A Nightingale Christmas Wish

by Donna Douglas

  ‘Perhaps she did . . . in her own way,’ Effie said carefully.

  His mouth twisted. ‘You don’t believe that,’ he said. ‘No, you were right when you said she used me. She never had any feelings for me. She was just bored, that’s all.’

  Effie twirled an olive around on the end of a cocktail stick. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have been so unkind.’

  ‘No, I needed to hear it. I’m grateful to you for your honesty.’ He lifted his gaze to meet hers. ‘I just wish I hadn’t made such a fool of myself, that’s all. And more than anything, I wish I hadn’t hurt my best friend.’

  Effie hesitated, then said, ‘What happened . . . on the night of the accident? You’ve never really told me.’ She’d never liked to ask while Adam was in hospital. But now she felt they could speak more openly.

  ‘I decided to tell Richard the truth. He was my best friend. He’d taken me under his wing when I first came to London. He was rich, well connected – he introduced me to lots of his friends. I felt I owed it to him to be honest.’

  ‘About you and Adeline?’

  He nodded. ‘I fell in love with her from the first moment I met her. She was the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen. But, of course, I didn’t do anything about it. As I said, Richard was my best friend. But then he had to go to Scotland for a couple of months on family business, and Adeline and I were left in London on our own, so—’

  ‘So you seduced her?’ Effie said. Even though she’d said she didn’t want to talk about Adeline, this was more intriguing than one of the torrid stories in Devora’s magazines.

  Adam smiled. ‘Is that what you think of me? A great seducer? I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m hardly Rudolph Valentino.’ He shook his head. ‘It was Adeline who seduced me. Not that I wasn’t willing,’ he added. ‘As I said, I’d loved her from the first moment I saw her. I genuinely believed she’d fallen for me, and that our love was meant to be.’

  Effie looked into his green eyes, so sincere and full of emotion. She could imagine how flattering it must have been for Adeline, having someone so devoted to her that he would betray his best friend.

  ‘It was a very passionate affair,’ Adam went on. ‘I’d never felt like that about anyone in my life, I didn’t even know it was possible to feel such an overpowering love for anyone. I knew it was wrong, but I couldn’t help my feelings. I was mad with love for her. I knew we were meant to be together.’

  Effie sipped her drink, wincing at the sharp taste. ‘And so you decided to tell Richard?’

  His gaze fell away. ‘I had to. I couldn’t go on lying to him, it wasn’t right. And I thought Adeline wanted to be with me. That’s what she told me, or I would never—’ He broke off. ‘I thought I was doing it for her,’ he said. ‘I wanted her to tell him, but she said she couldn’t bring herself to. I thought if I did, it would save her all that heartache . . . But I suppose the real reason she didn’t tell him was because she didn’t want to.’ Adam’s expression was bitter.

  He explained then how he’d decided to tell Richard one night, when they were on their way home from a party. ‘We were driving back to London, and we’d both been drinking, and – I don’t know, it just seemed like the right time.’ Adam shrugged. ‘I don’t know how I expected him to react, but he went berserk. He put his foot down, started acting like a madman. He kept screaming that if he couldn’t have her then neither would I.’ He screwed his eyes shut, reliving the moment. ‘Poor Richard,’ he whispered.

  ‘Not just him,’ Effie said. ‘You could have been killed too, don’t forget.’

  ‘I would have deserved it,’ said Adam in a low voice. ‘Perhaps it would have been better for everyone if I had died that night.’

  ‘You mustn’t talk like that!’ Impulsively Effie put out her hand to cover his. He stared down at it for a moment, but didn’t take his hand away.

  ‘Why not? I’ve made a mess of everything, haven’t I? My friend nearly died, and the woman I love doesn’t even care about me.’

  The woman I love. In spite of it all, he still loved Adeline.

  Effie pulled her hand away. She didn’t know why his admission should hurt so much, but it did.

  As he took her home, Adam said ruefully, ‘I’m sorry if you’ve had a wasted evening.’

  ‘It wasn’t completely wasted,’ she assured him. ‘I got the chance to show off my dress at the Savoy!’

  ‘You looked very nice.’ His eyes met hers for a moment, then he looked away. ‘I’ve made a mess of this too, haven’t I? What girl wants to sit listening to me bemoaning my lost love all night?’

  ‘I didn’t mind,’ Effie said. ‘Anyway, I’m prepared to give you another chance.’

  His mouth curved. ‘That’s very generous of you.’

  ‘Isn’t it? Only this time I choose where we go.’

  He eyed her warily. ‘What have you got in mind?’

  ‘Never you mind.’ She tapped the side of her nose. ‘But wherever it is, it’ll be a lot more fun than a poetry recital!’

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  ‘YOU WANTED TO see me, Matron?’

  Kathleen looked up at Gertrude Carrington, sister of Hyde, the Female Chronics ward, standing in the doorway of her office. She glanced at the clock on the wall. Half-past seven on the dot. Trust Sister Hyde to be punctual to the second.

  ‘Yes. Please come in, Sister.’

  Gertrude closed the door carefully behind her and crossed the room to stand in front of Kathleen’s desk, hands folded in front of her. She was in her sixties, tall, gaunt-framed and utterly fearsome. Her grey hair was drawn back under her starched bonnet, the jaunty bow under her chin a stark contrast to her bony, unsmiling face.

  Kathleen picked up her pen in an effort to prevent her hands from shaking. She wasn’t looking forward to this. Sister Hyde was one of the old school. She had been at the Nightingale for as long as anyone could remember, and probably several decades before that.

  She wasn’t going to like what Kathleen had to say. But it had to be done.

  She invited her to sit down but Gertrude Carrington dismissed her offer with a stiff, ‘I’d rather stand, if you don’t mind, Matron. It wouldn’t be proper.’

  Kathleen smiled. ‘As you wish.’ She paused for a moment, then said, ‘As you have probably heard, the Trustees have put plans in place for the hospital in the event of war – which, unfortunately, seems ever more likely.’

  Gertrude Carrington’s nostrils flared, but she said nothing. She wasn’t going to make this any easier, Kathleen realised.

  ‘We have already made arrangements to transfer the medical school down to Kent, and over the coming months we will be reducing the number of hospital admissions, and closing down wards as and when it is possible to do so,’ she went on. ‘But as you can imagine, that isn’t practical for the Chronic wards.’

  Strictly speaking, the Chronic wards were for patients with long-term or terminal conditions. In reality, they were the elderly men and women who had nowhere else to go. Often they were alone in the world, or had been abandoned by their families. They were the forgotten, the confused, the infirm and the weak.

  And Sister Hyde protected them with the ferocity of a lioness.

  ‘So what will you do with them, Matron?’ Gertrude Carrington’s tone was polite, but with an undertone of steel.

  ‘We have decided to disperse them to other hospitals.’ Kathleen busied herself consulting her notes so she wouldn’t have to meet the older woman’s eye. ‘So far, we have managed to arrange beds for them at St Agatha’s in Sidcup, St Giles in Guildford and – the St Albans Public Assistance Institution.’

  There was a lengthy pause. ‘The workhouse.’ Gertrude Carrington uttered the words through stiff lips. ‘You’re sending them to the workhouse.’

  ‘Now, Sister Hyde, you know there’s no such thing these days,’ Kathleen told her briskly. ‘These are all perfectly good hospitals, where our patients will be well looked after. And it will be a lot safer for them out
of London, if war comes . . .’

  She trailed off in the face of Gertrude Carrington’s basilisk stare. Sister Hyde had the power to make Kathleen feel like a foolish probationer again.

  ‘I don’t know if you are aware, Matron, but many of the elderly patients on my ward and on Male Chronics grew up in fear and terror of the workhouse. They have lived all their lives in the shadow of it. If you send them there, it could kill them.’

  ‘Very well,’ Kathleen said. ‘I will find other hospitals.’

  ‘Wherever you send them, the journey will probably kill them anyway,’ Gertrude said. ‘But then I suppose that would solve your difficulty,’ she added in an undertone.

  Kathleen put down her pen. ‘Sister, please. I’m doing my best.’

  ‘I beg your pardon, Matron, but you’re not. If you were doing your best then you would have put an end to this nonsense straight away, instead of letting the Trustees get away with closing the hospital down when there is absolutely no need.’

  Kathleen stared at the elderly nurse as she stood before her, ramrod straight in her immaculate grey uniform. ‘How dare you take that tone with me!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Matron, but it’s about time someone told you the truth. I have spent my whole life caring for these people, and I’m not going to abandon them to an uncertain fate just because some self-important fool of a Trustee tells me I should. And I must say, I’m surprised you don’t feel the same,’ she added.

  I do, Kathleen wanted to shout back. Any other time she might well have stood up to Constance Tremayne and the other Trustees. But not now.

  Pain gnawed at her. The aspirin she had taken first thing had failed to dent the urgent stabbing in her belly. She could barely think of anything but the constant, grinding agony.

  She held on to her temper. ‘This wasn’t an easy decision,’ she said. ‘But the Trustees have to consider the safety of the doctors and nurses who work here—’

  ‘Then ask them!’ Gertrude cut her off bluntly. ‘Ask those doctors and nurses if they would rather be here, saving lives where they belong, or cowering in the countryside praying for it to all be over. Because I know which I’d choose!’ She faced Kathleen, her blue-grey eyes full of fire. ‘Did you know there has been a hospital on this site for five hundred years? Long before it was ever called the Nightingale, long before Florence Nightingale ever picked up a lamp. It’s lived through wars, bombings, fires and God knows what else, and has stood firm through it all. Because we don’t run away when things get difficult. We turn around and face them.’

  Kathleen winced as pain lanced through her. She gripped the edge of her desk to stop herself from crying out.

  ‘That will be all, Sister,’ she said through clenched teeth. She could feel beads of sweat gathering on her upper lip.

  But Sister Hyde didn’t move. She stood there, towering over Kathleen, looking down at her with icy contempt.

  ‘You know, when you were first appointed Matron everyone thought you were too young and inexperienced,’ she said. ‘But I saw something in you. I thought you would be good for this place. I thought you would bring fresh ideas, new blood, something to keep it alive for years to come. I never imagined you would be a coward.’

  ‘That will be all!’ Kathleen raised her voice above the pain that screamed through her body.

  The door closed behind Gertrude Carrington, and Kathleen finally allowed herself to collapse forward, her head in her hands. Behind her, rain fell steadily out of leaden skies, pattering against the window like gravel thrown at the glass.

  Sister Hyde was wrong, so wrong. Kathleen loved this hospital, had cherished it for five years. She had shaped it, cared for it, defended it. It was her whole life. How could anyone believe she would want it to disappear?

  The pain subsided, washing away like waves receding from a shore, and Kathleen took a moment to catch her breath and reflect. It was the second time recently she’d been called a coward.

  Was that really what she was? She’d thought she was being heroic, soldiering on, but now she realised she was running away from her problems.

  Perhaps, as Sister Hyde had said, it was time to turn around and face them.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  JAMES COOPER HAD just finished his rounds on the Gynae ward when Kathleen found him.

  ‘Matron.’ He looked up from scrubbing his hands in an enamel bowl, a smile crinkling the corners of his intense blue eyes. He was in his forties, tall, dark and handsome in his expensive pin-stripe suit, with just a touch of rakishness about him. His charm was all the more lethal because he seemed completely unaware of it. ‘What a pleasant surprise. I didn’t realise you were doing your round this afternoon.’

  Kathleen glanced past him to where Sister Wren stood looking very peeved. The ward sister disliked sharing the chief consultant’s attention with anyone else during his twice-weekly visits. She also disliked Matron turning up unannounced.

  ‘I was looking for you, Mr Cooper.’ Kathleen lowered her voice. ‘I wondered if I might have a word with you in private?’

  Now she was here, she was already beginning to regret her decision to speak to him. She crossed her fingers in the folds of her black dress, hoping he would say no, he was too busy. If he told her to come back another time she would have the chance to escape . . .

  ‘Of course.’ He shook the water from his fingers and reached for the towel a student nurse was holding out for him. ‘Come along to my office.’

  James Cooper’s office was sleek and beautifully furnished, as befitted a consultant of his high standing. The walls were lined with framed certificates attesting to his qualifications and achievements. Two very comfortable-looking leather armchairs flanked the fireplace. His desk was empty, save for a pristine blotter and a gilt-framed photograph of a beautiful, dark-haired woman. The window gave a fine view over leafy Victoria Park, bathed in brilliant early-summer sunshine.

  On the other side of the office was a couch half hidden behind a green hospital screen. Kathleen shuddered, remembering why she was here.

  James Cooper closed the door and invited her to take a seat in one of the armchairs, then sat down opposite her.

  ‘What can I do for you, Matron?’

  Kathleen clutched her shaking hands together and pressed them into her lap. She took a deep breath to steady herself.

  Tell him, the voice inside her head urged. Just say it and get it over with.

  He waited, his handsome face smiling and composed, blue eyes searching hers. Kathleen opened her mouth to speak, and—

  ‘I wondered if you’d had any thoughts about the evacuation plan yet?’ she said.

  His face clouded over. ‘The evacuation plan?’

  ‘Yes. We – need to start drawing up a schedule of when we can start to send patients home.’

  ‘I see.’ His voice lost its warmth. ‘I didn’t realise it was a matter of such urgency? As far as I know, no one has declared war on anyone yet.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s as well to be prepared, don’t you think?’

  ‘If you say so. But you’ll need to speak to Sister Wren about it, not me,’ he dismissed impatiently.

  ‘I will.’ Kathleen stood up quickly, and only just stopped herself from yelping with pain.

  ‘Is that all? Mr Cooper asked.

  ‘Yes. Yes, it is.’ She clenched her teeth and turned hurriedly for the door. ‘Thank you for your time, Mr Cooper.’

  Coward. The word echoed around her brain as she cleared the space between the armchair and the door.

  ‘Miss Fox?’

  She jumped at the sound of her name. Her hand was already on the door handle, ready to escape. ‘Yes?’

  ‘You could have spoken to me about the evacuation plan outside, you know.’

  She heard him cross the room to stand behind her. She could smell his cologne, subtle and lemony, as he stood behind her shoulder, but she didn’t dare turn round to look at him in case he saw the agony written all over her face. Instead she stared at th
e hand he’d placed on the door. His nails were well manicured, nothing like her own which were shamefully ragged and bitten-down.

  ‘What do you really want?’ he asked.

  His voice was so deep and gentle, Kathleen felt herself melt. There was something about his calm presence that reassured her, that actually made her believe he could help.

  Without meaning to, she suddenly found herself telling him about her pain.

  ‘I’m sure it’s nothing,’ she said hastily. ‘Just my age, that’s all. You expect this kind of thing as you get older, don’t you?’

  She allowed herself to glance at him, expecting more reassurance. But his face gave nothing away.

  ‘Let’s have a look, shall we? If you could undress behind the screen and lie on the couch . . .’

  ‘Oh, no!’ Kathleen panicked. ‘Surely there’s no need for that now?’ Her hand was already scrabbling for the doorknob again. ‘I’m sure you must be very busy. I can easily come back later . . .’

  ‘There’s no time like the present, is there? Besides,’ he added with a knowing smile, ‘I suspect if I let you get away now, you’ll find an excuse not to come back.’

  Kathleen’s shoulders slumped in defeat. ‘You’re right,’ she said.

  ‘Then let’s get on with it, shall we?’

  It should have been mortifying to find herself on Mr Cooper’s couch, but Kathleen was in so much pain she was past caring. She lay there, biting her lip to stop herself from crying out, staring up at the elaborately corniced ceiling as he examined her. Only once did a whimper escape her as his warm hands pressed her swollen abdomen.

  He looked up at her sharply. ‘Does that hurt?’

  ‘A little.’

  ‘More than a little, judging by your face.’

  Finally, he finished his examination. ‘You may get dressed,’ he said shortly.

  Kathleen uncurled her fingers that had been gripping the edges of the couch and sat up, wincing with the effort. As she dressed, she could hear the splash of running water from the other side of the screens.