The Healing Time

by Lucilla Andrews

  ‘If he did, he didn’t say so. I don’t think he did.’

  Suddenly she was scarlet. ‘I’m awfully sorry. I quite forgot you’re a widow. I didn’t mean to be tactless.’

  I said truthfully, ‘That might have upset me once. Not now. The me then isn’t the me now. And I now genuinely prefer to be treated as an ordinary human being without the kid gloves, or the label.’

  Her high colour faded. ‘Did that take a long time?’

  I looked backwards. ‘Yes. Marcy’s his spitting image, and for ages every time I looked at her I saw him. Now I just see her.’

  ‘She miss him?’

  ‘She must miss not having a father, because even though she can’t remember him, she’ll know other kids have fathers. No kids like to be different. As she was only two weeks old when he died, no, not Marcus as a person in her life. And as we’ve nearly always lived with these cousins, David Clinton, the husband, provides a very real kind of father-figure in her background.’

  ‘Joel Kirby said that too. We’d quite a chat about you.’

  ‘So I gather.’

  ‘His clips had dug themselves in. I’m afraid I had to hurt him and it sort of took off both our minds to chat about you.’ The late visitors were beginning to go. ‘I must take myself off. Have a good night.’

  ‘Thanks. Good luck with the R.L.’

  ‘I need more than luck. I need hormone shots!’

  Nurse Carter appeared and draped herself over Nanny. ‘Staff, Mrs Bridger’s just had a row with her husband. He’s stalked off and she’s in tears. I thought I should tell you.’

  ‘Yes, thanks. I’ll see if I can sort things out.’

  ‘Do you like me to tell you things?’

  ‘Please.’

  She was a conscientious and literal girl. For the next two nights if a patient sneezed, took a sip of water, or as in Mrs Bridger’s case shed a couple of tears because hubby had been rude about her mother’s cooking, Carter arrived at my elbow and tied her arms and legs in knots as she kept me in the picture.

  Inevitably, she threw in Joel’s sick-leave plans. ‘Dig that, Staff!’

  I had now had this in strict confidence from five people. ‘I dig,’ I said flatly.

  By that Friday night Paul’s bed was back at a normal angle, his transfusion had been discontinued after his fourteenth pint and after Maggie had consulted privately and separately with Dr Rowlands and Mr Brown, Audrey East had been allowed to spend ten minutes sitting by his bed holding his hand. Her framed photo now ornamented his bedtable. She had long brown hair, good eyes, a sweet sexy mouth and tough chin.

  On Saturday night she was leaving the ward as Carter and I arrived on. I recognised her from her photo, but she spoke first. ‘You’re the Staff Holtsmoor Paul’s talked so much about and who I’ve talked and talked to on the phone.’

  ‘That’s me, Miss East.’ I had run into Grey in the park, so could safely add, ‘I hear he’s had a good day.’

  ‘Nurse, wonderful ‒’ She began to cry with relief and like a child. She didn’t attempt to mop her tears and let them roll down her face. ‘I’ve just been talking to that little Irish doctor. He says Paul’ll sit out in a chair for a little tomorrow. I can’t believe it. You’ll think I’m stupid, but on Thursday night I kept feeling he was going to die. I prayed and prayed like crazy. And that was cheating as I never pray. Do you think God minded?’

  Carter was an agonised knot of sympathetic embarrassment. I said, ‘I don’t think so.’ I had loaned Audrey East a tissue and my shoulder before I saw the full cause of Carter’s embarrassment. Joel was talking to Liz in Sister’s day office a few feet off. Joel had on a new and midnight-blue tie-silk dressing-gown over black silk pyjamas. Liz was in uniform. Maggie was seated at the desk and looking alternatively sympathetic and disapproving. She was halfway through her report when Joel paused on his way back to his room. ‘Thank you very much for the loan of your day office phone, Sister.’

  ‘Not at all, Dr Kirby,’ she retorted icily. ‘I’m only sorry the portable machine is still up in Luke.’

  There had been another patients’ general post that day. Mr Brown’s old bone-graft had returned to us from the old blocks and was in William, Four. His full name was Rosser Martin Smith, he was thirty-nine, married, but as his wife was presently in another hospital, he had given his father as next-of-kin. He had originally sustained gross fractures in both legs as well as internal injuries in a car accident and was due in the theatre tomorrow to have another stage on his hip graft completed.

  As it was my job to know I asked, ‘Which hospital is his wife in, Sister? And what’s wrong with her?’

  Maggie sniffed. ‘I have not been informed, Staff. Naturally, I have enquired. But I have been informed by the Office that Mr Smith prefers not to discuss the matter ‒ as he is perfectly entitled to do being of age and having provided us with a next-of-kin. I can only guess there may be some domestic trauma in the background. I wouldn’t object to that’ ‒ another sniff ‒ ‘but in confidence I will tell you that I object most strongly to Sister Brecklehurst’s manner when imparting this information!’ Suddenly, she shed her starch. ‘That girl hasn’t the manners of a Glasgow cabbie! She sailed in here just now, demanding Dr Kirby. I said he was using my office phone and without so much as a by your leave she was away after him! She treats him ‒ and my ward ‒ like her personal property!’

  Mr Smith was still allowed up that night. He needed two sticks, but walked remarkably well in view of his relatively recent accident. He was a large man with darkish slightly greying hair and a very cheerful face. I liked his voice. It was nearly as deep as Joel’s and deep male voices have always been one of my weaknesses. I liked still more his amiable attitude to his forthcoming op. ‘Hell of a bore, Staff, but if one will drive fast cars too fast on wet roads it’s not much use beefing when the bill comes in, particularly when one’s damned lucky to be alive to foot it. But for Messrs Brown and Co. and all the nurses in Arthur Ward, I’d have been six feet down these last few months. Want me to get back to bed now? Right! Then do I get a nice Mickey Finn to see I’ve a good night-before?’

  ‘I see you’re an old hand, Mr Smith.’

  ‘My dear Staff! Lesser patients come to St Martha’s. I am St Martha’s, and what’s more I’ve the scars to prove it! You wouldn’t care for a stitch-by-stitch account? I’ve been dining out on them for weeks! I wonder, would that be why people have stopped asking me out to dinner?’

  ‘Perish the thought!’

  If he kept out of fast cars he should live to be a fat man. He already had a fat man’s chuckle.

  ‘Do tell me, aren’t you a contemporary of Miss Brecklehurst?’

  ‘Yes.’ I put away his sticks as he was back in bed. ‘She told me you worked in her father’s old firm. Quite a coincidence, her being your special in Arthur.’

  ‘It was more than a coincidence,’ he replied gravely, ‘since she’s the person to whom I know I owe my life. The others were magnificent, but she saved me by flatly refusing to let me die.’

  I thought of the tenacity in Liz’s face and realised why she had wanted to see him on Thursday. No nurse-patient bond is stronger than the one between a special nurse and D.I.L. patient. I was not at all surprised late that night when Liz enquired after him as if he were still on the D.I.L. If I was around when Paul Streeter next came in and I was in a position to use a phone, I’d use it. The same for Mr Worstley. And to a lesser extent, for Joel. I hadn’t forgotten any of the events leading up to Joel’s illness but these last six nights had wholly altered my attitude to them as well as to himself. Though I was now seeing very much less of him as his clips were out and he was sleeping well again, I had noticed his attitude towards me had undergone as great a change. Maybe later we would go back to fighting it out, but I suspected we were more likely to live in peace. I was very glad. I had outworn, and perhaps very belatedly out-grown, old passions and new strains.

  On Sunday morning I was as tired as I ever remembe
red. I put my head round Joel’s door at the end of my final round to say I was off till Tuesday. He was now in the dark red pyjamas that had once given Parsons great joy. The colour and the rest suited him. He looked years younger whilst still very much his spruce 1969 self. He was writing a letter on the bedtable across his bed. ‘Only two nights? You look as if you can use a month off.’

  ‘That takes care of my morale! Never tell a woman she looks tired! Bad as telling her she looks her age.’

  ‘Oh, God! Aren’t we on speaking terms again?’

  ‘Definitely not. That is, after you’ve told me how you feel for my handing-over report.’

  ‘For the record, fine. Off, fed to the back teeth with this life of ease, idleness, and luxury.’

  ‘Cheer up. They’ll soon sling you out.’

  ‘Can’t be too soon for me. Then I’ve got to have a month. When’s your holiday?’

  ‘I forget the exact date as it starts five days after Marcy breaks up, but as she does that on a Thursday, and I’ll be off from Friday morning, I get my nights off tacked-on.’ I smiled sleepily. ‘Seventeen glorious nights in bed. Who could ask for more?’

  ‘How well I recall that feeling. Going away?’

  ‘I think Holtsmoor House for my second week. My mother-in-law and her husband should by then be back from Majorca, and she’s asked us down.’

  He seemed about to question that, but all he said was, ‘I hope you get good weather.’

  ‘And you. Enjoy your sick-leave.’

  ‘I haven’t gone yet ‒ but in case they do chuck me out before you get back, thank you very much for nursing me so kindly.’

  ‘No trouble at all. Take care of that wound. See you when we both get back, if not on Tuesday night.’

  ‘Hey! Wait!’

  I had all but closed the door. I opened it. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Have you got the time and strength to come right in? If this is the big farewell scene, there’s something I want to tell you, but not with the entire ward listening in.’

  I went in, closed his door, and leant on his footrail. For no particular reason, I suddenly felt rather ill. I watched him light a cigarette and for something to say, said, ‘I thought you’d given up?’

  ‘With sex and alcohol temporarily out, leave me one vice, Pip.’ He inhaled. ‘This is going to be dodgy since it doesn’t concern me and Liz has asked me to swear you in before I kick off. I know that’s unnecessary, but ‒ well ‒ you’ll understand all when you hear all. Just for you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said wearily. Liz and Joel had both been too long at the top, if they seriously believed ‘all’ was not known and discussed by half Martha’s. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Poor girl, you are tired! I’ll keep it as short as possible, but first Liz wants me to say she’ll be much happier if you are in the picture ‒’ He stopped as Carter knocked and opened his door.

  ‘Staff, I’m awfully sorry, but I thought I should tell you Mr Lane’s vomited again.’

  ‘He has? Oh yes, thanks. Sorry,’ I said to Joel, ‘I must go. I’ll come back if I can.’

  ‘If you can, please do.’

  I could not get back. The day nurses were already on-duty and by the time Mr Lane’s stomach had settled Maggie was waiting for my report. In Martha’s as most hospitals, it was considered the worst possible etiquette for the night staff to return to any patient after the handing-over report.

  In one way I was sorry. Only in one way. That way was sufficiently disturbing to make me hope very much that Joel would be gone when I got back on Tuesday night. I had liked having him as a patient, but enough, as they said, was enough.

  Chapter Fifteen

  A MATERNAL ACUTE-ANXIETY STATE

  The massive box of chocolates arrived whilst I was fetching Marcy from school on Tuesday afternoon. The chocolates came with a card; ‘Dear Pip, Thank you very much, Yours Joel.’ David glanced at Ann as he helped himself. ‘The king is dead; long live the king!’

  I said, ‘Sorry, Annie, but this one’s on another list.’

  Marcy surveyed the open box with an expression in which infant greed and feminine smugness were equally mixed. ‘My Doctor just knew we liked chocolates so that’s why he’s sent us some.’ She shoved a chocolate toffee into one side of her mouth and asked for another for the other. ‘Then I can look like a balloon.’

  I told her she did that already. ‘You finish that one first. No, darling, I do not want to see it!’

  ‘Be a devil, Pippa! Let the kid live dangerously!’ David picked out another toffee. ‘Don’t choke on this, Marcy, or Mummy’ll clobber me!’

  ‘All right,’ I said, ‘and God help her psyche.’

  Marcy had pottered off with Dusty. David said he didn’t think Marcy’s psyche needed any help. I told him about that phone conversation with George.

  ‘End of a beautiful friendship,’ put in Ann gloomily. ‘I, for one, am very sorry!’

  ‘I’m not.’ David took another chocolate and dropped the paper in the basket. ‘Marcy didn’t like him, and I think he resented her. No future there.’

  I asked, ‘She tell you she didn’t like him? She never told me.’

  ‘She didn’t tell me. It was just very obvious from the sidelines.’ He chewed reflectively. ‘Pity My Doctor’s booked. She likes him.’

  Ann snorted. ‘And Pippa doesn’t!’

  I said nothing.

  The Rowlands-Brown feud had been dying down. That night the fire had gone out as a new one had been lighted by Dr Bush, and the Wing residents were a band of brothers united in their indignation.

  ‘There’s no doubt the man was in his rights to insist that for the duration of this present emergency no patient, whether medical or surgical, comes into any Martha’s bed without his signature on the admission form. The rule’s right there in the book, though no S.M.O. has apparently availed himself of it since the last war. But they’d no Wing then. You’ll imagine,’ said Brendan Cousins, ‘it’s not been well received.’

  ‘Very clearly.’

  ‘And the man made matters worse by going through the present Wing bedstate with a toothoomb. The shake-up you’ve had here has been repeated in every Wing ward.’

  Joel had disappeared to his room in the Doctors’ House; Mrs Bridger to a chronic spinal ward in another hospital in our Group; Messrs Lane and Worstley to convalescent homes; Mr Smith to the Private Wing. The empty beds had all been filled, mainly with pneumonias.

  When Mr Brown arrived I asked after Mr Smith. ‘Seemed a nice man. I’m sorry we’ve lost him.’

  ‘You’re not half as sorry as I am, Staff! I wanted you for Smith’s first few nights. His op went off nicely, but that just got him into the wood. He won’t be out for days! But though he’s my patient, certain matters have been taken out of my hands! Physicians?’ He spat the word. ‘You can get through to some, but you can talk to others till you’re blue in the bloody face without getting into their thick heads the simple fact that surgical patients needs the best nurses quite as often as do medical ones! The finest surgery in the world can be wrecked inside of hours, if not minutes, by inefficient nursing. Not that I’m saying the private nurses are inefficient!’ He wagged his finger to make his point. ‘For all I know, they may be Miss Nightingales to a woman! That’s my objection! I don’t know as we’ve no private beds in the Wing and when I was a houseman in the old block I was far too lowly to be allowed near the upper-classes in Private! You, as I’ve said, I do know. Like a fool, I opened my mouth too wide and told Bush precisely why I wanted Smith back here. Huh! A man doesn’t get to be S.M.O. at S.M.H., London without more nous than the next man! Next thing I knew, he’d produced a bed in Private for Smith as a G.W.E. (General Ward Emergency) and bunged in here his most moribund chests! How’re they doing?’

  ‘Not too badly. They’re all responding to antibiotics.’

  ‘They’ll do,’ he relied glumly. ‘This ward’s now got the best bloody night staff in the Wing.’

  I blushed. ‘Thank you, Mr Bro
wn.’

  Liz should have been acting Night Super that night, but owing to the plague, the Night Super had stayed on. She told me Liz was running Arthur and Albert with the help of two second-years in the first and one in the second. ‘Arthur’s on major accident take-in this week. I hope poor Sister Brecklehurst won’t be worn to a shred, but I fear she will be.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’re right, Sister. Those wards are heavy, plus even without being on take-in.’

  ‘My dear Staff,’ she retorted calmly, ‘this entire hospital is now heavy, plus and being run by a skeleton staff. We shall weather the storm. We invariably do. Sometimes I wonder how. But we do.’

  Joel had sent chocolates to every nurse in our ward. Hills was watching her calories and made her box last fifteen nights. Each time she produced it, she said, ‘Have I told you I’ve decided he’s the exception to prove my rule? You won’t believe this, but he’s left a gap in my life.’

  I was sufficiently aware of the gap Joel had left in mine to come closer to screaming at all that. I kept reminding myself that Mr Worstley had left another. Mr Worstley had also written me one of the nicest letters I had ever had from a patient and followed this up with flowers for me and a toy bulldozer for Marcy.

  Maggie was rather shocked. ‘Wouldn’t a doll’ve been more suitable for a wee girl?’

  ‘Not my wee girl, as the nice old boy obviously gathered from all my chat.’

  I had neither seen, nor expected to see, more than the occasional glimpse of George in the playground recently. Sometimes, he waved. I had wondered about that Bach concert, but as Maggie had never mentioned it, didn’t feel it a subject I should bring up. We were still having our long after-report chats, but since she now never seemed to visit her brothers during my waking hours, we had had no more girlish tea-breaks.