I had to push my thoughts about Robert and that telephone call to the back of my mind as the Rugger Club coach drew up at the front door. A stream of students swept out. ‘Sorry we’re late, Sister Mary. We had a puncture.’
Jill muttered, ‘Taffy’ll have a coronary! We expected a few clerks, not half the final year. I’ll warn her.’
A few minutes later I saw Nick Dexter with Sister Mary. He had not yet seen me. I was glad about that. Seeing him had such an effect on me that I deliberately reminded myself of David. And then I thought, to hell with David and went on watching Nick Dexter.
He looked even better in a suit than he had in casual clothes. The way he held himself was a joy to me after working for years among Barny’s men with their beloved and affected medical stoop. He looked large even in the middle of all those rugger-playing students, but he managed to look elegant at the same time, which was something no student I had come across had ever achieved. His dark suit accentuated his fairness, but his colouring was neither anaemic nor the type that would turn ruddy. He was the only man I had seen who, as a man, equalled for looks Sabina Wardell’s looks as a woman. His face was sensitive and good-humoured. And he had sent me orchids. I touched them to make sure they were there.
Sister Mary was greeting all her guests warmly, but seemed to be greeting him with extra warmth. I thought of Harriet’s theory, and then I saw him coming towards me and stopped thinking.
We shook hands, and he thanked me for wearing his orchids. ‘I hoped you would, but I wasn’t sure.’ He looked me over, still hanging on to my hand. ‘May I say I like your dress? And that you look very lovely?’
‘Thank you ‒ and for the flowers.’ I moved my hand and took a mental grip. It was necessary. I asked if he had met Sister Mary previously.
‘Yes.’ He smiled. ‘We are old pals.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me so this morning?’
‘You didn’t give me much time, did you?’
Jill appeared at my elbow. ‘Doctor, you must forgive me, but I need Nurse Rowe. What? No drink? Rowe, my child, why haven’t you looked after the poor man better?’
Nick said, ‘The lady is a girl after my own heart, Anna.’
I introduced them. Jill pumped his hand briskly. ‘So you’re not a Barny’s man, Mr. Dexter? You must feel a fish out of water. How do you come to be here?’
He was amused. ‘That’s quite a story, Nurse. When you’ve three days to spare I’ll tell you it.’
Professor Ferguson came out of the sitting-room wearing a short houseman’s coat. ‘Ah, Dexter!’ He pushed through the crowd. ‘Good evening to you! I didn’t expect to see you here. Naturally I should have done! Where would the Obstetric Department of St. Barnabas’ Hospital be without you, eh? And how did you enjoy Rome? Have a good time? Come and have a drink and tell me all about it. I’m barman, so I’m the man you want to know tonight!’
‘Dexter! Of course!’ Jill said to herself as the Professor removed Nick. ‘Rowe, Taffy’s having a crisis. Go and cope, and if you see that wretch Jones, tell her to get back to her job. Hurry!’ She gave me a shove to be on my way.
I met Harriet in the kitchen corridor. She had come out of the scullery with a tray of clean glasses. ‘Your new boy friend shown up, Anna?’
‘Yes. He’s with the Prof. Harriet, I think your hunch was right.’
‘Aren’t I always right? Out of my way, girl! I must see this dreamboat.’
‘Hold on, there’s something else I want to tell you.’ I lowered my voice as the sound of the sink being rinsed came from the scullery. ‘Old Martin’s been ringing Robert Gordon here. What do you make of that?’
‘Nothing. I happen to know ‒’
I cut her short. ‘I also happen to know him, dear. You’d be surprised how much inside information one picks up about a man when one runs around with his best friend for a few years. And men say girls yak! God! If you’d seen and heard as much about Robert Gordon as I have, you wouldn’t put anything past him either!’ She shook her head violently. My voice and trigger-temper rose together. ‘All right! Be like that! Trust that smug, conceited, dead-crafty bastard! But I’ll bet you anything you like he really is Martin’s nephew, and this is one bet I’ll win!’ I swept round her and raced down the remaining corridor to the kitchen. ‘What’s the problem, Taffy?’
Mrs. Evans had an apron tied round her black satin middle, a resigned expression on her face, and one of the cold turkeys scheduled for tomorrow’s lunch on the table before her. She was sharpening a carving-knife. ‘There’s four pairs of hands I need, Nurse, and there’s my problem! Be a good girl and go find me a sensible man to help with my carving. No students, mind! I am not having my turkey dissected like a dogfish!’
‘Shall I carve? I can.’ She looked so horrified that I recovered my temper and laughed. ‘Don’t worry, Taffy dear. Leave it to me. I’ll get you no less than a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons if I can lay my hands on a Master of Surgery!’
‘I’m no M.Ch.,’ said Robert Gordon’s voice behind me, ‘But I’ve got a Fellowship. Any use?’
‘There’s enough work you’ve done already, Mr. Gordon, with all the washing up you’ve done for Nurse Jones,’ protested Taffy. ‘Working your fingers to the bone, you are, and you in your fine suit. Nurse Rowe will be on her way to find me another man.’
Nurse Rowe was in no condition to be on her way anywhere. Robert had been in the scullery, and must have overheard most if not all of what I had said. Not that his expression gave anything away, but then it never did. Like most quick-tempered people, I was always instantly overwhelmed with guilt after an outburst, but on this occasion my guilt was very short-lived. He had had it coming to him. ‘Before you do another good deed, Robert, you ought to ring a Mr. Martin in Wylden. He rang you.’
‘I know. He rang again. I’ve spoken to him.’ He took the carving set from Taffy. ‘How far do you want this to go, Mrs. Evans?’
‘As far as you can make it, Mr. Gordon.’ She raised her eyes to the ceiling. ‘It’s a mercy I’m used to catering for doctors and nurses. There’s starving they always are? Now Nurse Collins tells me we have forty extra students, and starving they will all be! Nurse Rowe, love, will you go and count heads for me that I may know the worst?’
‘Heads just for tonight? What about lunch tomorrow? Every other guest seems to want to stay the night.’
Taffy sighed. ‘Wait then while I look in my larder for the list Nurse Collins gave me, then you can tell me the numbers for the two meals.’ She handed me a dish and fork.
‘You can be arranging the pieces for Mr. Gordon while you wait.’
Robert said nothing when she disappeared into her vast larder. The atmosphere between us was so thick that I doubted even that the carving-knife could have got through it. I did not let it stifle me. I was determined to get the truth out of Robert, but had to be careful for Sister Mary’s sake. Taffy was a dear, but a great talker, and the larder door was open. Sister Mary would be very upset if she heard I had a row with Robert during her party. At lunch she had described him as such a dear boy. If I was right, and I did not doubt that ‘if’, Sister Mary would do all she could to make allowances for him. I was in no humour to make any.
I studied him covertly, thinking up a way to begin, and was annoyed to notice he looked unrecognisably spruce. It was the first time I’d seen him in such a good suit, and it did a great deal for him, but nothing could make him as attractive as Nick Dexter ‒ which thought made me feel much more cheerful. Robert’s face was too thin and had too much jaw. He did not look as physically tough as Nick, but his face was tougher and totally lacking in that good-natured charm.
I said abruptly, ‘I didn’t know you knew Mr. Martin.’
‘Why should you?’ He did not look up.
‘Are you related to him?’ He looked up then. ‘Didn’t you know he was selling his cottage to Sister Mary?’
He said, ‘You’ve got the wrong tense there, Anna. And your facts wrong.’
I put down my fork. ‘How do you mean?’
Taffy came back. ‘Nurse Rowe, love, be a good girl and ask the young man your questions later. Here is my list. Count how many for supper and how many staying on, and put the figures on these two sides. Careful now. There’s easy it would be to make a mistake with this crowd and count the same head twice.’
I had to go. ‘I’ll be careful, Taffy. I won’t make any mistakes.’
Robert looked at my orchids, then at my face. ‘Care for a wee bet?’
Had Taffy not been there, he would have had that turkey at his head. His glasses would not have stopped me any more than my being a woman would have stopped his chucking it straight back at me. I went off, fuming, and did not cool down until Nick Dexter joined in my head-counting.
The Professor wanted to know why I was making our guest do sums. ‘A useful assistant, eh, Nurse? Mathematics must number among your many talents, Dexter. As a matter of interest, how long did it take you to do all the sums necessary for all those complicated blueprints of my new block you showed me?’
‘The new Mary, Professor?’ I demanded, and turned on Nick. ‘Did you design it?’
‘It’s all those regular meals,’ he apologised. ‘I told you I had to get a proper job.’
‘But you are one of the architects working on our rebuilding?’
‘The new boy. Very junior partner.’
‘That’s as may be!’ boomed the Professor, who was in terrific form. ‘But your most senior partner told me my new Mary came originally out of your head, my lad! Have another beer!’
‘Later, thanks, sir.’ Nick took my elbow, and we moved on. I was very impressed, and did not attempt to hide it. He suggested I just call him a genius and have done. ‘At least you now know how I got my invitation.’
‘Yes.’ Sister Mary had said she was inviting our architects. ‘So you were coming?’
‘I was not. Until I met you. I forgot all about this party when I decided to come down to Wylden for the week-end yesterday. I’m staying at the pub. It’s a good pub. I discovered it when I first had to come down here to talk to Ferguson three years ago. That’s when I met your Miss Bush. She said I could use your grounds when I was in the village. What’s the joke?’
He laughed at Harriet’s theory. He had heard of Mr. Norris, but never met him.
‘Let’s get this job finished, Anna. I want to dance with you.’
The red night-lights down the centre of Ward Three were switched on, and as the long May twilight faded outside the crimson glow deepened. It was as mild a night as it had been a warm day. The air genuinely smelt of roses and lilac and new-cut grass, but even if it had not that was how it would have seemed to me as we danced dance after dance. Nick was not the only man to ask me to dance, but because he was making such an obvious play for me and was an outsider, I had many more offers than I should have had without him ‒ there being nothing like having one man openly admiring a girl to make all other men present sit up and take notice. Had Nick been a Barny’s man they might have taken notice, but would have left me strictly alone, as Barny’s men played the game to their own rules. Only a few knew Nick’s job ‒ it did not bring him into the fold. He did not look as if he objected to my being such a success story with the boys, but each time I danced with someone else he was waiting for me when the music stopped. I always went back to him.
I was dancing with him when the strap of my left sandal snapped, he said, ‘Let’s sit this one out while you fix it.’
It was now dark outside. He had already tried twice to get me outside, and twice I had refused. My nerve was coming back, but it was not yet wholly back. ‘I’ll get another pair first. Why don’t you’ ‒ I looked round ‒ ‘finish this dance with Jill Collins? Over there by the radiogram. I did introduce you.’
He did not look round. He looked hard at me. ‘In case you’re interested, my sweet, I have never yet kissed a girl who didn’t want me to kiss her. You don’t have to run out on me again.’ He was smiling. ‘Don’t look so scared. I don’t mind hanging around while you change your shoes, though, as you must know, I would much rather we took a little walk round the garden.’
‘Nick, I’m sorry. You must think me crazy.’
He shrugged amiably. ‘Maybe. Maybe I’m crazy too, to let you get away with this. Why worry? Just a couple of nuts, that’s us. Don’t be too long.’
I looked back when I was out of the nearest French window and saw him walking towards Jill. She smiled uncertainly, then something he said made her laugh. He was still dancing with her when I got down from my room, and as my feet were reminding me I had been on them all day, I went back to the terrace and sat on the low wall, wondering if I ought to get my head examined, what I had done to deserve my luck in meeting Nick Dexter, and whether it would last if I went on behaving like this.
It was queer to see dancers and not the outlines of beds and sleeping mothers in that ward; to hear the music and voices and not to have to worry about the noise disturbing the babies or the ill mothers on the isol floor. I glanced casually back at the house. My head stayed over my shoulder when I saw who had come out of the staff sitting-room. ‘Robert,’ I said accusingly, ‘I thought you had gone.’
He had been handing things round at supper, but had not appeared since in the dance ward, and I had been enjoying myself too much to remember his existence and that conversation Taffy had curtailed. I had not given another thought to Sister Mary’s future. That now made me annoyed with myself, and doubly annoyed with him for being the fundamental cause of my annoyance.
‘I had to go into Wylden. I’m just back.’ He sat on the wall a little away from me. ‘Someone getting you a drink?’
‘No. I’m resting my feet.’
‘Want a drink?’
‘No, thanks. As you’re here, there’s something I do want to know. About that cottage ‒’
‘Not that nonsense again!’
‘Is it nonsense?’ I sat sideways to face him. ‘Is Sister Mary going to buy that cottage from Martin? Yes or no?’ He was silent. ‘Robert, I asked you a question.’
‘Does the fact of asking automatically give a right to an answer?’ There was enough light from the house to illuminate his slight smile. ‘Life might be even more amusing than it is if that was so.’
‘Don’t be evasive, please.’ I spoke quietly. I did not want to lose my temper again, as he never lost his. Consequently, in our previous arguments he had invariably won the point, as I had equally invariably ended up too angry to talk sense. ‘You know what I’m getting at.’
‘I don’t know anything. I can guess that you seem to have some fixation about Sister Mary’s future plans, but why you should assume they concern me I don’t follow.’
‘You’re not involved in them?’ Again he was silent. ‘Then why did you say earlier I was using the wrong tense about that cottage? I know Sister Mary can’t have bought it yet. Has it been sold? And why have I got my facts wrong? Aren’t you Mr. Martin’s nephew?’
‘How do you work that one out? I’d be interested to know.’ He folded his arms and settled his legs in a more comfortable position. ‘The way your mind works always used to fascinate me, Anna. Are you still incapable of using your intelligence when not wearing a uniform? Do you still use your emotions as stepping-stones to all non-professional conclusions? Or have you reached this specific conclusion by a process that has actually involved a certain amount of thought?’
I knew he was trying to rouse me. It amused him. It always had. He had succeeded in the past. He was succeeding now. I also knew he was hedging. ‘Why won’t you answer my questions?’
‘Is there any reason why I should assuage your very feminine curiosity?’
That did it. ‘Don’t be so damn silly, man!’ I snapped. ‘I’m not being girlish! I don’t want a good gossip with you! I’m asking because what happens to Sister Mary matters to me ‒ though, knowing your utter indifference to other people’s feelings, I can’t expect you to underst
and that! And if you don’t want me to ask you more questions, why did you make those remarks in the kitchen?’
‘Why, indeed?’ he queried dryly. ‘I slipped up. Even Homer sometimes nods.’
‘But not you, Robert!’ I jeered. ‘David always said you never spoke without thinking! Incidentally, if you want to know how I guessed you were Martin’s nephew, it was from something he once said. Of course, I can understand why you don’t want to talk about it. Here we are surrounded by half Barny’s, and, though you’ve left, you are, unfortunately, an old Barny’s man and ‒’
‘I haven’t left Barny’s. I was away for two years. I’ve been back these last six weeks. And, having cleared that up, we may as well deal with another minor detail ‒’ and there he had to stop, as Sister Mary came out of the sitting-room.
‘Dear boy, there you are! I’ve been looking for you everywhere to thank you.’ She did not notice me until she took both his hands. ‘May I tell Nurse Rowe? I know how interested and delighted for me she will be. Dearie such excitement …’ and without waiting for his permission she explained how this morning Mr. Norris had warned her he had heard from his housekeeper the local rumour that Mr. Martin had had a better offer for his cottage. ‘I thought it was bound to come to me, but Mr. Norris said there was a legal loophole. And what do you think he did? Dearies, he sent this dear boy to act for him and outbid any offer Mr. Martin might have had. You remember Mr. Martin’s solicitor was away? At Mr. Norris’s particular request he returned this afternoon. Do you know what the position is now?’ She patted my hand. ‘Mr. Norris now owns that cottage and is selling it to me on Monday morning! I declare I am in quite a little daze what with all these complicated business arrangements, and so very grateful to this dear boy for his busy day on my behalf, and to his most kind and generous godfather. But I must not keep you young people talking any longer. Off you go and dance!’
‘Sister Mary,’ said Robert, ‘can’t I persuade you to dance with me first?’
A House for Sister Mary Page 4