Not So Quiet...: Stepdaughters of War
304
Not So Quiet...: Stepdaughters of War
304eBook
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781558616325 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Feminist Press at CUNY, The |
| Publication date: | 01/01/1993 |
| Series: | Women & Peace |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 304 |
| File size: | 474 KB |
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
We have just wakened from our first decent sleep for weeks — eight glorious dreamless hours of utter exhaustion. The guns are still booming in the distance as energetically as when we fell on our camp beds without the formality of removing our uniforms, shoes, gaiters or underclothing. We have not had our garments off for nine days, but there has been an unexpected lull this afternoon; no evacuations, only one funeral, and very few punishments, though we feel the usual midnight whistle will break our run of luck any time now. That gives us ten minutes to dress and stand by ambulances ready for convoy duty. In the meantime we snuggle neck-high in our flea-bags and munch slabs of chocolate and stale biscuits. We have slept like logs through the evening meal — all except Tosh, who never misses a food-call on principle. It is her turn to make the Bovril. We gloatingly watch her light the little spirit lamp. We are hungry, but we are used to hunger. We are always hungry in varying degrees — hungry, starving, or ravenous. The canteen food is vile at its best; at its worst it defies description — except from Tosh. We have existed mostly on our own Bovril, biscuits, and slab chocolate since arriving in France, and when all is said and done it is a colourless, discouraging diet for young women of twenty-three — which our six ages average — who are doing men's work. Tosh is the only one who can systematically eat the canteen tack without vomiting or coming out in food boils; but she has a stomach as strong as a horse's. Also, she has been out longer than the rest of us and is more hardened. At first her inside used to revolt as ours still does, but she thinks that in another month or so she could eat what the food resembles without turning a hair.
The girl in the next bed, known as "The B.F.," objects to this remark on the grounds of coarseness, but Tosh only grins. The rest take no notice. A short while back we should have shrunk into ourselves with undisguised horror at the simile, but our minds, in addition to our digestions, are becoming acclimatised. Sordid comparisons are in the picture here where life has so suddenly become sordid. We wish they would both dry up and let us doze on our biscuits until the whistle actually blows. Besides, we know The B.F.'s protests are merely for refinement's sake. Tosh the sinner is not of the common herd. She is the niece of an earl. That, in The B.F.'s eyes, covers a multitude of Anglo-Saxon franknesses.
I watch Tosh lazily. She is wandering around in the flickering candlelight dressed in a soiled woollen undervest and a voluminous pair of navy blue bloomers, chain-smoking yellow perils at a furious rate. There is something vaguely comforting in the Amazonian height and breadth of Tosh. She has the hips of a matron — intensified by the four pairs of thick combinations she always wears for warmth, a mind like a sewer (her own definition), the courage of a giant, the vocabulary of a Smithfield butcher, and the round, wind-reddened face of a dairymaid. She says she picked up her repertoire of language from the stable lads — her father is a well-known sportsman — and there is no reason to doubt her word. Nevertheless, Tosh is the idol of the entire convoy, not only of this room. I have adored her since the first night I arrived, that ghastly first night I was shoved on to an ambulance and told to meet my first convoy of wounded. I had never driven by night before, even in England. My nerves were all on edge, and the first ghastly glimpse of blood and shattered men sent me completely to pieces. We backed our ambulances in a long row. Tosh was next in line to me. She watched me climb down, saw me, half-fainting, retching my heart out against the bonnet of my own bus, slipped from her driving seat, seized me and shook sense into me. "Pull yourself together, you bloody West Kensington lady with your bloody West Kensington tricks. You're loaded. Get back before Commandant spots you. You're holding up the line. Get back."
I got back. I drove till dawn to and fro — station, Number Five Hospital — Number Five Hospital, station ... sick, numb, frozen-fingered, frozen-hearted ... station, Number Five Hospital — Number Five Hospital, station. ...
It ended, just as I thought it would never end. Back again at the depot I collapsed with my head on the steering wheel. Tosh helped me down, forced steaming cocoa into me. ... "Pretty bloody kick-off, Smithy. But wait till you get gas cases or, worse, liquid-fire...."
I whimpered like a puppy. ... I couldn't go on. ... I was a coward. ... I couldn't face those stretchers of moaning men again ... men torn and bleeding and raving. ...
Tosh laughed a funny, queer laugh. "And the admiring family at home who are basking in your reflected glory? 'My girl's doing her bit — driving an ambulance very near the line. ...'" She laughed again. "Will they let you off, Smithy? Not likely! You'll never have the pluck to crawl home and admit you're ordinary flesh and blood. Can't you hear them? 'Well, back already? You didn't stay long, did you?' No, Smithy, you're one of England's Splendid Daughters, proud to do their bit for the dear old flag, and one of England's Splendid Daughters you'll stay until you crock up or find some other decent excuse to go home covered in glory. It takes nerve to carry on here, but it takes twice as much to go home to flag-crazy mothers and fathers...."
I watch her now running a comb through her hair, softly damning and blasting the knots. Generous hair, Tosh's, as generous as the rest of her, thick, long, red as a sunset in Devon when not grime- and grease-blackened. As I stare she parts the strands over her right ear, peers anxiously into the square of looking-glass, and emits a string of swear-words before turning to The Bug.
"Lend me your scissors, Bug."
The Bug silently hands them over, lights a cigarette, and passes me the paper packet.
"Everyone read this paper?" asks Tosh.
Everyone has. Tosh spreads the newspaper on the floor near her bed and kneels down, brandishing the scissors.
The B.F. cries out in alarm. "You're not going to cut off your hair, Tosh? Your lovely hair."
"Why should I be a free lodging-house for waifs and strays?" Tosh laughs hoarsely at her own crude wit. She has, when amused, the big porky, jolly laugh of a fat publican.
"Oh, Tosh, how can you? Short hair's terribly unfeminine. I wouldn't cut off my hair for anything."
"No, you vain little scut, you'd rather crawl."
Snip, snip, snip go the scissors. Snip, snip, snip. The long, red strands fall into the much-scanned crumpled newspaper. I crane my neck. Have I read it? Is it the Daily Mail or the Daily Express? If it's the Mail I have read it, but if it's the Express there's something I haven't quite finished....
A red curl of Tosh's hair hides the top of the page. I can't see. Perhaps a post will come to-morrow bringing fresh newspapers; we haven't had any letters, or, better still, parcels, for six days.
Snip, snip, snip....
"No wonder I've scratched my head off — no wonder I couldn't sleep!" Tosh points triumphantly to the paper. We interestedly follow the direction of her fingers and go on munching our ginger biscuits. A few weeks ago we should have vomited. But after cleaning the inside of an ambulance it would take more than a few lice to make our gorges rise.
"A bloody platoon," says Tosh.
Snip, snip, snip....
"I'll bet you're all as alive-o, if you only carried out a smashing attack," chuckles Tosh.
I catch the eye of The Bug and we both grimace — we know Tosh is very near the truth, for we have both been itching furiously for days past. Small-tooth combing, though a temporary check, has no lasting effect. We get them from the "sitters" — the cases well enough to sit beside us in front on the ambulances. Straight from the field dressing stations, before that straight from the trenches, who can wonder the sitters are alive with vermin?
Snip, snip, snip....
Tosh's hair is half off, giving her a curiously lop-sided effect. I wish I had her courage, but a mental vision of Mother restrains me. Poor Mother, she would die of horror if I came home on leave with my hair cut short like a man's. She wouldn't understand the filth and beastliness after my cheery letters home. Only dreadful bluestocking females cut their hair. Besides, Mother has always been so proud of my hair — why, I cannot imagine. It is not beautiful hair. It is long, but thin and mouse-coloured. Nondescript. Like its owner. Like its owner's name, Helen Smith. Helen Z. Smith. How jealously I preserve the secret of that Z., that ludicrous Z. bestowed on me by my mother. Z. was the heroine of a book mother read the month before I arrived on earth. She wanted me to grow up like Z. Z. was the paragon of beauty, virtue, and womanliness. Mother has been sadly disappointed over the first; I am still the second, but the third — well, Z. was never an ambulance driver somewhere in France. I am very dubious about the third.
Snip, snip, snip....
No, I had better not emulate Tosh. It would definitely put the tin helmet on the womanliness. It would also spoil Mother's pet story of myself and my sister Trix — of how, a wee fair head and a wee dark head, lately released from the tortures of curl-papers, we used to walk demurely to Sunday school while Mother waved from the front gate. Since Father grew rich and promoted us to Wimbledon Common, Mother omits the reference to the front gate — it isn't done on Wimbledon Common to wave from the front gate — but she still bores everyone who will listen (and a lot who won't) with the story of the two wee curly heads. With Trix a V.A.D. and me ambulance driving, I can see those wee curly heads working overtime, while Mother drops a sentimental tear on the socks she is knitting for my second-loot brother, her "hero boy."
Snip, snip, snip....
"You'll look awfully unsexed, Tosh," warns The B.F.
"Unsexed? Me? With the breasts of a nursing mother?" Tosh winks behind The B.F.'s back. The poor B.F. gasps and goes scarlet. Tosh is revolutionising her ideas of the British aristocracy in private life more and more each day.
Snip, snip, snip....
We go on munching our biscuits and smoking our gaspers. Directly the kettle boils there will be hot Bovril, something to warm us before starting out — thin, miserable stuff, for the bottle is nearly empty and there are six of us, but enough to send a glow through our bodies. We think of it with mouthwatering anticipation and watch Tosh marshalling the lively contents of the newspaper more towards the centre with a pen-holder.
"What an R.T.O. was lost when I became an ambulance driver," says Tosh.
That goes down well with us, even The B.F. Inwardly we are proud to think our stomachs no longer heave up and down at the sight of a louse. After all, a few vermin more or less make little difference. Our flea-bags are full of them, in spite of Keatings and Lysol, and our bodies a mass of tiny red bites with the tops scratched off. We are too hard worked to spare the necessary time to keep clean, and that is the trouble. It is four weeks since we had a bath all over, nine days since we had a big wash — we haven't had time. We dare not hot-bath in case we have to go out immediately afterwards into the snow. The last girl who did it is now in hospital with double pneumonia and not expected to live.
Tosh finishes her barbering. She shakes her head like a shaggy dog. I see to my satisfaction that the paper is the Mail and not the Express. I have read it, after all. Tosh crumples it into a ball, takes the enamelled chamber from under her camp-bed, and proceeds to make a bonfire inside it. It smokes at first, but after a few seconds begins to crackle merrily.
"Wholesale slaughter," says Tosh. "Well, it's the fashion in our circles, n'estce pas? Anyone got a fag?"
She takes another sheet of paper and small-combs her short locks, shaking the results into the emergency incinerator. We all do this when we get a chance and our heads become too unbearable. If Commandant knew there would be ructions and punishments galore. "Mrs. Bitch," as Tosh has christened Commandant, is punishment-mad. She punishes us by giving us extra work to do in our time off (when we have any). Usually it is extra orderly duty, though recently she distinguished herself by sending me out with a dustpan and small brush into the snow-covered path where the ambulances stand to sweep up the bits of paper, cigarette-ends, and rubbish that were lying in the snow. I had committed the awful offence of warming my hands near the canteen fire, because they were too frozen to go on cleaning my engine, and Commandant caught me.
"What are you doing here?" she inquired majestically. "You are supposed to be ambulance-cleaning, I thought."
I explained about my frozen fingers.
"Oh!" said Mrs. Bitch, with a sweet smile. "Then perhaps you haven't enough work to do to keep your fingers warm. Perhaps a little extra work will help."
That is how I became a scavenger. Commandant is dreadfully efficient. Like most dreadfully efficient women, she is universally loathed. Even The B.F. has got as far as calling her "Mrs. You-Know-Itch!"
"I feel pounds lighter," says Tosh. "If only I could soak and soak and soak in a real bath."
Our thoughts fly to bathrooms: big, white-tiled bathrooms with gleaming silver taps and glass-enclosed showers, bathrooms with rubber floors and square-checked bathmats, bathrooms fitted with thick glass shelves loaded with jar upon jar of scented bath salts, white, green, mauve — different colours and different perfumes, lilac, verbena, carnation, lily of the valley. We see ourselves, steeped to the neck in over-hot, over-scented water; in our hands are clasped enormous, springy sponges foaming with delicious soapsuds, expensive soapsuds — only the most expensive will suffice — sandalwood, scented oatmeal, odiferous violet. Massage brushes lie to hand, long-handled narrow brushes with quaint, bulbous bristles of hollow rubber that catch the middle of the back just where the arms are too short to reach. ... We scrub and scrub and scrub until we are clean and pink and tingling and glowing, we lie in a pleasant semi-coma until the water begins to cool, but emerging has no terrors. Electric fires glow softly; before them are spread incredibly huge bath-sheets, soft, lavender-scented, monogrammed, waiting to caress our dripping bodies, to smother them in voluptuous warmth. Now we are dry; we pepper our newly-born selves with talcum powder. "June Roses" fills the air with its fragrance, daintily argues with the scent of the bath water, triumphs....
"Half a pint of icy water between six of us," says Tosh. "Oh Hell, there's a war on, they tell me."
We munch stolidly.
My cigarettes have given out. Tosh gets the cups, wipes them with a handkerchief and divides the contents of the Bovril carefully.
"If there isn't a parcel soon with a new supply we go out empty to-morrow," says Tosh.
Skinny wakens with a yawn, exhibiting a hideous vulcanite plate in her lower jaw. Skinny is smart and tolerably good-looking in uniform, but when she first awakens she reminds one uneasily of a corpse. Her face is yellow with the skin stretched tightly across the high cheekbones and there are queer bags under her eyes. Tosh says the bags mean kidney trouble. Certainly Skinny is out of her flea-bag every quarter of an hour — an awful nuisance when we are nervy and easily awakened. She isn't very quiet about it, either. When Skinny is asleep her rather large mouth pinches up tightly and greyly, and she is irresistibly like a photograph a gardener of ours showed me once of his mother, taken in the coffin after death.
Skinny glances at her wrist-watch and grabs the biscuit tin. "You've cut your hair off," she remarks to Tosh.
Tosh gives her a quick glance and turns her back. She loathes Skinny, and never misses an opportunity of snubbing her — not the good-natured ragging to which she treats The B.F., but the kind of snub that makes those present wish they had never been born. It is Skinny's own fault. She will talk to Tosh. Tosh has asked her straight out not to, but she will persist. Tosh wants Commandant to move Skinny to one of the two-bed or three-bed cubicles — there are often vacancies when the girls go sick — but Commandant knows Tosh wants it, and therefore Skinny will remain with us to the bitter end.
"You look like a Shakespearian page, Tosh, or Rosalind," continues Skinny.
Tosh goes on stirring the Bovril.
"Something fascinatingly boyish," says Skinny.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Not So Quiet ..."
by .
Copyright © 1930 Helen Zenna Smith.
Excerpted by permission of Feminist Press.
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