One Night in London: a hospital in wartime (The Jason Trilogy Book 1)

by Lucilla Andrews

  ‘Yes, nurse.’

  ‘No. I don’t think you do. You don’t look as if you’re even hearing me. You look as if you’re just thinking I’m being awful ‒ beastly ‒ hard ‒’

  ‘No, I’m not,’ Nurse Carter replied with the terrible calm that was etched into her waxen face. ‘I’m not thinking at all. I don’t bloody dare think. I just meant, yes, sure, I understand and you’re right. They mustn’t know.’

  ‘Oh. Yes. Right. Only, please, Carter ‒’ Nurse Dean’s voice quivered pathetically, ‘please don’t say “bloody”. Bad language is dreadfully unprofessional and ‒ and, it’s not nice.’ Nurse Dean’s eyes were mesmerized by the closed duty-room door. ‘Now they’ve got their tea we must do the penicillins together before we clear the rest of the mess. You will remember what to say when they ask?’

  Nurse Carter didn’t look at the closed door. ‘It’s okay, nurse. I won’t forget.’

  Nurse Dean’s face was still the colour of her pristine apron when she emerged from Briggs’s screens to usher Mrs Browne to her husband’s bedside. ‘The Major’s sleeping again, but do sit with him. Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘Just had a good cuppa in Nightingale, thanks, nurse.’ Mrs Browne paused at the foot of the bed that was now raised on lower blocks and glanced at the half-empty bottle of blood hanging from the stand. ‘Still pumping it in?’

  ‘Yes, but that’s the last we hope he’ll need. Then he’ll go onto a glucose-saline drip. Looking quite a bit better, isn’t he?’

  Mrs Browne forced herself to study the masked face. ‘More like his old self. Having a really good kip. Has ‒ umm ‒ has he been kipping like this since I left?’

  ‘Almost continually. The rocket woke him for a minute or so but he was too drowsy to stay awake. He was awake a little longer when we washed him this morning but naturally he was rather weak and exhausted and beginning to feel his missing leg.’

  ‘Not ‒ umm ‒ up to a natter, one imagines?’

  ‘Oh no. Far too tired. The shock of any operation is very tiring, and I expect the Major’s job has kept him pretty busy lately. He probably needs to catch up on a lot of sleep.’

  ‘Busy time for the British Army, nurse.’

  ‘Yes, I expect so. Of course, one reason why he’s sleeping so well now is that we gave him another injection before his wash. We nearly always do that for post-op. patients before their first wash. That’s why Mr Gill next door is well away. I doubt if he or the Major will wake before mid-morning. But do sit with him.’

  Mrs Browne ignored the suggestion and for the first time since she had just come in, looked at Nurse Dean’s face. She was rather shocked. Poor gel looked spick and span enough to have just come on parade, but ready to drop. Lost all that nice healthy colour. ‘Heavy night, eh?’

  ‘Fairly.’

  Mrs Browne backed to look searchingly all round the ward. ‘Heavy enough for just three gels. What’s going on up that far end? Got chaps under those grey blankets?’

  ‘Yes.’ Nurse Dean glanced covertly at her watch. ‘Those are our eight rocket casualties. Shocked, not injured.’

  ‘Good show,’ murmured Mrs Browne absently, continuing her search. Both Jarvis’s and Briggs’s screens were open at the foot, but the only nurse she could see was the child haring round with washing bowls. ‘How’s the poor old chap with all the tubes?’

  ‘A little more comfortable this morning.’

  ‘Good show. Can’t ‒ umm ‒ see her, but one imagines Nurse Smith’s with him?’

  Nurse Dean reached for the Major’s wrist and kept her gaze on her watch. ‘I’m afraid she wasn’t too well and has had to be taken off-duty.’

  Mrs Browne stiffened. ‘Back tonight, DV?’

  Nurse Dean didn’t look up. ‘I’m afraid she won’t be well enough to work in London for the present.’

  Mrs Browne looked back at her husband in a new way and compressed her invisible lips. Not really surprising. Luck of the devil all his life and the too clever by half chaps never had the right stamina. She couldn’t have said anything to this nice, sensible gel. If she had, this one would’ve said so. This one was the type one understood. The right type. ‘Very sorry to hear it. Nice gel, but thought she looked a bit peaky. Just the two of you now? How about another pair of hands? Couldn’t one collect cups or wash-up or something? Only got to say.’

  Nurse Dean hesitated though she was accustomed to offers of help from DILs relatives and allowed to accept them for jobs that required no professional skill. But Mrs Browne suddenly seemed to her to be sagging with fatigue, since she did not recognize the cause as relief. ‘It’s very kind of you, but wouldn’t you rather sit down? You’ve had a worrying night.’

  ‘The Major doesn’t need me whilst he’s kipping. Far rather do a job than twiddle thumbs. Far!’

  Nurse Dean recognized the genuine appeal as she had heard it so often before. If I can’t do anything for him, nurse, other relatives had said, it’ll be something to feel I can give a bit of help round the ward. Won’t feel so alone with the worry ‒ if you know what I mean?

  She said, ‘In that case, Mrs Browne, we’d be most grateful. That wooden trolley beyond the middle sinks is waiting for the morning tea cups and saucers. Not many saucers this morning, I’m afraid, as so many shot out of the dresser cupboard. Cups came off best. Could you collect up and push the trolley into the kitchen?’

  ‘Say no more, m’dear!’ Mrs Browne removed her coat, deposited it with her handbag on her husband’s locker, touched one of his hands lightly, then pushed up the sleeves of her shapeless jersey. ‘Action stations, nurse! Action stations!’

  Nurse Carter paused in the sluice to scribble a note on the upturned hem of her apron, for her own benefit, ‘16-19 22/23 Firemen 20/21 empty 24/25 Cops C25 a Sgt.’ She always made private notes of the newcomers’ occupations when particularly tired, as she thought of the patients as people, was interested in their jobs, but sometimes found these difficult to recall exactly when several came in together on a busy night. And just as Nurse Dean, when emotionally numbed Nurse Carter was incapable of varying her habitual behaviour.

  The newcomers’ names had presented no problems since all had been carried into Casualty in the uniforms that made contacting their respective authorities and next-of-kins a matter of routine. ‘As I have just explained to all concerned, Nurse Dean,’ said Night Sister over the telephone at five thirty a.m., ‘your admissions will remain sedated until out of shock and then, if fit enough, be discharged home later today, or transferred to the country for a few days. I’ve suggested their families ring Sister Walter Walters in the morning before coming up. The more seriously injured men just in have gone to other wards. It was Mr MacDonald’s decision to send you the merely shocked, but I must say I entirely agreed. Of course, as you now have the only two empty male beds in the hospital and no emergencies up, if we have more male casualties tonight, they’ll go first to you. I sincerely hope for everyone’s sake that we have no more. Fortunately, nothing in the air since that rocket and Mr MacDonald has at last gone to bed. Poor Mr MacDonald. I am really distressed for him, nurse. I was most relieved when Professor Surgery put his foot down and said he would remain up and on-call until Mr Davis arrives in the early hospital van at eight. The Professor was just going home when the rocket landed and came straight back. Such a help for Mr MacDonald in Casualty. Poor man. Tch. Tch. Tch.’ Night Sister clicked her teeth and sighed. ‘However, one has to remember there’s a war on. All well in your ward now, nurse? Very well. I’ll see you on my morning round.’

  The eight men were still in their torn, matted uniforms and their bodies, faces, and hair were still filthy with dust, soot, and begrimed plaster. They would stay in that condition until they had recovered from the shock that for all eight was consequent on having been buried alive. They, and all the survivors admitted to Martha’s, had been on the periphery of the explosion. Survivors always were, reflected Nurse Carter with icy detachment when she returned to the ward. Yo
ur only hope with a rocket was to be on the periphery and you couldn’t always bet on that one, either.

  The immediate treatment of air-raid casualties in Martha’s had been wholly altered from that given earlier in the war. Formerly, as soon as possible after admission, casualties had been stripped, washed, dressed in clean nightgowns and operation stockings, tucked into clean hospital beds. And then long experience of air-raids had shown that any unessential handling of patients in acute clinical shock, no matter how skilled and gentle, could increase the degree of shock, and that where the individual injuries made it feasible the casualties made quicker, successful recoveries if left sedated, unwashed, in their own ruined clothes in their original Casualty blankets until the shock wore off.

  This alteration and advance in treatment, like so many medical advances made in wars, was born of necessity. It was after the earlier raids that research into why so many raid victims had made excellent recoveries even although the hard-pressed Casualty and ward staffs had had no time to give them more than basic first-aid treatment, produced the figures that had resulted in Martha’s abandoning the old methods as swiftly as it had once abandoned the glass in the hospital windows and doors.

  The smell of grime hanging in the stale ward air reminded the men awake of the ugly, unmistakable smell of human fear that had hung over Wally’s after the rocket and again later, when one by one the eight stretchers had been carried in by the shirt-sleeved students, as again the stretcher-trolleys had been in too great a demand to be spared beyond the lift. So many of those men had been carried in the previous night. Few, if any, remembered arriving in the ward, but they all remembered the fear that had lingered in their minds when they eventually surfaced, and the day nurses had washed the beads of black sweat from their faces. And they remembered how that fear had finally been dispelled by the indescribable, triumphant relief of the full realization that they had come out of it alive. They kept a careful watch on the closed grey faces under the grey blankets, and longed for the moment when they could exchange grins and thumbs-up signs, and pretended to ignore their shared, unspoken fear that maybe this new lot wouldn’t have the same luck. They tried to guess the new lot’s ages, as they knew the young and strong stood the best chance, but they couldn’t guess as all the faces looked old. And for another reason that they had shared in whispers when no nurse was in hearing, they kept a careful watch on the two night nurses and were pleased with the Major’s lady for lending a hand even if she was stomping round like she’d a bad smell under her nose. ‘Wouldn’t care for her as a S’arnt-Major,’ Bert Harper confided to George Mercer, ‘but you can see as she means kindly like.’

  George Mercer nodded in answer. Nurse Dean saw his expression as she sailed from Jarvis to Briggs and stopped. ‘Is that ache in your hand turning to pain, Mercer?’

  ‘I’d not say that, nurse. Just sore.’

  ‘Sure?’ She checked his pulse. The beat reassured her more than his disclaimer. ‘Nurse Carter’s just coming to wash you. You’ll feel fresher after a wash.’

  ‘Got a tick, nurse?’ Bert Harper clasped his stomach and sat forward. He jerked his bullet head at the balcony end. ‘Jerry fetch down another old folks’ home with that rocket?’ She shook her head and hesitated, though she knew they would shortly hear every detail and rumour from the newspaper-seller on his early morning round. She still hedged. ‘I’m not quite sure just where it landed, but I gather that Fire Station behind us was somewhere on the edge and has come down. But could’ve been much worse, as so many crews and engines were across the river helping with a big fire quite near St Benedict’s. I believe that’s nearly under control now.’

  ‘That’s nice,’ said Bert Harper drily. ‘How about them lads up there, nurse?’

  ‘Only shocked.’ She sounded as if shock equated with a cold in the head. ‘Six are firemen and two, policemen, but none should be in long. I expect you’ll find most of them driving down to the country with most of you today.’

  The other men were listening. They jerked up their thumbs and agreed the country was all right if you didn’t mind a bit of quiet and that was good news about the new lot, wasn’t it? But though some of their anxiety had been eased, their faces and voices remained strangely subdued for that normally cheerful washing-and-bed-making time of the morning that for Wally’s not only signified the start of the new day, but the survival of another wartime night. There was a sudden hush when they heard Briggs weakly voicing the question the nurses had dreaded and no other patient had yet asked. ‘Where’s my other nurse, Nurse Dean? … Nice little nurse … can’t remember her name … oh, yes, I can … easy, she said … Nurse Smith … Where’s my Nurse Smith, nurse?’ Nurse Dean’s voice, placid and clear, ‘I’m afraid she was rather poorly and had to go off-duty, Briggs, dear. Just fainted. Better soon. You feeling a little more comfortable after your nice sleep? Good. Now, I’m going to hold the spout of the feeding mug to your lips and I want you to take a sip, swish it round, then spit it out … that’s it. And another. There. Doesn’t that make your mouth taste much nicer? And, again …’

  With the exception of George Mercer, the listening men exchanged grim glances and reached for their cigarettes.

  George Mercer glanced at Nurse Carter who was washing his good arm and hand, and began telling her about the camp hospital, Nobby, the lads, the Eytie surgeon and the bush tomatoes; he didn’t mention ice, cotton wool, or anchovies.

  She dried him gently. ‘I’ve never been to Italy. I didn’t know they grew tomatoes on trees. No, please don’t try and roll over with that splint. Can you dig in your good heel and lift-up? Fine. I’ll just shove your towel under.’ She soaped his back flannel. ‘Was your camp miles from anywhere?’

  ‘Seemly, nurse. Can’t say as I minded seeing I spent most me time in the hospital hut. But I got about a bit the last few weeks right at the end. Had me Red Cross crutches then, I had, and a real nice pair at that. Gave me the chance for a fair look round. Nice bit of country they got round that camp. Good and green it was then. Good growing land, seemly. And they got these vines growing up the hills all around. Green, the vines were.’ His blue eyes narrowed reminiscently, almost affectionately. ‘Good to see that green, nurse. And there was this river winding gentle round the foot of the hills ‒ well, no more than a stream it wasn’t, really, but many’s the time it put me in mind of the old Stour when you looks down from the old Pilgrims’ Way on top the hill and sees Canterbury coming up out of the mist over below.’

  She looked at him and for a few seconds saw neither the bandaged man in the white bed, nor the still figure under the grey blanket covering the duty-room examination couch that haunted the forefront of her mind. She saw a tall, broad-shouldered, fair-haired Englishman in a worn battledress with one trouser leg hanging emptily, balanced on one foot and hunched over armpit crutches as he gazed through barbed wire at enemy country and saw his homeland. She blinked and had to avert her head. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know Canterbury. I suppose you’re Kentish.’

  ‘Not me, nurse! Man of Kent, I am. Born south the Medway. Kentish men is born north. And you know what we say down Kent, Nurse Carter?’ She shook her head.

  ‘The Men of Kent saved England ‒ and the Kentish men helped ’em. And any Saturday night you want to start up a fight down my way you just got to step into a pub and say that!’ He grinned with the pleasure of making her eyes smile. ‘Don’t you ask me what we saved England from, nurse. Couldn’t say I’m sure and never met no one as could. Can’t have been Jerry. My old dad he taught me this long afore the last war. Can’t have been old Boney seeing as he never got here neither same as Jerry.’

  ‘Still, nice to know you saved England. Comfortable?’

  ‘Nicely, ta. All done am I?’

  ‘Except for your bed. Nurse Dean and I’ll do that together.’

  Bert Harper waited until she had disappeared to the sluice with the used washing bowl, then leant carefully as far left as he could manage without toppling out of bed. ‘You
done rightly, mate,’ he whispered, softly for him. ‘Times it’s best to keep chatting like.’

  George Mercer gestured to show Nurse Dean was still with Briggs, and winked without humour. Bert Harper nodded understandingly and heaved himself back.

  ‘Going to have another little nap, Briggs, dear? Good.’

  Nurse Dean looked down at the drowsing, dying man, kindly, but clinically. It had suited him. He was so much more rested this morning he even looked a little stronger, and whilst this was almost certainly his final rally, it was nice to see him so peaceful. And the trained part of her mind registered every medical detail, and stored it away for the benefit of her future patients. She was relieved she would not have to see MacDonald for a few days since, had he been back tonight, her professional honesty would have forced her to admit she had been wrong. All her life she had found it difficult, and generally impossible, to make such an admission.

  It didn’t occur to her to wonder if she would ever see him again, or if either he, or she, would now want their relationship to continue. Such personal matters had to wait until she was off-duty. She had to combine specializing three patients with getting her ward ready for the day staff, with only a junior’s help, and in those circumstances she would never spare one moment from her work. She would not have spared one had she been told the world was coming to an end in an hour’s time. Her only reaction would have been, in that case we must get weaving as we’ve got to do two hours work in one.

  She patted Briggs’s hand to feel his skin temperature, moved quietly, gracefully away to the Major and then across to Jarvis.

  George Mercer had been watching her through a chink in the screen, and when she disappeared he closed his eyes that were bright with suppressed anger. She’d not taken it as hard as that young Nurse Carter, but hard enough, he reckoned, and maybe more than she knew. Often the way of it. He had heard the other lads saying the little one looked to have hurt her head real bad when she hit the table, but he knew she wasn’t just hurt bad same as did old Bert next door. Been through it all in the last war, hadn’t he? He’d spotted the look back of that young Nurse Carter’s eyes same as hisself. Couldn’t miss that look back of a mate’s eyes, not when you’d seen it enough. Not right, it wasn’t. Only a slip of a girl not doing no harm and just doing good. And there’s not many you could say that about these times. But when one got your number on it, don’t matter what you do, you’ve had it. Same as Dora, he thought. Same as Dora.