Green for Danger Read Online Free PDF Page A

sat up in bed and every time a bomb fell tapped himself on the back of the head and made his false teeth shoot out.
    â€œYou have no business to have all these lights on,” said Freddi severely, and went round clicking them off.
    Night Sister appeared in the doorway. “Oh, Nurse Sanson—are you here?”
    â€œI said I’d stay on and help Nurse Linley, Sister, if that’s all right?”
    â€œYes, of course. I expect she’ll be very thankful. I shan’t be able to help you much to-night, nurse; we’ve got four bad casualties in St. Catherine’s.… However, if you need anything you must send for me at once. They’ve just rung through from Reception and there’s a man coming in with fractured femur; get him into bed, will you? and just keep him quiet and warm; don’t do anything about the leg. Major Eden will be along in a few minutes to see him. Let me know if he wants me.” She hurried off again.
    â€œWhat a flap!” said Frederica calmly, watching her go.
    Two civilian stretcher-bearers appeared, carrying a grimy bundle on a canvas stretcher. “Is this right, Miss? The old gent in Reception asked us to bring him straight down here, as he hadn’t got any orderlies to send with him.”
    â€œYes, that’s right: this corner bed, please. Esther, will you deal with this, while I get the rest of the ward settled? I think that’ll be the best way to manage it.”
    The stretcher-bearers helped to lift the man on to the bed. “Wouldn’t they take him in the resuscitation ward?” asked Esther, rather surprised at his condition.
    â€œNo, it seems they’re filling up there, and he wasn’t as badly shocked as some of the others. They’ve had two deaths there already. Never should have taken ’em in, really, but we thought there might be half a chance. The A.R.R Centre’s been hit, and a pub out at Godlistone, and various other places. They’re still digging one chap out. Rescue squad they was, waiting to go out on a job. Looks as if he’d needed a bit of rescuing himself!” said the stretcher-bearer cheerfully. He put out his hand and pushed the damp hair off the man’s forehead, with the rough, crude gentleness of all his kind. “Poor old boy!” he said, and picked up his stretcher and, whistling softly, went away.
    Poor old boy. He lay pathetically still under the blankets, packed in with hot-water bottles, his hands lying loosely at his sides, his eyes closed, his face covered with dirt and dust and grime. His leg was bandaged to a long wooden splint. His boots had been torn off by the blast and his clothes were cut to ribbons, but she made no attempt to undress or wash him till the warmth and rest should have strengthened his pulse and brought back depth to the flickering respirations. She put her hand to his mouth, however, to feel the cold breath on her knuckles, and he must have been unconscious of the gesture, for he moved his head a little, laying his grimy cheek against her forearm with a gesture of trust and dependence, infinitely touching. Tears filled her eyes. “Don’t worry. Just lie still. It’s all over now. You’re safe now. You’re going to be all right.”
    He opened his eyes and she turned away her head, for she knew all too well the expression she would see there. It was only six months since her mother had died. For two days and two nights she had waited in anguish while men toiled unceasingly at the mountain of rubble that had once been a tall block of flats; had torn with her own helpless hands at the beams and girders and concrete that, having proved so frail a shelter, now heaped themselves into so deep a tomb. At the end of the second day, a foreman had come to her and wearily wiping the filth and sweat from his face, had broken it to her that it was useless to go on; at any moment the building would collapse, burying his men with those