Tender Nurse (4 page)

The dark brows shot up. “Hm. He will, will he?” A slight smile of approval played on his lips. “That right, Brown?” he asked the patient who had just opened his eyes.

Brown nodded sleepily.

“Good enough,” said Martin. “We’ll soon have it out. Right, George,” he said to a fair-haired young doctor who had just appeared. “He’s ready for his spinal.”

He clumped out again.

Julia Fisher turned a cold eye on Andrea. “Nurse, I should have thought you had been told by now. Never address Mr. Graham as ‘doctor.’ Either
Mr.
Graham or ‘Sir.’ To do otherwise is against the rule of the hospital and the height of bad manners.”

Andrea reddened and was about to make a reply, but having delivered her reprimand, Julia Fisher had turned on her heel and was already giving out fresh orders in the theatre. Sister Hawthorne came along presently.

The rest of the morning stood out in Andrea’s memory for the rest of her nursing career and for long after that. This was a new experience for her and she was entirely fascinated. For two and a half hours she watched Martin operate and was amazed at his skill. She watched entranced as without the slightest hesitation and with a sureness of touch he made his clear-cut incision; noticed his dexterous handling of delicate instruments, the steadiness of his hands, the rapidity with which he worked and gave his orders, and saw the intense concentration in his cool grey eyes. All held her enthralled.

Between operations he found time to have a personal word with every patient endowing each one with confidence. Once when Andrea herself was beginning to feel both the mental and physical strain he said:

“Get nurse a stool, someone. She can’t stand the whole morning — before we know where we are she’ll be passing out on us — big strain the first time.”

FOR the remainder of that day, Andrea strove to fight down her agitation. She walked away from the theatre almost in a state of fury. How dared he assume that she had spread that ridiculous rumor merely on the strength of being given a lift. That he should think she had actually boasted about the incident made her seethe. The admiration she had felt for him in the theatre was swept away by the turbulence of her anger. “The be-all and end-all; the Alpha and the Omega” indeed! The idea was preposterous! Such vanity was not to be borne.

It was perhaps fortunate that she was off duty during that afternoon. At least, she had reached a degree of composure before going on duty for the evening. The work, combined with an hour’s interruption for a lecture, served to divert her thoughts somewhat, so that by bedtime her hot anger had cooled a little.

It was renewed in full force, however, the next morning when she was summoned to Matron's office to receive a reprimand for rudeness to the surgeon.

“After all, Nurse,” Matron said as she regarded Andrea across her desk, “Mr. Graham is our chief surgeon and is entitled to a high degree of respect—especially from our probationer nurses—irrespective of what their relationship off duty might be.”

Andrea started visibly. Her lips opened to make a protest, but Matron continued.

“You did not tell me, Nurse, that you were acquainted with Mr. Graham before you came here. I am presuming that such must be the case, as I am told you were out with him yesterday evening. It is hardly likely that you have become as friendly as that in your very brief stay here.”

Coloring, Andrea told Matron exactly what had occurred. She smiled. “Oh, I see. Well, now you will realize how easily those kind of rumors can begin. In a place like this where a large number of people live and work in such close contact, it is easy to cause a scandal. It was a rather unfortunate occurrence on your first evening off duty. Be careful not to let such a thing happen again.” She paused, her hands clasped before her on the desk. Then she went on: “I am fully aware that our doctors and nurses quite frequently fall genuinely in love, being human, and while I make every allowance in those cases, I have to deal very severely with flirting. Too much of that would very soon get the hospital a bad name, quite apart from the effect on the work. However, you don’t look the flirtatious type, and I am quite sure that this silly rumor will very soon be forgotten. Regarding the matter of your rudeness to Mr. Graham, there is no need for you to apologize to him on this occasion, but don’t let me hear of such a thing again.”

The serene grey eyes rested kindly on Andrea for a moment, then she said briskly, “That will be all, Nurse.”

In all justice, Andrea knew that Matron had been most kind and understanding, but the knowledge that Martin Graham had actually reported her renewed her dislike of him.

“Really, Virginia,” she exploded as the two girls sat on her bed that evening after duty. “What a despicable thing to do, reporting me to Matron! After all, he began the argument.”

Virginia laughed, though not unsympathetically.

“My dear child, you don’t
argue
with a man like our Martin! In any case, how do you know that it was he who reported you?”

Andrea looked at her in surprise. “Who else could it have been? There was no one else there.”

“It may have been Sister Fisher.”

“If that is so, then he must have told her about the incident himself. It would be just like him, he’s so full of his own importance.”

Virginia smiled tolerantly. “Well, he is rather important,” she pointed out.

“In his own particular sphere perhaps, yes, but that doesn’t give him the right to be so abominably conceited in other matters. He evidently imagines that all the nurses are falling over themselves to be dated by him if he thinks that one of us will stoop to inventing a thing like that.”

Virginia eyed her quizzically. “You
are
in a state about him aren’t you?”

Andrea plumped up a pillow for her back. “Well, I’m certainly not lining up in the queue to be asked out.”

Virginia threw back her head and laughed.

Andrea looked at her in mild surprise. “I mean that, Virginia. He has obviously taken so many of the nurses out at one time and another that it was taken for granted I had been out with him too.”

“My dear girl,” said Virginia, still laughing, “wherever did you get the idea—that he had taken so many of the nurses out?”

“Well, hasn’t he? That’s the impression I’ve been given.”

“No. It’s just wishful thinking on their part—and they
are
falling over themselves to be dated by him. But Martin has never been known to date a nurse yet.”

“He hasn’t?”

“No, he has
not
. They’d be only too flattered if he did. The very fact that his position makes him rather unapproachable adds to his attraction. Besides that, he’s young, good looking and he can be very charming on occasions.”

Andrea suddenly remembered how he had ordered a stool to be brought for her, and how wonderful he had been to the patients.

“He may be all you say he is,” she conceded, “but quite apart from that, it infuriates me to see the way everyone kow-tows to him.”

“Well, you can hardly blame
him
for that, can you?”

“But he
allows
it.”

“My dear, he probably isn’t even aware of it.” She looked thoughtfully at her friend. “You seem rather prejudiced against our Martin if you don’t mind my saying so.”

Andrea reddened. “Oh, let’s talk about something else, Virginia.”

Virginia gave her a sidelong glance. She liked this somewhat quick-tempered girl. She admired the untiring way in which she gave herself to her patients; nothing was too much trouble for her. Her sympathy was warm and ready, even with the difficult ones, revealing a particularly loving and generous nature. There must be some reason for her prejudice against Martin Graham.

“All right,” she said good humoredly. “Tell me about this friend of yours — the one whose car broke down when this other ‘odious’ person gave you a lift.”

Andrea longed to tell Virginia about the incident on the ward as well as the one in the car — her attitude toward the surgeon would not then seem so unreasonable — but a strange reticence prevented her.

“Oh, Godfrey is all right,” she answered lamely.

Virginia’s eyes widened. “Only ‘all right’?”

“Well, he’s rather a dear, really.”

“You’re not engaged then?”

“Oh no——”

“Nor in love?”

“I hardly know.”

“Well, my dear, if you don’t know, the answer is definitely in the negative surely?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that, Virginia. I do love Godfrey in a way, and I know he loves me. He has asked me to marry him, but——”

“But you didn’t want to commit yourself, eh?”

“That sounds a little heartless. It’s not that, Virginia. Somehow I wanted to begin my nursing career free, if you know what I mean. If I’d embarked on my training already engaged, it would have made my nursing seem such a transient thing — something to be got over as quickly as possible so that I could be married. Whereas I want to really give myself to it for a few years. It hardly seemed fair either to Godfrey or the job to become engaged.”

“And he’s going to wait for you?”

“He said so, yes.”

“He must be very much in love with you, Andrea,” the other said soberly.

Andrea was silent for a moment, then she said quickly.

“Tell me something about yourself, Virginia.”

“Me? Oh, I’ve not much to tell. I’ve lived a very sheltered life. This is my first job. We are a large family, or were, when we were all at home. I have four brothers and three younger sisters. My brothers are all older than I. I studied music for some years — I wanted to become a professional pianist. So instead of having help in the house and my taking a job, I stayed home to help mother and studied music at the same time. Then, one by one my brothers married and so——”

“But what became of your musical career?”

Virginia gave a wry smile. “Oh, I guess I just wasn’t good enough. You have to be a really brilliant pianist to be up to concert standard. You need a kind of flare for public performance too. At auditions, I was always so nervous, I fumbled and hit wrong notes. I tried teaching for a while, but found that deadly. Of course, I still love to play.”

“And I’d love to hear you.”

“Then you must come home with me one day. I play here on odd occasions, but with the competition of the radio and television, opportunities are a bit rare.”

“I’d love to come to your home sometime. I’ve no proper home, I’m afraid. At least, I’ve no family.”

“You poor dear,” Virginia said with quick sympathy. “How’s that?”

Andrea told her about the death of her mother.

“Having no father for as long as I remember, mother and I were everything to each other. When she died and I decided to take up nursing, I sold our house and furnished a small flat. Actually, I have been wondering whether to let it whilst I’m here, but on second thoughts, I may keep it on. With the money I made from the sale of the house, and a little mother left me, I can afford to for a while, at any rate. It would be rather nice to have somewhere to go on our off-duty, wouldn’t it?”

“It certainly would,” Virginia agreed. “My own home is about fifty miles away — much too far to travel on an evening off.”

“There we are then. We’ll be able to go along there— to the flat I mean — and cook a meal, or even have a party. Incidentally, there’s rather a nice piano there. Mother played beautifully, that’s why I didn’t want to part with it, but I’m not much of a player. It will be lovely to hear you play, Virginia.”

“I can hardly wait to try it, my dear,” she said, her eyes shining.

“Well, what about Friday? We’ve both got an evening off, haven’t we?”

“Oh yes — but haven’t you heard? There’s a hospital dance on Friday evening. You do dance I suppose?”