The Final Touch

She said, her voice quite quiet once more, ‘Yes, I think I was, but I’m sane now.’ And, suddenly impatient, she added, ‘Oh, go away, do.’

He turned on his heel and went without a backward glance, leaving her standing there, watched with calm interest by the man who had come from the children’s ward. Only when he saw her take out a handkerchief and blow her small nose with unwonted vigour did he put out a hand behind him, push the door soundlessly open and then allow it to swing back with some force so that she was aware of someone there. She didn’t turn round. He hadn’t expected her to; he walked past her rigid back without haste on his way to the medical wing and he was very nearly at the end of the corridor when he heard her muffled sobs.

He walked back to where she was standing. ‘Staff Nurse Pearson, is it not?’ He had only the faintest of accents and his voice was quiet. ‘Perhaps I can help?’

She hadn’t turned round and her sniffs were prodigious but she answered him at once. ‘Thank you—but not really, please don’t bother.’

He said easily, ‘You haven’t been here long, have you? I expect you are feeling homesick, are you not? I was just going out for a breath of air and a cup of coffee. Why not come with me? And do turn round; there is nothing to be ashamed of in tears, you know.’

He had a compelling voice, she turned round obediently and lifted her face, rendered plain by tears and a pink nose, to his. She hadn’t seen him before; she was sure that she would have remembered him if she had. He was quite overpoweringly tall and massively built and good-looking into the bargain. ‘Are you a visitor?’ she asked.

‘Er—no, I work here.’

‘A doctor?’

‘A surgeon.’ He smiled down at her very kindly. ‘Van der Brons.’ He put out a large firm hand and engulfed one of hers. ‘Go and put on a coat; I’ll be in the entrance hall in ten minutes.’

He saw her hesitate and added gently, ‘And wear something on your head—it’s a chilly evening.’

His prosaic remark was somehow reassuring.

He was in the entrance hall when she got there ten minutes later, looking larger than ever in a thick jacket, his silvery head uncovered. The jacket looked expensive and she wondered uneasily just who he was but his friendly, ‘Ah, there you are,’ dispelled any vague doubts and they went out into the courtyard together and thence into the busy street. It was a chilly damp evening and the streets around the hospital were narrow with ancient houses brooding over them. He took her arm and led her through the narrow alley which brought them out into a better-lit street.

‘Coffee first?’ he asked, and didn’t wait for an answer but steered her into a half-empty café and sat her down at a small table. It was very warm there, and he took her raincoat and tossed his jacket over the back of his chair, revealing a beautifully tailored suit, immaculate linen and gold cufflinks. Her uneasy thoughts returned but were swept away by his easy, ‘Toasted sandwiches? And uitsmijter? Soup?’

She chose sandwiches, he gave the order and they drank their coffee while they waited. However upset she felt, she was given no chance to brood, for he kept up a steady flow of small talk about nothing in particular.

The sandwiches were delicious and the coffee hot and comforting; Charity’s pale face resumed its normal healthy colour and, led on in a gentle way by her companion, she began to talk, not noticing that his casual questions were encouraging her to tell him something of herself.

He fetched more coffee from the crowded counter and asked carelessly, ‘Do you intend to stay in Holland for a time or is this just a few months’ visit to see if you like us?’

She didn’t answer at once. She had a sudden wish to spill her bewilderment and misery and loneliness all over this large placid man, but of course that was an idiotic idea; she didn’t even know who he was, only his name and the fact that he was a surgeon at the hospital. She blushed scarlet, remembering that she and Cor had met in a similar fashion. Perhaps this man had picked her up on the spur of the moment, and how willingly she had agreed to go with him!

Mr van der Brons, watching her, guessed unerringly what was in her head. ‘I have a sister about your age,’ he said in a soothing voice. ‘She’s in Edinburgh on a six-month course; she qualified here, now she wants to spread her wings—just as you. She is the youngest—I have two other sisters and two brothers. Have you any brothers and sisters?’

Somehow he had conveyed the impression that he was her elder brother too, so she said readily, ‘No, at least—I have a stepsister. She’s a model and lives in London. She’s very pretty…’

‘Your parents?’ The question was so softly put that she hardly noticed it.

‘My mother died when I was still a small girl, and my father married again—my stepmother was a widow and had a little girl too. He died just after I started my training and my stepmother has gone to live in the South of France.’

Before she could regret her chattiness he began to talk about his own family, vague remarks which in truth told her nothing about him or them but allayed her shyness and doubts.

‘Do you care for a brisk walk? It will have to be up one street and down another but some of the buildings are charming and the canals are always interesting.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Are you on duty in the morning?’ And when she nodded, ‘Then we have time to walk for half an hour before you need to be back.’

They went out into the dark evening and he took her arm to cross the street. ‘Do you find the duty hours easier here?’

‘Well, seven o’clock is earlier then I was used to in London.’ She had to skip a bit to keep up with him and he slowed his steps. ‘On the other hand, it is nice to be off duty earlier; I mean, half-past three is very handy if one wants to go shopping.’

He agreed gravely as they started to walk alongside a canal, along a cobbled street lined with gabled houses, their windows lighted, the curtains undrawn. He pointed out the variety of gables to her, described their interiors, remarking that for the most part their owners took great pride in keeping them in good order.

‘They look delightful from outside,’ said Charity, ‘I hope I get the chance to see inside one before I go back to England.’

‘Well, there’s time enough for that, is there not? Do you have a six-month contract?’

‘Yes.’ His remark reminded her of her talk with Cor and a very sharp wave of unhappiness washed over her so that she was quite unable to say anything more; just for a little while this nice quiet man had pushed away a future she didn’t want to think about but now it was back again. She drew a troubled breath and made a great point of examining the contents of a small antiques shop they were passing, doing her best to regain her usual good sense.

‘You’re unhappy,’ he stated in a matter-of-fact voice, ‘and I find it difficult to believe that you are homesick since you have no home, but I dare say you don’t want to talk about it, not just now.’

He turned her round and began to walk back the way they had come. When they were within sight of the hospital she asked, ‘Why did you ask me to come out with you?’

‘I told you that I have a sister about your age; I would like to think that if she were unhappy and alone in Edinburgh there would be someone to keep her company for an hour or two, since I couldn’t do that myself.’

‘Oh—oh, I see. Well, thank you very much—you’ve been very kind. I feel quite all right again. I’m not usually so silly…’

He pushed open the big door and held it for her to go through. ‘There is nothing silly about admitting one’s feelings.’ He smiled very kindly at her upturned face. ‘Now go to bed and sleep well.’

‘You too, Mr van der Brons.’

He waited near the door until she had disappeared from the hall and then turned and went out again to where a dark grey Rolls-Royce was parked, got in and drove away.

Charity hadn’t expected to sleep, but she did, only to wake very early to face a day she would have to get through somehow. She supposed that in a little while she would feel happy again but on this dark cold morning the future seemed a hopeless blank. In vain she told herself that Cor wasn’t worth another thought, that she was well out of it. She would forget him in time, and when her contract was up she would go back to England and get a good post in one of the teaching hospitals and carve a career for herself. The thought depressed her but at least it was something to think about.

She joined her fellow nurses at breakfast, outwardly her usual quiet self, answering their good-natured remarks in her peculiar Dutch and then hurrying through the hospital to her ward.

Ladies who had been operated on the previous day were feeling, naturally enough, low-spirited and the Hoofdzuster, a rather peevish woman at the best of times, had started a cold so that her peevishness was even worse than usual. Charity, doing her best, was glad that she was off duty at half-past three. If she were quick, there would be time to go to the book shop on the Singel and choose a paperback. Books were expensive in Holland, she had discovered, but they were her only extravagance.

When her father had died the allowance he had given her had been stopped by her stepmother, who had pointed out that now that she was nursing she earned enough to be independent. She had added, ‘I know that in his will your father arranged for me to continue your allowance but of course when he went to make it you were still at school. I don’t believe in young people living on money they haven’t earned. You are not like Eunice, who will probably marry well; you need to work hard and make a career for yourself.’ She had left for France shortly after that, taking every penny with her.

There was nothing to be done about that; Charity, never an extravagant girl, learned to buy the sort of clothes which didn’t date and made them last and, since although she was well liked at the hospital she was seldom asked out, that didn’t matter too much. If sometimes she envied her friends’ new outfits and sighed over the glamorous photos of Eunice in the glossy magazines she never mentioned it.

Now, hurrying towards the shops in the Kalverstraat and Leidsestraat, she decided that the time had come to buy something new and for once fashionable. She had saved for a rainy day and this seemed to be it. She chose a book and then turned her attention to the dress shops. They were all too expensive; C & A and Vroom and Dressman would suit her pocket better. It was a pity that there wasn’t time to buy anything before they closed but she studied their windows so that on her next free day she would have some idea of what she wanted. Her winter coat was good for another year; it had been bought in a sale, a serviceable brown wool bearing a quality label. She had a couple of skirts too and jumpers and sweaters enough even if she was heartily sick of them. A really smart dress, she mused, some pretty shoes and, if there was enough money, a pair of soft leather boots. She walked back to the hospital, keeping her mind on new clothes and off Cor, who most tiresomely lurked at the back of her head however she tried to forget him; it was a pity that she should walk into him as she reached the hospital forecourt. He stopped in front of her and started to speak, but she brushed past him, her chin in the air, and Mr van der Brons, standing at the ward window high above her, nodded his head in approval.

Charity plunged wholeheartedly into her work; it wasn’t too bad on the ward for her head was occupied with the different jobs she was doing and struggling to speak a coherent Dutch which the patients could understand. They were all very good to her, making her repeat a new word until she had it right so that she began to achieve quite a vocabulary, albeit with a marked Amsterdam accent. She got on well with the other nurses too and once or twice went out to the cinema with them or to a café for a cheap meal, but even so there were still times when she was alone and unable to do anything but think of Cor. It should have helped her to forget him when snippets of gossip reached her ears, dropped by kindly nurses who had put two and two together about her and Cor and considered that he had treated her badly, but none of the tales of the light-hearted affairs with first one nurse and then another had eased her feelings. It was the first time she had fallen in love so wholeheartedly and she was incapable of knowing the difference between that and infatuation. However, she was sensible enough to know that she couldn’t sit around and mope. She began to make a systematic round of the city’s museums and botanical gardens; quite a few of them were free and in others the charges were small. She tried Madame Tussaud’s wax models of the Dutch through the ages and balanced that visit, which was expensive, by spending half a day at the Museum Architectuur, which was free, and of course she went again to the Rijksmuseum, for as well as the paintings there, the displays of silver and glass and furniture were enormous; it would probably take her until the end of her stay to see it all.

Once or twice she thought about Mr van der Brons; she had never seen him again and she began to wonder if he had been a visitor, enjoying a joke at her expense, but even if that were the case she thought of him with pleasure and a little wistfully, for he had proved a friend in need without offering tiresome advice or being too sympathetic.

It would have surprised her to know that he was aware of her comings and goings.

He was in Brussels when she was moved to Men’s Medical, which meant that she saw Cor each and every day, not always to speak to, of course, but, all the same, even if he were at the other end of the ward, she was unhappily aware of him and it took all her self-control to attend him while he examined a patient. As for Cor, he found the situation amusing and took every opportunity to speak to her, putting a hand on her shoulder for good measure as he passed her, giving her speaking glances, exchanging knowing looks with the patients. She had to put up with it, for she had no reason other than to get away from him with which to plead to the directrice to have her moved to another ward. The Hoofdzuster had given her a good report after her first week and she enjoyed her work there. It seemed as though she would have to bear with his unwelcome attentions. For they were unwelcome, despite the fact that she still thought of him with longing, for every time he came on to the ward—and that was often enough—the sight of him set her heart beating and brought the pretty colour into her cheeks. Just the same she began to look plain and pale; there were shadows under her eyes and her slim person became thin.

This was something which Mr van der Brons noticed at once when he came on to the ward to give his opinion on a patient needing plastic surgery. He was accompanied by his registrar, a posse of housemen and the medical consultant of the ward, and met at the door by the Hoofdzuster with suitable pomp. Charity, busy getting old Mijnheer Prins back into his bed, looked up as the party proceeded down the ward, her firm little chin dropping with utter surprise, remembering just in time to uphold the tottering Mijnheer Prins before his old legs gave out, while a nice warm feeling crept around her insides. Rather like seeing a comfy chair by a bright fire on a cold day, she thought confusedly, or finding the right path when you thought you were lost.

Mr van der Brons came unhurriedly down the ward, his head bent to catch whatever it was his colleague was saying, but he glanced up and smiled very faintly at her as the entourage swept past. She didn’t smile back at him; it might not do. She beamed at her patient instead as she heaved him carefully between the sheets.

Mr van der Brons, back in his consulting-room on the ground floor of the hospital, made no effort to do any work but sat deep in thought until it was time for him to go to his own operating theatre and deal with a particularly nasty case of burns needing skin grafts. Scrubbing presently with his registrar at the next basin, he remarked casually, ‘I saw that man on Medical this morning; we had better fit him in next week. He’s well enough, I think. I see the English nurse is working there…’

‘Yes—van Kamp was talking about that the other day, so one of the housemen told me. Everyone knows how shabbily he has behaved and it is a shame; she’s a nice girl too and has never uttered a word against him. More than he deserves. He should keep to his own sort. I’m told he needles her when he’s on the ward.’