The Private Wing

by Claire Rayner

  “I’m not so sure,” Jennifer Cooper leaned across from the other side of the table. “I was on Radiotherapy with you, remember? And no gorgeous private patients never made any signals at me through the kitchen window.”

  “They feed ’em something special in New Zealand,” someone said from the end of the table. “Brings ’em on faster than your common or garden English rose – ”

  “Seeing you’re Irish, Mary-Margaret, how do you know?” Ngaire said equably. “Anyway, you’re right of course. They do feed us better at home. Tamarillos and feijoas and – ”

  “And passion fruit,” said Tricia succinctly, and they all laughed with the somewhat exaggerated hilarity that goes with fatigue while Ngaire, unperturbed, buttered her fourth slice of toast, and smiled happily at them all.

  “Just jealous, that’s what you lot are,” she said, her mouth full. “Me, I’m happy as a box of birds. All I ask is that they’ve put me somewhere nice to work this next three months. Not much to want, is it?”

  “Nice meaning not too much work, or nice meaning lots of interesting men for you to add to your collection?” Barbara Lloyd asked.

  “Why, both of course!” Ngaire said, opening her eyes very wide.

  And then the big dining room stilled as Night Sister came in, clutching a clipboard, and the ninety night nurses put down their cups and rose to their feet with a crisp flutter of starched aprons.

  “Good morning, Nurses,” she said, her voice sounding almost as starched as the aprons.

  And “Good morning” they chorused back “for all the world like great babies in Sunday School” whispered Ngaire in Tricia’s ear, and turned a limpid gaze on Night Sister’s frown in her direction.

  “Change list, Nurses.” Night Sister said. “Ten senior night nurses, ten intermediate, ten juniors are to change to day duty as from 4.30 p.m. this afternoon. Listen carefully, as I do not intend to read any name more than once.”

  The ritual began. Tricia found herself sitting with her fingers crossed under the table, and then, annoyed with herself, consciously relaxed. It was ridiculous to care so much about where she was to be posted. Damn it, it was all part of the job, wasn’t it? Wherever they sent her, she’d still be nursing at the Royal, wouldn’t she? But how much better it would be to be working somewhere she really wanted to be. It did matter, like mad, and she couldn’t deny it. And not least because it would be much – well, not easier, but say less difficult – to stick to her guns as far as David was concerned if she was posted somewhere she knew she’d enjoy, where she’d be able to do a really good job.

  “Nurse Lloyd, Children’s Medical,” Night Sister intoned. Across the table, Barbara grinned hugely, and joined her fists in a successful boxer’s salute; she loved children’s nursing so much that she intended to go on to get her paediatric certificate as soon as she had finished her general training, and clearly Matron had remembered this and allocated her accordingly. Tricia smiled back at Barbara in congratulation. Maybe this augured well for herself, she thought hopefully.

  “Nurse Mullins, Out-Patient Department, Nurse Nanson, Gynaecology One, Nurse Noone, Fracture Clinic, Nurse Oxford, Private Patients’ Wing, Third Floor, Nurse Rawlings, Male Surgical Three, Nurse Taylor, General Theatres, Nurse Throgmorton, Emergency Services – ”

  And as the list droned to its end, and Night Sister left her staff to finish their breakfasts in a clatter of cups and a roar of chatter, Tricia and Ngaire sat and stared at each other miserably.

  Chapter Two

  “But my God! Theatres! Me!” Ngaire wailed. “They must be clean round the twist! I mean, can’t you just see it? I’ll fall over everything, I’ll drop all the instruments, I’ll give the surgeons the screaming abdabs, and – ”

  “Oh, give it a rest, Ngaire!” Mary-Margaret Noone said from the deep armchair near the fireplace where a cheerful early morning blaze crackled and spat, for it was still cold enough for fires even at the end of April. “You’ve been grizzling ever since breakfast. And what have you got to moan about anyway? Theatres are fun! Not like rotten old Fracture Clinic where they’ve stuck me. I’ll spend the next three months up to my behind in plaster of paris, and I’ll develop muscles like a boxer and hands like – like old kippers!”

  “It’s all wrong!” Tricia said furiously, and got out of her chair to begin to prowl about the sitting room, from bookcase to fireplace and back again. “I mean, for God’s sake, why can’t we have some sort of say in where we work? We’re senior students, aren’t we? Here’s Ngaire terrified out of her socks because she’s got to go to Theatres, and me, I’d give my eye teeth for it. Why can’t we just change places? Ngaire’d adore being on the Private Wing, but me – it makes me sick to just think about it! Damn it all, I didn’t go into nursing to act like a glorified chambermaid or a nanny or something to a bunch of spoiled stupid idiots with more money than sense who aren’t proper patients at all, but just fancy a week off in bed in a fancy expensive private hotel – ”

  “They aren’t all like that,” Mary-Margaret said mildly. “I did Private Wing last year, and some of them were – ”

  “Oh, I know, they get the occasional patient that really is ill, I suppose, but most of them – you’ve only got to look at them strolling around the corridors in their mink and maribou negligees to know that they’re – ”

  “Mink and maribou? Oooh gorgeous,” Ngaire said. “And just think about the fabulous men you’d meet! I mean, I can just see it – there’s this smashing disc jockey, flat on his back, in agony and helpless – ”

  “Sounds like a classic case of slipped disc to me,” Barbara Lloyd murmured sleepily from the other side of the fireplace.

  “Yeah – why not?” Ngaire said agreeably. “Anyway there he lies, a complete pushover for a girl with reasonable legs in sheer black stockings – ”

  “With or without runs and holes?” Barbara asked sweetly, staring pointedly at Ngaire’s legs, but Ngaire was too well established on her daydream to hear her.

  “He’d lie there, and he’d have all these fabulous visitors, and I’d nip in and out with champagne glasses and flowers, and – ooh, it’d be gorgeous! Why can’t we change, Trish? I mean, no one would notice, would they, as long as someone turned up in each department? We could pretend we made a mistake, and by the time they found out, hell, it’d be too late to change things again, so we’d all be happy – ”

  “Oh grow up, Ngaire,” Molly Throgmorton said crushingly. “Even you can’t be so daft as to think you’d get away with that!”

  “No – I suppose not,” Ngaire said. “But it’s a great idea, all the same, isn’t it? Never mind, Trish. You can have the Wing. Only do me a favour. Remember your old friend. I mean, I’ll bet those private patients are all so stinking rich they give their nurses fabulous presents when they leave after a week of brow-soothing, and although I wouldn’t say I was exactly mercenary, I have to tell the truth and say I’m usually pretty broke, which reminds me – can anyone stake me to – ”

  “No!” several people said very firmly and at the same time.

  “And if you think I’m going to let any of those rotten lazy stupid idiots hand out their condescending tips to me, as though I really were a chambermaid, you’ve got another think coming!” Tricia said furiously.

  “Not that it’s likely to be offered if you go on like that, Trish,” Mary-Margaret said. “I mean, why get so mad about it? It won’t be that bad, surely? I know it’s not like Theatres one bit, and that you’d enjoy that more, but it’ll still be interesting and anyway, nursing means a bit of everything doesn’t it? Including private patients.”

  “I know what’s the matter, Trish,” Ngaire said shrewdly. “You’ll be the lowest of the low up there, won’t you? A bit of a comedown after being in charge of Men’s Surg. Three for your last night duty. All those staff nurses on the Wing – why, it’ll be like being a junior pro all over again – bedpans and all – ”

  Tricia scowled, and opened her mouth to argue, and then clo
sed it again and stood up, shrugging her cape around her shoulders. “Oh, the hell with it. I’m going to bed. Anyone coming?”

  One or two people yawned, and then one by one, they stood up. Collecting their capes and night bags they straggled out of the big sitting room where the night staff always congregated for an hour or so after breakfast, and followed Tricia up the stairs to their respective bedrooms.

  And as she bathed, and cleaned her teeth, and prepared a fresh uniform for the afternoon, and for a while after she climbed into bed, Tricia went on turning her disappointment and anger around in her head. Private Wing! It’s downright degrading, she told herself. That was why she was so upset. It wasn’t – was it? – that she would again be a junior instead of enjoying the responsibility and status of the senior student. But really, she was too honest to be able to keep up that pretence for long. Of course Ngaire had been very perceptive (and she often was a good deal more aware of realities than her flibberty exterior manner suggested) in pinpointing the real cause of Tricia’s irritation. It would indeed be miserable to be back where she had been almost three years before, at the start of her training.

  Inevitably, she slept badly, waking at every sound; a thoughtless junior clattering up the stairs at lunchtime on her way off duty, the buzz of vacuum cleaners as the domestic staff made their desultory way around the big building that was the Nurse’s Home, the distant shrill insistence of the telephone. At four o’clock as she dressed and pinned on her cap, and filled her pockets with scissors and pens and notebook, not even the bright afternoon sunshine pouring into her room cheered her. She ate very little at teatime, settling for a cup of tea and one of the rare cigarettes she allowed herself, and listening glumly to the chatter of the others around her. And seeing Ngaire in the short white socks, white plimsolls and close fitting white cap that marked out the theatre staff didn’t help at all.

  By the time she walked across the courtyard to the red brick building that carried over the main door a plaque that read “St Cuthbert’s Wing for Private Patients Endowed by Sir Samuel Costerd 1931” (and irreverently labelled “St Custard’s” by most of the medical students), she was in a thoroughly unpleasant mood. Her eyes felt sandy and hot – legacy of inadequate sleep after a hard night’s work – and the irritation in her was barely contained.

  So it wasn’t much help to be stopped at the lift gates in the flower-bedecked entrance hall by the bustling and officious hall porter who sat in his small cubbyhole of a lodge in the corner.

  “’Ere, nurse – where you goin’?”

  “Up to the third floor,” Tricia snapped irritably. “Why? What does it matter to you?”

  “A lot, Nurse whateveryournameis. On account of I’m the ’all porter ’ere, and it’s my instructions to stop the lift being used by the nursing staff and the junior medical staff, on account of the fact that this lift is used for patients and their visitors all the time, and staff – except for the senior medical – ’as to use the stairs. Matron said, so there it is. I’ve got to report anyone as doesn’t do as I say about that there lift – ”

  “Oh, go to hell – ” Tricia muttered under her breath, and leaving him still talking ran up the stairs. And as she passed the first and second floors, her nose wrinkled in disgust at the composite smell of expensive perfume and cigar smoke and flowers mixed up with the more familiar hospital odours of antiseptics and soap, floor polish and food. She’d complained sometimes about the smelliness of Men’s Surg. Three, especially after one of the patients had smoked a home-made cigarette or one of those bubbly old pipes so beloved by elderly men, but this was worse somehow – it reeked of money, and Tricia was in no mood to find that in the least tolerable.

  The third floor was quiet when she arrived and stopped just inside the double doors, leaving them swinging behind her. On each side stretched the long polish-gleaming corridor, lined with heavy wooden doors each embellished with a glassed central square, and with vases of elegantly arranged flowers set in the occasional niches between them.

  Outside one of the doors a red light glowed, while a white one winked steadily outside another. She could hear the muffled sound of a radio coming from somewhere, and then a telephone began to ring in the office which faced the main entrance to the floor, and she started forwards and then hesitated. Should she answer it? Not much point, really, seeing she knew nothing about the work of the floor as yet, and had no idea where she’d find someone who did. The phone rang on insistently, and again she stepped forward and again hesitated.

  Then, sharply, the door outside which the red light was burning opened, and a tall woman in Sister’s uniform swept out and hurried along the corridor towards the office. She threw a sharp glance at Tricia as she went past, and said irritably, “Nurse Oxford, I suppose? And how long must a telephone ring before you decide to do something about it?” and not waiting for an answer swept into the office and picked up the phone.

  Tricia, furious, set her jaws. Stupid old bag, she thought angrily. You’d think her own commonsense’d tell her why I didn’t answer it – I’ll soon tell her –

  With a clatter the phone was recradled, and then Sister came out of the office and stopped in front of her.

  “Well, Nurse Oxford? I am Sister Cleland to whom you should have reported on duty – ” she looked at her watch “five minutes ago.”

  “I was here five minutes ago, but I didn’t know where anyone was to report to!” Tricia said sulkily. “And about that phone – ”

  “No excuses, Nurse! I have no time to waste on them. Just remember, on this floor we believe the old proverb – ‘qui s’excuse, s’accuse’. Now, put your cloak in the nurses’ changing room, down there, put a pleasanter expression on your face, and then come back to me here and I will deal with your duties for the rest of the day. Hurry along now!” and she turned and went swiftly back to the room with the red light, leaving Tricia fuming.

  This was really going to be choice! Bad enough to be lumbered with the Private Wing without having to put up with such an old battleaxe of a floor sister into the bargain. As she put her cape on a hook in the changing room, and tweaked her cap straight, Tricia was very close indeed to tears.

  And the next half hour was a pretty miserable one, too. In her office Sister Cleland briskly reeled out a mass of information that Tricia could only just listen to, let alone absorb; patients’ names and diagnoses; the location of such important places as the sluice, the linen cupboard, the sterilising room, the drug cupboard; times of patients’ meals, visiting arrangements, rules about flowers, about talking to visitors, about reporting on and off duty. And at the very end:

  “There is one other very important rule on this floor, Nurse, that I want you to understand clearly. On occasion some patients take it into their heads to give the nurses gifts – and while I cannot really object to the occasional chocolate, I object very strenuously to anything more. Any nurse that accepts a gift in money or kind on this floor will – ”

  “I wouldn’t dream of doing such a thing!” Tricia interrupted, outraged. “It’s bad enough being stuck with private patients without being accused of – ”

  “Oh?” Sister Cleland raised her elegant black eyebrows at that. “So nursing private patients is not to your taste, is it? How unfortunate! And you are too lofty a personality altogether to consider accepting gifts? How remarkable! Well, let us see just how both these statements stand up to the test of the next three months. I have no further time to waste on you now, so go along to the linen cupboard and help sort out the fresh linen delivery. Hurry along now! I have some important nursing work to do, whatever you may think goes on in a private patient’s wing!” And she swept Tricia to one side and went swiftly along the corridor to disappear into the room outside which a white light blinked.

  Seething with temper, Tricia marched along the corridor to the linen cupboard, which was actually big enough to have been dignified with the label of room. Certainly it held not only shelves full of linen, when Tricia pushed the door ope
n, but three other nurses besides, and crowded though it was there was still room for Tricia to join them. And she, a third year student, sent to sort linen like any junior pro, she thought angrily. It was outrageous.

  “Hullo! You our new student nurse? I only hope you’re a bit quicker off the mark than the one who’s just gone!”

  Tricia looked with distaste at the very pretty plump little blonde who was perched on one of the shelves, her legs swinging, and her cap on her lap as she teased and tweaked her hair to a more becoming arrangement.

  “I’m not anybody’s property, as far as I know. I’m a Royal student nurse, but that doesn’t mean I belong to you or anyone else on this floor. And as for the student nurse who was here before me – if you’ve any complaints go and make them to madam Cleland. I’ve no doubt she’ll be only too happy to listen to you – ”

  A small girl, in an all white uniform, busily folding sheets on the far shelf, laughed softly. “Oh, boy! Has she started on you already? Poor old you! She always has to have someone to have a go at. Never mind, me love. It’s not as bad here as you’ll be thinking it is. Take no notice of old Jensen there. She’s as much sense as a fly, the silly ijjut – but what can you expect from one that trained in the wilds of – where was it, Jensen? Birmingham, did you say? Or some such place – ”

  “Better than being chucked up out of a bog in the much wilder wilds of Connemara or wherever it is you slept your training years away,” Jensen said without rancour, and pinned on her cap, peering into the tiny mirror that hung crookedly on the back of the door. “Anyway, Miss Royal Student, don’t get so uppity. We’re all in the same boat, really – stuck with a stinker like Cleland, is it any wonder we have to insult each other to get rid of our spleen? Listen, Gallon, it’s as near five thirty as makes no matter, and I for one am not about to hang around this haven of hygiene one minute longer than I have to. Not unless they dish out some overtime pay, and since they won’t do that, I’m off. Coming?”