Uncertain Summer

‘That’s not going to stop the police asking awkward questions—it was his fault, driving an E-type Jag up a one-way street.’

Serena refilled their cups. ‘No? Did he really? Lucky it wasn’t a lot worse for him.’

‘And that the bus he collided with was a bus and not some defenceless Mini.’

Serena got up. ‘Look,’ she said reasonably, ‘you drive a Mini, and anything less defenceless I’ve yet to meet—it’s nothing but a battering ram once you’re in the driver’s seat.’ She smiled. ‘I must get back, Staff White’s on in ten minutes and I want to be cleared up before she gets here. There’s nothing worse than other people’s leftovers when you come on duty.’

She nodded airily and hurried back to make sure that the department was clear once more. She had had a busy day, but she didn’t look in the least tired, only untidy, but she was such a pretty girl that a shining nose and a few stray curling ends did nothing to detract from her appearance. She was a slim small girl and this, combined with her outstanding good looks, made it hard for people who didn’t know what work she did to believe that she was a nurse. She rolled up her sleeves now as she went, looked at the clock, said: ‘Off you go,’ to the student nurse who was due off duty, and took the laundry bag from her as she spoke, so that the other nurse could finish filling it with the used linen. They were still hard at it when Staff Nurse White reported for duty.

Serena went off herself ten minutes later, and quite unmindful of her untidy pile of hair and shining nose, went straight to the surgical floor. It was on the other side of the hospital, three stories up, and as she had to cross the main entrance hall to reach it, she took the opportunity of posting some letters in the box by the big glass doors. This done, she paused to look outside; the day was still fine and the busy city street was thronged with traffic and people hurrying home from work. As she watched, a dilapidated Mini drew up, was wedged expertly into the space between two other cars and its driver got out and mounted the few shallow steps before the door without haste. He paused within a foot of her, and she was conscious of his eyes resting upon her for the briefest of moments before he walked, still without haste, across to the porter’s lodge. She was left with the impression of size and height and unhurried calm, but by the time she turned round to take another discreet look, there was no sign of him.

She was half-way up the stone staircase to the first floor when she met Miss Stokes coming down. Miss Stokes, who by virtue of the Salmon Scheme had turned from Office Sister Stokes to a Number Seven in the hierarchy of the nursing profession, smiled and stopped. She had been at Queen’s for a very long time, long before Serena had arrived there to do her training, six years earlier. She was a pleasant, good-natured body, in whom young nurses willingly confided and with whom the older, more experienced ones conferred.

‘Busy day, Sister Potts?’ she wanted to know, and sounded as though she were really interested.

‘Very, Miss Stokes, and if you can spare a second, when is it convenient to have a word with you?’

‘Now,’ said Miss Stokes, who was an opportunist by nature.

‘Nurse Harris—’ began Serena, and her superior nodded understandingly. ‘Could she be moved, do you think? She’s quite unsuited to Cas work, she—she isn’t quite quick enough.’

‘I know—I don’t know where to put that girl. She’s theoretically brilliant and she hasn’t even mastered the art of making a patient comfortable. I had hoped that in the Accident Room she would be able to apply her knowledge.’

‘She does,’ said Serena, ‘but the patients can’t always wait while she does.’

Miss Stokes allowed herself a smile. ‘I can well imagine she’s somewhat of a responsibility. I’ll move her, Sister, don’t worry.’

‘Thank you, Miss Stokes.’ The two ladies smiled a farewell to each other and went their separate ways; Miss Stokes to half an hour’s peace and quiet in her office, Serena to run up another flight of stairs and go through the swing doors at the top to the surgical floor. Half-way down the corridor she met one of the staff nurses and asked her if Sister was around, and was told that she was, with one of the consultants.

‘I’ve come to see the patient we sent up this morning, Staff— Doctor van Amstel. Is it OK if I go in?’

Staff thought so. ‘He’s in number twenty-one, Sister,’ she advised her, and darted off with the faintly harassed air of someone who had a lot to do and not enough time in which to do it.

Number twenty-one’s door was closed, Serena tapped and went in and came to an abrupt halt just inside the door because the doctor had a visitor; the large man who had got out of the dilapidated Mini—he had draped his length into the only easy chair in the room and unfolded it now at the sight of her, to stand silent and faintly smiling. It was the patient who spoke first.

‘I’ve been waiting for you,’ he remarked cheerfully, ‘to brighten up an otherwise very dull day.’

‘Dull?’ Serena was astonished; people who had car accidents and broke legs and what have you didn’t usually refer to such happenings as dull.

‘Oh, yes, only not any more—it’s turned out to be a red letter day, I shouldn’t have met you otherwise, should I?’

She went faintly pink because although she was used to admiration, it wasn’t usually quite so direct. She said repressively: ‘I hope you’re feeling more comfortable, Doctor,’ put a hand behind her and started to turn the door handle. ‘I’ll come back later—or tomorrow…’

‘Don’t go on my account,’ said the large man with lazy good humour, and his voice was the voice of the man who had spoken to her on the telephone. ‘When Laurens remembers I daresay he’ll introduce us, although I believe there to be no need—Miss Potts, is it not? I’m the patient’s cousin, Gijs van Amstel.’

He smiled gently and engulfed her hand in his large one.

‘How do you do?’ Serena wanted to know politely, and remembering, added: ‘Why did you say incredible?’

‘Ah, yes—so I did. You see, your voice isn’t the kind of voice I would associate with someone called Miss Potts.’

‘He’s right,’ said his cousin. ‘What is your name? And you had better tell me or I shall call you my beautiful gipsy and cause gossip.’

Serena choked; very much on her dignity, she said: ‘Potts is a good old English name,’ and before any one could take her up on it, went on rapidly: ‘I only came…I didn’t know you had a visitor…I must be going.’

‘All right, Gipsy Potts,’ the young man in the bed was laughing at her, but very nicely, ‘but I haven’t got a visitor, only Gijs, and he doesn’t count—he’s come over to bail me out and get a solicitor and see about the car.’

For someone who didn’t count it seemed quite a tall order; perhaps he was a poor relation or a junior partner. She took a lightning look at the man standing on the other side of the bed. He was good-looking, she admitted rather grudgingly, if one should fancy a high-bridged nose and a determined chin, and although his tweed suit was superbly cut and of good cloth, it was decidedly shabby. He looked—she wasn’t sure of the right word, for lazy wasn’t quite right, perhaps placid was the better word, although she had once or twice detected hidden amusement behind the placidity. She wasn’t sure if she liked him—besides, he had been beastly about his poor injured cousin.

The poor injured cousin continued: ‘I shan’t be in bed long, you know. As soon as I can get a good stout stick in my hand, the stitches out of my head and this damned headache gone, we’ll go out and live it up.’ He looked beseechingly at her. ‘You will, won’t you? And don’t look like that—do say you will.’

She found herself smiling at him because she wanted to see him again quite badly; besides, he had the kind of smile to charm any woman. She answered carefully. ‘Well, we’ll see how you go on, shall we, Doctor van Amstel?’ and looked away to encounter the surprisingly sharp stare of his cousin. His placid expression hadn’t altered at all; all the same, she had the strong impression that he had been waiting to hear what she would say.

‘Call me Laurens,’ commanded the younger Doctor van Amstel.

Serena looked down at his still pale face on the pillow. ‘I’m going now,’ she stated in her pleasant voice. ‘I hope you have a good night.’

She went round the bed and shook the hand the older man was offering.

‘I hope you don’t have too much trouble getting things sorted out,’ she remarked, and thanked him politely as he went to the door and opened it for her.

She met Joan outside in the corridor. Joan was tall and slim and blonde and they were firm friends. She grinned engagingly when she saw Serena and said with a chuckle: ‘Stealing a march on me, ducky? I know you saw him first…’

‘I only came up to see how he was—I didn’t know he’d got someone with him—some cousin or other…’

‘Yes, rather nice, I thought, though I’ve only said hullo so far. A bit sleepy, I thought.’

Serena nodded. ‘Yes, I thought so too. He’s come over to see to everything—I suppose he’s a partner or something. I saw him downstairs, he’s got the most awful old Mini,’ she paused, feeling a little sorry for anyone forced to drive around in anything so battered. ‘Perhaps he’s not very successful.’

‘Can’t say the same for the patient,’ said Joan. ‘I hear it’s an E-type Jag he was driving and it’s a write-off.’ She sighed. ‘I don’t suppose he’ll be here long, though. It’s a simple fracture, once he’s got his walking iron on and his head’s cleared, he’ll be up and away.’ She gave Serena a shrewd glance. ‘You like him, Serena?’

‘I don’t know—I don’t know him, do I? But he’s so alive, isn’t he?’ she appealed to her friend, who nodded understandingly; they had both dealt with so many patients who were just the reverse.

Serena went over to the Nurses’ Home and washed her smalls and then her hair, went to supper and so, presently, to bed, feeling that the evening had somehow been wasted. It would have been nice to have gone out with someone—someone like Doctor van Amstel, who would probably have been ridiculously and untruthfully flattering and made her feel like a million dollars. She went over to her mirror and stared into it; she was almost twenty-five, an old maid, she told herself, although she had probably had more proposals than any other girl in the hospital. But she had accepted none of them, for none of them had come from a man she could love. She sighed at the pretty face in the mirror and thought, a little forlornly, that perhaps she would never fall in love—really in love, especially as she wasn’t quite sure what sort of a man she wanted to fall in love with. She amended that though; he might possibly look a little like the owner of the E-type Jag.

She wasn’t on duty until one o’clock the next day; she got up early, made tea and toast in the little kitchen at the end of the corridor, and went out, to take a bus to Marks and Spencers in Oxford Street and browse around looking for a birthday present for her mother, who, even though she was fifty, liked pretty things. Serena settled on a pink quilted dressing gown and then loitered round the store until she barely had the time to get back to Queen’s. She went on duty with seconds to spare and found the department, for once, empty, but not for long; within half an hour there was a multiple crash in, as well as an old lady who had had a coronary in the street and a small boy who had fallen off a wall on to his head. It was almost five o’clock before she could stop for a quick cup of tea in the office and it was while she was gulping it down that Joan telephoned.

‘When are you off duty?’ she asked. ‘I’ve got this mad Dutchman wanting to know when you can come and see him.’

‘I’m up to my eyes,’ said Serena, crossly, ‘and likely to be for hours yet. I’m not off until nine o’clock anyway and I doubt if I get to supper at the rate we’re going.’

‘Come on up when you’re off, then—he needs cheering up. That cousin’s been in and I don’t know what he said, but Laurens is a bit down in the mouth.’

‘Laurens already!’ thought Serena as she said: ‘Surely he wouldn’t be so mean as to upset him after the accident…’

‘Well, Laurens did tell me that he’s done this sort of thing several times, and I suppose it’s a bit of a nuisance for his cousin having to leave the practice and sort things out.’

‘Probably,’ commented Serena, not much caring. ‘I’ll come if I can get away in time.’ She rang off, aware that whether she was on time or not, she would go.