Mistress of Greyladies (11 page)

The scene would have been idyllically beautiful, if it hadn’t been spoilt by two ambulances standing to one side. From one of them, injured men were being carried into the building on stretchers, covered in grey blankets; from the other ambulance, the walking wounded were being helped to get down and move into the house. It reminded Phoebe of the scene at the railway station.

The wounded soldiers stopped moving to stare at them. One waved and gave them a cheerful grin, so she waved back.

They drove round to the rear of the house, which had two small wings, between which the driver came to a halt. ‘Here we are.’

A maid stuck her head out of the door. ‘They’re all busy with the new patients. Sergeant Buchanan says to come inside and have a cup of tea while you wait for the orderlies to be free to help you unload the new equipment. Looks like you’ve got some heavy boxes there.’

‘What about our cases?’ Penny asked. ‘We could bring those in ourselves.’

‘They’ll be out of the way if you leave them there for the moment. It’s chaos in here.’ The four women slid along the bench seat to the car doors at each end of it, this time with no one to open it for them or help them down. Our idle days are over, Phoebe thought to herself. She followed the cheerful maid into a big room next to the kitchen, which had been set up as a mess and was crammed with tables of all shapes and sizes.

‘There are always people coming and going,’ their guide
said cheerfully. ‘You’ll soon get used to it. I’ll fetch you a big pot of tea. Cups and saucers are over there, with the milk and sugar. And there are some currant buns. You’ll have to help yourselves. I’m Nelly, by the way.’

‘Looks like they feed you well here,’ the driver said, stretching and waggling his arms in the air before settling into a chair. His assistant got him some food and a cup of tea as soon as a huge enamel teapot arrived.

It would be more like an hour before anyone could attend to the new VADs, Nelly said. ‘Why don’t you go out and explore the gardens? Get a breath of fresh air while it’s fine. It poured down all day yesterday.’

‘Won’t anyone mind?’

‘Why should they? They can’t help you settle in yet. They’re too busy with the men. And what else are gardens for but enjoying?’

Eventually an orderly came to find them and escort them back into the house to meet Matron. He left them with her in a room off the main entrance hall, then went back outside to help unload their trunks and cases.

This room must have been beautiful before it was converted into an office, Phoebe thought. The ceiling had delicate plasterwork patterns and the curtains were a rich red in colour.

‘Welcome to Bellbourne House. I’m Matron Turner and this is my deputy, Sister Langham, to whom you four will answer. We’re very glad to see you, because we’re short-handed and still settling in here. I’m going to assign three of you to nursing and domestic duties, and one to the ambulances. Do any of you drive?’

‘I do,’ Amy said. ‘I love driving but I’ve only just learnt. I’m not sure about driving a big ambulance.’

‘Don’t worry. Practice makes perfect. You’ll be assigned to Corporal Stokes, who is our driver and general factotum, and he’ll help you brush up your skills. We have to take the patients into Swindon sometimes to catch a train, or go there to pick up other patients. And we like to give the long-term patients little outings if the weather is fine. Some will have to stay here for quite a while, poor fellows, and it does cheer them up to get out and about.’

By the time Matron had finished her briefing, Phoebe’s head was spinning with information.

‘Now, girls, Sister Langham will take you to your quarters.’

To their surprise, the plump, grey-haired sister took them outside again, to what had been the outdoor staff’s dining room, across the backyard next to the stables.

‘It’ll have to house eight VADs,’ she announced, ‘and you’re the first to arrive. Here we are.’

They stopped to stare inside at some piles of bed frames and mattresses.

The sister smiled. ‘Your first test of initiative. Do you need me to send you an orderly or do you think you can put the bed frames together yourselves?’

They looked at one another, then Phoebe decided to tell the truth. ‘If he can show us how to do one, I’m sure we can do the others ourselves, but as it is, I wouldn’t know how best to do it.’

The sister nodded. ‘Right attitude. If you really don’t know how to do something, find out and then give it a go. I’ll see if Corporal Stokes is anywhere around. He’s a handy fellow. Once the beds are up, two of you can come to me for the bedding. You’ll be issued the same as the patients, all the staff will. I’ll leave you to make up all eight beds.’

She vanished and they waited.

‘I never thought I’d be putting furniture together,’ Penny said. ‘I hope mine doesn’t collapse in the middle of the night. I’m a restless sleeper.’

Amy wandered across to the window at the front. ‘No curtains. We’ll need to change clothes in here, and we don’t want to encourage peeping Toms.’

‘Better make a list of the things we need.’ Jane opened her big, shabby bag and took out a notebook and pencil. ‘Towels, bedlinen, curtains.’

‘Wash basins and ewers.’

‘A screen round the washing area.’

‘Find out where the conveniences are,’ Amy said, grimacing. ‘Not to mention toilet paper.’

‘We always tore up newspapers for that,’ Phoebe said.

‘Ugh. Rather rough on the backside.’

‘Cheap, though.’

They’d written down everything they could think of when footsteps came clumping across the yard. A huge man in uniform came into the dormitory. ‘Corporal Stokes reporting for duty, ladies. I’ve got exactly half an hour to help you, so let’s not waste a second.’

By the time he left, they had erected a second bed themselves under his guidance, and he’d said they were quick learners.

When they were on their own, Amy said thoughtfully, ‘Talk about being thrown in at the deep end.’

‘We’re coping, though, aren’t we?’ Phoebe said. ‘And we have it easy compared to the men who’ll be sent here.’

They were all silent for a moment or two, then carried on working on the beds and arranging the furniture. At least
they had a small chest of drawers each, and a half share in one of the four wardrobes.

‘I’m never going to remember everything we’ve been told today,’ Amy said as they unpacked their clothing. ‘I’m no good with details, never have been.’

‘We can help each other remember things,’ Jane said quietly.

By the time they’d unpacked, Phoebe was exhausted and glad to sit quietly over an evening meal in the mess. Again, they had to serve themselves.

She was about to go to bed early, when they were called to help clear up the kitchen. They saw a long corridor leading out of it with a shelf along one side, where trays full of dirty dishes were standing.

Nelly took charge. ‘We have to wash the dishes ready for breakfast. When it’s cleaned up, that shelf is where the patients’ trays are set for meals and food is served. It’s been hard getting everything done, so we’re all glad to see you four. It won’t take long tonight with all of us piling in.’

Sister Langham came along for her evening meal as the four young women were finishing washing the dishes. She beckoned them across. ‘Phoebe and Jane, you’ll be on for the early-morning shift in the kitchen, setting the trays for the patients’ breakfasts, washing up, preparing food, whatever’s needed. You’ll need to be here by five o’clock. Amy, you’ll start with Corporal Stokes tomorrow morning at seven o’clock.’

She turned to the maid. ‘Nelly, thank you for all your hard work. If you can bear to teach our new helpers what’s needed tomorrow, you can start later for a day or two after that to give you a break.’

‘Thanks, Sister.’

The nurse continued her explanations. ‘The beds at the hospital are only a quarter full so far, but that still means twenty patients’ trays to set out. Staff serve themselves in the dining room. Corporal Stokes is going to arrange for another line of shelves to be erected above this one, for when we’ve got our full quota of patients. All right?’

‘Yes, Sister.’

‘I should get to bed early if I were you. Oh, and you’ll be answering to Cook for the moment, Phoebe and Jane. She’s gone to visit her ailing mother today, but she’ll be back on duty tomorrow. Nelly’s in charge till then. Penny, I’ll tell you each day where I need you. You’re my reserve for emergencies, and don’t think there won’t be any, however efficient we are.’

By the time Phoebe got into bed, she was exhausted. She’d be all right here, but she wasn’t going into Swindon, if she could help it. She knew too many people there, any one of whom could mention her to her relatives. And then what would Frank do?

She woke with a start from a nightmare about him grabbing her, as he had before, to find moonlight streaming in through the uncurtained windows and someone shaking her.

‘You all right?’ Jane whispered.

‘Just had a nightmare, that’s all.’

‘I’ll leave you to sleep, then.’

As Phoebe snuggled down in the narrow bed, she heard Jane yawning and that made her yawn too.

She’d expected to lie awake for a while, as she usually did after a nightmare, but the next thing she knew, the alarm clock Sister had given them was ringing and they had to get up.

Benedict got out of his car and studied the house more closely. Greyladies was much smaller than he’d expected and even before he went inside, that worried him. With the severely injured patients he was expecting to house here as the war progressed, a bigger establishment would be better, so that one man’s death didn’t leave such a big hole in the group.

He frowned, remembering a poem he’d loved, seeking to get the words exactly right in his mind:

That was it. By … yes, John Donne: ‘No Man is an Island’. He loved that poem.

How true that was of present circumstances!

The trouble was, there weren’t enough larger establishments to cater for the casualties they were expecting, but this place, pretty as it was, surely couldn’t be called a hospital or have the facilities to deal even with the
minor corrective surgery in which he specialised. He’d place Greyladies under the category ‘other’ and at best call it a ‘small convalescent home’.

A grey-haired woman with rather masculine features came out of the house and stood waiting for him in the doorway, arms folded, positively bristling with white starched garments. ‘Dr Somers?’

‘Yes. You must be the matron.’ He had met her once before somewhere, he thought, but couldn’t for the life of him remember her name or where it had been. Perhaps she’d attended one of his talks.

‘I’m Matron Dawkins. We have met before, Dr Somers.’

‘Have we? Sorry. Life’s been such a whirlwind lately, I’m afraid things have passed in a blur at times.’

She scowled at him. The expression looked as if it sat regularly on her face.

‘I was sorry I couldn’t get here sooner to be involved in setting up the convalescent home—’

‘Convalescent hospital, surely, Dr Somers?’

‘Is it large enough to call a hospital?’

‘A small auxiliary hospital, surely.’

The status seemed important to her, but it was the men’s welfare that mattered to him. ‘We’ll see. As I was saying, I had some important work to finish before I could come here, including some delicate operations.’

‘I was quite capable of making a start. I have, after all, been nursing for several decades now and know what is needed. Do come inside.’

He sighed at her tone as he followed her. The appointment of a matron hadn’t been in his hands and he’d never have chosen a woman with such a sour expression to deal with
men facing permanent disablement. He could only hope that when they got to know one another better, when they grew used to working as a team, the tension between him and Matron would ease. She had better be tactful with the men who would be coming here later. He wouldn’t put up with trying to regiment badly disabled chaps.

She gestured towards a door to the left. ‘I’ve allocated this room for your office.’

He walked inside and stopped in shock at the sight of a huge drawing room. ‘This is far too big for one person! Most of my work will be on the wards or doing minor operations. And I’ll still be going into Swindon to supervise training of doctors, or if there are more complex operations needed. We should try to find a smaller room elsewhere for my office, not waste this space on one man.’

‘I’m afraid the authorities aren’t allowing us to make any structural changes to this house, so we have to take the rooms as they are. I can’t see what they’re making such a fuss about. It’s quite a small country house and seems nothing special to me.’

‘Mr Pashley has already shared the details of Greyladies with me and even after seeing only the outside, I agree with him that this house is valuable to the country historically. We can’t ruin one of Britain’s architectural treasures, Matron. That would go against the very thing we’re fighting for.’

A huff of air was his only answer.

‘I think the first thing to do would be for you, or someone else, to show me round.’

‘Wouldn’t you like some refreshments first, Dr Somers?’

‘No, thank you. I stopped at a friend’s house on the way here.’ He went back out into the entrance hall. ‘Once I have
a full picture of the house in my mind, I can decide where I want my office. A room as big as this would make a beautiful sitting room for our patients.’

Her expression went even more acid, if that were possible, so he changed the subject again. ‘I met the owner of Greyladies on my way from the village. I thought he was one of our patients because he was limping, so I offered him a lift.’

‘That man! For a cripple, he has some utterly ridiculous ideas about his own importance.’

Benedict couldn’t hold the reproof back. ‘Don’t
ever
call someone a cripple again in that tone of voice, Matron! People with serious physical problems have enough to get used to without facing the scorn of more fortunate people with whole bodies.’

She blinked, opened her mouth, then snapped it shut like a steel trap, but the look she threw in his direction showed exactly what she was thinking.

‘The tour?’ he prompted.

They walked round the house, and he couldn’t help exclaiming at how beautiful some parts were, especially the big stained glass window which must flood the entrance hall with rainbows of colour in fine weather.

He found a much smaller room on the ground floor which would make a perfect office for himself, and another next to it which would suit Matron, who had taken possession of the former dining room. Since he knew by now that it would be war between them, he didn’t scruple to use his authority as Commandant and Medical Officer of Greyladies to ask her to move to the smaller room. Good heavens, the larger one could hold six severely injured patients.

‘We must all make sacrifices for these men, who have made great sacrifices for us,’ he reminded her when she glared at him. ‘And there will be far worse injuries to come than those who’ve arrived so far.’

‘Tell that to the owners of the house.’ She gestured towards an ancient wooden door at the rear of the entrance hall. ‘They have refused to give me the key to that door, so they can walk into the house at any time and interfere with our treatment.’

‘Have they walked in without invitation?’

She hesitated. ‘No. But they might do so at a crucial moment, and we can’t risk that. If it were up to me, I’d burn that old door and replace it with a sound modern one. Look at it! The wood’s rough and it needs painting.’

He wasn’t having that! ‘If anyone burnt or damaged the door, I’d personally see them prosecuted for it. It’s an immensely valuable antique dating from the sixteenth century.’

‘I can see that Mr Latimer has been bending your ear already, and no doubt blackening my name.’

‘No. He didn’t mention the door, or discuss his dealings with you in any way. It was Mr Pashley who admired the former entrance door connecting the two parts of the house.’

Even that didn’t please her. ‘You will find Mr Latimer too weak willed to do anything properly. He even changed his surname to his wife’s when she inherited this place. What sort of man goes against the usual customs of our country like that?’

‘It’s family tradition for the Latimers, I gather.’

Another angry huff of sound expressed her feelings.

Benedict wondered what sin he’d committed to be given
the penance of working with this harridan, who found fault with everything and had upset him several times in the first hour. ‘There’s another problem that must be solved if this place is to function properly, and that’s the need for a lift to take the patients up and down. There are three floors designated for use, after all.’

She stared woodenly at him.

‘I’ll have to discuss it with Mr and Mrs Latimer, and see if they’ll agree to some minor structural changes, perhaps in the servants’ area at the rear. No time like the present. I’ll go and see them straight away. I should introduce myself to Mrs Latimer, anyway. We need to maintain good relations with the family, who can probably help us in dealing with the locals. Do you use the connecting door to visit them or the rear door of the old building when you want to consult them?’

‘
I
do not consult them about anything. I know my job already.’

As a new young doctor, he’d been secretly terrified of a matron very much like her. As a surgeon in his late thirties, with a great deal of experience working with badly damaged human beings, he wasn’t in the least bit afraid of her or anyone else. But he was angry that he had to waste his energy on the stupid, bigoted woman when there were men desperately needing his help, men who needed a calm, happy environment in which to recover.

He didn’t usually judge people so quickly, but in this case, she had made her feelings and approach to the medical profession very plain: old-fashioned and authoritarian. Nineteenth-century medical practice not twentieth. She was completely the wrong person to work here. And he wasn’t
at all sure that Greyladies was the right place for him and his patients, either. It was too small and on too many levels. How were injured men to get up and down those staircases if they couldn’t build a lift?

The War Office was doing its best, he knew, but there were bound to be some changes needed to the places allocated in such a hurry.

He had some influence with the authorities, thank goodness, and was quite prepared to use it to get the best for those in his care, and for the doctors with whom he’d share his skills.

Phyllis came bustling into the big hall where the family lived. ‘The new doctor’s come to see you. I put him in the servants’ dining room.’

‘I’ll fetch him,’ Joseph said at once. ‘I think you’ll like Dr Somers, darling. He’s not at all like the Dragon.’

Harriet put down the diary she was trying to write, and waited for them to return. The doctor was a man approaching his middle years, with a face that might once have been good-looking but now looked careworn, as if he’d seen some terrible things.

He held out his hand. ‘I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs Latimer.’

She shook it, pleased at this sign of respect and a modern attitude towards women. ‘It’s good to meet you, too, Dr Somers. Please sit down.’

He took a chair but didn’t wait for her to speak. ‘I should have been here at the beginning to prepare the house for patients, but I was dealing with a group of doctors I’ve been training
and
a group of bigwigs whose goodwill is important for my type of medicine.’

‘Your type of medicine?’

‘Rehabilitation surgery and the convalescent needs linked to it.’

She watched his brow wrinkle and there was a pause, as if he was unsure how to continue.

‘I gather Matron Dawkins has been somewhat … er, aloof in her dealings with you, Mrs Latimer.’

Harriet contented herself with a nod. He was trying to be polite and professional about the Dragon, which spoke well of him, but his expression had become grim when he spoke of Matron Dawkins. That displeasure had happened quickly!

‘We need to make some changes to the front part of the house, to enable our patients to get around.’ He held up one hand to stop her speaking. ‘If you’d just let me finish? I don’t want to do anything to damage the house, which is beautiful, but some of the men need a lift to take them up and down to their various areas. They can’t sit in their wards all day. And I think I know how we can fit in a small lift without damaging the fabric of the house. Would you consider it?’

Harriet looked at Joseph, and he nodded encouragingly. ‘We’d certainly consider it, if it didn’t damage the house. The men’s welfare is important, but I’m the current custodian of Greyladies and I take that responsibility very seriously, too.’

He relaxed visibly. ‘I only ask you to stay open-minded until you see what I’m thinking of. We could go and look now. I’d explain better with that part of the house in front of us.’

‘Of course.’ She stood up, hesitated, then decided if they were being frank, she needed to say something. ‘Dr Somers … could you allow some of the men to visit us once
they’re able to walk around? They could use our garden, which is at the side and has several pleasant places to sit? It’s such a waste not to use it, because there are places there which are sheltered, even during the winter.’

He looked at her in puzzlement. ‘It’s very kind of you to invite them. What’s stopping them from coming?’

‘Matron has forbidden it.’ Harriet tried to soften her words. ‘I think she’s worried about … um, about their welfare. But how would it hurt for them to come here, into the house even, to borrow books and sit reading quietly? They would surely enjoy a change of scene, however minor.’

Dr Somers bit his lip as if trying to think what to say. ‘Matron isn’t used to the sort of hospital I shall be running. It’s not necessary medically to supervise the men for every minute once they’re convalescent. It can be a question of time for healing between operations and minor adjustments, and they do better if given as much freedom as possible.’

In for a penny, in for a pound, she thought. ‘One of the officers, Captain Averill, is an acquaintance of my husband’s family and even
he
has been forbidden to visit us.’

‘I seem to have jumped straight into the deep end of a difficult situation, Mrs Latimer.’

‘Yes. I’m sorry for that, but I’m not going to pretend that relations between Matron Dawkins and ourselves got off to a good start. Or that she has any goodwill about improving them.’

Joseph nodded. ‘My wife is right. We’ve tried but we’re simply not welcome to help the men. In fact, she told my wife she had enough to do, staying here and looking after our children. As for her attitude towards my … physical difficulties, it’s not good.’

‘I won’t pretend either. For the patients’ sake. They are more important than anything else, in my eyes. But we’ll keep such thoughts in confidence and feel our way carefully. She
is
an experienced matron and has done an excellent job of setting up the wards and medical supplies.’

Heaven help the people she’s in charge of, though! thought Harriet, not for the first time. She stood up. ‘Then please show us your idea.’