The Village Nurse's Happy-Ever-After

by Abigail Gordon

  Her expression had said she hadn’t known and her husband Keith said, ‘It will be an arrangement that Ethan will have agreed to before he left—probably a member of the staff.’

  ‘That’s correct,’ Harry had told him. ‘Her name is Phoebe Howard, she’s the district nurse.’

  The retired doctor had shaken her head. ‘Although I take a great interest in the practice, I’m afraid I don’t know every member of staff, Harry. She must be someone new.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose that could be it,’ he’d agreed, and after saying his farewells had disappeared into the winter night.

  And now he was back at the apartment and wondering if history would repeat itself, if the door opposite would be opened a crack to observe him. But it remained closed and there was silence all around, which was how he preferred it to be, wasn’t it?

  It was two o’clock in the morning and there was silence no longer. He’d been awakened by a strange sound and was lying wide eyed against the pillows, trying to identify it. It wasn’t a cat yowling out on the tiles, he told himself, or someone who’d had too much to drink breaking into song as they went past the surgery building.

  He sat up suddenly. It was the loud cry of a baby that was shattering the peace and he was out of bed in a flash, quickly throwing on a robe.

  The door opposite was still closed when he went out onto the landing but he had no doubt about where the cry was coming from. Phoebe had a baby in there and from the noise issuing forth, it was not a happy one. The doctor in him simply couldn’t not check if everything was all right.

  The crying stopped for a moment and he knocked on the door, but it still remained closed. In case the district nurse had a husband or partner with her who might be bristling at the invasion of their privacy, he called, ‘I’ve no wish to intrude but can I help?’

  There was no response and he was in the process of knocking again when the door opened suddenly and he almost fell on top of Phoebe. The baby she was holding observed him with tear-drenched brown eyes as she said apologetically, ‘I’m sorry we’ve disturbed you, Dr Balfour. I’m afraid that Marcus is teething.’

  He glanced around the room and still poised on the threshold asked, ‘Are you living alone up here with a young baby?’

  Phoebe hesitated and as if on cue the infant in her arms began to cry again. She stepped back reluctantly to let him in and said, ‘Yes, I’m afraid there are just the two of us. If you want to help, could you possibly hold Marcus for a moment while I make him a bottle? It usually soothes him back to sleep. And, Dr Balfour, the reason I didn’t tell you I had a baby was exactly because of nights like this. I didn’t want us to disturb your privacy, but I should have known better.’

  Harry had stepped inside and was observing her doubtfully as she held out the baby for him to take from her. She smiled and told him, ‘He won’t bite you. He’s only been protesting because he’s teething. Look, he’s smiling now.’ He looked down at the small warm body that he was now holding close to his. Sure enough, there was a little smile coming in his direction from the child with the same pale skin and wide brown gaze as his mother.

  She was moving towards the kitchen to make the bottle, and Harry said in a low voice, ‘Do I take it that his father isn’t around?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said quietly, not looking at him. ‘We’re divorced.’

  He nodded, and looking down at the child in his arms said wryly, ‘And this is the reason why you finish early? Why on earth didn’t you tell me that?’

  ‘Yes, Marcus is the reason,’ she said steadily. ‘I take him to a nursery in the village before I start at the surgery on weekdays and have to pick him up at four o’clock. I suppose one of the reasons for me not telling you was because I don’t want anyone seeing me as disadvantaged. I chose the kind of life I’m living and have no regrets. It was Ethan’s suggestion that I finish early and I was hardly going to refuse when it gave me some extra time with my son.’

  ‘So how long have you lived here?’

  ‘Only since New Year. My maternity leave was up at the end of December. I’d lived with my sister and brother-in-law before that,’ and with a tired smile. ‘So now you have the story of my life.’

  ‘Not entirely, I would imagine,’ he said dryly. He looked down at Marcus who was getting ready for another weeping bout. ‘If that bottle is ready, now might be the moment to produce it.’ With a feeling that he was out of his depth and had served his purpose, he said, ‘If you’re sure he’s going to settle, I’ll leave you to it.’

  ‘Yes, we’ll be fine,’ she said hurriedly. ‘I feel that I’ve been taking advantage of your good nature, Dr Balfour.’

  ‘I haven’t got a good nature to take advantage of,’ he informed her shortly and then pausing in the doorway, amazed himself by saying, ‘Before I go, why don’t I make you a warm drink? Coffee maybe?’

  ‘Er, yes, please, that would be lovely, and do make one for yourself,’ Phoebe said meekly, wanting to pinch herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. She couldn’t remember what it felt like to have someone do something for her, and of all people it was the unpredictable new head of the practice who was waiting on her in the middle of the night.

  Marcus had been fed and changed, and was now sleeping peacefully in his cot. On the point of finally going back to his own apartment, Harry said, ‘Just one thing—if ever you need any help like tonight, feel free to call on me.

  ‘I would rather you did that than me having to lie there imagining you struggling on your own. And by the way, Nurse Howard, why is this place so much less attractive than mine?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ she told him, ‘but it isn’t going to be like this for long! And I will only ever disturb you if it’s an emergency—when we move house we can’t choose our neighbours, can we? They come as part of the package.’

  Harry wondered if that was in the form of an apology, or letting him know that she wasn’t all that keen on having him living so close.

  But if she’d been expecting a reply, there was none forthcoming and as tiredness took hold of her, she wished him goodnight and bolted the door behind him.

  When she went back to bed exhaustion was there, but not sleep. Her mind kept going over what had turned out to be the strangest of days. It has been full of highs and lows between Harry Balfour and herself, then had ended with him knocking on her door and offering to help with Marcus. She’d been so tired and frayed at the edges she’d welcomed him with open arms and thrust her little one at him.

  Yet there was no way she was going to take him up on his offer by using him as a standby in times of stress. The odds were that he wouldn’t have taken the apartment across the landing if he’d known that his neighbours were going to be a single mother and her baby.

  Despite his offer of help, he hadn’t exactly seemed very comfortable around Marcus. Lucy, the elderly practice nurse, had told her on the day he had been due to arrive that he hadn’t any family to bring with him, which maybe explained his reluctance to hold Marcus and his eagerness to be off once he had been satisfied that calm had been restored.

  Yet he’d lingered long enough to make her the hot drink she’d been gasping for, and had made one for himself, as she’d suggested. But those had been things unconnected with her child… A last thought struck as her eyelids began to droop. Maybe his reaction on discovering there was a baby living only feet away wasn’t all that strange, as it clearly wouldn’t be every man’s idea of heaven.

  Across the landing Harry’s thoughts were moving along different channels. Seated in a chair by the window, looking out bleakly at a starlit winter sky, he was remembering a time long ago when a baby precious to him and his parents had been lost, and how nothing had ever been the same afterwards.

  Only small himself, he’d been left lonely and unloved while they’d tried to cope with their grief by spending all their time in their business, running stables in Bluebell Cove. Ever since, he’d been reluctant to take on the responsibility of bringing a child into a world where
nothing was certain and loss could bring with it such pain and loneliness.

  So family life wasn’t something he was familiar with due to his childhood. Marriage to a woman who had been in no hurry to start a family had also left his wariness of it unchanged.

  Yet Phoebe across the landing had opted for it without the support of a husband or partner and seemed content, so which of them had the right idea?

  Breakfast and getting Marcus to the nursery went smoothly the next morning, and Phoebe was at the surgery in good time, although with an uncomfortable feeling inside whenever she thought about her nocturnal meeting with Harry.

  She shuddered to think what she must have looked like in a crumpled cotton nightdress with an old robe over it and her hair all over the place, yet it didn’t really matter. He’d been in her apartment for just one thing and there’d been nothing sensual about it. He’d come to assist in the hope of bringing back the peace that had prevailed before Marcus had begun his tantrum, and she’d do well to remember that!

  Leo Fenchurch, the other doctor in the practice, had been out on an early call and appeared while she was making the usual big pot of tea for the staff before the day commenced. He brought a blast of cold air in with him and while warming his hands around a mug of the welcoming brew he said, ‘So, what do you think of the new guy, Phoebe?’

  He was a fair-haired six-footer with a charm that appealed to most women, but not to her she thought. He was an excellent doctor but a bit lightweight for her to succumb to his charms.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ she said in answer to his question. ‘I feel that he isn’t going to be an easy person to get to know, that he is very much his own man. Yet I’m sure he will be good for the practice, even if he can be somewhat unpredictable on occasion.’ And of that I have on-the-spot experience, she thought.

  ‘But, Leo, we have to remember that Harry has lost his wife in tragic circumstances. I’m not sure how, but it was an accident of some kind, and for a marriage to end like that must have been horrendous.

  ‘Mine fell apart because of a huge divide in our priorities, but we at least we had a choice, not like Harry.’

  ‘Wow!’ he exclaimed. ‘That summing-up comes after him having spent just a short time among us? You must have seen more of him than we have.’

  She wasn’t going to enlighten him on that and almost dropped the mug she was holding when Harry’s voice said from behind her in the passage, ‘Is there any tea on offer, Nurse Howard?’

  As she reached for the teapot, Phoebe was praying that he hadn’t heard her discussing him with Leo. It would be just too embarrassing if he had, but his expression was serene enough, and once she’d poured him the tea, he returned to his room without further comment. As the rest of the staff were appearing in varying degrees of haste for their early brew, she tried to put the incident out of her mind.

  She wouldn’t have been able to if she’d seen Harry’s expression as he sat gazing into space behind his desk with the tea untouched. It would seem that little Baby Bunting’s mother had him well and truly catalogued, he thought dryly.

  Thankfully his visit to her apartment in the middle of the night hadn’t been mentioned—it would have gone around the surgery like wildfire! Noting that it was almost time for the day to start, he went out into Reception to have a word with Phoebe before she left.

  She was halfway through the main door when he called her back. He saw her shoulders stiffen and almost smiled. What did she think he wanted her for, to tell her that he’d heard what she’d said to Leo?

  ‘Did you manage to get some sleep after I left?’ he asked in a low voice.

  ‘Er…yes,’ she replied, looking around her quickly to make sure no one was near enough to jump to any wrong conclusions. ‘Marcus was fine this morning. It seems as if the tooth might have come through.’

  He was smiling and she thought how different he looked when he did, but a second later he was the man in charge as he said, ‘You’ve got young Rory down for a visit, I hope.’

  ‘He’s top of my list, Dr Balfour,’ she said stiffly. ‘If I am still concerned about his leg I will be asking for your presence or that of Dr Fenchurch.’

  ‘Good,’ he said briskly, as if he hadn’t picked up on the drop in temperature. ‘Hope you have a good day after a not-so-good night. I see that the waiting room is filling up so must go.’ And off he went, wishing that he hadn’t come over as quite so bossy with Phoebe. He wouldn’t be surprised if she had him labelled as a control freak!

  Conversely, as Phoebe drove the short distance to the fishing-tackle shop she was thinking that the man was only doing his job. So why had she let him get to her like that? He’d been kind and supportive in the middle of the night, even though she could tell that he wasn’t used to babies. It was ungrateful of her to take offence at what, to Harry, would just be part of the job.

  The infection around the sutures on Rory’s leg had improved overnight, and with it the boy’s mood. As she changed the dressing, with his uncle looking on anxiously, Phoebe told him, ‘Make sure that he takes all the antibiotics he was given when he left the hospital, Jake. That and the different kind of ointment we’re using now should do the trick.’

  He breathed a sigh of relief. ‘The last thing I would want to tell my sister is that her boy isn’t well, so that’s good news, Nurse.’

  ‘How are his parents progressing?’ she questioned.

  ‘Not bad, but they have a way to go yet before Hunter’s Hill will be ready to send them home. So it’s just the two of us for a while, isn’t it, Rory?’ he said to his nephew, who was still in his pyjamas.

  ‘Yes, Uncle Jake,’ he chirped. ‘And don’t forget, as soon as my leg is all right, we’re going out in your boat.’

  ‘There’s no chance of me forgetting,’ was the teasing reply. ‘You won’t let me!’

  Jake turned to Phoebe. ‘How about a coffee before you go, Nurse?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, thanks just the same, I’ve got a rather long list of patients to see and must be on my way.’

  He was smiling. ‘If I can’t make you a drink, how about letting me take you for a sail when this young fellow is well enough to come along?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ she told him gently. ‘You wouldn’t want a young baby on the boat.’

  ‘So you’re married,’ he said disappointedly.

  ‘No. I’m a single mother,’ she explained, and could tell from his expression that a possible relationship had just gone down the drain. Yet who could blame him? She couldn’t help but think it would take a lot for a man to be willing to fill the gap of a father in the life of another man’s child, however nice he was.

  She’d also only met Jake for the first time the day before. It would take longer than that for her to want to know him better or introduce him to her son. But as a vision of Harry Balfour awkwardly holding Marcus safe and secure in his arms came to mind, she thought that she’d only known him for a similar length of time, yet she would trust him with her child.

  When she arrived at her next call, pulling up in front of the biggest farmhouse in the area, Phoebe was amazed to see the man who had been in her thoughts getting out of the brand-new red convertible he’d had delivered to the surgery that morning. The question was immediately there in her mind—was he checking up on her?

  It seemed that he wasn’t. Harry was already ringing the bell and called across to her, ‘Well timed. We have an emergency.’

  She was out of her car in a flash and hurried to the door, wondering what could be wrong at Wheatlands Farm.

  She visited the place every week to put a fresh dressing on a varicose ulcer that was plaguing old George Enderby, the patriarch of the family. As far as she was aware, that was the only thing wrong with the cheerful old guy, but if what Harry was saying was correct…

  ‘Is it George that you’re here about?’ she asked as footsteps pounded towards them from inside the house.

  He shook his head. ‘No. A call came through to the s
urgery to say his daughter-in-law Pamela had fallen downstairs early this morning and almost knocked herself senseless with a crack to her head. She was soon back working on the farm, until a few minutes ago when suddenly she didn’t seem to know where she was.’

  The door was being wrenched open as he spoke and George’s son Ian was there, his face taut with anxiety.

  ‘Thanks for coming so quickly, Harry,’ he said urgently. ‘I wasn’t expecting us to be renewing our acquaintance so soon. Pamela is upstairs resting with a huge bump on her head and isn’t very coherent.’

  ‘So let’s have a look, then,’ he said briskly, adding to Phoebe, ‘Come along, Nurse, you can see to your patient when we’ve sorted Mrs Enderby out.’

  The swelling on Pamela Enderby’s head was huge and soft to the touch and her eyes weren’t functioning properly. Neither was her mind as Harry gently tried to get her to answer a few simple questions rationally.

  Turning to her husband, he said in a low voice, ‘There is almost certainly bleeding inside the skull.’ He turned to Phoebe. ‘Phone for an ambulance, Nurse, and stress the urgency, while I check the patient’s heartbeat and pulse.’

  She was about to confirm that the emergency services were hastening on their way when he said tightly, ‘Pamela’s gone into a coma.’ He placed his stethoscope against her chest. ‘There’s no heartbeat! Get ready to resuscitate!’

  Together they worked on the patient until the ambulance arrived and paramedics stepped in with a defibrillator and then a faint rising and falling of the injured woman’s chest indicated that she was back with them.

  Her husband had watched their efforts with tears streaming down his face and as the ambulance was leaving, with him by her side and a paramedic monitoring her heartbeat, he said raggedly, ‘Whatever the outcome of this, I will never forget what the two of you did back there.’

  Before they could reply, he was gone with flashing lights and sirens wailing to warn other road users that the vehicle was carrying someone seriously ill or injured.