A Girl in a Million

‘She was—she’s expecting a baby in a week’s time. She came over from Holland. She’s beautiful—you know—fair hair and blue eyes and the most gorgeous clothes.’

Caroline didn’t want to hear about her—of course she would be beautiful, Mr van Houben wouldn’t have married a girl less than perfection. ‘Is Marc the only one? Other than the baby?’

She lifted out a small sleepy toddler while Staff put in a clean sheet.

‘Yes. Mr Spence seems to think that Marc will live but the thing is if he’s going to come out of this coma. He may have to operate again.’

‘Oh, the poor little boy.’ She kissed the top of the baby’s head; he had a cleft palate and a hare lip but Mr Spence would see to those in a day or two. She put him gently back into his cot and tucked him in.

Staff said, ‘You like kids, don’t you?’

Caroline was at the next cot, changing a nappy. ‘Yes.’

Staff was feeling chatty. ‘Sister says you’re a natural—I dare say you’ll end up with a ward full of children and make it your life’s work.’

‘Yes,’ said Caroline again. She did like children, but she would prefer to have her own; vague thoughts of a charming house in the country with dogs and cats and a donkey and, of course, children filled her mind. She would need a husband, of course. Mr van Houben’s rather frosty features swam before her eyes and she said, ‘Oh, dear, that won’t do at all,’ so that Staff looked at her and observed kindly,

‘Well, there’s always the chance that you’ll marry.’

She was to special little Marc each morning for the foreseeable future. Sister rambled on rather about his subconscious getting used to the same person by his bedside, so that the three of them shared the twenty-four hours between them. It was towards the end of her eight-hour stint that Mr van Houben came again, and this time with Marc’s mother.

Staff hadn’t exaggerated. Marc’s mother was lovely despite the fact that she was desperately worried and pale with anxiety. She stood by the little bed, staring down at the small face, and Mr van Houben put an arm round her shoulders.

Mr Spence came in then and the two men conferred quietly and Caroline said, ‘Sit down for a minute and hold his hand…’

His mother lifted unhappy blue eyes to hers. ‘He does not know?’

‘Well, we don’t know, do we?! I hold it all the time unless I’m doing things for him.’

His mother smiled then. ‘You’re very nice,’ she said, and they sat silently until the men had finished their talk, checked the charts and the three of them had gone away. Caroline sat down again and picked up the limp little paw and held it firmly. It was a way of communication—that was, if communication was possible.

Several days went by and each morning Mr van Houben and Marc’s mother came to see him until one morning Mr van Houben arrived early by himself. His, ‘Good morning, Nurse,’ was curt and he looked as if he had been up all night. If she had known him better she would have told him to go home to bed.

‘Well, Marc has a little sister.’ He stared down at the inert little figure in the bed and Caroline said, ‘Oh, you must be delighted. Congratulations, sir.’

He turned his head to look at her. He looked as though he was going to speak but he only smiled slightly, made sure that Marc’s condition was unchanged and went away. He came back with Mr Spence just as she had handed over to her relief, but since there was no reason for her to remain she went away to eat a late lunch in the empty canteen. The boiled cod and white sauce, boiled potatoes and carrots, edible in company and when freshly cooked, had rather lost their appeal. She ate the apple crumble which followed, coaxed a pot of tea from the impatient girl behind the counter and then went to her room and changed into outdoor things—she was off duty until five o’clock and a brisk walk would do her good. She took a bus to Victoria Park and marched along its paths, in no mood to admire the first of the spring flowers braving the chilly day. She had no idea why she was feeling so edgy; perhaps she was hungry or just a little homesick for Aunt Meg’s cosy little house—or was she just anxious about Marc, who was making no progress at all. Walking back presently to catch her bus back to the hospital, she admitted to herself that it wasn’t any of these things—it was Mr van Houben’s smile when she had congratulated him. It had been faintly mocking, slightly amused, as though she had made a bad joke. Sitting squashed between two stout women with bulging shopping bags, Caroline told herself to stop thinking about him, that there was no point in doing so, and when presently, as she was crossing the forecourt to the hospital entrance, he went past her, on his way to the consultant’s car park, she glared at him so ferociously that he paused and turned to look at her small person; even from the back she looked cross.

When she went back on duty it was to be told that it was intended to operate on Marc again. ‘Seven o’clock, Nurse,’ said Sister Crump. ‘You’ll probably have to stay on duty; Mr Spence wants two of you specialling for the first twelve hours. You’ll stay until a second nurse can come on around midnight. That’ll be Staff or myself.’

She nodded, her cap slightly askew. ‘You and Nurse Foster get Marc ready for Theatre—she’s off duty at six o’clock, and you’ll take him to Theatre. Understood?’ She smiled at Caroline. ‘Run along. We’ll have to fit in your supper somewhere, but at the moment I don’t know when.’

Marc would be wheeled to Theatre on his little bed; they did everything needed, checked the equipment, did their observations, and when Nurse Foster went off duty Caroline sat down to wait, holding Marc’s small hand in hers. She liked Theatre work, although she didn’t know much about it; she had done a short stint during her first year but it hadn’t been enough for her to learn much beyond the care of instruments, the filling of bowls and the conveying of nameless objects in kidney dishes to and from the path lab. She hoped now that she wouldn’t have to go into Theatre; she had grown attached to the silent small boy, away in some remote world of his own, and the thought of Mr Spence standing with scalpel at the ready made her feel a little sick.

Mr van Houben was in the anaesthetic room, somehow managing to look distinguished in his Theatre kit—a loose pale blue smock and trousers topped by a cap which would have done very nicely to have covered a steamed pudding. He was joined by Mr Spence and then by his registrar and all three men held a muttered conversation while Caroline stood patiently by the bed, admiring the back of Mr van Houben’s head, never mind the cap.

It was a disappointment to her that presently one of the staff nurses from Theatre took her place and she was dismissed with a laconic, ‘Thanks, Nurse.’

She went back to the ward and made up the bed and checked the equipment and was then sent to her supper. ‘They’ll send down one of the ITC nurses,’ Sister Crump told her, ‘but you’d better be there to fetch and carry.’

The day staff were going off duty when Caroline went back; the children were sleeping as Sister Crump did a round with the night nurses, and paused to speak to Caroline as she went. ‘I’ll be back presently,’ she told her.

It was after ten o’clock when Marc came back to his little room. Once he was again in his own bed, it was just a question of his being linked up with the apparatus around him and a careful check made as to his condition. Sister Crump had appeared silently to see things for herself and presently Mr Spence and Mr van Houben came in. The little room was full of people, and Caroline, feeling unnecessary, tucked herself away in a corner. Sister Crump caught her eye presently. ‘Go off duty, Nurse,’ she said briskly. ‘Come on at ten o’clock tomorrow.’

Caroline went, feeling anxious about little Marc and rather put out since her off duty had been changed—and she had agreed to go to the pictures on the following evening with Janey and several other of her friends.

She yawned her way into a bath and, despite her concern for the little boy, went to sleep at once.

Marc was still there when she went on duty in the morning; she had been half afraid that he wouldn’t have survived the night but there he lay, looking just as before, with Mr van Houben checking the tangle of tubes around the bed, calculating the drip and then taking a sample of blood from the small hand lying so still on the very white coverlet. He turned to look at Caroline as she went in. ‘Ask Sister Crump to come here, will you, Nurse? You’re taking over here?’

‘Yes, sir.’ She sped away to fetch Sister Crump and then con the charts with the nurse she was to relieve. He had looked at her, she thought sadly, as though he had never seen her before.

It was two days later, halfway through the morning, that Marc’s hand, lying in Caroline’s, curled gently over. For a moment she couldn’t believe it and then she wanted to shout for someone to come, press the panic bell, do a dance for joy… Her training took over; she sat quietly and waited and sure enough within a minute or so his hand turned again, a graceful languid movement as though it were returning to life. Which of course it was.

She did press the panic bell then. Sister Crump got there first.

‘He moved his hand in mine—twice,’ said Caroline.

‘The good Lord be thanked,’ said Sister Crump. The two other nurses had arrived. ‘One of you ring Mr Spence or his registrar—one or other is to come at once. The other nurse to go back to the ward.’

The nurses went and Caroline said softly, ‘Look, Sister.’

The small hand was moving again, curling round her thumb.

Mr Spence had just finished his list in Theatre and he still wore his Theatre kit as he came soft-footed to stand by the bed, followed by his registrar.

‘Give your report, Nurse,’ said Sister Crump.

Which Caroline did, trying to keep the quiver of excitement out of her voice. Put into a few sparse words it didn’t sound much, but as she spoke Marc lifted his arm very slightly as though he wanted to make himself more comfortable. ‘Eureka,’ said Mr Spence softly. ‘Someone get hold of Mr van Houben.’

He wasn’t in the hospital, although he had left a phone number where he could be reached. It was two or three hours later by the time he entered the room, looking calm and unflustered, giving no indication that he had been driving hell-for-leather down the M1 from Birmingham where he had gone to give his opinion concerning the anaesthetising of a patient with a collapsed lung and a tracheotomy into the bargain.

It was at that moment that Marc opened his eyes, blinked and closed them again.

‘Too soon to carry out any tests,’ said Mr Spence. ‘Another three or four hours—do you agree?’ When Mr van Houben nodded, he added, ‘We’ll be back around four o’clock, Sister.’ His eye lighted on Caroline, sitting like a small statue, not moving. ‘You are to stay with Marc, Nurse.’

Which made sense; she had seen the very first movements, and she was in a better position to gauge his progress or deterioration than anyone else coming fresh to the scene. All the same, she hoped that someone would bring her a cup of coffee before Mr Spence returned.

They did better than that. A tray of tea and sandwiches was brought and arranged where she could get at it without disturbing the child, and, besides, Sister Crump was in and out every hour or so. Marc hadn’t moved again; Caroline had charted his movements carefully, noting with delight that his temperature had come down a little. Certainly his pulse was steady.

She was stiff and cramped by the time the men came back. Mr Spence said, ‘Good—take over, Sister, will you?’ And watched while Caroline withdrew her hand, only to have it clutched again.

‘You’d better stay; we don’t want him disturbed in any way.’

A silly remark, thought Caroline, watching the gentle poking and prodding, the tickling of the small feet with a pin, the meticulous examination for pupil reaction, for Marc was disturbed, making small fretful movements and wriggling at the touch of a pin. But of course that was what they had hoped for: all the signs of a return to consciousness. The three men and Sister Crump bent over the bed and Caroline sat on a hard chair out of their way. She was happy about little Marc; it was the nicest thing which had happened to her for a long time. Mr van Houben must be over the moon, she reflected, although it was too early to tell if there would be lasting damage to little Marc; he had a long way to go still… Feeling selfish and uncaring, she longed for a cup of tea. At such dramatic moments cups of tea and feeling tired were not to be considered.

Little Marc had fallen asleep again—natural sleep now, not a coma—and the men were still discussing further treatment. It was Sister Crump, her eyes lighting upon Caroline’s small person in a corner, who exclaimed, ‘Go off duty, Nurse, I’m sorry you’re late. You’ve missed your tea—go to the canteen and see if they’ll boil you an egg or let you have your supper early. You missed your lunch?’

Caroline nodded and stood up. The men were writing now, absorbed in their problems. She whispered, ‘Good evening, Sister,’ and slipped out of the room and down the ward and out on to the landing beyond before anyone had a chance to say anything to her. Presumably the nurse to relieve her was already waiting; Sister Crump would be there to brief her. She made her way down to the canteen and found no one there, something she had half expected, for tea had been finished hours ago and first supper wasn’t until seven o’clock. All the same she went up to the counter in case there was someone beyond it in the serving-room.