The Lieutenant's Nurse Read online

  November, 1941. She’s never even seen the ocean before, but Eva Cassidy has her reasons for making the crossing to Hawaii, and they run a lot deeper than escaping a harsh Michigan winter. Newly enlisted as an Army Corps nurse, Eva is stunned by the splendor she experiences aboard the steamship SS Lurline; even more so by Lt. Clark Spencer, a man she is drawn to but who clearly has secrets of his own. But Eva’s past—and the future she’s trying to create—means that she’s not free to follow her heart. Clark is a navy intelligence officer, and he warns her that the United States won’t be able to hold off joining the war for long, but nothing can prepare them for the surprise attack that will change the world they know.

  In the wake of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Eva and her fellow nurses band together for the immense duty of keeping the American wounded alive. And the danger that finds Eva threatens everything she holds dear. Amid the chaos and heartbreak, Eva will have to decide whom to trust and how far she will go to protect those she loves.

  Set in the vibrant tropical surroundings of the Pacific, The Lieutenant’s Nurse is an evocative, emotional WWII story of love, friendship and the resilient spirit of the heroic nurses of Pearl Harbor.

  Praise for the novels of Sara Ackerman

  “The Lieutenant’s Nurse illuminates the attack on Pearl Harbor with a riveting drama told from a unique perspective. Sara Ackerman brings a time and place to vivid life, putting a human and heroic face on events that changed history. I savored every page!”

  —Susan Wiggs, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Set against the backdrop of the attack on Pearl Harbor, The Lieutenant’s Nurse is an emotional and heartfelt tale of love and courage. Depicting a dramatic period in history, Ackerman’s richly detailed and evocative writing transports the reader, bringing Hawaii to life.”

  —Chanel Cleeton, USA TODAY bestselling author of Next Year in Havana

  “With the wit and richness of a Beatriz Williams novel, The Lieutenant’s Nurse weaves a tale of love and courage. Bittersweet and suspenseful, it offers readers a firsthand, female perspective of the harrowing days surrounding Pearl Harbor, honoring both the complexities of war and resilience of the human spirit.”

  —Amanda Skenandore, author of Between Earth and Sky

  “Ackerman writes about WWII Hawaii with vivid detail, wit, and a sense of place evocative of Kristin Hannah. She re-examines history with a nuanced and immersive narrative that is impossible to put down. Simply put, The Lieutenant’s Nurse is a fantastic and enthralling read.”

  —Emily Strelow, author of The Wild Birds

  “A dramatic saga of motherhood, loss and the possibility of renewal.... With a sensitive touch and an instinct for authenticity, Ackerman depicts the fraught nature of wartime relationships...[and] mixes romance, suspense and history into a bittersweet story of cinematic proportions.”

  —BookPage on Island of Sweet Pies and Soldiers

  “A close-up look at how wartime chaos affects a tight-knit group of women living on Hawaii in 1944 at the height of Pacific combat.... [Violet’s] journey overcoming her trials and grief through friendship, family, and romance is a story of strength and perseverance.”

  —Booklist on Island of Sweet Pies and Soldiers

  “Strong female friendships and an unusual World War II home front setting add to this debut novel’s appeal for historical fiction fans.”

  —Library Journal on Island of Sweet Pies and Soldiers

  Also by Sara Ackerman

  Island of Sweet Pies and Soldiers

  Look for Sara Ackerman’s next novel

  available soon from MIRA Books.

  SARA ACKERMAN

  THE

  LIEUTENANT’S

  NURSE

  This book is for my father, Douglas Ackerman

  A swimmer with feet like fins, a craftsman of the highest order, a surfer, a gifted cookie maker, an architect and an early pioneer of the tiny house, a rebel, a naturalist, a hiker of tall mountains, a comedian, a rascal, a skilled palapa builder, a musician, a traveler, a birdhouse maker, a pancake and waffle magician, a hopeless romantic, a visionary, an adventurer, a true child of Hawaii and a beloved friend to so many, myself included. He was and always will be my biggest fan.

  Contents

  QUOTE

  A PECULIAR MESSAGE

  BANZAI!

  ROUGH SEAS

  MOSCOW MULES

  EAST WIND, RAIN

  WAR CHESS

  LADY LUCK

  DANGEROUS SEAS

  A BOLD STATEMENT

  THE GAME

  THE TROUBLE WITH TOMMY LEMON

  A BUMP IN THE NIGHT

  AN UNUSUAL OCCURENCE

  OFF TO THE RACES

  GHOST SIGNALS

  THE EXCHANGE

  HEADS OR TAILS

  THE WOODS WING

  THE ONE-TWO PUNCH

  NO TURNING BACK

  UP IN FLAMES

  BOAT DAY

  THE DUNGEON

  NIGHT AT THE PINK PALACE

  A MASSIVE CIRCLE

  BLACKFISH

  SISTERS

  THE VISIT

  SUNKEN WORDS

  FINAL SONGS

  THE RUN-IN

  HELL DIVERS

  THE BIG MISS

  THE REAL McCOY

  EGG LAYING

  PURPLE HEARTS

  BLIND ASSUMPTIONS

  THE LITTLE FELLA

  THE PATIENT

  INFAMY

  ROWBOAT TO CHINA

  ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE

  WAR BLINDNESS

  THE TALK

  THE SMELL OF LIES

  MISSION IMPOSSIBLE

  THE McCOLLUM MEMO EIGHT-ACTION PLAN

  UNTIMELY

  A LONG WAY DOWN

  HEADLINE

  SISTER LOVE

  A FEW GOOD MEN

  TALKING STORY

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  READER’S GUIDE

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  In war, truth is the first casualty.

  —AESCHYLUS

  A PECULIAR MESSAGE

  November 22

  Achtung! Warning! Alerte! We hope you’ll never have to spend a long winter’s night in an air-raid shelter, but we were just thinking...it’s only common sense to be prepared. If you’re not too busy between now and Christmas, why not sit down and plan a list of the things you’ll want to have on hand...and though it’s no time, really, to be thinking of what’s fashionable we bet that most of your friends will remember to include those intriguing dice and chips which make Chicago’s favorite game: THE DEADLY DOUBLE.

  —MYSTERIOUS ADVERTISEMENT IN THE NEW YORKER MAGAZINE, TWO WEEKS BEFORE THE AIR RAID ON PEARL HARBOR.

  BANZAI!

  November 26

  The men understand nothing. The leaves have changed from green to red and the wind has turned icy. Something big is afoot and they are told there is a good chance they will not be coming back. They are given warm winter clothing for the journey. The sky is dark, the sun still below the horizon. The ships Akagi, Kaga, Shokaku, Zuikaku, Hiryu and Soryu lead the way, battering through the whitecaps and wild seas. Anticipation is something they can taste on the wind. Once they leave the Kurile Islands, north of Japan, the fleet will head north, into the vast and blue Pacific. Strict radio silence is ordered. Banzai! they shout as they say goodbye to their homeland.

  No one knows how this will end.

  ROUGH SEAS


  November 28

  The sea was dark green and angry, not the lazy blue that her imagination had conjured up. Eva was well versed in lakes, but here in San Francisco, the air was thick with salt and the tang of dead fish. Toward the horizon, storm clouds blacked out the sky. She wrapped her scarf tighter around her neck as wind whipped her hair in every direction. Cold lodged into her bones, as she had little extra padding to keep her warm. Nevertheless, people crammed all along the edges of the ship, throwing serpentine and waving madly at the crowd along the pier.

  After the ship had let out two long horn blasts, guests began to file off, stuffed full after the bon voyage festivities. She had meandered around before departure, watching pounds of cheese balls, pigs in a blanket and pâté disappear into people’s mouths, and startling at champagne corks being fired off. As she had stood off to the side gaping at the decadence, one of the stewards proudly told her that it was not unusual to go through five hundred bottles on sailing day.

  “Good Lord!” she’d said.

  Eva had had champagne all of once in her life—the day she’d graduated from nursing school.

  She leaned against the cold steel railing, overcome with the realization that she was leaving the continent for a tiny speck of an island thousands of miles away. She searched the throngs of people for any familiar faces, and was thankful to see none. A tall figure pushing against the debarking guests on the gangplank caught her eye. Dressed in a blue service uniform, the man stood out not only because of his height, but the look on his face. While everyone else was gay and merry, his jaw was clenched and his expression set in stone. What would he have to worry about? Eva tried to keep abreast of news and knew that tensions were rising around the world, but being stationed on a tiny island in the Pacific would certainly have its perks. Being in a whole separate hemisphere from the Germans and their U-boats, for one. But also isolated by thousands of miles of ocean and protected by much of the Pacific Fleet. Eva tried to look away, but her gaze was fixed on the powerful way he moved. Something about being in uniform, too, gave him an air of gravity. There weren’t too many soldiers in the backwoods of Michigan. The man ducked onto the ship and then he was gone.

  Couples and families and an athletic team of boisterous young men grouped around her. Most everybody was attached to someone else, and she wished Ruby could be here with her. This was just the kind of thing her younger sister would have loved, obsessed as she was with fashion and the latest trends. Ruby never met a piece of material she didn’t want to nip and tuck and whip into some unique article of clothing. Her sister was the one meant to be in San Francisco or New York or traveling the globe. You left her, said a gnawing voice inside. But she’d had no choice. As soon as she settled in her room, she would write her a postcard.

  In the colorful brochures, Eva had noted how well dressed the passengers were. But nothing could have prepared her for the real thing. These women seemed another breed altogether. Pencil-thin skirts and blazers, with rows of pearls around their necks and corsages made from gardenias and baby’s breath pinned to their lapels. Hair twisted and piled and coiffed into updos. Eva owned exactly two fancy dresses and she was saving those for dinners, and her hair, which she had gone through the effort to pin curl set, was quickly blowing out.

  After another fifteen minutes, three long blasts of the horn sounded, the massive anchor pulled up and Matson’s grandest luxury liner, the Lurline, backed away. Four o’clock sharp. The amount of black smoke pouring from the two stacks on board was enough to require a gas mask. No one had mentioned that in the brochure. She moved upwind as best she could. People ran alongside the ship as though not quite ready to say goodbye. Even though she didn’t know anyone, Eva waved a dingy white handkerchief to the crowd below.

  She had been imagining this moment for so long, and now that it was finally here, she felt a tightening in her chest. Hawaii was about as far away as you could get from Michigan, which was precisely why she had joined the Army Nurse Corps. But not long after she’d made her decision to go, Ruby had come down with fever, headache, back pain. And then the paralysis. The fear was something she had no defense against. Polio. A word that ruined lives. Ruby had been admitted to the hospital the next day, and Eva departed two weeks later, feeling like she’d been split in two. Ruby had stabilized, but whether she would walk again still remained to be seen.

  It was easy to get caught up in the guilt, but Eva ordered herself to enjoy the journey as best she could. Focus on what lay ahead. Warm lagoons and coconut trees. A fresh start, where no one knew who she was. And of course, Billy would meet her at the dock. It had been so long since she’d seen him, half of her felt weak-kneed at the thought, and the other was worried that he wasn’t the same Billy she had fallen for. His last few letters had been brief and businesslike, not his usual pressed flowers and professions of love.

  If anyone was concerned at all about the storm they would soon be sailing into, it didn’t show. This was not the California she had been promised—sunny skies and smooth water. Instead, fog obscured much of the Golden Gate Bridge as they passed underneath. They weren’t even in the open seas yet and the ship swayed from side to side.

  Pretty soon, raindrops began to fall and people took cover on the long side deck. Eva found an empty chair and sat back, watching the city grow smaller and smaller and disappear in the clouds. Goodbye, America.

  A steward came around offering warm tea, which she gladly accepted.

  “Will the weather be worsening?” she asked, thinking about all the ship skeletons at the bottoms of the Great Lakes.

  “Hard to tell, but not to worry. This ship could sail right through a hurricane with barely a wobble.”

  “So we won’t have to worry about seasickness?” she asked.

  He laughed. “I wish I could say that was the case. You never know who will be immune and who won’t. But most people gain their sea legs in a day or two.”

  She sipped her tea and watched a toddler in a ruffled dress zigzagging across the deck like a drunk sailor. The mother had a glass of champagne in one hand and a teddy bear in the other. On the chairs next to her, some of the college athletic team were huddled up under blankets. Tall, gangly boys on the cusp of manhood. From their chatter, she found out they were football players from Oregon and California off on a trip to play the University of Hawaii. Eva caught herself staring. She hadn’t been to a football game in ages. Not since summertime, when life was still moving in a whole different direction.

  With no chance for a sunset and night falling early, she made her way back to her stateroom on D deck—“Dog Deck,” as it was called—passing by many folks who looked green in the face. At several points along the way, she commanded herself to breathe and keep an eye on the horizon. But that became difficult once inside the walls and heading downstairs. The stale air didn’t help. When she opened the door to her room, there was a woman curled on the second bed, groaning.

  “Heavens, are you all right?” Eva asked, rushing to her side.

  “Do you think they could turn around? I need to get off immediately.”

  Eva fought back a laugh. “Not likely, but they say by morning, the sickness usually wears off.” The trash can was pulled up next to the bed. She did her best not to look inside, as though seasickness might be contagious. “I’m Eva. What’s your name?”

  A long pause. “Jo.” It came out like ruff, almost like a dog’s bark.

  Jo was man-size, with wrists the size of tree branches and a dockworker’s shoulders. To lift her would be impossible, and Eva hoped for a fast recovery. Assessing people based on how hard they’d be to move was a built-in habit, formed after years helping her father set a broken leg or turn over an invalid with bedsores. Being small, she’d made up for it with ingenuity and leverage.

  Eva set a glass of water on the bedside table. “I’m going to get set up here, but let me know if you need anything. I’m a nurse,” sh
e said, as if that mattered right now.

  Jo moaned.

  The windowless room was small but not cramped, with enough room for two twin beds and two small bureaus. An ornate gold mirror with lamps, and a blue patterned rug made for lovely accents. She peeked into the bathroom, which was shared with another cabin, and admired the black-and-white tile floor and porcelain tub. Even cabin class on the Lurline was fancier than what she was accustomed to.

  While she unpacked, the ship’s swaying seemed to grow even more pronounced. On the bureau, she noticed her dining assignment card: Eva Cassidy, Second Seating in the Waikiki Dining Room. It was going to take a while to adjust to a new last name. Jo Holstad was meant to be seated next to her. That would not likely happen.

  All of Eva’s clothes fit nicely in the drawers, and she hung her two dresses. She also set a small framed photograph of Ruby—holding an armful of ducklings and smiling as though she had just won the lottery—on a built-in shelf next to her bed. She hurried to freshen up and get topside into the open air, regardless of her seating time. She would sit on the deck and wait if she had to, this time armed with a warm sweater and a blanket.

  “Do you want to come up for dinner? Fresh air would do wonders for you,” Eva said, already knowing the answer.

  “I’m going to die on this ship, one way or another,” Jo said.

  “Oh, nonsense, you just feel that way now.”

  The poor woman did look about as miserable as one could be. Perspiration matted her hair to her forehead and her mouth hung slack with a stripe of dried spit off to the side. Suddenly, the ship listed sharply and Ruby’s picture, a comb and a perfume bottle flew onto the floor. Eva steadied herself against the wall.

  “See? We should have never set sail,” Jo said.

  Eva had to admit that all this rocking was unnerving. “I trust they know what they’re doing. If it were dangerous, we would have waited a few days.”