The Bannister Girls (29 page)

Why did He allow it? Angel wept for the poor wretches who could no longer see or taste or hear or feel … those were the fortunate ones, those who couldn't feel. The rest of them limped painfully towards death, inch by harrowing inch, and all that women like Angel could do was watch and comfort, and hold hands until there was no pressure left in those dead fingers to hold.

There had been several letters from Margot, beseeching Angel not to think too badly of her because she simply could not return. The way she wrote the words told Angel that already the old Margot was reasserting herself, but she couldn't blame her for relinquishing her job at Piersville.
Margot had always been more vulnerable, despite her outward froth.

Angel was constantly surprised at her own resilience. Sister Yard was pleased with her, informing her so in that odd, mannish way of hers. Bannister had proved to be solid. Angel no longer flinched at the unfeminine analogy. She was deeply moved to be thought an essential part of the team at Piersville, of whom Sister Yard was a tireless and humane worker. There was no room for lightweights here. Margot had been right to retire gracefully, and besides, her mother needed her…

Since the horror of Edward Lacey's death and subsequent loss of Margot's friendship, Angel had made no real friends. Acquaintances she had in plenty, but the work was what kept her going. The months slipped by, and although she kept the memory of Jacques alive in her heart, she admitted that it was harder and harder to believe in his survival.

All the same, she clung to the fact that his whereabouts were as much a mystery to his unit. Twice she had been to Brighton Belle, to be met with the same embarrassed looks and evasions. No one knew what had happened to Jacques de Ville. Clearly the officers and men there believed him dead. But without actual proof, no one came out and declared it. Not to this girl, whose love for the man shone out of her…

Angel had to keep the hope alive. If she didn't, no one else would. Only his father, somewhere in Bordeaux. He probably knew nothing more than she did. He would have been the one to receive the message that his son was missing. Missing, believed killed … at that point, Angel always clamped her imagination. If she didn't, pain rushed in, heartache began, the numbness that was her salvation wore off.

In late December, one of the day's intake of badly wounded moaned and cussed with all the ripeness of his Cockney
background. Angel hid a smile, despite her sympathy. She didn't think much of his chances. His chest had caved in, and he would need constant care if he was ever to recover from the mangled mess the bullets had made of him. She forced him back on his bed, her arms stronger than anyone would believe in so slender a girl, and uttered soothing words to him.

‘The doctor will be along very soon, and he'll see that you get something for the pain. Try to lie still, please –'

The soldier looked up at her in dumb amazement. Angel was perplexed by his look. She thought she had seen it all. Lechery, adoration, hatred, rage, slobbering tears, dehumanised weeping…

‘Gawd almighty, where've I seen yer before?' Harry gurgled through the heaving jelly of his chest.

Angel shook her head gently. The poor devil was probably having hallucinations. It happened all the time. A face, a look, reminded some poor devil of a girl at home, a wife or a sweetheart. She put a cool hand on his forehead. It burned with fever, despite the bitter cold outside.

‘I ain't bleedin' crazy, ducks. Not yet. I've seen yer, I tell yer.'

‘I've been here a long time. Perhaps you've been to Piersville before. Is this your first time in hospital?' Angel asked gently.

At least the irritation over where he had seen her was taking his mind off the evil-looking wounds in his chest. He must have been ripped right open, and only a hastily stuffed piece of darkly reddening padding was holding him together.

‘Nah!' Harry said with scornful pride. ‘I bin at the Front off'n on for two bleedin' years, though I've seen the inside of more bleedin' ‘ospitals than you've had hot dinners!'

His whole body heaved with the effort of talking now. He squinted his eyes at Angel's face, until she became more of a blur, an image, a sketchy image of black lines on white paper…

‘Good Gawd almighty, I know where I seen yer!' he croaked. ‘It was that bleedin' loony chap at the Abbey – St Helene! 'E had a drawing of yer by his bed.'

‘What chap?' Angel's stomach retched with shock. Her heart raced so fast she could hardly hear the Cockney's words. She felt like dragging him out of the bed and shaking him to tell her … tell her… but if she did that, he'd probably die right in front of her, and she'd know nothing…

The voice was dwindling, fumbling for sounds, losing its control. She leaned forward desperately.

‘'E never said proper words. Only bleedin' rubbish. Posh chap. One o' them Froggies –'

The sounds were rasping and gurgling now, as if they came from under water, as if they were drowning. Angel knew that was precisely what the man was doing. Drowning in his own blood. So many of them did it. Edward Lacey had done it. She wept for them all. She wept over the man, listening desperately for one more word, for him to mention Jacques' name…

‘Bannister, there's nothing more to be done here.'

Sister Yard's voice, sharp as a whiplash, was beside her ear. Sister Yard's hands were hauling her away from the dead body of the soldier who had given her flaring hope. The front of her uniform was stained with the blood that had erupted from the useless padding. The wounds disgorged blood, poured out blood like a fountain. An orderly was scuttling to the bed, removing the body, making way for yet more bodies, either fit for repair or to be made ready for disposal. It was an endless nightmare. But for Angel, out of the nightmare had come a sliver of light. A hope. Angel turned to scream at Sister Yard to tell her so, but before she could say anything, it seemed as if the floor came up to hit her between the eyes.

She heard nothing of the panic among the hard-pressed staff in the next hours. She was put to bed under sedation, ordered
complete bed rest for a week. She was no use to anyone if she collapsed, and she had worked as hard as anybody. Sister Yard herself gave the orders, finding an odd attachment for the golden-haired girl who gave so much of herself so tirelessly. And those poor lady's hands that cared nothing for the rough work they were given, were laid carefully over the bedcovers while the girl was restored to health and strength.

The doctor insisted that Angel be kept sedated. She had been under a terrific strain lately, and the mind and body could cope with only so much. The drugs dulled Angel's senses. She hated them, while knowing that they healed. But at last she was allowed to wake with her head clear, to see the girl called Jones beside her bed.

‘You're awake! I just looked in to see if you were all right. How d'you feel, Bannister?'

‘Better,' Angel said cautiously. Everything was winging back to her. The soldier who had died. The certainty that he had seen a drawing of her. The only person who could have made it was Jacques. And the name of the hospital. Oh God, she couldn't remember it. Some Abbey. Some saint's name. There were probably hundreds in Catholic France.

‘The Abbey of St Helene!' she said in sudden, joyous triumph. Jones backed away uneasily, as though Angel was experiencing a holy vision. As Angel made to leap out of bed and then clutched quickly at the side table, Jones disappeared through the door, calling quickly that she'd fetch Sister.

There were more urgent things to attend to than visiting a recovered nurse. By the time Sister was free, Angel was washed and dressed, and wishing that her legs didn't feel so much like wool. She was ready to return to the wards, and ready to beg with a request of her own.

‘You'll do no such thing. You'll be in the same state as before if you start work immediately,' Sister said in annoyance. She thought the girl had more sense. ‘One more day
taking it easy, and tomorrow you may return to the wards.'

‘All right.' She would give in on this, and then Sister would grant her request. The next minute she felt as if she had been slapped in the face.

‘There's no question of a transfer at the moment, Bannister! I hardly need tell you how hard-pressed we are for every nurse and helper. Perhaps in the new year. We're promised some new V.A.D.s then. I'll see if I can release you then.'

Angel could have wept. ‘But Sister, don't you see how useful I would be? The man who died was British, and the nuns would be French. I speak excellent French. Oh please, Sister, won't you think again?'

‘In the New Year, Bannister. I can say no more than that. As soon as we get some replacements, you may go. But I'll be damn sorry to lose you, all the same. You're a good egg. Solid.'

Left alone, the incongruity of the words failed to amuse Angel. A good solid egg, hard-boiled … but she was none of that. She was soft-centred, ready to spill over right now. For a moment she had almost breathed Jacques in her lungs, held him in her arms, as real and surely as she lived. And now she had to wait until the new year to find out if it was really him. If he was well, or injured beyond help, mentally or physically. He needed her, but she couldn't go to him because she was needed here.

The frustration of it all overwhelmed her, and she threw herself down on her narrow bed and wept until she felt as though there were no tears left inside her.

Early in January, Ellen snuggled into the collar of her coat, wishing she had somewhere to go. She felt decidedly unsettled, shocked, everything jarring and worrying inside her. It wouldn't be so bad if Rose had stayed with her after they had come out of the cinema into the pale cold daylight. But Rose had gone scurrying off to meet the young man of
whom she was now enamoured, unfit for war service, but apparently fit for everything else, according to Rose's irritatingly coy descriptions.

Ellen would have liked to go to a tea shop with Rose, mulling over the disturbing film together, instead of standing here like a left-over scone at Sunday tea. The film was appalling. I mean, one heard of the dreadful things that were happening in France and at the Somme, but to sit through such a terrible film about it, seeing the men, laughing into the cameras, but nevertheless with that awful mud and the trenches, and the tanks, and all the things one never really thought about in too much detail…

Ellen groaned to herself, listening to her own thoughts. God, she sounded just like her mother, distancing herself from the real world so that she didn't have to be too deeply involved in it … she wasn't ‘one', she was herself, she was Ellen Bannister, munitions worker, lost in a world where she didn't belong, living with a friend who indulged too freely in sex with strangers, conveniently forgetting her avowal to remember her dear departed Ronnie for always and always…

‘Ellen, is that you? Good Lord, it is! Ellen, how splendid to see you!'

The cut-glass voice shattered the silence of the winter afternoon. Ellen realised that the crowds outside the picture palace had dispersed, and she had been standing there as if she was waiting for a bus. She stared in disbelief for a moment, and then seized the other girl's hand as if it was a lifeline.

‘Margot! Why aren't you in France? Oh God, I'm sorry. Didn't something happen to your brother? You look awful if you don't mind me saying so. Have you been ill?'

She blundered on, embarrassment putting words into her mouth she didn't intend. Margot had gone to France with Angel, and nostalgia for her sister rushed at Ellen with a speed she didn't expect, making her blink the stupid
tears away. It was the sight of that damn propaganda film, terrifying and terrible, and the loss of the friendship she and Rose had once had, and now seeing Margot so unexpectedly…

‘You've seen the film, I suppose?' Margot said matter-of-factly. ‘You and thousands of others. Some people fainted when they saw the men going over the barbed wire into No Man's Land. They don't show it all though. They don't show the numbers of the wounded.' Her voice was bitter. ‘Nor the reality of the hospitals and the things we had to see. They prefer to glorify the Somme to make money from gullible people at home –'

‘You can't believe that, Margot!'

‘Why shouldn't I? Oh, for heaven's sake, let's get some tea. Do you have the time? There's a little place near here that's not too bad.'

Margot was Angel's friend, not Ellen's. They had little in common. But Margot was a link with Angel, and Ellen badly needed something, someone of her own to cling to. She followed this brittle girl almost obediently, in a very uncharacteristic way, until they reached the warmth of the tea shop and ordered tea and buns, and Ellen began to feel very uneasy at the burning light in the other girl's eyes.

‘D'you know what ended the fighting?' Margot went on as if she was an authority, as indeed she was, keeping up avidly with every communique she could, as a kind of penance for opting out of the war. Ellen noticed for the first time how thin she was, how nervous and jumpy.

‘What ended it?' she queried, sipping the hot tea gratefully.

‘Mud. Bloody filthy mud. They fought until November, until they couldn't see for mud. They drowned in it. Except Eddie, of course. He was already dead by then.'

‘Margot, I'm so sorry.' Ellen clattered the cup in the saucer, in a way that would make her mother frown.

‘It's all right.' Margot waved away the apology. ‘I'm used
to it now. Sometimes, it still takes me by surprise and I remember with a start that he won't be coming back, and then it hurts like fury.'

‘The film showed plenty of German prisoners being taken,' Ellen tried to steer away from the uncomfortable subject of her brother.

‘They didn't show the real slaughter, did they? The Red Cross people being blown up while they were taking the wounded away to hospital, the men caught on the wire, hanging there until they disintegrated.'