and committees sat on me figuratively
and almost literally, too, but could come to no conclusion. Though I
could be in a military hospital in France it was somehow not to be
thought of in England. Finally I heard a W.A.A.C.'s ward had been opened
in London at a military hospital run by women doctors for Tommies, and I
promptly sat down and applied for admittance. Yes, I could go there, and
so at the end of November, I found myself once more back in London. I
was in a little room--a W.A.A.C. officers' ward, on the same floor as
the medical ward for W.A.A.C. privates. I met them at the concerts that
were often given in the recreation room, and they were extremely kind
to me. I was amused to hear them discussing their length of active
service. One who could boast of six months was decidedly the nut of the
party! We had a great many air raids, and were made to go down to the
ground floor, which annoyed me intensely. I hated turning out, apart
from the cold; it seemed to be giving in to the Boche to a certain
extent.

I loved my charlady. She was the nearest approach to the cheery
orderlies of those far away days in France, I had struck since I came
over. Her smiling face, as she appeared at the door every morning with
broom and coalscuttle, was a tonic in itself. I used to keep her talking
just as long as I could--she was so exceedingly alive.

"Do I mind the air rides, Miss? Lor' bless you no--nothin' I like better
than to 'ear the guns bangin' awy. If it wasn't for the childer I'd fair
enjoy it--we lives up 'hIslington wy, and the first sounds of firing I
wrep them up, and we all goes to the church cryp and sings 'ims with the
parson's wife a'plying. Grand it is, almost as good as a revival
meeting!"

(One in the eye for Fritz what?)

I asked her, as it was getting near Christmas, if she would let me take
her two little girls (eight and twelve respectively) to see a children's
fairy play. She was delighted. They had never been to a theatre at all,
and were waiting for me one afternoon outside the hospital gates, very
clean and smiling, and absolutely dancing with excitement. I was of
course on crutches, and as it was a greasy, slippery day, looked about
for a taxi. It was hopeless, and without a word the elder child ran off
to get one. The way she nipped in and out of the traffic was positively
terrifying, but she returned triumphant in the short space of five
minutes, and we were soon at the door of the theatre.