A Cuppa Tea and an Aspirin (37 page)

They then tiptoed in and out of the other rooms on the floor, staying a few minutes with any patient who seemed able to communicate with them. They
were made politely welcome. They did the same in the wards on the top floor.

Feeling completely depressed after looking into the faces of so many old, obviously fairly helpless patients, they slowly descended the stairs. Nowhere did they find anyone attending to the residents: and, in two cases, they themselves poured glasses of water for patients who asked for them.

Lavinia swallowed. Then she said slowly, ‘It's the silence that gets me. And their awful look of patient resignation. I've always found that old people love to talk their heads off.'

Edwina smiled in response. ‘It's true,' she agreed.

Finally, down in the hall, the indifferent Rosie, who was now cleaning the glass doors, unlocked them and ushered the ladies out.

At the bottom of the front steps, Lavinia took in a great breath of fresh air. In the trees birds sang, and in a nearby flowerbed early pansies bloomed.

‘Poor devils!' she ejaculated. ‘They should be out here, enjoying the sunshine.'

Edwina slowly pulled on her gloves, as she nodded agreement. ‘I wonder how many places there are like this?'

‘Too many, I suspect,' replied Lavinia soberly.

As they walked slowly back to her car, she said,
with considerably more spirit, ‘But we can see what we can do for this one.

‘You know, we should make our committee as strong as we can,' she continued. Her voice lightened. ‘Get a VIP to be president, at least a duchess. What do you say?'

Not to be outdone, Edwina replied, ‘What about our MP? He's a member of the Opposition. He could ask questions in Parliament about the care of the elderly, couldn't he?'

Lavinia cheered up considerably. ‘Brilliant! That would draw attention to other similar Homes, wouldn't it?'

‘It would.' Edwina sighed a sigh as gusty as any that Martha could produce. ‘I don't know how either of us is going to find the time for all this – both with kids and full-time jobs.'

They were, of course, unaware that a far more important lady than any duchess was taking an interest in two humble elderly women from the waterfront, who represented so many others. She thought a local Roman Catholic duchess, whose humble prayers she received from time to time, would be an excellent choice, and could perhaps be motivated to become a patron. She was a very capable woman.

To Edwina and Lavinia that afternoon it seemed
that they suddenly received a huge infusion of physical and mental energy. They both felt imbued by a sense of power for which they could not account.

As Lavinia unlocked the car door, she said thoughtfully, ‘You know, one day…'

Edwina smiled at her, as she immediately interjected, ‘One day, we'll be old, too.'

Their laughter was rueful, as they acknowledged this fact.

1965

A few days after Edwina's and Lavinia's visit, Martha emptied the box of chocolates, except for one, which she had determined to save for Angie.

To fill in the time and with an unfocused sense of gratitude for small wonders which seemed to be occurring, wonders like the promise of a walking stick, three nice visitors and a box of chocolates, she decided to say a full decade on her rosary. She was still at it, with eyes closed, when Angie came in with a tea tray for her.

‘Bread and margarine and jam and a slice of plain cake!'

Martha put down her rosary and looked disconsolately at the tray. It was what she would have eaten herself at home, provided she had had a main
meal at lunch time. But a small portion of liver and boiled potatoes, followed by inadequately cooked rice pudding, had not felt particularly filling.

‘What I wouldn't give for a good plate of ribs and cabbage cooked meself,' she sighed. Then, as she picked up her knife, she remembered Angie's unexplained day off the previous week. Out of curiosity, she asked, ‘Where were you, Angie? I missed you the other day.'

Angie was shaking a lethargic Sheila into wakefulness. ‘Just took a day off,' she replied absently. ‘Come on, Sheila, girl.'

As Sheila slowly sat up, Angie turned back to Martha, and added with an elfish grin, ‘Said I was sick to me stummick.'

‘Holy Mary! Matron'll fire you if you do that very often.'

‘I don't care. I went and got another job.'

‘You never!'

‘I did. Start in a month's time.'

Martha felt like someone about to be bereaved.

‘Where?' she asked dully, through a mouthful of bread and margarine.

Angie's face lit up.

‘Oh, Martha,' she whispered, ‘it's real nice. It's to look after an invalid lady. There's a little cottage by the gate where me and Star and Dad can live.
And he's going to be the gardener – he's that set up about it. It's near a village.'

‘Humph!' grunted Martha. ‘You'll be run off your feet with two houses to keep.'

‘No, I won't. She's got a housekeeper, too. All I got to do is look after Mrs Bowen herself, personal attendant – like I have to do for you and the others here. And look after Dad and Star, what I do now.'

Even sleepy Sheila, struggling to make her eyes focus, turned her head towards the aide, as Angie stood between the beds, and went on.

‘When I answered the ad, it were for a husband and wife; I thought I'd better tell her we was father and daughter. And I said we was black, 'cos some folks can't stand us.' She shrugged at her last remark, as if she accepted that it was a fact of life. ‘I really didn't think she'd answer. But she did – and we liked each other on sight.'

‘What about Star? She's got to get some learning,' said Martha, aware of her own great lack of it.

‘Mrs Bowen says she can go to the village school – and she'll ask the school teachers to watch her, so she don't get bullied.'

Martha was quiet, as she chewed. Then she said, ‘We'll really miss you, love, won't we, Sheila?
Don't know what we'll do without you.' Then she remembered the chocolate and took the little box out from under her pillow. She held it out shyly to the girl, and said, ‘I kept this for you. You was so busy this past day or two, I forgot to give it to you.'

A surprised Angie opened the box.

‘It's all I've got to give you, after I shared them with Sheila and the ladies,' Martha said with real regret. ‘Those two strange ladies who come to visit me give me a box of them.'

Angie came round the side of the bed to lean over the little woman. She put her arms round her and hugged her closely. She said, ‘I'll miss you, too. Tell you what, though, I'll write to yez – and maybe Sheila will read it for you.'

Sheila put down her mug of tea. Her head was clearing. ‘For sure, I will. Don't I get a hug, too?'

She was duly hugged.

Angie said, ‘I were talking to the cook downstairs, and there's a rumour that this place is to get a real overhaul. Department of Public Health, and all. Sounds as if things will be better for you.'

‘Oh, I hope you're right,' said Sheila fervently.

‘They might close it down if Matron don't pull her socks up,' warned Angie.

Martha looked shocked. Fear swept through her
of what those terrifying people, the Theys, could do once they got started. ‘Where would we go?' she asked apprehensively.

‘Right,' replied Sheila. ‘Where could they put us?'

It had not been Angie's intention to scare her two patients, and she said quickly, ‘Matron's nothing but a bloody bean-counter, for all she claims to be a registered nurse. But if They put enough pressure on her and watched her, this place could be quite good. One thing, if they put in a lift, then folk like you could move around.'

Sheila's grunt was dismissive.

‘Why not, Sheila? You could learn to lift yourself out of bed and into a wheelchair and away you go; with a few alterations in a kitchen, you could keep house in a flat. And I've caught Martha here walking not so badly.' Angie smiled down at her favourite patient.

Without much real hope, Sheila and Martha awaited events. They both noted with relief that no more nightly pills were pressed upon Sheila: a shaken Lavinia had told Dr Williams about it, and the outraged doctor had, over the telephone, reduced the Matron to tears, a phenomenal victory.

A week later, a sturdy walking stick was delivered
to the nursing home, with instructions from Dr Williams that it was for the use of Mrs Connolly, who was to be encouraged to walk. It was taken in by Rosie, who brought it upstairs to Martha.

Since the Matron rarely visited the first floor, it was some time before this dereliction of duty on Rosie's part was discovered: a jubilant Martha was already walking quite steadily on the day she bumped into Matron escorting Dr Williams upstairs to the second floor, where lay two more patients whom the doctor felt should, like Martha, be able to walk.

Dr Williams expressed his pleasure at seeing an upright Martha. The Matron said nothing. Looking at her face, Martha began to fear a pill.

She managed to get herself back into bed, and, after a moment's thought, lifted the stick in with her. ‘With that bitch, you never know: she might take it away.'

She leaned back on her pillow and spent the next several hours, including teatime, filled with foreboding, until Freda, the evening aide, shook her out of a doze.

‘Come on,' she said sharply. ‘Time for bed. Get out and do a pee before I put the lights out.'

Sheila was already perilously poised on a bedpan, and she giggled, as Freda went over to persuade the
dementias to do similarly. ‘No pills!' she whispered gleefully.

‘You're right,' responded Martha. ‘Thanks be!'

Martha said her prayers, her face alight.

Like a pair of Sleeping Beauties, they slept soundly and naturally, as hope lifted their spirits.

They awoke to the usual sounds of Angie's heavy tread across the wooden floor, and her cry, ‘Time for up, girls,' and then the nervous whimpers of the dementias, as they struggled up in their beds in alarm. A basin, with a ewer of warm water beside it, was plonked on a table beside the stroke victim, and she was swiftly wiped down.

Martha, who had for much of her life managed with little water, did not complain when her hands and face were washed in the same water. Sheila, however, refused to use it. An irritated Angie, who knew she was in the wrong, but was, as usual, hard-pressed, snatched up the basin, took it to the bathroom and threw the water away.

Without a further word, the basin was refilled from the ewer and presented to Sheila.

Looking as upright and determined as she must have done before she was disabled, a tight-lipped Sheila triumphantly washed her hands and wiped her face.

Though she was fond of Angie, Martha watched
the scene in awe. Sheila had actually corrected an aide! Long since drained from Martha was the determined optimism and physical strength which had got her through her earlier years, when she had fought to keep her family fed. Her later isolation in a respectable Protestant neighbourhood had also taught her to keep her mouth shut. Our Sheila was being real brave, she decided.

Angie had barely given the faces of the dementias a quick wipe, when the dumbwaiter rumbled up to their floor from the kitchen. She opened the tiny lift's wooden door and took out the ward's breakfast trays. Breathing hard, she carried the five trays, balanced on top of each other, to Martha's commode and dumped them down.

As a tray of porridge and slopped tea was handed to Sheila, which she was expected to balance precariously on her thighs as best she could, the invalid continued to be her usual acerbic self.

‘I feel I come from Glasgow,' she remarked to Martha, as she dipped her spoon into the milkless porridge. ‘With so much of this stuff, I'll be wearing a kilt next.'

Martha suddenly choked with laughter. Here was Sheila as she ought to be. She hoped frantically that pills could, for ever, be crossed off their list of nightmares.

They spent most of the morning discussing whether one really could arrange a scullery so that an invalid in a wheelchair might be able to cook.

‘I gave up me home,' confided Sheila. ‘It were a little house. I reckoned I was stuck for life in this place – and I may be yet. Me next-door neighbour what used to come to visit me in the hospital put some of my stuff in her attic, but most of it were sold.'

Martha nodded, her expression dismal. ‘Same with me,' she said. ‘I don't own nothing. And I lost touch with most of me friends when I moved to the Dingle.'

When they were supposed to be taking an afternoon nap, they were, instead, still enjoying a great game, as they explored ways to arrange a scullery for a wheelchair, and what fun they could have together cooking their favourite meals.

‘Tripe and onions!' cried Sheila.

‘Ribs and cabbage!' Martha almost shrieked.

They were still laughing at their wild bursts of imagination when the muffled sound of male voices arguing in the hall below drifted up to them.

They paused in their discussion, suddenly fearful that they had made too much noise.

Martha queried, ‘Doctor giving Matron what for?'

More than one pair of boots could be heard trudging up the long staircase.

1965

Both women looked up as, through the open door, two men almost burst into the room.

A dumbfounded Martha was engulfed in two sets of arms, as the men chorused, ‘Mam, Martha, thank God we've found you!'

As Martha looked into Number Nine's wide, innocent blue eyes, she burst into tears.

‘Oh, Jamie, love, I never thought to see you again.' She turned to the other young man, ‘Danny, me love. Oh, Danny!'