by Maggie Craig
‘My parents will be worrying about me.’
Adam shook his head again. ‘No they won’t. Your brother Eddie came past - oh, hours ago—‘ He yawned, and put a hasty hand over his mouth. ‘Excuse me. He thought you’d be here and that you might not get away at the usual time, so your folks know exactly where you are. Matron was there when he called, apparently, and she told him you might be staying over.’
Liz was looking very doubtful. Adam lifted her hand from her lap and on to the cool tiles of the windowsill, his own on top of it.
‘Want to talk about it? I’m a doctor, you know. Well – almost. If I ever manage to pass my finals.’
‘You’ll pass. You’ll make a great doctor.’
‘You’ll make a great nurse.’
‘I don’t think I’ll make any kind of a nurse.’ It came out in a rush of breath.
‘How do you work that one out?’
‘Just look at me,’ she wailed. ‘Look at the state I’m in!’
She began to cry, the painful lump in her throat dissolving into hot tears. Adam didn’t move any closer to her, but he kept a tight hold of her hand and he said all the right things: the things Liz had been saying to people all evening.
‘You’re all right now. Just take your time. You’re fine.’
She poured it all out to him. She’d wanted to be a nurse all her life. It had been the dream which had kept her going, the dream she’d refused to give up on, but when it came to the crunch she wasn’t up to it. Look at the way she was reacting now. Her first genuine emergency, and she’d gone completely to pieces.
He paid her the compliment of listening carefully and just as carefully considering what she had said.
‘Think about it, Liz!’ He gave her hand a shake. ‘You’re upset now, and that’s only natural, butyou didn’t behave like this with the survivors, did you? You coped. And I’m sure - no, I know - that you did them a lot of good. You’re being too hard on yourself. You’ve heard some heartbreaking stories tonight’ His mouth tightened. ‘We all have. But the important thing is that you listened to the people who needed to talk without letting them see how it was upsetting you. You kept it inside until it was safe to let it out.’
‘But look at me now!’
He gave her hand another encouraging squeeze. ‘But that’s what I mean. You’ve held it all in till now - so that you can let it out when you’re among friends. There’s nothing wrong with that, nothing at all.’
She turned to him then, her eyes huge.
‘Isn’t there?’ She was like a little child seeking comfort and reassurance.
‘No, in fact, if you weren’t upset by everything you’ve heard today, you wouldn’t make a very good nurse. Don’t you know that all nurses and doctors feel like you do to begin with?’
‘They do?’
‘Definitely. I bet even Ming the Merciless has had her moments.’
‘Now you are telling fibs.’ Liz tried a smile.
Adam smiled back. ‘She does resort to a wee brandy now and again, you know.’
‘No!’ Liz was incredulous.
‘Well-known fact,’ he said briefly. ‘She keeps a bottle in her room. Fondly imagines the rest of us know nothing about it.’ He released her hand and stood up. ‘Come on, MacMillan, let’s get up the road. I don’t know about you, but I’m bloody starving.’
She shivered as they stepped out on to the pavement
‘Cold?’
‘No. It’s the blackout. I hate it already.’ How well did she know this street? Like the back of her hand. But in this total darkness it was like stepping out into the abyss. ‘I can’t see anything. It all feels different.’
Adam’s deep voice was reassuring. ‘But it’s not different. Everything’s the same as it’s always been. We can’t see it at the moment, but it’s all still there. Right, I think we’re coming to the road. Step down now.’
‘I can’t. I’m scared I’ll fall.’
‘Off the pavement?’ He sounded amused.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘and I know that’s ridiculous, but I can’t help it!’ She froze, unable to go any further. He didn’t tell her not to be so stupid. He simply waited, standing with her on the edge of the pavement.
‘They were singing,’ she said suddenly. ‘Some of the children on board the Athenia. One of the survivors told me. Just before the torpedo hit them. They were on deck singing South of the Border. She lifted her face to the night air. ‘Like we did on Friday.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I know.’ His voice was husky. They stood for a minute or two in silence.
‘I think my eyes are getting a bit more used to the dark,’ Liz said at last.
Take my arm,’ he suggested. ‘That’ll help.’
Arm in arm, they stepped off the pavement and crossed the road.
‘How long will it go on?’ she asked. ‘The war, I mean?’
‘I don’t know.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘But the lights will come on again. Don’t you remember how they did at the Empire Exhibition?’
They paused briefly before they went through the door of the café, itself completely blacked out.
‘Thank you,’ Liz said.
She could just make out his smile.
‘What for?’
‘Taking time to comfort a gibbering wreck.’
‘Any time, Liz,’ he said. ‘Any time.’
Inside the cafe, all was warm and bright. She headed for Mario’s arms. That is to say, she would have, if he hadn’t been engaged in setting tables. His hands full of plates and cutlery, he was unable to fasten them around her, but he looked pleased.
‘Darling! This is so sudden.’
Trust him to make a joke of it, although it was as well that he did. Liz was embarrassed after she’d done it - in front of the others, too.
‘The police came round to the café today.’ It was an hour and a half later and Mario was walking Liz down the road to the nurses’ home. As long as she got in by eleven o’clock, she’d been told. Naomi Richardson had passed on the message.
‘Think yourself lucky, MacMillan. A late pass for us poor life prisoners is normally half past ten!’
The moon was up, the night much brighter now. She could distinguish the buildings and make out the line of the road quite clearly - and the odd expression on Mario’s face.
‘The police? What on earth for?’
‘My father’s a foreign alien, Liz.’ The tone of voice was equal parts rueful amusement and sarcasm. ‘Sounds like something out of a Flash Gordon film, doesn’t it?’
‘A foreign alien?’ she repeated. ‘But your father’s lived here most of his life.’
Mario shook his head. ‘He was born in Italy, lived there till he was eighteen. That’s enough. They’re checking up on us all. In case we’re a danger to the state.’ He enunciated the final four words carefully, the sarcasm growing heavier by the second.
‘That’s ridiculous,’ spluttered Liz. ‘I never heard such nonsense in my life. How could your father be a danger to anybody?’
Then she registered exactly what Mario had said. Us all? She stopped dead. So did he, smiling wryly in the moonlight when he saw her reaction.
‘Don’t worry Liz, apparently we’re both only Class C dangers to the the state.’ He was taking a savage delight in using the words.
‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘What does that mean?’
‘That we’re not considered particularly dangerous.’ He struck a contemplative pose. ‘Perhaps I should find that insulting. However, if Italy does come into the war, we’d become enemy aliens.’
‘Were you born in Italy?’ she demanded.
‘No, I was born here.’
‘So you’re Scottish: a British citizen. How could they possibly classify you as an enemy alien? And Mr Rossi’s been here for ages. I don’t see that, either.’
He smiled at her logic - and her loyalty to him and his father - but he told her the truth.
‘Liz, I’ve got dual nationality: Br
itish and Italian. My father registered me with the Italian consul when I was born. Added to which, what I really am is half-Irish and half-Italian. Eire is probably going to remain neutral, but the Irish aren’t very popular as it is. You know that as well as anybody. It’ll be a case of he who is not for us is against us. And the chances of Mussolini coming into the war on the German side are pretty high. Italy could probably conscript me to fight for them.’
‘But you wouldn’t. Would you?’
He gave a quick frown. ‘No, of course not. How could I fight against the country of my birth, against my friends? But like I told you before, I don’t think I could fight against my own relatives in Italy either. So what happens when the authorities here ask me to prove my loyalty to Britain? By being disloyal to my father’s country?’ He stopped abruptly, and bit his lip.
She reached out a hand to him, clutched his sleeve. ‘Och, Mario. I’m so sorry.’
He looked down at her. For once he was completely serious. ‘You’ve got a choice to make.’
‘Me?’
He nodded grimly. ‘Going out with me could cause you problems. It hadn’t occurred to me last Friday when I met you at the station, but it sure has occurred to me now. That visit today from the boys in blue concentrated my mind wonderfully.’
He let her think about it for a minute or two. She did. Then she put a question to him as they stood together in the silent and deserted street.
‘What do you want? No jokes, now. I want a straight answer.’
That made him smile, his teeth a flash of white in the gloom, but he did as she asked.
‘I want you,’ he said simply, ‘but it’s not too late for you to decide not to get involved with me.’
‘I already am involved with you.’
He lifted her hands to his mouth and kissed her fingertips, first one hand, then the other. ‘Thank you. You’ll never know how much I appreciate that.’ They smiled at each other. Then he became brisk. ‘Come on. Time you were in your bed.’
They walked up to the door of the nurses’ home. ‘It’s like a convent, this place,’ Mario said conversationally. ‘No man has ever been allowed to cross its hallowed portals. I’ve always wondered if there’s human sacrifice of innocent young maidens behind these walls.’
‘I’ll survive,’ said Liz, glad that he was joking again. ‘I suppose I’d better be getting in. It must be nearly eleven.’
‘Come to the café for your breakfast tomorrow?’ he suggested.
‘That would be lovely. Goodnight,’ she said shyly, wondering if he was going to kiss her. He did, but on her forehead, the merest brushing of his lips against her skin.
‘Goodnight, Liz.’
‘Say it in Italian,’ she urged. ‘I love it when you speak Italian.’
His smile was very tender, and she saw how much he appreciated her request. Tonight of all nights. ‘Buonanotte, Elisabetta.’ He put his lips to her brow a second time. ‘Buonanotte, bellisima. Sleep well.’
Twenty-six
‘So,’ Mario asked, his elbows on the table and his chin resting on his fists, ‘when are you going to take me home to meet your parents?’
Liz mimicked his posture and pretended to consider. ‘Well...’ she began, ‘how about some time after hell freezes over?’
‘You really think your father would take it that badly?’
She gave him a rueful look. ‘Why do you think I keep persuading Eddie to put off introducing Helen to my parents?’
That had to happen eventually. There were going to be fireworks that day, all right.
‘Don’t frown,’ said Mario, shifting position and stretching across the table to rub his thumb gently along her lips. ‘Why not take me to meet your grandfather instead?’
Liz straightened up and laid her hands flat in front of her. ‘My grandfather? But you’ve already met him.’
‘Not as your boyfriend, I haven’t.’ He smiled his lazy smile. ‘Not as the young man you’re walking out with.’
‘I thought you preferred staying in,’ she murmured, tucking a rogue strand of hair behind one ear. ‘Judging from last night, that is. When you plied me with alcohol.’
‘A glass of vermouth is hardly plying you with alcohol.’ There was a gleam of mischief in his brown eyes. ‘And if you’re implying that I was trying to break down your resistance, I would have to point out that my strategy was spectacularly unsuccessful.’
Liz blushed and dipped her head. Mario reached for the hand still lying on the table and gave it a little tug. She looked up and met his eyes again.
‘I’m sorry. You’ve been very patient.’
She was surprised how patient he’d been. Not a little touched, too. She’d done her best to meet him halfway but progress, she would have to admit, had been slow.
‘We’ll get there eventually,’ he said softly. ‘Give us a kiss, beautiful.’ Liz leaned towards him, eager to comply. Holding hands and gentle kisses were fine. More than fine.
Someone coughed. With a start, Liz broke the contact with Mario and looked up. Adam, Jim and Naomi had come into the previously empty café.
‘Oh,’ said Liz, ‘I didn’t see you there.’
Jim and Naomi were grinning, but Adam’s voice was very dry.
‘Evidently,’ he said.
Liz was regaling Naomi Richardson with the story of Cordelia being unable to make tea the night the Athenia survivors had been brought to the Infirmary. A couple of months on from the event, the stories she’d listened to hadn’t got any less vivid. She suspected they never would.
There had been a second tragedy in Scottish waters, up in the Orkneys, at the Royal Navy’s anchorage in Scapa Flow. Supposedly impregnable, its defences had been breached by another German U-boat. It had sunk a battleship called the Royal Oak. Over eight hundred British sailors had been drowned.
When war had been declared it had been awful. It was going to be a struggle, a hell of a fight, but deep down everyone had assumed that Britain was going to win in the end. But if the Germans could get right into Scapa Flow... Liz couldn’t stop thinking about the families of all those eight hundred men either.
She’d decided there was only one way to cope with it all. Pick out the funny stories and concentrate on them.
‘Imagine!’ she scoffed to Naomi. ‘How could anyone not know how to make tea? I believe the Honourable Miss Maclntyre had a very expensive education - boarding school in England, finishing school in Switzerland, a year in Heidelberg studying German. Yet she can’t even make a cup of tea. Mind you, I suppose her mama would be horrified if she could!’
Adam was sitting in a corner of the outpatients’ kitchen having a quick break. Many qualified doctors had already joined the Royal Army Medical Corps or gone off to military hospitals. That left the Infirmary’s medical and surgical residents at full stretch, trying to reallocate the duties of the missing doctors as well as dealing with their own overcrowded schedules.
Some of the more capable senior medical students had been asked to help out by covering some sessions, both on the wards and in the outpatient clinics. Adam was one of them. He looked up from his reading - a medical paper this time - with a frown.
‘You’re a bit of a snob, MacMillan, aren’t you?’
Stung by the note of reproach in his voice, Liz stared at him.
‘A snob? Me?’
‘Yes, you!’ he said, standing up and running an angry hand through his hair. His fair locks were a bit untidy. He needed a haircut.
‘Cordelia can’t help her background any more than you can help yours. And it’s as unfair for you to mock her for the way she was brought up as it would be for someone to look down on you for the way you speak. Cordelia’s got the money to go and sit out the war in some funk-hole - yet she chooses to stay here and do her bit. Doesn’t she deserve some credit for that? Or are you really so naïve you believe that because she’s well-off she doesn’t have any problems?’
He flung out of the room, his white coat billowing out behind
him. Liz felt like bursting into tears. He’d never spoken to her like that before.
‘You put your foot in it there, MacMillan,’ said Naomi softly. ‘I rather think you touched a raw nerve.’
Liz looked at her in dismay. ‘Is he right?’ she asked. ‘Am I being unfair?’
The other girl shrugged. ‘Well, you can say what you like about the honourable Miss Maclntyre, but she is one of the world’s workers, you’d have to give her that.’ She stood up. Time I went back to the salt mines myself. See you later, MacMillan.’
She went out, leaving Liz alone with her thoughts. They weren’t comfortable ones. She thought of Lady Maclntyre, whom she’d met the day of the evacuation. With a mother like that, maybe it was no wonder Cordelia hadn’t a clue how to make tea - but she’d been more than willing to learn. She always was.
When she’d asked for help in tying her cap that first day, Liz had suspected she might be one of those girls who were attracted to the VADs because they wanted to swan about in a nurse’s uniform. Liz had met a few of them. They didn’t last long - till they were asked to give a patient a bedpan perhaps, or clean up after a child who’d been sick. Cordelia wasn’t like that at all. She was always willing and always cheerful.
Adam had been perfectly right. She had been unfair. Unkind, too, making fun of Cordelia for something that wasn’t her fault. And she’d offended Adam - worse, she’d upset him. She wouldn’t have done that for the world.
Sphygmomanometer. She was to go the female medical ward up on the second floor and ask to borrow their sphygmo— How did the blasted word go again? Sphygmomanometer. There. She had it again. She’d better keep repeating it to herself.
Why did hospital corridors have to be so blinking long? Oh Lord, she’d forgotten it again. She could get as far as sphyg—, but the rest of the word had gone. Something like meter on the end of it. Sphygmeter? No, that wasn’t right. She stopped short, biting her lip. She was going to look like a right eejit.
Especially as she was always sounding off to Sister MacLean about wanting to do more medical things. Especially as it was Sister MacLean who had sent her on this errand. Especially as it looked as if she was going to have to go back and ask her to write the word down.
