The Stolen Years

She turned her thoughts to the ward, the smell of antiseptic and the stifled sighs coming from the iron beds, and rose, slipping the letter into her apron pocket. She winced as pain shot relentlessly from her ankles up her slim, shapely legs, stiff and swollen after forty-eight hours on duty. Not that Matron cared, she reflected bitterly. To her, the Voluntary Aid Detachments were nothing more than glorified slave labor. Never mind that many of them, by this stage of the war, were more knowledgeable than most of the young nurses brought in fresh from training.

Resolutely, Flora switched on her flashlight and straightened the intricate uniform that enveloped her diminutive figure like a suit of starched armor. She glanced sleepily at her watch before making her way past the row of narrow beds, her rubber soles squeaking eerily on the linoleum.

She lingered, staring sadly through the shadows at the bandaged remains of a generation. Months before, boys her own age had left for the front as brave young warriors, ready to conquer the world, only to return wounded forever in heart, body and soul. Each time her eye fell on a flat sheet where a limb should have been, her throat clenched, for try as she might she was unable to shut out the smothered moans and the heartrending aura of resignation. Six months of quivering stumps, the familiar hum of agony, and dressing wounds, some so horrific death would have been preferable, should have made her immune to these sights and sounds. But they hadn’t, and probably never would. The outer control she displayed was a necessary survival tool, one that she upheld bravely, aware that a calm front helped the suffering patients. But her soul wept, unable to accept so much needless pain and mutilation.

Halfway down the ward she stopped to smooth the forehead of a sandy-haired private, relieved to find him calmer. But his limp pajama sleeve told its own tale, and she wondered for the thousandth time what it would be like if Gavin were to return like this. The thought was haunting. Again she chased away the images of his tall, handsome figure lying broken and maimed at the bottom of a trench, his bright blue eyes dulled by pain and his thick, black hair caked with blood and mud.

Shuddering, she headed toward the screens raised ominously around Jimmy McPherson, a young private brought in yesterday for whom little could be done. She slipped behind the divide and gazed unhappily into a pair of delirious eyes that glittered, bright and frantic, above fiery emaciated cheeks.

With nobody to alleviate his soft moans of agony, Flora lay the flashlight on the nightstand and realized that all she could do now was pray. Reaching out, she took the boy’s hot, dry hand in hers, begging not for his recovery, but for a quick release from this horrendous suffering.

“Allow him to go in peace, dear Lord,” she pleaded, holding her other hand close to the young man’s feverish brow.

All at once, her body became weightless, as though she were not a part of it, and a strong sensation of energy ran through her. It had occurred several times, always with those patients on the brink of death who seemed unable to let go of life. As on the other occasions, she suddenly felt an invisible presence. The heat from Jimmy’s brow abated, his eyes cleared and his chapped lips moved. Flora leaned closer, desperate to catch his last, whispered words.

“Tell Mother I planted the daffodils for her. Tell her…” But the rest was lost as his eyes closed and life ebbed gently away, and Flora watched in motionless awe as two hazy shadows appeared above the bed. She saw him rise out of his body and walk away between them.

Slowly, as the dawn crept stealthily through the Victorian windows, the image faded and she became aware that her fingers still clasped the stiffening hand of the figure in the bed. Gently, she folded his hands over his chest and, with a final look at his expressionless countenance, devoid now of suffering, she pulled the sheet up over him. A rush of exhaustion followed and she clutched the railing of the cot as everything went black.

Gradually she recovered her balance. The ward and its gloomy monotony came back into focus, and she stared as though seeing it for the first time. All at once, the endless rain battering the rattling panes of the old windows, the groans, the sickening scent of death and despondency, swooped down on her like a terrifying specter, and to her horror she feared she could not go on. Shame followed her initial panic as she faced her own inadequacy. Suddenly she wanted to run, escape from this dismal drudgery.

“Nurse?” A harsh call from the door made Flora snap to and hurry to face the starched, disapproving matron. It was bad enough being surrounded by suffering, but the matron’s constant censure made matters worse. She never missed a chance to slip in a snide remark about the privileged few, coupled with derogatory reflections on Flora’s small frame. Added to that were the woman’s disdainful looks. Often Flora wished she were plain and invisible, ashamed of her trim figure, her misty gray eyes, delicate, translucent complexion and chestnut hair that the matron regarded as nothing less than the wiles of a wicked temptress.

“I was just doing the rounds, Matron,” she murmured hurriedly, afraid her expression might give her thoughts away. “I’m afraid poor Private McPherson passed away.”

“I see. I hope you filled out the chart properly, Nurse. I won’t stand for any inefficiency.” She peered ominously through a pair of thick, horn-rimmed glasses perched on the beak of her bony nose. Behind them, her small, steely eyes glinted like two metal buttons. “You can finish cleaning the floors before you go. There’s to be no slacking. And mind your posture, Nurse. I won’t have slouches on my ward.”

Mustering her dignity, Flora straightened her sore back and dragged herself to the laundry to get a mop and pail, feeling the matron’s piercing gaze boring into her back as she trundled down the corridor. She cleaned the floor with aching arms and sighed with relief when the clock finally struck seven, careful to make herself scarce before the woman found another last-minute task for her to perform.

Flora grabbed her cloak and umbrella, left the drab building and made her way through the heavy rain to a shelter on the street corner. There she waited for the tram that would take her to the end of Prince’s Street, where Murray and the car would be waiting to take her home. She leaned against the damp wall, staring at the rising mist still clinging to the flagged pavement, and glanced shamefacedly at the peeling posters with their patriotic appeals. What right had she to complain, when everyone was suffering just as she was? Still, she knew she’d reached the end of her tether and could not stand the ward or the matron’s badgering any longer.

At the sound of the tram’s approach, Flora went to the curb and waved it down. The aged conductor gave a tired smile. She sat down on the wooden bench, relieved to be off her feet, and considered her situation. As a solution presented itself, a slow smile and a tingle of excitement replaced the shame and fear. Why hadn’t she thought of it earlier? The Foreign Service! Perhaps it wasn’t here at home that she was needed but at the front. Perhaps there, in the midst of it all, she could be of true help, offering more than the menial tasks the matron assigned her. She steadied herself as the tram rumbled along, filled with newfound inner strength, elated despite the physical and emotional fatigue. All at once Jimmy McPherson’s passing and the strange, recurring experiences made sense.

Then she remembered Tante Constance and Uncle Hamish and her heart sank. What would they say? They were sure to protest. Technically, they could even stop her from going. Like Gavin and Angus, their sons, she had lied about her age to become a V.A.D. Still, her mind was made up. Somewhere deep within, a dogged voice summoned, as though the young private’s death had opened a window to her soul, making the months of frustration and endurance—of patiently washing slops and cleaning bowls, rolling bandages and running endless errands—worthwhile.

She gazed out of the clammy window at the drizzling morning, wishing she were a man. Men were simply called up, and neither family nor personal commitment mattered before service to king and country. But for women it was different. The older generation, having so willingly given up their sons, husbands and brothers, considered it the duty of a young woman to attend to them. An ailing parent was enough to call a V.A.D. back from the front, leaving her no choice but to return, wretchedly divided between duty to her family and her country.

Flora leaned forward, pulling her cape closer, anxiously imagining all the arguments her aunt and uncle were sure to put forward. But the more she thought, the more prepared she became to do battle if necessary. No matter how exhausting she found the Foreign Service, it couldn’t possibly be worse than the tedious, unrewarding pattern of the present, where the only highlight lay in Angus’s sporadic letters, carrying brief news of Gavin.

With her six-month trial period complete, Flora was eligible to apply overseas. The government was appealing daily for V.A.D.s willing to go to the front. As the tram swung round the corner into Prince’s Street, a large billboard came into view, exhorting the population to trust in their country and support those brave young men and women at the front. It had to be an omen, Flora averred.

The moment she reached the car, Flora instructed the chauffeur, who was too old for the war or the coal pits, to drive straight to the inscription office. There she waited for nearly an hour in a stuffy waiting room, while an efficient middle-aged woman in uniform sat behind a large desk, writing diligently. Flora stared at the carpet’s fading gray pattern, which was probably once blue, and read the announcements pinned on the walls. She fiddled nervously with the buttons of her cloak, convincing herself she’d done right to come.

Finally the woman beckoned and Flora followed her down a colorless corridor to a door that had an opaque glass panel with RECRUITING written on it in bold, black letters. She was invited to sit down by an unusually sympathetic young matron who did not question too closely when she blushingly stated her age as nineteen. She merely filled in the blanks on the form, apparently glad that after three long years of pain, tedium and despair, some gallant souls were still ready to go to the western front. The interview went well, and by the end of half an hour she had been accepted for foreign service.

Flora dropped her bombshell at dinner that evening, a formal affair despite the lack of servants. Tante Constance gazed helplessly down the gleaming stretch of fine Georgian mahogany decked with the usual array of silver and porcelain, silently seeking her husband’s opinion in the aftermath of the announcement. Flora fidgeted under the table, about to break the silence, when Tante Constance finally spoke, her French intonation still noticeable after twenty years of living in Scotland.

“But why you, ma chérie? They have so many nurses already. The conditions…Angus writes that conditions are appalling.” She appealed once more to her husband, who continued eating the meager soup, unusually quiet. “Hamish,” she exclaimed, irritated, “did you hear what Flora is suggesting? It is absurd, ridiculous—out of the question. I don’t think she should go. You agree, of course, Hamish, yes? It is impossible to permit the child to go. She was only sixteen last week! Mon Dieu! What would your poor cousin Seaton have said if he and Jane were still alive? I’m sure they would have been opposed to their only daughter going to the war.”

“But Tante, how could they be opposed when they themselves were the first to seek danger?” Flora blurted out. “The missions in Africa were very dangerous. That’s why they were killed. For what they believed in,” she pleaded, caught between the determination to go at all cost, and the boundaries of an upbringing that placed family considerations before all else.

“That was not at all the same. There was no war at the time and they were missionaries,” Tante Constance replied with a dismissive wave of the hand.

Flora bit her tongue, knowing it was useless to point out that her father—a distant cousin of Uncle Hamish’s—and her mother had lost their lives in the midst of a tribal feud. So she remained silent, anxiously waiting for Uncle Hamish to answer. Although he ran the MacLeod coal empire like a benevolent nineteenth-century dictator, he often reacted unexpectedly. It was he, despite all Tante’s supplications, who had allowed the twins to lie about their age and enlist, saying that in their place he would have done the same. Now, seeing his gray hair and lined face, it was easy to deduce what it had cost him. There must have been days when he rued his decision, wishing only for their safe return, questioning his own sanity for having allowed them to go. But her uncle bore that, and Tante Constance’s endless reproaches, in stoic silence.

She waited with bated breath as he laid down the soupspoon and carefully dabbed his thick mustache with a white linen napkin.

“This is a sudden and serious decision, my dear Flora. Are you certain that you have reflected sufficiently upon the matter?”

“Oh, yes, Uncle Hamish, I have,” she responded, meeting his gaze full on. “I can’t bear being useless here. I have to go,” she said simply.

He looked at her hard, then nodded silently before turning to his wife. “I respect Flora’s decision, just as I respected that of our two sons,” he said, continuing before Tante Constance could protest. “There is a war on, my dear. The flower of our youth has suffered its consequences, but so it is. And although, like you, I deplore the fact of her going, I can only applaud our dear Flora for her courage. Patriotism will wear thin soon if nothing breaks,” he added, tight-lipped. “If it weren’t for the endurance of our troops on the western front, their amazing courage and sacrifice, God knows what would become of us all. The future of our nation depends on the effort and fortitude of those willing to sacrifice their personal lives for a bigger cause. Therefore, I believe that she should go if that is her wish.” He turned back to Flora and smiled, his eyes filled with melancholic admiration. “We shall miss you dearly, child, but you have my blessing.”

“But how shall we manage without her?” Tante Constance’s large form sagged before her husband’s decision.

“We shall manage, my love, just as everyone else does.”

“But it seems so unnecessary for her to join the Foreign Service. I’m sure they have enough girls out there already. The government should deal with it.”

“But Tante, if no nurses or V.A.D.s went to the front, what would happen to all the wounded? What if Gavin or Angus were hurt and there was no one to tend to them?” Flora appealed softly.

“I know, ma chérie. I…” Constance raised her hands in a Gallic gesture of defeat, lips quivering as she shook her graying head and sighed. “But you are so very young, ma petite. There is so much of life you don’t know yet, things you are not aware of, ought not be exposed to. Girls should not have to go to the front with the men. It is not at all seemly.” She gave another long sigh that expressed better than words all the pain and anxiety, the keeping-up of a brave front while praying fervently that the ominous telegram beginning with those fateful words—We sincerely regret to inform you…—would never arrive.

“It won’t be for long, Tante.” Flora reached across the table and gently touched her aunt’s trembling fingers. “I’m sure the war cannot last much longer.”

“How can we tell?” Tante Constance pressed a hankie to her eyes, trying to hold back the tears. “How do we know how much longer? They say in France that General Nivelle has all these wonderful plans, but all the while, the army is refusing to fight. My brother Eustace writes that were it not for the astute intervention of a young officer named Philippe Pétain things would be a disaster. And look at this country! Lloyd George argues with General Haig and that Robertson man, and everything remains exactly the same, more young men dead or wounded, more widows and weeping mothers. Have they no hearts?” she cried. “You are like a daughter to me, Flora dearest.” She clasped the outstretched hand. “I could not bear to lose you, too. Oh, mon Dieu, non!”

“My dearest,” Hamish said soothingly, “we must all be prepared to make the supreme sacrifice for the good of the nation. Or there will be no nation,” he added dryly.

Flora stroked Tante’s tremulous hand, wishing she could offer solace. She hated being the cause of more suffering, yet she knew she had no choice. She glanced at Uncle Hamish, struck all at once by the irony that this war that they all deplored was multiplying his fortune several times over. The need for British coal was overwhelming and Hamish’s factory could provide it. But she knew he would gladly have given every last penny to have his sons returned to him safe and sound.

That night they played cards in the drawing room as they had before the war. Little had altered at Midfield, as though defying the onslaught of change that would inevitably come. Here, a few miles south of Edinburgh, the war seemed a remote happening that had afflicted but not yet debilitated. Rationing wasn’t felt the same here; Uncle Hamish had arranged for eggs, butter and lamb to be brought from Strathaird, the estate on the Isle of Skye where the family used to spend a large portion of the summer holidays before embarking on an annual trip to Limoges. There Tante Constance’s brother, Eustace de la Vallière, and his wife, Hortense, owned la Vallière, one of the largest porcelain factories in France.

Flora gazed at the green baize of the card table and thought of Cousin Eugène, Oncle Eustace and Tante Hortense’s son, so serious, spiritual and mature despite his youth, entering the priesthood. It had been three long years since they were all together. She tried to concentrate on the game, making sure she made just enough mistakes for Uncle Hamish to believe he’d won fair and square, her lips twitching affectionately when she discarded an ace and his mustache bristled with satisfaction. He was so dear, and she so grateful that he supported her decision, despite his natural concern and what were sure to be endless recriminations from his wife.

As soon as the game was over and tea was served, Flora excused herself and slipped outside. The rain had stopped and the sky was surprisingly clear. The stars glimmered like the flickering flames in a Christmas procession seen from afar. Were these the same stars Gavin gazed at from his trench, she wondered, sitting on the damp terrace despite Tante’s admonitions about catching a chill, her knees hugged under her chin.

The pale satin of her evening gown cascaded down the stone steps like a waterfall as she searched the gleaming stars, their sparkle replaced by Gavin’s twinkling blue eyes and possessive smile. She sighed and recalled each precious moment, each tender endearment and the treasured instant when his lips had finally touched hers. Before leaving, he had raised her fingers to his lips, kissing them ever so softly before whispering the question to which he already knew the answer. She smiled and bit her lip. How could he possibly have doubted? Of course she would wait for him. A lifetime, if need be.

Yet he never wrote. Never communicated directly except for the occasional scribble at the bottom of a page, sending his love and a hug. It was always Angus, the younger twin, who kept her abreast of their life in the trenches, sharing anecdotes, some so tragic they were hard to believe, others oddly humorous despite the circumstances.

Now, at last, it was her turn to experience these things.

She rose slowly and wandered back into the house, gazing affectionately at Tante’s stiff French furniture, the paintings and the delicate porcelain on the shelves, realizing how much it all meant to her.

Midfield and Strathaird had been home to her since she was barely four, when the family had taken her in as a surrogate daughter and sister after her parents’ death. It seemed a lifetime ago. But then, so did the boys’ departure to the front.

She heaved another sigh, feeling worldly-wise and much older than her years. The last few months spent at the hospital had been a shock at first, a revelation. The prim, innocent young girl who had entered its portals with no more knowledge of male anatomy than a nun was now a different person. She smoothed the faded brocade of her favorite cushion, glad that women were taking on new functions, becoming vital to the country’s economy, and learning much about themselves and their capabilities. That was about the only positive aspect of this dreadful war. All at once she remembered Tante’s veiled remarks at dinner and grinned, wondering if her aunt had the slightest idea of the tasks Flora performed each day—washing the men, dressing their wounds, emptying their bedpans.