Song of Songs

by Beverley Hughesdon

  I suggested tentatively, ‘A sleeve?’

  ‘But it’s not attached to anything – and it’s the bottom half!’ She threw the object down on the bed. ‘Come on, Hellie, locate this cap of yours and we’ll get downstairs.’ I found a pile of flat white cambric pancakes with tapes running through them, picked one up and followed Juno out.

  We found the right room at last. The woman in the blue dress looked impatient and as soon as we came in she pounced on my ring, Gerald’s ring. ‘Whatever are you doing wearing that?’

  I put my hand protectively over it. ‘It’s my betrothal ring.’

  My fingers were prized open. ‘No jewellery at all to be worn on the wards, most insanitary – it will harbour germs, besides the damage to patients.’ She made irritated clucking noises in her throat. ‘Here.’ She rustled to her desk, scissors snapped and I was handed a length of tape. ‘Take it off and tie it round your neck for the time being – under your dress.’ Slowly I pulled off Gerald’s ring, threaded the tape through it and pushed it down inside my camisole. The stone lay cold on my skin above my heart. Then she seized my pancake, tweaked the tapes and converted it into a cotton shovel. ‘Bend your head, Nurse. Dear me, no bun? All nurses must part their hair in the middle, lift it above the ears and wear it in a bun above the nape – how else can your cap be attached?’ She waved the ends of the tapes.

  Somehow the shovel was fastened to my hair, then Juno bent her head in turn. We stood uncertainly waiting until there was a tap at the door and two more girls came in, clutching white pancakes. ‘Is this the right room?’ The leading girl spoke with a marked and unpleasant accent. I glanced at Juno and shuddered.

  The next hour passed in a confused melee of unfamiliar sights and sounds: the tiered lecture room, the massed ranks of nurses, the frock-coated doctor addressing us – haemorrhage, arteries, tourniquet – whatever did his words mean? Then out again along endless stone passageways and steep bare staircases until Sister’s sharp voice pierced my frightened senses. ‘You are allocated to Allsop Ward, Nurse.’ I was whisked through a lobby and into a long high room which receded into the shadows. The blinds were drawn but a red-shaded lamp glowed by one bed; the humped figure in it shifted restlessly and I heard a low moan of pain – my stomach lurched.

  A woman in blue came forward without speaking to me. ‘Thank you, Sister. Staff Nurse is in the kitchen.’ I was whisked back out again.

  Staff Nurse was tall and angular and looked angry. As soon as my escort had left she snapped, ‘I don’t know what we’re supposed to do with you – we’ve one useless pair of hands already.’ She glared at a small mousey girl stirring something at the stove who shrank back over her saucepan, her eyes frightened. Staff Nurse turned back to me. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Lady Helena Girvan.’

  Staff Nurse’s bony face reddened. ‘We don’t have any ladies here – or Christian names either. That’s the first rule.’ She jerked her head towards the door. ‘I suppose I’d better show you round. Carry on with that custard, Fraser – at least try and stop the lumps getting any larger or Number Seventeen won’t even be able to get them in her mouth. Follow me, Girvan.’

  It took me several seconds to realize she was addressing me; then I hastily scurried after her. ‘Sterilizer, linen cupboard, Sister’s room, bathroom.’ She rattled off the names, sprang at another door and flung it open. ‘Sink room.’ The stench hit me like a blow in the face and I stepped quickly back. ‘Patients’ WCs and lavatories are at the other end of the ward though not many use them, they’re mostly confined to bed.’

  She paused for breath and I ventured a query. ‘Where are the WCs for us to use?’

  ‘Officially down three flights of stairs by the side entrance – but you’ll be lucky to ever be allowed off long enough to get there, so you’d better learn to hang on, or if you’re desperate you can slip into the patients’ – but don’t let Sister catch you and for God’s sake don’t sit on the seat – some of our women are as infectious as lepers.’ I felt sick, and decided I would ‘hang on’. ‘I’ve got to sort out that idiot Fraser – you’d better just stand in the corner there and use your eyes, we’re off duty in ten minutes.’

  I stood still in the corner of the darkened ward, feeling frightened and useless. I saw the momentary flash of a white cap at the far end, then it vanished behind a screen and I was left alone, while all around me sick women lay sleeping in their beds. A thin white plait stirred on the bed cover nearest to me, and a pair of eyes gleamed in the gloom. Very slowly the bedclothes moved until a claw-like hand emerged and began to flutter above the sheet. The eyes were fixed on me as the toothless mouth opened and gave a low moan; I shrank back against the wall. The moan rose in pitch until it was a keening cry of distress; I was terrified. The keening came again, higher and shriller; I looked desperately round and at that point the ward door swung open and the mousey nurse called Fraser came in. I let my breath out in relief – but she ignored the outstretched claw and headed up the ward. I ran after her and caught her arm. ‘Please – an old woman – she’s crying…’

  Fraser pulled herself free. ‘For goodness’ sake!’ Her voice was impatient. She marched back to the bed at the entrance and glared at the old woman. ‘Be quiet at once, Number Fifteen, you’re disturbing the whole ward.’ The moan stopped abruptly in mid breath; she clutched at her sheet and stared up at us with crazed, frightened eyes. Fraser was gone; I backed treacherously away from the despairing eyes and half ran to hide in the other corner.

  I peered at the hands of the ward clock, willing them to move on, and at last they crawled to twenty past nine, and Staff Nurse came to fetch me. ‘The night nurses are here – come and be dismissed.’

  I stood at the end of the row while Sister dismissed us; she did not even glance in my direction. We walked sedately out into the lobby and then there was a stampede. Staff Nurse hissed, ‘Harris, take Girvan to the dining room with you.’ A small blonde girl looked quickly back and nodded; I scuttled after her, terrified of being lost in the maze of passageways.

  When we finally reached the dining room another blue-frocked woman sat at the entrance with a register in front of her. ‘Number?’

  I stared at her blankly. The blonde girl spoke over my shoulder. ‘She’s new, Sister, she hasn’t got a number yet, her name’s Girvan.’

  The sister’s mouth tightened as her finger flicked down the page. ‘Twenty-seven.’

  There was a jab in the small of my back and a hissed, ‘Give her your number.’

  I jerked out, ‘Twenty-seven’; the blonde said, ‘Fifty-two’, and we were finally allowed in to the sound of impatient mutterings from the queue behind us.

  I was pushed towards a chair and almost fell into it. A panting Juno flopped down beside me. ‘What’s your number Hellie?’

  ‘Twenty-seven.’

  ‘How strange, I’m Thirty-four, yet we arrived together.’

  A nurse opposite glanced up. ‘They give you the number of the last pro to go – Thirty-four was Potts, couldn’t stick it, I believe – Twenty-seven was Rowley’s number, wasn’t it?’

  Her neighbour nodded. ‘Pity; nice girl, I believe.’

  Juno asked, ‘Did she give it up, too?’

  ‘No, she died last week, tubercular meningitis – ssh, Sister’s saying grace.’

  A plate with some kind of rissole on it was slapped down in front of me. I picked up my knife and fork, but the rissole tasted of warmed-up grease and I could only force half of it down. I looked around the big bleak room at the hundreds of strange faces and felt very alone. Then Juno muttered beside me, ‘What foul food,’ and I was a little comforted – at least I had someone of my own sort there beside me.

  At the end of the meal we followed the nurses from our table and found ourselves in the wrong Nurses’ Home – apparently there were two – it was very confusing. When we eventually found our way back to the right corridor both the bathrooms were occupied, with dressing-gowned queues outside. Juno shrugg
ed. ‘I had a bath this morning, I’m going to bed dirty – anyway I want to write some letters.’

  So did I, but I found it very difficult to concentrate in that box of a bedroom. I took out the smiling photograph of Gerald and looked at it for a long time before I began to write ‘Dearest Gerald’, but still the words would not come. In the end I managed a few lines on our arrival, but I could not tell him my fears about this strange new life – not when he was so bravely fighting the enemy. I sealed the envelope and began to write to the twins instead. I was pouring out my anxieties and despondency in this frightening place when the room was plunged abruptly into darkness; it was ten-thirty. I fumbled my way into bed, but it was a long time before I fell asleep.

  Chapter Three

  The clanging of a handbell shook me violently from sleep; the noise grew louder, the clapper resounded outside my door, then the ringer passed on. Shaking, I pushed myself out of bed; it was a quarter before six. While doors banged and feet scampered along the corridor I pulled on the unaccustomed uniform; and combed and twisted and pulled at my hair until I had anchored it in some kind of bun at the back of my head. I tied the tapes of my white cambric shovel under it and speared in hairpins until they hurt; I saw with dismay that my face in the mirror looked like a scalped chicken’s without any softening dark mass above it.

  At breakfast the butter was an odd colour and tasted horrible; the new probationer with the accent squealed, ‘Ugh, margarine!’

  Juno’s voice was indignant. ‘Mama’s staff would all go on strike sooner than eat that muck – and this fish has seen better days.’ We chewed grimly, and tried to mask the rancid flavours with the dark bitter tea.

  Breakfast lasted a bare ten minutes, then the nurses began to stream out. We looked at each other – we did not know what to do next then Juno grabbed a passing arm and demanded instructions. ‘You can go back to your rooms if you want, but be on your ward at the stroke of seven, else you’ll catch it.’

  I decided not to risk going back to the Home; I knew it would take me all my time to find Allsop Ward again. I scanned one dusty courtyard after another and ran all the way up the wrong staircase before I arrived panting at the door of the ward just as the clock chimed seven. I searched desperately through the lobby until I found the other pros on the ward standing in a line in front of Staff Nurse. She glared at me and rapped out, ‘Girvan, sweep first and then dust – Harris, show her where the things are kept.’

  Harris seemed less impatient than the others; she even smiled at me as she spoke. ‘Goody, that’s usually my job, now I can make beds instead.’

  ‘Stop dithering and get a move on.’ At Staff Nurse’s rebuke we shot into the lobby. Harris whispered, ‘Staff’s not a bad old stick, her bark’s worse than her bite.’ She handed me broom, shovel, and bucket of tea leaves, pointed to the box of dusters and gave me a push towards the ward.

  After an hour I felt battered and bruised and totally stupid. I did not know how to sweep or how to dust; I could not even hold a broom correctly. Staff Nurse shouted at me; the other probationers hissed and pushed me out of their way. I thrust desperately hither and thither with my broom until my shoes and stockings were coated with dirt and the floor of the ward was streaked with dusty tea leaves. The patients who were propped up in their high beds looked at me with amazement. I saw one broad-faced woman glance at her neighbour, raise her eyebrows, then tap her forehead significantly. In my childhood I had seen housemaids perform these very tasks so easily, so efficiently – and now I was being branded as a half-wit by some costermonger’s wife. I burnt with shame.

  As I struggled with the duster I knocked a bed crooked, so that the woman in it groaned in pain. Staff Nurse scolded, ‘Don’t be so careless, Girvan – and remember, Number Twelve is a typhoid case, if you so much as shiver her bed you’ll kill her!’

  Number Twelve lay huddled on her side; my hands shook as I gingerly dusted her bed rail – typhoid, surely that was very infectious? My eyes kept going back to the tiled stand which stood at the foot of the bed, bearing its ominous bowl of disinfectant. As I circled round I saw there was a set of cutlery and crockery stacked on the lower shelf – each item painted with a bright blue ‘T’. I shuddered.

  When I had finished the dusting, Staff Nurse set me to clean a glass trolley with big bottles of lotions on it – yellow, blue and pink – the colours were pretty in this bleak ward and it was a relief to be able to stay in one place for a while and have a simple task to perform. But I put too much meths on the cloth and the glass smeared, and when I rubbed at it frantically to try to clean it, small threads of lint clung where the duster moulted. My back ached, so I pulled up a nearby chair and sat down to attack the lower shelf, but no sooner was I seated than a stern-faced probationer swung round from one of the beds and snapped, ‘Get up at once! You must never sit down on the ward in the daytime.’ I leapt to my feet like a scalded cat, thrust the betraying chair away and crouched down by the shelf. Tears stung my eyes.

  At twenty-five past eight I was summoned to the central table and handed a cup of tea. ‘Drink it quickly, Sister comes on at half-past.’ I was embarrassed to be drinking in front of the watching patients, but I felt so sick and shaky I swallowed it gratefully. As soon as we had finished I was sent to return the tray to the maid in the kitchen; I was walking back through the lobby when a door opened and Sister came out. Without thinking I glanced into the doorway behind her and saw a little sitting room, with ornaments on the mantelpiece and pictures on the walls – and realized incredulously that she lived there, on the ward – how ever could she stand it? Her face stiffened as she saw me and she shut the door with a sharp click.

  I followed her back into the ward and joined the group of nurses. Staff Nurse whispered, ‘Fetch the hassock for Sister.’ I looked wildly round – for an instrument? A utensil? ‘The hassock, don’t you ever go to church?’ and then I saw the plump needlepoint hassock nestling under the table. I snatched it up and Staff Nurse flicked her apron over it and placed it in the exact centre of the ward. Harris held out bell and prayerbook to Sister, who took them, rang for silence and then creaked down on to the hassock. The rest of us fell on our knees on the hard wooden floor.

  ‘We beseech Thee… to bless the work of this hospital… We commend the patients to Thy loving care… Help all those who are nurses…’ Sister’s voice intoned monotonously on and I found myself repeating silently over and over again:

  ‘Please God, look after Gerald – please God, keep him safe,’ until suddenly everyone else was on their feet and I had to hastily scramble up, feeling very foolish.

  We were sent back to our rooms for half an hour to clean them and make our beds and to put on fresh aprons. The thought of another struggle with broom and shovel was too much for me; I collapsed on to the mattress and stared hopelessly at the bare walls. I was a failure, before I had even finished my first morning. Then Juno burst in waving a Times; she looked as dishevelled as I felt, but she did not seem to care. ‘Look, Hellie, the appointments are out from the London Gazette – just look here.’ I followed her stabbing finger below the heading ‘Cavalry’ and read: ‘1st Life Guards, Captain the Marquess of Staveley to be Major.’ My face flushed with pride and my heart beat faster. I thought of Gerald riding at the head of his squadron as he fought for his King and country; of Guy leading his men into battle; and of Lance, Lance with his gentle face a white mask as he lay still on the fields of Belgium. Whilst I, I sat weeping because I could not perform the simplest of household tasks. I stood up straight and began to tug at the crumpled sheets.

  Back on the ward I was set to cleaning again: the brass knobs on the beds; the brass taps on the lavatory basins; the brass rims round the tables; the brass trays in the kitchen. My fingers became stained and dirty; my nail broke and caught in the polishing cloth. Harris saw me tugging at it. ‘You’d better cut those nails, Girvan – here, borrow my scissors.’

  I managed to cut my left hand, but I could not hold the scissors straight
to trim the right. Harris seized them from me and pared the nails down quickly. As she snipped she asked, ‘How ever have you managed not to learn to cut your own nails?’

  I whispered, ‘My maid always manicured my hands.’

  She glanced up at me, her face astonished. ‘Then I don’t know what you’re doing here, Girvan, but I think you’re wasting your time.’ I had to blink hard to keep back the tears.

  When I had finished cleaning the bath I had to empty the sterilizer, scrub it out and refill it; my apron was sodden by the time it was done. As soon as I reported to Staff Nurse she hauled me into the vile-smelling sink room with curt instructions on how to deal with bed pans. She seized one, ran the seat under the hot water tap, dried it briskly then rushed me up the ward and made me pull the heavy screens round a bed. ‘Don’t worry, Granny, you’ll soon be comfortable. Watch carefully, Girvan.’ Shrinking, I watched her put her right hand under the woman’s back and slide the white earthenware pan under the flabby buttocks. We heard the splash of urine and I prayed there would be nothing more.

  Staff Nurse tipped the pan down the low glazed sink, then pulled the chain which flushed it. ‘A quick dowse with hot water and a drop of lysol, then it can be hung up to dry. We only do a full wash once a day, after the evening round. There, you’ll know what to do next time – never keep a patient waiting for a bed pan, it’s far more trouble to change a dirty bed. Wash your hands now, it’s nearly dinnertime.’