“Overseas duty!” Those were the magic words they had long wanted to hear. They brought a joyous outburst from the eager nurses, that ended in clapping.
“Aren’t we the lucky blokes!” exclaimed Mabel.
“And say, it looks as though it’s going to be in the tropics,” Nancy whispered.
When they rose to go back to the trucks Tini began to complain. “It’s utterly silly not letting us tell anything about what we’ve been doing in the swamp.”
“Ah, gee, who minds that?” asked Mabel. “After all, we agreed to submit ourselves to this rigorous training.”
“Of course we did,” said Nancy. “I’m sure they have good reasons for all these restrictions. You can never tell what spies may make of the smallest bit of information that may leak out.”
When they were rolling along again in their trucks, Nancy recalled how Tini had spent all her spare time back on the river shore, writing letters. Every night she had pushed her cot close to the lantern and sat under her mosquito bar to finish her writing. With her usual lack of consideration for others she kept the light burning till the tent swarmed with mosquitoes, moths and other insects.
“I bet she’ll try to mail those letters in spite of what Lieutenant Hauser said,” Nancy thought with disgust.
For the next twenty-four hours, however, there was no time to dwell on her tent mate’s tendency to insubordination. The nurses had thought they had stiff training in the swamp, but they truly got a taste of real training when their journey ended in the pine thicket at three that afternoon. No sooner were the ropes tied to the last tent peg than they were ordered to a near-by field.
They found several soldiers with guns in the bushy cover on the edge of the field. When the nurses came up in their coveralls and G.I. shoes, Sergeant Tanner gave them instructions.