‘Apparently, it’s as important that I pass that part of the training as the nursing part. I shall make sure I pay particular attention. Breaking down close to enemy lines is not an appealing prospect,’ Tilly replied.
‘Well, I hope you’re better at fixing a manifold than you are at replacing a bicycle chain.’ Ronnie grinned. ‘Last time you tried that, I had to bail you out.’
‘I will learn,’ Tilly replied curtly. ‘It’s all only a matter of practice. I’d like to see how you’d manage a first-aid course. How would you be faced with tying a tourniquet?’ she teased.
* * *
When she returned to the hospital after the weekend, Tilly was one of six young women sitting shoulder to shoulder in the training room. There was an air of anticipation as they waited for their instructor to appear. Tilly’s heart sank when the door opened and Robert McFarlaine took up his place at the front of the room. So, he was to be their instructor. Tilly just hoped that her first impression of him was not entirely accurate. She couldn’t afford to be at loggerheads with him and fail the course.
The first part of the morning was a general introduction to the type of duties they would be asked to carry out. They were given a set of overalls and a basic tool kit, which McFarlaine said was to become more important than their manicure kit. Tilly seethed inside. If he thought that nurses spent all their time worrying about their appearance, then he had a thing or two to learn. She conceded that Fliss spent a good deal of time on her personal grooming, but then Fliss was not a typical nurse. Sometimes Tilly wondered why she stuck at it at all. Then she remembered that it was her mother’s idea and she was on a mission to marry Fliss off to a doctor.
After tea break, McFarlaine took them out to the workshop area. The smell of engine oil filled Tilly’s nostrils and she feltquite intoxicated by it. An ambulance stood in the entrance to the workshop. McFarlaine asked the women to gather around, and then raised the bonnet and called for a volunteer. A young woman called Joan stepped forward.
‘Now, Joan, I’d like you to point out where you think the engine oil should go and where the radiator is that holds the water to cool the engine. An essential part of an ambulance driver’s job is to ensure that their vehicle is topped up with both. Without oil and water, the engine will seize and your patient won’t make it to the field hospital.’
Joan looked bemused. She stared at the parts of the engine and finally took a stab at guessing.
‘Be prepared for your ambulance to break down as soon as you try to drive it down the road, Miss . . . ?’ McFarlaine grinned.
‘Smiley, Joan Smiley,’ Joan replied, her face colouring up.
‘Well, you won’t be so smiley when the ambulance grinds to a halt and your patient dies through loss of blood. Think of the engine as a human body,’ McFarlaine crowed. ‘If you administer the wrong treatment, you put your patient at risk and their body deteriorates and finally fails to work properly.’
McFarlaine was enjoying making Joan squirm and the sight of his self- righteous grin incensed Tilly.
‘Isn’t that why we’re here?’ Tilly said. ‘To learn about mechanics? If we knew these things already that would put you out of a job, wouldn’t it? So, can we get on with the class and could you get on and teach us? We’re wasting time here,’ she complained.
Over the lunchtime break, Joan thanked Tilly for standing up to McFarlaine.
‘No need to thank me,’ Tilly said. ‘I enjoyed putting him in his place. It’s men like him who are responsible for keeping women down in the workplace.’
The afternoon went quickly. There was a lot to take in and Tilly made as many notes as she had time to take down. There would be a practical test at the end of the course and she wanted to make sure she passed it. She was struggling with trying to get a spark plug out and any amount of brute force was not going to get it to budge, when she realised that McFarlaine was leaning over her shoulder. She could feel his body against hers and she objected to his being that close to her.
‘There’s a trick to it,’ he said, breathing down her neck. ‘Sometimes these things can be temperamental, a bit like a woman, if you see what I mean?’
‘No, I don’t see what you mean,’ Tilly replied.
‘Well, we grease monkeys always give our machines a female name — my Packard Custom Eight is Josephine. Now, you have to treat Josephine delicately. When you’re working on her, you have to have the gentle, persuasive touch. She doesn’t respond to rough treatment. Know what I mean?’
‘No, Mr McFarlaine, I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Well, how am I to know. Anything goes, these days. Isn’t that right? How does the song go, about driving fast cars?Well, do you like driving fast cars, Miss . . . ?’ he asked, moving beside her and leaning on her chair.
‘Truscott, Miss Truscott. And even if I wanted to try driving a fast car, wild horses couldn’t drag me into a seat next to you,’ Tilly snapped, leaving McFarlaine in no doubt as to her feelings about him and his over-familiar behaviour. ‘And I would appreciate it if you removed your hand from my shoulder, Mr McFarlaine, unless you want me to report you to Sister,’ she said, turning to look him straight in the eye.
Chapter 19
January 1940
By the end of the training programme, Tilly knew how to use a jack and change a tyre, how to replace spark plugs, clear a clogged carburettor, change oil, top up water and various other roadside jobs that could easily be performed with the right tools. She was issued with her own tool kit and overalls, a hard hat and boots that would protect her feet in any weather conditions. She was informed that an essential piece of kit was lipstick, because it cheered the wounded. That was the last thing she thought she would need to pack, but she was reliably informed that it was a must. Fliss wouldn’t have dreamed of going anywhere without her lipstick, her whole make-up kit to be truthful.
Although Fliss declined to complete the ambulance-driver training on the grounds it might destroy her nails for ever, she did agree to do the nursing part of the training and accompany Tilly to France. Tilly teased her constantly, asking her if she was sure she wouldn’t prefer to stay behind and work on her husband project, but Fliss’s response was, ‘What and let you have the pickings of all those good-looking officers? You must be kidding.’
Tilly got the feeling that Fliss’s bravado was a front for the nervousness she was really feeling. Fliss had let slip once that her father had been an officer in World War One and that she had often been woken, as a child, by his calling out in the night. Fliss didn’t speak an awful lot about her family, but she did reveal that her father had a short temper and would often fly into rages. Her mother tried to say that the bruises on her face were where she’d fallen off her bicycle, but she heard them rowing at night sometimes and Fliss didn’t believe her mother. One timethe doctor had to be called and some people came to take him away.
‘They call it shell shock, now,’ Fliss explained, ‘but they didn’t know much about it back then.’
On 10 January 1940, Dot and Amelia stood on the quay in East Cowes to see Tilly and Fliss aboard and wave them goodbye. They had volunteered their services a month earlier and were accepted immediately. Nurses were badly needed. Fliss’s mother had declined to come because she said that it was ‘foolhardy, stubborn and selfish’ and that Fliss only sought to annoy and upset her mother. Fliss’s father made excuses and said he was unwell. Tilly saw this as a clear illustration of how difficult Fliss’s upbringing had been. Fliss had said many times how much she envied Tilly for the closeness of her family, how much they loved and cared for each other and how happy Tilly always was to go back home. The only aspect of Fliss’s life that her parents were interested in, it seemed, was the importance of securing her a ‘good marriage’. By good, they meant a wealthy husband and a financially secure future that meant she was off their hands. So, Dot and Amelia took Fliss under their wing and hugged and waved her goodbye, alongside Tilly.
