Mary had followed me and began to chatter. ‘Of course, at the meeting the laird will want to know if you are going to stay here. Are you sure you don’t just want it for holidays?’
I assured her that we intended to move here permanently.
‘And what will your man do for work?’
I explained what ‘my man’ would do and added that if there was anything on the island for a trained nurse to do, maybe I could work too.
‘There’s a wee hospital on the other side.’
I was amused to hear her talk of the ‘other side’. The phrase was so often used to describe the other side of death, and we had already heard the terms ‘passing on’ and ‘passing over’. We did seem to be referring to death rather a lot, but I knew that ‘the other side’ referred to the opposite side of the high spine of hills that ran roughly down the middle of the island. Most places of importance—hospital, harbour, garage, and so on—were on the other side of this steep hill. Dhubaig and Coiravaig were the only two villages on our side.
A price had been agreed between Archie and George. ‘If the laird and the factor agree and the meeting lets you in,’ added Archie. Mary imparted the apparently exciting news that I was a trained nurse.
Finally, we remembered the phone call, collected the boys, and promised to return the following day. Elizabeth had passed with flying colours.
After some essential shopping on ‘the other side’, we returned to our home on the beach, taking far more notice of every hill and glen, every loch and lochan, in readiness for our residence here . . . we hoped!
The all-important meeting was scheduled for the following day. We were not invited, as I suppose they wanted freedom to talk about us rather than to us. Late in the evening, an ancient car crunched to a halt on the pebbles and Archie thundered on the door.
‘It’s all right,’ said he. ‘You have been approved!’
Apparently, this was a considerable departure from normal policy, as we were the first incomers to ‘our side’ of the island. There had been much heart searching and some dissenting voices before a vote decided our fate and we were allowed to contaminate the indigenous population of Dhubaig.
Archie had no understanding of the procedures to be followed in property transfers. One evening, he asked for the money for the house as though we were buying a chair or a bicycle and was amazed when we told him that solicitors and deeds were involved.
We intended to finish our holiday, go home, and start negotiations to buy the feu and sell our house. Our centrally heated, modern, dry, clean, convenient house that we were leaving to buy this old, near-derelict, damp, remote wreck with no facilities! Were we quite mad?
So home we went. Our solicitor, while seeming to believe that he was dealing with folk from outer space rather than from a Hebridean island, still managed everything smoothly so that a completion date was soon arranged.
And so, one damp Friday afternoon in 1969, we came to our ‘small acre’.
*
But enough of this reminiscing by the fire! I put the albums away. It was late. George was arriving in the morning and Christmas was upon us, so I should be getting to bed.
FOUR
Katy
The next day dawned at about 9.30. It was only two days past the winter solstice and, being so far north, the days were very short. George would probably arrive fairly early, as he often travelled overnight catching the early ferries, so I had been up long before it got light.
I was just stoking the Rayburn when Duchess began to wag her tail and in came George. The boys came tumbling from their beds and mayhem ensued. We had a huge breakfast and George unpacked all manner of weird presents, including an enormous sledge, and the boys started hoping for snow.
That evening, we drove to the steamer to meet John, Elizabeth, and her boyfriend. There was a feeling of excitement in the air as the lights of the little ship came into view. They were waving from the deck as she drew alongside the tiny pier. Oh dear! Would I get the boyfriend’s name right?
Down the gangplank they came. John immediately took Andy onto his shoulders, cuffing Nick’s head by way of greeting. I received a bear hug and George endured a very firm handshake. Elizabeth appeared, more restrained, accompanied by a very tall, thin, dark-haired but blue-eyed young man who was introduced as Paul. While she hugged us all, he gazed round at the office-cum-shop-cum-store room on the narrow stone pier and at the single-track lane leading away into the darkness beyond.
People and luggage were loaded into the Land Rover and everyone talked at once on the trek homeward to a celebratory dinner. The night was cold but overcast. No moon or stars tonight.
Early the next morning, I became aware of an ominous stillness. Fearfully, I opened an eye. As I thought: instead of darkness, there was an eerie white light on the ceiling. Snow! Excited shouts came from the boys’ bedrooms and downstairs a rather chilly Paul was warming himself by the Rayburn.
The snow was deep and beautiful, with huge drifts. Not a human footprint sullied the surface that was luminescent in the early light, but foxes, rabbits, and deer had obviously visited us in the night. The sea looked like slate, and the sky held the promise of more snow to come. The corries on the mountains were white, but many of the peaks were too sheer for the snow to pitch and looked even more stark than usual against the glowing white of their surroundings.
A hasty breakfast and everyone was off! Snowballs and sledging were the order of the day, followed, no doubt, by steaming heaps of clothes round the Rayburn. After a hectic morning, we were about to stop for some hot soup and a warm-up when a shout caught my attention. Struggling through the deep snow towards us was an agitated figure.
‘Murdoch! What’s the matter?’
‘Nurse! Nurse . . .’ Murdoch paused to get his breath. ‘It’s Katy again! Come quick!’
‘What about the doctor?’ I queried as I loped along beside him.
‘He canna come. The road’s blocked. ’Tis Loch Annan . . .’
It was always Loch Annan, or rather the steep hill beside it.
‘What’s wrong with Katy?’
‘She canna breathe right, and she’s awful pale.’
I shouted back to Nick to fetch my bag and to John to bring my small oxygen cylinder. We were already making our way up to Murdoch’s croft.
As soon as I entered the dark, smoky house, I could see that Katy, Murdoch’s 22-year-old daughter, was very ill. Marion, her mother, was hovering about her. Katy had leukaemia, which had been in remission for some months but had just flared up again, and as a result of this serious blood disorder she was particularly prone to infections. We had been pumping antibiotics into her for several days, but this was bad.
‘Hello, Katy. Let me sit you up a bit higher. More pillows, Marion, please?’
Marion hurried away and returned with her own and Murdoch’s pillows. Between us, we raised the gasping girl and I was pleased to see that her breathing eased. But her lips were blue and she was clearly exhausted.
Nick arrived with my bag and John followed with the oxygen. I was just opening the cylinder when I noticed that Murdoch had lit a cigarette. John noticed at the same moment and startled the old man by snatching it from his mouth and hurling it out into the snow. I left John to explain about the fire risk.
I told them that I was going to ring the doctor for his advice.
‘You canna. His line’s gone down,’ said Murdoch.
This was hopeless! There were more blue/black clouds on the horizon, and I could see that snow was falling again on one of the neighbouring islands. I looked at Katy and listened to her laboured breathing. I didn’t like the look of the weather or the patient, and I had to decide what to do. There was no possibility of help from the doctor, but I knew that my phone was working. As the district nurse, I had the only phone (other than the post office) in the village. I made a decision.
Telling Marion to go on giving Katy oxygen and leaving John to monitor Murdoch’s smoking habits, I floundered my w
ay home to do the only thing now open to me. I rang the RAF Helicopter Service. Helicopter help these days is almost routine, but in the far north in the early ’70s, it was very new.
‘The weather’s closing in,’ came the doubtful reply to my request.
‘It’s desperate! I really believe that she will die if we cannot get immediate hospital treatment.’ There was some muttering at the other end of the very crackly line.
‘Can you have the patient ready and at a suitable landing spot by 1300 hours?’
Mentally changing this to real time, I said ‘Yes’ with more confidence than I felt. Murdoch’s croft was perched on a rocky outcrop with no real access apart from a boulder-strewn, steep cliff-like path. We’d have to get her down to the flatter land in the village centre. And it was already 12.15 p.m.
The stern voice resumed. ‘Right. We must be away by 13.30, as the weather window will probably close at 15.00 and we have 155 miles to do to the hospital.’
This was all pretty unreal. I drew breath.
‘Fine. Middle of the village—area about the size of a school playground all right?’
‘Mmm . . . any trees?’
‘No trees.’
‘Right. On our way.’
Leaving George to round up some of the able-bodied men in the village and tell their wives to fill hot water bottles, I fished out a warm sleeping bag and some thick socks. Elizabeth added a woolly bonnet and gloves, and everyone set off to Murdoch’s croft through the snow once more.
On the way, I tried to think how we were going to get Katy down across the rocks without the aid of a stretcher. The oxygen had to come too, preferably without a break in its administration. Suppose the men slipped and dropped her? Suddenly, I caught sight of the sledge. It was huge: now it might come in useful. I grabbed it and towed it with me up and over the crag to Murdoch’s house. Katy seemed fractionally better. The oxygen was helping, but she was very weak and her chest rattled alarmingly.
We set about giving her a warm drink and bundling her into the socks, pullover, and bonnet. By then the men had arrived with hot water bottles and ropes. (Ropes?) The sledge was just big enough to take most of Katy’s tiny body in a semi-sitting position, but her thin little legs had to stick out over the end. We strapped two pillows at her back and a man got behind to hold her up. Blankets tucked tightly around her, with the hot water bottles inside, kept her reasonably warm.
Off we went! One man on each side to hold her, one to hold her feet, John carrying the oxygen and myself generally hovering. Puffing and struggling, the men still had breath for some mild ribaldry and a lot of laughter. I have always marvelled at the ability of the average Gael to find something to laugh about in the most unlikely situation. Katy was amazingly brave throughout.
Marion joined us with a small paper carrier full of Katy’s ‘things’, muttering about going with her daughter, but there would be two pilots and a doctor as well as the patient, leaving little space for a substantial lady like Marion.
As the procession neared the snow-covered area beside the road, we became aware of the drone of the approaching helicopter. Some of the men had had the presence of mind to arrange some tattered red curtains in the shape of a cross. The pilot circled the village, obviously checking the suitability of our makeshift helipad.
With a flurry of snow, the monster landed. We waited for the engine to die, but it continued to roar. Two figures jumped out, the badge on the uniform of the first proclaiming him to be the doctor. I went forward and we conferred by shouting within an inch of each other’s ear. The other figure hovered somewhat agitatedly.
‘We must be away,’ he said. ‘That’s why we have not turned the engines off. The weather is closing in and the pilot is anxious to go.’
The pilot now appeared with earmuffs and protective clothing for Katy. With oiled expertise, she was lifted from the sledge and onto the helicopter’s purpose-built stretcher and an oxygen supply was set up. She was loaded aboard and the doctor jumped in beside her. During all this, she smiled and gave a weak wave.
We were told to ‘stand away’, the doors were closed and we cowered away from the now-familiar blast of snow as the monster lifted into the already darkening sky. I looked at my watch: 13.30 precisely! We watched as the retreating helicopter disappeared over the hill and the noise gradually faded. The silence was almost as deafening as the engines had been.
Marion was weeping pitifully. She not been able to accompany her daughter, and because of the uncertain telephone communication she felt that she might not even hear if Katy arrived safely or how she progressed. I promised to do all that I could to keep everyone informed.
There seemed to be a sense of anticlimax and people milled around for a while, chatting and shaking their heads, before gathering their possessions and trudging homeward through the gloom. At least 20 of the 42 inhabitants of Dhubaig were present that afternoon to help Katy.
We too trudged home to get out of our wet clothes, build up the Rayburn and the now-dead fire, and try to warm up. John, Nick, and Andy had been very impressed with the whole procedure and the size of the helicopter with its array of instruments, which they had seen through the door. Paul must have wondered what this new girlfriend of his had got him into!
Later that evening, the phone rang. It was the hospital. Katy had arrived safely, been diagnosed as having pneumonia (no surprise to anyone), and was then sedated and put on an antibiotic drip. She was said to be ‘comfortable’.
I ploughed across the valley once more to tell Marion and Murdoch the good news, and as I returned the snow began to fall again. Well, that was the first of my so-called five days off!
FIVE
A nurse’s nightmare
Christmas Day was wet and windy. Our usual winter weather.
I rang my relief nurse, Nurse Robertson, to tell her about Katy and to make sure that she was able to get about the island to do the routine visits. There was no reply. I rang Dr Mac, but he had not seen her. However, the Loch Annan road was open, the doctor had been told, so I said that I would come over to do the essentials and try to locate my relief nurse.
I set out early to traverse the ten miles over the top to the nurse’s house. There was slush on the road and piled beside it were walls of fast-melting packed snow. We did not warrant a snowplough (I don’t think there was one on the island), but some of the men had been wielding shovels under the eye of the factor.
As I walked up to the front door of the nurse’s house, it was suddenly flung open and a tall man, clearly in a terrible temper, strode out. With no more than a glance, he pushed past me on the narrow path, but as he reached the gate he appeared to take in the significance of my uniform.
‘You’re the other one, are you? Well, she won’t be staying here!’
He strode off down the road. I was completely at a loss but most alarmed. Was she inside? What was going on?
I pushed the door open. ‘Angela, are you there?’
No reply.
I advanced tentatively into the hallway. A creaking sound made me look up and there, sitting on the top stair, was my relief nurse. Her face was swollen. Her hair, usually constrained in a neat bun, was loose and unkempt, and she was wearing her dressing gown. It was bitterly cold in the house but her feet were bare.
Angela was clearly hysterical. ‘I’m leaving! Now! Today! He’s found me and I can’t stay.’
None of this made sense. ‘Angela, come and sit down. I’ll switch the fire on and you come and get warm in here. Then you can tell me all about it.’
Slowly, she came down the stairs and into the sitting room.
‘I can’t stay,’ she repeated. ‘You can’t make me!’ She didn’t seem to know who I was. Her eyes were wild and unfocused, and her movements were jerky and uncoordinated. She sat by the pathetic little electric fire like someone in a dream and stared straight ahead.
‘I have to ring the doctor, Angela. We were very worried about you.’
‘I’m not staying,’ she s
aid again. ‘He can’t make me stay here.’
I called the doctor from the hall and in almost a whisper I tried to explain the situation.
‘I’m on my way,’ he said.
She was in exactly the same position when I returned: still staring blindly ahead.
‘Angela, tell me what’s wrong. Who was that man? Is he your husband, perhaps?’
She nodded. ‘He’s found me. I can’t stay—I can’t.’ She struggled up again, but I pushed her gently back onto the settee.
‘What do you mean? Has he threatened you?’
She stared at me for a moment then suddenly looked round in a panic and sniffed the air. She sank to the floor and began to twitch. Epilepsy!
At that moment, Dr Mac arrived and, taking in the situation immediately, knelt beside me and together we prevented Angela from injuring herself. Her dressing gown had slipped open and we could see bruises on her arms and legs. The result of other fits or signs of abuse?
Gradually, she quietened. She was dazed and tearful but no longer belligerent, so we got her onto the settee and tucked her up for warmth. She kept looking fearfully at the door but seemed to take comfort from having Dr Mac beside her. With gentle probing and tactful questions, he got the story out of her.
The man I had seen was her husband, whom she had left years ago when he became an alcoholic and had started to be violent towards her and her two children, now grown up. Being a Roman Catholic, she had never divorced him. She had had epilepsy nearly all her life but, like so many, was embarrassed and kept it a secret even from the Nursing Services Board that employed her.
Recently, her widowed mother had died, leaving Angela quite a large sum. Somehow the husband had heard about it and kept turning up to demand money. She kept moving and changing jobs, and she didn’t know how he had found her this time.
Call the Nurse Page 3
