Home Front Girls

‘Miss Kent is in Ward Three, but I have no entry for a Miss Timms. Are you sure that they were brought in together?’
    ‘Quite sure,’ Lucy told her solemnly. ‘I was there when they put them into the ambulance together to bring them here. Miss Timms was unconscious.’
    ‘I see.’ The nurse gave her a strange look, then taking up another list she began to scan that too until eventually she asked, ‘Was Miss Timms admitted from the Kenilworth Road?’
    When Lucy nodded, she told them curtly, ‘Just wait here a moment, would you? I’ll get a doctor to see you.’
    ‘But isn’t Miss Timms on the same ward as Dotty?’ Lucy questioned.
    The woman ignored her and hurried away, only to come back some minutes later to tell them, ‘Take a seat over there, please. A doctor will be out to see you as soon as he can. Next, please!’
    The three women trooped back to the seats to begin yet another long wait, but eventually a doctor appeared and after having a hasty word with the reception nurse who pointed towards where they were sitting, he approached them.
    ‘I believe you are here looking for Miss Timms?’
    When they all nodded, he shook his head gravely. ‘Then I am very sorry to inform you that Miss Timms was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital.’
    ‘B-but she can’t be!’ Lucy spluttered. Yet one look at his face revealed that he was telling the truth.
    ‘I’m afraid she is. She has been taken to the hospital morgue at present,’ he informed them. ‘But you are welcome to go and see Miss Kent if you wish. Luckily, apart from a broken arm and cuts and bruises, she escaped unharmed. It appears that the older woman shielded her with her body and took the full brunt of the collapse of the cellar roof, thereby sustaining serious internal damage that proved fatal. I’m very sorry to have to be the bearer of such bad news, but now if you will excuse me I really must get on.’
    ‘Of course,’ Miranda muttered as she placed her arm protectively about Lucy’s shoulders. ‘But just one question before you go, Doctor. Has Dot . . . Miss Kent been informed of Miss Timms’s death?’
    ‘No, we were waiting for her next of kin to do that. Would you happen to be related to her?’
    ‘Well, not exactly,’ Lucy told him. ‘But I think we are the nearest people she has. Dotty was an orphan, you see.’
    He nodded. ‘Then perhaps it would be best if you broke the news to her,’ he agreed. ‘Goodbye.’
    The three women stared at each other in horror, wondering how Dotty was going to take the news. They all knew that Miss Timms had been the only constant person in Dotty’s life and were all too aware of how fond Dotty had been of her. Their friend was going to be absolutely heartbroken.
    ‘I dare say we should go and see her now,’ Miranda said, eventually breaking the stunned silence. ‘At least Dotty survived, which is something to be grateful for.’
    ‘Yes, but how will she feel, knowing that Miss Timms may have died protecting her?’ Lucy answered numbly.
    ‘I think we shall have to cross that bridge when we come to it,’ Miranda said sensibly. ‘For now, Dotty needs to know we are still here for her. Come along.’ And so the three women set off, following the signs for Ward Three with heavy hearts.
    The ward they were shown into was every bit as chaotic as the reception area had been, with beds jammed down the middle of the room and along each wall.
    ‘You’ll find Miss Kent just along there,’ the unsmiling Sister told them, and after thanking her they walked in the direction she had indicated. They were each dreading what they might find, so were surprised to see Dotty sitting in a chair at the side of her bed.
    Their first glimpse of her caused them all to gasp with shock, for the poor girl was almost unrecognisable. Both her eyes were black and swollen, and every inch of her that was visible was covered in cuts and bruises, and yet as she caught sight of them her face broke into a radiant smile causing her to grimace with pain.
    ‘I knew you’d come,’ she croaked painfully as they stared at her arm, which was in a heavy plaster cast supported by a sling. ‘The ambulance men told me that you saved my life by insisting that the soldiers searched for me, Lucy. Thank you so much. I thought I was a goner down there in that cellar for a time. The only trouble now is that I can’t find where they’ve put Miss Timms. Well – she’s not Miss Timms any more really but I’ll