The influenza epidemic was already being spoken of as a twentieth-century plague, and no one was safe. I feared for my parents-there had been no word from Somerset for over a fortnight. Even Simon Brandon hadn’t written, and that was more worrying. Was he too ill? Or trying to find a way to tell me that the Colonel Sahib and my mother had died? Every post seemed to bring sad news to the wounded or the staff, and word was that people in Britain as well as France were dropping in the streets or dying before they could reach hospital, entire families wiped out. Matron had told me that the posts were delayed because so many of the censors had fallen ill and there was no one to take their place. Cold comfort, but all I had. And as time went on, I wasn’t really sure that I wanted to hear.
Sister Burrows came out the door, and I moved aside. She slipped off her mask as I had done and took a deep breath of the evening air.
“Dear God,” she said, and it was half a prayer. “I don’t know how much more I can face. There’s nothing we can do for them. Nothing. And there are the wounded to nurse as well. It’s-it’s rather overwhelming.”
She was pale with exhaustion, dark circles beneath her eyes. A mirror of my face, I thought. If I had had the time to look at my own reflection.
“I ache with weariness,” she went on after a moment. “How are you bearing up?”
“As well as anyone else,” I answered. “It will have to end soon. The influenza. There will be no one else to infect.”
Two officers leaning on canes limped past, nodding to us, and another man, turning his back to us, disappeared into the canteen. His shoulder was swathed in bandages, and I couldn’t help but notice how stained and ragged they were. I knew I ought to hurry after him and ask to have a look at the wound, but I didn’t have the energy. Let him drink his tea undisturbed, then report to Matron.
“Today we received more influenza patients than battlefield wounded,” I commented as the heavy odor of French tobacco followed in the wake of an orderly carrying a mop and pail.