfort and Gordy’s joy. Sam didn’t have the heart to tell the scoundrel that he’d be unable to use any of his advice. Sam knew he’d be hopeless at empty flattery and the thought of flirting with other girls to make Lily jealous made him feel squirmy and guilty. When Baden pulled out of the yard on his bike, another collection of sighing VADs gathered at the window to see him off. Lily rolled her eyes at Sam and they shared a secret smile. As he drifted off to sleep, he was still grinning.

The next morning dawned and another hospital train arrived at the station. Lily headed out the door with a forlorn look in her eyes. Sam was reminded again of how much she dreaded triage.

The next few days went the same way. Sam spent his days listening to Gordy while his unread mail piled up. Though Lily spent her daylight hours at the station, every night she carved time from her hectic schedule to stop by Sam’s bed, late in the evening when the rest of the ward was asleep.

Her visits were never very long—just a few moments, really. They rarely said much. She would ask how he was feeling. He would inquire about her day. As he’d expected, nothing had come of her inquiries about anyone named Buchanan.

Each night after she left, her lavender scent still hung in the air along with so many of his unasked questions.

“Why do you keep stopping by? Are you checking up on me? Making sure I’m not trying to dash my brains out on the stone floor?”

Or perhaps dare say the real question he longed to ask.
“Did you come by because you were thinking of me? The way I’ve been thinking of you?”

He couldn’t think of a way to ask anything that wouldn’t end up making him sound like a great bloody fool. Thank Christ they hadn’t given him any sedatives in a long while. With a little morphine, he doubted he’d be able to keep his queries locked down where they belonged.

As the days passed, Sam was as good as his word. He followed Lily’s every directive. He didn’t read. He avoided bright lights. He tried to rest as much as possible.

After nearly two solid years of living in a warzone, Sam felt he was drowning in a swamp of calm. To be so far removed from the action pulled steadily on his nerves. How would he ever adjust to life back on the farm?

If, indeed, the farm was still for him.

Did he still belong there? Should he truly possess the ability to save the dying, would going back home be the right thing to do? Would he even be able to carry on his strange battlefield visits from so far away?

He supposed it was all a moot point. He had no way of knowing how long these peculiar visions would continue or how real they might be. He had to smile at his foolishness. Forced into so much tranquility, he’d chosen to fill his mind with strife.

All his mental wanderings were for nothing, anyway. He’d made a promise to Lily and he’d keep it.

Friday afternoon found Sam napping in the nearly abandoned ward. Volunteers from the village, termed ‘Comforters’, had come by and the patients had emptied to the back garden for a play—a comedy by the sounds of laughter floating in through the window. Gordy nearly burst with joy when the buxom French villager attended to him. When she wheeled Gordy out of the ward, Sam thought Gordy might have actually been levitating, just a little bit.

Since Sam’s orders forbade such stimulating activities, he spent the afternoon trying to sleep. Unfortunately, he was having very little success with the endeavor.

When he heard the
click, click
of approaching footsteps, he glanced over, expecting to see Sister Newell with his mid-day injection of Phenobarbital. Sam was delighted to see Lily instead.

She looked down as she walked and appeared lost inside her head—preoccupied. She moved sluggishly, not like the Lily he knew. When she turned to see Sam looking her way, however, she found a smile for him. Even her weary, forced smile transformed her entirely. God, she was beautiful when she smiled.

“Captain, I thought I might find you here. Well, I hoped I would.”

“I was tempted to go out dancing,” he said. “But I can’t find my dancing shoes anywhere. Do you know where they might be? You didn’t steal them, did you?”

She laughed. “How absolutely unlike you, Captain. No, I did not steal your shoes.”

Well, yes, he had to admit to himself, he was talking like a fool, but the sound of her laughter was very worth the cost. He’d happily play an idiot if he could chase that sad look from behind her eyes.

She settled herself on the chair at his bedside. “I thought you might be a little bored in here all by yourself. And I haven’t read your mail to you in such a long time.”

He wanted to say something charming. He’d even settle for saying something silly again, on the hopes of hearing that laugh. Words eluded him, however, and he stared stupidly at her.

“That is, if you need your mail read. I suppose the newer VADs have been keeping you up-to-date.” She glanced at his mail basket.

“Ah, yes. Th-that is to say, no,” Sam stammered. “I mean, they offered, but I wasn’t feeling up to it at the time.” Because he might be a fool, but he wasn’t so desperate as to tell her that he’d been waiting on the hopes that she’d come by.

“Oh, well if you’re not feeling like it, I should let you rest.” She twisted her hands together in a nervous gesture. Though the strange stiff air between them had dissipated a bit, they still hadn’t quite returned to their earlier, close relationship.

“Please, no,” he said. “I’m quite out of my mind with boredom. I’m about to begin conversing with ceiling tiles.” He’d felt a rush of pleasure at the sound of her laughter that he couldn’t help but try to coax more from her lips.

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?” She retrieved the basket and plucked out the three unopened letters on top. “Shall we begin with this one? From your mother, I think.”

Sam smiled and nodded.

Mother’s letter was filled with news from the farm and village. Which local boys had been injured and who had gone missing. In between the lines of gossip and details about various neighbors, Sam heard her worry for him.

Lily opened Bad’s letter next.

“Well, this is short,” Lily said.

Sam took a steadying breath. Though his brother’s letter might be brief, it held the potential to be quite damaging. Especially if Bad was indecorous enough to mention his opinions regarding Lily. Come to think of it, the thought of his brother talking about any females in general was terribly worrisome.

“‘Dear Old Man,’” Lily read, rolling her eyes at the salutation. “‘Don’t have much time, but I know what a worrying sort you are, and I wanted to put your mind at ease. I got back to my unit with no trouble. Well, to be honest, there was some trouble, but not the usual kind. I’ll have to tell you about it sometime.

“‘Did Evie tell you the latest? I’ve sent some money to the blacksmith along with some instructions I’ve drawn up for a trap for Lady P. It should be ready within the week. I predict that we’ll win this bloody war in another few weeks and we’ll all be back in the barn again by Christmas. We’ll have another toast in the barn with Lady P at our side where she belongs. Get well soon, Sam. Your brother, Baden.’”

Lily shook her head and blinked at Sam. “A trap? Is he…do you think he’s serious?”

“Quite serious.”

“A metal cage?” Lily wore a horrified expression.

“Well, it’s the next logical step, I suppose. Nothing else has worked.”

“It just seems so barbaric.”

“I suppose it might seem a bit confining to her after two years of freedom.”

“Confining?” Lily folded the letter and tucked it back into its envelope. “I’m sorry, Sam, but I feel your brother’s plan is extremely cruel. I can’t believe you’re so untroubled by his actions.”

“Baden is only trying to do what’s right.” Sam couldn’t fathom why she was so affronted. Perhaps it was a Canadian sensibility. Their proximity to so much wildlife gave them an affinity with farm animals.

“A cage is…what’s right?” Lily looked indignant.

“It’s his fault she’s been running wild all over the county for the past two years, after all.”

“Was he to blame?” Lily tilted her head toward him, her eyes questioning.

“Most certainly,” Sam said. “It happened the night we entered the war. Bad’s head was filled with plans for signing up and he wasn’t paying attention. He let her go that night and she…” Sam looked at Lily and faltered.

Her eyes had filled with tears and her expression damned near to weeping. Her extreme reaction to the antics of the family pig were becoming disturbing. Perhaps so much triage had simply pushed Lily too far.

“He let her go because he was going to war?” Her voice was choked with emotion. “How tragic for your brother. And doubly tragic for poor Lady P, to have her heart broken so.”

Sam realized her mistake in an instant and all became clear. No wonder she seemed so distressed whenever they discussed the pig. “Oh dear god. Lily, you do understand that Lady P isn’t actually a lady.”

“Perhaps not in deed, a lady. But a woman in pain, nonetheless.”

“Lady P is a sow.” He bit his lips, hard, trying to contain his laughter.

Her mouth formed an ‘O’ of surprise, disappointment writ large across her expression. “Your sister has been so charitable toward her. I’d hoped you shared her sympathies.”

He held his palms out to her, as he could control his laughter no longer. “No, please, Lily. You misunderstand. She’s truly a pig. Livestock.”

Lily stared at him, still gape-mouthed.

“She’s Evie’s pet. Lady P is short for Lady Precious—a five hundred pound sow.”

Lily covered her mouth with her hands, a pretty bright blush sweeping across her cheeks. When the sound of her laughter joined his, Sam felt better than he’d felt in years, since the whole bloody war began. Whatever barrier had grown between them was shattered by that musical sound.

“I can’t imagine what you thought of us,” he said once he was able to speak again.

Lily grinned at him. “And when Evie wrote of young men trying to ride her?” Somehow, impossibly, her blush deepened and she burst into a fresh round of giggles.

“I can’t wait to tell Evie,” Sam said once he stopped laughing.

“Oh, she’ll think me an idiot.” Lily shook her head.

“She’ll love you. She couldn’t help it.” He dropped his gaze. Who could help but love Lily?

She beamed a grin at him. “I believe I like your sister even better now. A pet pig? I always pictured her sewing samplers and taking tea.”

“Not for Evie. She’s terribly handy with a rifle and, as you can tell, she fosters unhealthy fondness for farm animals. She is quite her own person. A lot like you, I suspect.”

“She seems delightful.”

“You’d get along like a house afire, I’m sure.” He couldn’t help but smile at the thought.

She tucked a stray strand of hair inside her cap. “I wasn’t around other girls often growing up, so whenever I ran across one, I tended to frighten them off. I don’t think Evie would scare easily.”

A door slammed. Rose led a contingent of patients, fresh from their performance in the back yard.

“I suppose I should help them settle the lads back into their beds.” Lily stood to leave.

“Thank you for coming by,” he said. “It was so lovely to see you again, Lily.”

She gazed at him, a lovely blush still coloring her cheeks. She grinned again and shook her head. “A pig.”

“Well, look at you two,” Gordy said. “Carrying on and laughing and la-de-dah. And here I was feeling badly that you missed the performance. I even saved a sweet for you.” True to his word, Gordy held a small cake in his palm.

“Siren Sophie here baked it.” Gordy yanked his head back to indicate the French brunette who pushed his wheelchair. Sophie smiled blankly at Lily and Sam. “She cooks like a goddess but doesn’t understand a word of English. I don’t figure that’ll be much of a problem for us, though.”

“I think not understanding you might be a point in favor of the romance,” Sam said.

Lily shook her head. “I’ll leave you boys to one another.”

“Bluebird, you can’t go. I’ve only just gotten here.”

Lily shook her head and grinned. As she walked away, she called over her shoulder, “And I’ve told you, it’s Miss Curtis.”