The
probationers and the second-year students worked twelve hours without rest. The
other trainees and the qualified nurses worked on, and no one could remember
how long they were in the wards. All the training she had received, Briony felt
later, had been useful preparation, especially in obedience, but everything she
understood about nursing she learned that night. She had never seen men crying
before. It shocked her at first, and within the hour she was used to it. On the
other hand, the stoicism of some of the soldiers amazed and even appalled her.
Men coming round from amputations seemed compelled to make terrible jokes. What
am I going to kick the missus with now? Every secret of the body was rendered
up—bone risen through flesh, sacrilegious glimpses of an intestine or an
optic nerve. From this new and intimate perspective, she learned a simple,
obvious thing she had always known, and everyone knew: that a person is, among
all else, a material thing, easily torn, not easily mended. She came the
closest she would ever be to the battlefield, for every case she helped with
had some of its essential elements—blood, oil, sand, mud, seawater,
bullets, shrapnel, engine grease, or the smell of cordite, or damp sweaty
battle dress whose pockets contained rancid food along with the sodden crumbs
of Amo bars. Often, when she returned yet again to the sink with the high taps
and the soda block, it was beach sand she scrubbed away from between her
fingers. She and the other probationers of her set were aware of each other
only as nurses, not as friends: she barely registered that one of the girls who
had helped to move Corporal MacIntyre onto the bedpan was Fiona. Sometimes,
when a soldier Briony was looking after was in great pain, she was touched by
an impersonal tenderness that detached her from the suffering, so that she was
able to do her work efficiently and without horror. That was when she saw what
nursing might be, and she longed to qualify, to have that badge. She could
imagine how she might abandon her ambitions of writing and dedicate her life in
return for these moments of elated, generalized love.
Toward
three-thirty in the morning, she was told to go and see Sister Drummond. She
was on her own, making up a bed. Earlier, Briony had seen her in the sluice
room. She seemed to be everywhere, doing jobs at every level. Automatically, Briony
began to help her.
The sister
said, “I seem to remember that you speak a bit of French.”
“It’s
only school French, Sister.”
She nodded
toward the end of the ward. “You see that soldier sitting up, at the end
of the row? Acute surgical, but there’s no need to wear a mask. Find a
chair, go and sit with him. Hold his hand and talk to him.”
Briony could
not help feeling offended. “But I’m not tired, Sister. Honestly,
I’m not.”
“You’ll
do as you’re told.”
“Yes,
Sister.”
He looked
like a boy of fifteen, but she saw from his chart that he was her own age,
eighteen. He was sitting, propped by several pillows, watching the commotion
around him with a kind of abstracted childlike wonder. It was hard to think of
him as a soldier. He had a fine, delicate face, with dark eyebrows and dark
green eyes, and a soft full mouth. His face was white and had an unusual sheen,
and the eyes were unhealthily radiant. His head was heavily bandaged. As she
brought up her chair and sat down he smiled as though he had been expecting
her, and when she took his hand he did not seem surprised.
“Te
voilà enfin.” The French vowels had a musical twang, but she could
just about understand him. His hand was cold and greasy to the touch.
She said,
“The sister told me to come and have a little chat with you.” Not
knowing the word, she translated “sister” literally.
“Your
sister is very kind.” Then he cocked his head and added, “But she
always was. And is all going well for her? What does she do these days?”
There was
such friendliness and charm in his eyes, such boyish eagerness to engage her,
that she could only go along.
“She’s
a nurse too.”
“Of
course. You told me before. Is she still happy? Did she get married to that man
she loved so well? Do you know, I can’t remember his name. I hope
you’ll forgive me. Since my injury my memory has been poor. But they tell
me it will soon come back. What was his name?”
“Robbie.
But . . .”
“And
they’re married now and happy?”
“Er, I
hope they will be soon.”
“I’m
so happy for her.”
“You
haven’t told me your name.”
“Luc.
Luc Cornet. And yours?”
She
hesitated. “Tallis.”
“Tallis.
That’s very pretty.” The way he pronounced it, it was.
He looked
away from her face and gazed at the ward, turning his head slowly, quietly
amazed. Then he closed his eyes and began to ramble, speaking softly under his
breath. Her vocabulary was not good enough to follow him easily. She caught,
“You count them slowly, in your hand, on your fingers . . . my
mother’s scarf . . . you choose the color and you have to live with
it.”
He fell
silent for some minutes. His hand tightened its grip on hers. When he spoke
again, his eyes were still closed.
“Do you
want to know something odd? This is my first time in Paris.”
“Luc,
you’re in London. Soon we’ll be sending you home.”
“They
said that the people would be cold and unfriendly, but the opposite is true.
They’re very kind. And you’re very kind, coming to see me
again.”
For a while
she thought he might have fallen asleep. Sitting for the first time in hours, she
felt her own fatigue gathering behind her eyes.
Then he was
looking about him with that same slow turn of the head, and then he looked at
her and said, “Of course, you’re the girl with the English
accent.”
She said,
“Tell me what you did before the war. Where did you live? Can you
remember?”
“Do you
remember that Easter, when you came to Millau?” Feebly, he swung her hand
from side to side as he spoke, as though to stir her memory, and his dark green
eyes scanned her face in anticipation.
She thought
it wasn’t right to lead him on. “I’ve never been to Millau .
. .”
“Do you
remember the first time you came in our shop?”
She pulled
her chair nearer the bed. His pale, oily face gleamed and bobbed in front of
her eyes. “Luc, I want you to listen to me.”
“I think
it was my mother who served you. Or perhaps it was one of my sisters. I was
working with my father on the ovens at the back. I heard your accent and came
to take a look at you . . .”
“I want
to tell you where you are. You’re not in Paris . . .”
“Then
you were back the next day, and this time I was there and you said . . .”
“Soon
you can sleep. I’ll come and see you tomorrow, I promise.”
Luc raised
his hand to his head and frowned. He said in a lower voice, “I want to
ask you a little favor, Tallis.”
“Of
course.”
“These
bandages are so tight. Will you loosen them for me a little?”
She stood and
peered down at his head. The gauze bows were tied for easy release. As she
gently pulled the ends away he said, “My youngest sister, Anne, do you
remember her? She’s the prettiest girl in Millau. She passed her grade
exam with a tiny piece by Debussy, so full of light and fun. Anyway,
that’s what Anne says. It keeps running through my mind. Perhaps you know
it.”
He hummed a
few random notes. She was uncoiling the layer of gauze.
“No one
knows where she got her gift from. The rest of our family is completely
hopeless. When she plays her back is so straight. She never smiles till she
reaches the end. That’s beginning to feel better. I think it was Anne who
served you that first time you came into the shop.”
She was not
intending to remove the gauze, but as she loosened it, the heavy sterile towel
beneath it slid away, taking a part of the bloodied dressing with it. The side
of Luc’s head was missing. The hair was shaved well back from the missing
portion of skull. Below the jagged line of bone was a spongy crimson mess of
brain, several inches across, reaching from the crown almost to the tip of his
ear. She caught the towel before it slipped to the floor, and she held it while
she waited for her nausea to pass. Only now did it occur to her what a foolish
and unprofessional thing she had done. Luc sat quietly, waiting for her. She
glanced down the ward. No one was paying attention. She replaced the sterile
towel, fixed the gauze and retied the bows. When she sat down again, she found
his hand, and tried to steady herself in its cold moist grip.
Luc was
rambling again. “I don’t smoke. I promised my ration to Jeannot . .
. Look, it’s all over the table . . . under the flowers now . . . the
rabbit can’t hear you, stupid . . .” Then words came in a torrent,
and she lost him. Later she caught a reference to a schoolmaster who was too
strict, or perhaps it was an army officer. Finally he was quiet. She wiped his
sweating face with a damp towel and waited.
When he
opened his eyes, he resumed their conversation as though there had been no
interlude.
“What
did you think of our baguettes and ficelles?”
“Delicious.”
“That
was why you came every day.”
“Yes.”
He paused to
consider this. Then he said cautiously, raising a delicate matter, “And
our croissants?”
“The
best in Millau.”
He smiled.
When he spoke, there was a grating sound at the back of his throat which they
both ignored.
“It’s
my father’s special recipe. It all depends on the quality of
butter.”
He was gazing
at her in rapture. He brought his free hand to cover hers.
He said,
“You know that my mother is very fond of you.”
“Is
she?”
“She
talks about you all the time. She thinks we should be married in the
summer.”
She held his
gaze. She knew now why she had been sent. He was having difficulty swallowing,
and drops of sweat were forming on his brow, along the edge of the dressing and
along his upper lip. She wiped them away, and was about to reach the water for
him, but he said,
“Do you
love me?”
She
hesitated. “Yes.” No other reply was possible. Besides, for that
moment, she did. He was a lovely boy who was a long way from his family and he
was about to die.
She gave him
some water. While she was wiping his face again he said, “Have you ever
been on the Causse de Larzac?”
“No.
I’ve never been there.”
But he did
not offer to take her. Instead he turned his head away into the pillow, and
soon he was murmuring his unintelligible scraps. His grip on her hand remained
tight as though he were aware of her presence.
When he
became lucid again, he turned his head toward her.
“You
won’t leave just yet.”
“Of
course not. I’ll stay with you.”
“Tallis
. . .”
Still
smiling, he half closed his eyes. Suddenly, he jerked upright as if an electric
current had been applied to his limbs. He was gazing at her in surprise, with
his lips parted. Then he tipped forward, and seemed to lunge at her. She jumped
up from her chair to prevent him toppling to the floor. His hand still held
hers, and his free arm was around her neck. His forehead was pressed into her
shoulder, his cheek was against hers. She was afraid the sterile towel would
slip from his head. She thought she could not support his weight or bear to see
his wound again. The grating sound from deep in his throat resounded in her
ear. Staggering, she eased him onto the bed and settled him back on the
pillows.
“It’s
Briony,” she said, so only he would hear.
His eyes had
a wide-open look of astonishment and his waxy skin gleamed in the electric
light. She moved closer and put her lips to his ear. Behind her was a presence,
and then a hand resting on her shoulder.
“It’s
not Tallis. You should call me Briony,” she whispered, as the hand
reached over to touch hers, and loosened her fingers from the boy’s.
“Stand
up now, Nurse Tallis.”
Sister
Drummond took her elbow and helped her to her feet. The sister’s cheek
patches were bright, and across the cheekbones the pink skin met the white in a
precise straight line.
On the other
side of the bed, a nurse drew the sheet over Luc Cornet’s face.
Pursing her
lips, the sister straightened Briony’s collar. “There’s a
good girl. Now go and wash the blood from your face. We don’t want the
other patients upset.”
She did as
she was told and went to the lavatories and washed her face in cold water, and
minutes later returned to her duties in the ward.
At
four-thirty in the morning the probationers were sent to their lodgings to
sleep, and told to report back at eleven. Briony walked with Fiona. Neither
girl spoke, and when they linked arms it seemed they were resuming, after a
lifetime of experience, their walk across Westminster Bridge. They could not
have begun to describe their time in the wards, or how it had changed them. It
was enough to be able to keep walking down the empty corridors behind the other
girls.