by Betty Neels
She turned round and gaped up at him. ‘That’s my case,’ she told him sharply. ‘And I’m not going by car; there’s a bus…’ She drew breath. ‘How did you get here, and why?’
‘How you do chatter.’ He took her arm. ‘I’m on my way back to Salisbury. Margaret rang me this morning and mentioned that you would be on this flight; it seemed only good sense to collect you on my way.’
They had reached the car and he had opened the door and stuffed her inside and put her case in the boot; now he got in beside her. She was still thinking of something to say as, with the minimum of fuss, he drove away from the airport.
‘Had a good trip?’ he asked casually.
‘Yes. Thank you.’ She had remembered that she had never wanted to see him again and she sounded waspish.
‘Still peeved?’
Hateful man. ‘I don’t know what you mean, and please don’t feel that you have to—to entertain me with conversation; I have no wish to come with you. Probably you mean it kindly but I thought I had made it clear that I didn’t want to see you again…’
They were away from the airport and the big car surged silently forward.
‘Yes, yes, I know that, and if you’re bent on keeping to your rigid principles I won’t say another word; you can sit there and pretend I’m not here.’
And he didn’t. They went down the M3 at a spanking pace, slowed to go through Salisbury and ten minutes later slowed again as they reached Wilton. He stopped outside her home, got out, opened her door, fetched her case and banged the knocker on the door.
‘Thank you for the lift,’ said Daisy. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee or—or something?’ She looked as far as his tie and then gave him a quick glance. He was looking down at her, an eyebrow raised to mock her.
‘My dear Daisy, is this an olive-branch?’ He turned to the door as it opened and Mrs Pelham gave a small shriek of delight.
‘Daisy, darling—how lovely.’
She looked enquiringly at the doctor and Daisy said, ‘Hello, Mother. This is Dr Seymour, who kindly brought me home…’
‘That’s twice,’ said her mother, and smiled at him. ‘Come in and have a cup of tea.’
‘I should have liked that, Mrs Pelham, but I’ve an appointment.’
Mrs Pelham nodded sympathetically. ‘Well, of course, you doctors don’t have much time to spare, do you?’
He had nice manners; his goodbyes weren’t to be faulted but the eyes he rested upon Daisy were as cold and hard as granite.
They waited until the Rolls had reached the end of the street before they went indoors.
‘Such a lovely surprise,’ said her mother. ‘I thought you wouldn’t be home for another few weeks, dear.’
‘Well, so did I, Mother, but there was a governess who’d been with friends of the Thorleys and she’s taken over the twins.’
‘Well, I’ll put on the kettle and you shall tell me all about it. Pam will be home soon; she will be pleased.’
Mrs Pelham led the way into the kitchen. ‘That nice doctor driving you back like that. Did he meet you at the airport?’
‘He was on his way to Salisbury and the Thorleys did tell him which flight I’d be on.’
‘Now that is what I call kind; you must have had a delightful journey together.’
Daisy took off her jacket. ‘Oh, yes, we did, indeed we did.’ She uttered the lie so heartily that she almost believed it herself.
CHAPTER FIVE
PAMELA came home when Daisy was halfway through the account of her stay in Holland, so she would have to begin all over again, but before she had a chance to start her sister said, ‘Do tell; this Philip you wrote about, is he nice? Will you see him again?’
‘Perhaps, if he comes home on leave and he hasn’t forgotten me. He had planned to take me to the north of Holland but I’ve come home instead—I only had a few minutes in which to say goodbye.’
Her mother said, ‘There, I knew you’d meet someone nice.’
‘He was just a friend, Mother; I think he felt lonely and he enjoyed showing me round the Hague.’
Her mother looked disappointed. ‘Yes, well, dear…did you meet anyone else while you were there?’
Daisy refilled the teapot from the kettle. ‘Friends of the Thorleys—there are a lot of English people living there—and Dr Seymour; he’s abroad a great deal and he came to see them while I was there.’
‘He didn’t bring you all the way home?’
‘No, I told you, he was on his way from London to Salisbury and Lady Thorley had told him I would be coming back on the late morning flight.’
‘So kind,’ commented her mother. ‘It’s lovely to have you home, Daisy.’ She glanced at Pamela. ‘We’ve managed quite well, I think.’
‘I knew you would. I’ve almost all of my wages; I’ll go to the bank tomorrow and pay them in.’
‘Yes, dear. Now I’m going to get us a nice supper while you unpack.’
It was much later, after Pam had gone to bed and her mother was sitting contentedly knitting, that Daisy took a look at the housekeeping purse and then leafed through the chequebook. Even in those few weeks while she had been away the money seemed to have melted away alarmingly; she would have to start looking for a job as soon as possible.
She spent a couple of days at home, sorting out the small problems her mother had, paying one or two bills which had been overlooked, catching up with the local news and tidying the garden. After the weekend, she promised herself, she would start looking for a job.
There was nothing in the local paper on Saturday so she cycled into Salisbury on Monday morning, bought all the magazines which advertised work and visited two agencies. Neither of them had anything for her; there was, it seemed, no demand for mother’s helps, nannies or unqualified kindergarten teachers. ‘Now if you had simple typing and shorthand,’ suggested the brisk lady at the second agency Daisy went to, ‘I could offer you several good jobs. I suppose you haven’t had any experience in a shop? There’s a good opening for an experienced sales girl in a fancy goods shop.’
Daisy shook her head; she wasn’t sure what fancy goods were anyway, and the lady gave her a scornful look. ‘Well, dear, all I can suggest is that you take a course in something and then try again—there’s always domestic work or work for early morning office cleaners…’
It might even come to that, thought Daisy. How fortunate it was that there was a little money in the bank, enough to keep them all for several weeks, although the uneasy thought that she would have to order coal for the winter very soon haunted her… There was no point in getting pessimistic, she told herself; after all, she had only just started to look for work.
She spent the week applying for various jobs she found in the magazines but they were few and none of the advertisers bothered to answer her applications. So she sat with Razor on her lap, writing an advert to put in the local paper, and had to admit that her skills were too limited to attract more than the casual eye. All the same, she sent it off and went along to the job centre.
There wasn’t anything there, either; it seemed that she was unemployed. But things could have been worse; the local bakery needed part-time help—Friday mornings and Saturday afternoons for two weeks only. It was quite hard work and she didn’t get on very well with the till but the money was a godsend, little though it was. She received her wages for the last time and started to clear up in the shop before she went home. The manageress was totalling the day’s takings and was disposed to be friendly.
‘Well, you’ve not done too badly, love,’ she observed, ‘though I can see it’s not quite your cup of tea; still, anything’s better than having no work, isn’t it?’
Daisy, wiping down the counter, agreed. ‘I’ve liked working here. I dare say something will turn up
soon.’
However, it didn’t, and September was nudging its way into October. Daisy ordered the coal; paying for it left a hole in the bank account, a hole which would have to be filled. She cycled to Salisbury again and tried the two agencies once more; the first one had nothing at all, the second offered her work as a mother’s help in a family of six children living on a farm at Old Sarum; she would have to live in and the wages were low. Daisy said that she would think about it and despite her lack of money went and had a cup of coffee. If only something would happen, she reflected as she drank it.
It was as well that she was unaware that Dr Seymour was drinking coffee too—in her mother’s kitchen. He had called, he told Mrs Pelham, on the spur of the moment. ‘I know my sister will want to know if Daisy has found a good job and I shall be seeing her shortly.’
Mrs Pelham gave him a second cup of coffee and offered biscuits. ‘Daisy’s gone to Salisbury to see those two agencies again; there’s nothing, you know, and you have no idea how difficult it is to find work, and the dear child isn’t trained for anything—you see, my husband died and there was such a lot to see to and I’m not very businesslike and then we found that there wasn’t enough money so she took that job with Mrs Gower-Jones—it was just enough with my pension.’
‘So Daisy has no work yet?’
‘Well, she helped out at the local bakery for two weeks, just for two half-days a week.’ Mrs Pelham paused. ‘I really don’t know why I’m bothering you with all this…’
‘Perhaps I can be of help. I happen to know that the hospital is short of ward orderlies—not domestics but they help with all the small tasks so that the nurses have more time for their own work.’ And since Mrs Pelham was looking bewildered he explained, ‘Helping with the meals, tidying beds, arranging flowers and so on. I believe that the hours are reasonable and the pay is adequate; at least it might tide her over until she finds something more to her taste.’
‘She wouldn’t need any training?’ asked Mrs Pelham eagerly.
He said gently, ‘No, just common sense and kindness, and she has both.’
‘I’ll tell her the moment she gets in…’
‘Why not? But I think it might be a good idea if you don’t mention that I’ve been to see you or that I’ve told you of the job; I think Daisy might resent anything which smacks of charity and it might seem like that to her. Could you not say that you’ve heard of work at the hospital from some friend or acquaintance?’
‘Well, yes, I can do that; we know a great many people in the town—I could have heard about it from a dozen people. And I see what you mean about not telling Daisy that you called and told me about it; she is a dear girl but very independent.’
They had another cup of coffee together and parted on the best of terms and Mrs Pelham sat down and rehearsed what she would say to Daisy when she got home, pausing to regret that the doctor seemed to have no interest in Daisy; his voice had been impersonal when he had talked of her, and why should it have been otherwise? Daisy was no beauty and she had a way of saying exactly what she thought which could be disconcerting; perhaps she had annoyed him in some way, in which case it was kind of him to put himself to the trouble of finding her a job and in all probability he was only doing what his sister had asked him to do.
Daisy, despondent at her lack of success, listened eagerly to her mother’s news when she returned home. ‘I met Mrs Grenville—remember her, dear? She lives somewhere in Salisbury. She was at the market and we got chatting. She told me that they need these orderlies at the hospital; they’re going to advertise but if you went along you might stand a chance before it gets into the paper.’
‘I’ll go in the morning; I can at least apply if there really are vacancies.’
It wasn’t until she woke up in the middle of the night that she remembered Dr Seymour worked at the hospital. Unfortunate, she thought sleepily, but that was a small hindrance compared with the possibility of a secure job.
She telephoned the hospital the next morning and was told that yes, applicants were to be interviewed for several vacancies for ward orderlies and if she cared to present herself at two o’clock that day, bringing with her two references, she would be seen some time during the afternoon.
It was rather daunting to find that she was one of many and one of the last to be interviewed.
She hadn’t much chance of getting a job, she reflected, answering the questions the severe woman behind the desk was asking her, unaware that the severe lady had been discreetly told that, should a Miss Daisy Pelham present herself for an interview, Dr Seymour would vouch for her personally. Thoroughly reliable, hard-working and trustworthy, he had said, previously employed by his sister and leaving only because the children had grown too old for a nanny.
The severe lady did not mention this for the simple reason that she had been told not to; she merely told Daisy that she would be notified if she was successful.
‘I’m not very hopeful,’ said Daisy as she had supper with her mother and sister that evening. ‘There were dozens of us there and most of them looked frightfully efficient.’
‘We’ll have to wait and see,’ sighed her mother placidly.
They didn’t have to wait long; there was a letter the next morning confirming her appointment as a ward orderly, starting on the following Monday. She was to report for work at half-past eight each morning except for Saturdays and Sundays, but she would be expected to work one weekend in four. The wages were adequate; there would be no money to spare but they would be solvent. They had a rather excited breakfast and Pamela said, ‘I’m glad you’ve got a job, Daisy, but you’re not to stay a ward orderly a day longer than you must—if something better turns up… Will the work be rather beastly? Cleaning up after patients and fetching and carrying for the nurses?’
‘It will be interesting,’ said Daisy stoutly.
When she presented herself in a wrap-around pink overall on Monday morning she really found it more than interesting—thoroughly bewildering. She was to work on Women’s Medical with another orderly, a woman in her thirties, who, Daisy quickly discovered, did her work with a kind of dogged thoroughness, disregarding the occupants of the beds—indeed, they might as well have been empty for all the notice she took of them. Daisy, friendly by nature, smiled at the patients, moved their glasses of water where they could reach them, picked up their knitting dropped on the floor and unreachable, and exchanged magazines and papers.
‘You’ll never get your work done while you waste your time with them,’ observed Mrs Brett sourly. ‘Just you collect up them empty cups and take them out to the kitchen. The trolley’s on the landing.’
So Daisy collected cups, wiped locker-tops, collected water jugs and ran errands for Sister, who, beyond asking her her name and telling her to do whatever Mrs Brett told her to do, had had nothing more to say to her. Mrs Brett, relishing her superiority, told her to do a great deal: carry round the trays at lunchtime, help frail elderlies to the loo, change sheets in the beds of those who had had unfortunate accidents and hurry with bowls to those who felt sick. It was all very muddled and Daisy wasn’t sure if she was going to like it; Mrs Brett was far too bossy and the nurses were too busy to see it…
She was sent to the canteen for her lunch at half-past twelve and was much more cheered to find several girls of her own age at the table, orderlies like herself and prepared to be friendly, and when she told them where she was working a comfortably plump girl with a pleasant country accent observed kindly that it was hard luck having to work with Mrs Brett, who had been at the hospital for a long time and behaved as though she ran the place. ‘A pity that once you get a ward you stay on it, though you might be lucky and get moved.’
Daisy went back for the afternoon’s work feeling more cheerful; it was, after all, her first day and probably Mrs Brett would be nicer when they got to know each
other. Mrs Brett, however, wasn’t disposed to be friendly; indeed if anything she became more sharp-tongued as the afternoon wore on. Daisy, her day’s work done, went home and presented a cheerful face to her mother and sister; the work was interesting, she was sure she was going to like it, and to her mother’s enquiry as to whether she had met any of the doctors on the ward she said no, not yet, not wishing to disappoint her parent with the fact that the doctors, even the young housemen, didn’t so much as cast a glance in her direction and weren’t likely to either; an orderly was a domestic after all.
By the end of the week she had come to the conclusion that Mrs Brett, for all her bossiness, wasn’t organised; there was a great deal of time wasted over their various jobs and far too much to-ing and fro-ing. Besides, she didn’t much like the way Mrs Brett tossed knives, spoons and forks on to the patients’ beds ready for their meals, so that some of the less agile patients had to wait until someone bringing their lunch- or tea-tray scooped them up and handed them over. Daisy knew better than to say anything and, uncaring of Mrs Brett’s cross voice, nipped around arranging things within reach, and tidily too, and when Mrs Brett wasn’t looking cutting up food and filling water glasses. She got the sharp edge of her colleague’s tongue several times a day but she ignored that. One day, she promised herself, she would tell Mrs Brett just what she thought of her. It was a great pity that she was allowed to do more or less what she liked on the ward but to Sister she presented an appearance of hard-working efficiency, ready with the tea-tray when that lady sat down in her office to do the paperwork and running errands for the nurses. The patients didn’t like her; indeed, some of the elderlies who depended on a helping hand were a little afraid of her.
Daisy, going home at the end of the first week with her pay packet in her pocket, decided that even if she didn’t much like being an orderly the job provided her family’s bread and butter and gave her the chance to help some of the patients.