When May Follows

She looked up into his face and saw his eyes twinkling. ‘I’m very happy to remain here. I enjoyed our little talk about the weather—to be expected, of course—an English topic and so safe.’

Katrina felt her face pinken and was annoyed; he was laughing at her again and because he was a guest she couldn’t tell him what she thought of him. She looked down her beautiful straight nose and said coldly: ‘I hope you enjoy the rest of your visit to England, Professor,’ and left him, feeling surprise at her feeling of regret that she would never see the tiresome man again. Just so that I could take him down a peg, she told herself as she joined a group of young people all talking at once. Their conversation seemed a little brash after the Professor’s measured observations, but then of course he was much older; at least thirty-six or seven; she would find out from Uncle Ben.

It was later, when all the guests had gone and they were sitting round the fire drinking tea and eating the left-overs from the party for their supper, that Ruth observed: ‘That was quite someone—the man Uncle Ben brought with him. If I weren’t engaged to Edward I could go for him—he’s a bit old, though.’

Katrina, to her surprise, found herself protesting. ‘Not all that old, love. I daresay he’s on the wrong side of thirty-five…’

‘He’s thirty-eight,’ said her mother, ‘I asked Ben. What were you talking about, Kate?’

‘The weather.’ Three pairs of blue eyes looked at her in surprise, and she frowned. ‘Well,’ she muttered, ‘I’m so large—men don’t chat up big women…’

‘But you looked quite small beside him,’ comforted her mother, ‘and it must have been very nice for him not to have to bend double in order to talk to someone.’ She looked puzzled. ‘But the weather, darling?’

‘I found him difficult to talk to.’ Katrina yawned. ‘Let’s do the washing up and then I’m for bed; I must be off early in the morning.’

‘When is your next holiday, dear?’ Her mother piled cups and saucers and smiled across at her.

‘Well, I can’t be quite certain; Uncle Ben’s got a backlog as long as my arm and as fast as there are a couple of beds empty they’re filled by emergencies. I expect I’ll wait until he’s worked off most of his cases and decides to take a holiday himself.’

Katrina got to her feet and carried the tray down the stone-flagged passage to the kitchen where Amy, who had been with the family since she could remember, sat dozing by the Aga. She woke up as Katrina went in and said crossly: ‘Now, Miss Kate, there’s no call for you to be doing that.’ She got out of her chair, a small round person with a sharp nose and small boot-button eyes.

Katrina put the tray down and gave Amy a hug. ‘Go on with you!’ she declared robustly. ‘I’ve been standing around all the evening; a bit of washing up is just the exercise I need. Go to bed, Amy dear, do, and for heaven’s sake call me in good time in the morning.’

Amy made only a token remonstrance. ‘And you’ll not go before you’ve had one of my breakfasts,’ she declared. She sniffed. ‘I daresay they starve you at that hospital.’

Katrina peered down at her splendidly proportioned person. ‘Not so’s it shows,’ she observed.

She left soon after eight o’clock, driving herself in her rather battered Mini. The rain had ceased and it was a chilly morning with a pale sky holding a promise of spring. The house, standing back from the narrow street, looked delightful in the clear light, its grey stone walls softened by the ivy climbing them, its garden showing colour here and there where the daffodils were beginning to open; Katrina was reluctant to leave it and still more reluctant to leave her mother and sisters; they had always got on well, doubly so now that her father was dead. She waved to the various heads hanging from windows and turned into the street. There was no one much about; she passed the boys’ school and turned into the main street through the town and presently joined the A30. London wasn’t all that distance away and she had all the morning. She slowed through Shaftesbury and took the Salisbury road; she had done the trip so often that she knew just where she could push the little car to its limit and where it was better to slow down. She had time in hand by the time she reached Salisbury, and once through it, she stopped at Winterslow and had coffee, and not long after that she was on the M3, on the last leg of her journey.

Benedict’s was an old hospital in name but very modern in appearance. The original building, empty now and awaiting demolition, lay on the north side of the river, strangled by narrow streets of ugly little houses, but now it was housed in a magnificent building, very impressive to look at, and fitted out with everything modern science could conceive of. It was a pity that there wasn’t enough money left to staff it fully, especially as the nurses complained that it took them all their time to get from one part of the building to the other, for its corridors were endless and staff weren’t supposed to use the lifts.

Katrina, in charge of the men’s surgical ward on the fourth floor, glanced up as she swept the Mini into the forecourt and housed it in the roomy garage to one side. It would be take-in week in the morning, she remembered: The ward had been full when she had left two days ago for her days off. Just for a moment she thought longingly of her home in the placid little Dorset town, which only bustled into life once a week on market day, but she had chosen to be a nurse and to train at a London teaching hospital, and she loved her work enough to stay in the city even though she disliked its rush and hurry.

She got her bag from the boot and crossed to the side entrance, to climb to the second floor and cross by the covered bridge to the nurses’ home. She had a bed-sitting room there in the airy corridor set aside for the ward Sisters with its own door to shut them away from the student nurses, and a tiny kitchen as well as a generous supply of bathrooms, and above all, it held a nice sense of privacy. Katrina unlocked her door and went in. She had time enough to change, time to go to lunch if she wished, but she wasn’t hungry; she set about the business of turning herself from a well-dressed young woman to a uniformed ward Sister, and while she did it, thought about the man Uncle Ben had brought with him to last night’s party. She hadn’t meant to think about him, and it annoyed her that somehow he had managed to pop into her head and wouldn’t be dismissed. She forgot him presently, though, going back on duty a little early so that she could have a cup of tea before plunging into the rest of the day’s work.

The ward was still full; true, two patients had gone home, but three had been admitted, which meant that there was already one bed in the middle of the ward and with take-in imminent, it would certainly be joined by several more.

Her senior staff nurse, Julie Friend, was on duty and Katrina breathed a sigh of relief; her second staff nurse, Moira Adams, was a tiresome creature, a self-important know-all, who bullied the nurses whenever she had the chance and irritated the patients, Katrina found her much more trying than all the patients put together and had told her so on various occasions, she had told the Senior Nursing Officer too, and that lady, although sympathetic, had pointed out that Adams would be leaving in a couple of months’ time to take up a post in a surgical ward and she needed all the experience she could get. Katrina had thrust out her lower lip at that and wanted to know why the girl couldn’t be transferred to the female block, only to be told that Adams would ride roughshod over Sister Jenkins. Which was true enough; Jilly Jenkins was a small sweet person and a splendid nurse, but she could be bullied…

Julie Friend was a different kettle of fish entirely. Katrina gave her a wide smile as she came in with the tea tray and put it on the desk, and Julie returned it. She was a pretty girl, good at her job and popular, and saving hard to get married. Katrina, in her rare fits of depression, envied her wholeheartedly; Julie’s Bill was a nice young man, a chemist in the hospital pharmacy and neither he nor Julie had any doubts about their future together, whereas Katrina had to admit to herself that she had any number of doubts about her own. She had had the opportunity enough to marry; she was a striking-looking girl and besides that, she had a little money of her own, a wide circle of the right kind of friends, and a comfortable home. She was quite a catch; it was a pity that those who had wanted to catch her were all small men. She hadn’t had deep feelings about any of them, but she wondered from time to time if one of them had looked down at her instead of up, if she would have accepted him.

She poured their tea and listened to Julie’s careful report, and after that, as Julie tactfully put it, there were one or two things…

They took half an hour to sort out: the laundry cutting up rough about extra sheets; the pharmacy being nasty about a prescription they couldn’t read, the CSU calling down doom upon her head because a pair of forceps were missing from one of the dressing packs, and one of the part-time nurses unable to come because of measles at home. Katrina dealt with them all in a calm manner and turned her attention to Julie’s report again. Old Mr Crewe, who had been admitted as an emergency hernia four days ago and not quite himself after the operation, had been making both day and night hideous with his noisy demands for beer. Julie had reported that she had allowed him one with his lunch and been told, for her pains, that he had three or four pints at midday and the same again in the evening. Katrina chuckled and then frowned; she would have to think of something. She twitched her cap straight and got up to do a round.

It was one of the quietest times of the day; dinners were over and visitors wouldn’t be coming just yet, the men were dozing or reading their papers or carrying on desultory conversations. Katrina went from bed to bed, stopping to chat with their occupants, filling in a pools coupon for a young man who had his right arm heavily bandaged, listening with patience and every appearance of interest while someone read her a long account of startling goings-on as reported in one of the more sensational newspapers; some of the patients were sleeping and two were still not quite round from anaesthetics. She checked their conditions carefully, gave soft-voiced instructions to one of the student nurses, and went on her way unhurriedly. She never appeared to hurry, and yet, as one nurse had observed to another, she was always there when she was needed.

Her round almost over, she tackled Mr Crewe, eyeing her belligerently from his bed. ‘And what’s all this about beer?’ she asked composedly.

She let the old man have his say and then said reasonably: ‘Well, you know if you have eight or nine pints of beer each day, we simply can’t afford to keep you here. Have you anyone at home to look after you?’

‘Me wife.’

‘Anyone else?’

‘I’ve got a daughter lives close by. Sensible she is, not like the old girl.’

Katrina thought for a bit. ‘Look, let’s make a bargain; you can have a pint at dinner time and another with your supper and I’ll see if we can get you home a couple of days earlier. Mind you, you’ll have to behave yourself.’

His promise was of the piecrust variety, she knew that, but at least it meant temporary peace.

A peace they needed during the next few days; it seemed as though everyone in the vicinity of the hospital was bent on falling off ladders, tripping over pavements or being nudged by buses. Usually there were broken bones involved, but for some reason this week it was cuts and bruises and concussion, so that none of the victims went to the orthopaedic block but arrived with monotonous regularity in the surgical ward.

It was on the last day on take-in, with the cheering prospect of Mr Crewe going home very shortly and a hard week’s work behind them all, when things began to go wrong. Julie went off sick for a start, which meant that Katrina wouldn’t be able to have her days off and Moira Adams, taking advantage of Julie’s absence and Katrina’s preoccupation with her patients, began chivvying the junior nurses. Katrina, coming upon a tearful girl behind the sluice door, had to take Moira into her office and rake her down, pointing out as she did so that she was having to waste time which could have been spent to much greater advantage on the patients. Moira pouted and argued until Katrina said sharply, ‘That’s enough, Staff, you should know better, and you’ll never get anyone to work for you if you bully them.’ She glanced at her watch and saw with relief that it was after five o’clock and Moira was due off duty—better still, she had days off as well. Katrina felt relief flood through her, but none of it showed; she said with quiet authority: ‘Go off duty, Staff.’

It was lucky that she had two second-year student nurses on duty, both good hard-working girls, as well as the tearful little creature who was still apparently in the sluice. Katrina swept through the ward, her eyes everywhere; nothing seemed amiss. She reached the sluice and found Nurse James, washing a red, puffy face under the cold water tap. ‘The thing is,’ began Katrina without preamble, ‘you have to learn not to mind, Nurse James. There’ll always be someone you can’t see eye to eye with, someone who’ll try and upset you. Well, don’t let them—you’re a very junior nurse at present, but if you work hard you’ll be a good one one day and these upsets will have been worth while. Now come into the ward with me; we’re going to do the medicine round together.’

The evening went swiftly after that, there was so much to do: cases from the morning’s list needing to be settled; dressed in their own pyjamas again, given drinks, gently washed and when they could be, sat up. The four of them had to work hard but by first supper, Katrina was able to send the two senior girls to their meal; there was only one case which bothered her and she had already sent a message to the registrar to come and see the man the moment that he was free. The man had been admitted that morning after an accident in which he had had an arm crushed so badly that it had been amputated. He had come round nicely from the an-aesthetic and the surgeon had seen him and pronounced himself satisfied, and although Katrina could see nothing wrong she thought that the man looked far more poorly than he should. It was no joke, losing an arm, but he was a powerfully built young man and healthy. They had settled him nicely against his pillows and he had had a cup of tea and the drip was running well. All the same she was uneasy. Leaving Nurse James to trot round the ward, making sure that the men were comfortable, she went along to write the report in her office, only to go back again to the man’s bedside on the pretext of checking his chart. He looked worse, so much so that she drew the curtains around the bed and bent over him with a cheerful: ‘Sorry to disturb you, I just want to make sure that your dressing’s nice and firm, still.’

The dressing was all right, but there was an ominous red stain seeping through the bandage. There was a tray on the locker by the bed with everything needed for just such a happening. Katrina put on a pad and bandage, binding it firmly and pretended to adjust the drip while she watched. Something was very wrong; already the blood was oozing through the package she had only just put on.

‘How do you feel?’ she asked the man. ‘There’s a little bleeding and you may feel a bit faint, but it’s nothing to worry about.’ She smiled reassuringly at him and called softly: ‘Nurse James!’

She was busy re-packing yet again when she heard the girl behind her. ‘Go to the office, please, Nurse,’ she said in her usual unhurried manner, ‘and tell the porter to get Mr Reynolds at once. He must come here immediately. Tell them it’s urgent. If he’s not available then any house surgeon will do. Be quick and come back as fast as you can.’ She hadn’t turned round, she heard Nurse James say: ‘Yes, Sister,’ and added: ‘Is the ward OK?’

‘Quite OK,’ said Uncle Ben from behind her. ‘In trouble, Sister?’

She was applying pressure now and didn’t look up. Dear Uncle Ben, arriving just when she needed him most. ‘An amputation this morning; he recovered well, but his blood pressure has been dropping very slowly. Mr Reynolds came to see him this afternoon and found everything satisfactory. This has just started—five—six minutes ago.’

Uncle Ben gave a little cough. ‘Well, we’d better have a quick look—got some forceps handy?’

She turned back the towel covering the tray and was on the point of taking up the scissors when a large hand took them from her.

‘That’s right, Raf—let’s get this off and see the damage. Sister, send your nurse to theatre and tell them I want it ready in five minutes. I shall want four litres of blood too—get on to the Path Lab, will you?’

Nurse James had come back with the news that there was a major accident just in and there was no one available right away. ‘Never mind, Nurse—Sir Benjamin is here, so we’re all right. Now go to theatre, will you…’ She passed on Uncle Ben’s wishes and turned back to the patient. He was semi-conscious by now and the bandages and dressing were off. ‘Dear, dear,’ observed Uncle Ben in his mildest voice. ‘Apply pressure, Sister, will you? Raf, can you get at it with the forceps while I swab?’

Professor van Tellerinck, in waistcoat and shirt sleeves, somehow contrived to look elegant despite the messy job he was doing. He was very efficient too; Katrina’s head was almost fully occupied with what she was doing, but a tiny corner of it registered that fact, and another one too, that she was pleased to see him again, which seemed strange since she hadn’t liked him over-much. Probably it was just relief at his timely help. He hadn’t spoken to her, indeed, she wasn’t sure that he had even looked at her; in the circumstances that was to be expected. He had found the slipped ligature and had put on a Spencer Wells and the two men were carefully checking that there was no further trouble.

Uncle Ben unbent slowly. ‘Something big in the Accident Room, did I hear Nurse say? In that case, Raf, be good enough to give me a hand, will you?’

The theatre trolley and the two student nurses arrived together. Katrina told one of them to go with the patient to theatre and with the help of the other nurse, started to clear up; it took some time to get everything clean and ready for the man’s return and it was time for the nurses to go off duty when they had done. Katrina sent them away and greeted the night nurses with the suggestion that they should get started with their evening routine while she got down to the report. She had written it, read it to the night staff nurse and was back in her office when the patient came back, and because the two nurses were changing a dressing and there was no one else available, she saw him safely back into his bed, still groggy from the anaesthetic. She was checking the drip when Uncle Ben arrived and wanted to know why she was still there and when she explained, he gave a snort of impatience and walked off to the Office to telephone.

Katrina hadn’t realised that the Professor was there too, standing quietly watching her. His silence was a little unnerving, and, as she knew that despite the fact that she had cleaned herself up as best she could she looked a mess, her pretty features assumed a haughtiness which sat ill upon them.

‘I wouldn’t have believed it,’ observed the Professor suddenly. ‘When we met I assumed you to be a young lady of leisure with nothing more on her mind than the latest fashions and the current boy-friend.’

She gave him a cross look and said peevishly: ‘Indeed? Just as I was amazed to find that you were a surgeon.’