Altogether it was a most entertaining afternoon, and when we came out in the dark and rain the eldest again slipped off to get a taxi, dodging cabs and horses with the dexterity of an acrobat.
Christmas came round, and there was tremendous compet.i.tion between the different wards, which vied with each other over the most original decorations.
At midday I was asked into the W.A.A.C."s ward, where we had roast beef and plum pudding. The two women doctors who ran the hospital visited every ward and drank a toast after lunch. I don"t know what they toasted in the men"s wards, but in the W.A.A.C."s it was roughly, "To the women of England, and the W.A.A.C.s who would win the war, etc." It seemed too bad to leave out the men who were in the trenches, so I drank one privately to them on my own.
As I sat in my little ward that night I thought of the happy times we had had last Christmas in the convoy, only a short year before.
CHAPTER XVIII
ROEHAMPTON: "BOB" THE GREY, AND THE ARMISTICE
After Christmas it was thought I was well enough to be fitted with an artificial limb, and in due course I applied to the limbless hospital at Roehampton. The reply came back in a few days.
"DEAR SIR, (I groaned),
"You must apply to so-and-so and we will then be able to give you a bed in a fortnight"s time, etc.
_Signed_: "SISTER D."
My heart sank. I was up against the old question again, and in desperation I wrote back:
"DEAR MADAM,
"My trouble is that I am a girl, etc."
and poured forth all my woes on the subject. Sister D., who proved to be an absolute topper, was considerably amused and wrote back most sympathetically. She promised to do all she could for me and told the surgeon the whole story, and it was arranged for him to see me and advise what type of leg I had better wear and then decide where I was to be put up later. He was most kind, but I returned from the interview considerably depressed for, before I could wear an artificial leg, another operation had to be performed. It took place at the military hospital in January and I felt I should have to hurry in order to be "doing everything as usual" by the time the year was up, as Captain C.
had promised.
For some reason, when I came round I found myself in the big W.A.A.C.s"
ward, and never returned to my little room again. I did not mind the change so much except for the noise and the way the whole room vibrated whenever anyone walked or ran past my bed. They nearly always did the latter, for they were none of them very ill. The building was an old workhouse which had been condemned just before the war, and the floor bent and shook at the least step. I found this particularly trying as the incision a good six inches long had been made just behind my knee, and naturally, as it rested on a pillow, I felt each vibration.
The sheets were hard to the touch and grey in colour even when clean, and the rows of scarlet blankets were peculiarly blinding. I realised the meaning of the saying: "A red rag to a bull," and had every sympathy with the animal! (It was so humorous to look at things from a patient"s point of view.) It had always been our ambition at Lamarck to have red top blankets on every bed in our wards. "They make the place look so bright and cheerful!" I daresay these details would have pa.s.sed unnoticed in the ordinary way, but I had already had eight months of hospitals, during which time I had hardly ever been out of pain, and all I craved was quiet and rest. Some of the women doctors were terribly sarcastic.
We were awakened at 5 a.m. as per hospital routine (how often I had been loth to waken the patients at Lamarck), and most of the W.A.A.C.s got up and dressed, the ones who were not well enough remaining in bed. At six o"clock we had breakfast, and one of them pushed a trolly containing slices of bread and mugs of tea from bed to bed. It rattled like a pantechnicon and shook the whole place, and I hated it out of all proportion. The ward was swept as soon as breakfast was over. How I dreaded that performance! I lay clenching the sides of the bed in expectation; for as surely as fate the sweeping W.A.A.C. caught her brush firmly in one of the legs. "Sorry, miss, did it ketch you?" she would exclaim, "there, I done it agin; drat this broom!"
There were two other patients in the room who relished the quiet in the afternoons when most of the W.A.A.C.s went out on pa.s.s. One of them was a sister from the hospital, and the other a girl suffering from cancer, both curtained off in distant corners. "Now for a sleep, sister," I would call, as the last one departed, but as often as not just as we were dropping off a voice would rouse us, saying: "Good afternoon, I"ve just come in to play the piano to you for a little," and without waiting for a reply a cheerful lady would sit down forthwith and bang away virtuously for an hour!
We had had a good many air raids before Christmas and I hoped Fritz would reserve his efforts in that direction till I could go about on crutches again. No such luck, however, for at 10 o"clock one night the warnings rang out. I trusted, as I had had my operations so recently, I should be allowed to remain; but some shrapnel had pierced the roof of the ward in a former raid and everyone had to be taken down w.i.l.l.y-nilly.
I hid under the sheets, making myself as flat as possible in the hopes of escaping. I was discovered of course and lifted into a wheel chair and taken down in the lift to the Padre"s room, where all the W.A.A.C.s were already a.s.sembled. Our guns were blazing away quite heartily, the "London front" having recently been strengthened. Just as I got down, the back wheel of my chair collapsed, which was cheering!
We sat there for some time listening to the din. Everyone was feeling distinctly peevish, and not a few slightly "breezy," as it was quite a bad raid. I wondered what could be done to liven up the proceedings, and presently espied a pile of hymn-books which I solemnly handed out, choosing "Onward Christian Soldiers" as the liveliest selection! I could not help wondering what the distant F.A.N.Y.s would have thought of the effort. In the middle of "Greenland"s spicy mountains," one W.A.A.C.
varied the proceedings by throwing a fit, and later on another fainted; beyond that nothing of any moment happened till the firing, punctuated by the dropping bombs, became so loud that every other sound was drowned. Some of the W.A.A.C.s were convinced we were all "for it" and would be burnt to death, but I a.s.sured them as my chair had broken, and I had no crutches even if I could use them, I should be burnt to a cinder long before any of them! This seemed to comfort them to a certain extent. I could tell by the sound of the bombs as they exploded that the Gothas could not be far away; and then, suddenly, we heard the engines quite plainly, and there was a terrific rushing sound I knew only too well. The crash came, but, though the walls rocked and the windows rattled in their sockets, they did not fall.
Above the din we heard a woman"s piercing scream, "Oh G.o.d, I"m burning!"
as she ran down the street. Simultaneously the reflection of a red glare played on the walls opposite. All was confusion outside, and the sound of rushing feet pierced by screams from injured women and children filled the air. It was terrible to sit there powerless, unable to do anything to help. The hospital had just been missed by a miracle, but some printing offices next door were in flames, and underneath was a large concrete dug-out holding roughly 150 people. What the total casualties were I never heard. Luckily a ward had just been evacuated that evening and the wounded and dying were brought in immediately. It was horrible to see little children, torn and maimed, being carried past our door into the ward. The hum of the Gotha"s engines could still be heard quite distinctly.
Sparks flew past the windows, but thanks to the firemen who were on the spot almost immediately, the fire was got under and did not spread to the hospital.
It was a terrible night! How I longed to be able to give the Huns a taste of their own medicine!
The "All clear" was not sounded till 3 a.m. Many of the injured died before morning, after all that was humanly possible had been done for them. I heard some days later that a discharged soldier, who had been in the dug-out when the bomb fell, was nearly drowned by the floods of water from the hoses, and was subsequently brought round by artificial respiration. He was heard to exclaim: "Humph, first they wounds me aht in France, then they tries to drown me in a bloomin" air raid!"
There was one W.A.A.C.--Smith we will call her--who could easily have made her fortune on the stage, she was so clever at imitations. She would "take you off" to your face and make you laugh in spite of yourself. She was an East-ender and witty in the extreme, warm of heart but exceedingly quick-tempered. I liked her tremendously, she was so utterly alive and genuine.
One night I was awakened from a doze by a tremendous hubbub going on in the ward. Raising myself on an elbow I saw Smith shaking one of the W.A.A.C.s, who was hanging on to a bed for support, as a terrier might a rat.
"You would, would you?" I heard her exclaim. "Sy it againe, yer white-ficed son of a gun yer!" and she shook her till her teeth chattered. I never found out what the "white-ficed" one had said, but she showed no signs of repeating the offence. I felt as if I was in the gallery at Drury Lane and wanted to shout, "Go on, "it "er," but just restrained myself in time!
A girl orderly was despatched in haste for one of the head doctors, and I awaited her arrival with interest, wondering just how she would deal with the situation.
However, the "Colonel" apparently thought discretion the better part of valour, and sent the Sergeant-Major--the only man on the staff--to cope with the delinquent. I was fearfully disappointed. Smith checkmated him splendidly by retiring into the bath where she sat soaking for two hours. What was the poor man to do? It was getting late, and for all he knew she might elect to stay there all night. He knew of no precedent and ran in and out of the ward, flapping his arms in a helpless manner.
I felt Smith had decidedly won the day. Imagine an ordinary private behaving thus!
There were sudden periodical evacuations of the ward, and one day I was told my bed would be required for a more urgent case--a large convoy was expected from France and so many beds had to be vacated. Three weeks after my operation I left the hospital and arranged to stay with friends in the country. As it was a long railway journey and I was hardly accustomed to crutches again, I wanted to stay the night in town.
However, one comes up against some extraordinary types of people. For example, the hotel where my aunt was staying refused to take me in, even for one night, on the score that "_they_ didn"t want any invalids!" I could not help wondering a little bitterly where these same people would have been but for the many who were now permanent invalids and for those others, as Kipling reminds us, "whose death has set us free." I could not help noticing that at home one either came up against extreme sympathy and kindness or else utter callousness--there seemed to be no half-measures.
In March I again hoped to go to Roehampton, but my luck was dead out. I could still bear no pressure on the wretched nerve, and another operation was performed almost immediately.
The W.A.A.C.s" ward was all very well as an experience, but the noise and shaking, not to mention the thought of the broom catching my bed regularly every morning, was too much to face again. The surgeon who was operating tried to get me into his hospital for officers where there were several single rooms vacant at the time.
Vain hope. Again the familiar phrase rang out, and once more I apologised for being a female, and was obliged to make arrangements to return to the private nursing home where I had been in August. The year was up, and here I was still having operations. I was disgusted in the extreme.
When I was at last fit to go to Roehampton the question of accommodation again arose. I never felt so sick in all my life I wasn"t a man--committees and matrons sat and pondered the question. Obviously I was a terrible nuisance and no one wanted to take any responsibility.
The mother superior of the Sacred Heart Convent at Roehampton heard of it and asked me to stay there. Though I was not of their faith they welcomed me as no one else had done since my return, and I was exceedingly happy with them. It was a change to be really wanted somewhere.
In time I got fairly hardened to the stares from pa.s.sers-by, and it was no uncommon thing for an absolute stranger to come up and ask, "Have you lost your leg?" The fact seemed fairly obvious, but still some people like verbal confirmation of everything. One day in Harrod"s, just after the 1918 push, one florid but obviously sympathetic lady exclaimed, "Dear me, poor girl, did you lose your leg in the recent push?" It was then the month of June (some good going to be up on crutches in that time!) Several staff officers were buying things at the same counter and turned at her question to hear my reply. "No, not in this _last_ push,"
I said, "but the one just before," and moved on. They appeared to be considerably amused.
How I loathed crutches! One nightmare in which I often indulged was that I found, in spite of having lost my leg, I could really walk in some mysterious way quite well without them. I would set off joyfully, and then to my horror suddenly discover my plight and fall smack. I woke to find the nerve had been at its old trick again. Sometimes I was seized with a panic that when I did get my leg I should not be able to use it, and worse still, never ride again. That did not bear thinking of.
I went to the hospital every day for fittings and at last the day arrived when I walked along holding on to handrails on each side and watching my "style" in a gla.s.s at the end of the room for the purpose.
My excitement knew no bounds! It was a tedious business at first getting it to fit absolutely without paining and took some time. I could hear the men practising walking in the adjoining room to the refrain of the "Broken Doll," the words being:
"I only lost my leg a year ago.
I"ve got a "Rowley," now, I"d have you know.
I soon learnt what pain was, I thought I knew, But now my poor old leg is black, and red, white and blue!
The fitter said, "You"re walking very well,"
I told him he could take his leg to ----, But they tell me that some day I"ll walk right away, By George! and with my Rowley too!"
It was at least comforting to know that in time one would!
Half an hour"s fitting was enough to make the leg too tender for anything more that day, and I discovered to my joy that I was quite well able to drive a small car with one foot. I was lent a sporting Morgan tri-car which did more to keep up my spirits than anything else.
The side brake was broken and somehow never got repaired, so the one foot had quite an exciting time. It was anything but safe, but it did not matter. One day, driving down the Portsmouth Road with a fellow-sufferer, a policeman waved his arms frantically in front of us.
"What"s happened," I asked my friend, "are we supposed to stop?" "I"m afraid so," he replied, "I should think we"ve been caught in a trap."
(One gets into bad habits in France!)