The Nurses of Steeple Street

by Donna Douglas

  Christine slid her gaze away. ‘I told her I had to stay late at school for extra studies.’

  ‘Well, I am teaching you a thing or two, I suppose!’

  ‘Don’t!’ Christine turned on him. ‘It doesn’t feel right, lying to my mother. She doesn’t deserve it.’

  ‘Would you rather we stopped meeting?’

  ‘No!’ Christine replied, a shade too quickly. ‘I just wish I could be honest with her, that’s all. Couldn’t you at least meet her?’ she pleaded with him.

  Oliver shook his head. ‘And have your brothers tear me apart with their bare hands?’

  ‘It wouldn’t be like that,’ Christine assured him quickly, although deep down she wasn’t sure what her brothers would do, or her mother for that matter. ‘Please, Oliver? You’ll have to meet her sometime, won’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but not just yet.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Soon, I promise.’

  She turned to face him. ‘You do love me, don’t you?’

  ‘You know I do.’

  ‘And you want to be with me?’

  His mouth twisted. ‘I’m here, aren’t I?’

  She blushed. ‘I don’t mean like that. I mean …’ She paused, the words sticking in her throat.

  Oliver reached for her hand, his expression mock-solemn. ‘Christine Fairbrass, I love you. I adore you. I worship you. And one day, when the time is right, we will declare our love to the world and I will marry you.’

  ‘Will you? Will you really?’

  ‘I just told you so, didn’t I? Now come back to bed.’

  ‘I can’t …’ she started to say. But his fingers were trailing down the bare skin of her back, setting all her nerve endings on fire, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to refuse him for long.

  Who cared if they had to keep their romance a secret? she thought as she succumbed to Oliver’s embrace. He loved her. He wanted to marry her. And that made everything all right.

  Isaiah Shapcott lived in an area of Quarry Hill Agnes had never seen before.

  Bess led the way, pushing her bicycle down narrow alleyways and under low arches. It was a dull, drizzly day, and barely any daylight penetrated the gloomy, stinking warren. Agnes was used to the overcrowded yards, but here some of the houses had fallen into ruins, leaving mountains of cracked walls and crumbling rubble, over which children swarmed and played.

  Finally, Bess stopped in a tiny, dark courtyard.

  ‘Here we are,’ she said. ‘That’s Mr Shapcott’s cottage over there.’ She pointed to a solitary door and two windows, one to the side and one above. The grimy glass on the lower window had been plastered over with yellowing newspaper.

  Agnes looked at her. ‘Aren’t you coming with me?’

  Bess shook her head. ‘As you’ve said yourself, you’re quite capable.’ Her mouth twitched. ‘Oh, don’t look like that, Miss Sheridan. I’m sure giving someone a bath will present no difficulty for a nurse who’s assisted with complicated surgical procedures!’

  ‘Well, can you tell me something about the patient at least?’ Agnes said as Bess turned her bicycle around.

  ‘You’ll find out for yourself soon enough!’ And with that the Assistant Superintendent pedalled out the way they’d come, ducking under the low archway.

  Agnes watched her go. I’ll show you, she thought. She had no idea who or what lay in wait for her inside the cottage, but she was utterly determined to succeed in her task, if only to prove a point to Bess Bradshaw.

  A group of children gathered in the entrance to the yard, watching her with interest. Agnes smiled at them as she propped her bicycle against the wall and knocked on Mr Shapcott’s front door.

  ‘Who is it?’ came a muffled voice from inside.

  ‘It’s the district nurse, Mr Shapcott.’

  ‘Bugger off.’

  The children laughed. Agnes squared her shoulders.

  ‘Open the door, please, Mr Shapcott.’

  ‘No.’

  More laughter from behind her. Agnes’ face began to flame. ‘You have to open the door.’

  ‘Who says?’

  She didn’t have an answer to that, so she rattled the latch harder. ‘Let me in,’ she commanded, in her sharpest nurse’s voice.

  It seemed to work. There was a silence, then the muffled voice said, ‘Wait there a minute.’

  Agnes waited. She risked a glance over her shoulder. The children had gathered in a knot, watching with interest.

  She heard the window opening above her and stepped back to look up – just in time to see a pair of bony hands emerging, holding a china chamber pot.

  Agnes realised what was happening and threw herself out of the way a split second before the contents of the pot came down, splashing all over the cobbles.

  The children fell about laughing.

  ‘Oh, do shut up!’ Agnes snapped at them as she examined the hem of her coat. Her shoes and stockings seemed to have got the worst of it. But it could have been a lot worse, she thought with a shudder.

  ‘You know the door’s open, don’t you?’ one of the boys called out from the archway. ‘No one locks their doors round here, missus!’

  One of the other children muttered something she couldn’t catch, and they all laughed again.

  Struggling to hold on to what was left of her dignity, Agnes stepped over the disgusting puddle, went back to the front door and tried the latch. Sure enough, the door swung open.

  Inside the cottage was dark and stank of urine, stale grease and the tell-tale sweet odour of bugs. A meagre coal fire sputtered in the grate, surrounded by a clothes horse festooned with greying, stained long johns. From the sour odour they gave off, they hadn’t been well washed.

  Agnes searched around for somewhere clean to hang her coat and put down her bag. She finally found a stack of old copies of the Sporting Life by the fire and spread out a few pages on the kitchen table.

  ‘Get out! Get out or I’ll call t’police!’ a thin, wavering voice called from upstairs as she washed her hands under the rusting tap.

  ‘Not until I’ve given you your bath, Mr Shapcott.’ Over the sound of running water she heard the creak of the stairs.

  ‘I don’t need one. I had one last week.’

  Agnes turned round and started in shock at the sight of Mr Shapcott. He was scarcely bigger than a child, his threadbare clothes hanging off his slight frame. According to his notes he was thirty-seven, but it was difficult to tell his age because his face was so ingrained with dirt. His ashy brown hair stood up in filthy tufts around a blackened face.

  Agnes looked him up and down. ‘I can see that’s not true,’ she said briskly. ‘Now, where is your bath tub?’

  ‘I in’t telling you.’

  Most of the residents of Quarry Hill kept their tin tubs hanging up in the yard. But it took at least two people to bring one in and, since Bess had abandoned her, Agnes didn’t think she could manage it alone.

  ‘Very well, we’ll have to make do with a wash instead,’ she said. ‘I’ll put the kettle on to boil.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing!’ Mr Shapcott stood in front of the range, blocking her path. As he spoke, his hands moved restlessly, scratching his chest through his filthy shirt. Agnes shuddered to imagine what nastiness she would find under there. ‘You just go away and mind your own business, missus.’

  If only I could, Agnes thought. She could feel her own skin crawling at the thought of touching him, but it had to be done. ‘I’m afraid I can’t leave until I’ve made you clean and presentable.’

  ‘You’ll wait a long time, then!’

  ‘Don’t be like that, Mr Shapcott. I’m sure you’ll feel better once you—’ She turned round, the kettle in her hand. ‘Mr Shapcott?’ she called out. But he had vanished.

  Agnes set the kettle down on the draining board. ‘Mr Shapcott, where are you?’

  ‘I daresay he’s locked himself in the cupboard. That’s his usual hiding place.’

  She swung round to see Be
ss Bradshaw standing in the doorway.

  ‘I came to see how you were getting on,’ she said.

  Agnes pushed a stray wisp of hair off her face. ‘Very well, thank you,’ she replied, with all the dignity she could muster.

  ‘Except you’ve managed to lose your patient.’

  ‘I …’

  Without waiting for an answer, Bess pushed past her and crossed the room to a tiny broom cupboard under the stairs. She rapped smartly on the door.

  ‘Mr Shapcott? Are you in there?’

  ‘And you can bugger off an’ all!’

  Bess sighed. ‘Very well, Mr Shapcott, we’ll go,’ she said. ‘But you know this can’t go on for ever. We’ll have to give you a bath one of these days.’

  A muffled oath came from behind the door, making Agnes blush.

  ‘Come on,’ Bess said, ‘let’s leave him to it.’

  Agnes looked back at the cupboard door, unwilling to accept defeat. ‘I’m sure I could persuade him to come out.’

  ‘Not in a month of Sundays,’ Bess said. ‘No one’s managed it yet, in all the years I’ve been here.’

  ‘Then why did you tell me to give him a bath?’ Agnes asked as she followed her outside.

  Bess sent her a teasing look. ‘I wanted to see how long it would take for him to run rings around you. Oh, don’t look at me like that, lass. I were only having a bit of fun with you.’

  ‘A bit of fun?’ Agnes echoed in disbelief. ‘But he – he tried to empty a chamber pot over me!’

  ‘He didn’t?’ Bess hooted with laughter. ‘Oh, that’s a new one! Wait till I tell the others about that!’

  Agnes was so full of rage she couldn’t trust herself to speak. All she’d wanted to do was to prove herself, and Bess Bradshaw had made a fool of her again.

  And then she noticed something else.

  ‘Where’s my bicycle?’

  Bess frowned. ‘I don’t know, do I? Where did you leave it?’

  ‘Just here.’ Agnes stood in front of the blank space and looked around. The yard was suspiciously empty. The children had all disappeared, like rats down a hole.

  ‘Someone must have pinched it,’ Bess voiced the thought that was going through Agnes’ head.

  ‘I thought you said people here wouldn’t touch a district nurse’s bicycle?’

  ‘Happen they know you’re not really a district nurse,’ Bess said with a touch of spite.

  Agnes watched her helplessly as she retrieved her own bicycle from the other side of the yard and mounted it.

  ‘But what shall I do?’

  ‘Reckon you’ll have to start walking, won’t you?’ Bess gave her a wink then cycled off, leaving Agnes standing in the yard.

  It took her a long time to find her way out of the warren of Quarry Hill on foot. All the time, she kept looking around for any sign of the children who might have stolen her bicycle. But they were nowhere to be seen.

  Finally, she reached a street she recognised, which opened up into a wider road, and she could breathe again. The rain had started to fall steadily and she pulled her coat tightly around her. She bit her lip, determined not to cry.

  Bess’ cruel remark had stung.

  Happen they know you’re not really a district nurse.

  Agnes was doing her best. She studied hard, and did everything she was supposed to. It wasn’t her fault that things seemed to keep going wrong for her, or that she couldn’t get any of the patients to like her.

  She kicked at a wall in frustration. I don’t care, she told herself. I hate district nursing, I hate Quarry Hill, and most of all I hate Bess Bradshaw. The Assistant Superintendent was probably already back in Steeple Street, having a good laugh with the other nurses about Agnes’ latest misadventure.

  She dashed away an angry tear with the back of her hand. She wouldn’t give Bess the satisfaction of seeing her cry, at any rate. It was just what she wanted.

  Agnes so wished she were back in the Nightingale, looking after the patients in a nice clean ward where she knew exactly what she was doing.

  But even as she wished it, she knew it could never happen. Those days were long gone.

  Within a moment, she realised she was lost again. Somewhere she had taken another wrong turning and ended up in a part of the city she didn’t recognise. There were some shops, and a pub, and a rundown bed and breakfast.

  Agnes paused on the corner to get her bearings, when her attention was briefly caught by a couple caught in a passionate embrace just inside the doorway of the bed and breakfast.

  Embarrassed, she started to avert her gaze, but as the girl pulled away a bright flash of copper hair caught the corner of Agnes’ eye. She looked round and found herself staring into the face of Christine Fairbrass.

  She didn’t know which of them was more shocked and embarrassed. Christine grabbed the young man’s arm and pulled him away hurriedly down the street. A moment later, they were gone.

  Chapter Thirteen

  ‘Here she is again.’

  Henry Slater nodded his grizzled head towards the lych gate. The two men were making the most of the Indian summer to cut back the overgrown shrubs at the far end of the churchyard, but Henry kept having to stop because he couldn’t catch his breath. Job lay a short distance away, enjoying the October sunshine, watching them from between his outstretched paws.

  ‘Who?’ Finn didn’t look up. He didn’t need his grandfather to tell him Polly was there. He could sense her presence, like a prickle at the back of his neck.

  ‘Your young lady.’

  ‘She in’t my young lady,’ Finn muttered, hacking at a thick branch.

  ‘You always seem to be with her these days. Sneaking off when you think I aren’t looking.’

  Finn felt an uncomfortable flush rising in his face. ‘I pass the time of day with her sometimes, that’s all.’

  ‘Is that right? I’ve never known you say more than two words to anyone before.’

  ‘I’m just being polite. Nowt wrong with that, is there?’

  ‘Nay, don’t look at me like that, lad. I’m pleased for you. She seems like a nice lass.’

  His words hung heavily between them.

  ‘Too nice for me,’ Finn said bitterly.

  Henry sighed. ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself.’

  ‘I’m only speaking the truth.’

  His grandfather said nothing. He didn’t try to contradict him, Finn noticed. Because deep down Henry Slater knew it was the truth. No girl as nice as Polly Malone would or should ever go near Finn.

  And yet … Finn struck at another branch with his blade. He thought he had taught himself to stop dreaming, to stop hoping that something good might happen in his life. But Polly had made him forget himself. She had made him wish for more than he had.

  And that was a dangerous thing.

  He hadn’t meant to get to know her. As his grandfather had observed, he usually made a point of trying to avoid the people who visited the churchyard, preferring to stay in the shadows. But then all that business with Job had happened, and Polly had been so good, standing up to that stuffed shirt curate and helping Finn to protect the dog.

  He glanced down at Job, stretched out on the grass. This is all your fault, Finn chided him silently. Job gazed back at him with wise brown eyes. He liked Polly too. Finn knew nothing of the dog’s history, but he sensed that, like him, his experiences of life had made him wary and ready to attack. And yet somehow Polly Malone had managed to worm her way through both their defences.

  It was all right for Job, but Finn had been careless. He shouldn’t have let it happen.

  He allowed himself to glance over his shoulder, while pretending to stretch his stiff muscles. He saw her straight away, her pretty summer dress bright in the sunlit churchyard, her burnished gold hair lit by the sun. She was walking up the path to her husband’s grave, a wicker basket of flowers over her arm. But she was looking around, searching for something – or someone.

  ‘I reckon she’s looking for you.’ His g
randfather spoke the thought that went through Finn’s mind. ‘Happen you should go and have a word?’

  Finn turned back to his work, keeping his head down. ‘I’m busy,’ he muttered.

  He was at the other side of the churchyard, half hidden by overhanging branches. Polly saw his tall, broad-shouldered figure, bent over his work, his powerful arms hacking away at the branches, and felt a treacherous lift of her heart at the sight of him.

  He would be waiting for her. He would keep a respectful distance while she spent time at Frank’s grave, but all the while she would know he was there, watching her. Then, when the time was right, she would hear his footsteps on the path behind her. She would turn, and there he’d be with Job. The dog would rush to greet her, and she would pet him and ask Finn about him, and then he would walk down to the gate with her and they would talk.

  It was only ever small talk, about the dog, the weather, the various plants that were blooming in the churchyard. Or sometimes they would stroll in silence, watching the bees and butterflies fluttering between the flowers. It was nothing, just the briefest of shared moments, but Polly had begun to look forward to them.

  She saw him looking at her, and raised her hand in greeting. Finn paused for a moment, then went back to his work. Polly frowned. He must have seen her, surely.

  Job certainly saw her. He jumped eagerly to his feet and started trotting towards her, but Finn gave a sharp whistle, calling the dog back to his side.

  Polly stared at them, disappointed and confused. Had she done something to offend Finn? she wondered.

  ‘Hello, again.’

  She started at the sound of a man’s voice behind her. She turned, trying to give herself time to paste on a smile before she faced Matthew Elliott. ‘Oh, hello.’

  ‘I haven’t seen you in a while. I hope you haven’t been avoiding me?’ he said teasingly.

  ‘Of course not. Why should I?’

  ‘No reason, I suppose.’ His confident smile didn’t waver. He reminded her of a schoolboy, his bright, freshly scrubbed face shining, surrounded by a halo of wispy light brown curls.

  She hitched her basket higher on her arm and started up the path to Frank’s grave. Matthew followed her. She could feel him hovering behind her as she kneeled down to arrange her flowers. Someone – Finn, she supposed – had scrubbed the headstone to get rid of the dirt and moss, so it gleamed in the sunlight.