‘And this must be where they expect us to wash,’ Angela snorted in disgust. ‘But what do we do for hot water and how do we take a bath?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ Holly admitted, dropping her bag on the bed next to Angela’s. ‘But let’s go and find where we eat now. I’m hungry after all that jolting about and I’d do anything for a cup of tea.’

Holding their capes closely about them they stepped out of the tent and asked a young soldier who was passing by, ‘Could you tell us where we can get something to eat, please?’

He pointed across a patchwork of duckboards. ‘That’s the mess over there. The cook’s usually got something warm on the go.’

They thanked him and made their way cautiously towards it, very aware of the gunfire in the distance. ‘Blimey, you’re taking your life in your hands trying to get across these things without slipping,’ Angela commented.

‘Hmm, and I wouldn’t fancy our chances if we were to slip into the mud,’ Holly agreed.

The mess, as the young soldier had referred to it, turned out to be another, larger, tent and as they entered, the warmth from the stoves positioned to one side of the tent met them. There were tables and chairs arranged in two lines down the length of the room and weary, filthy men with dull eyes were sitting at some of them sipping hot, sweet tea.

‘Ah, newcomers I presume,’ the cook greeted them, his brown eyes twinkling. He was enormous in both girth and height and seemed friendly.

‘Yes, we are,’ Holly admitted. ‘And we’ve travelled through the night to get here so we’re quite hungry.’

‘Then you’ve come to the right place,’ he told them cheerfully as one particularly loud explosion echoed around the tent, making them start. ‘How about a nice plateful of my cottage pie? There’s nothing like it on a cold day like today.’

Both girls nodded, their eyes huge as they tried to ignore the sounds. Minutes later they were seated at a table with piled plates and steaming mugs of tea in front of them. The food was plain and simple but surprisingly tasty.

‘I wonder what we should do next?’ Angela mused.

Holly wasn’t sure either. ‘I dare say someone will come and tell us, but let’s go back to the tent when we’ve eaten and wait there.’

Some more of the newly recruited nurses were drifting in by now and they all smiled at each other. When the two girls had finished they made their way back along the duckboards and managed to find the right tent eventually. The trouble was they all looked exactly the same from the outside so they wondered how they would find their way back to their own tent in the dark as there didn’t appear to be any lights. They were both beginning to wonder what they had let themselves in for and home suddenly felt like a terribly long way away.