Grasp a Nettle

Miss Creed opened her eyes and sat up very straight. ‘We will do no such thing, Janet. I’m never ill. You will oblige me by not referring to it again.’

‘Well,’ said Jenny reasonably, ‘if you have any more headaches like this one, I shall certainly refer to it. Probably you need stronger glasses.’

Her aunt turned her head to look at her as she stood at the table, pouring herself her tea. ‘H’m—perhaps that’s it. You’re a sensible girl, Jenny.’

Jenny smiled at her; her aunt always called her Janet when she was vexed, now she was Jenny again. They began to talk of other things and her aunt’s indisposition wasn’t mentioned again that day. Only the next morning when she went along to her aunt’s room to wish her goodbye did that formidable lady declare: ‘If ever I should be ill, Jenny, I should wish you to nurse me.’ And Jenny, noting uneasily the pallor of the face on the pillows, said hearteningly: ‘You’re never ill, my dear, but if ever you are, yes, I’ll look after you—you know that.’ She bent to kiss the elderly cheek. ‘You’ve been father and mother to me for almost all of my life, and very nice parents you’ve been, too.’ She went to the door. ‘I’ll be back in ten days’ time and I’ll telephone late this evening unless anything crops up.’

London at the end of summer was crowded, hot, and smelled of petrol. Jenny wrinkled her nose as she drove across its heart and into the East End. When she had started her training as a nurse, her family, particularly Margaret, had been annoyed at her choice of hospital. With all the teaching hospitals to choose from, she had elected to apply to Queen’s, large and old-fashioned and set squarely in the East End; not the type of place which, since she had insisted on taking up nursing, a Creed or a Wren should choose. But Jenny had had her own way, for despite her pretty face she was a determined girl with a quite nasty temper to go with her hair, and she had done her three years general training, followed it with a midwifery certificate and now held the post of Junior Theatre Sister. Her family still smiled tolerantly at the idea of her having a career, thinking no doubt of Toby Blake waiting in the wings, as it were; sure that very soon now she would realise that to be married to him would be pleasant and suitable and what was expected of her. But Jenny had other ideas, although she wasn’t able to clarify them, even to herself. There would be someone in the world meant for her; she had been sure of that ever since she was a little girl, and although there was no sign of him yet, she was still quite certain that one day she would come face to face with him, and he would feel just as she did—and in the meantime she intended to make a success of her job.

Queen’s looked grey and forbidding from the outside, and indeed, on the inside as well, but she no longer noticed the large draughty entrance hall, nor the long dark passages leading from it. She plunged into them after a cheerful exchange of greetings with the head porter, and presently went through a door, painted a dismal brown, across a courtyard overlooked by most of the hospital’s wards, and into the Nurses’ Home, an old-fashioned building which had been altered and up-dated whenever there had been any money to spare, so that it presented a hotchpotch of styles and building materials. But inside it was fairly up-to-date, with the warden’s office just inside the door and a wide staircase beside the two lifts. Jenny wished the warden, Miss Mellow—who wasn’t in the least mellow—a staid good morning, for it had barely struck noon, and started up the stairs, taking the handful of letters Miss Mellow had wordlessly handed her with her.

Three of them were from Toby; he was a great letter writer; his handwriting small and neat and unmistakable. Jenny sighed as she saw it and glanced at the others; from friends who had married and left hospital, inviting her severally for a weekend, to dinner, and to meet for coffee one day soon. She read them as she wandered upstairs, for she wasn’t on duty until the following morning and she had plenty of time to unpack and get her uniform ready. But Toby’s letters she didn’t open, not until she had gained her room on the third floor, put her case down, kicked off her shoes and curled up on her bed.

There was nothing to say in any of them which she didn’t know already, and why he had to write on three successive days to point out the advantages of marrying him was a mystery—besides, she had seen him only four days ago, and when, as usual, he had asked her to marry him she had said quite definitely, with the frankness of an old friend, that it just wouldn’t work. She put the letters down after a while and went along to the pantry to make a pot of tea. Clare Brook was there, putting on the kettle, having had a free morning from Women’s Surgical, and she greeted Jenny with a cheerful ‘Hullo,’ and went on in mock dismay: ‘You’re on call tonight, ducky. Old Hickory (Miss Dock, the Theatre Superintendent) is off with toothache, Maureen’s got days off and Celia being Celia and left in charge doesn’t feel she should.’ She raised her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Our Celia is getting too big for her boots, just because Mr Wilson likes the way she hands him the instruments… So there you are, Jenny Wren, and for sure there’ll be a massive RTA and you’ll be up all night.’

Jenny spooned tea into the pot. ‘Well, I’ve been away for two weeks,’ she observed, ‘so I suppose it’s fair enough, though it’s beastly to come back to.’

Clare eyed her with interest. ‘Had a good time at that ancestral hall of yours? Seven-course dinners every evening, I suppose, and a dress for each one…’ She spoke without rancour; everyone liked Jenny and nobody grudged her her exalted background. ‘Not engaged to that Toby of yours yet?’

Jenny spooned sugar into their mugs and reached for the biscuit tin. ‘No—it’s silly of me, but I just know we wouldn’t suit. Well, what I mean is…’ she frowned, wishing to make herself clear: ‘We’ve known each other simply years and years, and there’s no…no…’

‘Spice? I know what you mean—you’re so used to each other you don’t even quarrel.’

‘He has a very even temper…’

‘Huh—so there’s nothing for you to sharpen your bad moods on, is there? You need someone with a temper as fine as yours, my dear, without an ounce of meekness in him, to give as good as he gets.’

‘It doesn’t sound very comfortable,’ protested Jenny.

‘Who wants to be comfortable? Chris and I fight quite a bit, you know, and we’re only engaged. Heaven knows what it’ll be like when we marry, but it’ll never be dull.’ Clare handed her mug over for more tea. ‘Which reminds me, I saw the sweetest wedding dress the other day…’

The pair of them became absorbed in the interesting world of fashion.

Jenny had to get up during the night, not for the massive RTA which Clare had prophesied, but for a little boy who had fallen out of his bedroom window to the pavement below; it took hours to patch him up and his chance of survival was so slim as to be almost non-existent. Jenny, going back to bed at three o’clock in the morning, lay awake worrying about him for another hour, so that when she got down to breakfast at half past seven her pretty face was pale and tired, but the news that the child was still alive cheered her up and she ate her breakfast with a fair appetite, wishing, as she always did, that she was back at Dimworth, having her breakfast in the little sitting room overlooking the water garden, with Aunt Bess sitting opposite, reading indignant pieces from the newspaper and calling everybody, impartially, a fool.

There was a heavy list for the morning and Celia Drake, assuming the mantle Miss Dock had temporarily laid down, was at her most trying; if the morning’s work was to run smoothly, then both of them would have to work, sharing the cases. But Celia, topheavy with importance, had elected to take the easiest of the list and leave the long-drawn-out ones to Jenny, which meant that Jenny wasn’t going to get off duty punctually; the list would drag on until after dinner and there would be a wild scramble to get the afternoon list started on time, and although it wasn’t a long one, Jenny guessed who would be scrubbing for it.

She eyed the cases she was expected to deal with and frowned heavily, her lovely hazel eyes dark with temper, while her coppery hair seemed to glow. Celia had retired to the office, probably to sit at the desk and dream of the day when she would—perhaps—be Theatre Superintendent. Jenny poked her indignant head round the door and gave her a fuming look.

‘Come on out and do your share, Celia,’ she invited waspishly. ‘You’re not in Old Hickory’s shoes yet, you know. We’ll share this list, half and half, and if you don’t like the idea, I’ll drop everything and go off sick.’

Celia might hand the instruments with éclat, but her wits weren’t all that quick. ‘Go off sick?’ she wanted to know. ‘But you’re not…’

Jenny nodded her bright head vigorously. ‘Oh, but I am—sick of you. What’s it to be?’

‘Oh, all right,’ declared Celia peevishly, and added nastily: ‘I don’t see why you should have it all your own way just because there’s a baron in your family.’

‘I’ve got his red hair,’ Jenny pointed out, ‘and his nasty temper.’

The day was long and hot and tiring; the cases ran over their times and small complications cropped up which no one could have foreseen; consequently by the end of the morning’s list the surgeons were a little edgy, the housemen ravenous because they hadn’t had a coffee break, and the nurses’ dinnertime hopelessly late. Jenny saw the last case out of theatre, sent as many nurses as she could spare to their meal, drank a hasty cup of tea with the surgeons, and aided by the one nurse she had kept back, started on getting ready for the afternoon’s list. Her staff nurse would be back in time to scrub for the first case, and the list was a straightforward one. She might even have time to eat a sandwich and have another cup of tea.

She did, while Staff took the cholestectomy, and as she made her hasty meal she wrote up the books and then put the rest of the paper work on one side before going into theatre to scrub for the rest of the list. They were finished by five o’clock, but there was still the desk work to get through. Celia, with a much shorter list, had already gone off duty, and Jenny sat in her office, writing swiftly in her rather wild handwriting, one ear cocked at the various familiar sounds coming from the theatre unit. She had two nurses on now, and a part-time staff nurse coming on duty at six o’clock. With luck, she would be finished by then.

It was too late to go out by the time she got off duty, and besides, she was tired; she took a bath and put on slacks and blouse and went to her supper, then sat around in the Sisters’ sitting room, talking over the inevitable cups of tea. She was on the point of going to her bed when Miss Mellow arrived to request her presence in the telephone box in the hall. She spoke grudgingly, for she disliked what she called running messages, and she disliked Jenny too, partly because she was a pretty girl and partly because she came from that class of society which Miss Mellow always referred to as They. Jenny, who didn’t like Miss Mellow either but had the good manners not to show it, thanked her nicely and went without haste to the callbox; it would be Toby—she sighed as she picked up the receiver. But it wasn’t Toby, it was Doctor Toms. His voice, as mild as usual but carrying a note of urgency, surprised her. He wanted her at Dimworth. Miss Creed was ill and was asking for her.

‘Now?’ asked Jenny.

‘Yes, my dear. Your aunt is very insistent that you should come.’

‘Those headaches!’ she exclaimed, remembering.

‘Very severe—I want her to be seen by a specialist, but she says she’ll do nothing until you’re here.’

‘Blackouts?’ asked Jenny.

‘Two today—probably she’s had others and has told no one.’

Jenny glanced at her watch. ‘I’ll come at once, just as soon as I can fix things here. Will you ask someone to leave the side door open please—I ought to be with you by two o’clock.’

‘Good girl! I shall be here, Jenny, with your aunt.’

She rang off and raced out of the home and across to the hospital, Night Super would be on duty by now, but heaven knew how far she had got with her first round. Jenny took five precious minutes tracking her down, and ran her to earth at last in the children’s ward, where she held a hurried whispered conversation with her. Mrs Dent was a sensible, kindly woman, who listened without interruption before saying that of course Jenny must go at once and she would see that all the right people were informed in the morning. She even asked Jenny if she had enough money and if she would like a hot drink before she went. Jenny said yes, thank you and no, thank you with real gratitude and went back through the quiet hospital to her room, to fling clothes into a bag, explain her sudden departure to Celia, and go to the car park behind the hospital where she kept the Morgan.

She thanked heaven silently as she turned into the almost empty street that she had filled up on her way into London; there was enough petrol in the tank to get her to Dimworth. It was getting on for eleven o’clock by now, but once clear of London she made good time on the motorway; the clock tower bell chimed two as she stopped the car outside the private wing of the house. There was a light showing through the transom over the side door, and when she turned the handle, it opened silently under her hand. She stopped to bolt it before running up the stairs and along the corridor to her aunt’s room. The door was slightly open and when she pushed it wide she saw Doctor Toms there, sitting in an arm-chair by the bed. He got up when she went in, but before he could speak Aunt Bess, her commanding voice a mere thread of hesitating sound, spoke.

‘Jenny! You made good time. Don’t let Doctor Toms frighten you. All this fuss about a headache…’

Jenny went to the bed and looked down at her aunt. She didn’t like what she saw. Her aunt had looked off colour when she had left only two days earlier, but now she looked ill; her breathing was bad, her colour ghastly, and the pupils of her pale blue eyes were fixed and small. All the same, the lady of the house hadn’t lost any of her fire. She spoke now in a snappy voice. ‘Doctor Toms wants me to be seen by some puffed-up professor or other—he happens to be staying with him. I won’t hear of it.’

‘Why not, Aunt Bess?’

‘He’s a foreigner for a start,’ Miss Creed’s voice was slightly slurred. ‘He’s bound to be too big for his boots and make something out of nothing and then charge me a small fortune.’

Jenny had perched on the bed beside her aunt. Now she took one of the hands lying idle on the coverlet and held it between her own. ‘Look,’ she said persuasively, ‘why not let this man take a look at you? If you don’t like him you can say so and then you need not see him again—and as for the small fortune, you know quite well that you could pay a dozen professors and hardly notice it.’ She lifted her aunt’s hand up to her cheek for a moment. ‘To please me?’ she coaxed.

‘Oh, very well,’ agreed her aunt grumpily. ‘You’re just like your mother, she could charm water from a stone. But mind you, if I don’t like him, I shall tell him so.’ She stared at Jenny for a moment and added in a confused way: ‘I don’t feel very well, Jenny.’

‘No, I know, my dear, but you will feel better, I promise you, and I’ll stay with you. Now will you rest for a little while? I’m going to talk to Doctor Toms for a few minutes and then I’ll come back and sit with you.’

Miss Creed nodded, seeing nothing unusual in the fact that someone should forgo their night’s sleep in order to keep her company; she wasn’t a selfish woman, but she had been used to having her own way and people to carry out her wishes without question for so long that the idea that it might be inconvenient for them to do so never crossed her mind.

Jenny waited until her aunt had closed her eyes and then followed the doctor out of the room, closing the door softly for her aunt had sharp ears.

‘She’s ill, isn’t she?’ she whispered, and when the doctor nodded. ‘Can you get this professor quickly?’

Doctor Toms nodded again. ‘By sheer good fortune he happens to be spending some days with me—we’ve been friends for some years and he has been lecturing at Bristol; he still has several lectures to give, so he won’t be going back for a week or so.’

‘Back where?’