Here is the story of the courageous young women who served at Pearl Harbor, Corregidor, Anzio, Battle of the Bulge, Iwo Jima, and other fighting fronts of the Second World War.

When Nurse Dani Sutton had an opportunity to go to State University for postgraduate studies in medicine, she jumped at the chance. At State a whole new world opened to her, a world of bright, happy young people, far removed from the pain and poverty she had seen at run-down Community Hospital And handsome young Professor Slade Davis wanted her there, too — permanently.

Then Dani got a letter with just one sentence in it, and her safe world turned upside down. The letter was from Dr. Barney Conrad, and it said, “When are you going to start being a nurse again?” And Dani had to decide which life held her loyalty and which man held her heart.

Was this love in disguise — or a threat to her future?

When Nurse Delora Lambert boarded the train for Chicago, she left behind everything she knew and loved. Behind her was the unwanted sympathy of friends who told her it would only be a matter of time before she forgot she’d been jilted two weeks before her marriage.

Would her new job give her the incentive to start anew? And could the unexpected attention of two handsome new acquaintances threaten her firm resolve never to fall in love again?

“Well, now you’re on your own, Cherry Ames,” said the nurse supervisor. “Now you’ll be the one and only nurse responsible for good public health nursing service in this entire county. Just you, Cherry.”

“I’m scared and delighted all at once,” Cherry said. “All those families! We visited only a sampling of them. All those towns and villages!”

Cherry and Miss Hudson had just returned from their last visit together to the twenty-five square miles of Cherry’s county in southeastern Iowa. It was a lovely countryside of thriving farms, where some ten thousand persons lived and worked, and where their children attended rural schools.

“Scared or not,” Cherry said, “I feel I’m off to a good start, Miss Hudson. I learned a lot driving around with you, nursing under your supervision during this training period.”

“I think you’ll do fine,” her supervisor encouraged her. “I’ll visit you regularly, and you’ll come to monthly meetings with my fourteen other county nurses. Between times, if you need any advice or extra help, you can always phone or write me at the regional office upstate. Of course all the specialized facilities of the State Health Department are open to your patients on your request.” Miss Hudson smiled at her reassuringly. “And Dr. Miller, as health officer and your medical adviser, will confer with you frequently here in your office.”

Cherry had been assigned this rather bare office on the second floor of the county courthouse in the small, quiet town of Sauk. Sunlight sifting through the trees outside shone on file cabinets and tables stacked with county health records and pamphlets about community health.

“I’m glad,” Cherry admitted, “that Dr. Hal Miller is young and as new on his county job as I am on mine. Makes it easier to work comfortably together.”

Cherry stopped in front of the Hilton Hospital and glanced at her wrist watch. She was not due to be on duty for twenty minutes. She stood for a moment, enjoying the sunshine and the fresh, sweet air of spring. What a glorious morning!

In the sky overhead a small plane was circling about. Shading her eyes with her hand, Cherry watched it it descend slowing in widening spirals and bank to come in for a landing at the new private airport outside Hilton.

“I wouldn’t mind being up in a place myself this morning,” Cherry thought dreamily.

“Nurse Ames, you have a very bad case of spring fever,” she heard a voice boom.

Startled, she turned her head and saw Dr. Watson, a wide grin on his face, beside her. “Check that fever at the door,” he told her, laughing. “It’s highly contagious.”

“Good morning, Doctor. You sneaked up or I would have heard you, “she accused him as he started up the walk. Her eyes followed his clumsy, bearlike figure to the entrance. She had a warm spot in her heart for Dr. Ray Watson who was in charge of Men’s Orthopedic Ward. He had been patient, understanding, and always cheerful when she was a nurse on his ward.

Cherry was now one of the Emergency nurses and was often the nurse on one of his cases. Dr. Watson handled accident cases involving orthopedics, such as fractures and other conditions which caused interference with the use of bones and joints.

Cherry forgot the sunny sky and the plane and walked through the door into the antiseptic small of the hospital. The quick change from the air outside made her nose prickle as always, but the odor quickly became familiar and she felt completely at home.

“Good morning, Miss Ames.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Peters,” Cherry returned the greeting from the head nurse on Orthopedic Ward.

“Whenever you’ve had enough of Emergency,” Mrs. Peters said with a smile, “remember, I can always use an extra nurse.”

“I’ll say we can,” declared Nurse Ruth Dale, as she came in the door and fell in step with Cherry. “We’re always short of nurses, you know that.”

“Hospitals are always short of nurses,” agreed Cherry. They went on down the corridor toward the section where the nurses had their lockers. “It’s a complaint as common as the common cold, or haven’t you heard?” Cherry asked airily.

Ruth made a face at her, taking the teasing in good nature. She and Cherry had been on duty in the same ward and had been good friends for a long time. Ruth was frank to say that Cherry was shining proof that beauty and brains went together. Cherry’s dark-brown, almost black eyes, black curly hair, and red cheeks, which had won her the name of Cherry, always called forth admiring remarks. Her patients appreciated her cheerful presence.