At the End of the Day

by Betty Neels

  Julia ate her sandwich and drank lager with it although she longed for a cup of tea and all the while she was wondering what the professor was doing, probably eating a delicious supper at the Savoy or somewhere equally splendid and if not that, she decided, her imagination running riot, driving home where he and his Martha would sit by the fire in a splendid drawing room, the low table between them loaded with dainty sandwiches and vol-au-vents and a silver pot of coffee—she could almost smell its fragrance.

  ‘Hi!’ Nigel sounded amused. ‘You’re a long way off. Have another of these cheese sandwiches. Must keep up your strength you know. We’ve a list as long as my arm in the morning, can’t think where they all come from.’

  She gave herself a mental shake and listened while he told her about the various cases and when he’d finished she asked suddenly: ‘Nigel, do you ever wish you were doing something else?’

  His rather serious face broke into a smile. ‘Lord, no. What else could I do? And you? You wouldn’t want to be anything but a nurse, would you?’

  ‘Well, yes—I want to be a wife and have a family. Nigel I’m thirty years old…’

  ‘So what? You don’t look it for a start and time enough to settle down.’ He grinned at her, ‘I can’t wait to get my teeth into this new job.’

  And I, thought Julia sadly, can’t wait to get married, only it looks as though I shall have to.

  It was a good thing she was going on holiday soon, she decided the following morning, for she had no wish to go to work. The weather had broken and late summer had suddenly become chilly autumn. The grey damp sky had affected the patients too, true several of them were too ill to care what the weather was doing, but even Mrs Winter had lost her interest in her companions and lay back on her pillows, staring at nothing.

  ‘And what’s the matter with you?’ asked Julia on her morning round.

  ‘Me, fed up, I am, Sister. Nothing but ham and injections. Now if you was to offer me a bar of Cadbury’s fruit and nut…’

  Julia laughed gently. ‘Mrs Winter I wouldn’t dare do such a thing—think of the work we’d have getting you stabilised again. Besides what would Professor van der Wagema say?’

  Mrs Winter brightened a bit. ‘Would ‘e mind? If I was to go all unconscious?’

  ‘You bet he would, he’d probably throw me out without a reference too.’

  Mrs Winter grinned. ‘Now that’s something ‘e won’t do, Sister. Not if I knows it.’

  ‘So no chocolate, Mrs Winter,’ warned Julia and went back to her office.

  She had no sooner sat down than Pat put her head through the door. ‘Time for a cup of coffee?’ she asked. ‘I’ve sent Wells and the new student down to get theirs; and there is half an hour before the prof. comes.’

  They were discussing the advantages of moving Dolly Waters to the far end of the ward where a young woman with pneumonia had been admitted. ‘It might do Dolly good to have someone cheerful to talk to her,’ said Julia. ‘Mrs Thorpe’s a dear soul, but she’s too ill to chat much, I think we’ll move her…’

  She looked up as the door, after the most peremptory of knocks, was thrust open, and the professor walked in. His ‘Good morning’ was so blighting that it seemed probable that the weather had affected him too. She said at once, quite forgetting that she was never going to offer him refreshment again: ‘Would you like some coffee, sir?’

  He fixed her with a black stare. ‘No, Sister, I would not. I came in to see Dolly Waters, but perhaps it’s not convenient?’

  She disliked the silkiness of his voice but there was nothing she could do about it; open rebellion was out of the question. She put down her coffee mug and sailed to the door. ‘We were discussing,’ she informed him haughtily, ‘whether it would be a good idea to move her next to Mary Perkins. Mary isn’t very ill and might cheer up Dolly. Mrs Thorpe’s a marvellous patient but I fancy she depresses Dolly.’

  He had held the door wide for her to go through. ‘I think that might be a sound idea, Sister.’

  He spent some time with Dolly. It was remarkable thought Julia, standing on the other side of the bed watching him, that a man could make himself so disagreeable and within minutes switch on a charm and a warmth to put heart into the unhappiest patient. Which was the real man, she wondered. Only Martha would know that, she decided.

  His examination finished, she accompanied him out of the ward and on the landing outside her office he paused long enough to remind her that he would be back to do his normal round in an hour’s time.

  He didn’t smile but wished her a grave goodbye.

  Back in her office Pat was sorting charts. ‘I’ll get some fresh coffee,’ she said. ‘I suppose he didn’t want a cup now?’

  ‘I didn’t ask him,’ said Julia with some heat. ‘There’s plenty of places in the hospital where he can get coffee if he wants it.’

  Her staff nurse blinked in surprise. ‘Why, Sister—was he cross?’ She giggled. ‘I’ve always rather fancied him, even when he’s in a rage.’

  ‘He’s the most unfanciable man I know,’ declared Julia. ‘Let’s have that coffee, shall we?’

  Professor van der Wagema arrived on the dot, Dick Reed was with him and a handful of medical students and the round took a good deal longer than usual as the professor spent rather more time with each patient, listening with bland impatience to his pupils’ halting answers to his questions. Julia felt sorry for the young men, standing there like schoolboys while he took them apart with a few biting phrases, though always out of earshot of the patients. It had always surprised her that to a man they liked him. They called him hard names behind his back, but let anyone say a word against him and they were immediately up in arms. And give him his due, his praise, though not given often, was worth something. He looked across at her as she was studying his face while he lectured, paused and smiled briefly at her.

  She had been wrong—all these years she had been wrong; she didn’t dislike him, she liked him, she suddenly understood why the bunch of young men standing around the bed liked him too. She would have to tell Nigel when she saw him, for he had never understood why she didn’t share his respect for the professor. Not that she respected him, that was too strong a word. If anything she was vaguely sorry for him although she wasn’t sure why—she had no reason to be, he had his Martha and his son and more than likely a most comfortable home to live in.

  She smiled back at him, probably they would be at odds within the hour, but that didn’t seem important. As it happened the rest of the round went smoothly and they drank their coffee, together with Dick Reed, in perfect harmony, the conversation exclusively about his patients.

  Only as they were leaving did the professor observe, ‘You go on holiday shortly, Sister?’

  She nodded. ‘Next week, sir. Staff Nurse Down will take over.’

  ‘And for how long?’

  ‘Ten days.’

  He said surprisingly. ‘Wellington goes with you, of course?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And Longman?’ His face was as bland as his voice and she mistrusted both. Besides, as one of the senior consultants at St Anne’s he must be fully aware of the comings and goings of the registrars and senior housemen. He had no need to ask her, anyway she was sure that he already knew.

  ‘If he is able to get a few days,’ she said with vague sweetness.

  Watching his broad back going down the corridor, she had to admit that although she was still prepared to like him, he could be awfully tiresome.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE DAY BEFORE Julia’s holiday, she had a free evening. It had meant a rush from St Anne’s to the flat to change rapidly, ram Wellington into his basket, pick up her case and nip down to the main street to find a taxi. It would have been nice if Nigel had been free to run her to Waterloo in his car, but he had had a long list in the afternoon and when she went off duty, theatre was still busy. She got into a cruising taxi, thankful to have found one so quickly and sat back with a sigh of relief, castin
g a quick look at the hospital as they passed it. There was a lot of traffic, she had barely ten minutes in which to catch her train but the queue for tickets was short and the Salisbury train was already at a nearby platform. She had paused to get a firmer grip on Wellington’s basket when she saw Professor van der Wagema, coming towards her, and with him the same girl she had seen outside the cinema. He was the last person she had expected to see there and there was no way of avoiding him and his companion. She pinned a small smile on to her face and sped past them. The professor hadn’t looked in the least surprised and Martha had glanced at her in a casual way without remembering her.

  Julia was wrong there, the girl said at once, ‘That’s the redhead you spoke to the other evening.’

  The professor took her arm to cross the street to where his car was parked. ‘Sister Mitchell,’ he agreed calmly. ‘I’ll drop you off if you don’t mind—I’ve a round to do in the private wing.’

  He didn’t appear to notice his companion’s pout.

  Julia sprinting down the platform to find a seat, had hardly given the incident a second thought, it was only when the train was well under way and she sat, looking out into the autumn dusk, that she wondered what the professor was doing there—putting his wife on a train, meeting her? Perhaps she had been to see the boy at school. She looked very young to have a schoolboy for a son. She was quite lovely too. Julia sighed without knowing why, perhaps because it would be nice to have a son and be beautiful and have, too, the professor for a husband. She sat up straight at the thought, really, she was letting her imagination run away with her. She turned her thoughts to her holiday, dwelling happily on the days ahead. She would garden and go shopping for her mother and go riding and catch up on her reading, and when Nigel came for his free day, they would go for a long walk. There were miles of country in which to stretch their legs. She sighed again, this time with content, closed her eyes and dozed until they reached Salisbury.

  The drive from the station was taken up with family gossip. Madge would be over to spend a day; Jason and Gregory were in their house football teams, and her mother had bought a new winter coat, Jane the donkey had had her hooves trimmed. Julia sitting with Wellington in his basket balanced on her knee, enjoyed every word of it.

  Her mother welcomed her warmly and then stood back and gave her a good look. ‘You’re getting thin,’ she declared, eyeing Julia’s magnificent shape. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, I didn’t know that I was,’ Julia found herself making excuses. ‘And anyway I’m huge, Mother—I feel like a mountain—you’ve no idea how slim most of the nurses are…’

  Her mother, still what her father described with pride as a fine figure of a woman, gave her a tolerant smile. ‘Well, it won’t hurt you to put on a pound or two, darling, you’ll lose it again when you get back to St Anne’s.’

  The hospital seemed another world by the end of her first day at home; the weather had looked kindly upon her and although it was chilly in the early mornings, it had been a lovely hazy day in which she had done almost nothing, she wandered off to her bed feeling relaxed, her head pleasantly empty of serious thoughts. And the moment she laid it on the pillow she was asleep, Wellington curled up tidily beside her.

  She was in the kitchen the next morning, standing at the table, rolling pastry for the plum pie they were to have for lunch while her mother busied herself with something or other at the sink.

  ‘Here’s your father. There’s someone with him. Heavens, was that—what a man! Julia do look. Well over six feet tall and enormous with it. He looks quite…’ She broke off as Julia, nipping across to peer out of the window spoke.

  ‘What on earth is he doing here?’ she demanded a trifle wildly. ‘It’s his round…’

  ‘Who is he?’ asked Mrs Mitchell in a placid voice, just as though she hadn’t guessed. ‘And what round, darling?’

  ‘Professor van der Wagema,’ hissed Julia, ‘his ward round.’ She went back to the table and started slapping dabs of butter down on her pastry, if it didn’t puff it would be too bad. From the brief glance she had allowed herself, the two gentlemen had been on the best of terms, deeply engrossed in conversation.

  The kitchen door opened and her father and the professor came in.

  ‘My dear,’ said Mr Mitchell, ‘here is Professor van der Wagema come to arrange for his son to have extra tuition in Latin. Luckily I can fit him in with the other boys I have…’ He looked across at Julia. ‘You know Julia, of course.’

  The professor, shaking hands with Mrs Mitchell, agreed pleasantly that he did indeed. ‘My hard-working right hand,’ he murmured with a bland kindliness which set Julia’s teeth on edge. ‘And very deserving of a holiday.’ He added politely, ‘Cooking is your hobby?’

  Before Julia could find her tongue her mother had answered. ‘Oh, Julia’s a splendid cook—she has a light hand with pastry too. You must stay to lunch, Professor?’

  It annoyed Julia very much indeed when he accepted and was presently borne away by his host to sample a rather splendid dry sherry.

  ‘What a charming man,’ observed Mrs Mitchell, rapidly peeling more potatoes. ‘How old is his son?’

  ‘He’s eleven years old apparently.’

  ‘Any more children?’ asked her mother chattily, ‘and I wonder what kind of a wife he has.’

  ‘I have no idea,’ said Julia crossly and slapped her pastry down on to the fruit in the pie dish. Probably it would be as tough as leather and serve him right. She put the dish in the oven.

  Her mother said,

  ‘Do go and talk to the men love—only take that apron off first.’

  ‘They’ll be quite happy on their own, Mother, exchanging Latin tags and swapping Greek verbs. I’m going to lay the table and tidy myself.’

  Her mother gently prodded the leg of lamb in the oven with her cooking fork. ‘Well, well,’ she said softly, and then: ‘Oh, dear I do hope…’ She closed the oven door gently and went upstairs to make sure that her appearance befitted the arrival of a visitor.

  The table laid, Julia wandered up to her room, where she did her face, combed her hair into coppery neatness, wasted five minutes trying to make up her mind if she should change her dress, and deciding against it, went downstairs again.

  ‘In your father’s study, dear,’ called her mother and after a moment’s hesitation, she joined them. They were sitting round the fire with Maud, Muffin and Gyp with Wellington curled up between her paws, sitting tidily on the shabby hearth rug. The professor, sitting opposite her father, got to his feet, smiling a little. ‘Will you sit here, Julia?’

  ‘Don’t get up, please.’ She fetched a glass of sherry which her father had poured out for her and curled up in a corner of the sofa.

  His smile widened a little as he sat down and resumed his talk with her father. Not Latin or Greek but education for boys; from time to time Mrs Mitchell and Julia were drawn into their talk and she had to admit that the professor was behaving beautifully; her father doubtless delighted to find someone as intelligent as himself, was enjoying himself, and her mother, she could see, was intrigued. Bursting to ask questions but unable to do so although probably she would discover a way to do that before long. She went to the kitchen presently to take a look at the lamb and was brought up shortly by her mother’s voice as she went back into the study.

  ‘And your wife, Professor? She lives in London too?’ Mrs Mitchell’s question was put so pleasantly that no one could take exception to it.

  The professor looked over her shoulder to where Julia stood in the doorway. ‘My wife died eight years ago, Mrs Mitchell. Nicholas and I are taken the greatest care of by my housekeeper. Martha has been with us for a long time now.’

  Happily, Julia was unable to see her face, but the professor, watching her surprise, allowed himself a smile. ‘Not,’ he said smoothly, talking to Julia now, ‘the young lady you met outside the cinema, Julia.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry,’ said Mrs Mitchell, not feeling sorry at all, ‘but how
nice that you’ve someone to look after you so well. George, will you come and carve?’ She swept her husband away. ‘Finish your drink, Julia—perhaps the professor would like another…’

  Julia scarcely heard her mother. After a moment alone with him in the quiet room, she said thoughtfully. ‘How strange—I didn’t know a thing about you all these years at St Anne’s and then Mother asks a couple of questions…’ She picked up her glass and finished her sherry. ‘I won’t tell anyone,’ she promised him kindly.

  ‘I would have said nothing if I had for one moment imagined that you would,’ he told her crisply. ‘You must have gathered by now that my private life is private.’

  ‘Oh, indeed, yes. Tell me, Professor, why did you pick on Father to give your son extra lessons? Did you know that he was my father?’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘Naturally I knew—you yourself mentioned it.’

  She said with a frown, ‘Oh, did I? I’m sure I never meant to…’

  He laughed then. ‘No, I imagine not. I shall be bringing him over to meet your father in a few days’ time—on his half day, but if you do not care to meet me I will give you ample warning.’

  She said coolly, ‘Why shouldn’t I want to meet you? After all, I’m always meeting you on the ward.’

  ‘So you are, but in rather different circumstances. You tell me that you knew nothing about me in all the years we have been at St Anne’s and now I realise that I knew nothing of you, Julia—the real you.’ He smiled and she found herself smiling back at him. ‘Making pastry and keeping an eye on the roast.’ He paused. ‘And I think that’s the real you, isn’t it?’

  She answered him seriously: ‘Yes, I think so. I like my work very much, I want to be a success at it, but there is so much more…’

  He said quietly, ‘I like my work too, but as you say there is so much more. And at the end of the day you know what that is, Julia? To love and be loved. Just that.’

  She put her glass down carefully thinking what a pity it was that one couldn’t ask any of the questions crowding into her head. Why was he talking to her like this? Was it an oblique reference to the lovely girl he had been with? Was he hinting that he was going to marry again? And why bother to tell her anyway? True, in the last few weeks they had become friends in a guarded way, but why should he suppose that she was interested in his love life? She was saved from wondering what to do next by her mother’s cheerful voice, bidding them to come to lunch.