Nurse Kelsey Abroad (5 page)

“Nurse Wroe. She’s settled down now, but I’ve never fathomed quite why she came out here in the first instance, unless it was because her boy-friend was killed in a car accident and she’s had a horror of the Western ways of fast traffic, speedy highways, and all manner of
modern
civilisation ever since. She’s certainly escaped it in coming here, so if that’s why she did it I’m not surprised she’s settled down. Then there’s Karleina, Marietta and Julianice,” she rolled the names off her tongue dramatically. “They’re three pleasant girls, and you’ll get along very well with all of them, if you remember they aren’t in the least "accustomed to the disciplined training people like ourselves expect when they enter Preliminary Training School. There was another girl, Vozva,” she ended slowly. “I never did find out why she left. One day she was there, the next there were four officials in Dr. Lowth’s room for hours and hours.
Some time later we saw Vozva being helped into one of the state police cars, and that was the last we saw of her. Nobody ever mentions her. I once said something about it to Dr. Jim and he immediately told me it was none of our business and a matter of state security, so that was that. I wonder what became of her?” she reflected aloud. “She wasn’t at all a pleasant girl, but she was useful, and the patients liked her.”

“I suppose there must have been some reason for it all,” Jane said, making a mental reservation not to query the whereabouts of any missing staff at any time. “But when do I report to Dr. Lowth?” she repeated her earlier question.

“Normally we would have been across and in his office shortly after your arrival,” Ann said crisply. “As it is, there was an emergency this morning, and he’s somewhere up country doing what he can to help. He left word for me to show you round the hospital, entertain you, brief you and give you a general idea of what’s expected of you, and to take you along to meet him in the morning. Eight a.m.—normal starting hours, so that shouldn’t be too difficult, unless you’re worn out by your travels?”

“Not worn out,” Jane corrected with a smile, “but eaten by curiosity, I must confess. I’ve spent a holiday or two in France, one on the Costa Brava and two in Switzerland. Apart from that I’ve absolutely no experience of life in any other place than Rawbridge, which isn’t exactly the hub of the world!”

“And this isn’t really
the place to begin,” Ann commented, “but you’ll find it interesting, providing you can keep on the right side of firstly Jim Lowth—and that means just being a good nurse and keeping out of sight when off duty—and authority. That means,” she made a wry face, “leaving the locals to amuse themselves in their own way, attending to them when they need you and leaving them strictly alone at all other times. There’s the odd one or two, of course, who are perfectly harmless. I’ll take you to meet a lovable old couple if there’s time before I leave. If there isn’t I’ll leave you their address and a note of introduction. They both speak English. He was a worker with the Allies in the war years and she nursed a little. She’s by no means fully trained, but she can help a great deal when we happen to be short-handed, and that often happens out here. Here you are,” she offered the plate of cakes and a steaming huge cup of fragrant tea. “Sorry I’ve not made a full meal, but I thought you’d prefer to try the local dishes first and see how you make out. I warn you, they’re all highly spiced, but apart from that I think you’ll find them enjoyable. There’s a great deal of fruit eaten, and that helps a lot in a ba
s
ic diet. When you’re ready
...
”

Jane enjoyed her tea and ate two of the small cakes which were a mixture of savoury inside and sweet coating, strangely palatable. Ann made herself a second cup of tea, and when Jane refused another hastily finished her own and announced that she was ready to leave.

It did not take long for the two girls to freshen up, powder their noses—and Jane smiled a little as Ann warned her, “Too much make-up marks you immediately as a member of the decadent society.” It would be no hardship to use little make-up, for she seldom used more than a light touch of foundation powder-cream and an equally light touch of lipstick in one of the fashionable paler shades.

They were ready almost at once, and Ann showed Jane how to regulate the stove so that a small but constant heat came from it.-

“It seems warm enough at the moment,” she observed, “but the nights here are chilly right to the middle of summer. If you look after your fuel ration—each flatlet is allowed so much in addition to have the hot water and so forth maintained by the main boilers to the block
—
you’ll keep fairly warm all the year round. It took me the first winter to find that out for myself, and I wouldn’t have realised the best way to do it even then, if Granny Hansvitch—the old lady I mentioned—hadn’t shown me how to damp down the stove, and so conserve my supplies so that there’s a surplus in the really cold weather.”

“I thought coal was one of the main exports here?” Jane asked as Ann switched off the light and prepared to lock the door.

“That’s why fuel mustn’t be wasted,” she was told. “The more used in home consumption the less there is available for export, and the Dalasalavians are going all out for export of any and everything they can produce.”

“One has to admire
...”
Jane was beginning, and broke off in mid-sentence as a tall, very thin old man emerged from the small, box-like room at the foot of the stairs. Ann spoke to him, and he replied, if the noncommittal grunt he emitted could be said to
merit the title “reply”.

“Who’s he?” Jane asked, disregarding the quality of her question. “He didn’t look very happy.”

“He’s all right, I think,” Ann smiled as she scanned the long, not too wide street for a taxi. “He’s the caretaker I mentioned. N
o
matter what time you come in or go out, he’ll know. I don’t think he ever sleeps, or if he does it’s in cat-naps and he keeps one eye and both ears wide open. I always get on all right with him. His English is limited to ‘nice day’ and ‘good morning’ or ‘good night’ as the case may be, but he’s never been any trouble where I’ve been concerned. I just don’t like the thought of anyone snooping around all the time, but” she shrugged, “I suppose that’s what he’s paid to do so he’ll do it to the best of his ability. Just don’t give him anything to be suspicious about and you’ll be fine.”

“All this sounds very restricting,” Jane commented, but she still found it hard to believe this
sort of life could really happen.

“It is,” Ann took her by the arm and hurried her along the street. “But there’s no need to panic if you remember what I’ve told you and mix only with the people the authorities approve of. There are plenty of them,” she paused as they .entered a broader and more important
-
looking street and waited under a lamp. “They’re just
—
by our standards—rather dull,” she observed quietly, “but that doesn’t matter. What free time you have you’ll fill in quite well with one or the other of them, and on the whole you’ll enjoy life—if you want to,
and
if you remember to respect their ideas.”

“I’ll try,” Jane promised, a little bewildered by all these pros and cons which were a totally unexpected result of her acceptance of this post. “Why are we standing here?”

“One of the only two taxi ranks, if you can call them that,” Ann explained. “There are four taxis in Seonyata. The one I took to meet you is the best of them, and he stands here when he’s free—he and his brother. The other two operate from the other side of town and are the greatest pair of bone-shakers you’d find in a million years, but their owners are very proud of them. It’s just that I like what creature comfort I can get without inconvenience, and
...
here we are!” she interrupted herself as an ancient vehicle pulled up under the light. “After you.”

She handed Jane into the cab which looked strangely like a long-discarded London taxi, but Jane couldn’t be sure of that, muttered some instructions to the driver, and they were off, heading, Jane knew not where.

They seemed to have been driving for about seven or eight minutes when the taxi pulled up before the one lighted doorway in a street of darkened houses and shops.

A swinging lantern above the door, with a painted picture of a man seated before a meal, knife and fork at the ready, indicated their arrival, and, looking about her with intense curiosity, Jane followed Ann indoors.

Ann led the way to a small table at the far end of the room where they could observe the other diners without being in the limelight themselves. A waiter approached, and Ann gave the order, leaning back and pulling off her gloves as the man went to bring their food. Suddenly she gave a little gasp.

“Glory be,” she said briefly and fervently. “He must have got through in record time and felt the need of sustenance! Don’t look round for a moment, I’ll tell you when. Dr. Jim’s dining alone at the table by the door!”

Perhaps it was the strangeness of her surroundings, perhaps it was because she was tired after two days of constant travel, but whatever the reason, Jane suddenly felt her heart begin to pound, her cheeks to grow hot and she looked round a little desperately in the direction of the door.

There was only one table with a single occupant, all the rest had either two or more diners seated opposite or close to one another, all apparently absorbed in their own affairs.

The man who was alone had quite obviously followed closely upon the heels of the two girls, for he was still in the process of discarding his top-coat and hanging it on a nearby clothes stand. As he turned round to seat himself at the table, Jane had a full view of his rather attractive face.

He looked to be in his middle thirties, with a high forehead and a broad, not unintelligent face. His jaw looked square and rather forbidding, but the eyes under the level, thick brows looked round the restaurant as though seeking for someone. They were widely spaced, and, at this distance, Jane guessed them to be hazel and long
-
lashed. There was absolutely no evidence to support this theory, but s
o
mehow this was the impression she had received. His mouth was firm and well-shaped, but she had a peculiar flash of intuition in w
h
ich she knew perfectly well, without being told, that mouth could set in stem, forbidding lines and that its owner could be, on occasion, totally uncompromising.

‘‘He looks
...
stem,” she said in a whisper, and Ann nodded, but before she could comment it was obvious he had seen them. He rose, leaving the table where the astonished waiter had just placed his plate of soup, and came to stand beside Ann.

“Nurse Palmer?” he said in an enquiring tone. “Hadn’t you better introduce us? I take it this is our
...
replacement for your services?”

Jane felt a momentary sense of shock. If he had said “I take it this is Staff Nurse Kelsey” or simply “our new staff nurse” she had the absurd idea it would have sounded more friendly. In addition, the rather chilling words, politely spoken though they were, had been accompanied by a cool, appraising stare which seemed to search her very soul, so that she was scarcely conscious of having made the correct responses as Ann performed the introduction.

“Would you mind if I joined you?” Dr. Lowth asked almost immediately, dispensing with the friendliness Jane might well have read into the suggestion by adding: “It would save so much time when Nurse comes along for interview in the morning.” ‘

Ann nodded permission without consulting Jane. In any event, she reflected wryly, she could scarcely object to his joining them at their table! He turned and spoke to one of the passing waiters, and almost before they all had time to seat themselves the man had brought fresh soup and placed it before the doctor, talking rapidly in
the language Jane felt in bewilderment she would never be able to follow.

“He was merely saying Doctor Lowth’s soup would be cold and he had therefore brought a fresh plateful, and could he amend our order,” Ann explained, adding: “I told him we’d have soup as well. At first I thought it might be too highly concentrated for you, but it always
is
rather strongly flavoured, so you’d better see how you like it now instead of when you’re summoned to some function or other and finding yourself faced with it for the first time.”

Jane, whose previous intake of soups had been mainly that of the canned or packet conventional varieties, mushroom, beef broth, vegetable or chicken, and a varied assortment of her mother’s excellent home-made stews, dipped in a wary spoon when the plate was placed before her.

She wasn’t unpleasantl
y surprised. She had once been
to a dinner where they had served game soup, and the taste of the soup she had before her now was very similar, but, as Ann had warned, more emphatic. There were also an obviously multiple addition of flavours to which she could not put a name, but which tantalised the palate, and, as the soup was swallowed, seemed to set up a glowing feeling in her stomach which was not altogether unpleasant. Ann was watching f
o
r her reactions from the other side of the table, and when Jane set down her spoon Ann asked immediately: “How do you like it?” As Jane, feeling as self-conscious as a child at a party, said, “It’s unique, but on the whole I do rather like it,” Jim Lowth nodded and gave what she decided must be his most professional smile.

“Then you’ll manage very well, Nurse,” he observed. “You’ll find soup on every menu in this place, and after a time one grows accustomed to the taste. That one,” he tapped the side of his empty bowl, “had a great deal of
goat meat in it. Whatever else it had that stood out a mile. Nearer the river and the huge, fresh-water lake you’ll have a variety of fish soups. All of them are so strongly flavoured, however, that at first you’ll feel the need of a private detective if y
o
u really want to know what you’ve been eating
!
”

Dutifully Jane smiled, wondering what sort of man this was who, while obviously doing a job of importance, could discuss at length the peculiar tastes of the soups of the country in which he worked.

“Maybe he’s secretly trying out my own reactions,” she thought, sensing his gaze on her bent head. “I wouldn’t care what the food’s like. I came out here because I wanted to travel, to see how some of the other people in the world live—and to escape from Dudley,” her mind added honestly, but she refused to think about Dudley now.