Nurse Jess

by Joyce Dingwell

  “It won’t do. Jessamine certainly won’t do, Miss Barlow.” She looked down on the form again, brow puckered, lips pursed.

  Then triumphantly it came to her. The frown smoothed away, the mouth straightened.

  “That’s it, of course. You’ll be Nurse Jess.”

  CHAPTER II

  JESS, Bess, Tess ... what did it matter?

  She was here, she was accepted, she was to be a trainee at the Lady Belinda for Prems.

  Only for Matron—no, Matron Martha—she would have executed a victory dance on the spot She knew all the actions already, every triumphant pose, she had even joined in with their Crescent Island natives once or twice.

  But instead she listened rapturously to Matron Martha’s homily on what-was-expected at Belinda and what-was-not.

  The lecture followed rather along the lines of the previous one on door closing. Gentleness, quietness, soundlessness, careful restraint. Jessa was reminded irresistibly of the old nursery rhyme:

  Come when you’re called,

  Do as you’re hid;

  Shut the door after you,

  Never be chid.

  “Are you listening, Nurse Jess?” reproached Matron Martha sharply.

  “Yes, Matron Martha.” Oh, dear, only five minutes in Belinda, thought Jessa, and already I’ve been “chid.”

  She paid more attention then. She hung on every word. Every year in this hospital, she learned from Matron, four hundred babies were nursed to normal; babies whose healthy survival sometimes seemed almost a miracle even in this scientific world.

  There were usually about forty inmates and to deal with them a staff of twenty-three.

  “The infants need non-stop care every hour of the day, however, so you needn’t think you’ll be having a soft time because of the comparatively big staff,” warned Matron.

  “No, Matron Martha.”

  “Also while you’re on duty, work never pauses, not like at the Great Southern.”

  “We worked hard at G.S.”

  “Nurse Jess, I shall not tolerate interruptions.”

  “No, Matron Martha. Sorry, Matron Martha.” Only seven minutes gone, and her second chid.

  More tolerantly Matron Martha explained, “I really meant unceasing vigilance. My memory of normal hospital work is that of a moment available here for a few words with a fellow nurse, a moment slipped in there for a short chat with a patient. It’s quite different at Belinda.”

  “Yes, Matron Martha.”

  “First thing in the morning,” Matron resumed, “if you’re on Days you will work in one of the busiest kitchens, I should say, in the hospital world. Bottles are made up, individual bottles (for every baby is on a special diet), to last twenty-four hours. Work that out and multiply it by forty, Nurse Jess.”

  “Yes, Matron Martha,” nodded Jessa, who had never been good at mental arithmetic and would have required a pencil and pad to reach a result now.

  “Then there is the actual feeding,” said Matron. “Most of them are fed every two hours. Some are done intravenously, some by drops, some are given miniature bottles only three inches long.”

  “The taxi-man’s son,” nodded Jessa knowledgeably—and clapped her hand over her mouth.

  “Sorry, Matron Martha.”

  Matron Martha looked her over coldly.

  Chid Number Three, sighed Jess.

  “Then there are the emergencies you will be taught to cope with ... blood transfusions for Rh-factor babies, babies who have to be hand-pumped oxygen because they’re too small for an iron lung.

  “Another thing is equipment. It’s very expensive. You would not want to treat an isolet which costs four hundred pounds as you treated that front door.”

  The door again Jessa hung her head.

  “However,” buoyed Matron Martha, who seemed to like to push you under and then rescue you again, “there are certain intrinsic rewards. Costs, either in money or energy or sacrifice, don’t count in saving premature babies. The love and affection you give and get—yes, I really believe get—in return are the best rewards on earth.

  “When an infant is finally discharged you will be happy that you have helped a child to the future that no doubt you have been dreaming up for him ... judge, engineer, statesman, who knows?”

  “Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor,” nodded Jessa Matron Martha said soberly, not chiding Jessa this time, “It’s all in our hands.”

  She told her new trainee where to find her uniforms and caps. “We none of us wear veils here.”

  “Not even sisters?” Jessa thought of Rene and her anticipated veil instead of a cap, her brave red cape.

  She must have murmured “cape” aloud, for Matron Martha said testily, “Don’t be stupid, Nurse Jess, there would be no need for anything so protective in our specially heated wards, and you surely have noticed that the rest of the building is centrally heated. Winter does not touch us here, we need no capes.”

  She seemed to have come to the end of her homily. She stacked the papers neatly and told Jessa where to look for the duty roster, and also where to find her room.

  “If on your way you meet a parent, that is quite in order. Many of our babies are long-term members, and parents are encouraged to have a short while with them whenever they can.”

  “Yes, Matron Martha.”

  “That is all, Nurse Jess.”

  Jess rose, neither opened nor went out of the door—or so she hoped—but discreetly disappeared.

  Half an hour and a tally of three chids. Not so bad, she thought.

  She remembered her directions. Up more stairs, first turn on the right, second turn on the left, Room Fifteen. She hoped Margaret would be somewhere close.

  As she went to turn right after climbing the stairs she heard that little weak distant squeak again. It must be a prem, and she must steal her first look, she must.

  The squeak came from the left. She tiptoed down a long corridor. Like most hospital corridors, although it was still bright daylight, none the less it was lit. The illumination was placed in such a position that it sent shadows on the opposite wall. There was a shadow there now ... a rather odd shadow ... someone all long arms and still longer legs. Jessa wanted to laugh.

  She rounded the corner. She saw that there was a full-length panel of glass probably enclosing a nursery. There was also a warm powdery sweet baby smell.

  She noticed that that someone shadowed on the wall was having a peep through the glass, and that of all people in this female-to-the-core hospital, it was a man. He was a very tall man with very long legs—almost daddy-long-legs, in fact. They were even long when he was doubling himself over to peer through the glass. When he straightened up, she thought with intrigue, they would seem positively endless. He would be a parent, of course.

  Her heart went out to him in tender sympathy. Poor new father, yearning to possess wholly, not just behind glass, his little helpless child.

  She went forward impulsively and put a hand on his shoulder. It startled him, and he gave a squeak not so unlike that prem squeak, then he lost his balance and keeled over to the floor. On the way down he dropped his glasses—big, owl-like, horn-rimmed glasses. As he picked them up and replaced them rather lopsidedly across his nose and then got clumsily to his feet, Jessa whispered, “I’m so sorry, but which one is yours?”

  The glasses evidently had achieved some dust. He took them off again to clean them, peering at her as he did. He looked younger without them. At first sight she had thought he was rather an old father, but now she could see he was just about right.

  “I beg your pardon?” he blundered.

  “I asked which one was yours, but I think I can tell. That one. You have the same ears.”

  “Have we?” He peered through the glass again critically and did not appear very exalted. Poor man, thought Jessa, he is worried about having to leave his baby here when he goes.

  “You musn’t fret,” she counselled, remembering Matron’s homily. “Every year at Belinda four hundred
babies are nursed to normal; babies whose healthy survival sometimes seems a miracle, even in this scientific world.”

  “Really?”

  “I assure you. You’re not the only one who is undergoing all this. Tell me”—gently—“is this your first?”

  The man shook his head. He had shaggy hair that fell over his forehead at the slightest movement, so that the shake now touselled him entirely and even necessitated the removal of the owl glasses again because the movement had set them askew once more.

  “Oh, no,” he answered, “not by a long chalk. I mean”—hastily—“I’ve had plenty before.”

  “Oh.” Jessa looked incredulously at him, saw that he was serious, then looked away, a trifle disconcerted. Well, that’s how it should be, she reminded herself stoutly; big families were this country’s greatest assets. He must be a fine parent to possess already his quiver-full and yet yearn after this last frail little one.

  “But none of them were inmates here, I suppose,” she smiled encouragingly.

  He nodded unconcernedly, and touselled the shaggy hair a third time. “Yes, every one of them,” he said.

  “Oh.” Jessa uttered it rather blankly. She felt a little shocked somehow. To have a quiver-full and every one of them prems must be—well, discouraging to say the least. She must try and encourage this poor parent at once.

  “Never mind,” she soothed. “It was probably not your fault.”

  Feeling she was getting a little out of her depth and perhaps not being quite fair to his wife, she added breathlessly. “I would suggest you both attend some sort of clinic. I must go now. Goodbye, Mr.—?”

  The daddy-long-legs man murmured, “Gink.”

  “Gink?”

  “G-i-n-k.”

  “Oh Well, good luck, anyhow, to you and your son. Or is it a daughter?” She sincerely hoped not, not with those ears, because then it would not be able to wear earrings when it grew up, of course.

  “He’s a boy.”

  “Then your son.”

  She smiled and was gone.

  She took a while to get back to the spot where she had to mm first to the right, second to the left, but after losing herself in many corridors she found what she sought, Room Fifteen.

  And when she opened the door, really opened it this time and entered, not just arrived, there was Margaret, dear, sweet Margaret, with violets in a violet vase and a spirit stove with a saucepan of water ready to brew tea.

  “I thought you’d never arrive, Jessa,” she greeted. “I’ve been here for hours.”

  “I was waylaid by an anxious parent,” explained Jessamine importantly. “Oh, Margaret, you are a pet!” She buried her nose in the violets and came out with a dusting of pollen over her freckles. “You’ve bought buns, too. Have you started working yet? What’s it like? Are you on Days? Is the pace exhausting? Are the prems very difficult to hold, do you sort of feel they’ll break in two?”

  Margaret said, “I haven’t started,” and they both laughed.

  They sat on the bed together and Margaret told Jessa about her own arrival. She appeared not once to have been “chid.”

  “She’s really a splendid person, Matron Martha.”

  “I suppose so—it was just that bosom, it seemed so hard.”

  “Not with a baby in her arms, they’re calmed at once. Oh, Jessamine, this is a lovely worthwhile place.”

  “I suppose so,” said Jessa again, still not quite so convinced as her friend.

  “Perhaps,” she sighed, “I’ll feel more at home when I fix my room.”

  Margaret watched her “fix” it. Her mother’s photo, her father’s, a snapshot of Lopi.

  “What on earth is that?” she asked.

  “Our volcano. It’s a sleeping one, of course. I always fetch it along with me. Some people bring lucky charms, I bring Lopi. Lopi is my talisman.”

  Jessa patted the odd picture of lava rock and crater and propped it against the violets.

  “What are our uniforms like?” she asked.

  “Well, not a tailored fit exactly if you’re between sizes, but then neither was Great Southern’s. A pleasant surprise, though, Jessa—colours!”

  “Colours!” That was a surprise.

  “Any colours you fancy,” resumed Margaret. “It appears that this valued adviser of Belinda’s, this professor who believes in—”

  “Friendly pleasantry,” interrupted Jessa with a grin, “and no more bald surnames and speaking of that, Nurse Margaret, I’m to be Nurse Jess.”

  Margaret smiled patiently back at her. “It appears,” she concluded, “that she also believes in cheerful hues in preference to cold hygienic white. You can choose whatever your mood tells you’, and you can have a different colour every day if you wish. And you don’t wear a veil, of course.”

  “I know, Matron Martha told me. Not even the sisters wear them.”

  Margaret nodded. “The folds might get in the way, I presume; this is very exacting work.”

  They both sat silent a moment in the little room, thinking their own private thoughts. The hospital was full of the usual quiet hospital noises. Somewhere outside came the sound of traffic, but it was pleasingly muted and somehow friendly.

  “When do you go on duty, Margaret?” asked Jessa.

  “I haven’t looked yet. I thought I’d wait for that pleasure with you.”

  Jessa flashed her an appreciative smile. “You mean you knew I’d forget as usual where I was instructed to find the roster. You’re a pet, Meggy, let’s go now.”

  As they descended the stairs together, Jessa argued aloud with herself as to colours. “Yellow is cheerful, but my hair goes with blue.”

  “No need to worry about one’s complexion, anyway,” laughed Margaret. “In those heated wards we’ll have a becoming flush.”

  “One thing, I’ll be more acclimatized,” anticipated Jessa. “Crescent isn’t really tropical, but it’s warmer than here. You might find it hot, though.”

  But to herself Jessa doubted if Margaret would find any fault anywhere at any time. She was that rare person, a born nurse.

  Another descent, and there was the roster. Matron Martha had been kind to her fledglings. Neither were expected on duty until tomorrow at eight o’clock.

  The correspondence rack at the side of the roster brought a squeal of delight from Jessamine. Ba had remembered her in advance. She knew his writing. It looked like a greeting card. She tore it open, appreciating his forethought at posting it in time for her arrival. “To Mother on Mother’s Day,” she read aloud, and they both laughed.

  They began a tour of the hospital and grounds. They peeped into the dining-room first, then the kitchen, the lounge. They walked around the lawns.

  “After tea we’ll explore the district,” suggested Margaret.

  She looked at the clock-tower. “And tea will be in a quarter of an hour.”

  “If time keeps going this quickly I’ll be back at Crescent before I know it,” said Jessa. “My course behind me and another certificate to hang on the wall.”

  “You’ll have several breaks before that. Matron Martha told me that leave is more generous here because of the high-pressure work.” Margaret paused. “What will you do, Jessa, after you’ve finished with Belinda?”

  Jessa thought privately that she was too relieved just now to be accepted by Belinda, let alone think of what would happen when she was finally dismissed.

  “I don’t believe I know myself, Margaret,” she admitted.

  Margaret smiled. “Marry?” she suggested slyly.

  “I don’t know. There’s Ba, of course, who sent me that card, and he’s a dear, but I still don’t know.” She paused in her turn. “What about yourself?”

  Margaret smiled again, happily, contentedly. “Old people, perhaps ... or nursing the incapacitated, the disabled something like that.”

  Jessa sighed deeply. “Darling Margaret, I’m going to find it hard living up to you,” she said.

  They strolled back over the ground
s, green and well-tended, with leafy hedges and a few trees already resonant with the end-of-the-day twitterings of tired little birds. It was pleasant, but it was all rather small, even confined, since being a national hospital it had perforce to be situate in the very core of the city, and there was no room for settings or extensive lawns.

  Jessa thought a little wistfully of Crescent Island, the reef, the sea beyond, the wide-sands, the shoal of little brown fish that were really island picaninnies, Lopi in the background with its lava rock and crater and inward fire.

  As they passed the notice-board again they saw that something else had joined the invitations to sign up for the musical society or patronize the hospital library.

  There was to be a lecture, the sheet read, in the second hall, by Professor Gink. All able to attend would be expected to as a matter of course.

  “Gink...” frowned Jessa, and wondered idly where she had heard it. It was rather an amusing name, a name one shouldn’t forget. Probably it had belonged to some island trader calling in at the Jessamine Hotel after collecting sponges and conchi shell, she decided. She thought it would not be a very flattering tag for a woman to be called Professor Gink, even though Professor sounded very learned and tremendously important. And she would be a woman, most certainly, because this hospital, as everyone knew, was female to the core.

  CHAPTER III

  WHEN she went along to the locker room with Margaret first thing in the morning, the colour that took Jessa’s eye in a twinkling was the happy pink.

  “That’s for me,” she said gladly. “I need some joyfulness—unless, Margaret, you had the same idea.”

  “I’m a size taller, a size thinner,” reminded Margaret, “and besides, this lilac just fits my mood.”

  “On Crescent Island,” chattered Jessa excitedly, “we have frangipani in just this pink as well as in cream.”