by Susan Barrie
“What will Dr. Mackay think of me?” she wailed.
Charlotte, conscious of immense relief, regarded her kindly.
“There’s no reason why he should ever hear that you didn’t keep awake. After all, it’s some time since you were actively engaged in nursing, and I don’t want to sound as if I begrudged it you, but you did drink most of the wine at dinner, and you’re probably not used yet to the strong sea air. If anything had happened to the patient on the way up the stairs it would have been different. But you say he’s all right! ” “He seems to be reasonably all right.”
But Hannah was inclined to rock backwards and forwards with distress.
“It’s an unpardonable thing for a nurse to fall asleep on duty! And I never did it before… no, not even in my very earliest days as a probationer! I was too afraid of the ward sister, for one thing.”
“Well, there’s no ward sister here, and we can tell Dr. Mackay that you’d left the room for a moment and Richard – Mr. Tremarth
– seized the opportunity to vanish up the stairs.”
Hannah regarded her with hollow eyes.
“The patient knows I was asleep. And what would have happened if you hadn’t been awake?”
“I was awake because I was cold and couldn’t get to sleep.” And that reminded Charlotte that Richard was still without hot-water bottles. “There was no particular virtue attaching to the fact that I was awake while you snatched a nap, but now that we’re both up I think we’d better give the maximum amount of attention to our first patient -” and she smiled encouragingly at Hannah. “You go and take a bath and I’ll fill the hot-water bottles and make us some tea. As a matter of fact, I was on my way down to the kitchen to make tea when I ran into
Richard____________________ Somehow I can’t get used to calling him Mr. Tremarth!”
It was an admission she made to herself rather than Hannah.
It was a wonderful early dawn, and the sea was flushed with rose as she made the tea. She stood beside the kitchen window and looked out at the delightfully fresh world of dew-drenched roses and white-capped lazy wavelets, and thought of the green cliff-top where Richard’s car had come to grief absorbing the warmth from the first rays of sun, and wondered what the real explanation was of that mad burst of speed of his the night before. He had been driving quite recklessly, and he must have been aware of it himself. He was not the sort of man to bother about his dinner… or that was the impression she had received of him. He might have been healthily hungry, but he wouldn’t have risked his car and his life simply and solely because the landlord at the Three Sailors might have assumed that he was not returning for dinner that night, and locked up the kitchen.
In any case, the landlord at the inn was much too obliging not to provide something for a guest.
Charlotte felt inclined to shake her head over that ridiculous explanation, and at the same time her curiosity was aroused, and she wished she knew the answer. But one man’s poison was another man’s meat. Only a few days ago she and Hannah had been discussing the starting of a nursing-home, and now here they were with their first patient! He was a patient they were hardly likely to have for long, for the doctor was almost certain to whisk him off to the local hospital after he had seen him that morning, and that would be the end of an unusual episode.
Goodbye to Richard Tremarth… Possibly an agreement with his agents to sell to him, and then back to normal again. Very likely back to London and the old routine.
But when the doctor called he was not so optimistic about the idea of removing his patient. The hospital was fairly full, and their beds were precious. Richard Tremarth seemed to be doing reasonably well where he was, although he was undoubtedly slightly concussed and in addition to a strapped-up arm an ankle was injured and had to be dealt with. The doctor was satisfied as a result of his examination that no other serious damage had resulted from the accident – which was a miracle – and all the patient really needed was rest and attention. He was certainly somewhat astonished when he heard that his patient had selected a moment when his nurse was temporarily absent to walk upstairs and install himself in Charlotte’s room, but apart from raised eyebrows he said nothing.
It was Charlotte who offered the explanation about Hannah being temporarily absent, and she could tell by the faintest flicker of amusement in Richard’s eyes that he understood she was defending her friend. He said nothing, however – perhaps because her own eyes were quite definitely appealing to him – and afterwards Hannah thanked her in gruff tones.
“You shouldn’t have done it, you know,” she said. “Your precious Richard is perfectly well aware that I fell asleep on duty, and one day when he feels like it he may tell Dr. Mackay. Not that I care,” she added, with an air of bravado. “I’ve no intention of returning to nursing, so it doesn’t worry me.”
But Charlotte had already observed how eager she was to please Dr. Mackay, whose red hair positively quivered like a flaming torch in the morning sunlight that filled the sick-room, and she was quite sure she would blench most unhappily if he rebuked her. She smiled a little to herself, wondering why human beings went out of their way to deceive themselves.
But they had a problem on their hands which prevented her thinking about very much else just then, and that was to ensure that the patient didn’t have a serious relapse as a result of being cared for by them. It was obvious Dr. Mackay thought Hannah was quite capable of taking charge of the nursing, but he did offer to send a night nurse along as soon as he could find one who was free.
“It isn’t easy nowadays, however,” he explained, “and this is an out-of-the way place. In London it would be different, of course…
He turned to the patient.
“You’ve no objection to being looked after here by Miss Woodford and Miss Cootes?” he asked.
Richard, who was still extremely drowsy and difficult to rouse, smiled faintly.
“You’d better put the question to Miss Woodford and Miss Cootes,” he suggested. “They are the ones who are going to be burdened with me, and I should hardly think they want me here.”
But Charlotte assured him earnestly that, since the doctor didn’t seem to think it would be a good thing to move him, they were quite in agreement that he should remain where he was.
“In your bed?” he asked, looking straight up at her and proving, by the slight quirk at one comer of his mouth, that he was not actually suffering from amnesia, and he knew perfectly well what was going on around him.
“There are lots of rooms in the house,” she replied, automatically smoothing the top of his sheet, “and I can choose another for myself.” “How long can I stay here?”
“As long as it’s necessary.”
He smiled in a curiously contented manner, and turned his face to the wall.
“In that case I shall probably become a permanent invalid,” he murmured drowsily.
For the remainder of that day he slept under the influence of the drugs that had been administered to him, and required little or no attention from his nurses. Hannah took up her station beside his bed, and arranged with Charlotte to have a sleep during the evening so that she could take over during the night, and she made it perfectly clear that Charlotte was to have little to do with the actual nursing of the patient, not so much because she was untrained but because the circumstances were slightly peculiar. After all, as she pointed out to her friend, Richard Tremarth was virtually a stranger to her… and the fact that she had known him when she was five years old didn’t add a touch of conventionality to her performing services for him that an unmarried girl wouldn’t normally perform for a little-known man of Tremarth’s years.
“You mean wash him and that sort of thing?” Charlotte asked, and Hannah nodded.
“It’s different for me,” she explained.
Charlotte agreed… and wondered afterwards what would have happened if Hannah had been without any sort of training and the same set of circumstances had occurred.
Whe
n Tremarth really came to himself it was she, Charlotte, however, who was on hand to watch him frowning perplexedly round the room that was filled with the light of sunset. He lay listening for a few minutes to the monotonous surging of the sea, and for a while he watched the reflected light of the sea on the white-painted ceiling as if it fascinated him; and then he turned his dark head swiftly in Charlotte’s direction and asked her in quite a strong voice:
“What time is it?”
“It’s about half-past eight.”
“In the evening?”
“Yes.”
His grey eyes were frankly puzzled as they gazed at her.
“Why am I here? And where exactly am I?”
“This is Tremarth… Tremarth House. Don’t you remember? You had an accident – in your car. It overturned on the road the night before last.”
His grey eyes grew so dark they appeared almost black for several seconds, and then the pupils became distended and she could have inserted a finger in the deep cleft between his brows.
“I don’t remember. I don’t remember anything…He looked very white in the warm light that filled the room, and because it appeared to be worrying him she went across to the windows and drew the curtains.
She bent over him very gently.
“But surely you remember Tremarth? It’s your favourite house! ”
“No.” He winced this time as he shook his head.
“You don’t remember that you wanted to buy it?”
“No.”
“You have no recollection at all of the accident?”
“None whatsoever.”
Charlotte hesitated, standing there beside his bed – that was in actual fact her bed. Her instincts warned her that she should refrain from questioning him and run along the corridor to Hannah’s room and waken her. Hannah might know how to deal with this situation, but she did not.
And to complicate everything a violent curiosity was stirring in her. It was almost a ‘must’ that she find out something.
“But you do know me?” she asked him softly. “You’ve very good reason to remember me, because you were annoyed with me on the night of the accident – ”
He stared straight up into her eyes.
“You’ve got red hair,” he murmured almost absent-mindedly, “and I suppose it’s very pretty hair. It appears to curl naturally.”
“It does curl naturally,” she agreed.
“You’re very pleasant to look at altogether, but I haven’t the foggiest idea who you are. Ought I to know you very well?”
“I’m Charlotte Woodford,” she said distinctly.
He closed his eyes.
“Sorry, Charlotte, but if you said you were Florence Nightingale I’d have to believe you! To the best of my knowledge I’ve never met Charlotte Woodford.”
Charlotte went downstairs and sought out Hannah with a very grave look on her face. Hannah was not so immediately alarmed as Charlotte was, and said she had heard of cases of this kind before. It was nothing to be really startled about that Richard Tremarth, having survived an appalling accident, should have forgotten who he was. It was simply a form of amnesia resulting from delayed concussion. He had probably received a blow on the head that was much worse than any of them had imagined, and he would probably be foggy about everything around him for a while at least.
Nevertheless, she wasted little time in telephoning the doctor, and the latter said he would be with them in about half an hour. He too took the news quite calmly, saying reassuringly that it was the sort of thing that often happened.
Charlotte, however, was seriously troubled. As she pointed out to Hannah he appeared to have forgotten everything… and that in a matter of hours.
“Only this morning he knew me perfectly well,” she said. “He walked up the stairs under his own steam, recognised that the room we entered was my room, and was concerned because he felt he had no right to turn me out of it. Of course I told him it didn’t matter about it being my room, and he looked so relieved at the prospect of getting into bed. I’m sure he was normal at that time.”
“But since then he has had a long sleep.” Hannah went upstairs alone to see the invalid, and Charlotte had no opportunity to find out what transpired at the interview because the doctor arrived before she left the room again and he suggested, quite kindly, to Charlotte that it might be a good thing if she remained downstairs while he conducted a fresh examination of the patient.
“After all, he is only a very casual acquaintance, isn’t he?” he said, in the same kind and detached voice. “I mean, it’s upsetting enough for you to have your house turned into a temporary nursing-home, and you don’t want to be harrowed by all the medical details as well.” “Oh, but he’s an old friend – ” Charlotte protested.
The doctor’s eyebrows arched.
“I mean, I knew him years ago,” Charlotte explained.
The doctor smiled.
“In that case, he should remember you. But if you really mean years ago then you must have been very young at the time.”
“I was only a child.”
Dr. Mackay shrugged.
“Then if there’s been a very long interval between your childish knowledge of one another and your present acquaintanceship he’s still not much more than a virtual stranger to you, is he?” he observed reasonably. And Charlotte realised that what he meant was that unless there was some particular reason why Tremarth should have her firmly imprinted on his mind she was no more likely to affect his present state and assist his return to a normal one than any of the other people around him
– including the doctor himself if it came to that.
Charlotte allowed him to go upstairs to the invalid with an odd feeling of resentment, nevertheless, and when he had departed and Hannah passed on to her the information that he was not seriously concerned about the patient’s lapse, and expected it might last for several days unless something happened to jog his shrouded memory, she could not refrain from arguing somewhat perversely that it did seem to her extraordinary that Richard wasn’t able to recall her.
“But why?” Hannah asked, studying her with rather more intentness than usual, as if she was suddenly intrigued.
Charlotte shrugged.
“Oh, I don’t honestly know why. Except that he was very annoyed with me recently, and when you’re annoyed with a person you're less apt to forget them than if they happened to be someone else,” she argued without very much conviction herself, However.
Hannah went on studying her with a certain unconcealed interest.
“Apart from that is there any very good reason why he should remember you?” she asked.
Charlotte appeared suddenly confused by the direct question, and actually developed a slight pink tinge in her cheeks while she denied the imputation emphatically.
“Oh, no, of course not!… Why,” she added naively, “we don’t even like one another.”
“You mean you don’t like him?”
“Oh, I don’t dislike him at all!”
“But you think he was annoyed with you for good reason?”
“He wanted Tremarth…”
“Well, he must have wanted it very badly, for his subconscious took over and literally forced him into that crash the other night. If he wasn’t dwelling on you he was dwelling on Tremarth… and now it seems very likely that he’ll remain a patient here for weeks.”
“Oh, do you think so?”
“Well, perhaps not weeks. But it could be one or two weeks. Do you think you can afford to keep him all that length of time, and provide the various extras that will be necessary?” “Of course,” Charlotte replied, with a considerable amount of surprised emphasis this time. “Of course,” she repeated.
Hannah smiled somewhat curiously and turned away.
“Well, if you’ll forgive me,” she said, “I’ll go and have another look at him.”
Charlotte made a careful inspection of the contents of the kitchen and the larder, and by the time she was rejoi
ned once more by her friend she had already drawn up a long list of essentials that would have to be obtained from the village store if the patient’s physical wellbeing was to be maintained. Hannah took the list from her and arched her eyebrows a little at the sight of such items as chicken in aspic and fresh strawberries if available, and she suggested that there were probably some strawberries in the garden if they went searching for them. And a more economical buy than chicken in aspic – which the village store was hardly likely to have in stock – would be a couple of fresh chickens from the local butcher, which they could keep in the larder and turn into various things like soups and casseroles when the need arose.
“It might even be worth a trip into Truro,” she suggested, “if you really mean to stock up. I can’t see the importance of strawberries, but you’re bound to get them there if you really want them.”
Charlotte was immediately captivated by the idea, and then it occurred to her that this would mean leaving the patient. She looked anxiously at Hannah.
“We can’t do that, can we?”
“I can’t but you can,” Hannah replied, with the faintest of genuinely amused smiles. “I’m in charge, don’t forget. You’re free to do more or less what you like.”
Charlotte objected at once that they would have to take turn and turn about, and then it apparently struck her that she was putting forward a line of argument with which neither Dr. Mackay nor Hannah herself would be likely to agree. The most that she would be permitted to do was sit with the patient occasionally, and apart from that it was her job to look after the domestic side. She agreed after a hesitation of several seconds:
“Oh, all right, I’ll go into Truro tomorrow. You must make me a list of any medical requirements you’re likely to need, and I’ll make out a really comprehensive list of the things I think are needed.”
Hannah smiled at her more kindly.
“Don’t spend all your money,” she advised. “Remember he’s a rich man and can afford to be looked after, but you’re only a poor working girl.”
Charlotte said without having the least intention of doing anything of the kind:
