A Promise Is for Keeping Page 9

  He was sitting at his desk and so had to look up to her, but that did not make it any easier—and Fay resented this feeling of being in the wrong that he gave her.

  "Well?" he questioned after a moment's silence in which he completed something he was writing.

  "I think you know what I've come about—" Fay began, a little at a loss to know just how to tell him of her decision.

  "About going down to nurse Toni?" He worded it the most difficult way he could since she had to start with a denial.

  "I'm sorry. But I think you know that it's quite impossible for me to agree to do that—much as I would like to help."

  "Why?" he demanded curtly.

  "You know the shortage of nurses as well as I do." Fay was beginning to be a little annoyed at his unhelpfulness.

  "I was asking you to do a job of nursing," he pointed out mildly.

  "Yes—but a job that could be done by an older woman—in fact a stroke case could be nursed by a semi-retired woman. But I'm young and strong—I ought to use myself to the best possible advantage. Here I can look after thirty patients—I can't leave St. Edith's," she finished flatly.

  "You mean that you don't want to."

  "I mean that it would not be right for me to leave. I promised Matron—"

  "I could put it right with Matron," he spoke quickly. "That still wouldn't make it right."

  He shrugged and dropped his glance to the papers on his

  desk. "Very well, Sister—if that's the way you feel. But Sister

  Rainbow will be back on duty before very long, you know."

  "Of course," Fay agreed, "but I can still do a useful job here."

  He looked up now and said, "Well, if you're determined to stay, we'll say no more about it. Thank you at any rate for giving the matter your consideration."

  When she was out in the corridor again Fay found herself trembling all over—with anger, she thought it must be. Why had Mark treated her like that? He had no right to claim her services for Toni—no right at all. And no one knew better than he the drastic shortage of nurses both at St. Edith's and also at all the London hospitals. And what had he meant about her being "determined" to stay? It was almost as though he was trying to get rid of her. That he didn't like having her around "his" hospital. That idea struck Fay forcibly just as she was going through the swing doors to her ward, and being immediately claimed by a summons from her staff nurse she had no time to develop that startling thought further.

  Later in the morning Mark came up to do a round with his houseman in attendance. Shorty behind his chief's back signalled to Fay and she interpreted it to mean that the Registrar was not in a good mood—according to his junior's view, at all events.

  Certainly from his manner no one would have thought that he and Fay had met before that morning.

  When the round was finished Mark halted just outside Sister's office and said coolly, "Mr. Snow is sending in one of his private patients whom he wants me to look after. It's a colostomy case and the patient is quite elderly. I'm afraid I shall have to ask you to make your side ward available for its proper purpose, Sister."

  Over Mark's shoulder Fay could see Shorty goggling with curiosity about the meaning of this, but she managed to refrain from any comment whatsoever and merely said, "Very good, Mr. Osborne. When is the patient expected?"

  "I'm not absolutely certain," he admitted, "but it will definitely be within the next thirty-six hours."

  But for the fact that no one—not even Mark—could con-

  jure up a private colostomy patient at will, she would have said that it was all part of a plot.

  But a plot to what end? Unlikely as it might seem, Fay could come to but one conclusion—that Mark was doing this to spite her for not falling in with his wishes. But that seemed so petty and so unlike him. The only other reason which fitted the case—only that seemed more unlikely still—was that he was trying to separate her from Geoff.

  She rejected the second explanation—the first was much more likely. It was very possible, she thought, that her presence was an embarrassment to Mark. Everyone spoke of his uprightness and fidelity. Probably the remembrance of that kiss under the mistletoe was as much pain to him—reminding him always of his one lapse—that he did not want to be constantly running across her, so he was trying to get her posted somewhere where he need not see her—not so often at all events. Poor Mark ! She felt quite sorry for him —and yet a little glad for herself. For if Mark felt ashamed of having kissed her, then it followed that the kiss must have meant something to him too. That made her happy, and ashamed of being so.

  When she broke the news to Geoff his face fell.

  "I'll put you in a quiet corner," Fay promised him, "and I'll give you some cotton wool for your ears," she finished lightly.

  "It isn't that," Geoff protested. "I don't mind the noise or the other chaps—but in the ward I never get a chance to talk to you properly, without everyone listening."

  She did not quite know how to fend that off, but she consoled him by saying, "Well, I can give you the rest of the day in here, I think—the other patient won't be coming in until tomorrow."

  But she was wrong there. He arrived that very afternoon, and the news only came up from the porter's desk a few moments before a white-haired man was wheeled into the ward corridor.

  With rather flushed cheeks Fay went out to him. This was hardly what she might have been led to expect from Mark's estimate of "thirty-six hours," and she very much disliked being caught out unprepared.

  "Mr. Oliver?" she addressed the patient in the wheelchair.

  "That's right, Sister," a gentle voice replied, "and I'm afraid I'm being a nuisance, but my housekeeper had to go off earlier than expected, so my doctor arranged for me to come in today instead of tomorrow. I do hope I'm not putting you out, Sister."

  Fay smiled at the concern in the old man's face. "Not a bit, Mr. Oliver. We'll have your room ready for you in a very few minutes. Meanwhile we'd better push you inside out of the draught."

  She pushed the wheelchair into the side ward while Staff and another nurse rushed to help move Geoff out.

  "Will this be my room?" Mr. Oliver asked, looking round with interest.

  "Yes," Fay told him. "We'll soon have you all tucked up comfortably."

  "But this young man—am I turning him out?"

  "That's all right, sir," Geoff put in pleasantly. "They only put me in here temporarily while it was empty."

  The old gentleman looked up at Fay. "Don't turn him out, Sister. It's a nice big room—plenty large enough for two of us. Let him stay—I'd like a bit of company and I don't want anyone put out on my account. You wouldn't mind sharing with an old buffer, would you, young fellow? I'm not difficult to get along with."

  Geoff looked at Fay for guidance. "I'd like to stay, sir—and it's very kind of you. But there are regulations—"

  "Regulations nonsense !" Mr. Oliver showed sudden energy. "This is to be my room and I ask you to stay. Now, Sister, what do you say?"

  It was contrary to regulations and Fay knew it was. But it would so plainly make both her patients happy that she agreed, and soon both men were comfortably settled with all the little additional amenities which went with a private ward.

  She knew that she would have to defend her action to Matron, but thought she could rely on Mr. Oliver's charm to put that right. Mark was a different cup of tea, though, and she guessed there might be squalls when he discovered the position.

  She was not mistaken.

  "I thought I asked you to have this room cleared," he said with tight lips.

  "Yes, you told me to do so," Fay did not mean to imply any criticism by the correction—it just slipped out. "But you also told me that Mr. Oliver was expected within the next thirty-six hours. He arrived much sooner, and I was not told until he was wheeled into the ward. We started to clear out Mr. Wentworth's things, but Mr. Oliver insisted that he should remain."

  "I suppose you realise that it is most irregular
. Mr. Oliver is Mr. Snow's private patient—that is understood. But Wentworth is a National Health patient and there should be no favouritism shown amongst the general ward patients."

  "And none has been shown. Mr. Oliver met Mr. Wentworth and took a fancy to him. Mr. Wentworth is much happier away from the noise of the general ward. I consider that the well-being of my patients is of paramount important and I'm prepared to defend my action on those grounds." Fay was angry, and strictly professional.

  Her words, however, seemed to have an adverse effect on Mark. Plainly he was very angry. For a moment he obviously made a supreme effort at control, but then the words burst out.

  "Dammit, woman, can't you see that the young fellow thinks he's in love with you?" And with that he flung through the swing doors and was out of earshot before Fay's astounded "What absolute nonsense !" could reach him.

  CHAPTER SIX

  AFTER Mark's outburst Fay was a little apprehensive about their next meeting and half hoped that as she was not on duty until mid-morning he would have done his round before she arrived on the ward. But luck was not with her, for he and Shorty arrived almost on her heels.

  She need not have worried, however, for all was sunshine and light that morning. Mark seemed an adept at switching from the personal to the impersonal and wholly professional, and in one guise he seemed to have no remembrance of what had happened in the other. He made jokes with the patients —and with Sister across their beds, so that Fay was hard put to it to keep her end up.

  She remembered that she had once classed him professionally as an actor and she had not been far wrong, she thought. At any rate he certainly had the ability to lead two entirely separate lives—no, three, she corrected herself : one here at the hospital, another with Toni and the family at Beechcroft—and another with his wife and children. It was that ability she saw quite suddenly was the answer to something that had long puzzled her, the answer to the problem of how he had managed to keep his marriage a secret from Toni—for although the young guests had seemed to know all about it she felt pretty sure that Toni did not. Or—another thought struck her as she stood silent while a lengthy examination was in progress—was she an actor too with the ability to pretend that anything she did not wish to acknowledge did not exist?

  "Daydreaming, Sister?" Mark's voice with a hint of amuse-

  ment in it cut across her reverie, but fortunately she had registered his instructions almost unknown to herself, and she was able to refute the accusation by repeating them to him. Shorty gave her a broad wink as though he knew she had got away with a lucky one.

  When the ward was finished there remained the side ward to be visited, but it seemed to hold no inhibitions for Mark. He walked in breezily and greeted his patients with a cheerful "Good morning, gentlemen!"

  Although, of course, the houseman had already prepared notes on Mr. Oliver's case Mark himself made a thorough examination. He had no need to put his patient at ease, for the old man radiated a serene content which was infectious.

  When he had finished and Fay had straightened the bedclothes Mark perched on the side of the bed. "Well, Mr. Oliver," he said, "we'll do your little job for you, but I'm afraid it will have to wait a few days until we clear up your chest a bit. You've got a bit of bronchial trouble, haven't you?"

  "Ah, that's an old man's complaint, isn't it—I smoke too much," Mr. Oliver confessed sadly. "But you know best—I'm quite content to do whatever you say."

  "Good," Mark smiled. "Are you quite comfortable here—got everything you want?"

  For a moment the old man looked at Mark with a twinkle in his eye, and then he looked at Fay. "Sure—what else could a man want? Waited on hand and foot by a lot of pretty nurses and with good company into the bargain. No, I'll not find fault however long you keep me. Unless—" he paused for a moment.

  "Unless what?" Mark queried.

  "Unless you could transfer me and young Geoff here—and yourself and Sister too, to my little villa at Lamontella. This is the time one ought to be there—the peach blossom will be out, and—"

  "I'm afraid we can't spare Sister," Mark told him with mock seriousness.

  "I thought you'd say that." Mr. Oliver was smiling broadly. "But it does seem a pity that the villa should be going to waste. Don't you want a holiday, doctor? I'd like to lend you

  the villa—it ought to be used, so if you or Geoff or Sister are taking a holiday, just ask me for the key."

  Mark got up. "I'll take you up on that one of these days. Where is Lamontella? Italian Riviera?"

  "That's right—and it would make me very happy to know you were there."

  "We'll see. It certainly sounds attractive," Mark said. "But our first job at the moment is to get you ready for that operation and the first order is no smoking—none at all."

  "Right, doctor, I'll be good. Geoff will help me. It's mostly when I'm alone that I smoke too much—take out my old pipe and light up before I know what I'm doing. You'll stop me, won't you, my boy?"

  Mark swung round to Geoff. "I'm afraid it means no smoking for you too—you'll have to get them to push you outside if you want to smoke."

  "That's all right—I'm not a heavy smoker, and I can't smoke and write—not when I'm in bed, anyway," Geoff agreed. "Mr. Oliver has been giving me such marvellous descriptions of his villa and the countryside around that I can see it all and feel as if I've been there. It's going to be very handy," he said, picking up his writing pad significantly.

  "Picking up copy, eh?" It was the first time Mark had spoken to Geoff about his writing. "Is the hospital going to get into your novel too?"

  "Oh, sure thing. You'll all be in it," Geoff told them. The remark was greeted with good-natured laughter. "I'll have the law on you if you say I've got big feet,"

  Shorty, who took size twelve, threatened.

  "Well, it's the most noticeable thing about you," Mark twitted his houseman, and added, "I wonder if we shall recognise ourselves."

  There was no room left for wondering on that point, Fay discovered, when she read the opening chapters of "Life's Beginning."

  There was no doubt at all whom Geoff had cast for his heroine.

  Time being a commodity which was always in short supply with her, Fay was utilising the occasion of the train journey

  to Buckinghamshire to see Toni to read Geoff's manuscript, so that both items could be crowded into her one day off.

  Her first reaction when she had heard of Toni's illness had been to pay her a visit, but other things had intervened. Her rejection of Mark's suggestion that she should undertake to nurse his grandmother had made her feel a little awkward about proposing the trip and his outburst over Geoff Wentworth had been a further barrier to an easy approach.

  She had felt hemmed in on every side with inhibitions. Her natural impulse to ring up Beechcroft to get a report on Toni's condition had been thwarted by the recollection that Horsey must know by now that she and Mark worked in the same hospital and she would think it strange that she did not get her news through him. But here too there was difficulty. He sometimes switched from the professional to the personal relationship, from the hospital to Beechcroft, but she had never been the first to initiate the transposition and she felt shy of doing so.

  Eventually, however, she had nerved herself to make the approach, and it had been easier than she had thought it would be.

  "How is your grandmother?" had been her rather stilted opening. She had hesitated to say "Toni" for fear of seeming too familiar.

  "She's made quite a good comeback," he told her. "She sits out now and can move around with help. She's still a little slow in speech, and of course vague at times."

  "I've been wondering if she'd be well enough to have visitors—whether she'd like me to go down and see her."

  Mark's face lit up with one of his flashing smiles which always made her think of sunshine on a lake which until then had been cold and grey. "I'm sure she would be delighted to see you—her angel child! I'm afraid she still confuse
s you with your mother."

  "I have a free day next Wednesday," she suggested.

  For a moment a cloud obscured the sunshine of his smile. "That's my operating day," he said. "I couldn't drive you down that day."

  "But there's a very adequate train service from Baker

  Street," she pointed out, "and in any case wouldn't it be less of a strain for Toni to have visitors one at a time?"

  "Perhaps you're right," he admitted a little grudgingly. "I'll be ringing Horsey tonight—I'll tell them to expect you on Wednesday, then. D'you know about train times, and where to change?"

  "Oh yes, thank you—I found that out at Christmas."

  For a moment Mark looked at her without replying. There wasn't any need of a reply really, she reflected, but he did not seem to consider the conversation ended. "Yes," he remarked reflectively, "the time I failed to meet you at the airport. Things might have been very different if we hadn't misfired then—we might have got to know something about one another on the drive down." Then abruptly his face changed, and he spoke briskly. "I'll tell them to expect you by the morning train, then," and turned on his heel and walked away.

  And now it was Wednesday and a beautiful morning in early May. Through the train windows first the suburban gardens, bright with spring flowers, and then the fresh green of the countryside and the hedgerows in full blossom tempted her attention away from the manuscript which lay in her lap.

  Once she did bring herself to start to read her attention was held. "Life's Beginning" might be a first novel, but it was good. She read quickly, professionally, and it did not take her long to realise that here was talent in no small measure. The early chapters were touching in their portrayal of a sensitive, imaginative little boy, who emerged as a real child. The adolescent stage was not quite so good, and his account of his first meeting with Jocelyn, his first glimpse of romantic love, lacked vitality and warmth. But those two qualities returned in full and overflowing measure as the story proceeded. He met another girl—at an international skating meeting in the Austrian Tyrol—and this was his "Life's Beginning."