Cate stood in the middle of the enormous room and turned, slowly surveying the narrow beds and the last remaining patients lying in them. She shivered, instinctively wrapping an arm around herself as rain started to tap an erratic beat on the roof overhead. There were barely a dozen soldiers in the room, and it was strange to see so few men. For months, they’d faced an endless stream of men passing through their clearance hospitals, so seeing their numbers dwindle was almost more unsettling than the constant injuries she’d had to deal with. Until now, she’d been so busy she hadn’t had time to pause for breath, and that was how she’d liked it. At least then it stopped her from thinking about what might have happened to Charlie. Now the tremor of fear she’d mostly staved off was starting to take hold. She looked down at her hands, balling them to stop the tremble.

They’d arrived at the beautiful chateau in the early hours of the morning, running on little sleep and even less food, and by the time they’d finished setting up, there hadn’t been time to rest. They’d arrived in lorries full of surgeons, orderlies and nurses, as well as patients and supplies, and although it was vastly superior being in a house rather than a tent, or the old school building in Calais, it wasn’t helping her to settle. They were a clearance hospital, and they’d been told it would only be so long before they were inundated with men. Cate looked around again, surveying the room, so at odds with the canvas tents she was used to operating under. The walls were painted a soft duck-egg blue; luxurious drapes were still hanging, pulled back with elegant gold, plaited ropes. It was the most beautiful room she’d ever set foot in. She turned, imagining it filled with immaculately dressed couples, perched on sofas as they sipped wine, waiting to rise and be called to dinner, before the war.

As more and more orderlies arrived to assist with the evacuation and filed into the room, she forced herself to continue with her rounds, forgetting the possible past of the beautiful chateau and checking on her last remaining patients instead. It was the calm before the storm, because she knew instinctively that ambulances would start to arrive in their droves sooner rather than later, perhaps before she was even able to take her break. Her shifts seemed to merge together now; there was never enough time or enough orderlies or nurses to deal with the influx of men.