Edinburgh Excursion

by Lucilla Andrews

  I unwound her bandage. ‘Really?’

  ‘Indeed, yes. And then down to Cambridge to take his degree.’

  I sat on my heels to rewind. ‘Which college?’

  She tightened her invisible lips as if she considered that an impertinence, then recalled I was English. ‘You’ve nursed in Cambridge?’

  ‘No. That’s where my parents met when my mother was in her third year and my father doing post-graduate research.’

  ‘Indeed?’ From her expression I’d shot into the ranks of nice people. ‘Your parents don’t object to your doing this work?’

  My parents wouldn’t have taken serious objection had I chosen to be a stripper, providing I enjoyed the work and kept union rules. ‘They’re all for it. They know I love nursing.’

  ‘How much nursing experience have you actually had, my dear?’

  I wondered if I had imagined that note of appeal in her prim, plushy voice. Then I saw the anxiety at the back of her rather vacant pale-blue eyes. I gave her my professional history in detail.

  ‘Then you’ll know a little about’ ‒ she looked away ‒ ‘women’s troubles.’

  ‘A little.’ I watched her closely. ‘Are you having a little trouble, Mrs Graham?’

  She smoothed her skirt. ‘I don’t really care to talk about it, Nurse. It’s ‒ not nice.’

  I guessed, and correctly. ‘Have you told your doctor? Mrs Graham, you should.’

  ‘I couldn’t think of that! He’s a man!’

  I had heard that too often to underestimate the problem it seemed to her. ‘Have you never thought of having a private talk with the clinic sister?’

  ‘Nurse, it’s a varicose-vein clinic ‒ so busy ‒ and it’s not a subject I could bring myself to discuss with just anyone. The clinic sister is kind, but ‒ from Yorkshire. Very brusque.’

  ‘Some Yorkshirewomen can give that impression, though I’ve always found them wonderfully kind underneath. Have you ever had a cervical test?’

  She blushed. ‘Oh no, Nurse! It was mentioned, but I couldn’t, at my age. I’m sixty-three.’

  It took fifteen minutes to persuade her Martha’s gynaecological department considered the test should be taken every two years by women over forty, married or single, and ideally over thirty-five. ‘It only takes a few minutes. It does not hurt at all, and it can save lives. Can I get one fixed up for you? If not with your own doctor, I’m certain he’ll be happy to have some lady doctor attend to you. I’ve never heard of a man doctor who didn’t understand exactly how ladies like yourself feel about such matters. But you must have one, Mrs Graham. As you’re over the change, this trouble must be looked into and cleared up.’ A car had stopped outside. I stood up. ‘Here’s your daughter with the shopping. May I discuss this with her?’

  ‘Would you? I couldn’t ‒ not with my children. It’s not nice,’ she repeated pathetically.

  Mrs Allan, the daughter, was a younger, slimmer edition of her mother. Her mouth had not yet tightened to a trap, but, as she had the same mannerism of pressing her lips together, it would. We went into the kitchen, and I closed the door before we talked.

  ‘Nurse, is it really necessary to submit a woman of my mother’s age and fastidious temperament to such an experience?’

  ‘Your mother bore two children, Mrs Allan. This is not so far removed from a normal antenatal examination.’ She was only a couple of years older than myself, so I told her the truth without the tactful cotton wool. ‘I’m not a doctor. I can’t say how serious this discharge may prove. I can say it can’t be left unchecked, as if it is serious, unchecked it could prove fatal. A hysterectomy, if necessary and done in time, can not only give your mother years more life, but a much more active life. I’ve lost count of the patients who’ve said to me afterwards, “Why didn’t I have this done years ago? I’m a new woman!” ’

  ‘Would you give your own mother this advice?’

  ‘I have.’

  She nodded to herself. ‘Oh dear. Always something, isn’t there? Yes. We must do what’s right.’

  Miss Bruce sighed over my report. ‘We’re constantly coming up against this kind of reticence, and, though understandable, it can have tragic consequences. We’ve a dear old body on our books at this moment who’s placed herself beyond hope because she was too shy to tell her doctor she’d a wee “pimple” on her left breast. She’s another chronic varicose ulcer, and we’ve been attending her on and off for years, but only last month was she able to show her nurse that “pimple”. She’d hoped if she just ignored it it would go away, but it wouldn’t clear up.’ She looked at me across the desk. ‘By then it was an open carcinoma. Inoperable, with secondaries starting up everywhere. But taken in time she could almost certainly have been saved.’ The expression in her eyes was the same as Dr MacDonald’s with Mrs Thompson. ‘I’m thankful Mrs Graham felt she could confide in you. No matter how excellent their medical attendant, so many women, and particularly older women, will only discuss their gynaecological problems with another woman and in the privacy of their own homes. We go into their homes. That gives us a great advantage and a great responsibility. A sympathetic ear is one of the most important qualities required in district work. Thank you, Miss Hurst.’

  Mrs Graham’s test was positive, plus. Within days her uterus and the entire growth were removed without complications.

  I met Mrs Allan by chance one windy early evening in Princes Street. ‘You’ll be pleased to hear Mother is coming home at the end of this week. The surgeon is most satisfied, but told my brother; any real delay and he might have had a very different result. We are all most grateful to you, Nurse Hurst.’

  I felt very pleased, rather guilty, and deeply thankful her husband and my parents had been at Cambridge.

  It was Gemmie’s day off, and she was trousseau-shopping. Catriona and I had arranged to meet her after work directly opposite the Scott Monument. I got there first, and being a few minutes early was crossing the road intending to look over the monument when a sudden squall drenched me as effectively as a bucket of water. I dashed back for the shelter of a shop doorway and was brushing rivulets off my coat when Catriona appeared with Sandra.

  Catriona occasionally had maternally organizing moods. ‘Alix, if you wait around so damp in this wind you’ll end up with acute rheumatism. You need to go straight home and get in a hot bath. Don’t argue! I’ll explain to Gemmie, and she and I can perfectly well cope with her shopping between us! Do as Nursie says! Here comes the right bus, now!’

  ‘I’ll give you a hand with the parcels,’ said Sandra. ‘I’ve only got to book my reserved seat at Waverley, and there’s no rush as my boyfriend isn’t coming for me till seven. Got your key, Alix? Better make sure!’ She smiled meaningly. ‘Charlie mayn’t be all that eager to rescue you this time!’

  Catriona looked startled and then down her nose. Having discovered silence was the best answer to this from Sandra, and others, I just waved and got on the bus. It took me two-thirds of the way, but I did not bother to take another up the hill, as the squall-clouds had blown on, the wind was drying, and fighting the elements would use up some of the fury unleashed by that crack.

  The wind there was very much stronger. My hat was anchored with two cap-pins, but I had to hang on to it and keep my head down. The passers-by were either, like me, doubled-up against the wind, or leaning back like skaters off balance, to prevent themselves from being hurled off, instead of merely down, the hill. All over the pavements and cobbles were bits of broken slates, and the window of a small dress-shop had been blown in. A woman was sweeping up heaps of glass. She leant on her broom to yell, ‘Bit gusty!’

  ‘A bit. Anyone hurt?’

  ‘Just the boss’s pocket!’

  It took a lot of strength to open the front door of our house. It slammed itself shut so violently that I expected Mrs Kinloch to appear, then remembered the Kinlochs were away, visiting one of their married daughters. Mrs Kinloch had continued to be as pleasantly unobtrusive a neighbour a
s she had seemed from the start. Mr Kinloch and Mr and Mrs Dobie on the second floor were still only names to me.

  Our flat front door slammed behind me. Gemmie had left her bedroom window open, and the gale was sweeping through the flat. The dressing-table was in front of the window, and the curtains had flung all her possessions round the room. None had broken, so I heaved the dressing-table aside to shut the window first. The bottom sash was right up and had jammed. I hauled on it carefully, and did not dare give the frame a thump in case there was a weakness in the glass, as the wind was blowing straight at my face. It began to shift an inch at a time.

  The window overlooked the side-street where the car-owners kept their cars. I backed as Charles’s car crawled round the corner and up to the kerb. But I was still facing the opposite roof. I saw the slate shooting off and across the road. It crashed and cracked as it hit the bonnet of Charles’s car, and immediately there was a sound that could have been rifle-fire.

  I looked down discreetly. I was certain his windscreen had gone, and no driver at this moment wasted energy on watchers from windows. I was at the wrong angle to see the screen, but not surprised by the lack of glass on the badly dented bonnet. Modern windscreens weren’t easily penetrated, but, having worked in an accident unit, I knew that, along with just about anything else, could happen in any vehicle. So often simply a question of good or bad luck.

  I wondered if Charles appreciated his good luck now. Or had he always had too much to get that in proportion? In traffic an opaque windscreen could be a major disaster; miles from anywhere, a wretched nuisance; in an empty side-street outside his own house, to him, no more than a minor inconvenience; to most others, an expensive inconvenience.

  I now had the bottom sash moving freely, but kept it up. The street below was beginning to look unnaturally empty. Why wasn’t he examining the glass and damaged bonnet from the outside? And if the windscreen hadn’t gone; why hadn’t he bounced out to look at that dent? A woman might take time off to powder her face before coping with a mechanical crisis, but in these circumstances a man generally leaps out like an enraged jack-in-a-box. Most men, I mused uneasily, cherished their car’s paintwork as passionately as their own egos ‒ what in hell was the man doing? Clearing up the mess inside? What mess, with safety-glass? Of course, if a chip had gone through above or below the special striped strip ‒ and suddenly my stomach seemed to turn over. He was getting out of the car backwards, and very slowly. His face was soaked in blood, and he was holding one hand up to his right eye.

  I slammed down the sash, and for around five of the most extraordinarily disturbing seconds of my life I had to hold on to the sill. Then I stopped thinking.

  When I reached the front hall he was trying to fit his key into the side-door. He was having trouble, as he was only using his left hand. His right was holding open his right eye, and a smallish gash over the eyebrow was gently dripping dark blood into his left eye and down his face. The stains on his shirt were crimson.

  I registered every one of these relatively trivial details like a camera. ‘I saw that slate hit your car, Dr Linsey,’ I said casually. ‘Got a bit of glass in that eye? I can’t see as your hand’s in the way.’

  ‘Feels the size of the Castle Rock,’ he said as casually, facing me. ‘I haven’t been able to have a proper look at it yet because of all this gore. Sorry to be in such a mess.’

  ‘Spilt blood’s like spilt milk ‒ always looks more than it is.’ That old placebo was all I could manage, as I had now seen his right eye. Only training stopped me vomiting. ‘Not quite the Castle Rock, but it should come out, stat. I’ll do it.’

  ‘It’s very good of you ‒’

  ‘No trouble. No, don’t bend your head ‒ just hold still and, if possible, don’t blink the left.’ I had my fine forceps and throat-torch poised. ‘I’m afraid it may hurt a bit. Light on now. Ready?’ We were both holding our breath. ‘That’s out, but don’t close that eye yet.’ I checked again with the torch-light. ‘I can’t see any more on the surface ‒ no ‒ not in the lower lid. How does the upper feel?’

  ‘A wee bit gritty. Thank you for shifting the main problem. I expect I’ve only dust under here.’

  ‘I’ll see if I can invert it.’ I had to shake my head. ‘Sorry. Not far enough. To do it properly I have to work from behind, and I want you sitting down. Have you got an ophthalmoscope in your care? That I’d like very much.’

  ‘In my study. I could go up for it?’ He hesitated. ‘And a chair.’

  My immediate professional reaction was ‘Over my dead body’. Having seen the position of that splinter, I had no other. ‘I don’t think sailing up and down in your lift’ll be a good idea.’ I looked at his forehead. ‘You’ve some superficial splinters in your face. I’m going to touch them. Don’t blink, if you can help it. Yes. Superficial, but they shouldn’t wait long either.’ My third finger was on his temporal pulse. The rate was registering pain, not shock. ‘Right eye still hurting a lot?’

  ‘Just sore.’

  Not according to his pulse. ‘This standing isn’t a good idea. I can take out the lot, but you must be sitting. Certainly the lift’ll be better than the stairs.’

  ‘You’ll come up with me?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ was the only possible answer, unless I was prepared to change jobs. I wasn’t.

  The study was across the hall from the drawing-room, and more like a well-equipped lab. Very briefly, as I stepped out of his lift, I remembered.

  He said, ‘I forget where I’ve put my ophthalmoscope. I think it’s somewhere in the desk.’

  ‘Can’t I find it?’ I pushed forward a deep-backed leather armchair. ‘Could you sit here? The back’s high enough to rest your head and low enough for me to work over. Can you sit down very gently ‒ sort of all in one piece? That’s fine!’

  ‘Keeping this eye open?’

  ‘Please. And as still as you can. Stare’ ‒ I looked round, then crouched by him to get our faces level ‒ ‘at that microscope on the table over there. Isn’t that your eye-level?’

  ‘Exactly. Have you done much eye-work?’

  ‘Two months in Cas. Eyes as a junior, and three in Acute Surgical Eyes as a fourth-year.’ I was behind his chair. ‘Now I’ll invert that upper lid. I’ll get my hand under yours, and when I’ve taken over you let go. About to touch you, now. Braced against blinking?’

  He smiled. ‘Braced.’ He waited a few moments. ‘Anything worth finding?’

  ‘Just a little glass and a little grit.’ I did another check. ‘I think that really is clear, though it’ll still feel gritty.’

  ‘Much less so. Thank you very much. Do you now want the ophthalmoscope? Try the left-side drawers first.’

  His face was in a horrible mess, but the gash had clotted. ‘Yes. Ophthalmoscope next.’

  The top-left drawer contained several rubber-banded notebooks, an old patella hammer, and a large framed photograph of Josephine Astley smiling. The ophthalmoscope was two drawers down.

  I fitted it together, tested the light, then sat on the arm of his chair. ‘Right eye, first. Light, now. Watch my hand, please.’ I moved my hand slowly behind my head, right to left, then up and down. ‘Good. And your left.’ I repeated the performance. ‘That’s splendid.’

  ‘And the right?’

  ‘A small scratch on the cornea. Hold it, please. Being one of Sir Jefferson’s young ladies, I couldn’t look the little man in the face if I skipped his double-check. Both, please.’

  He waited until I switched off the light. ‘Sir Jefferson Evans?’

  ‘That’s him. Evans the Eyes from Welsh Wales, and the pride of Martha’s. No, no Doctor!’ I caught his hand just before he touched his right eye. ‘I’m sure you want to rub it, but please don’t! Some dirt’s bound to have got in, and touching it’ll only shove in more.’

  ‘I should’ve remembered. Sorry I didn’t.’

  ‘It’s a reflex action in these circumstances. My fault for not warning you against it.’ />
  ‘That another of Sir Jefferson’s maxims for his young ladies?’

  ‘Is it not!’ I looked at the glass cupboard above the double-sink. ‘I can see spirit, swabs, soap, and towels. Can I help myself for your face?’ I had dressing-packs in my bag, but, as the alternative was available, did not like to use them unnecessarily off my district.

  ‘Please do, and many thanks.’ He touched his face. ‘Good God! Repulsive! I do apologize. Can’t I just wash it off first?’

  ‘Not just yet.’ I put a hand on his shoulder very lightly, but it kept him in the chair. ‘Only a little dried blood.’ His bloodshot eyes lit with laughter. He seemed about to say more, but changed his mind and did not talk until I had removed all his facial splinters and was dealing with the cut.

  ‘I know more than one eye-man who considers Jefferson Evans the best in the western world. I’ve never seen him. What kind of man is he?’

  ‘Fortyish, and so fat you wonder how he’ll get near the table with his stomach, and then you see his hands. Six-and-a-half in theatre gloves. His touch is fantastically delicate. I don’t like watching any ops, but to see him in action on the eyes is an ‒ er ‒ aesthetic experience.’

  ‘If you don’t like watching, how did you get on in the theatre?’

  ‘By enduring it. You liked surgery?’

  ‘Not much. I did the usual stint as a student, but without taking any satisfaction from the experience. Not surprisingly, I was never an h.s. I moved on to the medical side directly I qualified, and remained there until I specialized.’ He smiled slightly. ‘Thankfully.’

  ‘Have you always wanted to be a pathologist?’

  ‘Yes. I like bugs.’

  ‘I guess you must.’ I held poised a spirit-soaked swab. ‘This is going to sting. Ready? Sorry.’

  ‘No worse than after-shave. Is this early-warning system another maxim?’

  ‘The top one. Whenever his ward nurses change the old boy rounds up the new girls in Sister Eyes’ day-office. “There’s welcome you are to my ward, young ladies, and there’s welcome you’ll remain so long as you recall the finest eye-surgery can be ruined by jerking and blinking. There’s careful you must be to avoid the former and keep the latter to a minimum. If you are not you will not remain in my ward to repeat your mistake. My patients are most peculiar people. They have only two eyes. Close your eyes, young ladies. All closed and in the dark? Then you will be seeing why, in ophthalmic work, we can never make the same mistake twice.” After which,’ I said, ‘one remembers.’