In the Shadow of the Lamp (10 page)

We rocked at anchor out of the wind for some hours yet, not getting off the
Vectis
until late in the afternoon. By then the sky had cleared and the sun started to dry off the buildings, which now looked washed with gold. As soon as we got to the dock we climbed into smaller boats called caiques to cross over to Scutari, where our army was based, with its barracks and a hospital and all. The caiques were very fancy, with ends that curled up like the shoes the Turks on the piers wore, and cushions in the bottom to lie on instead of sit down. “I feel like I’m in a pasha’s harem!” Emma said, flinging her arms out wide. Two other nurses, one of them Mrs. Drake, shared our boat with us. They smiled at Emma. I think everyone was happy to be off that steamer at last.

Mrs. Drake and I were almost friends toward the end of our journey. She’d taken to telling me I reminded her of a niece she had who lived in Wiltshire. “Mind you don’t catch cold dipping your hands in the water like that,” she said to me, almost as if she cared if I did or not. The water was cool and soft, though, so I just smiled.

At last we climbed out of the caiques onto a dock that bustled with people shouting in a language that sounded like gibberish. That struck me as terribly funny, so I was already disposed to laugh when I started trying to walk on dry land. With every step I took, it felt like the ground was in the wrong place and I couldn’t judge the distance. I looked round to see if it was just me and beheld one of the funniest sights I ever set eyes upon. All thirty-eight nurses and sisters were staggering like drunks, trying to look important and serious as we trudged up the hill to the town. I started laughing in earnest. Soon I was doubled up and laughing so hard the tears just streamed down my cheeks.

Emma was almost as bad as I was. Neither of us could stand up straight nor catch our breath from laughing. I had my arms across my middle trying to hold in my gasps. The other nurses didn’t laugh, though, and despite their awkward steps, managed to get ahead of us. Mrs. Bracebridge led them toward a huge square building with rows and rows of windows. “W-wait!” I called. But the hopelessness of them hearing me only made me laugh harder.

The people around us, the locals, were got up in such strange costumes, and that struck us as funny too. The women had on full trousers with sashes and silk wrapped round their heads. They looked a little like the Morris dancers that came at Christmas, only with dark, exotic faces and mostly green or golden eyes. A few men in uniform swaggered toward us, smiles twitching at their mouths.

“Oh, look at those handsome soldiers!” Emma whispered, which struck me as even funnier than the women in trousers. “They must be French, with those blue coats,” she said.

“
Quelque-chose vous amuse?
” said one of the men. I didn’t understand him.

“
Nous nous excusons
,” said a woman’s voice, commanding, right behind me.

I turned. It was Miss Nightingale, leaning on Mr. Bracebridge’s arm. The sight of her stern face pulled me up quick as anything. “I … I’m sorry, Miss Nightingale.” I wiped the tears off my face.

The French soldiers turned and wandered off, but not before I saw one of them cast his eyes over Emma in an all too familiar way.

“I trust this was a momentary lapse in judgment.” Miss Nightingale did not change her expression.

“It was only …,” Emma began but didn’t finish the thought.

“We looked so funny, all wobbly on shore after the boat,” I said, hoping maybe to get her to smile. I was amazed to see that Miss Nightingale looked quite clear-eyed and fresh, with roses in her cheeks, as if some magic made her well as soon as she set foot on dry land. She didn’t stagger like the rest of us, either.

“Hardly a good impression to make in a strange place where we will all have to earn the respect of the men. And I mean respect, not admiration.” This she said looking straight at Emma, who hardened her face. I didn’t know how she dared. “You have lost the others.” She turned to Mr. Bracebridge. “I would rather have remained on board another day so they could take us around directly to the hospital. This is not seemly, walking through the town like this.”

“You are still too unwell for such a walk, and all uphill.” He waved a passing cart to a stop and helped Miss Nightingale in.

This wasn’t a good start. “Come along, Emma, we’d best catch up.”

“She’ll get over it. We was only laughing,” Emma said.

When I looked back, Miss Nightingale was settled in the cart with a blanket over her knees. “Mind you both hurry,” she said as the donkey pulled the cart away.

We walked faster, now more used to the solid ground. I felt like a naughty child, but Emma kept a little swing in her walk, and I thought I saw her glancing now and then at the men standing around in their uniforms. She might not have had schooling in that “house” where she lived, but she’d learned a few things.

It didn’t take us long to get to the big building, the Barrack Hospital, where everyone else stood outside a door that led into the middle of one of its longer sides.

“Someone should be here to meet us. I don’t know where we’re to go.” Mrs. Bracebridge said.

A moment later, a man came out of the main door and walked toward us. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here the moment you arrived. Miss Nightingale has been settled in her quarters and is conferring with Dr. Menzies, the hospital superintendent. I’m to show you in. I’m Dr. Wilkinson.”

Dr. Wilkinson had a lined face and a drooping mustache. His skin was yellowish and he had circles under his eyes. “Won’t be much fun if they’re all like that,” Emma said, nudging me. I could feel the disapproving looks of the others and stayed silent.

Dr. Wilkinson led us through the door into a huge courtyard, big enough for a whole other building to sit inside it, and then along to the left to a corner of the yard where there was a small door. He held it open for us as we entered a dark corridor. We could hear but not see men lying there. Dr. Wilkinson passed us at a smart clip and didn’t wait for us to follow, but continued up two flights of stairs.

“Miss Nightingale will tell you how you’re to be disposed in your quarters. I’m sorry they’re not more spacious, but we’re a little short of that commodity here,” he said over his shoulder to us. I didn’t understand that. Such an enormous building! I didn’t know then that more than half of it was in desperate need of repair.

Dr. Wilkinson motioned us through a passage and into a small room that I later figured out was in one of the square towers at the corner of the building. Lying on a bed in the middle, propped up on pillows with Mrs. Bracebridge and a much older doctor next to her, was Miss Nightingale. Already she looked even better than she did when we saw her as Mr. Bracebridge helped her into the cart.

“Nurses, Sisters of Mercy, this is Dr. Menzies, whom we are bound to follow in all his instructions as this is his hospital.”

The doctor bowed to us. “Welcome. I wish I could promise you an easy time here, but we are much beset by disease as well as injuries, and have all we can do to treat those we have a hope of being able to help.”

“I have told Dr. Menzies that I am pleasantly surprised at how well regulated his hospital is, having expected the worst from the reports we had.”

I wondered how she had had time to come to any opinion, since she was obviously carried in from the street. But Dr. Menzies beamed. I supposed we’d find out soon enough for ourselves what the hospital was really like.

Dr. Menzies didn’t stay long, and directly he’d gone, Miss Nightingale swung her feet out of bed. “I’ve assessed our quarters and decided where everyone is to stay,” she said, looking surprisingly healthy and strong.

Strong or not, Mrs. Bracebridge took her arm to steady her, and together they showed us our rooms. The biggest one was to be a common room, where we’d have a table for meetings. The next biggest was for fourteen of us nurses. Then came the ten nuns, who would occupy the next. The eight Sellonites had the room directly above Miss Nightingale’s. Six more nurses, the ones from St. John’s House who were specially trained, occupied another small room.

“Beds will be brought in this evening, I have been assured,” Miss Nightingale said. “Until then, there is a great deal of cleaning to do. Fraser, since you have experience in this regard, you will help me with the cleaning of our rooms. Any others who are willing can join in. We are to be furnished with mops, brushes, and soap.”

Miss Nightingale took charge of everything so quickly everyone just did as she said, Bob’s your uncle. Within a few minutes several ragged-looking men carrying mops, pails of soapy water, and brushes clattered into our common room.

We took off our cloaks and laid them on the low divans that were built next to the wall, but soon found out what a mistake that was.

“Aieee!” screamed one of the nurses.

A huge rat squeezed out of a hole in the wood of the divan and went running around the room. We chased it out the door but didn’t know how to kill it, with no poison or traps around.

“These Turkish pallets are crawling!” said Sister Sarah Anne looking closely at the divans. Before you could say spit we grabbed our cloaks and piled them in the middle of the floor.

A few orderlies came back to help us, saying they were sent by Dr. Menzies. I’d never cleaned alongside men before. They swished the mops in the water and just sloshed it around the floor, without even getting down on their knees with the brushes. I looked at Miss Nightingale. She didn’t seem too pleased either.

“Thank you, I believe we can manage,” she said to the orderlies. “You undoubtedly have more important work to do.” Miss Nightingale as much as pushed the men out into the corridor.

I put my back into that scrubbing. I didn’t want to have lice all over me, and I sure as anything wanted to make certain Miss Nightingale saw that I could be useful. Cleaning was something I knew how to do. Mrs. Drake and Emma got right into it with me, and soon everyone else followed along with us.

With so many hands it didn’t take much time till the place looked a sight better. Then the beds and linens arrived, and we each went to our assigned rooms and did our best to settle in. After that it was time to eat. The orderlies brought up some kind of stew in a huge pail and cups to slop it into. The bread they gave us was stale, but I was so hungry I didn’t mind. While we ate in the common room, Miss Nightingale spoke to us.

“By now many of you may have heard of the charge at Balaclava, where our brave Light Brigade rode forth against the Russian heavy guns. These men were fearless, charging into a battle they had no hope of winning. When it was over, more than three-quarters of the brigade were killed or wounded. Dr. Menzies has had word by telegraph that ships will be arriving in the next few days bearing hundreds of casualties. We have landed just in time, it seems.”

My head was filled with a vision of hundreds of handsome cavalry officers in their dashing uniforms, sabers raised, horses snorting and pounding across the barren countryside. I somehow couldn’t make myself see them cut down and wounded.

Miss Nightingale left us so she could go and talk to the Sellonite sisters, who I saw clear enough were her favorites—them and the St. John’s nurses. I didn’t really understand why, but after a few weeks of working alongside them we all recognized they were the best, most experienced nurses. As for me—I had no notion of what was to come. I only thanked the stars that I was there and not sent home in disgrace. I would have a chance to make something of myself. The rest was in my hands.

C
hapter 12

We all expected to start in on our nursing the very next day. But instead we sat in our quarters, idle.

Around noon, Mrs. Bracebridge came in. “Miss Nightingale and Dr. Menzies have to decide how to apportion the nurses to different wards. Until that time, you can all get to work sewing stump pillows for the amputees and mending clothes and uniforms for the men,” she said.

“Humph!” It was Mrs. Drake. “I came out to nurse, not to be a domestic.”

“And I’ll tell you, this cap is nothing I ever would put on my head at home. It’s a disgrace.” The colorful Mrs. Wilson spoke up for the first time since we arrived—she’d been so sick on the
Vectis
that she hadn’t been able to talk at all and only now looked like herself again.

Once she started, complaints from everyone rained down on poor Mrs. Bracebridge’s head. She looked from one woman to another, opening her mouth to speak and shutting it again when the next one complained, until a din from the door that led to the kitchen put a stop to all the talking. A large woman, clearly English, stood there with a pot lid in one hand and a wooden spoon in the other, banging them together with all her might. When she stopped, my ears rang.

“Allow me to introduce Mrs. Clarke, Miss Nightingale’s housekeeper, who came to Scutari separately with a load of supplies from England,” said Mrs. Bracebridge.

“You all sound like cacklin’ geese! If you think you got trouble, you should see the god-awful mess I have to deal with—meat as is so full of maggots it wants to crawl off the block. Now get to yer work and be quiet.” With no more ceremony, she stomped away as suddenly as she had come, leaving silence in her wake.

Mrs. Bracebridge cleared her throat. “I’m terribly sorry. Mrs. Clarke is in charge of our household arrangements here. She’s efficient, if somewhat coarse.”