All Change: Cazalet Chronicles (35 page)

‘Why don’t you lie down on the sofa and we could go on with
Emma?’
She had found that Sid liked being read to, and Austen was a good choice.

‘Yes, I would like that.’

Rachel settled her down with a cushion for her head and a blanket wrapped round her permanently cold feet. ‘We’ve reached the insufferable Mrs Elton’s visit to Emma.’

But after she had read for a few minutes, she saw that Sid was restless, shifting about as though she could not get comfortable.

‘Are you in pain?’

‘It’s my back. It’s started again. It’s not too bad.’

‘Would you like some lemon tea?’

‘Yes. But I’d like some of my old pills first. Now,’ she said irritably. Rachel fetched them, then went to the kitchen to see about the tea.

When she returned with it, Sid was sitting up. ‘Sorry I snapped.’

‘That’s all right. Are they working?’

‘They are a bit, yes. The tea will be too hot to drink. Anyway, I want to talk to you – seriously. Give me your hand.’

Her heart sank. She knew that Sid was going to talk about her death – which they hadn’t done since before Christmas. Since then it had lain between them like a sword. They both knew it was there, but both felt in different ways that by refusing to acknowledge its presence they were somehow warding it off – Rachel because she could not bear to think beyond it, and Sid because she was desperately anxious about how Rachel would cope.

‘My darling, you know that I’m going to die, and sooner rather than later. I want to talk about you, because the only thing I grieve about now is what will happen to you. I don’t think you should stay on in this house alone. I think you should move to London. I’ve left you my house in case you want to live there. If not, you can sell it and choose somewhere else. I think you should find some work to do. You always want to help people, and perhaps you could find some charity – children, for instance, you’ve always loved them. Think of the Babies’ Hotel.’ She had run out of breath, and reached for her tea.

Tears were streaming down Rachel’s face, and after a moment she said, ‘I can’t bear for you to die. I can’t.’

‘And I don’t want to leave you, but we both have to bear it because it is going to happen. I can’t go on much longer like this – it’s becoming too difficult. I think I shall be quite glad when the time comes, except for you, my dearest Rachel. And I beg you to think about what I have said, about your life. We should be grateful for the marvellous years we’ve had together. Imagine if we had lived in Emma’s time how impossible it would have been.’ She was smiling now and stroking Rachel’s hand.

Rachel wiped her face with her other hand and tried to smile back as she said, ‘There were the Ladies of Llangollen. They brought it off.’ They had visited the redoubtable lesbians’ house, Plas Newydd, on one of their country walking tours.

‘So they did. That was a lovely holiday, wasn’t it? That amazing waterfall, and the aqueduct carrying that canal over the valley . . . Now, blow your nose and give me one of those anti-sickness pills and I’ll try to eat some tea. What is the time?’ It was only half past three, Rachel saw. There were hours to go before the doctor would come again, she thought, as she dried her face with one of the Duchy’s elegant, but inadequate handkerchiefs.

She had left the pills in Sid’s bedroom. And she waited a minute or two with the bottle in her hand, before returning to the morning room, while she tried to collect herself. She
must
stop crying: it would only distress Sid more. At least death had been mentioned – talked about – and it was Sid who had had the courage to do it. Nurses don’t cry all over their patients: they nurse; they try to make things as easy as possible for them. If you love someone, she thought, you can do anything for them.

By the time she returned to the morning room, she felt comparatively calm.

Sid was lying back with her eyes shut, but she was not asleep. Rachel propped her up, and gave her the pill. ‘Would you like a little sleep now before tea, or do you want me to go on reading?’

‘Think I’ll try to sleep. You won’t forget what I said, will you?’

‘Certainly not.’ She pulled the blanket round Sid’s shoulders, then rang for Eileen to stoke up the fire and, when she had done so, followed her out of the room. ‘We’ll have tea at half past four and would like a few honey sandwiches with the crusts cut off.’

‘Very good, Miss Rachel.’ Ladies, she knew, never ate the crusts on their sandwiches; after all these years Miss Rachel should know that she would never send in sandwiches without the crusts off, but there you were. Miss Rachel was not herself. Who would be with this tragedy hanging over them?

For the next hour, Rachel read to herself and sewed. Every now and again she checked Sid. Her eyes were closed, but small tremors, contorting her face, looked like attacks of pain. Nearly at the end of the hour, Rachel was startled by a curious sound – a muted howl – and saw that Sid had crammed her knuckles into her mouth. She flew to her and knelt by her side. ‘Is the pain very bad?’

‘A bit.’ She seemed to have no breath. Her forehead was burning hot. ‘Thirsty.’ She was barely audible.

Rachel held the glass for her to drink, then said she would fetch a compress for her forehead.

‘Don’t go. Please.’

So she rang the bell for Eileen to bring her two bowls of hot and iced water and napkins. Sid had another attack, cramming her knuckles into her mouth. As soon as Eileen had gone, she let out a subdued shriek of agony.

It was unbearable. It must be borne, Rachel told herself. Somehow these next hours must be got through. She hoped that bathing her forehead would distract Sid from the waves of pain. She told Sid that the hot and cold compresses would make her feel much better, discovering as she did so that her voice had a new, calm authority that she had not known she possessed. Tea arrived, and she helped Sid to sit up – to try to eat a honey sandwich. She did try, and failed, so she sent for the jar of honey and stirred two spoonfuls into the lemon tea. ‘You have to drink this, darling. I shall expect you to drink all of it.’

And Sid, with her eyes trustfully on Rachel’s face, did make a great effort to do so. The really agonizing pains seemed to come in waves, rising to a peak when she could not help crying out, and then Rachel would squeeze her hand hard and tell her to scream if she wanted to. As the pain slowly diminished, Sid would try to apologise, but she had little breath now. A few scalding tears would trickle down her face, and Rachel would wipe them away as she uttered endearments. She felt that she had never loved Sid so much as she did now.

When the doctor had administered the morphine, Sid asked whether it was a dose that would last all night. No, he said, but he would be back last thing to give her a shot for that. ‘I have hired a nurse for you, Nurse Owen. Unfortunately, she cannot come until late tomorrow as she has to do Christmas lunch with her family. But she will come afterwards, and she will be able to give you the medicine you need. I shall pop in meanwhile, of course, to see how you are doing. You’re running a bit of a temperature by the look of you, Miss Sidney. We must see if we can get that down.’ He put a thermometer in her mouth; it read l02 degrees when he removed it. ‘A couple of aspirin every four hours should do the trick there.’

Rachel walked to his car with him. ‘The nurse will be living in?’

‘Yes. She will do the night duty for you. You can’t go on like this, my dear. Nobody can do a twenty-four-hour job with a patient as ill as this. In any case, I don’t think it’s going to go on much longer, which should be a comfort to you. A tumour on or near the spine can be one of the worst pains in the world.’ He glanced down to see that her hands were tightly clenched together, rigid.

‘I should like you to take one of those sleeping pills I prescribed for you. You need at least a couple of nights’ proper sleep. I’ll be back about eleven.’

Just as he was getting into his car, she clutched his sleeve. ‘Dr Murphy, thank you so much for taking such trouble.’

‘Not at all. Only wish I could do more. See you later. Go on in, before you become a snowman.’

The snow was falling steadily, and was settling now, decorating the trees, speckling the brick path to the front door. It was dark, and Rachel could only see her way because of the lights inside. A nurse in the house, she thought. What would that mean for their relationship? A return to secrecy – to the façade of simply being good friends? No, it could not. She would only care about what Sid felt: nobody else could matter at all.

She found Sid much calmer, cheerful even. She wanted to stay on the sofa so that she could doze if she felt like it.

‘I’m so glad that a nurse is coming. It means you won’t have to deal with any more bedpans. I’ve so hated you having to do that.’

They had been a very new addition to her nursing, as Sid, in spite of her increasing weakness, had insisted upon being helped to the lavatory.

‘I didn’t hate it.’ She kissed Sid’s forehead – not burning so much now. ‘I’m going to give you the sickness pill because we’re going to have an early supper and I really want you to eat it.’

‘Would it be possible to have a small omelette?’

‘Of course it would. You swallow these and I’ll go and tell Mrs Tonbridge.’

Supper – compared to the rest of the day – was a success. Rachel made Sid eat her omelette with a spoon, as her hands were so shaky that she dropped most of it if she used a fork. During the meal they listened to the carol service broadcast from King’s College, Cambridge.

After the programme, Rachel suggested Sid going up to bed while she was still feeling good, and Sid agreed at once. She had become much more compliant, calmer, completely trusting that Rachel knew best for her. The stairs took time because she had become so weak, but at least she seemed not to be struggling with severe pain. She gripped the banister with her right hand, and Rachel held her left arm, and with a couple of short rests they reached the top.

When Sid was safely in bed, her teeth brushed, clean pyjamas and her knitted woolly hat firmly on her head, she wanted to sit up and talk, so Rachel draped her in one of the Duchy’s paisley shawls.

It was approaching late evening, and the doctor was due during the next hour. But it was not soon enough: the pain came back, and soon Sid was shifting restlessly, cramming her hand into her mouth in an effort to muffle her cries. She had earlier complained of being cold; now she was burning, her mouth parched and cracked. Rachel fetched a bowl of cold water and wiped her face with a flannel in an attempt to cool her, and put water from her finger onto Sid’s lips, which she seemed to like. Supposing, Rachel thought with panic, the snow was so bad that Dr Murphy couldn’t get to them?

She tried everything she could think of: rocking her in her arms, bathing her forehead, talking quietly with endearments – the doctor would soon come and then the pain would go away . . .

It was nearly eleven when she heard the car, and ran downstairs to meet him. ‘She is much worse, Doctor. Her fever is bad, and the morphine you gave her isn’t even lasting four hours and I don’t know what to do! Oh, it is good of you to come!’

‘It’s
very
good of me to come. I got stuck in our lane and had to dig myself out. But I’m here now and—’

There was a shriek – not at all muffled now – from Sid’s room.

‘We can’t have that,’ he said, and mounted the stairs at a surprising speed.

Sid had thrown off her bedclothes and was trying to clutch the small of her back.

‘Miss Sidney, I’m sorry you’re having such a rough time. I’m going to see to it with a stronger dose so that, with luck, you’ll get a good night’s sleep.’ He was preparing his syringe as he spoke. ‘You’re very brave, Miss Sidney,’ he soothed. ‘I know that it’s a devil of a pain. Now just hold still if you can.’

He was saying just the right things to her, Rachel thought. Although she shook her head, a very faint smile came and went.

‘Now I want you to drink a good glass of water,’ he said. The fever has dehydrated you, and that always makes things worse. Hot or cold, I don’t mind which. I’ll pop in again tomorrow morning.’

As Rachel was seeing him out, she asked, ‘Couldn’t I give her an injection if she needs it in the night?’

‘No, my dear, I’m afraid not. It’s against the rules. In any case, I don’t suppose you’ve given an injection of anything in your life, have you?’

She hadn’t, of course.

‘She should be out of pain quite soon, and then she’ll sleep. The dose I started her on was minimal, this time it will be different. Goodnight to you.’ And he went.