Enchanting Samantha

Samantha felt inclined to take umbrage at his tone, but perhaps he had been up all night like she had and wasn’t feeling very amiable. She got up and led the way to the ward, saying at the door: ‘You’ll come again? Day Sister will want to see you—have you a telephone number?’

He grinned. ‘Now we are making strides—we might even arrange a date.’

She lost her breath and caught it again with an angry snort. ‘Well, really—’ she began, and then, at a loss for words, walked ahead of him down the ward, past the highly interested patients, to where the old lady lay. As she pulled the cubicle curtains back he put two hands on her waist, lifted her effortlessly on one side and strode past her to bend over the bed and greet the patient in the gentlest of voices in some language she couldn’t make head or tail of. Samantha watched the elderly face light up, break into a smile and then dissolve into tears, but when she stepped forward, the man stopped her by saying:

‘Thank you, dear girl, don’t let me stop you from finishing your work.’

She contented herself with a cold: ‘Ten minutes, if you please, and not a minute more,’ before she stalked away. A rude and arrogant man, she fumed, even though his voice had held unmistakable authority. Too late she remembered that she had no idea who he was. He had mentioned being an old friend—possibly a lodger of some years’ standing with the old lady. Perhaps she had moved house and he with her—in that case surely there would have been other lodgers? She started on the medicine round, still cross because he had called her ‘dear girl’ with an off-hand patronage which she found quite insulting. On an impulse she went to the desk and telephoned the Surgical Night Sister; let him try and patronize that formidable lady if he could—it was unfortunate that she wasn’t to be found, and as it turned out it would have been pointless, for when Samantha, after exactly ten minutes, went to remind the visitor that he should go, he was nowhere to be found; he must have gone, very silently indeed, while her back was turned.

She explained it all to Sister Grieves when that lady came on duty at eight o’clock, and then sped away to the dining room for her breakfast, a meal which didn’t take very long to eat, for it was the end of the month and she hadn’t much money left. Tea and toast and butter—but as her companions at table were eating the same rather dull fare it didn’t seem so bad. Besides, she lived out, in a flat shared with three other nurses, all at the moment on day duty, and they had become astonishingly clever at stretching the housekeeping money; there would be a nourishing stew that evening when Samantha got up, and before she went to bed she would make coffee, and there were plenty of biscuits. She thought longingly of her nights off, still three days away, when she could, since it was pay day, go home to her grandparents and eat all she wanted.

‘You’re quiet, Sam,’ observed Pat Donovan from Men’s Medical. ‘Did you have a grotty night?’

Samantha spread the last slice of toast. ‘Not too bad…’ Before she could enlarge on this statement Dorothy Sellars from the Accident Room chipped in: ‘Did you find out anything about that dear old duck we sent up with the burned hands?’

Samantha nodded and said with a mouth full of toast: ‘She had a visitor at six o’clock—a man. She’s Dutch, some sort of housekeeper—comes from one of those uppercrust squares in Knightsbridge.’

‘Was the man upper-crust too?’ asked Pat flippantly.

Samantha considered. ‘Yes, he was rude too. He said he was an old friend—I daresay he lodges with her or something of the sort, he was a bit vague.’ She pushed back her chair. ‘I’m off, see you all tonight.’

The flat she shared was a bare five minutes’ walk from Clement’s; the top floor of what must have been at one time a large family house, complete with subterranean kitchens and several roomy attics. It was let out in furnished flats now, and besides Samantha and her friends, who lived under the roof, there were seven other occupants, not counting old Mr Cockburn who owned the place and lived in the transformed basement kitchens, with their windows giving a sideways view of everyone who went in or came out. He was a nice old man, born and bred in the district and with a soft spot for the four young nurses living in his attics, a soft spot partly engendered by his theory that if he treated them right, if and when he needed to go to hospital—which the Lord forbid—they would treat him right too. A form of insurance, as it were.

Samantha waved to him as she climbed the steps. She was tired and it was a cold, grey morning. She had no fancy for a brisk walk, nor for the lengthy bus ride which would take her from this plebeian area of the city to its more fashionable shopping streets. She yawned widely as she toiled up the last of the stairs and unlocked their flat door.

It was unexpectedly pleasant inside—small and shabbily furnished, it was true, but they had three bedrooms between them as well as a sitting room, a minute kitchen and a bathroom with what Mr Cockburn optimistically and erroneously called ‘constant ‘ot’.

She went along to the small room she had to herself because she was on night duty and flung off her coat and gloves. The other three were on duty until five o’clock that afternoon, which meant she would be able to sleep undisturbed all day if she wished. She donned the communal apron hanging behind the kitchen door, switched on the radio and began to tidy the flat, whistling cheerfully in time with the music while she got out the carpet sweeper and found a duster. They were fair about sharing the chores of their little home; whoever was on night duty tidied up in the morning, washed the breakfast things and laid the table for supper, and whoever was off duty during the day prepared the evening meal and did the ironing. The shopping they shared.

Today the other three could share the chores between them. Samantha, having done her quota, undressed and wandered along to the bathroom, where she found, most satisfyingly, enough hot water to fill the bath almost full. She lay in it, almost asleep, wondering about the stranger who had visited the old lady that morning. A sudden memory of his large, firm hands on her waist as he had shifted her out of his path disturbed her so much that she got out of the bath long before the water had cooled and set about getting to bed in the shortest space of time. She was really very tired, she told herself, refusing to admit that she found her thoughts of the man disquieting. ‘Probably because I dislike him so much,’ she mumbled as she pulled the blankets over her head and allowed sleep to take over.

She was awakened by Sue Blane bearing a mug of tea and the news that supper would be ready in half an hour, and although her first involuntary thought was of the man who had come to the ward that morning, she swept it aside impatiently, gulped down her tea, dressed, pinned up her hair, added a modicum of make-up because it was a waste on night duty, anyway, and joined her fellow tenants round the supper table. Sue worked on Women’s Medical, the other two, Joan and Pam, slaved away their lives, as they informed everyone, in the Children’s Unit under a martinet of a Sister who had the manner and visage of an updated Miss Betsy Trotwood, only instead of disliking donkeys, she disliked young nurses. Samantha ate her stew and laughed at her friends’ latest backslidings, and forgot all about her early morning visitor.

And there was no time to think of anything else but work when she reached the ward—there were the operation cases to settle after she had taken the report from Sister, they needed comforting and reassurance and lifting gently into the right position in which to sleep, and calm brief explanations—already given several times during the day—as to why they weren’t quite themselves. It was amazing, Samantha thought, as she explained a drip to a peevish elderly lady who had taken exception to it, how dreamlike life appeared to the various ladies who had visited the operating theatre that day; a merciful state of affairs which she took care to prolong with the almost unnoticed jab in each patient’s arm as they were settled for the night, so that they relaxed and slept.

Juffrouw Klara Boot needed a good deal of attention too, although her hands were doing as well as could be expected. Samantha irrigated them, made her as comfortable as possible and while Brown gave the old lady a drink, went away to prepare an injection for her too, for her kind eyes had noticed the drawn look on her patient’s face, although it had lighted up with a cheerful smile when Samantha expressed admiration for the flowers on the bedtable and the pretty shawl round Juffrouw Boot’s shoulders.

It was a pity that neither could understand what the other was saying, a fact which didn’t stop Samantha chatting away as she worked, for surely the dear soul would feel less lonely if someone talked to her, even in a foreign tongue. She popped in her needle and shot the contents of the syringe expertly into Juffrouw Boot’s arm, patted her shoulder in a motherly fashion, and slid away to help Brown with old Mrs Stone, who was deaf, ninety and not surprisingly, crotchety to boot, and all the while she was helping her companion to settle Mrs Stone, she was remembering the way Sister Grieves had bridled with pleasure as she recounted how Juffrouw Boot’s visitor had been to see her—that he hadn’t been rude to her was very apparent from her smiles—on the contrary, if Sister’s expression was to be believed. Samantha, who had almost burst with curiosity, had managed not to ask any questions about him, and Sister, while full of his charm, told her nothing which she didn’t already know—and that was very little.

She had been to her own midnight meal and Brown had only been gone to hers for ten minutes or so when she sat down at Sister’s desk and pulled the Drugs Book towards her and began to make her neat entries, her ordinary little face absorbed. She was disturbed almost immediately, however, by the opening of the ward door to admit Sir Joshua White, accompanied by her early morning visitor of the day before. Both gentlemen were in the full glory of white tie and tails and Samantha, getting to her feet, eyed them uncertainly. They had been to some function or other, she had no doubt, but what wind of fortune had brought them to the ward at this time of night? and why was this man with the senior consultant surgeon of Clement’s? There was nothing amiss with Juffrouw Boot—the obvious common denominator with both men—for Jack Mitchell, the Registrar, had told her so when he had done his late evening round. And this wretched man was staring at her now with a look of amusement on his face which annoyed her out of all proportion to the circumstances.

Sir Joshua had reached her by now, nodded a cheerful greeting and said, his usually booming voice suitable muffled out of deference to the snores around them: ‘Juffrouw Boot—is she asleep, Staff Nurse?’

‘I hope so, sir.’ Samantha’s voice was polite, but her look dared him to wake the poor old thing.

He ignored the look. ‘We’ll be very quiet,’ he promised her, and when she looked enquiringly at his companion: ‘Ah, yes—this is Doctor ter Ossel. Our patient is his housekeeper.’

So that solved that little mystery. She gave the Dutch doctor a cold glance, said ‘How do you do?’ just as though they hadn’t already met, and led the way up the ward to the patient’s bed. Its occupant was asleep. At a sign from Sir Joshua, Samantha shone her torch on the envelopes enshrouding the burnt hands and the two men bent to examine them, and because she hadn’t got the torch’s beam exactly where he wanted it, Doctor ter Ossel put out a large hand to correct it. There was really no need for him to keep his firm grip over her own hand and it disturbed her very much that she should find such pleasure at his touch.

Presently they all went back down the ward once more, to Sister’s desk, where Sir Joshua silently put out a hand for Juffrouw Boot’s chart. Samantha waited patiently while the two men muttered and murmured together, until at last the older man wrote his fresh instructions and handed them back to her. They didn’t stay after that; Sir Joshua wished her a civil good night and Doctor ter Ossel offered her a mocking one. She watched their disappearing backs—the Dutchman’s so very broad—as they crossed the landing to the stairs, and decided that she disliked him very much.

The night was busy; Samantha escaped to breakfast thankfully, gobbled it in company with such of her friends as shared her table and set off for the flat. One more night’s duty and she would be free for four days, the delightful thought quickened her steps and made her hazel eyes shine—even a note left by her flatmates asking her to do the shopping before she went to bed couldn’t sour her pleasure.

She skipped round the flat, tidying up before rather perfunctorily doing something to her washed-out face. It was raining, a faint drizzle—she could wear her raincoat with its hood up and not bother with her hair. She brushed it out rather carelessly, tied it back and bundled it away anyhow, then caught up the shopping basket, raided the housekeeping kitty on the mantelpiece, snatched up the shopping list thoughtfully made out for her and dashed down the three flights of stairs and through the house door, waving automatically to Mr Cockburn, whose face she could see, peering sideways through his window.

There wasn’t much shopping to do, as a matter of fact; bread, a cauliflower to make a cauliflower cheese for their suppers, four tubs of yoghourt to follow it, some tea and butter and more biscuits because they were quite cheap and filled one up, and a tin of milk in case an unexpected visitor should call for coffee. Having purchased these mundane articles she paused for a long moment outside a flower shop and looked longingly at the daffodils and tulips in its window; several bunches would make the flat look quite beautiful. She opened her purse and counted the money inside and then closed it quickly, but she still went on looking. She was standing there when Doctor ter Ossel spoke.

‘Good morning, Miss Fielding, do you intend to buy some flowers?’

She had whizzed round with the speed of a top. ‘No,’ she told him breathlessly, ‘no. They—they die so quickly, it wouldn’t be worth it.’

‘Worth what?’ he asked in such a gentle voice that she forgot for the moment that she didn’t like him and was intent only on hiding from him the fact that she couldn’t afford them.

‘I like to see them growing,’ she said after a pause.

‘Let me take your basket.’ And he had it before she could think of a good reason why he shouldn’t. Too late she said, ‘Oh, no—it doesn’t matter—I mean, I’m only going back to the flat, it’s no distance…’

‘In that case, I’ll give you a lift,’ he told her.

She looked round her. There were several cars pulled into the curb of the slightly shabby little shopping centre. Samantha looked at them each in turn and then at him. ‘It’s very kind of you, but I’d rather walk.’

She was sorry she had said that, for he said instantly: ‘Ah, the brush-off,’ and his voice wasn’t gentle any more and he was smiling with faint mockery. ‘Just the same, I should like a few minutes with you—about Klara.’

The mockery wasn’t faint now, it was very real; she went red under the gleam in his grey eyes and said stiffly: ‘Very well,’ and found herself walking beside him. When he stopped by a dark blue Rolls-Royce Merlin she did her best not to look surprised, but her ingenuous face wore such an eloquent look of enquiry that her companion said carelessly: ‘I travel a good deal,’ and as though he considered that sufficient, opened the door and bade her get in and make herself comfortable.

Samantha allowed her tired young bones to relax against the soft leather of the seat. How could one help but be comfortable? If it had been anyone else beside her but Doctor ter Ossel, she would have said so; as it was she gave him directions in a polite and wooden voice, and as he pulled away from the curb asked: ‘What was it you want to know about Juffrouw Boot?’

She saw the thick eyebrows lift. ‘My dear young woman, am I to be expected to tell you at this very moment? I think that I should be allowed a few minutes’ quiet in which to do that, don’t you? Your flat, perhaps?’

She cast him a suspicious glance. ‘How did you know that I live out?’

He looked vague. ‘Ah—do you know, I really cannot remember. Is this the street?’

‘Yes.’ There was no point in saying more; Morecombe Street was such that the less said about it the better; it was respectable, but it had seen more prosperous days. The doctor drew up outside the house and got out without haste and opened Samantha’s door, collected her basket and then trod, without being asked, up the steps to the shabby front door. He even had the temerity to lift a hand in greeting to old Mr Cockburn, watching them with great interest from his window.

With key poised at her own front door, Samantha hesitated. ‘Oh, yes,’ he told her blandly before she could frame the polite request that he should say what he wanted to and be gone, ‘I’ll come in now I’m here.’

She led the way through the minute hall and into the sitting room, where he put the basket down and looked around him with leisurely interest.

‘We like living out of the hospital,’ she stated defensively, just as though he had made some derogatory remark about his surroundings. And instantly wished she hadn’t spoken, because the eyebrows flew up once more although he said nothing, just stood there, dwarfing his surroundings and looking at her.

The rules of hospitality were too strong for her. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee?’ she asked him, and added dampeningly: ‘It’s Nescafé.’

He smiled at her and her heart flipped against her ribs because it was the smile he had given the old lady when he had visited her; kind and reassuring. ‘That will be nice, but don’t you go to bed?’

‘Yes, but I always have coffee first.’ She waved a small, sensible hand at the only real armchair the room contained. ‘Do sit down.’

They were half way through their coffee when he said abruptly: ‘I have to return to Holland for a day or so very shortly. I should be grateful if you would buy fruit and so on for Klara—and anything else she might fancy. I’ll see that she has a list of likely things on her locker with appropriate translations; she can point out what she wants.’