Isobel on the Way to the Corner Shop (31 page)

He called, ‘Come in, Isobel.’

He smiled at her encouragingly. ‘Take a seat. I think it’s time we had a talk about your future. Do you feel up to a bit more activity?’

‘I’ve been helping Miss Landers with the occupational therapy.’

It would not do to mention her gratifying success with the sweater kits: six placed, one khaki and turquoise, two khaki and white and three khaki and beige. They would be able to place another if Mrs Kent could find turquoise wool in the town.

‘I’m sure you’ve been a great help to her.’

Politely he repressed amusement.

Perhaps it’s more important than you suppose, thought Isobel.

‘What I was thinking of was helping Chris in the office. Just start with an hour a day for now, till we see how you go.’

‘I’m used to office work. I think I could manage it.’

He smiled again.

‘That’s not quite what I meant. It’s your health I was thinking of.’

He rubbed a knuckle against the corner of his mouth, a sign of hesitation.

‘You’ve made a very good recovery, but at one stage…’

‘It was touch and go?’

‘Well, there was some cause for concern. We want you to take it slowly, and if you start work here, we can monitor your progress. In fact…’

She waited.

‘How do you feel about staying with us for a while? Chris could train you in the office work. We need extra help in the office, particularly someone with shorthand who can help me with the correspondence. It wouldn’t be a paid job just yet, but you could have one of the chalets and get your meals here, of course, which would help with the pension. Then when you begin real working hours, we make up the pension to award wages.’

Isobel did not know what to say. She did not know what to think.

‘Well, there’s no hurry. Think it over and let me know.’

Still too astonished to speak, she got up, nodded and went away.

Sister Connor was blunt.

‘You do know that Doctor Stannard is married, don’t you?’

Isobel gaped in shock and indignation.

‘Of course I know he’s married. He’s married to Doctor Bennett, who works at the Clinic. And just what has that to do with me?’

‘Just thought I’d mention it.’

Isobel spoke with righteous anger.

‘And why did you think it necessary to mention it? He has offered me a job, that’s all.’

‘And what a job. Filling in record cards, typing up case histories.’

‘Well, it has to be done, I suppose!’

‘It doesn’t have to be you. There are plenty of people who can do that job. You should aim a bit higher.’

Isobel said, less certainly, ‘It’s a contribution. I owe something, don’t I? And if that’s what’s wanted, well…how can I say no?’

‘Try it sometime. It gets easier with practice.’

‘You wouldn’t be getting personal, would you?’

Isobel hoped that she was not blushing.

‘If the cap fits, wear it. But that’s by the way. There’s nothing to be said against Doctor Stannard’s morals. Just watch yourself, that’s all.’

Nothing against his sexual morals. He’s just a careless, amoral bastard who eats little girls like you for breakfast and doesn’t even know he’s doing it.

Sister Connor tried again, saying dryly, ‘And, of course, it’s cold out there.’

‘Now that’s not fair! I’m not afraid of going out.’ She wondered as she spoke if that was quite true. It was a shaming memory that the day Stannard had said, ‘I think we can stop the medication,’ she had felt, not the expected relief, but a serious stab of fear. ‘I have somewhere to go and a good chance of a part-time job. That’s not the issue.’ She added, ‘It wouldn’t be for life. Maybe a year.’

‘That’s what you think.’ Sister Connor spoke urgently. ‘You think you’ll stay a year, then some crisis will come and you’ll put it off till that’s over, and another year will go by. You say you’re not scared. Perhaps you’re not scared now, but you will be. Life outside will seem tougher and tougher. You’ll lose touch with your friends. They’ll forget you. This place will seem like home and you’ll forget about leaving. Believe me, I’ve seen this before. Take my advice and go while you can.’

She looked despondently at Isobel, wondering how a young woman could be such a fool as to take a job with an authority figure who traded on charm and looked like the Sheikh of Araby, a man who had paid her too much attention already. She knew she had better not tackle that subject again, yet she tried an indirect approach.

‘Would you feel so grateful if Matron offered you a job in the wards?’

Isobel felt that a lie was justified.

‘Yes, I would! And I wouldn’t have to put up with those beastly insinuations! How did they start? Where do they come from? That talk in the wards…How did it ever start?’

‘In the wards they will say anything to pass the time. But if they do talk, it’s a sign that you shouldn’t take a job like that. It just isn’t sensible.’

‘Well, it makes me think I ought to take the job, just to prove them wrong. And I’m sorry you should have such a poor opinion of my character.’

It’s not your character I’m thinking of, my dear.

‘Oh, go away. I’m too busy to waste my time talking to you. Just get lost, will you.’

Which was the opposite of what she meant.

On the verandah Isobel said to Doctor Wang, ‘But I thought you’d be pleased.’

‘I think you have more important things to do than fill in record cards and type case histories.’

‘That’s what Sister Connor thinks.’

‘And I agree. Selfishly, I should be pleased. You would be an ornament to our social circle. Our very limited social circle,’ he added bitterly.

‘Aren’t you happy here, then?’

‘I have my wife and my son and this has to be my work. A tubercular doctor has something special to give here, and little to give anywhere else.’

It had not occurred to Isobel that Doctor Wang might have preferred some other specialist field.

‘I don’t have special skills to offer, of course,’ she said snappishly, ‘but I thought I could do something for the young people. Boys like Garry and Lance. It’s terrible to see Lance lying there in the men’s ward like a mummy. There’s more to him than that. If one gave him some hope for the future, some sort of vocational training. I think I could talk to the Red Cross. Miss Landers thinks I could. That’s something I could do.’

Doctor Wang, who had not forgotten the incident of the joke teeth, said coldly, ‘One day Lance will make a decision, whether it is worthwhile to fight to be cured. Nothing you do will influence that decision. Indeed, anything you did to make his life here more tolerable might be to his disadvantage.’

‘Yes. I see.’

‘There is something you have not learnt from your English poets. It is better to love those who give rather than those who take.’

Isobel said crossly, ‘Who’s talking about love? You’re as bad as Sister Connor. Just plain vulgar, she was, asking me if I knew Doctor Stannard was married. What do you all think of me? I’m grateful to him. So I ought to be.’

‘Sexual love is not the only form of love.’

Like Sister Connor, he believed that she was bound for disaster. ‘You do have special skills, my dear. They belong elsewhere.’

‘I shouldn’t give up writing. I can write in the evenings.’

‘And what would you write about? APs and lobectomies? Idealists can be very dangerous to people like you and me. Well, I must not try to play the god. You must do what you think best.’

‘I don’t know what to think.’

It was Doctor Hook who decided her. It was astonishing for Doctor Hook to show any interest in a patient and that made her more inclined to listen to him.

Overtaking her in the corridor, he grasped her by the upper arm and spun her around to face him.

‘Listen to me.’ His voice was as cold and contemptuous as usual. ‘Tuberculosis is an episode, not a way of life. Why don’t you get out of here and grow up?’

He then released her arm and walked on, leaving those words resounding behind him.

Grow up. Grow up.

She thought of Katie, talking to the dear little girl in the mirror, Katie crouching under her blankets refusing health.

She thought of the unlined faces of Chris, whom she’d taken to be twenty-five though she was forty. Of Ron, of Max, of Diana, all youthful, all cheerful, forever young. The other category: those who stayed.

This is wog world, where everyone walks a little aslant and everything is a little askew. Everything is a substitute for something else; medical attention for love, doctors and sisters for parents, their approval a substitute for achievement, a hospital for a home and safety for real life and its chances. Had she really been puffed up with pride over the success of a knitted sweater? Yes, she had. And the joy of being chosen by him? Chosen for what? To fill in forms and type up case histories.

She knocked on the door of Doctor Stannard’s office and obeyed the call to come in.

‘I came to thank you for the offer of a job, but…I want to leave. If that’s all right.’

‘Oh. I see.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘I would have liked to keep my eye on you for a while longer, but if you feel confident…very well. When would you like to leave?’

‘When I’ve finished the work I’m doing for Miss Landers. That will be a couple of weeks.’

‘Do you have any plans for the future? The Red Cross will give some help with accommodation and employment if you need it. I’d be happier if I knew you had some place to go.’

I am going, thought Isobel, to a rented room, to part-time jobs, chance encounters, rejection slips and maybe some successes. My typewriter will be my only security. My only real fear, the failure of inspiration.

A pompous declaration. Lucky she did not need to speak it aloud.

She said instead, ‘Yes. A friend is giving me a room while I look around.’

It was understood that one did not give Mornington as one’s last address.

‘Right. We’ll send your records down to the Clinic and make an appointment for you to report there. You’ll need to report every six weeks for a while. Then, if everything goes well, it will be every three months…but they’ll tell you all that at the Clinic. And Isobel…’

‘Yes, Doctor?’

‘No more trips to that corner shop, if you please.’

This time his smile was full-blown and, she had to admit, enchanting.

She smiled back, then both smiles turned to laughter.

They had shared a secret and now were sharing a sunlit moment.

‘I’ll see to it.’

She thought, You may be a selfish, exploitative bastard, but in one corner of my mind, I’m going to love you all my life.

She got up and went through the door, closing it gently and firmly behind her.

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