Nightingale (30 page)

‘Indeed,' he agreed. ‘And that's where chaos occurs. But as I say, the chaos is mine . . . and does not belong to anyone else.'

She blinked at his abstract view and cursed herself inwardly for finding his curious and naive approach to life helplessly attractive. She could almost feel the bullet tip burning in her pocket, though, reminding her who her heart was waiting for, impressing that Rifki's attention was flattering but not to be acted upon. ‘Is this hurting?' she asked, knowing the answer but wanting to change the topic. Her face was close enough to smell the clove on his breath from the spiced celebration pastries they'd all eaten, and suddenly she could taste the spice, as though they'd kissed, and with that notion arrived a discomfiting warmth of shame.

‘Pain is a strange feeling,' he admitted.

She gave him a still slightly blushing, sideways glance of puzzlement.

‘Why do we press bruises or let our tongues search out the aching tooth? It alerts us that something is wrong, yes?'

She nodded.

‘But it can also divert us, and when you stop hurting me with your instruments I know I shall feel relief that it is over but it would have distracted me from the original injury with a capacity to hurt a great deal more. Plus, I shall be stitched and healing.'

‘That definitely confirms it for me – your mind is odd.'

He laughed, and she hadn't seen such a spontaneous, unguarded moment in him. It was momentarily intoxicating, like smelling a beautiful bloom or tasting an exquisite treat . . . or kissing Jamie.

‘I mean, you speak about simplicity through your numbers but you actually think in such a complex way.'

‘I'm a mathematician.'

‘I pity you. Life doesn't need to be so complicated,' she whispered.

‘Mine is, though, Claire,' and he shocked her by reaching with his hand to touch her hair, feeling its curl between his fingers with an expression of wonder. ‘So soft. I've wanted to do that since I saw you seated on the bench in the gardens. Your hair shone as though it was gilded with the golden paint of angels.'

His whimsical words helped her to move on from the shock of his action. ‘A poet as well as a mathematician?'

He smiled, dropped his hand. ‘You have made turbulent what was a straightforward, routine life.'

‘Right, I think that's as disinfected as we're going to get it,' she said, dabbing at the wound, still oozing.

‘I'm glad the stinging is done,' he admitted.

‘Ah, well, the best bit is yet to come,' she said, pointing to her needle and catgut. ‘I can give you an injection for some local numbing if you wish?'

________

He shook his head in answer. The bright pain as her needle worked kept him in contact with her. If she'd numbed the area he wouldn't be able to feel her ministrations and he wanted to experience every moment of Claire Nightingale's touch, even if it hurt to do so.

‘Tell me. How does a man – a near stranger – hold on to a woman's heart when she hasn't seen him in nearly five years?'

‘Why don't you ask yourself that?' Claire replied, drawing the thread taut and expertly knotting and snipping its end. He had been absently wondering, as he watched her stitch, why they called it catgut when he knew her thread was made of sheep's intestine.

‘What makes you say that?' he replied, puzzled.

She fixed him with a stare and he knew she had attempted to speak with surety but her eyes betrayed her and he knew if he was ever going to kiss her it was now. He desperately wanted to taste her . . . even if it was just once . . . even if she pushed him away. And it was as though she knew he was poised on the threshold of doing something that defied the neat rules of his life – and culture – or following instinct like the dreamer he had once been.

Claire decided for him. ‘I want you to accept that maybe now you and Sehr can be together.'

Sehr
. He closed his eyes. Now, that truly was unbearable pain. Kashifa's mouth had certainly been busy.

‘It's none of my business, but —'

‘No, Sehr is not your business,' he muttered, feeling windows in his mind opening that he had thought he'd barred shut.

‘Rifki?' She shocked him by moving around from the side and bending to cup his face in her cool, healing hands. ‘Do you remember how it felt to be in love with her?'

She was determined to make his sutured wound feel shallow by comparison to the deep cut of her words.

‘You don't forget how love feels,' he groaned.

‘That is how I feel about Jamie.'

He watched Claire's expression soften from earnest to compassionate. She reached for a chair nearby and pulled it over so she could sit close enough that their knees touched. Whether she was aware of that innocent yet forbidden kiss of flesh beneath clothes he couldn't be certain but he felt it within himself like a candlewick flaring into life.

‘Rifki, you represent a dangerous precipice.'

He grinned. ‘Good.'

‘No, not good for me. The promise Jamie and I gave to each other has evolved and become something spiritual for me. When I was at the Front, personally witnessing men die by the dozens each hour, I think all my innocence was torn into hundreds of pieces and rode the winds in all directions. Meanwhile my dreams rushed inward and coagulated into a hard lump of despair. There was nothing of me any more, Rifki. I was like a doll: immaculately groomed, with a permanent soft smile of encouragement painted on my face but inside was the void. I was hollow – no anger, just dutiful, but empty. It was as though the universe had decided to strip me of all hope and the harder I worked to save lives, the faster they slipped from me. Within a few months of seeing so much death I was lifeless myself, except for one tiny flickering flame in the corner of my battered mind. The flame was all I had . . . my warmth, my light, my hope. And the flame was the promise that Jamie made to me and it transcended a naive pledge between new lovers and became religion. As long as I trusted it, as long as I stayed faithful to it, there was hope for me in a world that felt hopeless. And the reason I came here to honour your son was to stay busy, have purpose, hold the faith that was Jamie . . .' She clasped his good hand, sending fresh sparkles of sweet agony through him. ‘And now here you are, threatening to disrupt my spiritual wellbeing.'

‘So we were simply an excuse for you?'

She gave a disappointed sigh. ‘No. Your family was my lifeline. Açar's book was a symbol of hope – if I kept the promise, I hoped the gods would smile favourably on me . . . on Jamie.'

‘How do you feel about me, Claire? The truth.'

She risked stroking the wiry, close cut of his pepper-and-salt beard, not appearing guilted by it. ‘In a different world, Rifki – and if I had known you before the war – I would be helpless in your presence and I'd defy your culture and your age to be with you. But I met Jamie first and he has my heart. This is my world . . . and it revolves around James Wren. So I'm asking you not to risk me unbalancing on the dangerous precipice that you are. Fate guided me to Jamie; it chose for us to meet but it was nothing so ethereal between you and me. Jamie guided me to you for a specific reason.'

‘You truly believe him alive even though there has been no word in nearly five years?'

‘I know this is going to sound very strange, but I hope you can grasp this. I've made a spiritual pact that if I don't move from the path of remaining faithful to his love, then Jamie will come back to me. In less than two weeks I will know if my private religion has been misguided. But it kept me alive when bombs were exploding around me and killing others. It inflicted terrible sights and experiences upon me and now it's testing me with you to see if I am true. I cannot and will not betray that religion.'

He nodded, experiencing a river of admiration swell for her and wishing he were on the receiving end of that kind of faith in love. Twice now he had fallen deeply for a woman and both were unattainable.

‘Are you finished?' he said, glancing at his hand and the ugly black pattern of eight stitches running down the meaty flesh at the base of his thumb.

‘I'm finished when I say so,' she instructed.

‘You are quite frightening, Claire, for someone nearly half my age.'

She began daubing a bright orange solution on his wound. ‘Are you angry with me?' she asked, sounding hesitant.

‘Yes.'

‘It's Sehr you long for, not me. It's the memory of that yearning that I've likely reignited. Others got in the way of you and her. You don't love me, because you barely know me. You
want
me. There's a whole world of difference between the two. But you loved Sehr; you knew everything about her. Perhaps she's waiting for the day she'll see you again. And don't say she's married because I happen to know her husband has been dead for years.'

‘I shall punish Kashifa for this.'

‘You'll do no such thing, or I will never forgive you. We are kindred spirits, Rifki. We both have lost loves. I don't know if mine will come back to me but you're a coward if you don't remind Sehr of how you felt . . . possibly still do.'

The truth of her words slipped through his defences as easily as her needle had punctured his skin and the pain was just as bright and sharp.

‘You'll never know unless you stop making the numbers add up neatly, Rifki. Love is messy. Be untidy for once – take a risk.'

‘I thought I was.'

She smiled sadly at him. ‘Yes, but with the wrong woman. The right one is Turkish, lives in Istanbul, shares your faith, your culture. The wrong one has silly short hair that goes frizzy in the damp, likes the miserable cold and rain of London and is hoping a fairy­tale is going to come true.'

‘I love your hair,' he admitted.

‘And I love your expressive eyes.'

‘So you do love something about me?'

She nodded. ‘There is plenty to love about you. That's what makes you dangerous.'

‘You said in a different life . . .'

‘Yes, Rifki, I would say yes. But in this life, it's no.'

________

She had worked in silence, dressing his hand, and when she'd split the bandage and tied it off neatly, she once again ignored protocol and bent forward to softly touch his cheek with her own before laying a tender kiss of farewell.

‘I couldn't do that out there in front of your family so I thought I would say goodbye properly to you here.'

He touched his cheek, looking surprised and moved by her gesture. He stood, waited a heartbeat or two to test that he wasn't dizzy. She smiled at him and he nodded. ‘Goodbye, Claire. I hope Jamie finds you.'

‘And I hope you will go in search of the happiness that might still be yours if you take the real risk.'

‘Total chaos?' He grinned.

‘What's to be lost?'

‘Thank you for this,' he said, raising his wounded hand.

‘It's going to start throbbing soon.'

‘It already has.'

‘Those stitches can come out in about ten days. I'm sorry I won't be here to remove them for you.'

‘It's probably for the best.'

She nodded. ‘I'll see you out.' Rather brazenly, she linked her arm through his good one and he didn't protest. Rifki was starved of affection and she needed him to go in search of it again. She dropped her arm as they rounded the corner and emerged into the waiting area.

His sister and husband helped each other to their feet and pointed at his hand, laughing nervously. He exchanged some Turkish with them.

‘I told them it looks worse than it is.'

Claire kissed Rifki's sister and said goodbye in her modest Turkish. The sister stroked her cheek.

‘She says you are beautiful,' Rifki translated. ‘And for once I agree with my eldest sister.'

Claire blushed, shook hands with his brother-in-law. ‘I'd like to hug him too.'

‘I'm sure he'd like it but best not to.'

‘And now I want to hug you but I am forced by your tradition to do this,' she said, holding out her hand. ‘Remember all we've said. Think of me when you hold Açar's prayer book.'

‘I shall kiss it perhaps and pretend.'

Claire swallowed. He was not going to make it easy for her. She nodded and smiled as though she was simply saying a goodbye.

He clasped her hand, his warmth transferring as a frisson of energy up her arm.

‘And I shall often think about that alternative world you spoke of and imagine what it might be like. Most of all I shall try very hard not to think of you naked in your tin bath at home.'

She laughed, half embarrassed, half delighted. ‘Don't translate that.'

‘Laughter like that needs no translation.'

The elder couple turned away, began lightly arguing with each other over something, and Rifki turned back to her with feigned despair in his expression. Claire laughed gently but realised she was also crying, her eyes damp and threatening to spill tears. He nodded, understanding, and this time when he led his quarrelling relatives out of the main door he did not look back and she did not follow . . . and soon he was nothing more than a deepening shadow in a moonlit Turkish night.

The taxi dropped Claire outside the gate of Eugenie Lester's home and as the cold March wind welcomed her back it carried with it the scent of freesia and lilacs to remind her that spring had arrived.

The housekeeper met her with her usual suspicious countenance. ‘You're back already.'

‘Hello, Joy . . . er, may I call you Joy?'

‘It's my name,' the woman replied, taking Claire's umbrella, hat and gloves. ‘No luggage?'

She shook her head. ‘I went back to Berkshire first. I still have to pack everything up there. But I couldn't bear not to visit immediately.'

‘Well, she'll be thrilled to see you, Miss Nightingale.'

‘Do call me Claire.'

‘She's having a good day. She's on the patio, expecting you. I'll serve some coffee shortly.'

‘Thank you. I'll see myself there.'

She followed her nose out through French windows onto the patio to where Eugenie huddled, rugged up in a wicker outdoor armchair; she didn't turn but chuckled softly. ‘I sensed your arrival at the train station. I've been counting the minutes.'

Claire was crouched at her side in a heartbeat, hugging her friend. ‘Are you a seer?' she asked as she kissed Eugenie's cheek with deep affection.

‘No, my dear, just attuned to you.' She beamed. ‘My, my, I'm amazed at what a few weeks in a warm climate can do. You're glowing.'

Claire could not say the same for Eugenie. She blinked. ‘Am I? I'm sure I worked for most of those weeks.'

‘You look wonderful, my dear, and so I can only assume it was a happy time for you.'

She couldn't lie. ‘Yes . . . yes, it was and I met some marvellous local people.'

‘You returned the prayer book?'

Claire nodded. ‘His father is . . .' She hesitated.

‘Is what?'

She shook her head with a small smile. ‘I think most would call him a cold fish.'

‘But you didn't?'

‘Not at all.' She cleared her throat as Eugenie's regard intensified. ‘He's charming and was delighted to have his son's precious book.'

Her elder raised a thinly fleshed hand and Claire was struck by how much weight her friend had lost in the short time she'd been in Turkey. ‘No need to explain any more, my dear. I think I understand. And you look so bright.'

Claire turned away, hating that she felt so guilty. ‘Oh, it's good to be back in England, though,' she gushed, hoping to cover the sudden memory of Rifki that came with the scent of sandalwood oil that he had bathed with on that day of celebration.

‘Well, it's lovely to see you so happy and no doubt filled with anticipation.'

‘To bursting point. He's going to be there, Eugenie, I know he is.'

Joy cleared her throat from the French windows and brought out the coffee tray, taking her time laying out the accoutrements.

‘Thank you, Joy,' Eugenie murmured and dismissed her with an endearing smile. ‘I don't know what I'd do without you.'

Joy's lips pursed slightly and Claire wondered as she watched the housekeeper leave why Joy couldn't simply smile.

She turned back to Eugenie. ‘I'm still waiting to hear from his parents,' Claire remarked. She shrugged. ‘I guess I'll know soon enough.'

Eugenie gestured. ‘I thought you'd like to pour.'

‘Of course,' Claire replied, moving to the small table, her expression entirely back under her control.

‘And while you do, perhaps you'll explain why you need to fib to me.'

Claire put the coffee pot down on the tray with a sheepish expression. ‘That obvious?'

‘I'm afraid so. You'd never win at cards.'

Claire gusted a sad laugh, relieved to be able to talk about it. ‘I nearly lost my head in Turkey.'

‘I'm presuming you mean that figuratively?'

She grinned and nodded, began pouring the coffee.

‘Actually, you don't have to tell me, my dear. Secrets are rather nice so long as they do no damage and can nourish us.'

Claire tonged a sugar lump which made a soft gulping sound as she plopped it into the coffee and warmed milk.

‘When did you get to be so wise, Eugenie?' she said, placing the cup and saucer into wrinkled hands.

‘It's just age, dear, and years of experience that teach that one cannot control the universe, or who walks into your life.'

Their eyes met. There was nothing rheumy about her friend's gaze; Claire saw only alert interest.

‘It felt scary,' she admitted, glad to let it out.

Eugenie nodded, sipped. Waited.

She wasn't sure why she felt the urge to speak of it but having lived her life off instincts, she knew this was no moment to break faith with them. ‘I had a moment of desperate need. I can't lie about that. He was sad, damaged, soulful . . . I could have changed his life and he mine.'

‘I didn't hear the word love, Claire.'

She lifted a shoulder. ‘We barely said more than a few dozen words to each other.'

‘It was the same with Jamie, as I recall, and yet you knew you loved him.'

Claire sucked in a slow breath of enlightenment. ‘You're right.'

‘And the Turk was different?'

‘Yes,' Claire said, letting out a sigh of relief. ‘So different.'

‘Obviously you made the right decision.'

Claire sat down and sipped her coffee, sighing inwardly at the tarry, licorice flavour, mellowed by the steaming milk and rounded off with the smallest lump of sugar she could find in the bowl. Her spine curved as her shoulders relaxed. ‘Did I? What if Jamie doesn't come?'

‘Keep faith with him, Claire, we'll know soon enough. What are your immediate plans now that you're home?'

‘“Home”. I like the sound of that. Well, I refuse to mooch around. I still need distraction and packing up the house in Berkshire will take a couple of days. I also want to get a new dress.'

‘Perfect!' She glanced up. ‘Yes, Joy?'

‘Forgive me, Mrs Lester. I meant to mention this to Miss Nightingale on her arrival and her comment reminded me. My apologies for being remiss.'

Both of them frowned. ‘What is it?' Claire asked.

Joy slipped her hand into the pocket of her black long-sleeved, drop-waisted dress over an embroidered white camisole. She wore it as a uniform; Claire had never seen her wear anything else but she'd not noticed the pockets before. She gasped softly as Joy withdrew an envelope, recognising the stamp immediately as one from Australia. And then she noticed the spindly writing in black ink.

‘Jamie's father . . .' she whispered, unable to say anything more.

The housekeeper held it out to her, looking immediately uncertain as Claire's hands remained steadfastly by her sides.

Claire suddenly had no desire to take that envelope. It was larger than average, and clearly containing more than a polite response. She could tell by the bulge. Had Jamie's luck run out? The sinking feeling turned dangerous. Claire felt she was drowning. She began to swallow.

‘You didn't mention that letter,' Eugenie said in a tone with a scolding edge to it.

‘Mrs Lester, it was delivered only this morning,' Joy said in bleating defence. ‘The postman said it was redirected from Berkshire.'

‘Claire, dear?' Eugenie said with an edge of concern.

She rallied her courage and nodded. ‘I asked for my post to be sent on to this address,' she murmured, still not reaching for it.

They all stared at the envelope from Australia.

‘It's not going to open itself, darling girl.'

Claire cut Eugenie a misty glance. ‘I don't think I want to read what's inside,' she admitted in a small voice, backing away from Joy.

They watched the housekeeper place the letter on the table between them. She stepped away. ‘Maybe it's good news,' she offered, her features suddenly and uncharacteristically softened.

Claire was reminded of how many loved ones this woman had lost to the war and guilt danced across her fear for one person's life. Joy nodded encouragingly and Claire felt her heart give a little for the woman. ‘Let me get a fresh pot,' the housekeeper murmured and turned away.

Now it was just the two of them staring at the envelope that looked scuffed for all of its travels. It lay harmlessly next to the tray, but Claire felt it carried within it the power to breathe life into her world or to snuff it out, like a candle starved of its oxygen. She realised she was holding her breath.

‘Open it, Claire. Whatever it says won't change for the waiting. Whatever it contains we shall face together.'

Claire became acutely aware of her breathing as well as the pound of her heart. She could hear Rifki's gentle voice querying her commitment to a daydream.

‘Would you like me to open it?' Eugenie's voice reached her from what felt like a much farther distance than she knew to be true.

She shook her head slowly and picked up the letter. The stock felt furry, almost gritty, from its journeying and she imagined all the different strangers who had handled it on its voyage to find her. She knew she was putting off the inevitable and so did Eugenie but her friend remained silent.

Miss C. Nightingale
was looped in a small but bold spindly script and beneath it her address in Charvil, the forwarding note scrawled above.

She finally turned the envelope over and realised she had no letter opener but the flap yielded beneath the barest of pressure, and the glue released easily.

Claire inhaled softly and deeply. This was it.

Birds trilled happily in the garden and she heard the drone of a single bumblebee nearby, exploring the spring daisies that had flowered in pots on the patio. Claire felt an immediate kinship – they were both searching to start their life – and she slid the letter and its accompanying contents from the envelope.

With tears gathering, she opened up Jamie's father's letter with a rustle of crisp paper.

Dear Claire,

We were glad to hear from you. I hope, even though we have not met, that you are not offended by my familiarity. We share a common love and now a common grief, so suddenly etiquette seems irrelevant.

Claire gasped aloud, felt as though she were struggling for breath, eyes watering to blur the words, but hurriedly she read on, unable to stop herself now.

I am enclosing the originals of the letters we have received from the Light Horse. I think you will find them self-­explanatory. Please return them at your convenience to our address at the top of this letter when you have finished with them. Frankly, my wife, Laura, wanted to burn them. I am at a loss for how to console her in her grief.

She stopped, dizzy and suddenly nauseous.

‘Claire?' Eugenie asked softly.

‘It's not good news,' she choked out, now presuming the worst as she forced herself to read on.

Jamie is – was – her favourite. I know that's unfair to our three other sons but . . . well, I feel sure I do not have to explain why to you and I am also sure her secret is safe.

I am deeply sorry to deliver this grave news contained in the accompanying letters and I wish we were closer so that we could meet you and offer comfort. We are strangers but loving Jamie has made you family to us. To find a perfect love as you describe is likely impossible for most people. I was lucky and it seems my son was blessed with the same lucky streak to have found you, dear Claire, in the most dire and bleak of situations. We will keep you in our thoughts and prayers as we grieve either side of the world for a fine young man who by all accounts carried out his duty to King and country with courage.

I regret with all of my heart that I failed to tell him just how proud I was of him and I regret that it has taken his death for me to be able to write with such affection about a child I loved but never told. I am glad you did.

Sincerely,

William Wren

All other sounds had been swallowed by a single long buzzing in her head like the drone of a machine; she could no longer hear, speak. Even colour had drained from her vision so her world had turned down its tones to blue-grey and narrowed to the manila package from William Wren. Without wanting to, yet inexorably drawn to the enclosure, Claire put Wren's letter behind the bundle and confronted the second envelope.

It too was buff and grimy from plenty of handling. She ran her fingertips over the navy-coloured stamp, absently flattening out a tiny triangle of its rouletted corner, then drew out the pages to confront her deepest fear. The first had an address at Victoria Street, London SW, and was typed.

Dear Sir,

I enclose details of witness accounts of Wren Tpr J W 799 that we have been able to compile. As you can see these are –

Claire lost patience and slipped the introduction to the back of the sheaves and hungrily scanned the next, which was headed up
Australian List A.I.F. Ist A.L.H.
It was from Egypt. Her gaze was drawn to the title
Unoff.M. Oct 1917 W.&.M.
but before she could fully grasp the meaning her desperate need for detail pushed her headlong into the main body copy.

Witness said he believed: Trooper Wren may have been killed in a charge in the Jordan Valley during the escalating battles to liberate Jerusalem.

Hope withered but still she needed to read more. Claire ripped another sheet out and sound returned to her senses as an anguished mewl escaped her tightening throat as she scanned. Her gaze tripped across the blotchy font of the typewriter as the queen bee merrily buzzed on, tripping from petal to petal. Except for Claire there was no golden pollen to be gathered but only cold, harsh, black words that bounced against her heart like pebbles stoning it.

. . . body not recovered. Ref:- F.D.Grant. Desert Mounted Div. Ward 19, Harefield. Note: Informant seems a quiet man who knows what he is talking about.