Vintage Love (216 page)

The driver halted the carriage before a good-sized building of gray stone. He opened her door, and pointed to the metal knocker on a shining, inner wood door. She used the knocker, and after a moment the door was opened by an elderly woman wearing a white apron over a gray dress.

Joy said, “I’m English. Is this the school?”

“Ah!” the woman replied with an accent. “You are the one Pastor Fliednor has been expecting.”

“I imagine so,” she agreed.

The driver brought her things in, and she paid him. She now had a chance to inspect the inside of the stone building. It was as severe and plain as the outside. The woman led her upstairs to a large, almost bare room on the third floor. It was also the top floor. The room contained several plain chairs, a dresser without a mirror a commode, and two narrow beds on either side of a tiny window which overlooked the street.

When the driver finished struggling up the stairs with her luggage, he bowed and went on his way. The elderly woman told her. “You may now follow me to the office of the Pastor.”

“Thank you,” she said, seeing that strict obedience was expected of her.

They went down the stone steps to the office of the director. It was large and cluttered with papers and books. But the Pastor was not there.

The woman said, “I will find the Pastor and tell him you are waiting.” She hesitated on her way out, and introduced herself, “I’m Frau Rose Grosz. I have been with the Pastor many years. Before he married again.”

“I see,” she said.

The old woman’s plump face was sad. “His first wife was Friederieke Munster. She and the Pastor began all this. He had been inspired by what he’d seen the Protestant deaconnesses doing in hospitals in Holland. He wished to see the Protestant Church in Germany have the same sort of fine nursing sisters as the Sisters of Charity of the Catholic Church.”

“And that was how it began.”

“I was among the first he enlisted,” Frau Grosz said with pride. “The Pastor’s wife found another fine volunteer in Gertrude Reichardt, a friend, who happened to be the daughter and sister of doctors. She arrived with some knowledge of the care of the sick.”

Joy said, “I have had nursing training in a doctor’s office.”

“Good!”

“I wish to win the credits the school can give me.”

“Excellent,” the old woman said. “I will find the Pastor.” And now she hurried out.

Joy sat in the musty office for a long while waiting for the Director to appear. Then she heard footsteps, and looked up to see an elderly man entering the room. He was dressed in black and walked with a limp; his face was shrewd and lined, he had gray side-whiskers, and a tousled head of gray hair.

Speaking careful English, he said, “Welcome, Lady Canby.” She had enrolled under her maiden name.

She smiled. “This is my great ambition.”

He sat across from her and spread his hands. “I hope you are not disappointed. You will not find it easy here. There is much hard work and our rules are strict.”

“I am not a stranger to hard work,” she said.

The Pastor nodded. “You know we had Florence Nightingale here. I visited England years ago and met Elizabeth Fry, who has done such fine work in your prisons.”

She said, “I have been away from London a good deal. I worked in Scotland for a fine doctor named John Hastings.”

“And you are recently a widow! Sad!”

“Yes,” she said. “And now I wish to make a career for myself.”

“You are from a social family,” the old man said. “We have none of your station here.”

“I do not think of such things.”

“I assure you our girls are from good families and carefully chosen,” he said. “The work is divided in departments. There is the housekeeping, the cooking, and the laundry. There is also the linen supplier, and the ward nurses. We shift our young women from one department to another so they may learn all phases of patient care.”

“The plan sounds excellent,” she said, liking the man and his ideas despite the clutter of his office.

“We have developed several daughter houses which are associated with the mother house,” the Pastor went on. “We are doing some pioneer work in regard to institutions for the insane. Such nursing services hardly exist.”

“Our Bedlam in London could do with some intelligent management,” she said.

“I agree,” he sighed. “I was shocked at the sight of poor, mad souls placed in cages and exhibited for a fee, as was being done at your Bedlam. I found myself concerned for what we like to call ‘civilization’.”

She said, “I have a small command of German. I think in a little while I will be able to converse in it properly.”

“There was that requirement in my letter accepting you,” the Pastor recalled. “You will share your room with a fine, young deaconness who is, I understand, an old friend of your sister-in-law. The woman’s name is Fraulein Spahn.”

Joy smiled. “Yes. My sister-in-law told me about the Fraulein.”

The Pastor rose. “That will be all. Go to your room and unpack. The evening meal is at six. You will begin your training tomorrow.”

She went upstairs in a good frame of mind. The Pastor had told her that in the morning she would be shown through the wards and introduced to the training staff and students. After that she would be assigned to one of the various departments.

After unpacking her things and placing them in an empty closet, she felt tired and lay on one of the small, iron frame beds and fell asleep. When she woke up she saw a small, blonde girl in the uniform of the school sitting on the opposite bed, watching her. The girl smiled, and Joy knew this had to be the Dresden beauty of whom Hilda had told her.

“I did not wish to wake you, Lady Joy,” the petite beauty said, rising and crossing to her.

“I was so tired,” she smiled and yawned. “Forgive me! You must be Fraulein Spahn.”

“I am Lisa,” the pretty girl said.

“Hilda spoke glowingly of you.”

The girl blushed. “I’m not so much. When Hilda and I were friends I was younger and full of life. Now it is mostly hard work.”

“Hilda is married to my brother.”

“So she wrote me,” Lisa said.

“I’m glad to have you as my roommate,” Joy told her. “I won’t feel so strange and alone.”

“I want to help you.”

Joy stared at the frail girl in wonder. “Your hair is the color of straw. And you have such a lovely face. I’m considered a blonde in England, but I can’t touch you.”

Lisa laughed. “Beauty is not important in this place.”

“I wanted to come here. The school is so well known.”

“You are a brave woman,” Lisa said.

They talked until it was time to go down for the evening meal. She learned that Lisa was one of the training staff, and permanently assigned to nursing surgical patients. She also learned that the hospital could handle one hundred and fifty patients in its dozen wards. Lisa was from a wealthy Berlin family. She had met Hilda on holiday in England, and they had become dear friends.

Joy met some of her new associates at the long dining table. After the meal, there was prayers in the chapel. Then she and Lisa returned to their room.

Lisa said, “We go to bed early here. Our day begins at six.” She lit a candle, and went to the corner of the room where three large jugs sat with covers of thin tile over them. She said, “This is the hot water I asked for.”

“Hot water?”

Lisa smiled at her. “Yes. I knew how weary you must be, and a nice, warm bath after your journey will refresh you.”

“How kind of you to think of it!”

“I will fetch the tub,” Lisa said. And went to the hall, and dragged back a large tin tub, higher at one end than at the other. Placing the tub in the area between their beds, Lisa began to fill it. She mixed the hot water with pottery jugs of cold, until she felt the temperature was right. Then with a shy glance, she told Joy, “Your bath is ready!”

The warm bath was more refreshing than any Joy could remember. She relaxed in the sudsy water, and by the time she was ready to step out of the tub she was more than half asleep. Lisa insisted that she get into bed while she removed the dirty water and the tub. Joy smiled at her from her pillow and thanked her. She promptly fell into a deep sleep, leaving the frail Lisa still busy.

Next morning, Joy began her training. She found that she knew much of the technical side of nursing but could learn a great deal about organizing a hospital service and supervising others. In Scotland, Heather had been her only assistant. Here she had to learn to work with many people. Her German progressed rapidly, and she soon became a favorite of the patients as the English Fraulein.

The Holidays came and went in a welter of work. She worked at the school for a year, adjusting to the long hours and the wards stripped of all but the bare necessities. She did not think she could have managed it without the help and friendship of Lisa.

When she returned to her room, weary and often discouraged, Lisa tried to cheer her up with gossip of the school. The nurses were overworked and many of them had breakdowns in health. She learned that Florence Nightingale had not been all that pleased with the way Pastor Fliednor ran the hospital, though she felt he was essentially a good man.

Letters arrived from London telling of James’ success in the house. His speeches had made him a popular figure. Lady Susan remained about the same, but her memory was fading so that she was often confused. There were ominous rumblings of war between Russia and Turkey. Charles Dickens had written a letter to the
London Times
in which he stressed his hope that the Queen would not allow England to be drawn into the conflict. He had pointed out the misery and poverty so prevalent, and suggested that money which might be uselessly spent on a distant war could be better used to alleviate the miserable state of the poor at home.

In January, 1852, Joy celebrated her thirtieth birthday. The hardships of hospital training had not robbed her of looks, but had honed her beauty to that of fine distinction. Lisa was the only one she told about her birthday, and the German girl marked the event by giving her a lovely old music box.

Joy said, “I feel so alone. I would be lost without your friendship.”

Lisa consoled her. “You will find the right man! I’m sure of it. A husband who will bring you happiness instead of sorrow.”

“I wonder,” she said. “I have known only one such man.” She was again thinking of John Hastings, and this invariably made her sad.

In February Lisa came to her and said, “I have been asked by Pastor Fliednor to go to the hospital for the insane in Vienna. He says the conditions there are deplorable, and he wants me to organize proper nursing for the patients.”

Joy was less than enthusiastic about the project. She said, “I know it’s an honor to be asked. But I’ve heard such terrible stories about that hospital. Do you think it safe for you to go there?”

Lisa said, “I cannot shirk from an unpleasant task. I have already agreed to transfer there.”

Joy stared at her for a moment and then asked, “Can I go with you?”

Lisa hesitated. “I suppose so. The Pastor is looking for other volunteers. But you have been planning to go back to England.”

“I’d like to try Vienna for a while,” she said.

“You mentioned it could be dangerous for me,” Lisa reminded her. “It could be just as dangerous for you.”

“If you’re willing to risk it so am I,” she said.

Lisa looked pleased. “We are good friends, aren’t we?”

Joy’s eyes were blurred with tears, and she took the pretty girl’s hands in hers. “I could not wish for a better friend than you, Lisa!”

“I’ll tell the Pastor you’ve volunteered,” Lisa said.

They made the journey to Vienna in frigid winter weather. Reaching the ancient city of the Hapsburgs, they found it caught in a blinding snowstorm. So they saw little of the city as they struggled to reach the lunatic asylum.

Not until later did they have a chance to enjoy what many people claimed was the most beautiful city in the world. The lovely buildings along the Danube, and the fine parks, and broad avenues made it a place of enchanting beauty. But within the walls of the asylum there was no beauty and much horror! When Lisa and Joy were shown through the many wards they were shocked by the sights they saw!

They learned from the doctors in charge that there was little treatment of the unfortunates who came to the asylum. The few lucky patients who managed to improve on their own were allowed to go out and beg for a living. Thus the city had more than the usual quota of the mildly insane roaming its streets. In the asylum, the mad were dosed with dubious drugs, bled excessively, restrained with chains, and crowded into filthy cells and wards which were often dark as dungeons. The truly violent were locked in deep, damp cellars.

Roman Catholic sisters composed the nursing staff. They did what they could, but were outnumbered by a large number of untrained male and female assistants who had no idea how to care for the mentally ill. Many of these people were themselves outcasts of society, and could hold no other job.

Lisa and Joy were resented by the Roman Catholic sisters, who disliked the idea of Protestant deconnesses coming to improve on their work. So they kept to themselves. The other untrained group saw the two nurses as intruders out to make them do needless work, or cost them their jobs. So they showed nothing but stubborn hostility towards them.

Lisa fell into Joy’s arms after the first week and sobbed, “It’s hopeless!”

“It surely seems so,” Joy said with despair. “Perhaps we should send a letter to the Pastor and ask him to take us back at Kaiserworth.”

Lisa shook her head. “He would only be angry.”

“But if we cannot accomplish anything here?”

“We must try a little longer before we give up,” the tiny blonde girl said.

So they toiled on. Gradually, the Catholic Sisters began to warm to them. This was a major victory. But the problem with the ignorant men and women who provided the rest of the help remained. This group resisted every gesture Lisa and Joy made to win their confidence and train them. Behind their backs, they mocked their manners and their accents.