Passions of War by Hilary Green

it. As they trudged round the streets Leo was reminded of the night she and Victoria had arrived in Salonika and she felt a pang of loneliness without her friend. All the main hotels were full and the owners of the boarding houses where they knocked regarded them with suspicion. Women in uniform were unheard of, and the landladies were unimpressed by the news that they were employed by the Belgian Red Cross. It seemed the citizens of Calais had little sympathy for their Belgian neighbours and made few distinctions between foreign nationals of any sort. As far as they were concerned, they might all be spies. By the time she finally found a house that was prepared to take her in, though only for that night, Leo was almost too tired to stand.
    Next morning they all assembled at Lamarck. On the top floor there was a big room with a stove which had been set aside as a kind of common room and it was there that they were given their duties for the day. Leo knew that most of her companions were expecting to be used as ambulance drivers, collecting wounded from the battlefield, but she was not surprised to learn that they were to be enrolled as probationer nurses. They had been assigned to the various wards and were just about to leave when they heard a loud honking from the courtyard. Leo ran to the window and looked out, to see Sparky with Victoria at the wheel come to a standstill at the main door. Having asked for and been given permission, she ran down the stairs and threw her arms round Victoria.
    â€˜Oh, am I glad to see you!’
    â€˜I told you I’d make it. What’s happening here?’
    â€˜You won’t be overjoyed to hear me say it’s like old times in Macedonia – but at least we know what we’re up against and we can face it together.’
    As they spoke a mud-spattered horse-drawn ambulance clattered into the courtyard.
    â€˜Oh, no! More casualties!’ Leo said. ‘We’re bursting at the seams already.’
    The driver jumped down and hurried over to them, releasing a babble of what Leo took to be Flemish and waving his hands at the rear of the ambulance.
    â€˜What’s he saying?’ Victoria asked.
    â€˜No idea. Let’s take a look.’
    â€˜Do you mean to say there’s a language you don’t speak?’ Victoria followed her to the rear of the vehicle.
    Leo lifted the canvas flap and peered inside. By this time they had been joined by one of the Sisters of Mercy and the driver had accosted her with the same urgent appeal. Leo let the flap drop and stepped back. ‘Typhus. No doubt about it.’
    â€˜You have met this before?’ the Sister asked.
    â€˜Yes, in Macedonia. What is the driver saying, Sister?’
    â€˜He says they have tried every other hospital in Calais and none of them will take typhus cases.’
    â€˜Can we take them?’
    â€˜We shall have to, somehow.’
    Behind her, Leo heard Victoria mutter, ‘Oh, no! Not again!’ But she did not hesitate when the Sister instructed them to bring the patient inside and Leo climbed back into the ambulance. Between them they lifted the stretcher with its writhing, delirious occupant and carried him into the hospital.

Seven
    Conditions in the hospital improved as the days passed. The Red Cross provided proper beds and appeals to charities in England produced bales of blankets, sheets and pillows. More recruits arrived and the FANYs swept and scrubbed until the wards were at least reasonably hygienic, if not exactly homely. They were less successful in improving their own living conditions. It seemed that none of the landladies who ran the boarding houses were prepared to put up English visitors for more than three or four nights, though they resorted to a variety of excuses to explain why their guests would have to move on.
    One morning on their way to work Leo and Victoria passed an empty shop, which bore the name ‘Le Bon Genie’.
    â€˜I wonder who it