Free Angel of the Somme: The Great War, Book 1 by Terri Meeker

room and headed directly toward her.
    “Miss Curtis,” the matron said, “you’re to let the less experienced girls handle meals. Dr. Raye has specifically requested your assistance on rounds.” Her voice was thick with disapproval. “Wait outside his office, if you please.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” Lily walked through the back hall toward the surgical rooms. Though she was slightly disappointed to be called away from breakfast duty, it was always a pleasure to work with Dr. Raye. He was unique in being the one person at New Bedlam who viewed Lily as an actual nurse, much to the matron’s discomfort.
    Even better, at least to Lily’s point-of-view, the doctor had a very educated approach regarding medical practices. He even agreed with Lily regarding the more modern practice of blood typing, even though he was English. Lily had discovered that American and Canadian medical staff disagreed with the French and English most profoundly when it came to blood transfusions. Her European counterparts looked at transfusions as a course of last resort, whereas the North Americans embraced newer techniques. Since Lily was working in an English-run hospital, however, her opinions on such matters were thoroughly ignored by all except the very forward thinking Dr. Raye.
    Lily reached the doctor’s office and knocked on the door.
    “Please come in,” Dr. Raye said.
    She entered his small and extremely cluttered office to find the doctor sorting through a jumble of files. He was a big man with a wide, sun-tanned face. He reminded her of the loggers back home, more fit for a life in the wild than inside a surgical ward. Perhaps that was why she felt such fondness for him—she and he were both square pegs trying to fit into round holes.
    “Good morning, sir,” she said.
    “Miss Curtis. Thank you for joining me.” Though usually quick to smile, the doctor looked more somber than usual, and extremely weary. His salt and pepper hair was especially unruly and he was badly in need of a shave. He cleared his throat, a nervous habit of his. “It’s been a rough couple of days. How’re you holding up?”
    “I’m fine, sir. Hard work is what I came here for.”
    Dr. Raye nodded at her. “That’s the spirit.” He wrote a few quick notes, then collected his stack of papers and attached them to his clipboard. “I should expect things will settle down any time now. A few days of this and neither side will have the temerity to push for much longer.”
    He stood and left the office, with Lily following behind.
    By the time they arrived in the officers’ ward, the VADs were just beginning their breakfast rounds. Though the ward was never as boisterous as the enlisted wards, it felt especially quiet this morning, like a fidgety child holding still for a church sermon. The regulars were attuned to the cycles of New Bedlam and tended to settle into a more silent mode when the freshly wounded joined their ranks.
    The doctor stopped by the beds of the newer patients first. Most of them had amputated limbs, likely performed in haste at a casualty clearing station. Many suffered the additional injury of the recent gas attacks at Deville Wood. Though most had been hit with mustard gas, a few were suffering from the effects of phosgene, an especially cruel invention. Between seeping eyes, lung injuries and the terrible skin blisters, examination took much longer than for the more established patients. The new arrivals were so doped from morphine, they were scarcely aware of the doctor’s presence, or their own.
    Lily trailed behind Dr. Raye, gripping a clipboard and taking notes regarding alterations to treatment or medication. On most of the charts, she noted “Cleared for England.” As soon as a bed was available, the man would be loaded on a hospital ship to finish recovering at a hospital back home. Not that any of them would ever fully recover. She’d seen thousands missing limbs or horribly disfigured, but the visible injuries were