The Orphan Collection

by Maggie Hope

  ‘But when will she be back?’

  ‘How the hell do I know? She gets gossiping down there in the village with her cronies and takes twice as long as she should. By the time she gets back it will be time for milking again.’ He spat across the dirt path outside the door and went inside, closing it behind him.

  Ada was seething. The man had no more manners than the pigs he kept. She set off walking back to West Auckland, her mind frothing with what she would like to have said to him if only she had thought of it at the time.

  Halfway there, Ada saw Eliza coming towards her. She was pulling a handcart with a milk can in it and Miles, wrapped in a blanket, beside it. Bertie was trotting by her side, a large muffler crossed over his chest and his nose red with the cold.

  ‘Ada! Eeh, I am glad to see you.’ Eliza’s tired face brightened as she saw her friend, then took on an anxious expression. ‘There’s nowt wrong, is there? You’re all right, pet?’

  Ada hastened to reassure her. ‘I’m in fine fettle, really I am, Eliza. I know I shouldn’t have come without letting you know, but it was the only chance –’

  ‘Why, man, that doesn’t matter. I’m that set up to see you. It was a right miserable day, me fingers are fair numbed. Howay, we’ll get in and I’ll build the fire, we’ll have a warm. Eeh, I’m over the moon to see you, pet.’

  ‘Me too, Eliza,’ Ada answered and smiled down at Bertie, who was standing quietly with his thumb in his mouth. His nose was running and she took her hankie out of her pocket and bent down to wipe it; it was red and sore with the cold. ‘Hello, Bertie, love, would you like me to give you a carry?’

  Bertie’s eyes brightened. ‘Piggyback?’ he asked.

  ‘Piggyback it is,’ she agreed and bent down so that he could climb on her back. ‘Hold on tight then.’

  ‘Did you see Albert’s brother, then?’ Eliza asked as they walked up to the house.

  ‘I did.’

  Something in Ada’s tone made Eliza look quickly at her. ‘He wasn’t rude to you, was he?’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘He’s not so bad as you think, not when you get to know him.’

  Ada was saved from answering as they had reached the house. Eliza led the way round the back, where she left the cart outside the door and picked up Miles, who was sound asleep.

  ‘Howay in, Ada, it’s warmer inside.’

  Inside, there was no sign of Ralph Maxwell, Ada was glad to see. She slid Bertie from her back and untied his muffler for him while Eliza stirred the fire in the range with a poker, added coal from the bucket and put a tin blazer in front of it. The chimney must have had a good draught for the fire quickly burst into life, roaring behind the blazer, which Eliza then took down and outside, away from the children. The heat from the fire soon warmed the room.

  ‘I’ll put the kettle on, pet, I won’t be a tick –’ Eliza bustled about – ‘then we can have a good chat and you can tell me everything that has happened. Bye, I was as mad as hell when you told me about those Parkers getting hold of you. Still, it came out all right, didn’t it?’

  A dish of bread dough covered with a white cloth was already rising on the hearth, and Eliza took a lump and rolled it out on the table. ‘I’ll put a stotty cake in, it’ll do nicely for our teas while the loaves are proving.’ Swiftly and efficiently, Eliza cut the rest of the dough and put it into tins, placing them on the fender to prove.

  As she worked, Ada looked around her with interest. Beside the fireplace there was a door and from the lowing behind it she guessed that it led directly into a cow byre. The walls were dingy brown with smoke and the windows uncurtained. The chairs were all odd, rickety and comfortless, Ada saw, except for the rocking chair by the hearth where Eliza had gestured her to sit. But a new clippie mat lay before the fire on the flagged floor and mat frames in the corner held another half-finished. Eliza was obviously trying to cheer the place up.

  ‘That one’ll be in bed.’ Eliza nodded to a doorway at the other end of the kitchen, at right angles to the front door. ‘He likes his bed of an afternoon. We’ll have a while to ourselves.’

  ‘Are you happy here, Eliza?’ Ada ventured. Bertie had climbed up on her lap and she sat back with him leaning against her breast. He had grown since she saw him in the summer, she thought. ‘Bye, what a big boy you are, Bertie,’ she said admiringly and he snuggled into her, content.

  ‘Happy enough.’ Eliza said after a while. ‘It’s hard, like – the cows to milk and the house to see to and the bairns. The worst is having to sell the milk, it takes a bite out of the day.’

  ‘Couldn’t Mr Maxwell do that?’

  ‘He works at the pit, you know, he hasn’t the time.’ Eliza opened the oven door and a heavenly smell of baking bread rushed out. Expertly she turned the stotty cake on the oven floor as the kettle began to sing. Ada was silent; he still shouldn’t expect Eliza to do so much, she thought.

  Eliza finished setting out the table and sat down opposite Ada. Sighing, she looked into the flames. ‘You know, Bertie’s better since we came up here. Better than he was in the village.’ She looked fondly at her elder son, who had fallen asleep on Ada’s lap. ‘Don’t you think he looks better, Ada?’

  Ada watched the sleeping boy. Indeed, he had grown and there was some colour in his cheeks. He had lost that anxious look he had about him the last time she had seen him, too.

  ‘I think you’re right, Eliza,’ she said.

  The kettle boiled and soon they were drinking tea and eating hot stotty cake smothered in golden syrup. It tasted heavenly, thought Ada. Bertie woke up and demanded his share, then got down onto the mat and played with his wooden engine. Ada told Eliza everything that had happened to her: her engagement to Tom and her new job at the hospital. Eliza’s pleasure for her good fortune was very satisfying to her. Bye, she thought, there was no one she could talk to like Eliza. Before they knew it, the afternoon was getting darker. Eliza fed little Miles and changed him and he settled back into his cradle, a cradle which was getting too small for him, Ada saw. They had a lovely, cosy time, brought to an end by the appearance of Eliza’s brother-in-law.

  He came through the door into the kitchen, yawning hugely and scratching his chest through his shirt. His face was unshaven, his hair stood on end and his braces dangled about his thighs. Without speaking, he went over to the mantelpiece and picked up a cigarette end, lighting it from the fire before turning round to toast his backside.

  ‘Isn’t it time you were out milking?’ He scowled at Eliza, ignoring Ada.

  ‘Aye. I’ll be doing it directly. Do you want some tea, Ralph?’

  ‘Aye. I was thinking I wasn’t going to be asked, when you have your fine friend here. In my house too, think on.’

  Ada rose to her feet. If she stayed any longer she would give this cretin a piece of her mind, she thought. ‘I have to go any road, Eliza,’ she said. ‘I have the train to catch.’ Bending, she kissed Bertie, still playing quietly on the mat, and went over to the cradle for a last look at Miles.

  Eliza went with her to the door, her face red with embarrassment. ‘It’s just his way,’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes,’ said Ada, and turned to Mr Maxwell. ‘Thank you for your hospitality.’ But the derisive note in her voice didn’t penetrate his skin; he merely grunted and spat into the fire.

  Later that evening, Ada lay in bed and opened her textbook of nursing, reading by the light of her candle. Her bag was packed all ready for the short journey to St Margaret’s Hospital next day. She was becoming excited at the prospect of starting her new life, though a little apprehensive: she thought she would be unable to sleep, but perhaps a few minutes’ reading would settle her down. Ada turned to the page where the requirements for probationer nurses were set out.

  ‘You are required to be sober, honest, truthful, trustworthy, punctual, quiet and orderly, cleanly and neat, patient and cheerful and kindly,’ she read. An angel, she thought wryly, that was what they wanted. This Florence Nightingale had certainly b
een a martinet.

  ‘You are expected to become skilful in –’ There followed a long list of skills necessary to a nurse. When Ada got to the one about the application of leeches, she stopped reading. Better leave that particular bridge until she came to it. She turned the page.

  ‘Now that nurses are drawn from a better class with more brains,’ she read. Oh, dear, was she of a better class with more brains? Would she get in? Restlessly, Ada closed the book and blew out her candle. The words of the good doctor Percy Lewis were adding to her inability to sleep, not settling her down.

  She thought of Tom, who had gone off to Newcastle early that morning. He would be back for Easter, he had called from the train as they parted on the station platform.

  ‘I’ll be counting the days, my love,’ he had said. And Ada had watched him disappear along the bend in the track and then crossed over the line for her train to West Auckland. Tom believed she could do it, and so did his father.

  Ada turned over on her side and closed her eyes, willing herself to sleep. This was no time for doubting. She could become a nurse and she was damn well going to; failure was definitely not part of her future. She would pass her entrance examination, she would go to the County Hospital and complete her training, she would do very well indeed, maybe even one day becoming a matron. And she would marry Tom. But that particular bit was far in the future, she didn’t have to worry about it yet.

  Being an undernurse at St Margaret’s was not much different from being a skivvy in a boarding house, Ada found. In fact, the boarding house had been good practice for it. She scrubbed floors, emptied bedpans, scoured the sluice and helped change the beds of incontinent patients.

  ‘Have you not finished that yet?’

  The voice of the ward sister coming up behind her twenty times a day sounded remarkably like that of Auntie Doris and their sour expressions were very similar too. Ada learned to confine her answers to ‘No, Sister’ or ‘Sorry Sister’, while she carried on scrubbing. For six and a half days a week, ten hours a day, she had no time to think of anything but the next task, collapsing on her bed in the tiny cell allocated to her at the end of a shift to even dream about the ward, the poor old women in their regimented beds, the uncomfortable feel of the stiff uniform collar on her neck, which was now permanently reddened from the contact.

  Gradually, Ada found she got used to the work. Her hands returned to a callus-hardened state, her nails became brittle and she was required to keep them cut as short as possible. She studied when she could and looked forward to her half-days when she could walk over to see Mrs Gray, calling on her way at Mr Johnson’s cottage.

  Mr Johnson was always happy to see her. His face would light up when he opened the door to her and he always had a supply of cream cakes for them to have with their tea. Ada found the cream cakes too rich and sweet but every week she ate one with apparent enjoyment while they discussed the latest book she had been reading, or her chances of getting into the County Hospital to train.

  ‘You’ll have no problem, no problem at all, Ada,’ he would say to her often. ‘You have a good brain and you like to use it.’

  Ada would leave the cottage feeling buoyed up and sure of herself. As she walked by the Wear week by week and saw the snowdrops fade and the crocuses spring up, followed by the primroses and daffodils, she was filled with hopeful expectancy for what the future would bring.

  Tom came home at Easter but Ada saw little of him, she had to work that weekend as she did every weekend. They did snatch an hour together and he too was full of the future. His finals were only weeks away, and things were about to happen.

  ‘I miss you, Ada,’ Mrs Gray admitted one afternoon in May, just before Ada’s seventeenth birthday. ‘Virginia leaves school this summer but she won’t be home for long. She and Christopher are announcing their engagement as soon as he qualifies. They want to be married in the summer. Christopher’s father has a big practice in Jesmond and, in any case, Christopher has money of his own. So Virginia’s future is assured.’

  Ada was surprised. Of course she had known Virginia and Christopher were interested in one another, but she hadn’t realised the romance had gone so far. But then, she thought, it was weeks since she had seen Virginia, most of her time having been spent at the hospital.

  She was even more surprised to receive a letter from Virginia at the beginning of June, inviting her to be bridesmaid at the wedding, which was to be in the cathedral. It was going to be a very grand affair, Ada saw, and wondered why Virginia hadn’t asked her friends from school. The letter was very brief and Ada wondered a little sadly at how Virginia had changed since she first met her. She could have been writing to a stranger.

  Visiting the Grays the following week, Ada listened to Mrs Gray chattering happily about the great event.

  ‘There’s to be three bridesmaids: Virginia’s friends from school and you. Virginia was only having the two but Tom suggested you might like –’ Mrs Gray broke off as she saw Ada’s expression. ‘Oh, Ada, it was just that Virginia didn’t think of you, but when Tom pointed out that he was best man and it would be nice … Well, I’m sure you understand. Don’t worry, everything will be provided, you’ll have no expense.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Ada grinned as she thought of her meagre salary. ‘Just as well. I dare say the dresses will be very expensive. I only hope I can get the day off from the hospital.’

  ‘Oh yes, dear, it will be all right, the doctor will have a word with Matron.’

  And, of course, given Dr Gray’s position at the hospital, Ada got time off, though she didn’t get away until the patients’ breakfast dishes were all cleared away and washed.

  The wedding day dawned bright and clear with the promise of a hot day to come. The marquee on the lawn was up and ready and the caterers installed when Ada arrived at the Grays’ house from the hospital two hours before the ceremony. Ada went straight up to Virginia’s bedroom, where she found the other two bridesmaids already dressed and busy helping the bride. Virginia saw Ada come in through her dressing-table glass and frowned.

  ‘Ada! Where on earth have you been? You’re supposed to be helping me and here you are not even dressed yourself yet.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Virginia, I got away as soon as I could,’ Ada answered mildly. ‘I had to –’

  ‘Oh, never mind what you were doing. Go and get dressed, I want you to help me with my hair,’ Virginia snapped.

  Naturally Virginia was nervous, that was the trouble, Ada said to herself as she changed into the dusty-pink silk dress and pink satin slippers. She gazed at herself in the looking glass, and thought she looked completely different. The dress was the latest fashion, shorter than usual; it reached only to her ankles and clung to her hips, making her look even slimmer than she was. The skirt was decorated with two fringes which danced as she moved, shimmering in the sunlight. Ada twisted this way and that to see her back. The neckline went down in a V almost to her waist and the dress was sleeveless, leaving her upper arms bare even when she drew on the silken gloves.

  ‘Ada!’

  At the imperious call, Ada picked up her beaded bag and hurried back to Virginia who was waiting, hairbrush in hand.

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Ada, what a mess your hands are! You’d better keep your gloves on all day.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Virginia,’ Ada said for the umpteenth time as she finished piling the thick, fair hair on top of Virginia’s head and put in the last securing hairpin. ‘It’s the ward work, you know.’

  ‘Well, you’d better go and do something with your own hair.’ Virginia dismissed her and turned to chat to her friends, who were sitting on the bed dressed in replicas of Ada’s gown.

  The wedding in the cathedral was like any fairy tale. Christopher, handsome as a prince in his morning suit, waited proudly as Virginia walked down the aisle, the bad temper of the morning forgotten. Her face was wreathed in angelic smiles, and the white satin of her gown gleamed as it clung to her curves.

  Later, at the r
eception in the marquee, Tom sat next to Ada, holding her hand. ‘Our turn next,’ he whispered and she nodded.

  ‘Plenty of time yet, though,’ she whispered back.

  Tom thought she sounded wistful but in reality Ada was becoming apprehensive about her own marriage, even though it was a year or two away. Listening to Virginia make her vows in the cathedral, she had been struck by the solemnity of the marriage service. Was she doing the right thing? Evidently Tom had no such doubts, he was very sure he wanted to marry her.

  Ada sighed. It was still a long time off. Tom had only just qualified and he was going to stay on at Newcastle as a surgical houseman.

  ‘I want all the experience I can get, my love,’ he told Ada. ‘But with you carrying on with your training, you won’t have time to miss me. And before you know it, we’ll be together again. We’ll have our whole lives to be together. It only wants a little patience, a little vision for the future.’

  Yes, thought Ada, she would be going to train at the County Hospital in the new year. Oh, she hadn’t passed her entrance yet, that was not until October, but she would, she knew she would. She had worked hard enough for it.

  The bride and groom went off to Paris in a flurry of laughter, excitement and good-natured bantering, driving to the station in the Rolls-Royce belonging to Christopher’s father, all gleaming white paintwork and well-stuffed leather. Following tradition, Virginia threw her bouquet to the waiting bridesmaids. Instinctively, Ada hung back so that it was someone else who caught it.

  ‘Don’t worry, Ada,’ said Tom. ‘You don’t need any good-luck signs, you’ve already got me.’

  ‘Yes, Tom.’ Ada shook herself mentally – what on earth was the matter with her?

  Ada passed her entrance examination with flying colours and in February 1912 entered the nursing school at the County Hospital. She was still a few months short of being eighteen, younger than most of the other probationers. She had thought she would have to wait until later in the year to commence her training, so she was very pleased when she got the letter telling her to report in February.