Vigil in the Night (3 page)

 
Yet there was one thing more she must do. At eleven o’clock, when the lights had been extinguished in the nurses’ home, she went down the stairs, stealing unobserved across the yard to a small stone building that stood detached, like a tiny chapel, close to the outer wall. It was the hospital mortuary.

 
Anne entered, unafraid. And there she stood, for moments which fled swiftly, while she contemplated with graven features what the silent place now held. She thought how pitiful was the death of a little child. How doubly pitiful a needless death. Her soul throbbed within her. She prayed as she had never prayed in all her life: for her sister, for herself, for their future, that singly and together they might expiate this terrible mistake of Lucy’s. Then, strangely comforted, she retraced her steps and slipped into bed.

 
At quarter to six next morning Anne’s alarm clock rang. She arose, dressed quickly, and, carrying her one suitcase, left her room. She wished no heroic farewells at this hour. As she passed her sister’s room she slipped a note underneath the door. She felt that Lucy would understand. Then she went down the deserted staircase and for the last time passed through the gates of the County Hospital.

 
It was raining gently, a soft sea rain which misted her hair and clung in tiny beads to the blue fabric of her raincoat. As she took the long road to the town, she dared not look across her shoulder lest she should give way to tears.

 
A quarter of a mile along the road there came an interruption to her march. The loud note of a motor horn drew her up sharply, and in the same instant a much-used sedan circled on the wet cobblestones and splashed to rest at the curb beside her. Next minute Joe Shand was beside her, a short, fair-haired figure in soiled overalls, his round good-natured face drawn into an unusual and almost pathetic expression of concern.

 
“I thought I’d find you making for the six-thirty.”

 
Anne considered the full implication of Joe’s stammered remark. She said slowly:

 
“You knew I was going then?”

 
“Why, the whole town knows—”

 
Joe caught himself up, but not before Anne had completely understood. The whole of Shereford knew of her dismissal, had undoubtedly been gossiping about it up and down the streets.

 
It was a bitter dose for Anne. She caught her lip between her teeth. “I must hurry, Joe. I’ve barely time to get the train.”

 
“No, no,” he protested confusedly. “That’s why I’m here. I can’t let you carry your case. Besides, if you’re taking the six-thirty local, you’ll have fifty minutes to wait at Grimthorpe Junction. Listen, Anne! Let me drive you to the Junction in the car. It’s dead easy for me, only thirty miles. And it’ll save you such a lot of bother.”

 
Anne considered his homely, honest face. What he said was true. His plan would save time, spare her some awkward encounters at the local station.

 
“Thank you, Joe,” she assented with quiet gratitude. “It’s like you to think of a thing like that.”

CHAPTER 8

 
The next minute they were in the car and bowling along in the direction of Grimthorpe; Joe drove beautifully; it was his one accomplishment, a quite superb knowledge of the mechanics and movements of motorcars. It was, in fact, his job. In all else he was clumsy and uncertain. And now he drove in silence. Studying his profile, which though pleasant was inclined to weakness, Anne saw that something was worrying him intensely. That worried her, too. She had known Joe Shand since her childhood. She and Joe and Lucy had gone to school together, gone bird’s-nesting in the woods together, sung in the church choir together, grown up together. And Joe had asked her to marry him so often that the question was a perpetual embarrassment.

 
They were five miles out of the town before Joe darkly exploded his worry.

 
“Anne! I can’t get the hang of this thing at all. It just doesn’t make sense. The things they say. Amos Green, for instance, he came to our house last night. I don’t believe him. For pity’s sake, Anne, tell me about it.”

 
Anne shook her head firmly. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said. “It’s over. I’ve made up my mind to put it behind me—for good.”

 
With Joe, Anne’s word was law. This time, however, he was not content.

 
“But this going away,” he broke out again. “I hate it. There’s no sense in it. Why in the name of heaven are you doing it?”

 
“Why should I stay?” she answered, realizing too late it was the wrong thing to have said.

 
He was quick to take advantage of it. “Because I want you to stay. Because I want you to marry me. I need you, Anne. I could do things with you—build up a great old business. I could get somewhere and besides—” Joe flushed and floundered lamely—“I love you. Maybe I could help you in this fix you’re in.”

 
Touched at this loyalty, Anne was silent, almost tempted, despite herself, to throw up everything and find a home and security with Joe. Yet something held her back, something intangible, something strange and deep.

 
“Don’t press me just now, Joe,” she temporized. “You can see I’m rather upset. Some other time, perhaps, if you feel like asking me again—”

 
Joe’s face colored more vividly, his mouth opened and shut. With a most unusual effort he restrained himself. Anne had given him more cause for hope than ever before. He would not spoil it by an ill-chosen word. He drove slower than before, though, spinning out their time together, reaching Grimthorpe Junction only four minutes before the southbound express was due. He had barely time to buy her some magazines and newspapers at the bookstall before the express shrieked round the bend and Anne was in her compartment, waving good-bye to him from the window.

 
“Take care of yourself, Joe,” she said. Then as her last and most important injunction she called out, “And take care of Lucy, too.”

 
The journey to Manchester was a dismal one, through harsh industrial land lying sodden and begrimed. Tall chimney stacks rose up in the rain among the dumps of slag and refuse. The towns were dark and ugly, beaten by the weather, grimed with soot.

 
Yet Anne had more to occupy her than the landscape or the weather. Though the eventuality which had broken up her life was a staggering one, as she had told Joe, she was determined to put the past behind her. Opening the
Nursing Mirror,
she went carefully through its advertising pages. By the time she had finished her brows were drawn. There was nothing, not a single nursing vacancy advertised for Manchester. This was a serious blow. It was essential that she find work at once; her last desire in the world was to take lodgings in the city and hang about till work turned up. If she were forced to do this, she would soon be destitute.

 
Anxiously she picked up
The Clarion,
the local Manchester daily. She folded back its advertisement page, and instantly her face brightened. There at the top of the first column was the following advertisement: “Nurses. Strong, young girls, with or without experience, wanted for the Hepperton Institution. Apply Miss East, S.R.C., Matron.”

 
How lucky, thought Anne, her heart leaping, to have chanced on this, on this particular day!

CHAPTER 9

 
Hepperton, which Anne reached by the penny tramcar, lay on the south side of the city in a working-class quarter packed with struggling humanity. As Anne gazed at it, finding it so different from the homely little County, dazed almost by its rows and rows of windows, she felt a sense of awe come upon her. What a great place! Yet what a chance, among this crowded population, for experience, for real, wonderful experience in her profession. Fortified by a cup of coffee and a bun at a neighboring stall—she had not broken her fast till now—Anne marched toward the porter’s lodge and boldly asked to see the matron. Her request was granted after she had filled in a printed form.

 
Though the interior of the hospital was much more antiquated than Anne had imagined, Matron East was far from being a relic of the past. A stocky, thickset, bustling woman of about forty, gave the immediate impression of restless, choleric energy. She wasted no time with Anne.

 
“Your name’s Anne Lee. You’ve had three years at the Shereford County. Cottage Hospital, eh? Just got qualified and then cleared out? Bit the hand that fed you, eh? I know what ingratitude is. I’ve had it all my life. I expect it, and I thrive on it. Where’s your certificate?”

 
Anne produced the document. The matron took it, glanced at it.

 
“That’s in order. Well, I’ll give you a chance. Report to Sister Gilson in Ward C, surgical side. You’ll have to pass the medical examination tomorrow. And remember, I don’t stand any nonsense. One half day a week if you’re lucky. Extra duty if you’re not. No smoking, cosmetics, or perfume. And you’ll have to share a bedroom. Take this slip along to Sister Gilson. That’s all.”

CHAPTER 10

 
Ward C lay at the far end of the north wing; it was in fact two wards linked by an operating amphitheatre, and Sister Gilson, to whom she made herself known, was a harassed-looking woman who accepted her as mechanically as the matron.

 
“You’ll take duty this afternoon. It’s our receiving day. We’re very full at present. And a little short-handed.” The ward sister turned to a young nurse at that moment passing. “Nurse Dunne, you’re going off now. Take Nurse Lee with you to the nurses’ home. Give her any help she needs. Get her a laundry number and find out where she’s to sleep.”

 
Nora Dunne was about twenty-five, with a rounded, compact figure, a freckled, merry face, and dark long-lashed Irish eyes which held a twinkle that nothing seemed to quench. With an appraising glance at Anne, her face broke into a grin of friendly welcome.

 
“So you’re the latest victim. Strong healthy girls wanted for the Institute for Destruction of Nurses. Well, you look as though you could stand it.” Anne’s blank expression only made her laugh the louder. “You don’t know what I’m gassing about, do you? But you’ll soon find out. Dear old Hepperton—the wonder hospital of the century—hot and cold running water, breakfast in bed, and all home comforts. Maybe!”

 
“It doesn’t seem quite so marvelous as that,” said Anne cautiously.

 
“It isn’t,” Nurse Dunne answered tersely. “It’s the frozen limit. Lousy accommodation, beds like boards, cockroaches in the woodwork, damp in the basements. The plumbing’s awful, you can’t get a hot bath in the home unless you send Mulligan, the janitor, a postcard. And you want the stomach—beg pardon, I forgot my physiology—I should have said the gizzard, of an ostrich for the grub.”

 
“What’s the work like?” inquired Anne.

 
Nora Dunne laughed gaily. “My dear, you’ll get plenty of that. Our wards are always full and running over. And we’ve got one marvelous man—Prescott—surgeon—a dark silent devil who operates like an archangel. Unfortunately we don’t belong to him in C, but we assist him in the operating room, and he’s simply grand. You see, the trouble with this place is lack of money. It’s entirely dependent on public subscriptions, and it doesn’t get them—at least, not enough. The result is—everything suffers, is skimped and scraped to the bone. Though the building looks good enough from the outside, it’s so old it creaks. What we nurses have to put up with would give you a pain. I suppose you thought you were lucky to see that ad. Let me tell you, dear chicken, that stays in seven days of the week. The matron’s a card. We call her the Bruiser.”

 
“Doesn’t anyone try to improve things?”

 
Nora pursed up her lips. “Oh, yes, one or two, I suppose. Prescott, especially, though he doesn’t really know how bad things are with us nurses. He’s up in the clouds, got some wild idea in his head about a surgical brain clinic. Then of course there’s Bowley. He’s not a doctor, he’s
the
Matthew Bowley. You must have heard of him. He’s practically a millionaire. And he seems to be interested in the hospital. He’s a regular pal of Prescott, too. But there aren’t any others worth writing home about. And what a committee we’ve got—frightened cheese-paring old sissies!”

 
As Nora rambled on, they reached the nurses’ home. Here the little Irish nurse turned to Anne with her sudden infectious smile.

 
“Pardon my indelicacy, angel face, but I think I like you. If you can stand it, why don’t you bunk in with Nurse Glennie and me? Our room’s not so bad, and it’s made for three. I warn you Glennie snores—I have to throw shoes at her twice nightly—but I can arrange it if you like.”

 
Because she had taken an immediate liking to Nora, Anne nodded in cordial agreement.

 
The room to which Nora introduced her was up three flights of winding stairs, a mere attic underneath the rooftops, with three cheap truckle beds, three old wooden chests of drawers, and two enamel washbasins. Amusedly Nora studied Anne’s face.