by Jane Arbor
Now there remained for Kathryn only the formality of handing her resignation to Matron and then the period of her notice to be endured.
When she took her letter of resignation to Matron’s office, Matron read it through without speaking. Then, in her calm, unemotional voice she asked: “Sister, have you considered this decision well? Can’t I persuade you to stay on with us? I thought you were very happy on the Children’s Ward?”
“I have been, Matron, I shall be very sorry to go.”
“I see here”—glancing down—“that you mention ‘private reasons’. Does that mean that you may be leaving nursing?”
Kathryn hesitated. She had hoped that the noncommittal phrase might satisfy Matron’s kindly interest and at the same time cover her indecision as to her future plans until she had left the Wardrop. Now she realised her mistake, and that Matron, with her finger tellingly upon the pulse of the hospital, would expect to be told more than that.
She was glad when a knock at the door saved her from immediately answering. Matron stood up, glancing at her watch.
“That will be Dr. Brand, I expect. He has an appointment with me. You will excuse me now, Sister, but you must let me talk further to you about this. Perhaps you would have coffee with me to-night after dinner?”
“I’d like to. Matron—” So there was to be no escaping the well-meant inquisition, but the respite was welcome. Kathryn moved towards the door, meeting Adam on the threshold as he came in.
He stood aside for her, his smile cool and rather absent, as if his mind were on his business with Matron. And as the door closed it seemed to Kathryn to emphasise the finality of what she had just done.
Probably he would regret her decision for the sake of their team work on the ward. He would be sorry—for Steven’s sake only!—that his ruthless matchmaking had failed. Would her going touch him anywhere else at all? Though she longed to believe otherwise, she knew that it would not. When Matron’s door had closed upon him, another door had closed in her heart.
On her way to lunch that morning Steven waylaid her, explaining that he was due himself to lunch with Adam, but declaring that she must give him a few minutes, as he insisted that she should be the first to hear his news.
“What news, Steven?”
He told her then in an eager flood of words—Sir Paul was starting a private clinic in South Africa, and he, Steven, was to be a member of its staff. This time he was going to make a success of the job, even though, lacking specialist qualifications, he was going to have to begin “at the bottom”. He didn’t care about that—he had felt only that he had to prove to himself and to everyone else that he could accept and hold down an overseas appointment, putting his last failure where it belonged—behind him for ever. Did Kathryn understand?
“Of course I understand,” she assured him warmly. “And I’m so glad for you. It’s a complete surprise too. I didn’t know you were thinking of anything of the sort”
“Only Thelma knew I meant to apply, and she broke the ice for me with Sir Paul, who, until now, has never concealed the fact that he hadn’t much use for me. But he has given me the job, which is all that matters, and I’m determined that you should be the first to hear of it, and to hear it from me, lest you should think it cowardly of me to—run away. I suppose I am doing just that, but I can hope that you understand, can’t I, Kathryn?”
How well she understood—that to run away from a love never to be returned was the only refuge the unloved one had! She and Steven were both running away before it was too late, before self-pity sapped their will to act. Meanwhile she was warmed by the knowledge that he had come straight to her with his news—had come in the simple friendship on which they had agreed and which he had honoured. Once, she remembered, Adam Brand had said that it would rest with Steven’s friends to convince him that he was not a failure. From that company he had meant to shut her out. Yet Steven had come to her first, and the quiet triumph of knowing it was very sweet.
Steven was saying: “Sir Paul had got hold of an odd idea—that I should be married before I went out to South Africa. I told him that I wished I could be, but that it was quite impossible, and for a while I thought he wasn’t going to give me the job in consequence. But he did, and even unbent so far as to say that it was an omission I should probably rectify in time. You know, Kathryn, I hadn’t even told Adam 1 meant to apply, and I’m lunching with him to tell him I’ve got the job. Incidentally, Sir Paul mentioned that he had offered him—Adam, I mean—a specialist appointment which he refused.”
“Refused?” Kathryn echoed the word, wishing she need not read into it a meaning she did not want to face—Adam’s need to stay in England at Thelma’s side. But she was ashamed of the thought when Steven went on: “I’m not surprised, really. He’s dead keen on his work here at the Wardrop, and it is typical of him to want to squeeze the last drop of experience out of it. I daresay Sir Paul was prepared to offer him the earth, but I could have told him that, against experience, money has never counted with Adam at all.”
“And—Thelma?” ventured Kathryn.
Steven shrugged. “As you know, she’s a law unto herself, but—” he broke off and glanced at his watch.
“Heavens, I’m due with Adam now, and he said he couldn’t wait if I weren’t on time, because he’s been called in consultation to a case at Great Ormond Street. I must be off, but I’ll tell you about Thelma later. I’m sitting on the fence and holding a watching brief—or whatever the proper metaphor is—while she makes up her mind. She knows what I want, but I’m not attempting to force her decision, lest she should react just the other way. Meanwhile, Kathryn, bless you for listening and being glad for me. I’ll do you credit in the end—see if I don’t!” And Steven rushed away, leaving Kathryn to feel that certain of his words were being hammered into her brain.
So Thelma was making up her mind. To what? To accepting Adam—what else? Naturally Steven wanted to feel that when he left England Thelma would be secure and happy in marriage to Adam, his best friend. But why should Steven doubt what her decision would be? Was there any real hesitation in Thelma’s mind? Or was it that, loved by Adam and adored by Steven, she could still indulge in caprice at their expense?
Kathryn thrust speculation aside as she went back to the ward after lunch. Soon now Thelma, Steven and Adam Brand would be part of her past, and immediately before her lay the coming interview with Matron. She would have to accept questioning and advice about her future—that future which she had purposely left hazy, because she could not bear to face the stark facts that it offered—another post in another children’s ward where every day’s work would draw the cruellest comparisons until memory dulled and faded. Now, in justice to Matron’s kindly interest, she must have something definite to offer for her approval. For if she were too vague and evasive, she suspected that Matron would try to persuade her to stay on at the Wardrop—the one thing to which her weakness must not yield.
When she went off duty there was more than an hour before her after-dinner appointment—time which she ought to fill by joining the other Sisters for the evening meal. But when she had bathed and changed she felt that dinner would choke her, and she decided to go out instead. The evenings were light enough now for walking, and she could well be back in time to go to Matron’s room.
Beyond the hospital the road mounted farther up the hill before dividing into pleasant residential avenues which in turn gave place to the open Surrey heathland which to-night she would not have time to reach. The houses here were older than the modernity of the hospital buildings, and were built in more gracious styles than the serried ranks of bungalows and blocks of flats which ranged along the lower slopes of the hill. Many of even the smaller of these houses had walled gardens and stood in their quiet privacy almost completely hidden from the road. Adam Brand had taken the lease of one of them on joining the Wardrop, and Kathryn, passing it frequently as she had to in order to reach the heath, had often yielded to wondering what it was like, this h
ome which he had made for himself, the home which she was never likely to see, the home to which he would probably bring Thelma as a bride.
To-night as she approached its only outlet to the road—a graceful wrought-iron gate set in its high outer wall—a small figure emerged, looked this way and that, and then stood irresolutely scuffing its shoe on the edge of the path.
“Hello, Roger—” began Kathryn, recognizing little Roger Horrick, and recalling that Adam had lately taken on Mrs. Horrick as a full-time housekeeper. She had met Mrs. Horrick in the town just after she and Roger had moved into their new quarters, and had had to stay to hear Mrs. Horrick’s praise of Adam as “the best and kindest gentleman I’ve ever had”.
Roger stared and then, recognising her, he ran to thrust his hand into hers. “Mummy fell down,” he announced conversationally.
“Did she? When?”
“No, she fell down!” Roger shook their joined hands in an effort to make his meaning clear. “She fell right down—and Roger can’t pick her up. She said—”
“You mean Mummy has fallen down and hurt herself now! Where is she then? In the house? Is Dr. Brand with her?”
“Dr. Brand isn’t there—only Mummy and me. And she can’t get up a—a bit!”
“Could you take me to Mummy, Roger?” There was no other decision possible.
“Can you pick her up?”
“I don’t know. But I’ll try, and if I can’t I expect I can still help her. Will you show me where she is?” They went together through the gate and along a wide grass path that wound between massed herbaceous borders towards the back of the house. A door stood open there, and Kathryn followed Roger’s trotting figure through a neat kitchen and into the hall beyond. At the foot of the stairs lay Mrs. Horrick, resting her elbow on the bottom step. One of her feet was turned ominously inward.
“Oh, Sister, what luck it should be you!” she began, but broke off, biting her lip with pain.
Kathryn smiled. “Good luck it was anyone. I should think your road is fairly deserted in the evening. But what have you been doing?”
“I don’t know how I came to be so awkward, Sister. I just caught my heel on a stair, and then my ankle gave, and I pitched right down. I can’t stand, and the Doctor’s due in for his dinner any minute, and there’s nothing ready for him—Roger can’t reach the telephone and wouldn’t know how to use it if he could, so I sent him out to stop the first person he saw going by—”
“And it happened to be me!” Kathryn knelt and with infinite care took the angrily swollen foot between her hands. It might be a broken ankle or a very bad sprain, but before either could be diagnosed she knew that it must have support and first-aid treatment. “Could I find some bandages?” she asked.
“Yes—in the cabinet in the cloakroom over there. Roger, show Sister—”
From the first-aid cabinet Kathryn selected a broad bandage, two short splints and a roll of cotton-wool for padding and fetched water from the kitchen. Then with swift, deft skill she dealt with the injury and helped Mrs. Horrick to hop to the couch in her own little sitting-room off the kitchen. And all the while Mrs. Horrick worried—about her own ‘silliness’ for falling, about its being long past Roger’s bedtime, and principally about ‘the Doctor’s dinner’.
“I’ll put Roger to bed,” promised Kathryn. “But I think I ought to ring Casualty Ward and have you taken in for an X-ray of that ankle.”
“Oh no, Sister, not to-night. I couldn’t leave until the Doctor’s been in. There’s his dinner—”
“But he’ll understand that you can’t do anything for him to-night, Mrs. Horrick. When are you expecting him?”
“I never know, but it could be any minute now. And nothing ready—”
“I daresay he’ll manage for once, or I could get something for him.” (The same wry fate which had thrust her uninvited into Adam’s house was probably delighting in the chance of permitting her to wait on him as well!)
“Well, you could, Sister—” began Mrs. Horrick reluctantly at the same moment as Kathryn remembered with dismay her appointment with Matron. She looked at her watch. Too late already to get back to hospital, even if she could leave at once. She must telephone—
But her call to Matron’s private quarters remained unanswered, and she was just wondering where else in hospital Matron could be located when the front door opened and Adam came in.
“Kathryn!” he breathed at sight of her. He was staring at her in a way for which surprise at finding her in his house did not altogether account. But in the twilit hall she only saw his tall figure silhouetted against the light from the open door behind him.
She said nervously: “I’m sorry about this—invasion. I’m on first-aid duty to Mrs. Horrick, who has fallen downstairs. I think her ankle is broken or badly sprained, but I’ve treated it, and she’s lying down in her sitting-room.”
Adam set down his brief-case and was dragging off his overcoat. He nodded at the telephone. “Were you ringing Casualty Ward?”
“No—Matron. I had an appointment for coffee with her, and I’m already too late to keep it. Mrs. Horrick refused to have me call Casualty until you came in.”
“I’ll go and have a look at her. Possibly an X-ray won’t be necessary until the morning. Meanwhile, you’ll have some dinner with me, won’t you?”
Kathryn’s lips curved into a smile. “I’m afraid there isn’t any,” she said.
“No dinner? Oh, I see—Well, I daresay something can be rustled up. Where’s the child, by the way?”
“Roger? Nodding in the kitchen, poor babe! I promised Mrs. Horrick I would put him to bed before I left.”
“Well, would you do that while I go and have a look at her? But you are not going yet. You are dining with me, if we have to make do with a can of soup. I rang you at the Wardrop, but couldn’t get you. I hardly expected to find you here, but now I have”—Adam paused with his hand upon the kitchen door-handle—“there are things we have to say to each other, Kathryn Clare—some of them long overdue.”
What could he mean? As she collected sleepy Roger and took his bedtime milk from the refrigerator in the larder, Kathryn’s thoughts were in a whirl. She forgot everything—even that she had failed to contact Matron and ought to call her again—in her mind’s bewildered repetition of his—“there are things we have to say to each other—some of them long overdue”. Before he had found her here he had meant to ask her to dine with him. To say what? Merely to regret her decision to leave the Wardrop, of which he would probably have heard from Matron? To blame her afresh for letting Steven go abroad without her—news which he would have had from Steven to-day? Anything more professional he would have said to her on the ward. Then why had he wanted to ask her to dine to-night?
She went downstairs again to hear that he had decided against sending Mrs. Horrick to Casualty Ward until the morning, that he had carried her to her room and wanted Kathryn to help her to undress. By the time Kathryn had done so, had improvised a “cage” to protect the injured ankle from the bedclothes and had foraged for a supper-tray for her patient, she began to feel that she had worked in Adam’s house for years!
She went down again to pass on to him Mrs. Horrick’s directions for their meal. There was some oxtail soup in the larder and some good bone-stock to add to it if it wasn’t enough—as if the Doctor imagined she made soup out of tins!—and a piece of boiled gammon to cut. There wasn’t a pudding, but the Doctor usually only had fresh fruit, anyway. And he made his own coffee at the table—
The table in the small graciously furnished dining room was already laid when, at Adam’s direction, Kathryn went to light the candles on it. As she waited for their shy light to steady into a bravery that was reflected strongly in the lovely patina of the polished table, she looked about her, appreciating now not the mechanics of Adam’s housekeeping, but the touches that spoke of the man himself, of Adam’s home-making, which for one brief evening she could share.
She judged that when he dined alone
he sat here in the evening. Then was a pipe-rack near the fireplace—she had never seen him smoke a pipe!—a book with his place marked, a deep armchair and, yes, from its downy cushions stared the startled blue eyes of a Siamese cat.
“Why, Puss!” Kathryn went over to him and coaxed his hostility by tickling his back near the root of his tail. He rolled over in response and pawed emptily at the air in cat-like ecstasy. And Kathryn thought yearningly: “How little I’ve ever known of Adam, when I didn’t even know he had a cat!”
“So you’ve made the acquaintance of Socrates. Do you like Siamese?” enquired Adam from the doorway.
Startled, Kathryn turned. “Yes, but I’ve never owned one.”
“Well, I can hardly be said to own Socrates—rather the other way about. Come, fellow—” Adam stepped forward, and at the sight of him the cat made a flying leap for his chest and nuzzled beneath his chin. Stroking him, Adam asked irrelevantly of Kathryn: “How hungry are you?”
“Hungry?”
“Yes. I ask because I’m attempting what cooks always declare to be impossible—holding back dinner, because I’d rather talk to you first. But the soup is still on the hotplate, and we can eat first if you’d rather.”
