A Nightingale Christmas Wish

by Donna Douglas

  Frannie felt the lump rising in her throat and swallowed it down determinedly.

  ‘And may I ask why?’

  John shook his head regretfully. ‘I’m a soldier, Frannie. The army is my life and always will be. I don’t have room for anyone or anything else.’

  Frannie looked into his rigid face. ‘I thought you’d learned your lesson after you almost lost Adam?’

  ‘Perhaps it’s too late for me to change.’

  ‘Or perhaps you don’t want to?’

  He flashed a look at her, and Frannie glimpsed something in his unguarded gaze. He wasn’t telling her the truth, she was sure of it.

  But the next second the shutters were back in place. ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ he conceded.

  ‘Then you’re going to be very lonely.’

  ‘It’s what I’m used to.’ He sent her a wary look. ‘I’m so sorry, Frannie. I should never have let it get this far. But I couldn’t help myself. I very much enjoyed your company, perhaps more than I should . . .’

  Then don’t go, she urged him silently. But she had more pride than to beg.

  ‘It’s all right, John, you don’t have to look so worried,’ she scorned. ‘I’m not some lovesick girl, I’m hardly going to scream and rage and dissolve in tears at your feet!’

  His mouth twisted in a heartbreaking smile. ‘Your anger is no less than I deserve.’

  ‘Well, I shan’t give you the satisfaction,’ Frannie replied with mock haughtiness.

  They looked at each other, and once again Frannie saw the flash of pain in his green eyes. This was hurting him more than he wanted to admit. There was still something he wasn’t telling her, but she knew this time she wouldn’t be able to get the truth out of him. It was buried too deep.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘For giving me the happiest few months I’ve ever known.’

  His voice was thick with emotion, and Frannie felt the sting of tears in her eyes. It doesn’t have to end, she wanted to cry out. But deep down she knew it did. She might never understand John’s reasons, but she had to trust them.

  The man opened his eyes and stared around him. ‘Where am I?’ he murmured groggily, his voice gruff from the anaesthetic.

  Effie leaned towards him. ‘You’re back on the ward, Mr Bennett. You’ve had an operation.’

  ‘Operation?’ He frowned.

  ‘For your hernia.’ She reached for his wrist to check his pulse. Post-operative patients made her nervous. She was always worried they might not wake up, and it would somehow be her fault. But Mr Bennett’s colour was good, and he was breathing normally. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘I – I—’ He turned his head towards her. ‘I don’t feel too clever, Nurse.’

  Effie saw the colour drain from his face. ‘Oh, wait!’ she cried, making a grab for the enamel bowl. But she was too late. Mr Bennett promptly vomited all over her.

  ‘Sorry, Nurse,’ he croaked.

  ‘Not to worry, Mr Bennett. I should have been quicker with the bowl.’ At least Sister wasn’t there to tell her off about it. Sister Holmes liked to make an example of students, and Effie was relieved she and her vomit-stained apron wouldn’t be paraded in shame before the other nurses.

  She cleaned him up, adjusted the blankets and hot-water bottles around him and made him comfortable, then when he had drifted off back to sleep, she went to find Staff Nurse Lund, to ask if she could go and change her apron.

  Mary Lund was a kind, motherly woman. She could be sharp when she wanted to be, but she was nowhere near as prickly as Sister Holmes.

  She was in Richard Webster’s room as usual. Effie could see Adeline’s smirking expression out of the corner of her eye as she explained her predicament to Mary Lund.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re asking me, you can’t very well wander around the ward like that, can you?’ the staff nurse sighed. ‘Go on, and be quick about it.’

  As Staff Nurse Lund left the room, Adeline smiled. ‘What a glamorous job you have!’

  ‘Stop teasing Nurse O’Hara,’ Richard said. ‘I bet you couldn’t do her job.’

  ‘I really wouldn’t want to!’ Adeline shuddered. ‘I can’t think of anything worse than spending every day up to my elbows in blood and bedpans.’

  ‘You don’t mind looking after me,’ Richard pointed out.

  ‘That’s different,’ Adeline replied, planting a kiss on his cheek. ‘I love you.’

  And I don’t see you doing much looking after him either, Effie thought. Adeline’s idea of nursing was sitting by the bed holding his hand and looking pretty. Effie could never imagine someone so exquisite administering an enema or mopping pus out of an infected wound.

  ‘Anyway, you’d better run along and get changed,’ Adeline dismissed her, nose wrinkling in disgust. ‘I can smell you from—’ She stopped speaking abruptly, her gaze fixed on the doorway beyond Effie’s shoulder.

  Effie turned around. There, just outside the door, leaning heavily on two sticks, was Adam Campbell.

  He looked different, dressed in his everyday shirt and trousers. Older, more manly, and very good-looking.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Effie asked.

  ‘I came to say goodbye. I’m going home today.’ But he wasn’t looking at her as he said it. He was staring at Adeline. Effie was suddenly horribly aware of the comparison between them, her still in her stinking vomit-soaked apron.

  There was a moment of tense silence. Then Richard said, ‘Hello, who are you?’

  ‘It’s no one.’ Adeline shot to her feet and hurried to the door, shutting it in Effie and Adam’s faces. ‘No one we know anyway,’ they heard her say through the door.

  ‘Are you sure? I thought I recognised him . . .’ Richard’s voice was uncertain.

  Effie looked back at Adam. He was still staring at the door, a thunderstruck expression on his face. She felt a sudden pang of intense dislike for Adeline.

  ‘So,’ said Effie, desperately trying to bring Adam’s attention back to her, ‘you’re going home?’

  ‘Yes.’ His reply was distant, his eyes still intent on the door. ‘Richard really doesn’t remember anything, does he?’ he murmured.

  ‘Not yet,’ Effie said. ‘But I’m sure he will, in time.’

  ‘Poor devil.’ Adam shook his head. Effie saw his troubled face and could tell at once the thoughts that were going through his head.

  ‘You mustn’t blame yourself,’ she said. ‘You didn’t ask him to get in that car and drive into a wall, did you?’

  ‘I suppose not,’ Adam agreed heavily. ‘But if only I hadn’t told him about being in love with Adeline – it was so selfish of me.’

  ‘Adeline was the selfish one,’ Effie insisted firmly. ‘You were just trying to put things right.’

  He finally shifted his gaze to meet hers, his mouth twisting. ‘Why do you always jump to my defence, even when I’ve been so awful to you?’

  ‘You weren’t that awful.’ Effie looked down at herself ruefully. ‘At least you didn’t vomit over me, like some people.’

  ‘True.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I wanted to see you before I left because I wanted to give you this.’ He reached into his pocket and drew out a slim book, which he handed to her.

  Effie looked down at the cover. ‘Collected Love Poems,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I got my father to bring it in for me. I know you said you didn’t pay any attention to poetry at school. I just wanted you to find out what you were missing.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Effie did her best to sound cool, but she could feel her face heating up with pleasure.

  They stood for a moment, neither of them speaking. Then she said, ‘Was there something else you wanted? Only there’ll be murders if Staff Nurse Lund comes along and sees me talking to you.’

  ‘Right. I’d better go, then.’ He shifted his weight from one stick to the other, but stayed put in the corridor.

  Then, just as Effie was beginning to despa
ir, he suddenly said, ‘Actually, there was something else. I wondered if you’d like to go out with me one night?’

  Effie stared at him. ‘Me? Go out with you?’

  He frowned. ‘You don’t have to look so appalled. Just a simple yes or no would do.’

  ‘No! I mean, no, I wasn’t appalled. And yes, I’d love to go out with you.’

  ‘Good.’ He smiled. ‘I’ll arrange it then.’

  He walked away slowly. Effie stared after him and was still hugging herself with joy outside Richard Webster’s door when Staff Nurse Lund returned and caught her.

  ‘Are you daydreaming, Nurse O’Hara?’ she asked.

  ‘No, Staff.’ Effie pulled herself together quickly.

  ‘Then why haven’t you got changed yet? And why is this door closed?’ she demanded, pushing open the door to Richard Webster’s room. ‘You know we always keep the doors to private rooms open.’

  ‘Yes, Staff. Sorry, Staff.’ Effie was so happy she would gladly have taken the blame for anything.

  Adam Campbell had given her a book of love poetry, and he’d asked her out! Even she didn’t have to sit and ponder what that meant.

  She was halfway down the passageway to get changed when Adeline caught up with her.

  ‘What did he want?’ she demanded.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Adam, of course.’ Adeline’s pretty face was tense with impatience. ‘Why was he here? Was he looking for me?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, he was looking for me,’ Effie said. ‘He wanted to ask me out. On a date.’

  ‘A date? With you?’ Adeline looked confused. ‘But why?’

  ‘I suppose he must like me,’ Effie replied. The pleasure she felt on watching Adeline’s face fall was second only to hearing Adam ask her out.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  IN HIS TIME as a medical officer in Casualty, David McKay had seen all manner of injuries. He had picked pieces of grit out of eyes, extracted beads from ears, and once retrieved a hat pin stuck in a woman’s enormous buttocks.

  But now he faced his toughest challenge – trying to dislodge a quantity of orange peel that was wedged up a small boy’s nostrils.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said, perplexed, as they waited for the anaesthetic to take effect. ‘How did it all get up there?’

  ‘Saturday morning pictures,’ the boy’s mother replied with the weary resignation of someone who’d lived through it all before. ‘I should know not to give him an orange. He always sticks the peel up there.’

  David glanced up and caught Helen’s eye across the couch. Her face was poker straight as she aimed the lamp at the boy’s nose. But he could see the telltale twinkle in her eyes.

  ‘He’s a little bugger for sticking things up his nose,’ his mother went on. ‘Last year he stuck one of his brother’s lead soldiers up there, and we didn’t even know until it turned septic.’

  ‘Sounds nasty,’ David said. He picked up the nasal speculum. ‘Right, let’s see what we can do . . .’

  As he leaned forward, Helen moved too and he caught the light scent of her hair mingling with the fresh starchy smell of her uniform.

  And that was when it all started to go wrong.

  It should have been a fairly easy job, and yet somehow David contrived to make a huge mess of it. His hands were shaking so much he dropped the forceps twice. He could feel beads of sweat gathering on his brow as he struggled to extract the piece of orange peel. All the while, the child’s poor mother watched him askance. She didn’t question him, but her worried glance said it all. She probably though he had delirium tremens.

  Finally, after several attempts, he pulled out the last piece of peel.

  ‘There.’ He held it up, triumphant.

  ‘Thank the Lord,’ the boy’s mother breathed. David didn’t know which of them was more relieved.

  ‘Try sending him to the pictures with an apple next time,’ he called after them, but the woman was already ushering her son out of the consulting room. Helen followed them, closing the door with a quick smile at David.

  He sank down on the couch and buried his head in his hands.

  ‘David McKay, you’re such a fool,’ he murmured. And he wasn’t talking about his lack of finesse with a pair of forceps.

  What was the matter with him? Jonathan Adler once said David made Helen nervous, but now he was the one who shook like a leaf in her presence.

  And he knew why, of course.

  He’d been horrified when Jonathan first suggested he might have feelings for her. But slowly he’d realised his friend’s assessment was correct.

  It wasn’t what David wanted. He’d intended to live out his years in the doctors’ house as a happy bachelor, enjoying the company of women but never getting close enough to fall for one.

  But then Helen Dawson had come along and ruined everything. Right from that first day she’d got under his skin in a way no other woman ever had. Which was why he’d started looking for reasons to reject her.

  When he meets the right woman, he’ll do the chasing. That’s what Esther had said. But the trouble was, when David McKay had met the right woman he’d promptly run a mile.

  And by the time he’d given in and accepted that he had feelings for Helen, it was too late. She was engaged to someone else.

  In a way it was a relief because it meant he wasn’t tempted to make a fool of himself. But in another way it made being close to her quite unbearable.

  At the age of thirty-five, David McKay had never lost his heart to someone before and he couldn’t say he was enjoying the feeling.

  But he was nothing if not practical, and had already worked out what the remedy should be. All he needed was his friend Jonathan Adler’s help.

  Jonathan was highly amused when David put his idea to him.

  ‘You mean it? You want Esther to introduce you to one of her friends?’ His dark eyes gleamed like glass buttons.

  ‘Do you think she’d mind?’

  ‘Mind? I’m sure she’d be delighted. She’s been feeling a little under the weather lately, so I’m sure this will be just the pick-me-up she needs.’

  ‘Oh?’ David was immediately concerned. ‘What’s wrong with her?’

  ‘Nothing serious, she’s just been a bit tired and rundown. But as I said, finding a woman for you will do her the power of good. You know she’s been desperate to get you married off for months.’

  ‘I don’t know about being married off!’ David laughed. ‘I just think it would be good for me to have some female company, that’s all.’

  ‘Quite right, too,’ Jonathan agreed. ‘But I wonder, do you really think it will work?’

  ‘Work?’ David frowned.

  ‘I mean, will it be enough to help you get over Helen Dawson?’

  David sighed. ‘For the last time, I have no feelings for Helen Dawson!’

  ‘Please yourself.’ Jonathan sent him a shrewd look. ‘But there’s got to be some reason for this change of heart. And I’m guessing our esteemed sister has more to do with it than you want to admit!’

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  ON A WARM April evening Frannie caught the bus home from Liverpool Street after another disappointing Peace Society meeting. Every week, there seemed to be fewer and fewer people there. They’d made plans for another protest in Hyde Park, but it was as if no one had the heart for it any more.

  On the way back to the sisters’ home, she thought about calling in at the Porters’ Lodge to see if there were any messages for her, then decided against it. After nearly a month, she’d given up expecting to hear from John Campbell. And she had more pride than to go looking for him. He’d made it very clear that anything they might have had between them was over.

  Frannie would have liked to see him again, though, just to ask him why it had happened. His sudden rejection had been all the more hurtful and shocking because it was so unexpected. One minute they were growing close, and the next – he was gone. Over the weeks since, Frannie had searched her mi
nd for the reason, but couldn’t come up with anything that satisfied her.

  At the sisters’ home a few of the windows glowed with light, but most were in darkness. The more elderly ward sisters tended to retire to bed early while the younger ones were still out, either together or with their admirers.

  Frannie was letting herself into her own little flat when she heard a door open at the other end of the corridor, followed by shuffling footsteps.

  ‘Miss Wallace?’ It was supposed to be a whisper, but Veronica Hanley couldn’t manage anything quieter than a boom.

  She loomed out of the darkness, her tall, square figure blocking out the light from the street lamp outside the window. She hadn’t earned the nickname ‘Manly Hanley’ for nothing.

  ‘Have you heard the news?’ she asked.

  Frannie paused, her key in the door. ‘What news?’

  ‘They’re closing down the hospital.’

  ‘April Fool’s Day was three weeks ago, Miss Hanley!’ Frannie laughed. Then she saw the Assistant Matron’s earnest expression. ‘Are you serious? Where did you hear that?’

  ‘Miss Trott was telling us about it at supper. If war breaks out, we’ll be closing our doors and sending everyone home.’

  ‘Oh, well, that explains it. You know you can’t believe anything Miriam Trott says. She’s inclined to exaggerate.’

  Frannie let herself into the flat and Miss Hanley followed her.

  ‘But it isn’t just Miss Trott. It’s all round the hospital,’ Veronica Hanley insisted. ‘I’m surprised you haven’t heard about it.’

  Frannie looked up into Veronica Hanley’s plain, square face, fringed with sensibly short grey hair. Miss Hanley didn’t usually allow herself to get upset over nothing.

  ‘There must be some mistake,’ Frannie told her. ‘Have you spoken to Matron about it?’

  Miss Hanley looked uncomfortable. ‘I tried to talk to her after supper, but she said I would have to wait until tomorrow morning. To be honest with you, Miss Wallace, I find it very hard to talk to her about anything these days. She’s very – distracted.’