A Hospital Summer Read online

  He started the car without another word; he did not speak to me again, or attempt to touch me as we drove home, stopping at all the barricades. When we reached the house, he got out to open the door for me. Only then did he offer me his hand, formally. ‘Take care of yourself,’ he said, as every one said in parting that summer, ‘see you some time, I hope. I’ll be writing. Cheers.’

  ‘Cheers,’ I echoed automatically. ‘All the best, Joe. And get something for that cough. Some cough-mixture or something.’

  ‘I’ll do that.’ He saluted me for the only time in our friendship, and waited by the car while I went into the house.

  Chapter Seven

  EXIT JOE SLANEY

  I was too shattered by Joe’s announcement to be able to sleep that night. Next morning I was off duty from ten to one. I rode direct from the hospital to the Stables. I had to see Mary. When I arrived the Stables nursing staff were in the kitchen being offered tea and hot buns by Sergeant Stevens.

  ‘Hallo, Sarge, still at it?’ I climbed on to the kitchen table. ‘Morning, girls. Nice to see how the other half lives. We don’t even rate a tea-break in A.S. No time. How are the sick A.T.S.?’ Mary moved over to make room for me and said the sick A.T.S. were revoltingly healthy.

  ‘We can’t keep the girls in bed. The moment our backs are turned they’re up cleaning, bedmaking, doing everything for themselves. They’re even worse than the men in the Ob. Block! They know how to take temperatures and how to chart. I promise you, Clare, we live a life of idle luxury. Agatha’s thinking of remustering.’

  ‘Remustering to what?’ I wanted to know. ‘If you join any of the women’s Services you’ll have to be a nursing orderly or sick-bay attendant. Might as well stay in a hospital as do that.’

  Agatha said she proposed to stay in hospital. ‘A proper hospital, Clare. I’m bored with getting no place fast. It looks as if this war’s going to be a longish one ‒ I mean, we can’t beat Jerry over-night, seeing as we’ve left all our bits and pieces over in France. I’ve decided to train. I,’ she announced smugly, ‘am going to be a nurse. The Real McCoy. An S.R.N. one of these fine days, and then I’ll come back here in a super scarlet and grey uniform and lead you all a ghastly life in one of the blocks.’ Mary shuddered.

  ‘It’s a grim thought.’

  I said I didn’t think Agatha would be such a bad Sister. ‘I wouldn’t mind working under you, Agatha.’

  Mary said she had not been considering that angle. ‘I was thinking about the War lasting four years. It takes four years to become an S.R.N., doesn’t it?’

  ‘In the voluntary hospitals,’ replied Agatha. ‘I believe at Matthew and Mark’s you take the State exam at the end of your third year, but have to work another as part of the contract because, although the State considers you are fully trained, the hospital doesn’t, and won’t give you a final certificate until you’ve done four years.’

  I was interested in all this. Momentarily it pushed Joe from my mind. ‘Are you going to Matthew and Mark’s, Agatha?’

  ‘If my interview with the Matron there is all right. I’ve got Madam’s permission and her blessing. She said she thought I was showing the stuff I was made of, Carter, m’dear, and if she had been twenty years younger she would have come and trained with me! Now, girls, wouldn’t that have been something?’

  ‘Enough to make you stick as a V.A.D. for the rest of your life, dear,’ said Mary. ‘Have some more tea, Clare. You’ve only had one cup.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I held out my saucerless cup, reflecting on the advice Joe had once thrust at me. ‘I can’t get over you leaving us, Agatha. When did all this come about? And why Matthew and Mark’s?’

  Agatha said she had been brooding on it secretly for some, time. ‘I’ve been here eight months, Clare. And where,’ she demanded dramatically, ‘have I got? I’m still on the bottom rung, labelled Stooge, and likely to remain so labelled for the duration. I’m sick of stooging. I want to get somewhere.’

  ‘You’ll be a stooge while you’re training,’ I warned her. ‘My father was a Matthew and Mark’s man, and he used to tell Mother and me of the ghastly time the pros had. Rules everywhere. And fearful Sisters. But it is a good hospital. Father said it was the only hospital.’

  ‘Thanet said that,’ put in Mary. ‘She trained there. Didn’t you know that, Clare?’

  ‘Did she now? I didn’t know that.’ This made me even more thoughtful. ‘She was awfully efficient, and human at the same time. Mason’s efficient as anything in A.S., but she’s only human when someone’s dying. If you turn into a Thanet, Agatha, you won’t do badly at all. I must say, I think you’re very enterprising. Going to be a terrific plunge starting all over again from scratch.’

  Agatha said she was scared stiff at the prospect, but intended going through with her plans if she was accepted. ‘One’s got to get on in life, Clare. I don’t know why, one just has. It’s different for Mary’ ‒ she nodded indulgently at Mary as she spoke ‒ ‘she’s got a home and husband to go back to when all this is over. I haven’t got either, and I’m the right age to train, and I like nursing, so, I feel, why waste any more time? All right, girls, laugh your heads off! I may be talking like Madam, but I am so sick of sitting on my bottom rung with never a chance of promotion. Take Monica. She started as a Vol. in the A.T.S. when I joined the Red Cross. She’s shot right up the N.C.O. ladder and has just gone to an O.C.T.U., or whatever they call the courses for A.T.S. officers ‒ and where am I? Still a miserable Grade One V.A.D., and having progressed to that, which I did after three months like you two, I can go no further.’

  One of the new V.A.D.s whose name I did not know, said gloomily, ‘You were lucky, Carter. It takes us much longer now to even reach Grade One.’

  ‘My dear,’ said Agatha patronizingly, ‘what can you expect? We girls are pre-Narvik, pre-Dunkirk, pre-everything. We are the genuine old brigade. They had to give us something extra to boost our morales.’

  Mary slid off the table. ‘We’d better go and search for some work. If anyone is lost make some more swabs. The hospital can always use our surplus.’

  I followed them out. ‘Can I come and make swabs with you, Mary?’

  She smiled. ‘Why? Haven’t you got enough work in the A.S. Block? That I cannot believe.’

  ‘Not that. I want to talk to you, and I suppose as you’re boss you can hardly knock off for half an hour mid-morning for a natter. So can we natter over swabs?’

  ‘Better than that. Come into the office. I’ve a few notes I must write for Madam. I can spend quite a long time on the notes if I really want to. There truthfully isn’t a thing to do for our ten highly co-operative patients. None of them are ill with anything more serious than minor sore throats.’ She led the way into her little office and closed the door behind me. ‘What’s on your mind, Clare?’

  I told her. ‘Mary,’ I said, when I had finished, ‘I was never so shaken in my life. Can you imagine Joe Slaney saying that to me?’

  She said placidly that she could imagine it very well. ‘I told you I saw him give you the green light whenever you were about. He was never able to take his eye off you.’

  I shook my head. ‘I don’t get it. Why wait until the last minute to tell me? Why didn’t he do something about it before?’

  ‘Would it have been any good if he had?’

  ‘Well ‒ I could at least have said no.’

  ‘Why should he ask for a rebuff? It was obvious you weren’t interested. Joe’s no fool, dear. Anything but. He’s right on the ball. No man likes being turned down, you know. Men go in for pride, dear. Very much more than women do. No sensible woman really cares two hoots about her pride where essentials are involved. Men do. Then, few man are sensible in the practical sort of way women are sensible. He didn’t propose?’

  ‘He made quite a point of not proposing. He said ‒ quote ‒ he wasn’t that conceited.’

  ‘He’s too intelligent to be conceited. And a proposal of marriage, although a tremendous com
pliment to the girl, also implies a certain conceit, since it takes for granted the fact that the proposer is the kind of person with whom some girl would want to spend the rest of her life. That’s a big order, when you work it out.’

  ‘I had not thought of it like that.’

  ‘I should give it a little thought, dear. Joe, too. He’s nice. What are you going to do about him?’

  I looked at her. ‘I don’t know. Nothing. What can I do? I don’t even know where he’s gone.’

  ‘He said he’d write. He’ll let you know. Will you write back? Do you want to write back?’

  I hesitated. ‘I suppose I do. I’m not sure. I’m all muddled. I don’t like being muddled. It makes life too complicated. It was much simpler when Joe just irritated me.’

  ‘Forgive my sounding like Madam, dear, but life is a complicated business. I can see that you’re muddled. I suspect Joe must have seen it, too. I think it was very nice of him not to propose.’

  ‘Nice of him?’

  ‘Yes.’ She considered me thoughtfully. ‘He knows you’ve been lit up with a series of emotions lately. First, worrying about Charles, then the shock of your father’s being killed, then the general set-up that’s had us all up in the air, plus that air-raid. You’re very young, Clare, and the very young can get very uncertain, when life proves to be strictly for adults only. As it is, all you kids are growing up fast, much too fast. And you must all be feeling, consciously or unconsciously, the need for the sort of security you should have at your age and aren’t getting. That, fundamentally, I should say, is why Agatha’s decided to train seriously. She’s going to get security in the job. It’s only right that she should want something to look forward to, and not exist ‒ as we’re all existing ‒ in the very indefinite present. Have you realized,’ she added, ‘that we have all stopped looking forward to anything ‒ leaves, dates, anything beyond to-day, or even now? Have you got a date for to-night?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘If you had’ ‒ she shot at me with the suddenness of that last question ‒ ‘would you be counting the hours until it came?’

  ‘Of course not.’ I smiled. ‘Much good that would do! I had a dinner date with Joe the night of that raid. Taught me a sharp lesson if nothing else did about the folly of looking forward to something a few hours off. The War, or work, is bound to break it up. Always does. But what’s all this got to do with Joe being nice?’

  ‘That’s my whole point. Joe sensed how up in the air you still are, possibly because he’s up in the air himself. He isn’t very much older than you, and, like you, his whole life must have been turned upside down since this time last year. I know that what is happening to you both is happening to everyone of your immediate generation the length and breadth of the country; but the fact that the condition is general does not make it any easier for a specific individual. Living in the present is all right for children, to whom a day seems a lifetime, or to the very old. They’ve had a past, and can dispense with a future. Even people like David and I don’t do so badly. We have stopped looking forward ‒ but we can look back, if only to a handful of adult years. You kids can’t. Consequently, it’s only too understandable if you do rush headlong into uniform, marriage, or bed, in an attempt to grasp something tangible out of the intangible present. I should say that Joe Slaney used a considerable amount of self-control last night. I’m not suggesting he would have been able to pull you into bed with him, dear, but I am suggesting that had he played up the fire and the passion he might have persuaded you into becoming engaged to him.’ She smiled slightly. ‘I see you are shaking your head, dear, but remember you are shaking it in the cold light of day this morning. Last night you might well have been carried away by the darkness around Joe’s car and the darkness ahead. Saying goodbye to even a casual friend who may well be on his way to be killed isn’t easy. Saying good-bye to an attractive young man who just told you he loves you can weaken the strongest mind. If that good-bye is embroidered with a heartbroken offer of marriage any girl might well accept, because she hasn’t the heart to send anyone off to possible death with a refusal. You’re a kind-hearted soul, Clare. Joe knows that. He’s worked with you. He is also as persuasive as an Irishman can be, when he wants to be. I should say he wanted to be that with you ‒ very, very much. I’m glad that he wasn’t. You aren’t in love with him, and you’d have been horrified when you woke this morning and realized what you’d done. But as far as Joe’s concerned, I do hand it to him. I think he behaved like that lamentably rare creature ‒ a little gentleman.’

  ‘But, Mary ‒ I would never have accepted him. As you’ve just said ‒ I’m not in love with him. I like him ‒ now. I like him a lot. I’m really sorry he’s gone. But as for marrying him ‒ the idea would never occur to me.’

  She said, ‘Did the idea that he was in love with you occur to you this time yesterday?’

  ‘Of course not!’

  She smiled. ‘Amazing how situations can alter in twenty-four hours, isn’t it? And you don’t have to be so up-stage about marrying him. Apart from the fact you might do a lot worse ‒ you might well marry someone you’ve only known twenty-four hours. It’s happening all the time at the moment. I don’t say it’s a sound scheme at all; I merely point out that it does happen, frequently. And I’ll tell you something, Clare, which you may not like. I think if Joe had turned on the pressure he could have got you to agree to marry him. I think he might even know it himself.’

  ‘Are you telling me,’ I asked indignantly, ‘that my subconscious is in love with him, and longing for me to fall into his arms with glad cries?’

  ‘No. I’m merely reminding you that recently your subconscious has taken a series of beatings. One by one all the bulwarks around your private life have tumbled down. I don’t only mean the obvious and greatest loss, your father; I’m thinking of your brothers, and your friends from home who are all scattered by this folly, your mother driving around in her van, half your house shut, and that whole house standing in one of the most dangerous spots in the country, so you can scarcely think of your home as a refuge any more. You may convince yourself you do not need a refuge, Clare; you may believe you can stand alone on your own feet. I don’t doubt that you can do that if you have to; but I do say that if you were my daughter I would very much rather you didn’t have to. Everyone needs some person or place as a refuge ‒ and right now you have neither.’

  I said slowly, ‘There’s my mother.’

  She looked at me. ‘I remember your telling me that your mother was gentle and quiet like Charles. Be honest, Clare; who lends the shoulder? Don’t you feel your mother has enough to carry now she’s on her own and has her constant anxiety for her two sons?’

  I nodded. ‘I do. But how did you guess that?’

  ‘It wasn’t hard, dear. You and I know each other pretty well. I’ve only had to listen to what you’ve said. Also, I know how it is with my own mother. She’s a perfect dear ‒ a perfect Edwardian ‒ she was sheltered as a girl ‒ married long before the other war ‒ and has remained sheltered. All our mothers are Edwardians and clean out of touch. One can’t blame them; they behave as they were taught to behave by their mammas, who were Victorians. That speaks for itself. I’m quite sure your mother always taught you to behave like a little lady, and is quite sanguine about your being a V.A.D., because nursing in wartime is considered a lady-like occupation ‒ by people who have never nursed in wartime. If your mother realized exactly what you’ve been doing lately, if she could have seen the work kids like you and Kirsty had to do after that raid, she’d have had a fit. You can’t run to her and tell her how you felt when that boy with half a face died in your arms? Can you?’

  ‘No. I couldn’t tell anyone at home. It would only worry Mother and her friends. It wouldn’t be any good telling them. They just wouldn’t believe that sort of thing. I don’t know what they think we do. Roll bandages, I suppose, and lay cool hands on fevered brows.’ I shuddered suddenly at the memory of John Stephen Rain
es’ face. ‘I couldn’t possibly say anything about that boy. Or’ ‒ I shuddered again ‒ ‘Albert.’

  ‘Which one was Albert? The boy whose head was sliced across?’

  ‘No. I didn’t know his name. He died that first afternoon. Albert had no face at all, but he was terribly strong. He wouldn’t keep any dressing on. He tore off whatever we put on, so eventually we had to leave his face exposed. He lived for two days, fighting mad and screaming. Mary, his screams were awful. Nothing seemed to touch his pain. Sister said it was probably because he was so strong and healthy. She said big men often do die hard. He did.’

  ‘Poor boy.’ Her face was lined with compassion. ‘Poor the rest of you. It must have been grim. I did hear about him from our M.O., but I did not know his name, or that he lasted so long.’ She fiddled with her pen. ‘Albert gave your subconscious another beating. You can’t have a defence against things like that. Not until you’ve had the experience that Mason has had. Maybe after twenty years’ nursing sights and screams do roll over your head; or maybe you just become a better actress. I don’t know about that. I only know that in your first year of nursing you cannot remain untouched.’ She gazed at me in silence for a few seconds. ‘Listen, dear, I’m going to give you some advice. Don’t take it amiss, and do think on it. To return to what I was saying, your defences are down, and when a girl’s defences are down it is not very difficult to persuade her into anything. Take my tip, Clare, walk a little warily in the immediate future. I think you may miss Joe far more than you imagine. I think you are going to want something or someone to fill at least one of the gaps. The hospital is stiff with men who’ll be only too willing. Don’t get swept off your feet by X, because you avoided being swept off your feet by Joe Slaney.’