The Nightingale Nurses (5 page)

‘I don’t think so, Sir. This is my first day.’

‘That’s odd. I’m sure I’ve seen you before . . .’ He thought for a moment. ‘I know! Jubilee Day. Your leg needed stitches.’

Dora stared at him in astonishment as it all came back to her. Last year, at the street party for the King’s Jubilee, her sister Josie had gone missing and Dora had injured herself looking for her. ‘How did you remember—’

He winked at her. ‘I never forget a patient!’ He turned back to the man lying on the bed. ‘You see, Mr Gannon? Nurse Doyle survived my tender ministrations, so I daresay you will too. Now I’m going to give you a few more stitches to tidy you up. Do try to hold on, Nurse,’ he added, out of the corner of his mouth. ‘It really wouldn’t do for you to faint in front of the patient, would it?’

‘No, Doctor.’

‘If anyone’s going to pass out, it’ll be me!’ Mr Gannon said.

‘As long as it’s not me, we’ll be all right,’ Dr McKay quipped back.

Dora watched him laughing, bewildered. She had never seen a doctor joking with a patient before. But then, she had never heard a doctor say ‘please’ before, either.

Dr McKay pulled the last stitch tight, and snipped it off, then stood back to admire his handiwork. ‘Beautiful,’ he declared. ‘Even if I do say so myself. What do you think, Nurse Doyle?’

‘Very nice, Doctor.’

Dr McKay smiled and said, ‘You’ve done a very good job yourself, Nurse. Well done.’

As Dora flushed with pleasure at the unexpected compliment, Dr McKay turned to his patient. ‘We’ll see about getting you admitted to a ward, Mr Gannon. We’ll need to take care of you for a few days, make sure that wound is kept nice and clean until it heals properly. You can sort out the paperwork for me, can’t you, Nurse?’

‘Yes, Doctor.’

Dora went off, glad to escape from the dizzying heat of the consulting room. The sickly smell of blood still filled her nostrils.

She was making her way to the booking-in desk when Sister Percival stepped out from nowhere in front of her, blocking her path.

‘Nurse! Where on earth do you think you’re going?’ she demanded.

‘Dr McKay asked me to sort out a bed for his patient, Staff.’

‘In that state?’

Dora looked down at herself. She had been in such a hurry to escape the operating room, she hadn’t noticed her apron and dress were soaked through with blood.

Sister Percival’s brows rose. ‘Do you think it inspires confidence and a sense of well-being, having you wander about looking like Sweeney Todd?’

‘No, Sister. Sorry, Sister.’

Sister Percival sighed. ‘Go and get changed. I will attend to the patient’s paperwork. And be quick about it.’ She nodded towards the rows of wooden benches, which had filled up since Dora had been gone. ‘We have a busy day ahead of us, and I certainly don’t need nurses slacking.’

Slacking! Dora wanted to shout at her retreating back. It wasn’t even eight o’clock, and she had already been soaked with more blood than she liked to think about.

But Sister Percival was already off, addressing an old woman huddled in a corner. ‘You there! I hope you’re not thinking of sleeping here?’

Dora returned to the nurses’ home to change, then headed back to Casualty. No sooner had she walked in through the double doors than the nurse behind the desk summoned her over.

‘There you are,’ she said. ‘Percy was looking for you. One of the patients has vomited in Consulting Room Three, and she wants you to clean it up.’

‘Oh, no!’ Dora looked down at her clean apron and groaned.

The nurse smiled sympathetically. ‘You’ll get through a lot of clean uniforms in this department, I’m afraid.’

‘Is it always like this?’

‘Oh, it gets a lot worse than this, believe me. Sunday is usually a quiet day.’ The nurse was a couple of years older than Dora, with a long, solemn face and heavy lidded grey-green eyes. The hair that peeped out from under her cap was the deep gold of honey. ‘It’s a bit busier at the moment because Dr Adler, the other emergency doctor, is away at a conference in Switzerland, delivering some learned paper or other. He should be back in a week or two, I think.’ Her voice was a slow drawl. ‘As long as you keep on the right side of old Percy, you should be all right.’

‘And how do I do that?’

‘By doing everything twice as fast as she asks you to do it, and making sure you never let anyone sleep in here. Percy’s got a real thing about it. They come in here a lot, poor old things, especially when it’s raining. But Percy thinks they make the place look untidy.’ She smiled at Dora. ‘I’m Willard, by the way.’

She couldn’t have been more different from Sister Percival if she’d tried. Where Percival fizzed with energy, Willard was languid and graceful. Dora couldn’t imagine her doing anything at any speed, let alone twice as fast.

For the rest of the morning, Dora was kept busy. While Willard draped herself behind the counter, taking down the names of people as they arrived and managing them on a list in order of urgency, and Sister Percival prowled around the waiting room, making sure no patients died or, worse still, fell asleep while they were waiting, Dora and two first-years assisted Dr McKay in the consulting rooms. She cleaned wounds, changed dressings, applied hot flannels for shock, gave emetics and held hands. At other times she filled in paperwork, organised the transfer of patients up to the various wards, or got on her hands and knees and scrubbed up blood, vomit and all manner of other unpleasant things from the white-tiled walls and floor of the consulting room before the next patient arrived. It was astonishing how quickly she got used to the stench and the mess. She could hardly believe she’d turned so queasy at the sight of Mr Gannon’s arm that morning.

And when Dora wasn’t cleaning, or bandaging, or listening to the ward sisters carping about how they couldn’t possibly accept another patient on their hideously overcrowded ward, she was fending off Nurse Willard’s chatter.

The only thing Penny Willard did with any energy was to talk. Every time Dora skimmed past the booking-in desk, she would start again.

‘I’m so glad to have someone my age to talk to at last,’ she gushed, when Dora passed by on her way to collect another patient’s notes. ‘Percy’s not a bad old stick, but she’s ancient. And all she ever wants to talk about is her latest hiking holiday. Honestly, don’t let her start telling you about the Peak District, because she’ll never stop.’ She rolled her eyes heavenwards. ‘Do you have a boyfriend?’

Dora stared down at the notes she’d picked up. ‘No,’ she said quietly.

Penny sighed. ‘Me neither. It’s so hard, isn’t it? My last boyfriend ditched me because we never saw each other. How can you court someone properly when you only get half a day off every week? And even then you don’t know when it’s going to be. I was for ever having to cancel arrangements, and in the end he just got fed up. He’s going out with a shop girl now,’ she said mournfully.

Dora had started to edge back towards the consulting rooms when the double doors opened and Nick Riley came in, pushing a wheelchair. She stood, frozen, as he approached the counter.

‘I’ve come to collect a patient for Holmes ward,’ he said gruffly, his gaze fixed on the floor.

‘Consulting Room One.’

Dora listened to the rattle of the wheelchair as it disappeared down the corridor. She felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach.

‘I know what you’re thinking.’

She glanced up in dismay. Penny Willard sent her a knowing look. ‘He is rather attractive, isn’t he? If you like that brooding sort, I mean. But I’m afraid he’s taken,’ she sighed. ‘He got married yesterday.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s sad, isn’t it? The best ones get snapped up so quickly.’

Nick returned, pushing an elderly man in the wheelchair. He didn’t glance Dora’s way as he headed for the double doors.

‘I know what you mean,’ Dora said.

Helen and Charlie heard the guard’s whistle as they were buying their tickets. They reached the platform just in time to see the Southend train disappearing in a cloud of blackened steam.

‘Well, there goes our day out at the coast,’ Charlie said, as it rumbled out of sight.

Helen stared after it. ‘Oh, Charlie, I’m sorry. If Sister Sutton hadn’t insisted on me going to church this morning . . .’

‘Don’t worry, love. It’s not your fault.’

‘But you were so looking forward to it!’

‘I’m sure there’s another train later. We can have a cuppa in the station buffet and wait. We’ve got all day together, after all.’ He took her hand. ‘Come on, I might even treat you to a currant bun, if you’re good.’

Helen smiled reluctantly as he led her back down the platform towards the buffet. She had been looking forward to their day out too. For the first time in a month she had the whole day off. It was a good day for it; the relentless rain had finally given way to a crack of blue sky and spring sunshine, although darker clouds lingered in the distance.

Charlie had been keen to show her the seaside town where he’d spent so many happy childhood holidays.

‘You mean to tell me you’ve never been to Southend?’ He’d been genuinely shocked when Helen had asked him about it a few weeks earlier. ‘Blimey, girl, you don’t know what you’re missing. There’s all sorts there. The pier, Kursaal amusement park, the planetarium. You can even get a special lift that takes you up to the top of the cliff. Or we could just go cockling on the beach.’ He laughed at her blank expression. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve never been cockling, either?’

‘I don’t even know what it is.’ But she knew it didn’t sound like something her mother would approve of.

They found a table in the window of the station buffet, and Charlie lined up at the counter to order their tea and cakes. Helen offered to help, but he was insistent.

‘You spend enough time waiting on people,’ he said, pulling out her chair for her. ‘You deserve to be treated for a change.’

She watched him standing in line, leaning heavily on his stick. She worried about how he would manage with a tray of tea things, but knew better than to question him. Losing his leg in a factory accident had made Charlie fiercely independent and determined to prove he was just as capable as any able-bodied man.

He was certainly a man in her eyes. Helen felt quietly proud as she noticed the girl behind the counter smiling at him, so tall, fair-haired and handsome.

‘Was she flirting with you?’ Helen teased him when he returned to their table.

‘Just a bit.’ He grinned back. ‘But she gave me an extra big slice of sponge cake, so I’m not complaining.’ He slid the tray deftly on to the table with one hand. ‘See? Not a drop spilt.’

‘I didn’t think for a moment there would be,’ Helen replied primly.

‘Of course you didn’t!’ Charlie pulled out his chair and sat down, shifting his leg stiffly into place. ‘Well, this is nice, isn’t it?’ His mouth twisted. ‘Tea and a stale slice of cake in a station buffet. Don’t ever say I don’t know how to treat a girl.’

‘I don’t mind.’ Helen smiled, pouring the tea. ‘We can pretend it’s the Ritz.’

Charlie looked at her consideringly. ‘You know, you’re not like other girls, Helen Tremayne.’

‘I know.’ She grimaced.

‘I meant it as a compliment.’ He reached across the table and laid his hand on hers. ‘I love you. Have I told you that recently?’

‘Charlie!’ Helen glanced around, heat rising in her face. ‘People might be listening.’

‘I don’t care. I’d shout it from the rooftops if I could get up a ladder!’ He grinned.

Helen handed him his cup. ‘You’re incorrigible.’

‘And you use too many long words.’ He picked up his fork and started digging into his cake. ‘Come on, then. How was your first day in surgery? Seen any gruesome operations yet?’

Helen shook her head. ‘They wouldn’t let me near anything like that,’ she said. ‘All I have to do is sterilise the instruments, make sure the surgeons have exactly what they need laid out for each operation, and then scrub down the theatre afterwards.’

‘Sounds like a lot of hard work to me,’ Charlie said through a mouth full of cake.

‘It is,’ Helen admitted. ‘Everything has to be just right. And all the surgeons have their different preferences when it comes to the instruments they like to use, and there’s hell to pay if you get it wrong. Like yesterday, when Mr Latimer was doing a laparotomy, and I put out the Dever’s retractors . . .’ She broke off, seeing Charlie’s fork poised halfway to his mouth. ‘Sorry, you don’t want to listen to me going on and on about hospitals and operations, do you?’

‘Who says? I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t want to know, would I?’ Charlie shook his head. ‘Stop apologising. You don’t go on and on, and even if you did, I love listening to you. Your work is a lot more interesting than my woodworking factory. Who wants to hear about boring old lathes?’

‘I do,’ Helen insisted loyally.

‘Well, I don’t want to talk about them.’ Charlie put down his fork and sat back. ‘So what are the people like? I suppose the Sister’s just as fierce as all the others?’

‘Worse, if anything!’ Helen shuddered. ‘Theatre Sisters have a reputation for being a tough and unforgiving bunch, and Miss Feehan more than lives up to it. She turns me into a nervous wreck even when she’s trying to explain something. I nearly fainted dead away yesterday when she was describing how to take instruments out of the steriliser. And as for the surgeons . . . they’re absolutely terrifying. They’re treated like gods. The only time they notice us nurses is when we drop an instrument, or take too long passing them something, or breathe too loudly.’

Charlie laughed. ‘They don’t tell you off for breathing, surely?’

‘Mr Latimer does. He has to have complete silence while he’s operating, apparently. He once had a junior nurse thrown out for sneezing while he was trying to take out an appendix.’

‘So there are no handsome young surgeons I need to worry about?’ Charlie lifted a quizzical brow.

Helen pretended to think for a moment. ‘Well . . . there is one,’ she admitted slowly. ‘He’s a registrar on Gynae. Tall, dark and a devil with the ladies, apparently. I haven’t seen him operate on anyone yet, but the Theatre nurses all seem to find him very dashing.’