The Flying Nurse (1960s Medical Romance Book 3)

by Sheila Burns

  She stayed there until Mother dozed off, then, when she was really asleep, Mandy slipped out of the room. She would find Marina, and discover what had actually happened. She had the feeling that there was a great deal more behind all this, maybe things that she would never know, nor understand. It seemed an eternity since she had been dancing with Luis, an eternity since the dark of tonight first came, and now the dawn was touching the east with opal.

  Marina was packing things in the next room and she told her what had happened. It had been shock that had killed Cam, and somehow both girls knew that it had been for the best.

  ‘There was just nothing more that could be done,’ she said. She was kneeling on the floor packing a suitcase, and she explained that Mother was determined to fly home this very day. She could not bear another minute in the island, she said, for it had brought her nothing but bad luck. ‘She said she’d take me with her,’ Marina murmured, ‘one of my dreams! The thing I have most wanted to do. I’d give my eyes to see England.’

  ‘It can be cold there, it’s often wet, and not so exciting as you’d think,’ Mandy said very slowly indeed.

  ‘I want it terribly.’

  ‘I hope Mother takes you. I ‒ I’d love to stay a little longer. I’ve seen nothing of the island.’ Then she said, ‘What ‒ what about the funeral?’

  ‘Today, I suppose.’

  ‘Not today? It ‒ it couldn’t be so soon.’

  Marina looked up from the packing with some surprise. ‘But of course! In Malta we always bury immediately. We have to. Maybe it’s better; sometimes I think that it is.’ Mandy went to the window and drew back the curtain. It was quite light now, and there were people moving in the street below, for they came out early to shop. She felt that a tremendous lot had happened, and she was numbed by the suddenness of it. She could not see ahead, nor what she would do, if she would stay here, or go home with her mother and perhaps Marina.

  The dawn was soft and lovely, the island stretching away into the distance, a thing of sheer beauty. About it was that tinge of soft pink, the glow of clover, and with it the light faint amethyst of mist. She turned back to where Marina had finished packing the case, strapped it together, and rose from the floor.

  ‘They say there is a lot going on in the island. The police have made all kinds of arrests. Carmina said it was to do with dangerous drugs.’

  ‘Drugs?’

  Marina nodded. ‘Yes. They say ‒ but this seems to be almost treason itself ‒ that the great Contessa Lucinda is connected with it. It seems impossible, but funny things happen in this world.’ Marina dumped the case in a corner and went across to the window. She opened the windows wide and let in the air. It was beautiful now, but with the sun rising so fast, in a few minutes’ time it would grow hotter, both of them knew. Then it would become intense.

  ‘I wonder if your mother really meant it and will take me to England? I’d love it so much.’ The girl’s voice was tense with longing. ‘It’s always been a dream to me, something which I felt could only come true if a fairy waved a wand.’

  ‘I’ll try to persuade Mother.’ Mandy’s voice was tender. ‘I want to stay behind here for a few days, for I want so much to see the island, and know something about it. It ‒ it is the most beautiful place that I have ever visited. If you took Mother home for me, I ‒ I could stay … I need the rest. I was tired out when I left St Jeremy’s; I think I’m even more tired now, for too much has happened to me.’

  Marina was eager. ‘Let us try to arrange it that way? You stay for the holiday, I go and see England.’

  That was, Mandy thought, exactly what they would do. She slipped to her own room still cool with the night, and she got into bed for a short sleep. She was utterly exhausted. This was a strange and unbelievable country, for her patient had gone from her, and she did not even know who had taken him away. He was dead. She could not feel sad, perhaps it was almost a relief, perhaps she had never really cared for Cam, for under it all she had known the sort of man that he was. One cannot force oneself to love a stepfather or mother.

  When she had found the contents of the packet she had come to dislike him intensely. She supposed that any girl who had received hospital training had in her work seen sufficient of the result of drugs (particularly heroin) to feel as she had done. Those poor, poor ‘junkies’! Cam had exploited his fellow beings’ weaknesses; he had trespassed on the fact that they could not stop the craving, and sold it at high prices even though he knew it would kill them.

  My own stepfather, she thought, and I should be sorry that he is dead, but I am not; worse, I am quite unashamed that I am not sorry.

  She slept for a time, to wake to street noises, the jangle of people talking, and she got up, bathed and dressed, then went to her mother. Mandy would not have wakened her for the world, but the mere fact that she had opened the door was what did it. Mrs Sykes seemed to be dazed at first, bewildered so that she could not come to grips with life, and thought that her memory of last night had been nothing more than a bad dream. She refused to accept it as being real, and wanted to go to Cam.

  Mandy had to tell her mother the truth and quite plainly. Mrs Sykes was very quiet, which was a bad sign. She was deeply hurt and worried, and when she could speak she said that all she wanted was to go home. Today.

  ‘I’m arranging that, Mother, and Marina is coming with you.’

  Her mother should have argued, but she was past that. She just assented. Whilst they were talking, the telephone rang and when Mandy went to it and picked up the receiver it was to hear Luis’s voice on the other end. She was deeply grateful to hear that voice, and more grateful that she should feel instinctively that he knew what had happened.

  ‘How is your mother?’

  ‘She is far better this morning, and very brave over it. She wants to fly back home at once. The moment that she can.’

  ‘That would be the best thing. Do you want me to help?’

  ‘Anything that you could do …?’ and Mandy was surprised that her voice was a little choky.

  ‘I think I can help. I’ll do what I can and ring you back within the hour. She ‒ she isn’t taking you with her?’

  ‘I think not, for Marina has offered to go. She always wanted to go to England and this is her chance. I could follow a week later. That is what I am trying to arrange now.’

  He said ‘Yes,’ and then in a lower voice, becoming deeply serious, ‘Does she know about Cam?’

  ‘I doubt that.’

  He said, ‘Kindest if she never knows that. It ‒ it was a dreadful night.’

  In a strained voice she said, ‘What about the funeral?’

  ‘At the English cemetery this morning. Don’t let her come to it.’

  ‘I’ll come myself.’

  He said, ‘No, Mandy, don’t do it! You can do no good. It doesn’t help him at all, and it could upset you most dreadfully. I’ll go for you.’

  ‘You’ll go for me?’

  ‘Yes. Tell your mother that. I’ll represent the family for you. Ring me back at one o’clock. By then I ought to have something settled about the plane. Ring me back.’ Mandy had an idea that he wanted to get away from the ’phone, and she rang off. It seemed quite wrong if none of them went to the funeral, but she did see Luis’s viewpoint. It could do no good. She brought her mother some breakfast in bed to comfort her, and was quite surprised to see that she ate it. The curious thing about her mother was that she would protest most violently, she would weep herself sick and look tragically ill, but she could always eat.

  Immediately after that, Dr Mallea came in to see her. He was kind, he wanted to help, and was not seriously worried for her. He was in fact far more concerned for Mandy, who he thought was not well. She had done too much and had been the victim of circumstances. She told him that she wanted to stay on for a week, and he felt that this would be the best thing for her.

  ‘Nobody thinks of me,’ complained her mother as he said it. ‘The sooner I get away the better, but it
is disgusting that Mandy is staying behind.’

  ‘It is for her good,’ the kind doctor said.

  ‘Who thinks of my good I’d like to know?’ her mother snapped back.

  At one o’clock she rang up Luis again.

  He had done exactly what he had promised to do; he had gone to the funeral, and that was over. Perhaps, thought Mandy, it was almost better that, if Cam had to go, he had gone then, for Carmina had come in with news of the arrest of Lucinda. ‘And her so rich lady,’ she had explained in amazement ‒ and it would seem that the bottom was dropping out of the drug trade for the moment.

  A plane would be leaving tonight at five o’clock, and Luis had reserved two seats on it, which meant that Mother could fly back with Marina. All the morning Mrs Sykes had been complaining that she would never get back, and now, when the good news came, she was not satisfied.

  ‘It is disgraceful that I go alone.’

  ‘But you won’t be alone, for Marina is coming. She is only too anxious to do all that she can to help.’

  ‘I daresay, but you are my own daughter, and you should be with me.’ Mother’s eyes were furiously angry.

  Mandy knew that she was in no mood for a scene; she felt too utterly worn out. She had been working here under immense strain; now the thread had snapped. ‘Mother, you simply must bear with me,’ she implored her.

  ‘I lose my husband, I’m worn out, and my own daughter picks on this moment to say that she won’t do anything more for me.’

  ‘It isn’t that. I’m worn out myself, and I must have a rest. This was to have been my holiday, Mother, and then everything started happening.’

  ‘But now your work is done, and you could help me go home, then have a nice holiday there.’

  As though anyone had ever had a nice holiday with Mother! ‘I want a holiday here,’ was what she said.

  Another idea struck her mother. ‘I believe this is that awful man you call Luis. Oh, I know he has been helpful in getting me a plane to take me home, I know he is rich, but I think you’ve fallen in love with him. You silly girl! He won’t ever marry you, for he isn’t that kind of man. He’s only playing with you.’

  Mandy knew that if she stayed here and argued, she would lose her temper and then regret it all her life. She was ashamed that suddenly she saw her mother as she really was, and could no longer make excuses for her. Her mother had gone through life getting her own way, and Mandy could bear no more.

  ‘I’m not discussing this, Mother. I’ve done everything that I can. I’ve got to have a rest, and this is the end.’

  ‘You want to stay here and have a holiday with that awful Maltese man, and I won’t allow it. I warn you, don’t you come back to me when it all goes wrong on you.’

  ‘All right.’ Mandy walked across the room to the door. ‘I don’t suppose that I shall be coming back to you, Mother. I just don’t suppose that it will ever be the same again.’

  Then she went to her own room.

  She sat down on the bed and stared ahead of her. Where did she go from here? In her bag she had a few pounds, quite insufficient to get her home. She felt a small pulse throbbing hard in her throat, warning her that inwardly she was desperately afraid, for she felt as one lost, all alone in this island.

  She clasped her head, helplessly conscious of the fact of an engulfing fear. What did she do, and where would she go? She could hardly go to Luis when she was in this state of mind, and so hard-up, for there is nothing more humiliating in life than to be short of money. How could she get some work to do in this island when she knew no one and had no influence? It was a fairly desperate proposition. She wondered if she could turn to Dr Mallea, and if he could provide her with some small pro tem job; some means of getting money for her nursing, and to save sufficient in the end to return home.

  England seemed to be an intolerable way off. This is shock, she thought; I’ve had too much to bear; Cam’s death, Mother appearing and then finding all the subsequent coincidences. What she was now getting was the back-kick, and she went out on to the patio beyond the window.

  The sunshine was not too hot yet, the flowers not withering. It always hurt her to see them curl up. A plumbago wreathed pale blue trails round a stone balustrade, and a pink rose, still exquisitely mature, emitted a fond fragrance. The silver spurt of a little fountain made a song of its own.

  She saw the door into the outer roadway opening slightly, and a face peered round it. It was the face of a man. She saw him in the narrow back street where once the Knights of Malta had fought their battles. Alarmed, Mandy looked at him and saw that he was a Pakistani. He was smally-made, light as a feather as are those men, and seeing her he held out supplicating hands as though he sought help. Mandy had nursed such men in the wards of St Jeremy’s, and she had always liked them, for they were gentle and very brave when you asked them to bear their pain well. In the wards of a great hospital, a girl becomes used to understanding the stamina in the bosom, a stamina which runs with forebears; she had known this.

  ‘Yes?’ she asked him.

  ‘I make the mistake,’ he apologized.

  ‘You wanted somebody or something?’

  He smiled rather weakly. ‘I do see the fountain, and it is very hot. I was thirsty,’ he explained.

  Mandy pointed to the seat. ‘Wait for a moment there and I will bring you a cold drink from the flat,’ she told him.

  He went to sit on the curved half-circle of a marble seat beside the fountain itself. A low cupressa cast a comforting shade over one corner of the seat, deeply purple in contrast to the yellow of the sunshine, and she knew that the man was grateful to wait there. She went inside the flat and brought him a long iced drink, watching him gulp it down with the desperate thirst of a man who is parched.

  Then he looked up at her, still smiling. ‘I thank you, kind lady.’

  ‘We all get thirsty at times,’ she said, as she accepted the glass back again.

  He stared at her, his eyes were sharp and bright, and of a far lighter brown than were Luis’s eyes, and somehow their sharpness seemed to read right through her.

  ‘I give you the thanks in another way,’ he said, and reaching out a thin hand he took hers. He turned it over so that the palm was uppermost and he stared down into it, reading it like a book. After a moment he spoke. ‘You will have the great love. You will have the much riches, great riches, and happiness. Oh, how happy you will be.’

  ‘It sounds good to me,’ she agreed, and half of her was convinced that he invented it.

  ‘You think that this hour is the darkness, but not so. The darkness will not last till the sun sets. You think that this is the end of all, but it is not the end of all, it is the beginning. Do not despair, lady, you have the life, the love, and much happiness.’

  She looked more closely at him and now she felt that about him there was something of inspiration. ‘I was feeling rather afraid,’ she admitted, for the thought of being stranded in the island was an alarming one.

  He nodded. ‘But you must have no fear. Go forward to the big happiness. You have the real happiness before you, and for ever, I tell you.’

  He dropped her hand and went as he had come, out through the gate which led into the narrow back street where once the Knights of Malta had fought and where now the men lolled in the kind shadows through the heat of what frequently was a harsh day.

  Mandy did not know how long she stood there.

  It seemed that she was staring into her own future, and that future did not seem to be so dark. She would go into the house and ring up Dr Mallea again, for he might know of some patient who wanted a nurse for part of the day for a week or two and this would pay for her living costs, and ultimately she could save sufficient for her passage home. She knew that the Pakistani had made her feel less uneasy, and somehow she had been impressed by him and what he had said to her.

  When she knew the doctor’s morning visits would be over, she tried to phone him, without success. As she re-entered the house she saw
that all her mother’s luggage prepared for the flight was strewn about the hall. Marina was dashing to and fro in a state of panic, but Carmina was more anxious. Carmina was older than Marina, and had seen too many people go and come to the island; she had watched too much happen in life.

  She smiled at Mandy. ‘The poor gentleman die,’ and she crossed herself devoutly. ‘Now too much to do. Everyone wants everythings. Everyone go ’ome.’

  ‘But I shall stay,’ Mandy told her.

  Carmina muttered a prayer for ever near her lips, then she dropped her voice lower. ‘There is trouble everywhere. The policemans,’ she said, and drew Mandy closer to her, whispering a fantastic story. Did Mandy know that the magnificent Contessa Lucinda had been arrested? So rich, so great, and so wonderful, and now the story that she sold drugs? ‘You know what they are?’ she asked Mandy.

  ‘I have an idea.’

  A whole band of these people had been run in and suspended. It was most dreadful and her eyes were round with horror.

  When Mandy had shaken off Carmina, she felt very disturbed, and she got through to Dr Mallea. He was at the hospital. She was now really worried, for her mother’s luggage had gone off to the airport, and Mrs Sykes herself had appeared, in one of her worst moods and prepared to make a scene. Dr Mallea was operating. The day was fatiguingly hot and nothing could be done until the heat had gone. But the car came round to take Mrs Sykes to the airport.

  Mandy was resting when she heard it, and rushed out to say goodbye. Perhaps she should have gone home with her mother, but she felt that was asking too much. Perhaps she was at cracking point. Her mother was already in the car and it started before Mandy got to it. She stood there in the almost white-hot heat of the bare pavement at this hour, and saw the big car drive away. It was the end of a disastrous adventure.

  I’ll get something fixed as soon as the cool comes, she told herself, and rang up Dr Mallea again an hour later. This time she got him.

  He appeared to be very surprised to hear her voice, for he had understood that all of them had flown back to England the moment that the funeral was over. She explained that she was left somewhat stranded here. She had felt too tired to return with her mother, so Marina had taken her place, and now she wanted some sort of a part-time job to see her through for a week or a fortnight.