Ship's Surgeon

by Celine Conway

  She listened raptly while Pat read the flowery goodwill messages, implicitly believed every word of them. A chastened Mrs. Lai came into the stateroom. As at the nursing home, the brown-skinned woman wore her straight grey hair combed back into an uncompromising bun, and draped her sari so that it could easily be pulled up over her head whenever she had to leave the cabin.

  Pat said, “I’ve asked for more tablets, Mrs. Lai. Take some as soon as they arrive. My cabin is thirty-two, on B Deck. If you need me, send a steward.”

  “No exercises today?” asked Deva anxiously. “I so want to get strong!”

  Pat smiled at her. “And so you shall, darling. Embarking was enough for today, but we’ll start again tomorrow morning at ten. I’ll look in again later.”

  She went out on deck, breathed in the cold misty atmosphere. Grey sea, a watery grey-blue sky and a faint smudge where the coastline was disappearing. England ... Tim and Keith were back there, cheerfully learning a little and playing football, and perhaps not quite so cheerfully remembering that she was leaving today, for Ceylon and Australia. They were chirpy and absorbed as boys of eleven mostly are, but Tim especially had looked a little odd when she had mentioned Australia. Tim was the more thoughtful one; he was capable of adding the fact that money was tight to the knowledge that Uncle Dan had his own business in Melbourne, and coming up with the right answer. Neither boy had looked very happy when she had told them she would do her utmost to be home before the summer vacation. To them, July had seemed an appallingly long way from early April.

  Pat flicked a wetness from her lashes, turned resolutely and went inside for a coat. Passengers were taking tea in the main lounge, and Pat, glancing cursorily at them through the glass, saw the big man she had noticed at the dock. He was fair and red-faced, around forty and expensively tailored, and at the moment he was alone at a table and looking sideways, towards the ocean. Head bent, she passed on, and walked down to her cabin. She opened the door, blinked in the dimness and drew a sharp dry breath.

  A woman in blue sat on her bed leafing through a magazine. Kristin. The long regular features smiled slightly, the afternoon light slanting through the porthole burnished the dark head so that it was a tiny pool of brilliance in the shadowed box of a room.

  “Surprised?” asked the quiet yet metallic tones that Pat would never forget.

  “Not ... entirely. I knew you were aboard.”

  “Really?” with a faint frown. “You haven’t mentioned it to anyone?”

  “I tried not to believe it.”

  “Why should you do that? We’re not enemies, Pat.” The old spell began to exert itself. A dark spell, that made Pat feel very young, quite stupid and totally unable to deal with this woman who had insinuated herself into Richard Fenley’s heart when he was thirty-eight and she twenty-six. Pat had been ten years old when Kristin came into the house, and from their first meeting she had been attracted and repelled by the woman. At twenty-six Kristin had not been nearly so beautiful as she was now; she had been white and ill-looking and so grateful to the man who had fallen in love with her that she could gladly accept a stepdaughter. Pat had never learned how her father had met Kristin, but as she grew older she realized how it might have happened. A lonely man; a young woman more or less alone in the world who had accidentally come into his life and caught at his heart.

  The change in Kristin had begun almost imperceptibly, soon after the twins had arrived. Kristin hadn’t wanted even one child, let alone two, but she was quick to make capital of the fact that her husband adored them. How fortunate that Pat was there, growing up now and able to look after the brats. Kristin could get out as often as she wished, she could even take a job, modelling for a Kensington store.

  Blithely, Pat had taken charge of the babies; soft, darling babies, especially the one with a squint who always looked cross while possessing the most even of temperaments. In those days, Pat would have done anything for Kristin, who dressed more and more simply and exquisitely, and who dropped a hint one day that she was earning almost as much as Daddy. But only Kristin benefited from her earnings.

  There came a grim period which had puzzled and frightened Pat. Sharp words between husband and wife, long silences; then a demand that Kristin give up working and settle back into the home. And in no time at all after that Kristin had left the house. “For a break from us,” Pat’s father had told her. “She’s tired.” Then that brief return, a patching-up while, covertly, she was amassing all the cash she could.

  Pat steeled herself. “We’re not friends, either,” she said now. “Why are you on the Walhara?”

  “Because you are, my dear. I had no intention of taking a sea-trip till I visited the shipping offices with Vernon Corey. A travel agent is not good enough for Vernon; he always goes to the shipping company’s offices to make sure that he’s given the stateroom he’s stipulated. He also likes to look at the passenger list. That’s how I learned you were to sail in this ship, though at first I thought the name was merely a coincidence. But my enquiries proved that it wasn’t.”

  “And you actually booked a passage because of me?”

  “I was going by air, in time to meet Vernon in Fremantle, but I decided to change my plans. If I could have persuaded Vernon to postpone his departure till the next ship I’d certainly have done so.” She lifted her shoulders. “He’s a coward—terrified of air travel—so I was caught.”

  Pat’s fingers pressed her eyelids, fleetingly. “Who is this Vernon Corey?”

  “My fiancé. We’re getting married after I’ve met his family in Australia.”

  “Is he the ... the big man?”

  “You’ve seen him? Yes,” with a humorous smile, “he’s the big man—big in every way. He and his mother own a dozen huge cattle stations but live a civilized life on the warm coast, near Brisbane. I’ve no intention of settling permanently in Australia, of course, but I shall have to live down-under for quite a while, to keep the old lady sweet.”

  In strained tones, Pat said, “You were afraid to let the man sail alone, is that it? Do you think it’s at all likely that he and I would have ... mixed? That must have been what worried you.”

  “By sea, it’s a long way to Ceylon,” said Kristin with a graceful shrug. “The ship stops half a dozen times on the way and there would have been every chance of your finding yourself alongside Vernon either on deck or ashore. He’s the chivalrous kind, and you’re still a bit large-eyed and dewy-looking in spite of your profession; you might easily have confided in him. By the way, there must be sweet pickings to that assignment of yours. The Wadias are rich and influential, I believe.”

  “I’m getting a good salary,” Pat agreed briefly. “What does Mr. Corey know about us—the boys and me?”

  Kristin’s glance flickered once, her expression remained smiling and remote. “That’s why I came to see you before you met the other passengers. Vernon knows nothing. To him, I’m thirty-two and a widow, without encumbrances.”

  Pat’s throat contracted. “You can’t do that,” she whispered, aghast. “The twins are your own sons. The chances are that Mr. Corey would be proud of them!”

  “It’s too late to tell him. When we first met he was even jealous of my dead husband, and I daren’t mention the boys. I told him I was married at twenty-seven, that I was widowed after only a couple of years. I can’t produce eleven-year-old sons even if I wanted to. Which I don’t. The boys were always more their father’s than mine—more yours than mine, come to that.”

  “But if you’re going to marry Mr. Corey he has a right to know all about you!”

  Kristin stood up, quickly for her. “Leave the ethical aspect to me. I’ll have to go now—Vernon’s expecting me to join him for tea. We’ll talk again, you and I. I came in as soon as I could to make contact and to let you know that on the Walhara you and I have no relationship except the coincidence of bearing the same surname. I dare say you’ll be fully occupied till you reach Ceylon, so you won’t find it difficult to keep your di
stance from Vernon ... and me.”

  Kristin came towards the door, and Pat shrank back as the other passed. With difficulty she said, “You’re expecting rather a lot from me, aren’t you? Why should I help you to deceive that man?”

  “Why?” With her long slender fingers on the door handle, Kristin turned and looked straight into Pat’s hurt green eyes. “For a simple reason, my dear. You’re determined that the twins shall miss their parents as little as possible, and have an ordinary life among their own kind. But I’ve discovered something. There’s a society that will take them on till they’re sixteen, give them a home in an institution and teach them a trade. I’ve only to prove that I can’t afford to keep them, and sign a paper or two.”

  Pat’s mouth was dry. “You wouldn’t do that, Kristin. I can’t believe it.”

  “Don’t try me. If I lost Vernon through you,” said Kristin steadily, “I’d do anything.”

  She was gone, and Pat was left alone in the small cabin, leaning against shiny white paint and gazing at a face she saw in the mirror. A young face that was pale and bewildered and frightened. Not a pretty face, but it was small-boned and the skin was delicately pink over the cheekbones; at least, it was normally pink, though just now even her lips were pale. For a long time she blankly took in her reflection. Then it receded, darkly, and she knew it was time she switched on a light and put on a dress for dinner.

  Dressed, she felt better, but not hungry. She went up to A Deck, knocked lightly at the door of Deva’s stateroom and walked in. Her first thought was how very attractive the spacious room looked in the soft artificial lamplight, and then she became aware of the tall man in uniform. No mistaking that brazen, springy hair, the broad shoulders. He turned from the bed.

  “Oh, Miss Fenley,” he said absently. “Your patient seems to have taken the transition from one cosy nook to another in her stride. I suggest a little steamed fish and warm milk for her supper and a sedative straight after it.”

  “Yes, Doctor. I’ll tell Mrs. Lai.”

  His dark blue stare raked her brocade dress before resting impersonally on the vulnerable hollow of her throat. “You ready for dinner?”

  Why did he look like that? “More or less,” she answered.

  “I have a table to myself—Number Three. I want a talk with you tonight, so you’d better dine there with me. Seven-thirty.”

  “Very well, Doctor.”

  Deva, watching them with her big dark eyes, gave her merry giggle. “This is one who barks, Pattie. Like Dr. Brownfield at the nursing home, but worse, much worse.”

  Pat smiled faintly. “I don’t think Dr. Norton will bark at you, Deva. He’s pleased with you.”

  “But not with you? Because you are not wearing uniform?”

  “Perhaps. Are you sleepy?”

  “Only a little.” The girl looked straight up at the doctor. “You should be good to Pattie. She is much more brave than I.”

  “Hush, Deva...”

  “So Miss Fenley’s brave, is she?” said Bill Norton. “To me, she looks wilted.”

  “No, she is sad, and it is my fault.”

  Pat threw out a hand and said brightly, “Deva has too kind a heart, Dr. Norton. She thinks I’m depressed at leaving England. She’s talked enough for one day.”

  “Talking won’t hurt her.” He leaned back on his heels, regarding Pat, before shifting the glance towards the dark girl in the bed. “What makes you think Miss Fenley is so much braver than you are?”

  Pat said hurriedly, “Deva likes to know all about the people who look after her. She’s questioned md about my background and decided my life is not all it should be.”

  “It’s the little brothers, you see,” said Deva earnestly. “Pattie is unhappy at leaving them.”

  “Oh, little brothers,” Dr. Norton snapped his fingers, as if he had no patience with a woman who was depressed for such a reason. “Don’t question me about my background, child, or I may tell you the shattering truth. Have your supper and sleep well. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  He left abruptly. Deva turned a large surprised stare upon Pat. “He is a strange man. His hands are gentle and he is kind. But his voice was different when you came in. Much harder.”

  “Doctors are always professional towards the staff.” In front of patients, Pat might have added. “Would you like me to stay until you’ve had supper?”

  “Please. And, Pattie, please don’t wear the uniform except when we are having exercises. I’ve never seen you look sweet like this. I like it very much.”

  Soon after seven Deva was settled for the night. Pat took a brisk walk round the deck, collected a stole from her cabin and went into the dining-room. Tables shone whitely under a modern artistic ceiling, soft music was being played by a five-piece orchestra which was half hidden by potted palms, and most of the tables were already occupied. Number Three was to the left, close to a pink wall which was scrolled in gilt, and the doctor was already there, smoking and talking to an officer who was seated at the next table. Bill Norton rose and saw her seated, sat down again and gave her another of those cool, clinical looks; this time Pat kept her own gaze quite steady.

  “You’ll certainly know me next time,” she murmured.

  “Have you had a shock?” he asked bluntly.

  Hesitating for only a second, she answered, “Yes, but I’m over it now, and getting hungry.” Purposefully, she lifted the attractively painted menu which lay in front of her. “What would you recommend, Doctor?”

  “For one of your figure, the whole works and a bottle of wine. Know anything about wines?”

  “I prefer something light and sparkling.”

  “You need it, too.” He ordered from the steward who hovered, jabbed out his cigarette and had the ashtray emptied. The thick brown brows came forward as he looked down at her hands. “You must be stronger in the limbs than you look. How old are you?”

  “Just twenty-three.”

  “That’s what I guessed. Where did you train?”

  “At Pethington. We lived close by at that time.”

  “And when you were through?”

  “I finished my training at St. Cedric’s, and then went on staff. Mr. Breiner, the open-heart surgeon, asked me to specialize, so I joined his department. I loved it, because our patients were mostly children. Deva Wadia is the oldest open-heart patient I’ve treated, though I’ve had a few elderly cardiacs. Deva’s a charming girl, isn’t she?”

  “Quite grown-up in her thoughts, I imagine, but she has the very young look of the heart case. She’ll probably mature quickly within the next couple of years.”

  He was silent while Pat helped herself from the trolley of hors d’oeuvres, and he took a selection for himself. “I suppose you’re hoping to get her walking normally before we arrive at Ceylon? Are you staying there?”

  “I’m not sure. Deva’s father cabled that he was engaging a physiotherapist from India, but Mr. Breiner thought he’d have difficulty. I’m booked right through to Melbourne, but I may have to break my journey and go on later.”

  “Got friends in Melbourne?”

  “An uncle,” she said with reserve.

  “Cagey, aren’t you?” he commented, but seemed not to care very much. “That girl said you were sad at leaving someone. Can’t remember whether it was a brother or a lover.”

  A warmth crept into Pat’s pale cheeks. “I think you do remember, Doctor.” She forked up a sardine and ate it, changed the topic. “Do you enjoy being a ship’s surgeon?”

  “It’s refreshing, in a way. Between the crew, the tourist deck and the various layers here in the first-class you get a good cross-section and plenty of interest. It’s restricting, though—can’t do any fancy surgery in a tilting theatre. This is my third and last trip, and it’s been just enough.”

  “You sign off in Australia?”

  “That’s right. I’ll do a bit of sightseeing for a month and then make my way to Suva, in the Fijis. I’m going to put in a spell as a plantation d
octor.”

  “Tropical medicine? Is that your speciality?”

  “Bugs,” he nodded. “In three years I’ll either be back in England or settled down into one of those canny, drink-sodden pill-dispensers you sometimes read about. You know the sort of thing—decaying hut, grease candles and a sweat-rag tucked in my cummerbund.”

  She sat back and looked at him; the line of scarlet among the gold braid at his cuff, the smart squareness of his shoulders in navy blue, his proud, almost leonine head, his angular rugged face, the look of strength and tolerance about his well-defined mouth—and suddenly she laughed.

  “That’s better,” he said. “Laughter suits the shape of your face. Eat up, and tell me about your family.”

  Carelessly, she mentioned that she had two brothers but no parents. Yes, both brothers were younger than herself, she said in response to a question, but they weren’t a burden because their boarding school ran a summer camp for the holidays.

  “Last year I took my two weeks in August and went down there to help. It was great fun.”

  “A physiotherapist,” he stated firmly, “should spend her holiday in complete idleness.”

  He ceased speaking rather abruptly, and Pat looked up to find him staring past her, over her head, at someone who had just entered the dining-room. Involuntarily, she half turned. It was Kristin, in close-fitting black with a gold fleck, the huge Vernon Carey just behind her. Pat felt her appetite ebbing, and placed her knife and fork beside the half eaten filet mignon.

  “That big buffalo,” said the doctor conversationally, “is Corey, the cattle millionaire. Forty-three and still a bachelor, but not for long. It was inevitable that he’d be hooked by a widow. Lovely dish, though, isn’t she?”

  But he didn’t look for long at Kristin Fenley. His eyes focused more keenly upon the woman who was following the other two towards the Captain’s table. All Pat saw of her was a swathe of ash-blonde hair and slim shoulders in pale green as she took her place at a table for four. When Pat looked back at the doctor he was smiling slightly but unconcernedly eating.