There were never any conversations regarding what would happen should Aileen want to marry. There had never been any conversations about David, ever. When he died, their interest in him had died too and it was at that point that Aileen had realized her mother and sister weren’t really interested in her, either. She had placed a photograph of David in his uniform on the mantelpiece. A week after he died, her mother asked her to take it down. ‘I don’t want to look at it all day while you’re at work,’ she’d snapped, and Aileen had obliged, putting David’s picture out of sight on her bedside table.
Day after day she would save her tears until bedtime, and then, once the lights were out, she would sob herself into a well of despair. It was only now, ten years on, that she could think of him without feeling a pain deep beneath her diaphragm, only now that she could even contemplate a life with someone else. But it was too late; she was too old. She had spent her best years grieving for a man who had died of his wounds on the battlefield. Missing in action, along with her heart. She would have given up nursing in a flash for David. But after he died, she put her heart and soul into her job at St Angelus. Even though Matron had now made it possible to be married and continue nursing, Aileen knew that Josie assumed she would never marry, that she would remain a spinster and continue being the one who looked after their mother.
They never discussed this, however. Aileen avoided confrontation whenever possible. Her nature was always to please. She’d had her thirtieth birthday earlier in the year, in the summer, and she could almost hear Josie breathing a sigh of relief. She imagined her saying to her husband, James, ‘That’s it, Aileen’s on the shelf, we’re safe. Mother won’t ever have to live with us.’
It was a fact that there was no love lost between Josie and Aileen. Mrs Paige knew this and Aileen sometimes wondered if Josie exaggerated the extent of the bad feeling between them, using it as an excuse to spend less time with their mother. Either way, Aileen couldn’t bring herself to put it to the test, couldn’t face the inevitable upset and drama that would come if she ever had cause to say to Josie, ‘It’s your turn now.’ As a result, Aileen, despite having received many invitations to go out for suppers or drinks with potential suitors, had never allowed things to go any further than a few dates. And anyway, no one could match David.
Most of those dates had been while she was living at the Lovely Lane home, before her mother’s stroke. Mrs Duffy used to encourage her, telling her how beautiful she looked when she walked out of the door and leaving a supper in her room for when she got back. Since she’d moved home again, though, she’d been on only a few dates. She never left until her mother was ready for bed and pretended that she was going to a choir meeting at the church. But she always felt so sick with guilt and worry that the date was inevitably a disaster. She couldn’t live with herself and the lies she had to tell just to have a night out. It was far easier simply to stay at home, do whatever it took to keep her mother happy and reread David’s letters.
Joining the choir, however, had genuinely transformed her life. Although it was an activity her mother didn’t exactly approve of – she rarely approved of anything – she had not objected with the forcefulness she was notorious for. Aileen had agreed to take part in the Christmas concert at St George’s Hall and even she was slightly amazed by how much she was looking forward to it. When she sang, she forgot her life. Her heart sang with her, and sometimes the words, music and harmonies moved her to tears. They were tears of joy rather than sadness, and why this happened, she couldn’t explain. But it was something she wanted to hold on to, and that meant secrecy and managing her mother in such a way as not to endanger the one thing, other than her job, that brought her pleasure.
‘Oh, take that away.’ Using what Aileen called her good hand, her mother waved away the plate of buttered toast Aileen had made to her precise instructions.
‘But you said last night that you wanted me to make you eggs and toast.’
‘That was last night. You haven’t asked me this morning.’
Aileen sighed and set the plate back down on the tray. As she did so, she glanced up at the framed picture on the mantelpiece of her father and mother, Josie and herself. She could sometimes feel her father’s presence, as though he was looking down on her, and right now his eyes were imploring her. Patience, Aileen, she thought she could hear him say.
Aileen had been told for all of her life that she looked just like her father, took after him, and that Josie took after their mother. He had fought with his wife for most of their married life. In the photograph, her mother was sitting on a wicker bench, Aileen and Josie to either side and their father standing behind, his hand on their mother’s shoulder, beaming. He’d served as an RAF group captain in the war and had died in 1943, leaving them all devastated. Neither rich nor poor, Mrs Paige and the two girls managed to get by, but as reserves began to dwindle and the cost of living began to rise, Aileen became increasingly determined to rise as high up as she could within the nursing profession and help finance the running of the house.
Always keen to keep everyone else happy, Aileen’s secret was to work as hard as possible. If she was never to marry or become a mother, she would have to succeed at her job. When other women closed their eyes and dreamt of wedding dresses and electric washing machines, Aileen imagined herself wearing a matron’s uniform. Her mother’s stroke had threatened these plans, but thanks to the intervention of Sister Tapps she now had Gina to help out at home. Gina had proved to be more resilient than Aileen could ever have hoped and was well worth the seven and six a week she paid her out of her nursing wage.
The toast was now back on the tray and Aileen placed a large cup into her mother’s good hand.
‘I will drink the tea, if it keeps you happy and stops you worrying about me when you’re at work,’ her mother said with very little sincerity.
‘Do you need help?’ Aileen asked, her own voice full of genuine care and affection.
‘No, thank you, I can manage quite well. Tell me, do you have anything exciting happening today?’
Aileen let the sugar lump drop from the tongs into her tea and began to stir. ‘We have a new student nurse from the Lovely Lane home starting on paediatrics this morning. There were meant to be three of them, but I think Matron lost a couple to Christmas leave. Apart from that, I’m expecting nothing out of the ordinary.’
As Aileen ate her breakfast, she thought about the fact that her mother had never once asked her if she wanted to marry and have a family of her own. She never asked if there was anyone Aileen cared for, a sweetheart on the horizon maybe. Even Aileen understood that she was regarded by most as attractive. Enough people had told her so – it was embarrassing how many people commented on her big blue eyes. She was well aware that her long thick fair hair was her best feature and she looked after it carefully, combing it through from her scalp to the ends one hundred times a night as she sat in front of her triptych dressing-table mirror. She often sighed wistfully, knowing that she could take as long as she wished. There was no one waiting for her to finish and only the cold crisp sheets to welcome her into bed.
There were times when she would stare at her own reflection for so long, her vision would blur and then she’d imagine him into the mirror, sitting on the bed behind her. It used to be David, but the man who now appeared on her bed was a stranger, someone she didn’t know and hadn’t loved. When had David left? When had his face slipped from her memory? The man on the bed was no longer David. It was just her imagination whispering the words she so desperately wanted to hear, if only it could happen, even just the once. The voice of a man who wanted her to join him.
As her mother sipped on her scalding tea, her white hair glowing in the firelight and the drips from the bottom of her cup seeping into the multi-coloured strands of the crocheted blanket that covered her knees, Aileen wondered why they had never had that conversation. Why it was that her mother had never encouraged her to go out and enjoy herself, to find a boyfriend, to ma
rry and have children of her own. It occurred to her that her mother was afraid. Afraid of what would become of her if Aileen ever did want to settle down. Her mother would rather ignore the possibility, believe it would never happen.
The only children in Aileen’s life were those she nursed on her ward and then handed back, along with a little bit of her own heart, to their grateful parents. Did her mother not realize that? Could she not sense Aileen’s aching loneliness?
Not wanting to dwell on her mother’s selfishness, and feeling guilty for entertaining such thoughts, Aileen sprang to her feet and began to clear away the breakfast things. ‘Right, I will miss the bus if I don’t hurry. Let’s move your chair, shall we, Mother?’
Mrs Paige liked to sit in the bay window during the day, once the room had warmed up. She said she needed the light to read by, but she also spent much of her time simply watching the street as it went about its business.
‘Leave the tray, Aileen. I might get the girl to pour me more tea. Off you go.’
‘Her name is Gina, Mother. She has been here long enough now. Please try and remember her name.’
Mrs Paige snorted her derision. ‘Are you going to your choir thing again tonight? You seem to be going rather a lot at the moment. Is it really necessary?’
‘I told you, Mother, we’re putting on a carol concert on Christmas Eve, so we need lots of rehearsals. We don’t have one tonight though.’
‘What on earth do you need to practise for? You know all the words and have done since you were a child. What a ridiculous waste of time.’
Aileen’s spirits dropped. How could she explain that their choirmaster was doing the most amazing things with the mix of male and female voices. That the harmonies and descants sounded spiritual, as though their words were being lifted heavenwards on the wings of angels. The acoustics sent a thrill down her spine and if she could have called into the Anglican cathedral and sung every night, she would. It was going to be a very special concert, not only because of all the different choirs, but also because everyone, from the sailors in the port to the gentry who lived on Rodney Street, would stand side by side as they sang together.
‘Well, I can’t let people down. Anyway, I have to go now, Mother. Gina will be up to take you to the toilet as soon as I leave, and she’s going to pop down to the shops first thing to catch the post office for you, so give her your list.’
As she stacked her own cup on to her plate, Aileen popped a kiss on the top of her mother’s head. ‘See you later,’ she said, and within seconds she was outside on the landing shouting, ‘Gina, can you come and take this tray, please. I have to dash.’
*
Mrs Paige stared at the closed door, listening. She hated Aileen leaving her alone. She resented the children she looked after and she resented Matron for employing her, but worse than all of that, she loathed Sister Tapps for encouraging and helping her.
The days always felt as though they would last for ever, until Aileen returned home to sit with her. At least today she could ask Gina to buy her the Reveille. She would read every one of its gossipy articles, as slowly as she could, to make the paper last.
She used to live in fear of Aileen meeting someone and of her marrying, setting up her own home and returning there each evening after work instead of tending to her. She said a prayer of thanks daily for the fact that this hadn’t happened, and now that Aileen had turned thirty, she was confident it wouldn’t. Aileen’s chances of finding a husband were thankfully well and truly over. Since the war, men had been in short supply in Liverpool. Those who were married stayed married. It was a Catholic city and divorce a shameful, unheard-of option. Even though they never talked about it, Mrs Paige knew that Aileen was sad that she would never marry. But her sadness would pass soon enough.
Leaning back in her chair, she watched as Aileen ran down the road for the bus. There she goes, she thought, as she heard the squeal of brakes and caught a glimpse of her daughter’s green Paisley headscarf as she reached the bottom of the road and hopped on. She lifted her good hand and grasped at the gold cross and chain around her neck. ‘It won’t happen now. No husband for Aileen, please God. Keep her busy. Keep her with me.’ She whispered her prayer and, as she did so, felt not a shred of guilt.
Gina tapped on the bedroom door.
‘Go away! Come back in twenty minutes when I ring the bell,’ Mrs Paige shouted with little grace or gratitude.
Standing up with ease, she pulled the tray table towards her, picked up a slice of toast, bit into it and then speedily began to crack the top of the eggs Aileen had brought her. Her bad hand, which was nowhere near as bad as she made out, held on to the eggs as she cracked them open with the good hand.
‘Hard,’ she grumbled to herself as she scooped out the yolk and devoured it, but she didn’t care. Hard eggs were a small price to pay to ensure that her daughter remained concerned about her and kept her uppermost in her mind throughout the day. Enough to send Aileen hurrying back home as soon as her shift finished.
8
Beth and Pammy stood at the top of the stairs. To the right were the large wooden doors to ward three. To the left, ward four.
‘Well, good luck then.’ Pammy smiled at Beth, who looked as miserable as it was possible to be.
‘Thanks a lot,’ Beth replied. ‘I wonder who I’ll bathe and dress first – the children, the special teddy or the dollies that Sister Tapps is apparently so fond of.’
Footsteps came running up the stairs towards them and they both looked down, keen to see who was daring to contravene Matron’s strictest rule: ‘No running unless in the case of fire, haemorrhage or cardiac arrest.’ The mystery was solved as the top of Anthony Mackintosh’s head came into view.
Pammy smiled and her tummy flipped.
‘Oh, there you are,’ he said as he grabbed the banister, propelled himself up the final few steps and stopped short at the sight of the girls. ‘I just came to wish you good luck.’ A grin spread across his face as he took in their startled expressions. ‘Morning, girls, how are you?’
Pretty much any other nurse at St Angelus would have thought they’d died and gone to heaven if their gorgeous doctor boyfriend had come running down the hospital corridors to wish them good luck, but Pammy was oblivious. ‘Thanks, I’m going to need it,’ she said.
‘Me too,’ said Beth. ‘Sister Tapps puts the new girls on teddy-and dolly-washing. I’ve heard that Mr Golliwog can be a very difficult customer and doesn’t like having his hair washed, and as for Miss Golden Curls, well, she is very lippy indeed if you don’t brush her hair just so.’
They both stifled their giggles and Pammy placed her hand over her mouth to stop herself from laughing out loud. Beth could not have been more grumpy if she’d tried.
‘Listen up,’ Anthony whispered, ‘I’ve been on ward three all night. There’s been a patient in overnight, one of the worst cases of neglect I’ve ever seen.’
‘Oh, gosh,’ said Beth, looking around to make sure no one had heard him. ‘On ward three? I’m on four, so I won’t get to be involved.’
But before she could say another word, the ward doors opened and, to their utter amazement, Matron strode out. The look on her face rooted them all to the spot.
‘Good morning, Dr Mackintosh. Have you now abandoned casualty and decided to try your hand at paediatrics after having spent one night here? I had no idea that the rumours about there being no end to your talents were true. Has casualty become too tedious and boring for you now?’
Despite his being an experienced doctor, Anthony Mackintosh’s response to Matron was immediate and beyond his control. She had more power over him than either of his late parents. ‘Er, no, thank you, Matron, I was just on my way back to casualty to wash up after the night, and then to bed.’ He had the good grace to look guilty. He knew that what he had just said was profoundly stupid.
‘Are you indeed? Have you suffered from some form of memory lapse? How often do you run up the stairs to casualty – which
is on the ground floor, as well you know.’
Anthony blushed to the roots of his hair. Only Matron could make him do that. She had the ability to make even the most senior consultants feel as though they were back in the nursery and answering to nanny. They discussed this often in the doctors’ sitting room, and just that morning on casualty old Mabbutt had been complaining that he couldn’t stand up to her, and he was the most abrasive and sweariest of them all. There was nothing quite as funny as hearing Matron tell Mabbutt off when he was using his favourite word, ‘bloody’. ‘That is quite enough of your bad language, Mr Mabbutt, really,’ Matron would say. ‘Behave yourself. You are not on the dock streets, you are working in a hospital and I will not tolerate it.’ It was the joke of the hospital, how huge, towering Mr Mabbutt blushed and shrank, simpering, ‘Yes, Matron. Sorry Matron.’
Matron’s eye did not waver as she held Anthony’s.
‘I’m on my way now, Matron.’
‘Well, that’s just as well because my nurses are about to be terribly busy, as you are well aware. I would hate to think that you had run all the way up the stairs from casualty, where you are actually needed, to prevent them from going about their duties?’
‘No, Matron, of course I didn’t. I wouldn’t.’ And without another word, Anthony was back down the stairs, quicker than he had climbed them, desperate to avoid further interrogation. He was the one who laughed at Mabbutt the most, when he and the other doctors discussed Matron’s effect on them all, and yet she had the exact same effect on him.
The trio listened in silence as his footsteps echoed down the corridor towards casualty. Looking satisfied at having reprimanded Dr Mackintosh, and obviously taking some pleasure in his discomfort, Matron continued. Such an obvious endorsement of her authority, despite her progressing years, made her feel surprisingly pleased with herself. But in a flash her small smile of satisfaction disappeared. Her expression became solemn and she turned to face her nurses.
With mouths dry, palms damp and hearts beating faster, both nurses noted the swift sweep of her eyes across their shoes and uniforms. They almost let out an audible sigh of relief when she made no criticism. Beth’s hand flew to the fob watch pinned to her apron under her cape and straightened it. As if alerted by the movement, Matron turned to her.
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