The New Sister Theatre

by Lucilla Andrews

  Sir Robert cleared his throat to explode. Joe said quickly, ‘I thought we agreed the other day that there’s no point in postponing the inevitable, Geraldine?’

  She considered him thoughtfully. ‘Have I truly got to have that kidney out?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. Sorry.’

  ‘Soon as this?’

  ‘Sooner the better.’

  ‘You mean that.’ She was not asking a question. ‘Oh, hell!’ She sighed. ‘All right. I’ll do what you want, Uncle Robert. Now don’t let’s talk about it any more.’

  David Easton came out of his studio when the light began to fade. He was a short, sturdy man, a few years older than his wife, with an attractive voice and pleasant, if very absent-minded, manners. He thanked Sir Robert and myself warmly for the trouble we had taken and proposed to take for his family, then obviously forgot who we were and what we were doing in his household.

  His habit of drifting away in the middle of a conversation or meal infuriated Sir Robert, but amused Joe and myself. I enjoyed being a guest in that house. No guest there could ever feel in the way, since most of the time it was apparent that neither host nor hostess recollected their guests’ existence. Now I had met the Eastons, I well understood why Joe had chosen to stay with them. The architecture of their house was ideal for anyone in his present physical condition; their attitude to him was even more ideal. They accepted him as part of the furniture and, when they remembered his presence, treated him as a combination of the Delphic Oracle and an elder brother, and ignored his health as completely as they did their own. That was far more restful for him than Sir Robert’s blunt acceptance of a regrettable situation, or my trained nurse’s ‘let’s-call-a-fact-a-fact-and-forget-it’ technique. Joe knew there was no real question of my being able to forget his health, but the Eastons did. With them he need never feel self-conscious about his slow walk, inability to manage without a stick, necessity to sit whenever possible, or to prop himself against the nearest wall when standing for more than a very short period.

  The baby was enchanting. Pilar and her female relatives had weighed him on the kitchen scales. He weighed six and a half pounds. His very marked resemblance to his great-uncle was the one thing that cheered Sir Robert since our arrival at the house. The old man was petulant with the fatigue he refused to admit and, though genuinely fond of Geraldine, thoroughly annoyed that his worst fears had not been proved right.

  For a little while that evening Joe and I were alone in the stone-flagged hall the Eastons had converted into a dining-room. Pilar had cleared the table and was washing up in the kitchen with two of her sisters. Geraldine’s bed had been pushed back to her bedroom. Sir Robert was with her. David had vanished.

  Joe talked about the difference twenty-four hours had made. ‘It’ll be a long time before Robbie forgives us for not saving the drama for him. He would have so enjoyed getting down to it with a penknife and a few hairpins on the kitchen table.’

  ‘I had that impression on the way out. Of course, we would have spoiled the fun for ourselves. We’ve a crate of instruments and dope.’

  ‘Nonsense, Maggie. The lot could have fallen out of the car on the way here.’

  ‘On that mountain road?’ I shuddered. ‘It was steep enough.’

  ‘Poor Maggie! You missed the view. It was worth seeing.’

  ‘And poor Robbie missed his drama,’ I said firmly. I did not want to be reminded of that car ride. ‘Do you think he’s going to take out her kidney, or leave it to Bill Swan? She’s a pretty close relative.’

  ‘I should say he’ll do it. It’s not as if she’s his wife. And that kidney may be a tough job. Robbie was always very good at doing his own dirty work.’ He pushed his cigarettes towards me absently, then looked surprised when I took one. ‘I thought you had given it up?’

  ‘I’m still fighting it. Not enough will-power.’

  ‘That doesn’t tie up with Robbie’s views on you as a theatre sister.’ He lit his own. ‘‘An excellent gel, m’dear! Capital, capital!” ’

  ‘Thanks.’ I was surprised at the pleasure that gave me. ‘He’s been very good to me.’

  ‘And to me.’ He studied his cigarette. ‘As you now know. He knew which strings to pull, and pulled the lot.’ He looked round. ‘Including this place. Before I came out to look at Robin’s leg I’d been staying with Margery and her husband in Casablanca.’

  I had wondered about that period of time. ‘Is that the sister married to the French architect?’

  ‘That’s right. He’s putting up some new flats there. They were very decent to me, said come on out at once when I wrote inviting myself, as Buckwell was very keen to have me get somewhere warm and dry. But I couldn’t stay on with them indefinitely. I wrote to Robbie before I left them saying I was coming home for a follow-up and not sure where I’d go next. I had Cornwall in mind as just about the warmest, if not the driest, place for an English winter. You know the rest.’

  ‘Yes.’ Then, as one subject had been nearly choking me since that morning, I had to mention it. ‘Joe, Mark told me a few weeks back that you are now engaged to Frances. I’ve been meaning to congratulate you. Kept forgetting. Of course ‒ I do.’

  He looked at me quickly, and then as quickly back at his cigarette. ‘So Mark told you?’

  ‘Yes. And about her staying on in her job. Very sensible.’

  ‘It would be more than foolish to let a girl chuck up a promising career for a man in my present set-up, Maggie. It would be bloody selfish and bloody silly.’

  I nodded vaguely. There was no point in reminding him there were two sides to that question, since Frances was clearly seeing it from his side. She might even be right. I did not think she was, but she might be.

  He asked about Mark. ‘Think he’ll get into Homer’s firm?’

  ‘Sure of it.’ I explained why at some length, since Mark was one of the few safe subjects we could discuss.

  He said drily, ‘Mark’s got a good P.R.O. in you, Maggie.’

  ‘Why not? I’m very fond of him, and he’s been very good to me ‒ and, incidentally, to you. You did ask him not to talk about your back?’ He nodded, watching me very closely, ‘Well, he not only kept his mouth shut on the main issue, but when necessary ‒ as I only now realize ‒ he produced instant ‒ and reasonable ‒ explanations to cover up for you.’ I told him about the evening he left Barny’s, New Year’s Day, that Beethoven concert. ‘You were there with Frances?’

  ‘Yes.’ He stubbed out his cigarette and promptly lit another. ‘Maggie, I hope you won’t misunderstand why I didn’t want you to know.’

  ‘I don’t think so. Isn’t it obvious? The less people in on any secret the better its chances of being kept. I don’t blame you for not wanting to talk, Joe. In your place I would have done the same.’ I suddenly remembered I had never thanked him for that radiogram and the records. I did so now, added, ‘It was your leaving them behind that first gave me my hunch that there was something odd going on.’

  ‘You had a hunch?’ he asked curtly.

  ‘Yes. I just couldn’t prove it.’

  ‘Until Robbie did it for you. Unintentionally.’

  I said, ‘Of course.’ I thought I was being honest at the time. Later, in bed that night, I wondered if that was true, or whether Sir Robert was once again two steps ahead. I suspected he was, but was too sleepy to work out why.

  No one called me in the morning, and I slept on until after eleven. When I was dressed and went to look for the others David was in his studio, Pilar singing in the kitchen, Geraldine, Sir Robert, and Joe were on the patio. Geraldine’s bed had again been lifted out, and she was reading her political economy. The men were playing chess.

  I apologized for oversleeping. ‘I feel most ashamed. It must be nearly lunch-time.’

  ‘Lunch indeed! Let me tell you, m’dear, we have only just finished breakfast! It was served at 10.45.’

  ‘Darling Uncle Robert,’ protested Geraldine, ‘that’s early for us. We usually have
it at eleven.’

  ‘Eleven!’ Sir Robert echoed impatiently. ‘By that hour I reckon to have half a day’s work done!’

  ‘Which is very clever of you, Uncle.’ Geraldine closed her book. ‘Maggie, come and sit by me. No, of course you mustn’t do anything. For one thing there’s nothing to do, and for another, it would offend Pilar. She’d be badly shocked if I let a guest lift a finger.’ She smiled. ‘And she is quite disturbingly hard-working and capable. Here she comes with your coffee.’ The men went on with their chess. Geraldine and I discussed the advantages of being an expatriate. She still refused to admit to that way of living having any serious disadvantages. ‘The rent we pay here wouldn’t cover the smallest flat in London. Then there’s Pilar ‒ I loathe housework. An English char three mornings a week would cost more than she does full time. But even those aren’t the main attractions.’ She looked over to the studio. ‘David can work here. The sun is something one can depend on. We like the people even though we don’t see much of them. We like being in this house too much to want to leave it for more than the odd evening. Uncle Robert thinks we are nut cases, and so do most of our friends at home. Do you?’

  I said truthfully, ‘I did, until I got here. I could still say you are taking a lot of risks with your own and your children’s health. But you’d do that every time you let them cross a road at home, or crossed one yourselves.’

  ‘You’re not going to give me a lecture on cutting my family off from all the advantages of modern living in a modern city?’

  ‘Did you expect me to?’ Joe had his back to me, so I could watch him with impunity. ‘When you must know how very much you are giving your family in exchange?’

  She said, ‘We know. But with the exception of Joe, and now yourself, every other visitor we have ever had has spent most of his or her visit taking me into quiet corners and warning me we are heading for disaster if we persist in our foolish ways.’ She grimaced. ‘That’s one reason why I’m really dreading flying home with you. The thought of leaving David and having an operation is bad enough, but it’s going to be hellish while I’m in hospital, as all our relations will descend on me with more lectures, and I won’t be able to get away.’

  I suggested she confided some of this to Sister Catherine. ‘If she suspects your visitors are going to upset you she’ll have them out of her ward before they’ve barely had time to deposit the flowers and grapes.’

  ‘Is she allowed to do that?’

  ‘In Barny’s, as in most good hospitals, a ward sister pretty well makes her own rules. If anyone should question that she’ll have the backing of the entire medical staff to support her. Technically we may all now be civil servants, but what the doctor says still carries all before it. Sister Catherine’ll be well able to keep your relatives out of your hair.’

  ‘And she won’t mind my asking? But hospital sisters are such fierce women! Oh ‒ dear oh me! What have I said!’ She smiled apologetically. ‘Yet it’s really your fault for being nothing like my idea of a hospital sister, or even a nurse. All the nurses I’ve ever met bustle around, say “we”, and act as if their patients are backward toddlers. You are so quiet, Maggie, and you sit so still. I noticed that yesterday as well as now. Is that anything to do with your working in the operating theatre?’

  ‘Possibly.’ I looked again at the back of Joe’s head, and remembered my thoughts on mental and physical pain. ‘A theatre in action is a very quiet place.’

  A car drove up the dirt road ‒ it was actually only a cart-track ‒ running up the hill from the olive-grove. Geraldine recognized it as belonging to the local doctor and called Pilar. ‘David’s going to be furious, but he must come and talk to Dr Alvaro,’ she explained to me before giving Pilar instructions in Spanish.

  I was a little surprised, remembered what Geraldine had said on that subject yesterday when we arrived. Later, when the four men retired to drink sherry in the hall, she said, ‘Lots of things don’t matter here, but good manners matter very much. Alvaro hasn’t come to see me. He wanted to meet Uncle Robert. That reminds me ‒’ She summoned Pilar again and arranged for a message to be taken to Miguel to ask him to drive Sir Robert into the village that evening to return the call. ‘Alvaro’s pride would be hurt if he didn’t. If you hurt a Spaniard’s pride you’re in for trouble. But then’ ‒ she watched the men through the open hall-door ‒ ‘one could say the same of most Englishmen.’

  ‘One could.’

  She looked at me keenly, then back at the men. ‘Joe looks a far more typical Andalusian than Alvaro, until he starts talking. Not because of his accent, but because he doesn’t use his hands. Now, when he’s just sitting listening he could be the Spaniard in that quartet.’

  I agreed. I realized we were now having one of those conversations in which the important words were those left unsaid. I was not sure why. I waited for her to give me the lead.

  She talked about the portly, middle-aged Spaniard with thinning light-brown hair, then his wife and five daughters. ‘I find the Señora rather frightening. She’s so chic and serene. She makes me feel I must do something about my hair. But David likes it done this way.’

  ‘Then I shouldn’t let any other opinion bother you.’

  ‘That’s what Joe said.’ She hesitated. ‘There’s no getting away from it ‒ you and he are awfully alike. Of course, you’ve known each other a long time.’

  ‘Yes.’ I was still waiting.

  She said, ‘He told me he was once engaged to you and that it broke off and about ‒ well ‒’

  ‘Frances Durant?’

  ‘Yes.’ She gave me another keen look. ‘Do you mind his telling me?’

  ‘I can’t say I enjoy the thought of being discussed, but it’s not going to make me take great umbrage, if that’s what you mean?’ She nodded. ‘Taking umbrage isn’t one of my hobbies. Possibly because I’m neither Spanish nor English.’

  ‘As Joe would say ‒ darling, you and me, both. Oh, hell! Here they come!’

  I too wished the men had stayed a little longer on their sherry. I wanted to ask her to explain that conversation, since most of her remarks had been so obvious and she did not strike me as a girl given to stating the obvious without good reason. I had no opportunity to do that then, or later, since that was the only private conversation we had during my stay in her house.

  When Miguel arrived for Sir Robert that evening David Easton suddenly decided I must see something of what he called ‘the real Spain’ before I left. ‘Why don’t Joe, you, and I go down to Luis’s with Uncle Robert, Miguel, and bring him back to join us in the taberna later? They make the best tortillas and serve the finest shrimps in Andalusia there. You’ll like it, Maggie. Joe and Luis are great pals.’

  ‘It’s a good place,’ agreed Joe unenthusiastically, ‘but we can’t all leave Geraldine.’

  ‘Why not?’ demanded David. ‘Pilar’ll be here ‒ and probably Carmencita and Maria as well. The brat’s fine. He’ll just snooze. The girls’ll look after Geraldine.’

  Geraldine backed him up. ‘You may not have another chance, Maggie. This is your last evening.’

  ‘Last?’ echoed her husband. ‘It’s to-morrow you are taking Geraldine back? Then I’m not going out. Joe can take Maggie. You two won’t mind leaving me behind, will you?’

  Sir Robert joined us at that point. He had been tidying himself for his formal call and looked very spruce in a professional dark suit he had brought with him, he now explained, for much this reason. ‘Didn’t I tell ye we might have to deal with the unexpected, m’dear?’ he asked me. ‘So I brought along all the tools of m’trade.’ He fingered his neat hospital tie. ‘Just in case I had to show the flag! And what’s all this about some outing for you youngsters? Staying behind are ye, boy? Quite right. Quite right. Y’wife needs ye to-night. These two young people will have a good time on their own, eh, Joe?’

  ‘Yes, indeed, sir,’ said Joe politely. ‘If you are ready, Maggie, let’s go.’ He did not add, and get it over. He might as
well have done. His reluctance was so apparent to myself, if no one else, that I thought momentarily of producing one of my nasty headaches. Then I realized that if I did Sir Robert would certainly insist on providing me with the antidote, and anyway it was not fair to intrude on the Eastons’ very natural desire to have that evening alone together. So I only asked if they would give me three minutes to get my bag and a coat and I would join them in the taxi.

  Chapter Ten

  DR DELANEY CALLS

  In the darkness the village looked more African than ever. The streets were narrow; most of the houses faced inward. Some were lit with oil-lamps, others with electricity. There was a flashing neon sign outside the wine-shop, and the first thing I noticed inside was a huge television-set. It was not in use.

  Joe said, ‘We’ll go downstairs.’

  That bothered me for him until I saw the stairs. They were stone, set wide, curving, and shallow. He managed them fairly easily.

  The large converted cellar below was lit with oil and candles for effect, not necessity. There was an electric switch on the wall near our table, and a row of unused, unshaded electric bulbs hanging from the shadowy ceiling. The tables were covered with scarlet linen cloths, and there were coloured posters of bullfighters pinned round the walls.

  I said, ‘Joe, this can’t be real. It’s too right.’

  ‘I know. One’s seen it all in a dozen movies. But those were the copies. This really is the original. It’s no tourist trap. They still get very few here. It’s too inaccessible, and there’s no main road to anywhere inside of thirty miles whichever way you chose to go.’ He smiled at someone over my head. ‘You must meet the boss, Luis.’

  Luis was a small, thin man with the face of a weary poet. I thought him around fifty. Later Joe told me he was thirty-four. He welcomed Joe with dignified warmth, bowed to me, then turned back to Joe with a quite charming smile and long comment in Spanish that had Joe smiling rather mechanically.