Nightingales at War (12 page)

Nick’s smile was grim. ‘I’ll have to go where they send me, won’t I? Anyway, it’s got to be better than being stuck in this place, doing bloody jigsaws!’ he added.

Dora’s face must have given her away, because his fingers tightened around hers. ‘Don’t worry about me, love,’ he said. ‘I’ll be all right. I survived Dunkirk, I reckon I can survive anything. It’s you I worry about.’

‘Me?’

He nodded. ‘You’ve got so much on your plate. I just wish I could be there to protect you and Danny, and the kids.’

Dora managed a smile, even though she was aching inside. ‘Don’t you worry about us,’ she said. ‘We’ll be all right. I’ll look after them all until you get home.’

They talked for another half an hour, holding hands and chatting about everything and nothing. Dora wished she could put her feelings into words, but it wasn’t her way. It wasn’t Nick’s way either, but she could read his love for her in the way his gaze never left her face.

All too soon, she had to leave to catch the last train back to London.

‘I don’t suppose I’ll be able to visit you again,’ she said glumly, as she gathered up her belongings.

‘I don’t expect you will,’ Nick said. ‘Besides, I don’t want you rushing down here every five minutes, not when you’ve got the kids to look after. I should get some embark-ation leave before I’m sent back, so I’ll see you then.’ He held on to her hand. ‘You will be all right, won’t you?’

‘I told you, don’t you worry about me. I can take care of myself.’

They were both making light of it, but she could see in his eyes that he was as afraid as she was.

She leaned forward and he kissed her. The touch of his lips on hers opened floodgates of emotion and desire.

‘You’d best go,’ Nick said hoarsely.

Dora’s smile wobbled. She felt a tear rolling down her cheek, but Nick brushed it away with his thumb.

She smiled. ‘You just make sure you come back safe,’ she said.

He smiled back. ‘You just make sure I have a home to come back to,’ he replied.

She walked away. She took a few steps, then turned. He was staring at the photograph, sadness darkening his eyes, as if he wanted to commit their faces to memory for ever.

‘
YOU DON’T MIND,
do you?’

Eve caught the appealing look Cissy gave her from under her lashes, and her heart sank.

‘Sister asked me to assist in Outpatients this morning—’ she began, but Cissy cut her off.

‘Oh, she won’t mind, as long as one of us is there,’ she dismissed airily. ‘Go on, you know you’re so much better at this sort of thing than I am.’

‘This sort of thing’ was an elderly tramp who sat between them on the wooden bench, stinking of stale sweat and cheap booze. He looked up from one to the other with sad, yellowing eyes, then coughed wheezily and spat into a dirty handkerchief.

Cissy winced. ‘Please?’ she begged. ‘He’s so dirty. I’m afraid he might have TB or something. I don’t want to catch it.’

‘Shh! He’ll hear you.’

‘Nonsense, he’s as deaf as a post. Aren’t you, you old goat?’

‘Baxter!’

‘So will you swap with me? Go on, as a favour,’ Cissy wheedled.

Eve sighed. There was no point arguing. Once Cissy had made up her mind not to do something, that was it.

And she was very fussy about what she did and didn’t do, as Eve had found out in the three weeks they’d been working together. Cissy didn’t like going near any patient who was dirty, or smelly, or whose head needed delousing. She wouldn’t clean up vomit because it made her retch, and she would only scrub the toilets if Eve had checked first that there was nothing unpleasant for her to encounter.

As usual, Cissy took her silence for assent.

‘You will? Thanks, you’re a brick. I won’t forget this,’ she called over her shoulder as she hurried off to Outpatients. ‘We can have lunch together, how about that?’

If you remember, Eve thought. Cissy was full of promises she never kept. She turned to the old man with a resigned sigh. ‘Come on, mister,’ she said, encouraging him to his feet. ‘Let’s take you to see the nurse. She’ll sort you out.’

It was a struggle to get the old man into the consulting room. He could barely shuffle and leaned heavily against her, his arm around her shoulders. Eve nearly buckled under his weight and the stench of his filthy clothing.

Nurse Kowalski raised a quizzical eyebrow as they staggered in. ‘I thought you were in Outpatients today?’ she said.

‘I was, but I swapped with Baxter.’

‘Did you indeed?’ Dev Kowalski sent her a shrewd look. ‘And I suppose that was her ladyship’s idea? You shouldn’t let her bully you, you know, Ainsley. You ought to stand up for yourself.’

‘I didn’t mind,’ Eve murmured.

‘Yes, well, you should. I’ve heard the way she speaks to you, ordering you about as if you’re her servant. It’s not up to her what she does and what she doesn’t.’ Kowalski shook her head. ‘Honestly, the way she goes on anyone would think she ran this place, not Sister. Anyway, what have we here?’ She turned to the old man.

‘He says he’s got a rash on his feet.’

The old man’s cough rolled up from his chest like an approaching train, ending in another noisy session with his grubby handkerchief. Nurse Kowalski frowned. ‘He’s got a nasty chest infection too, by the sound of it. Let’s get his shoes and socks off and we’ll take a look, shall we? You’d best give him a hand, I don’t think he can manage by himself.’

Eve crouched down to unlace his old boots. They had been patched and crudely mended several times, and the soles were hanging off.

Meanwhile, Nurse Kowalski was still holding forth on the subject of Cissy Baxter.

‘You know why she wants to help in Outpatients today, don’t you? So she can throw herself at Mr Cooper.’ Dev Kowlaski shook her head in disgust. ‘As if a respectable married man like him would ever be interested in a silly little thing like her!’

‘But Cissy has a boyfriend,’ Eve said.

Kowalski laughed. ‘That wouldn’t stop someone like her. I’m telling you, you’d do well to keep your distance from that one, Ainsley. She’s a cruel little cat.’

Eve was silent as she struggled to unpick the knotted laces. Whatever Kowalski said, as far as Eve was concerned, Cissy Baxter was everything she wanted to be. All right, so she could be a bit selfish sometimes, but that was only because she had the confidence to know what she wanted. If Eve was only a fraction as pretty and self-assured as Cissy was, she was sure her life would be completely different.

She pulled off the old man’s boot, exposing a worn, filthy sock. The ammonia tang of ancient sweat nearly knocked her backwards.

Holding her breath, she pulled off the sock, exposing weeping, crusty patches that spread up over his ankle and crept beyond the ragged hem of his trouser legs.

Nurse Kowalski looked over her shoulder. ‘Ringworm,’ she declared. ‘We’ll put some iodine on it and see if that helps.’ She turned to Eve. ‘Perhaps you’d like to have a go at applying it?’

‘Me?’ Eve looked around, to see if one of the junior students had come into the room behind her. ‘Why?’

Dev Kowalski smiled. ‘You always seem interested in what we’re doing. And if you learn how to do these things, you might be able to help us out a bit more when we’re busy.’

Eve couldn’t imagine a time when anyone would trust her enough to let her loose on a real patient, but she nodded eagerly.

‘I’d like that,’ she said. ‘If you’re sure you don’t mind showing me?’

The rest of the morning went by in a blur of cuts, coughs, boils, burns and infections of various types. Dev Kowalski was very kind, showing Eve how to clean wounds and apply fomentations, and letting her practise her dressings. But it all took longer than usual, and by the time Eve finally emerged from the consulting room for lunch, Cissy had already gone.

Eve was disappointed, but not surprised. She washed her hands, took off her apron and hurried off to find her.

Cissy was deep in conversation with Jennifer when Eve arrived in the dining room. They were sitting at one end of the table, their heads together, having a lively chat. Eve went to the hatch to collect her plate of stew and dumplings, then found a seat beside them.

Jennifer looked up at Eve as she put her plate down. ‘Do you mind?’ she said coldly. ‘This is a private conversation.’

‘It’s all right,’ Cissy said. ‘I told her she could join us.’ But she sounded half-hearted about it.

It was a very awkward mealtime. Eve sat beside them, her head down, feeling left out as they whispered together. From what she could make out, Jennifer was telling Cissy all about someone called Johnny who had sent her a note asking her out. From what she could also gather, Cissy didn’t seem too keen.

‘Are you sure, Jen?’ she kept saying. ‘There’s something not quite right about him, if you ask me.’

Eve looked up and caught Jennifer’s eye. Jennifer glared back at her and turned her shoulder to Eve, deliberately blocking her out. A moment later, she got up to leave and Cissy followed, with an apologetic shrug at Eve.

So much for having lunch together, she thought.

She was heading back across the courtyard after her break when she heard footsteps behind her.

‘Excuse me,’ a voice said. ‘Could you direct me to the Porters’ Lodge? I seem to have lost my bearings.’

Eve turned around and found herself yet again looking up into the lively green eyes of Oliver Stanton.

‘It’s you!’ He grinned and whipped off his hat in greeting. ‘We seem to bump into each other everywhere, don’t we? It must be fate.’

‘I suppose so.’ Eve tried to smile back at him, but all she could think about was the last time they’d met, and the terrible thrashing Aunt Freda had given her.

‘I didn’t know you worked here?’ he said. ‘I thought you helped your aunt in her shop.’

‘I’m here three days a week. War work,’ she explained.

He nodded. ‘Same here. That’s why I have to report to the Porters’ Lodge. I’m starting my first shift at two o’clock.’

‘Oh.’ Eve frowned. ‘You’re not joining up, then?’

‘No, I’m not.’ Oliver was silent for a moment, then went on, ‘I haven’t seen you at church recently?’

‘No, I’ve been busy. There’s a lot to do in the workshop now I’m not there every day.’

For all her strict observance of the Sabbath, business came first for Aunt Freda. Eve also suspected she was trying to keep her away from Oliver. Her aunt still didn’t believe their meeting in the blackout had been an accident.

They stood in awkward silence for a moment, then Oliver said, ‘Anyway, if you could point me in the direction of the Porters’ Lodge . . .?’

‘Of course. Sorry.’ Eve pulled herself together. ‘You need to go back past the main building the way you came, down the drive, and it’s the little brick building just inside the main gates.’

‘I must have walked right past it. I didn’t realise the Nightingale was such a big place,’ he said.

‘It is a bit of a rabbit warren,’ Eve agreed. ‘But you get used to it.’

‘I hope so.’ He glanced up at the clock tower. ‘Anyway, I’d better get a move on. I don’t want to be late on my first day, do I?’ Oliver turned on his heel and hurried across the courtyard. ‘Thanks for your help,’ he called back to her. ‘I expect we’ll bump into each other again before long!’

Not if I see you first, Eve thought, hurrying away. The last thing she wanted was to give her aunt another reason to be suspicious.

‘GOING OUT AGAIN?’
her mother asked, as Jennifer applied her lipstick in front of the mirror.

‘It’s Friday night, ain’t it? I always go out on a Friday night.’

‘And where are you going tonight?’

‘The Palais, with Cissy. Same as always.’ Jennifer didn’t meet her mother’s eye in the mirror.

‘Well, that’s odd. When I met Marge Baxter in the queue for the butcher’s earlier she told me she was going out to bingo with her Cissy tonight.’

Jennifer caught her mother’s shrewd gaze reflected in the mirror and knew the game was up.

‘So who is he?’ Elsie Caldwell asked. ‘I’m guessing there’s a boy involved in all this? And I want the truth this time, my girl. None of your stories!’

Jennifer paused. ‘His name’s Johnny,’ she said slowly.

Her mother folded her arms. ‘And what’s he like, this Johnny? Is he a local boy?’

Hardly a boy, Jennifer thought. ‘I don’t know.’

‘You don’t know? Where did you meet him?’

‘At the Palais. You’d like him, he’s a real gentleman,’ she put in quickly.

Elsie Caldwell’s frown deepened. ‘I’m not so sure about that. And I can’t imagine your father will like the idea, either.’

‘Oh, Mum! You don’t have to tell him, do you? This is the first time I’ve been out with Johnny, it might not even come to anything!’

‘All the same, I expect your father will want to meet him. You know how protective he is of you.’

‘Don’t I just?’ Jennifer muttered as she turned back to finish her lipstick. It was a good thing her father was on duty at the police station tonight. Being hauled up in front of Sergeant Alec Caldwell would put any man off!

‘What time’s he supposed to be picking you up?’ her mother asked.

Jennifer glanced at the grandfather clock. It was ten past seven, but she didn’t want to admit to her mother that Johnny was late. She just hoped he didn’t stand her up, or she’d never hear the last of it.

But before she could reply, her brother Wilf called out, ‘There’s a car outside. It’s stopping outside our house!’

‘That’ll be him.’

Her mother looked stricken. ‘You didn’t tell me he had a car!’

‘You didn’t ask.’ Jennifer shrugged. She dropped her lipstick into her bag and closed the clasp. ‘Don’t you dare go running out there!’ She made a grab for her brother as he slipped past her towards the front door.

‘Get in here, Wilf!’ Elsie seized him by his collar and pulled him back. ‘Your sister doesn’t need you embarrassing her.’

Jennifer gave him a smug look. In truth, she was more worried about him reporting anything back to her mother.

Elsie smoothed the lapels of her daughter’s coat. ‘Enjoy yourself, love,’ she said. ‘But take care, won’t you? Be sure to keep yourself respectable,’ she added in a low voice.

‘Mum!’

‘I mean it, Jen. I know what men are like. Especially men with cars,’ she said. ‘Your dad will be off duty at eleven, so I want you home by then. No sneaking in in the early hours like you do when you’re out with Cissy. And you’d best tell your – friend to park that thing around the corner,’ she added as an afterthought. ‘I don’t want your dad seeing it before we’ve had time to get him used to the idea of you having a boyfriend.’

‘Thanks, Mum.’ Jennifer gave her mother a quick peck on the cheek, and dashed out of the door.

Johnny was leaning against the car, smoking. As he looked up, Jennifer made sure she slowed her hurried steps to a nonchalant saunter.

‘Hello, gorgeous,’ he greeted her. Jennifer felt a thrill run through her as his gaze travelled lazily up and down her body from head to toe, but she refused to show it.

Johnny had kept her waiting for two months before he finally sent a note to the hospital asking her out. Not even asking, come to think of it. More like telling her he would be in Flint Terrace on Friday at seven o’clock, and she should be ready.

No one had ever treated her like that, and she’d had a good mind to throw the note straight in the bin. That would teach him a lesson. And she might have done, if she hadn’t been so desperate to see him again.

But that didn’t mean she had to give him an easy time.

‘You’re late,’ she snapped.

‘I had a bit of business to attend to. But I’m worth waiting for, ain’t I?’

She lifted her chin. She’d waited long enough. ‘I’ll be the judge of that. Where are we going?’

‘It’s a surprise.’ He opened the passenger door for her, and she climbed in.

‘I’ve got to be home by eleven.’

‘You’re joking?’ He grimaced. ‘Blimey, it’s hardly worth going out. Most places don’t get going till well after midnight.’

‘I know, but my dad will go mad if I’m not back.’

‘Can’t have that, can we?’

She glanced across at Johnny’s smiling face as he started up the car. Was he making fun of her? she wondered. She suddenly felt stupidly young and gauche.

She felt even more gauche when it turned out he was taking her to the Café de Paris, just off Piccadilly Circus.

‘I wish you’d told me, I would have dressed up!’ Jennifer grumbled, as they made their way down the darkened staircase towards the basement ballroom.

‘You look fine to me.’

‘Do I?’ She didn’t feel fine. She was wearing her best dress, red with a black flower print, and her high heels, and her dark hair was caught up with a clip on top of her head. But she looked like a child next to all the elegant ladies in their cocktail dresses and diamonds.

‘You’re young and you’re beautiful. That’s something no amount of couture frocks and posh jewellery can match.’

‘Do you really think so?’ Jennifer said, pleased.

‘Trust me. You could be wearing an old sack and you’d still be the loveliest girl in this place.’ He held out his arm to her. ‘Let’s go and have some fun, shall we?’

Jennifer had never been anywhere like it. It gave her a thrill when the maître d’ recognised Johnny and greeted him like an old friend. He showed them to the best table in the room, overlooking the dance floor. A band was playing, and some couples had already taken to the floor. The whole place reeked of expensive perfume and money.

Jennifer tried not to stare but she couldn’t help it. Johnny, by contrast, seemed perfectly at home as he summoned the waiter and ordered champagne.

‘That’s all right with you, isn’t it?’ he asked.

‘Of course.’ Jennifer affected a nonchalant shrug. She’d never tasted champagne before, she wasn’t even allowed to drink. But after Johnny’s comments about her being young she didn’t want to admit it.

She watched as the waiter popped the cork from the bottle and poured the champagne into fancy flat glasses. The bubbles rose like tiny strings of beads to pop delicately at the surface. It looked as if it would be sweet, like lemonade.

She took her first mouthful, and nearly choked at the dry taste fizzing in her mouth. She swallowed it quickly but it went down the wrong way. Tears streamed down her face as she coughed and spluttered.

Johnny laughed. ‘Serves you right. You ain’t supposed to guzzle it like dandelion and burdock, girl. Sip it slowly or you’ll be under the table in no time.’

‘I know that!’ Jennifer snapped back, to hide her embarrassment. ‘It just went down the wrong way, that’s all.’ She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and hoped her mascara hadn’t run down her face.

After her initial embarrassment, Jennifer started to relax and enjoy herself. Johnny seemed to know everyone. Every minute or two, someone glided up to the table to talk to him. Once, he excused himself and followed a man to the door. Jennifer watched them standing in the doorway, their heads together in hushed conversation. How rude to walk away and leave her, she thought. If the champagne hadn’t worked its way through her limbs, making her feel light-headed, she would have been quite cross about it.

Johnny returned after five minutes. ‘Sorry about that,’ he said.

‘Who was he?’

‘Just an acquaintance with a business proposition.’

‘What kind of business are you in?’

He smiled and poured her another glass of champagne. ‘You ask a lot of questions, don’t you? If you must know, I’m in the supply and demand business.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘It means people want things, and I get them.’

‘What kind of things?’

He leaned forward and took the glass out of her hand. ‘Let’s dance,’ he said, leading her on to the floor.

Johnny was a good dancer, not at all clumsy like the young men Jennifer usually danced with. She felt safe in his arms as he glided her around the floor with style and self-assurance. She noticed several of the other women sending him interested looks, and she smirked back at them, feeling like the cat who had got the cream.

They sat down again, and Johnny signalled for more champagne, and the menu. Jennifer wasn’t sure she would be able to eat, until she read what was on offer. Foie gras, lamb chops, steak – food she hadn’t ever seen in her life, even before rationing started.

‘Can I really have anything I like?’ she asked, wide-eyed, forgetting to be sophisticated.

‘Anything you like.’

‘But where do they manage to find all this food? Don’t they have rationing here?’

‘Perhaps they know the right people.’

Jennifer stared at him, mystified. She felt sure he was being clever, but the champagne had addled her brain and her thinking was fuzzier than it might have been.

She ordered oysters, and Johnny ordered Steak Diane cooked rare, whatever that meant.

‘Do you like oysters?’ he asked.

‘I’ve never tried them,’ Jennifer admitted. ‘But I’ve always wanted to. Film stars eat them, you know.’

‘Is that right?’

She still wasn’t sure if he was making fun of her. But she was having such a nice time, she really didn’t care.

She gazed at Johnny across the table, the candlelight flickering on his rugged features. No one could call him handsome, but there was definitely something compelling about him.

Emboldened by another glass of champagne, she decided to ask more questions.

‘Why aren’t you fighting, Johnny?’

‘I’m an invalid.’

She squinted at him across the table. ‘You look all right to me.’

His mouth curved. ‘Thank you very much. But if you must know, I have an ulcer.’

‘I’m surprised you can manage champagne and steak, in that case.’

He winked at her. ‘I won’t tell if you don’t.’

She frowned at him. Once again, she had the feeling he was teasing her. ‘How old are you?’ she asked.

‘Twenty-eight.’

Ten years older than she was. Her dad would have a fit.

He seemed to guess her thoughts. ‘Too old for you?’ he asked, his eyes meeting hers over the rim of his glass.

She pulled herself together, rearranging her face into what she hoped was a suitably casual expression. ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve always preferred older men,’ she said.

‘Is that right?’

She nodded. ‘They’re so much more sophis— sophisticated,’ she struggled over the word. Why wouldn’t it come out properly? ‘They know how to treat a lady.’ She hiccuped delicately.

‘You sound as if you speak from experience?’ he said, his dark brows lifting.

‘You’d be surprised,’ she said, hoping she sounded suitably mysterious.

Their dinner arrived, brought to their table under great big silver domes which the waiters removed with a flourish. As it turned out, oysters weren’t nearly as delicious as she’d imagined. She couldn’t think why film stars made so much fuss about them. She’d rather have pie and mash any day, although she didn’t dare admit that to Johnny as she swallowed them down.

They talked as they ate. Johnny made her laugh with his outrageous stories. He was as big a gossip as she was, Jennifer was pleased to discover. It made a change to find someone who knew how to make interesting conversation. Most of the boys she usually went out with were only interested in making saucy remarks and finding out what they could get away with before she batted them off.

Afterwards she wanted to dance again, but he said they had to go home.

‘You’ve got to be tucked up in bed by eleven, remember?’ Johnny reminded her.

As they drove home, Jennifer slumped in the passenger seat, feeling decidedly odd. There was a tight pain in her temples, as if she was wearing a hat two sizes too small. She could barely focus on her own hands, knotted in her lap. She’d also lost her hairclip along the way, but she couldn’t remember where. And it was her favourite, too.

Johnny parked the car around the corner, as she’d asked him to. ‘All right?’ he said. ‘Are you sure you can find your way home? You don’t want me to drop you at your door?’

She shook her head, and her eyeballs swivelled painfully in their sockets. ‘My dad would go mad.’

‘I don’t think he’s going to be very impressed in any case, seeing you in that state.’

‘I don’t feel very well,’ Jennifer confessed. ‘I think it must have been those oysters.’

‘It must have been,’ Johnny agreed. But there it was again, that mocking smile. He’d been making fun of her all evening, she realised.

Usually she would have come back at him with some sharp retort, or even got in first and given him the brush-off. But something, whether it was the oysters or the champagne, or just the realisation that she liked him more than any man she’d ever met, took away all her pride.

‘You’re not going to take me out again, are you?’ she said sadly.

‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

‘I don’t know.’ She lifted her shoulders in a gloomy shrug. ‘But I know you think I’m not old or sophisticated enough for you.’

‘Is that right?’

He was smiling again. Before she knew what she was doing, Jennifer lunged forward and kissed him full on the lips. She sensed his hesitation for a moment before he kissed her back. His tongue slipped between her lips, hungry and exploring.

When he pulled away, his eyes were glittering. ‘What was that for?’

‘To prove I’m not a little girl.’

He grew serious. ‘You don’t want to make promises you can’t keep,’ he said in a low voice.

‘Who says I can’t keep them?’

Johnny smiled, but this time there was nothing mocking about his smile. It was that wolfish grin that had made her heart stop the first time she’d seen it.