“So he is in love with Ethel?”

“They was both smitten at the same time. Cupid, ain’t he? Well, he got a direct hit on them two.”

“It’s charming. She looks so different… so pretty.”

“True. She does. Wonderful what a bit of love can do. Do you know, since Cupid struck, he’s been getting better. So has she. She worried me at times. Remember that time on deck? I bet you do. Something we would none of us forget in a hurry. She would have done it, you know.

They’ve got a lot of guts, them little ‘uns. She’d have gone right over if you hadn’t stopped her. “

“I felt that, too.”

“Well, she didn’t. Do you know, I reckon if she comes out of this all right and she’s got him to look after, I reckon that would just about be a bit of all right for Ethel.”

“Do you think he would marry her?”

“It’s what he’s said. He’s got a little farm out in the country somewhere. Shares it with his brother. Brother’s keeping it nice and warm till he gets back. Just the ticket for our Eth. Gawd ‘elp us. I pray that poor fellow don’t get well enough to be sent out again … just well enough when the right time comes to be sent home … and back to that little old farm with our Ethel.”

“Eliza,” I said, ‘you are a very good woman. “

“What! You going stark raving mad or something? It’s what this place does to you.”

“I’ll tell you what this place does to you. It makes you see things and people more clearly.”

“I’d be pleased to see little Ethel settled. It’s what she wants. The idea of her going back to that pigsty of a room, stitching away. It gives me the creeps. She wouldn’t be there more than two years.”

“We wouldn’t let her do that.”

“Who do you mean we?”

“You. Me.”

“What’s it got to do with you?”

“As much as it has with you.”

She looked at me through narrowed eyes and laughed.

“You know what you said about me a little while ago?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’ll return the compliment.”

“Thanks.”

As I was about to move away she said: “And I’ll tell you another whose got it as bad as Ethel.”

“Got what?”

“Love.”

“Oh?”

“Henrietta.”

“Henrietta? But with whom?”

“I dunno. You tell me. Someone. You can see it in her face. And let me tell you something else. It was when you came back from that late night out… when you got lost.”

I nodded.

“I saw her face. It was all a-shine. I’ve seen that look before and I know what it means. I wouldn’t mind betting that Henrietta has got as badly hit as our Ethel.”

“You’re mistaken. There isn’t anyone.”

“I reckon there is,” she said.

“You can’t fool old Eliza.”

“I’ll find out. I know her well.”

“You do … and you’ll see I’m right.”

After that I thought a great deal about Henrietta.

There was little time for anything but work. Although the casualties had decreased slightly, men were coming in from around Sebastopol almost frozen to death without adequate clothing, and starving. We were working for days with scarcely a break, snatching a few hours’ rest on our divans when we could.

I did talk to Henrietta now and then and I saw what Eliza meant about her. There was a certain radiance. I was very disturbed because she talked a great deal about Dr. Adair.

“I wonder if he will come back. Isn’t it different without him? It seems so dull. What a man! Imagine him … sporting with his harem while we are here.”

“I think he is absolutely despicable. He is a good doctor and we need good doctors. And he just walks off and leaves us . in pursuit of pleasure. “

“One would never really know a man like that.”

“Perhaps it would be better not to know him.”

“I should love to find out everything about him.”

The shine in her eyes, the lilt in her voice. Oh no, I thought, Henrietta could not be so foolish as to fall in love with him. Or could she? But he had gone and we might never see him again. Then I fell to thinking of my project to show the world what he really was, to prevent his using people as he had used Aubrey, to prevent his carelessly experimenting with lives as he had with my son’s. No, that was not fair. He had not exactly taken Julian’s life; he had simply not saved it because he wanted to experiment, in the same way as he had submitted that soldier to pain in order to gain some experience.

He was callous; he was hard and cruel; I hated him, and because of the intensity of my hatred the hospital seemed a dreary place without him.

It must be so, of course, because that was what it was; but when he was there, the prospect of meeting him suddenly, of feeling the hatred and resentment flare up within me, gave me some lilting of spirits and a meaning to the days.

One day when I was on my way to the wards I encountered Philippe Lablanche. He expressed great pleasure at the sight of me and told me that he was on one of his periodic visits to the hospital. He trusted I was none the worse for my adventure and I told him that I certainly was not and that it had all ended very pleasantly.

“No more trips into Constantinople?”

I shook my head.

“That was a very rare occasion. We are so busy here.

There is little time for junketing. “

“Soon Sebastopol must fall and then perhaps you will have a little time to look around that amazingly interesting city.”

“I shall before we go home.”

“Not just at first, though. You will have to stay a little while to look after your patients, I dare say. Then perhaps …”

He was smiling at me in a friendly fashion. Then he said:

“And your friend?”

I told him where he would find her and he left me.

Later I saw Henrietta and asked if he had found her.

“Yes,” she said.

“The gallant Frenchman. He’s rather a pet, isn’t he?”

“I think he is very charming.”

“He says that he does come to the hospital quite often. He would very much like to take us on a tour of Constantinople.”

“Unfortunately we are not here as sightseers.”

“A pity. Still, I must say I could enjoy another little encounter with our fascinating friend. I only wish …” I looked at her questioningly and she went on: “I believe you miss him as much as I do.”

“Who?”

“The demonic one.”

I forced a laugh, but I felt a tremor of uneasiness. I could not get Eliza’s words out of my mind.

“I wish he would get tired of that harem and come back to us.”

“I suppose we should not expect such a man to put duty before pleasure.”

She laughed at me.

“Oh, Anna, I can’t help it. You look so stern. You always do when you talk of him. And all the time I think you find him as fascinating as I do. Are you still bent on your quest?”

“If you mean do I still want to find some way of showing him up for what he is, yes.”

“But what is he? That’s what we don’t know. That’s what makes him the most exciting thing in our lives. I’m sure he’d get the better of us anyway … whatever we tried to do to him.”

She was laughing secretly to herself and I thought: She is obsessed with him.

I believed that I might be, too. But that was different. I knew he was a danger to those about him. I had seen the disintegration of my husband and I blamed him for that. I had read his books and I knew a great deal about him through them. His pagan spirit had looked out at me and I knew it was there.

I continued to be anxious about Henrietta. I knew how impulsive she could be. If he returned, if he had any notion of her feelings for him, what would he do? Would he attempt to exploit them? I feared he might.

I hope he will never come back, I said to myself.

But in my heart I longed for his return.

There was a small room close to the wards where we kept a few supplies and I was in there one day when Charles Fenwick came in. He looked very tired. Like all the doctors, he worked constantly and always under the shadow of frustration because of the lack of equipment.

“Oh, Anna,” he said.

“I’m glad I found you alone. I wanted to have a word with you.”

“It seems so long since we have spoken together,” I said.

“The two hospitals are really one and yet it is amazing how little one sees of one’s friends.”

“How is everything going?”

“Not very well. This wretched siege! If only they could break through.

We haven’t the heavy casualties now but the weather is killing our troops. Cholera. dysentery. These have always been a greater enemy than the Russians. It’s got to end. They can’t hang out indefinitely.

”

“They are a very determined people and they know how to suffer. Think what happened to Napoleon when he marched on Moscow.”

“This is different. Sebastopol has to fall. It is amazing that it has held out as long, but it can’t indefinitely and then the war will be virtually over. But it isn’t that I want to talk about with you. It’s us.”

“You mean … the doctors?”

“No. You, Anna … and myself.”

I looked at him questioningly and he laid a hand on my arm.

“I’m thinking ahead to when this is over and we go home. Have you thought about that?”

“A little.”

“Will you go back to that house of yours?”

“There’s nowhere else. Miss Nightingale is going to reform the hospitals at home. I should like to be involved in that.”

“Have you thought about marriage?”

“Why … no.”

“I have,” he said.

“I feel I want to purge myself of all this horror.

I want to forget it. these smells which have become part of daily life . the pain and suffering all around us. “

“Isn’t that part of the lives of doctors and nurses?”

“Not unnecessary pain and suffering like this, not these ghastly diseases which are brought about by insanitary conditions starvation and festering wounds which can’t be properly treated. I can only get through these days by thinking of the future.”

“I think we all feel like that.”

“I want a future to look forward to a quiet practice somewhere… perhaps in the country. Or if you would prefer, London.”

“I?”

“I want you to share it with me, Anna.”

“Am I hearing you correctly?”

“I think so.”

“Then this is a proposal of marriage?”

“It is just that.”

“But Charles … I thought…”

“What did you think?”

“I knew you liked me, but I thought it was Henrietta in whom you were interested … I mean in that way.”

“Of course I like Henrietta, but it is you whom I love.”

“I am just astonished.”

“My dearest Anna, of course I love you. I love your strength and your seriousness, your dedication. I love everything about you. If you promised to marry me as soon as we are free of all this, it would give me a great deal to look forward to, to plan …”

He had taken my hands and was looking earnestly into my eyes.

“Oh Charles,” I said, “I am so sorry. I was so … unprepared for this. I know that sounds like the cry of the bashful maiden, but I really am. I had no idea. I was certain that it was Henrietta.”

“Well, now you know it is not, what do you say?”

I was silent. I thought of the country practice, a new life, a new home, the village green, the ancient church with the yews which would have stood there for hundreds of years, dew on the grass, the lovely smell of damp earth, the gentle rain, daisies and buttercups and I felt a great yearning for it all.

He was watching me eagerly.

“Charles,” I said, ‘there is a great deal you don’t know about me. “

“It’s going to be exciting learning about each other.”

“We are here … in this place,” I reminded him, ‘and things are not natural here. You might make decisions which you regret afterwards.”

“I don’t think I shall regret this.”

“As I said, you don’t know me.”

“I know you well. Didn’t I see you at Kaiserwald? And here? I know your sterling character, your honesty, your goodness, your compassion.

I have seen you give yourself wholeheartedly to the sick. “

“You have seen a nurse, that’s all. I’m a good one, yes. It would be false modesty to deny it. But that is one part of me. I can’t think about marriage. I am not ready.”

“I understand that I have sprung this on you. Think about it. I love you, Anna, We could make a good thing of it. Our interests are so closely woven together.”

“There is something I must tell you, Charles. I’ve been married before.”