Coming Home to Liverpool

by Kate Eastham

  Maud walked down the steps of the Nurses’ Home like a machine. It was cold and starting to mizzle with rain as they made their way back through the city. She held on tight to Alice, glad to have her friend by her side. Whatever would we women do without each other, she thought to herself, as she felt the warmth of Alice’s hand in her own.

  14

  ‘A careful nurse will keep a constant watch over her sick, especially weak, protracted and collapsed cases …’

  Florence Nightingale

  Maud carried one bag and Alice managed the other as they wove their way quietly through the city on their way to work the next day. As Maud walked she tried to raise a smile for Alice, as she chatted of this and that. She felt relieved somehow to be moving back to the Nurses’ Home. It felt like she was reclaiming something that she’d mistakenly given up. Even the thought of living there, on site, right next to the hospital, and having the heavy wooden door of the Nurses’ Home that was routinely locked by ten p.m., gave her a feeling of satisfaction and safety. She wanted to retreat from everything else and feel even closer to the work that she intended to live and breathe from now on.

  Maybe, once she was back in her own room, with her copy of Notes on Nursing resting on the bedside table, and her uniform hanging neatly in the closet, she would be able to get some proper sleep at last. She’d lain awake for a good part of the night again, with fragments of recent and long-gone conversations and flashes of Harry and Nancy, all jostling for attention in her head. And even though they’d started lighting the fire in Alice’s bedroom, the dank cold still continued to seep up from the flags. She’d got up from her makeshift bed in a state of despair, in the end, and decided to keep her mind busy by sitting at the kitchen table to write her note to Miss Fairchild, telling her not to worry, that all was well, that she’d be moving back into the Nurses’ Home for the time being. She told her that she would be up to the house to see her as soon as possible but, in the meantime, please could she send the sewing machine to the Nurses’ Home on Dover Street? When Miss Merryweather had mentioned bringing her own sticks of furniture, Maud had thought instantly of the Singer – she knew that she could put it to very good use, making up bandages and compresses and hemming cotton squares for theatre.

  Miss Merryweather’s door clicked open as soon as they were in through the door of the Nurses’ Home.

  ‘Put the bags in here for now, girls,’ she said firmly, holding the door of her office open. ‘I’ll show you up to the room this evening, when you’ve got time to unpack. Just knock on my door when you come off duty. It’s good to have you back, Nurse Linklater,’ she called over her shoulder as she marched towards the nurses’ dining room.

  ‘Are you really all right, Maud?’ asked Alice. ‘I hope you’re going to manage on your own. I was hoping to keep you with me at Stella’s for longer, so that I could make sure that you were back on form.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry, I’m fine,’ said Maud distractedly, as she fumbled with the fastening of her apron.

  ‘You keep saying that, Maud. But how can you be fine?’ Alice stepped around to fasten Maud’s apron. ‘It wouldn’t be natural for you to be fine,’ she continued, blinking back her own tears as she turned to face Maud and took hold of both her hands.

  Maud sighed heavily and then looked Alice straight in the eye. ‘You’re right,’ she said, quietly. ‘I’m not fine … but once I get on the ward, I know that I will be able to lose myself in the work, and I’m hoping that the rest of me will catch up in due course.’

  ‘That’s a better response,’ murmured Alice, giving Maud’s hands a squeeze. ‘And are you sure about moving back in? I was feeling a bit jealous of you. But seeing Miss Merryweather stepping out of her door, with her face all stern – and knowing, for sure, that the woman can almost detect the sound of a pin dropping in the wrong place – I’m thinking it might be much better, after all, to be out through that door every evening.’

  Maud gave a wan smile. ‘Well, we’ll see, I suppose,’ she said, reaching up to the shelf for her starched cap. ‘She’s always been a good sort, though, really, Miss Merryweather, underneath it all.’

  ‘Maud, she is terrifying,’ laughed Alice, ‘but not as terrifying as Sister Law. So we’d best get a move on, or she’ll be on your back. You’re on her ward again today, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Maud, ‘we have a very poorly patient, Mr Langer, a collapsed case. If he’s made it through the night, I’m hoping that he’ll be showing some signs of recovery.’

  ‘Well, Sister Tweedy on Male Surgical nights is excellent. But you know what it’s like around three or four a.m., that’s when the patients are at their weakest. I’m sure there are more deaths around that time of day than any other. So if he’s made it through the night then that has to be a good sign.’

  Maud went straight to Mr Langer’s bed, relieved to find him alive and breathing, but she could see immediately that there was no sign of recovery for him. She picked up his wrist to check the radial pulse. It was rapid, but at least she could see from the chart by his bed that his temperature, although still worryingly elevated, had come down a notch.

  ‘Just keep going, Mr Langer,’ she murmured, as she moved away from the bed and made her way to the group of nurses assembled at the top of the ward. She saw Sister Law’s steely glare soften a little when she met her own.

  But then Sister was glancing around the group, narrowing her eyes, and Nurse Devlin nearly jumped out her skin when she pointed a finger at her and shouted, ‘You!’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nurse Devlin, her voice sounding small against the background noise of the ward.

  ‘Where is your apron?’

  Nurse Devlin glanced down and looked up, wide-eyed. ‘Bejasus, I forgot.’

  ‘Forgot!’ cried Sister Law. ‘Would you forget your head, if it were loose? It’s a very good job that you worked so well with Nurse Linklater yesterday, otherwise there would be no excuse for this. Now go to the sluice, you will find a pile of clean aprons there.’

  As soon as Nurse Devlin had left the group, Sister glanced at Maud and gave her a small conspiratorial smile.

  Maud nodded. She knew what Sister Law was like and, after all, she had a reputation to uphold. But Maud knew already that if she ever did become a ward sister, she would have a very different approach, something much more akin to Sister Pritchard’s – a real stickler but also fair and kind.

  When Nurse Devlin returned, she was in full uniform and they were ready to receive Sister’s report.

  ‘That’s better,’ proclaimed Sister Law, lifting her chin and puffing out her chest. ‘Now we can begin. And Nurse Devlin … I want you to work with Nurse Linklater again this morning.’

  Maud was pleased to be given the job of supervising the probationer. ‘We’ll start with a blanket bath for Mr Langer,’ she said, checking first the dressing and then the condition of his foot. It still appeared congested, but no more so than yesterday, and there was no darkening of colour.

  ‘You wash and I’ll dry, Nurse Devlin. You know the drill: start with his face, then his hands and arms, and then the torso, legs and private parts. Then we change the water and get a nurse assistant to help us roll him on to his side, and we’ll wash his back – even though he is in a comatose state, he will feel the benefit. And we can make sure that he has clean sheets underneath him with no creases, Nurse Devlin, no creases!’ Maud kept a watchful eye on the probationer. ‘That’s right, yes, use a little bit of soap on the flannel. And don’t forget to rinse the cloth in the bowl of cool water and then sponge him down again.’

  Maud liked the way that Nurse Devlin applied just the right amount of pressure as she used the flannel. She noted how she took care with the angles of Mr Langer’s face, and when she washed his hands she cleaned between the fingers and gave a soothing wipe to the palm of his hand.

  Maud had chosen the softest towel that she could find to dry him, and when she wiped his chest she could feel the muscle tone. He was a very stro
ng man and she knew, having nursed other men who worked at the sugar refinery, that the work there was heavy. The men had to be tough to manage the heavy lifting, and they worked in extremes of heat. The sugar boilers, like Mr Langer, were skilled workers, and no doubt he would have served a long apprenticeship in Hamburg or Hanover before he came to Liverpool. She’d heard stories that the men worked almost naked and drank gallons of beer each day just to survive.

  After the blanket bath was complete, and Maud had rubbed some liniment on to the reddened areas of skin on Mr Langer’s shoulders, sacrum and right heel, she made sure she was satisfied with the smoothness of the sheets, his change of position and the placing of the pillow, complete with fresh pillowcase, before she checked his mouth. His tongue was dry and furred, and his lips were dry.

  ‘This is a very important job in the nursing of any patient, but especially a fever patient, Nurse Devlin. I want you to go and find the small sponges that we use for mouth care and give his mouth and lips a good clean with water. Let him suck the sponge if he shows the inclination – the more fluid he has the better. And when you’re finished, apply some salve to his lips.’

  After Nurse Devlin had performed the mouth care to Maud’s satisfaction, it was time to re-dress the wound. Maud breathed with relief when she saw that it was still clean after the carbolic acid irrigation. They repacked it with saturated charpie and covered it with a dry dressing. Thankfully, the stiffened bandage that supported the fracture seemed to have dried out and it was still doing the job of immobilizing the leg.

  ‘All seems well with the wound, at least. But we still need to come back every two hours, on the dot, to move his position. We need to keep an eye on those reddened areas of skin and prevent a bedsore,’ said Maud, firmly. ‘It is the fault of the nursing if a patient develops a sore whilst in hospital, Nurse Devlin. And in a debilitated patient a bedsore can prove fatal.’

  Nurse Devlin nodded, soaking up all the information.

  ‘Now, Nurse Devlin, I’m going to move along to our next patient. Can I leave you to take Mr Langer’s temperature? Oh, and we need to apply another poultice to his foot, exactly the same as yesterday. And don’t make it too hot, bring it to me for checking before you apply it.’

  ‘Yes, Sis—I mean, Nurse Linklater.’

  There was no stopping Maud that morning, her whole being was attuned to the needs of her patients. Every tiny detail was accounted for and dealt with promptly. If she’d stopped for a moment, she would have been exhausted. But she didn’t stop, she couldn’t stop, because if she did, thoughts of Harry and the baby would sneak in and then build and build. No, she wanted to work, she needed to work. And that was that.

  Every two hours, Maud and Nurse Devlin checked Mr Langer, changed his position, administered his teaspoon of brandy and offered him a sip of water. He was still swallowing, at least there was that, and maybe he was taking a little more fluid than yesterday. And when Nurse Devlin removed the six-inch-long mercury thermometer from his armpit for the second reading of the day, it was still down a notch from the previous day.

  ‘Any change, Nurse Linklater?’ queried Mr Jones. He’d already seen Mr Langer on the ward round but he’d returned for another look.

  ‘Not so far. But thankfully, there doesn’t seem to be any further deterioration.’

  ‘Mmm,’ sighed Mr Jones, ‘let’s give it a bit longer. But if there’s no improvement by the end of the day, we’ll have to start treatment with mercury drops.’

  Maud nodded, praying that Mr Langer rallied. In other cases where she’d seen mercury drops used to treat inflammation and prevent poisoning of the blood, they’d made a terrible mess of the patient’s mouth, causing sores and bleeding gums. And invariably the patient had died anyway.

  ‘There is nothing more we can do, other than keep up with the routine of care and maintain a constant watch,’ offered Maud when Nurse Devlin gave a sigh, after they’d moved Mr Langer’s position for the fourth time that day.

  ‘But only the other day he was laughing and joking,’ murmured Nurse Devlin.

  ‘I know,’ breathed Maud. ‘But we can’t lose hope. If we do, then what about his family? They’ll be visiting soon. We need to keep fostering hope for the patient and for the family.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ murmured Nurse Devlin, with the glint of realization in her eyes. If she stayed the course as a probationer, Maud had no doubt whatsoever that she would become an exemplary trained nurse. She’d learnt in the first year of her training that the trick was to feel for your patients but learn to manage it, so that you could stay strong, still do the work and, most of all, help those in your care. A nurse wracked with sorrow would struggle to provide effective support for her patients or their families. It wasn’t easy, she knew that, but if Nurse Devlin could learn to manage it, there was a lifetime of rewarding work that lay ahead of her.

  ‘Are we all set for visiting?’ called Sister Law, down the ward, glaring at Nurse Devlin and then smiling at Maud.

  ‘Yes, Sister,’ shouted Maud, casting her eyes up and down each side of the ward, just to make sure.

  Maud saw Mrs Langer and the children come slowly into the ward, the two eldest glancing sorrowfully at their mother when they could see that their father was still lying flat in the bed. Maud smiled as she saw three-year-old Martha break away from them and run up the ward, her blonde curls bouncing as she made her way to the bed. She might look like a little angel but the girl was full of mischief.

  ‘Daddy, Daddy,’ she called, reaching up to pat his hand. ‘Daddy!’ she shouted, frowning now and pulling at his hand.

  Maud was instantly there and about to gently restrain the girl when she heard Mr Langer groan and, to her astonishment and great relief, he half opened his eyes.

  ‘Daddy!’ the little girl squealed with delight.

  ‘Hello there,’ said Maud, catching her breath and laughing now as her patient rubbed a hand weakly over his face and then looked down at his daughter.

  ‘Martha,’ he whispered, his voice husky. ‘Martha.’

  Mrs Langer was crying and the other two children were jumping up and down with excitement, and all the while Maud was doing her best to try and explain to Mr Langer exactly what had been happening over the last few days. Nurse Devlin came out of the sluice. She ran over to the bed and was hugging the children. Sister Law appeared at the bottom of the bed – her face impassive, as she took in the whole scene – and then even she beamed a smile at Mr Langer and his family.

  Maud was still smiling as she walked down the ward. Then she heard someone calling, ‘Psst, psst,’ from just outside the door. She went straight there, realizing, just too late to withdraw, that it was Harry. She stepped through the door to confront him as he stood swaying, with the dog at his side, his face flushed from drink.

  ‘I need to ask you to leave. And do not try to see me again,’ she said firmly, her steady voice belying the tightness in her chest and the pounding of her heart. She couldn’t look him in the eye but she was sorely tempted to reach down and stroke Rita, who was wagging her tail furiously.

  ‘Hear me out,’ he pleaded. ‘Please, Maud.’

  She put her head back in through the door and glanced up the ward. She could see Sister Law and Nurse Devlin, busy with a patient; she didn’t want to risk him following her in through the door, if she turned and left him standing there.

  ‘Just one minute, that’s all. And you’re not supposed to bring dogs in here, you know that.’

  ‘All I want to say is, I don’t even remember what happened with her … I was drunk, I’m ashamed to say. When you walked away from me at the docks that day, I didn’t want to go to her place, I told her I was going to stay with a mate of mine. But she was stamping mad, she tried to push me, and the baby slipped from her grasp – the poor little mite would have fallen to the ground if I hadn’t grabbed hold of her. So I had to go home with her then. I didn’t trust her to look after the baby. And now, she’s threatening me with all kinds of things. She
’s not in her right mind, Maud. I don’t know what to do about her, and I fear for the baby. Little Flora, she never asked for any of this, but it’s like Nancy doesn’t want to look after her properly. I’ve been up all night with her, and she’s feeding from a bottle. But she’s only tiny. I’m worried that she might get sick.’

  Maud was shaking her head now. Just hearing the baby girl’s name made her want to cry. ‘I don’t know what you expect from me, Harry,’ she gasped, and then her voice was wavering. ‘There isn’t anything I can do. This is your situation with her …’ She couldn’t even say her name. ‘You need to deal with it, and I think it’s only fair that you leave me alone from now on.’

  ‘Oh, Maud,’ he croaked, starting to cry, and then the dog was whining as well.

  ‘I’m sorry, Harry. I need to go back to the ward. Sorry,’ she said, leaving him there, knowing that he was watching her as she walked away.

  ‘Are you all right?’ said Nurse Devlin, a frown creasing her smooth brow.

  ‘Yes, I’m fine,’ said Maud, gritting her teeth and heading for the sluice. She closed the door behind her and leant back against it. Hard, bitter tears erupted from her as she stood, all alone. Swallowing the pain, feeling her chest sore and aching with it, she grabbed a clean towel off the shelf and wiped it round her face. Then she got a flannel and dipped it in cold water, ruthlessly wringing it out over the sink and then pressing it to her eyes. ‘I will be all right,’ she murmured, wiping her face again, straightening her back, then making sure that her apron and her cap were perfectly positioned before she took a deep breath and went back out on to the ward to finish her shift.

  Maud was wary as she left the hospital. She peeped out from the main door, making sure that Harry wasn’t waiting, before walking quickly along the footpath to the Nurses’ Home and running up the steps, grateful of the heavy sound of the door as it closed behind her.