Cherry Ames 05 Flight Nurse by Helen Wells Read Free Book Online

, F L I G H T N U R S E
    amazingly difficult things—helped take off plaster casts, made plaster bandages, took charge of a desk.
    Their favorite job was regularly visiting the patients with gifts of food. And how the lonesome GI’s enjoyed their visits!
    The young Cadets bobbed up with invitations for the nurses from their hospitable parents. Cherry was asked to dinner and to tea almost every day. She was disappointed that, so far, she was far too busy to accept.
    And then to her immense delight, Cherry received her first flight order. She was the envy of all Flight Three, for the others’ operational orders had not come through yet.
    Cherry was on the line at eight a.m. , dressed in her blue flying slacks, blouse, and cap—so excited, nervous, and happy she could hardly wait to get started. She waited in a small building—the “base operations”—on the air strip. Bunce, furiously chewing gum, was standing beside her. Like Cherry, he was wearing the white brassard with a Red Cross on his left sleeve. They had already carefully checked to see that straps, seats, and medical kit, were in place for patients. Bunce was too excited to talk. He merely sputtered.
    “If I do anything wrong—gosh, Miss Cherry, keep your eyes peeled—maybe you could catch my mistakes in time—”
    “You aren’t going to make any mistakes, Bunce. Calm down or you’ll explode into a million little pieces.” M Y S T E R Y O F M A R K G R A I N G E R
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    “Yes, ma’am! I’m calm! I’m calm like anything! Just—
    just—I mean—”
    “Well, here’s our pilot!” Cherry exclaimed.
    Captain Cooper strode down the air strip to the base operations hut, past the C-47’s with their motors idling.
    Lieutenants Mason and Greenberg marched together behind him, carrying their gear. Wade was not laughing this morning; he looked almost stern.
    “Good
    morning,
    Nurse.
    ’Morning,
    Sergeant.
    Parachute checkup. Line up, please.” Cherry nodded hello to the copilot and the radioman as they all lined up and Wade inspected their harness.
    “All right, everybody. Destination—Prestwick! Give it everything you’ve got.” Captain Cooper gave orders to his own crew, and to Cherry, “Nurse, whistle when you want me.”
    “Yes, Captain.”
    Wade stayed at the hut to make his necessary clearances and manifests—that is, records of crew, weights, weather, flight plan—and to make a last-minute weather check. The flight nurse and her technician walked on ahead to the plane.
    At the plane they were joined by the Flight Surgeon, plump little Major Thorne. Then the copilot backed up the C-47 to meet five ambulances rolling down the field. Cherry and Bunce ran, and Major Thorne puffed along too, to be on hand as the ambulance orderlies lifted out the litters.

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    C H E R R Y A M E S , F L I G H T N U R S E
    Cherry caught her breath as she looked into the first litter. She pressed her lips tightly together, to keep from weeping at what she saw. This was no healthy GI playing patient; this was a boy with his leg torn off. In the second litter handed down, lay a khaki-clad fellow whose face was white and set with pain; his tag showed that his spinal cord was severed. “Easy, don’t jolt him,” she cautioned the stretcher-bearers. She smiled at the lad.
    “How are you, fellow?”
    “I’m fine, Nurse,” he whispered.
    In the third litter was a boy in a leather jacket. His shattered jaw was held in place by wires, but his eyes smiled, because he was going home. In the fourth litter was a dazed-looking man. His medical tag read internal wounds and mental shock.
    As Cherry bent to look at each casualty, she directed, with the Flight Surgeon’s approval, where he should be placed in the plane. Then she hurried off to see that the litters went onto the elevator safely. She found that these skilled medical corpsmen were carrying off the whole loading process with the deftness and silence of a surgical operation. She beckoned to Bunce.
    “Sergeant,