Ruby Jackson - On a Wing and a Prayer

Eventually she came to a halt, remembering that Miss Partridge was coming to Sunday dinner. Heavens, being late will certainly spoil a perfect Sunday, she thought as she began to trot slowly back along the way that she had come, and I do want to see Miss Partridge.

She reached the rather rough road that wound its way across the area, and was about to quicken her pace when she heard the sound of a speeding motorbike. It sounded as if it was on this country pathway. What an odd place to ride a motorbike, Rose thought as she jumped off the pathway and onto the wide grass verge.

Rose’s older brothers had taught her to drive before she left school at the age of fourteen, and she was accustomed to delivering groceries in the family van, but their parents had never allowed either of their twin daughters to ride a motorcycle. ‘They’re too heavy for girls,’ Sam, their eldest brother, had agreed. ‘If you can’t lift it, you shouldn’t be riding it.’ Nothing the girls had said had persuaded him to change his mind.

The roar of the engine grew louder and closer. Rose moved further back on the verge, noting, with growing concern, both the poor surface of the road and the sound of the accelerating bike. Before she could think another thought or move a muscle, the bike was there and then…was gone.

‘Wow. Fantastic, what a speed, lucky—’ Rose began aloud, just as she heard a screech of brakes, followed by a thud. She listened but there was nothing but a terrifying silence.

For a fraction of a moment, she felt rooted to the spot, but the adrenalin lifted her out of the almost trance-like state and Rose Petrie, former junior sports champion, began to run. She was round the corner in moments. The motorbike was lying on its side across the pathway. Her stomach lurched in horror as she saw the driver pinned underneath. Rose kneeled down beside the machine and tentatively examined the unconscious man. How young he was, and how very, very still. His eyes were closed and there was severe grazing on one side of his jaw; blood was seeping from a wound in his forehead and mixing horribly with the dirt and gravel on his face.

Rose had no idea if he was alive or dead. She remembered her brother’s words – ‘If you can’t lift it, you shouldn’t be riding it’ – and wondered if it would even be wise to attempt to lift the machine off the young man’s body. Should she try somehow to clean his poor face? Water? In the wonderful films she had seen with her sister and their friends, the wounded hero was always given a sip of water. If she ran back to one of the ponds perhaps she could manage to wet a cloth, but she had no cloth. She looked again at the motorcycle, which was possibly crushing something important while she hesitated. Rose seemed to remember that any implement sticking into the body of an injured person should not be removed until qualified medical personnel were on hand, but what was she supposed to do with a machine that might well be crushing this man to death?

Thank God, Rose thought as she felt a faint pulse in the neck. Could he hear her if she spoke, and would that help him? ‘I’m going to try to move your bike,’ she said as calmly as she could. Oh God, what if I drop it back onto him? ‘I’m really very strong,’ she continued, hoping against hope that her low voice was reaching him, perhaps giving him some comfort. ‘I work in a munitions factory and lift machinery every day. You wouldn’t believe how heavy some of that stuff is.’

There was no response and so Rose stood up, took a deep breath, bent down, grasped the body of the bike firmly, and, having assessed in which direction to move, began to lift. The trapped rider groaned. He’s alive, he’s alive. I can do this. In another moment she had the bike on the grass verge. She wanted to fall down beside it, as every muscle in her well-toned body seemed to be complaining, but instead she looked for something with which to wipe the blood from his face.

Why did I change? She was wearing only a shirt and her shorts. Then she heard a voice, faint but clear.

‘Help me.’

Immediately she was back on her knees beside the injured man. ‘I’m going for help,’ she said. ‘I wish I could stay with you but there’s no one else here.’ She was pulling her shirt out of her shorts. Desperately she tried to tear off the bottom but the material resisted.

Rose looked around and her eyes lit up as she saw a large shard of glass from the broken headlamp. She picked it up and feverishly sawed at the shirt. At last there was a tear, which allowed her to rip it apart.

Praying that it was clean, she folded it and gently wiped the blood from the man’s face. ‘I wish I could do more for you but I’ll get help…’

The whisper was so faint that she had almost to put her ear to his damaged face. ‘Dispatch. Pocket. Urgent…Take.’

Again Rose looked round, hoping desperately that someone – anyone – was within hailing distance. No one.

She felt a touch on her hand. ‘Please.’

‘Of course, I’ll do what I can.’ With a hand now marked by his blood she tried the pocket of his leather jacket. Nothing. ‘It’s a dispatch. An inside pocket. Do you have…?’

His eyes blinked as if answering her. Rose reached inside his jacket, hoping that she was doing no damage to his poor body. There was a pocket, and inside was a fairly thick envelope. ‘Got it,’ she said. ‘I’ll run for help and then deliv—’

The eyelids fluttered again and the voice was fainter than before. ‘Urgent. Please.’

‘I’ll do it. Trust me. I’ll get you some help. Trust me,’ she repeated. ‘I’ll deliver your letter and I will bring help.’ As she spoke the last words she was already running. She had not run competitively since she was a schoolgirl, but she was fit and well. She tried to forget the injured, possibly dying dispatch rider, and the message that seemed to be burning a hole through her shirt. She had read the word on the front. ‘SILVERTIDES’. She knew the name only because she had occasionally delivered tea to the kitchen door of the great house. It was at least three miles away and she had a single mode of transport – her long legs.

Rose kept going. As she ran she remembered the words of her coach from those long-ago school days. ‘Long and longer strides for the first twenty paces; then accelerate until you think you can’t go any faster. Relax facial muscles.’ She almost flew, her long stride eating up the uneven ground. She tried not to think of the letter she was carrying, or the dispatch rider who had insisted that he be left, possibly to die, in order that the dispatch might reach its destination. The young man was in the military and was obviously about the same age as her brother Phil.

Twenty-three is too young to die, she thought fiercely, remembering the loss of her brother Ron, who had been even younger when he had given his life for his country.

‘Empty your head, girl, empty your head,’ came the order from the long-ago voice, and obediently Rose forced herself to concentrate on nothing but finishing the race.

She ran as she had never run before, oblivious of her screaming muscles, her labouring breath, her tears. Heel, outside of foot, rock off with the toes, over and over again; push with your ankles, drive with your elbows. For a moment she was in a bubble as she pulled remembered advice up from her subconscious, which helped her think only of technique and not of injured dispatch riders or important messages.

Ahead stood the gates of Silvertides Estate. With her last ounce of energy she reached them, clung to the bars to prevent her body sliding, exhausted, to the ground, and pressed the bell.

‘Don’t fuss, Mum, it was no more than a cross-country run.’