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She was busy in the room, removing all the traces of that preparation from wash-basin and dressing-table, when Mark arrived to make a brief examination of his patient in readiness for surgery on the following day.

Beverley blossomed at his entrance, casting aside her magazine and greeting him like a very, dear friend with hands outstretched and cheek proffered for his kiss. 'Darling...' she said warmly, confidently.

'How are you?' He pressed her fingers briefly and didn't seem to notice her tilted, expectant face.

She pouted prettily, shrugged. 'I feel a fraud. I suppose I really must have this beastly operation?

'That's entirely up to you,' he returned indifferently. 'I can only advise it.'

'Oh, if you think so ... you know that I trust you utterly,' she declared extravagantly. 'I'm prepared to put my life in your hands!'

His smile was dry. 'It's a very minor operation, Beverley. You'll be out of here in a few days.'

'I don't want to rush things,' she said firmly. 'I want to be quite, quite well before I go home.' She paired delicately. 'You will keep a very careful eye on me, won't you, Mark?' It was low, coaxing, faintly provocative. She lay back against the mound of pillows, the chiffon falling away from the lovely curves of her breasts, smiling at him with unmistakable allure.

Mark held out a hand for the chart. Gillian passed it to him automatically. 'You shall have the best nursing care we can provide,' he drawled, very smooth. 'For instance, Nurse Grant was trained at St Christopher's— and I shouldn't think you'd find a better nurse anywhere in the world.'

Gillian glanced at him with a sceptical gleam in her dark blue eyes. He looked back at her coolly as he returned the chart without comment. It hadn't been meant as a compliment, she thought. They were just empty words for the patient's benefit. They might even have held a touch of mockery—for
her
benefit.

At a nod, she hurried for the prepared trolley that she had left in the clinical room until it was required, carefully leaving the door open to protect his reputation. She returned very quickly to find him sitting on the side of the bed, chatting to his patient in a very relaxed manner. Beverley was openly flirting with him.

Gillian chaperoned while he carried out his examination. She suspected that the girl would have liked to be alone with the surgeon but he was strictly observing the code by ensuring the presence of a nurse in the room. Gillian thought he was wise. She guessed that Beverley Jakes was just the type to take advantage of an indiscretion.

She realised that they weren't just surgeon and patient. They knew each other socially. Like too many other women, in Gillian's opinion, the girl obviously fancied Mark Barlow and she meant to make the most of her opportunities.

They seemed to be on very easy terms. Beverley teased him and flattered him and played up to him with such obvious coquetry that Gillian was sickened. No wonder he was so spoiled, so arrogant, so carelessly contemptuous of all women, she thought crossly, hovering dutifully and obeying instructions like the well-trained nurse she was.

It was difficult to know if he found the girl attractive or merely amusing. She just didn't know enough about him. She couldn't believe that he was a womaniser although she didn't doubt his sensuality. He didn't seem to have a very high opinion of women in general. Having seen him with Louise Penistone, she felt that he might make an effort to charm for his own ends. She didn't think it came naturally to him.

He was just about to leave with a final word of reassurance, when a confident knock was followed by the opening of the door and a light voice that Gillian instantly recognised said easily: 'May I come in ... ?'

It was Louise, looking not only beautiful but expensively elegant in a cream silk suit with a matching trifle of a hat. She laid an enormous bouquet on the bed and kissed the air in the vague direction of Beverley's cheek. She smiled at Mark with the self-possessed and slightly proprietorial warmth that Gillian had observed on the previous occasion.

'How lovely!' Beverley enthused without so much as a glance for the flowers, busily observing Mark's reaction to the arrival of her lovely friend. There was some speculation about the couple in the town and she was anxious to know if it had any foundation in fact. Louise had walked off with too many of the men she would have liked for herself. It would be too much if she had already whisked Mark Barlow out of her reach, too. 'Thank you, darling—and how sweet of you to come!'

'Of course I came. I'm concerned about you,' Louise said lightly.

'What a reflection on Mark!' Beverley declared in light-hearted reproach. 'I'm sure that a girl couldn't be in better hands!'

The look she sent the surgeon as she spoke was a provocative challenge, charged with sexuality. Noticing, Gillian replaced the chart on its hook at the bottom of the bed with a faint clatter of disapproval. A smile lurked briefly in Mark's eyes as he glanced in her direction.

'Oh, Mark knows very well that I admire him tremendously,' Louise said, smiling, and there was a great deal of meaning behind the apparently casual words.

He smiled and inclined his dark head in cool acceptance of the compliment. Gillian was instantly infuriated by that arrogant air. Perhaps he
was
a brilliant surgeon and a wow with the women but he didn't have to preen himself like a bloody peacock, she thought contemptuously, trundling the trolley towards the door.

The atmosphere was heavy with feminine lures. Feeling very unfeminine in her practical uniform dress and flat-heeled brogues, pale hair severely knotted at the nape of her neck and face bare of any make-up, Gillian was glad to escape. Both women seemed so spoiled, shallow and superficial, that she wondered what any man could find to like or admire in either of them. And it wasn't sour grapes, she thought with a flicker of pride, for she wouldn't want Mark Barlow if he was served up on a salver with an apple in his mouth. An appropriate fate for such a male chauvinist pig!

Penny met her in the corridor and glanced at her curiously. 'Feeling all right, Gillian? You look rather flushed.'

She was immediately on the defensive. 'It's a warm day. Don't look so anxious. I'm not going to faint. I don't make a habit of it!'

Penny was an easy-going girl or she might have resented the sharp retort. Instead, she shrugged. 'Well, take things easy. This isn't
Emergency Ward Ten
and you don't have to rush around being efficient. Even if you
are
a Kit's nurse.' She was teasing and there wasn't an ounce of malice behind the words. She was too good-natured.

Gillian knew she was being over-sensitive and rather silly but she couldn't muster a smile. She seemed to have lost her sense of humour since coming to Greenvale. She began to walk on towards the clinical room with the trolley.

Penny glanced along the corridor. Mark Barlow had emerged from a patient's room and was looking towards them with a slightly raised eyebrow. She misinterpreted his attitude.

She checked Gillian with a hand on her arm. 'Mr Barlow is waiting for assistance,' she said quickly, whisking the trolley out of her hands. 'I'll take this. Go and see what he wants.'

Gillian turned and retraced her steps, rather reluctantly, too conscious of his steady but indifferent scrutiny as he waited for her to reach him. It was typical of the man that he wouldn't take even one step towards her, she thought with impatience—he was so damnably sure of himself!

Joining him, her chin tilted unconsciously. 'Do you want me?' she asked, not very graciously, and immediately regretted the unfortunate choice of words. The grey eyes narrowed and raked her slight figure as though he was carefully considering a very different kind of offer. The colour stormed into her face and her eyes sparked an angry rebuke despite the hint of humour in his expression.

'I'm hoping that you may prove to be useful—as a nurse,' he drawled with a momentary, slightly mischievous hesitation. 'As you know, I shall be operating tomorrow. Miss Jakes is on my list, of course. Also a gall-bladder removal and a rather tricky hernioplasty. I imagine you are familiar with the procedures and I would like you to assist me. My regular theatre nurse is leaving at the end of the month to work in New Zealand and I shall need a replacement. It's possible that you'll be suitable.'

Gillian's face immediately brightened and she promptly forgot her indignation. She knew she was a good theatre nurse and she couldn't help feeling that her talents were wasted on routine nursing.

'If my work was good enough to suit Sir Geoffrey or Paul Ritchie or Peter Lincoln then I don't think you'll have any cause for complaint,' she said confidently.

Mark regarded her thoughtfully. 'Heaven forbid that I should consider myself superior in any way to such eminent men,' he said, very dry. 'I daresay your work is excellent. It's your attitude that may cause a few problems, I feel.'

Gillian stiffened. 'My attitude?'

'You know as well as I do that a certain rapport must exist between surgeon and nurse for them to be able to work together as a successful team,' he reminded her bluntly.

She did know it. It was very important. They needed to be so attuned that they thought and worked as one during an operation. She needed to anticipate his every requirement, it was not enough to be familiar with procedure or surgical techniques. A good theatre nurse was a surgeon's right hand. He had to be able to rely on her—and there was no room for mutual dislike in an operating theatre.

But she was proud and she couldn't pretend to like him even to get a job that she particularly wanted. She knew that she could never work with him and enjoy it.

•I'm sorry,' she said stiffly. 'But I'm not a member of the Mark Barlow Admiration Society, I'm afraid. And I never will be!'

Mark's mouth hardened abruptly. Damn the girl! He had given her more than enough chances to bury the hatchet—and every time she insisted on planting it firmly between his shoulder-blades! He turned on his heel and walked away, too angry to continue the conversation with an obstinate and very silly young woman.

Gillian looked after him, her heart sinking. Her pride and her impulsive tongue had cost her the one thing she really wanted, she realised. What did she think she gained by continually clashing with a man like Mark Barlow? He held all the aces, after all.

Steve came to see Beverley Jakes later that morning. As the anaesthetist responsible for her safety while she was on the operating table, he needed to make his own check on her heart and lungs and ask certain relevant questions.

Gillian was with a patient when she saw him pass the door. She hoped there would be an opportunity for a few words before he went away.

Steve made the opportunity. She was in the spacious and well-appointed ward kitchen preparing a milk feed for her patient, when he came into the room.

'I'd love a coffee,' he said, smiling. 'What are my chances?'

Gillian glanced over her shoulder, a smile in her own eyes. 'I'll make some in a moment.'

'Good girl!' he dropped a kiss on the back of her neck as she busied herself with mixing the feed.

'Don't ask if I'm all right or I shall probably scream,' Gillian said quickly, very light.

He laughed. 'People getting on your nerves, love?'

She smiled wryly. 'Oh, I know I should be touched that people are so kind—and I am, of course. After all, I'm a newcomer and it's surprising that so many people I don't even know have stopped to ask how I am!'

'We don't get a lot of excitement,' Steve said, eyes twinkling. 'And it isn't every day that Mark Barlow rushes to the rescue of a damsel in distress. He's much more likely to step over an unconscious nurse in his path than scoop her into his arms, give her the kiss of life and then ride off with her on his dashing white charger.'

Gillian's laughing eyes held a hint of reproach as she turned to him. 'It sounds very romantic. But it didn't happen!'

'He didn't pick you up from the floor?'

'Well, yes, I believe he did do that...'

'No kiss of life?' His blue eyes danced with mischief.

'No! It was Penny who looked after me, in fact, she brought me round!'

'And he didn't whisk you home by the modern-day equivalent of an Arab steed?'

She smiled reluctantly. 'Well, yes—but I do hope that people aren't making too much of the whole thing,' she said firmly.

'It won't even be a nine-day wonder,' he said comfortingly. 'He's announcing his engagement to Louise Penistone next week.'

It wasn't unexpected. It wasn't even of interest. But Gillian felt an odd little pang of foolish disappointment that after all she would never know just how it felt to have his arms about her and that dark head very close to her own.

She shook off the thought, irritated by its absurdity. 'Louise Penistone?' she echoed, playing for time.

'Hugh Penistone is her father.' He looked at her curiously. 'You must have had a potted history of the clinic from Mary Kenny at your interview. He's the man who founded Greenvale. Louise is his only child. A beautiful girl, too. Mark's no fool,' he said dryly. 'There's a lot of men who'd like to be in his shoes.'

Gillian carried the milk feed carefully to the door, finding that she was glad of an excuse to leave him for a few moments and hoping that the subject of Mark Barlow's engagement would not be renewed on her return.

'I'll be back to make your coffee,' she told him with careful nonchalance. 'Two minutes ...'

She was a little longer, in fact. By the time she returned, Steve was setting out cups and spooning coffee into them, and the kettle was coming to the boil.

'You are house-trained,' she said warmly.

He grinned. 'I can do card tricks, too.'

Over coffee, to avoid any further mention of Mark Barlow and his personal affairs, Gillian spoke of her meeting with an old friend. She wasn't surprised to learn that Steve was acquainted with Robin. In a small community, it was inevitable that members of the same profession would know each other, belong to the same clubs, move in the same social circles.