The Children of Lovely Lane

by Nadine Dorries

  ‘Well now, that is one exhausting ward,’ Mrs Duffy said. ‘I know that from every nurse who has worked on nights on children’s. You will have to listen to me, Nurse Brogan. You have to look after yourself on nights or you can quickly become run down. And once that happens, ’tis the Devil’s own job to get you right again.’

  Dana gave Mrs Duffy a hug. ‘Mrs Duffy, seeing as you and my mammy write to each other every week, it would be more than my life’s worth not to listen to you.’

  She hadn’t really been surprised to discover that her mammy had written to Mrs Duffy to ask if she was attending Mass every Sunday. From this one letter a regular correspondence had been struck up, in which every aspect of Dana’s well-being was discussed.

  When Dana arrived back from her night shift, not an hour after the girls had left for the day shifts, Mrs Duffy was waiting with her breakfast ready and a hot-water bottle already warming her bed.

  ‘I know you nurses get cold feet after a night shift and it is terrifically hard to warm them up. Takes hours, it does,’ Mrs Duffy said. ‘No nurse finishing a night shift can sleep without a hot-water bottle, even in summer. Oh, some try, but they always give in.’

  Dana smiled to herself. How right Mrs Duffy was. She was right about everything. One day Mrs Duffy had struggled to get to work in the smog, had arrived late and had forgotten Dana’s hot-water bottle and Dana had lain awake with cold feet for hours, unable to sleep.

  There were two children’s wards at St Angelus, situated at the top of a long flight of wooden stairs. Wards three and four. Three was children’s medical. Four was children’s surgical. There was one nurse on each ward at night, with a torch-carrying orderly floating in between. The night shift was seven nights on and seven nights off.

  Sister Haycock had been right to place Dana on children’s. She adored the work, even though it was hard. However, just lately, the equilibrium of the wards had been upset with visits from Miss Van Gilder, which were becoming more and more frequent and, to Dana, intensely irritating.

  This morning a thought plagued her and was keeping her awake. It was the man she had passed at the back gates as she’d left the hospital.

  She had seen him before, three times in total, standing just inside the hospital gates, looking up towards the accommodation block. It was the little boy, Joe, who had pointed him out to her when she took him a hot chocolate after lights out.

  ‘Who is that man, Nurse?’ he had asked her.

  It was late, her ward round had finished, most of her patients were asleep and she was more interested in the book she had brought with her to read to Joe. She was thrilled at how willing he was to learn.

  ‘I don’t know, Joe,’ she said as she glanced out of the window. ‘Looks to me like he’s waiting for someone. Maybe he has a relative in the hospital.’ Dana looked at the man for a brief moment. In his mid thirties, smart. He was standing with both hands in his pockets, and when he saw Dana framed in the large window he walked away, towards the road.

  ‘He is often there, Nurse,’ said Joe. ‘I waved to him yesterday and he waved back.’

  ‘Well, there you go, Joe. He’s harmless enough then.’

  She decided not to tell anyone. They would think she was exaggerating because there was no pattern to his being there. It wasn’t as if he came every night. She thought she’d seen him again yesterday; he didn’t look at her, just walked up the steps of the main entrance to the WRVS stall. He stopped and she noticed that he bought a cup of tea and sat on one of the chairs. He kept looking at the main doors as though waiting for someone to appear. He’s obviously a visitor, she decided. Poor man, I hope it isn’t too awful for him, she thought. He has a sad face.

  ‘Come here, little fella, give us a hug,’ said Dana and, despite the strict rules about not sitting on the bed, she flopped down next to Joe. ‘Right then, what page did we get up to last night? If you do well, there’s something in my bag for you in the cloakroom.’ Her eyes twinkled.

  ‘What?’ asked Joe. ‘Is it something nice? The doctor gave me another piece of chocolate today, but he said I wasn’t to tell Sister.’

  ‘God job I’m not Sister then,’ said Dana as she ruffled his hair. ‘No, it’s not chocolate, although it is cake. Mrs Duffy made flapjacks in Lovely Lane today and she sent me in with a slice for you. I told her you were my favourite patient and every day she asks me all about you. She’s going to be heartbroken when you go home.’

  Joe grinned from ear to ear. ‘Will you go and get it now?’ he asked with a cheeky grin.

  ‘No, I will not. Not until you’ve shown me how much you’ve improved with your reading today.’

  The night-light cast a glow over Joe, and Dana thought he looked like an angel as she glanced at his face. The bed was in the middle of a small cubicle and on either side were two large, square-paned windows, one of which overlooked the car park, which was as black as the moonless night outside. The other looked out on to the corridor, lit by the red night-lights. As Dana turned a page, she was startled to see Miss Van Gilder standing against the far wall of the corridor, watching her through the glass. Her face glowed like that of a deathly ghost and Dana couldn’t help herself as she let out a shriek. Leaving Joe, she went to answer the hundred questions Miss Van Gilder fired at her every single night. If anyone or anything makes me leave this job, it will be having to deal with this woman, thought Dana as, with her best professional smile, she strode out to meet her.

  ‘It’s as if she doesn’t trust me to look after them,’ said Dana to the staff nurse on ward four. ‘She wanted to know every detail about every child. That was after she tore me off a strip for sitting on Joe’s bed. Does she not realize, I can hardly sleep during the day for worrying about this lot.’

  It wasn’t long after Miss Van Gilder had left that a young nurse came flying in through the office door to Dana, who was folding away the patient records Miss Van Gilder had asked to see.

  ‘Nurse, it’s Benny, his respirator has slipped out. Staff has asked if you can help. The orderly will stay on here.’

  Dana felt her heart pounding in her chest in a way she had never experienced before. Nursing children was a far greater responsibility than nursing adults. She had found it difficult to articulate to the others why that was so, but it was. Here, on the children’s ward, she worried, brought each child home in her heart. She dreaded an emergency, and now there was one, with little Benny. He was in a coma and it was his respirator that kept him alive. Her feet felt as if they were stuck to the floor.

  ‘Has he arrested?’

  ‘No, it’s still pumping, he’s getting some of the oxygen. But quick, she needs you.’

  Dana flew to the cubicle. Just as the nurse had said, the tube which allowed the air to pump into Benny’s lungs and was keeping him alive had become detached and was lying on his little chest.

  ‘His chest has stopped inflating,’ said Staff Nurse. ‘I’ve called for the doctor, but I’m going to try and get the tube back in myself, though it may be too late.’

  Dana could tell she was trying to keep the panic out of her voice. ‘What can I do?’ she asked. The sight of Benny had spurred her into action.

  ‘Here, place your hand behind his head and hold him steady. This machine is so temperamental.’

  Dana put her hand behind Benny’s neck and his mouth fell open.

  ‘Yes! Thank God,’ said the staff nurse. ‘His endotracheal tube is still in place.’

  The respirator at the side of his bed pumped and whirred away as its bellows moved up and down, up and down. It was still blowing oxygen at Benny’s mouth and nose, but it needed to be reconnected to the tube in his airway to make it work at full capacity.

  ‘Cut me some fresh tape,’ said Staff Nurse over her shoulder, and without a second’s thought she picked up the respirator tube and slowly slid it back down and through the rubber airway. Using the tape the orderly handed to her, she fixed the tube to the side of Benny’s face and the rubber tubing to the cot.


  ‘How did it happen?’ asked Dana. ‘God, he could have died without the oxygen.’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ said Staff. ‘Maybe he had an involuntary movement and his hand pulled the tube out, or maybe he came round for a moment and tried to pull it out himself. I’m going to call Night Sister and ask for help. We need someone to sit and special him. He is specialled all day, so why is it they think, given that he’s in a coma, the night is any different from the day? Thank God this happened when the Bone Grinder wasn’t here. She would have had me sacked for that, I’m sure.’

  When all was calm again, Dana headed back to her own charges. She took in every cot and bed with a sweep of her night torch as her heart slowed back down to a normal rhythm. Joe was sleeping, the book open on his bed, a smile on his face. Dana moved to the head of his bed to switch off his reading lamp. Brushing the hair back from his brow, she whispered, ‘God, you are a proper little angel, aren’t you, Joe Lancashire.’ Remembering her promise, she scurried back to the cloakroom, extracted the flapjacks Mrs Duffy had sent for Joe and slipped them into his locker.

  21

  Knowing that Joe was being cared for at St Angelus and that he was getting three meals a day was a blessing for which Lily could never give enough thanks. In the days immediately after he was admitted, Sister Therese had visited him twice and brought back reports of his recovery. Visiting hour was once a week on a Sunday afternoon, two until three, but the sister on the children’s ward had not dared argue with Sister Therese.

  ‘The doctor came over to see me when I was there this afternoon,’ Sister Therese said to Lily and Katie as they left Mass one evening. ‘He was asking after you, Lily. I told him you were well and good and he said to be sure to tell you that Joe is in good hands and being well looked after.’

  Lily had no idea why, but she blushed and looked down at her shoes. What Sister Therese had said was innocent enough, but it made her heart beat faster. A thrill of excitement shot through her belly to think that, with all the people Dr Mackintosh had to deal with every day, he had remembered her and asked after her.

  ‘Now, you two, we have special tea at the convent tonight for our new postulant and you are both my special guests. You would not believe the gorgeous ham the butcher on the market gave me for not a penny in return.’

  Lily smiled up at Sister Therese. She could believe it only too well. She’d probably promised him that there was a particularly special place in heaven for butchers who were generous.

  ‘How’s your mammy and daddy?’ Sister Therese dropped her voice to a whisper.

  Lily did not know how to answer. They hadn’t seen her stepfather for a couple of months. Her mother came home at some point each night to sleep.

  Sister Therese did not mention to Lily that she’d seen her mother standing on the pub steps at two o’clock, an hour before the pub was due to open, with the two other women who were the notorious drinkers of Clare Cottages. She also didn’t say that at the time she was on her way back from visiting little Joe. There was a lot that was left unsaid.

  At the convent, Lily and Katie were treated to the best meal they had ever sat down to. As they tucked into hot potatoes, ham and vegetables, followed by steamed jam pudding and custard, Sister Therese told Lily her plan. But not before Lily had noted how much pleasure the nuns sitting around the table took from the simple things in life. How much they all whooped for joy when the cook upturned the pudding bowls. The way their faces easily creased into smiles and laughter. It was a joy to watch them chatter and talk and eat. It dawned on Lily how little she smiled.

  ‘You know that Katie has come along in leaps and bounds at school, don’t you?’ Sister Therese said to Lily. ‘And we are aware that this is in no small part thanks to yourself, coaching her at night and all the rest. Just a year ago, I thought that Katie was a lost cause, but now I can see hope.’ She flashed Lily a reassuring smile. ‘Will you help us arrange for her to be sent to the boarding convent across the water? It’s in the middle of the most lovely countryside and the girls who live there, well, they are the nicest lot. It’s run by Sister Joseph and she is just a dote. Sure I have no idea how they learn anything, the girls run rings around her. Would you?’

  Lily did not hesitate. She would miss Katie with all her heart, but now that Joe was in hospital she knew that the biggest worry in her life was making sure her siblings were fed and clean. Tears pricked at her eyes. ‘We will make it happen,’ she said.

  Katie had overheard. ‘Can I take my dolly with me, Sister?’ she said as she slid from her chair and stood by the side of Sister Therese.

  Katie’s doll had lived in the convent since the day Sister Therese had persuaded the pawnbroker to give it back to her after their mother had pawned it in exchange for an afternoon in the pub.

  ‘Of course you can, because I say so. Now, why don’t you go and see her. She’s sitting on the shelf in the visitors’ room and I think she misses you.’

  Katie’s face broke into a grin as she slipped Sister Therese’s hand and skipped away. As both Lily and Sister Therese watched her disappear, to the joy of the nuns, who cooed over her as she passed, Lily said, ‘This is the nicest tea we have ever had. Thank you. It’s lovely that Katie got to enjoy it and thank you for seeing Joe. I can’t wait to go and see him on Sunday.’

  ‘I think you will be astounded at how well he looks.’ Sister Therese smiled. ‘Lily, I want to get Katie into the school after the summer. Can you cope with that? We may have to do something a little devious to persuade your mammy to sign the forms, but sometimes God gives me permission to do things like that. We have his blessing, if it’s for the betterment of a life on earth.’

  Lily wanted to throw her arms around Sister Therese’s neck, but instead, she gracefully accepted the handkerchief she held out to wipe away her tears.

  *

  The strict visiting regime was unbearable. As Lily pushed her way to the front of the queue on the following Sunday, she peered through the ward windows, her first impulse to reassure herself that Joe was actually still there and alive.

  She bumped into Dr Mackintosh while she was there. He happened to be on the ward during visiting hours.

  ‘The nurses have Joe in the steam tent each day,’ he said, ‘and I don’t know about you, but I think he’s looking much better.’

  ‘I’ve never seen him look so well,’ Lily blurted out as a smile spread across her face.

  Joe was indeed looking much better. He had put weight on, been regularly bathed, fed and fussed over, and was out of the cold and thriving.

  ‘He’s a bit of a favourite with the nurses, isn’t that right, eh, Joe?’

  It was Joe’s turn to blush.

  Never once did Dr Mackintosh ask where their mother was.

  Dana Brogan, who was now back doing day shifts at the weekend, thought she should warn Lily about the ward sister’s rules. ‘It is highly unusual that Joe’s mother does not visit,’ she said. ‘We only allow parental visiting. Sister would have my guts for garters if she knew you were his sister. She’s on her Sunday off, but, honestly, when it comes to taking him home, Sister will want to see his mother here or she will be making enquiries.’

  Lily’s face burnt as Dana delivered her warning from the foot of the bed. Dana whispered in as low a voice as she could to save Lily embarrassment, but they were both aware of the sound of silence and ears straining to hear every word.

  ‘She works, Nurse,’ was all Lily could manage in response. ‘Long hours. She asked me to come...’

  Dana knew plenty of families in Ireland where the children survived on their wits as parents worked every hour of the day to make ends meet. ‘Look, I’ll be covering up for you as much as I can,’ she said. ‘He’s the loveliest little lad I’ve ever looked after, aren’t you, Joe? So clever, he is, being as he’s only nearly four.’ She winked at Joe, who, now that he was feeling much better, winked back.

  ‘Where did you learn to do that?’ Lily exclaimed as she pulled up the cha
ir next to the head of his bed.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea? asked Dana. ‘Let me fetch you one.’ There was something about Lily that made Dana feel protective. She sensed that Lily was as vulnerable as Joe in her own way.

  ‘Look what I have for you,’ Lily said as she took a white paper bag out of her basket and handed Joe a packet of mint balls. She glanced at the lockers belonging to other children and saw that they were piled high with treats and toys in a variety of coloured wrappings. Joe’s locker was bare and contained only his water jug. Next to him on the bed was a soft toy that Lily had never seen before. ‘Who’s this?’ she asked as she picked up the bear and, holding it to her, smelt it. The bear was bathed more regularly that they were at home, she guessed.

  ‘It’s Mr Bear, Lily. Nurse Dana gave him to me. She said, while I am in hospital he is to be my special bear, to look after me and make me better. And look, Lily...’ Joe leant over, opened his locker door and removed a book. ‘Nurse Dana reads this to me when she has time and she’s teaching me the words too.’

  Lily picked up the book and turned over the front cover. Her eyes misted over. There is something behind why the nurses of St Angelus are called the angels, she thought. Nurse Dana had certainly taken a shine to Joe. Very few people had been as kind to her brother as she had.

  ‘Nurse Dana always brings me hot chocolate and gives me extra biscuits, and last night, Lily, she brought me apple pie. She said the lady who looks after her in the home where she sleeps sent it in with her, especially for me.’

  ‘Did she now? Well, aren’t you the lucky one with all these ladies fussing over you.’ Lily’s heart folded as she spoke. Not only was Joe better looked after in St Angelus than he was at home, he was better loved than he was by his own mother too.

  Despite her worst fears, their mother hadn’t shown the slightest inclination to visit Joe in hospital. Now, as Lily passed away the hour listening to Joe, a new panic set in as she wondered how she was going to convince their mother to come to the hospital when the day came for Joe to be discharged. The dreadful truth was that Lily’s mother truly didn’t seem to care any more whether or not the kids were taken into care. She had barely noticed that Joe was in hospital and only yesterday, as she’d fallen over the threshold, had she asked where he was. The condemnation of the nuns had once stirred her into short periods of sobriety, but not any more.