The Waiting Room Read online

  “Do? I don’t want you to do anything. I—I just want you to be here. That’s all. If you can stick it.”

  If I could stick it? He hadn’t a clue. I looked at the curve of his mouth, the shape of his hands, and I smiled. “I can stick it,” I said gently. I wanted to see his hands move, doing something just for me. “Could I have a cigarette?”

  He gave me one, lit it and one for himself, and I blew out the match. He frowned. “You’ve just been assigned Ward Six, you say?”

  “Yes. Lovely to have a ward of my very own at last. I shall be a regular new broom at first. The pros will hate me. And then I shall settle down into—”

  “You mean to stay in the hospital? Go into administration?”

  It was like a trickle of cold water down my back. Did I, after all, want to stay there until I had gray hair and ruined ankles, as well as a reputation as a tyrant? I shivered. “I don’t know. But I’d sooner nurse in a hospital than out. So what else is there? The trouble is, in administration you don’t nurse. That’s the trouble. You get caught up in a mass of paperwork. All the best nurses leave and go on the district, in the end.”

  Simon stroked the ash from his cigarette carefully on the edge of the ashtray. “You wouldn’t reconsider?”

  “I haven’t any reason to.”

  “You wouldn’t—for example—come and live here?”

  “But what as?” I asked. “Housekeeper? Dispenser? Secretary?”

  He was looking at me, and I felt all over again the warm current he had awakened in me five years before; the thing I’d fought so hard to dam back because of Midge. That I had still to dam back, because of Midge ... I knew my face was flaming, and I turned away to look out of the window into the dusk.

  “A bit of each, I should think,” he was saying quietly. “You see, there isn’t anyone else I could stand having about the place.”

  “I suppose that’s a compliment! No, Simon—I can’t just chuck my career overboard, to do something almost anyone could do. You mustn’t ask me to.” And I knew I wanted him to make me give way.

  “But I am asking you to, Lanna.” He looked down at his fingers, in a surprised sort of way, as though he had discovered an extra one sprouting. “Would it help to know that it was what Midge wanted, too?”

  “Midge! How could she—”

  “She was so ill. Quite suddenly. But she knew how it was going to be, you know. You know how people do. And she said—”

  “What did she say, Simon?”

  He stood up abruptly and paced across the hearthrug, kneeling to add a log from the basket in the alcove to the blaze. The red light lit his cheekbones from below, and I realized what a lot of weight he had lost since Christmas. “No,” he said slowly. “That wouldn’t be fair. But it was what she wanted. For you to come here and...” He stared into the blaze.

  I thought of the lonely little bedroom at the end of the landing. “What went wrong at Christmas?” I asked him abruptly. “What went wrong between you and Midge?”

  “Went wrong?” He stood up and dusted his knees, and then came to sit down again. “Nothing went wrong. If anything—”

  “Yes?”

  “I was going to say that if anything, that was when things first went right. When we were first honest with one another. Why do you ask?” He turned his head and looked into my eyes. His own were bewildered. “Lanna—”

  I don’t know why Alan Murray had to burst in just at that precise moment. But I was glad he did. I was just about to make an almighty fool of myself. And I think perhaps Simon was, too.

  “Ma Tarsh!” he said in a stage whisper. “Just coming up the path. Can’t you head her off, Simon? I’ve a waiting room full out here, and if she gets in...”

  Simon got up at once, and I think he was as relieved as I was to have the interruption. “You show her into the dispensary, Lanna, and tell her she’s jumping the queue. And I’ll see her in there.”

  I flew along the hall and around the corner to the side door. I was just in time. Mrs. Tarsh, wearing mink, was just closing the door behind her. She stared at me, and if she had carried a lorgnette she would have peered at me through that, too. “You needn’t go in the waiting room,” I told her. “Doctor will see you straight away save you waiting—if you’ll come into the dispensary.”

  She nodded delightedly, and a gust of completely unsuitable perfume reached me. She must have been at least 70, and green eye shadow didn’t suit her sagging features at all. But she had smeared it on, just the same, and her lipstick was shocking pink. I was laughing when I went to fetch Simon. It was a relief to be able to.

  “Time me,” he whispered as he passed me in the hall. It took him exactly one minute and 20 seconds, and he didn’t even raise his voice.

  When she had gone I said, “What’s the technique?”

  “No technique. She just doesn’t like me. Simple.”

  I was sure she must be crazy.

  I said, “There’s a lovely fire in the sitting room. Aren’t you coming to—”

  “No. No, I must go down to the Bridgers’ and look at Alfie’s rash, I suppose. You’ll be all right? I shan’t be long.”

  I nodded. “What time should I heat the supper?”

  “I’ll do that when I come in. You relax, Lanna.” He nodded and picked up his overcoat from the hall bench. “Back soon,” he promised.

  But he wasn’t. He still wasn’t back at midnight. Alan and I had our supper at ten. “No use waiting for him,” Alan said. “Probably got caught up in something. And I’m starving—aren’t you?”

  At eleven the local midwife put in an appearance. “I’m waiting on Mrs. Palin,” she told Alan. “You’re attending, aren’t you?”

  “That’s right. My night on call But I bet she keeps us until breakfast time—no sense in going yet, is there?”

  Nurse Green shook her head. “I’ve just come from there. Nothing doing at all yet.” She grinned broadly at me. “Any coffee on the go?”

  I made some more in the kitchen and took it out. She was a nice girl; I had met her before. I knew Simon thought a good deal of her as a fellow worker. When I had filled her cup I said, “Nice to see you again. I didn’t expect to before next Christmas.”

  Her face sobered at once. “No. It’s a rotten business. Of course, we all knew that—” she stopped and looked at me oddly “—it’s a rotten business,” she repeated.

  I remembered what Mrs. Cox had said. Maybe Nurse Green would tell me. “Yes, rotten,” I agreed. And then I said, “Tell me—” I waited until Alan had gone out to fetch his bag “—Tell me, why did somebody say to me: ‘Something had to happen’?”

  “Who said that?” she temporized. “Coxy, I’ll bet.”

  I sighed. “All right. Yes, Mrs. Cox. But what did she mean?”

  She looked at me hard. “I’m not supposed to know.” She went on drinking her coffee, watching me over the rim. “How should I know?”

  “But you do, don’t you? What’s been wrong here? Since Christmas, I mean.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know about ‘since Christmas.’ I do know they’ve never hit it off.”

  “Who? Simon and Midge? But that’s absurd! They were devoted.”

  “Were they?” She put down her cup. “All right, they were devoted.” She fumbled in her blue overcoat pocket for her cigarettes and offered me one.

  “No, thanks. Well, weren’t they?”

  Green stood up and went over to the fire for a light. “You’d better ask him,” she told me. “He’ll tell you if he wants to.” Suddenly her eyes snapped. “Ask him why Bill Corey left,” she said harshly. “And Tony Brandon, and all the rest of them. Ask him that!”

  I felt dazed. What was she telling me? I thought back to Christmas and tried to remember Bill Corey. He’d been a nice enough lad. Very young and rather shy. I’d thought at the time. Not the kind to play around with married women, anyhow. Nurse Green must be simply raving jealous, I decided. She was over thirty, and not very popular with men. “How d
are you!” I said. “Are you implying that there was anything between Midge and Bill Corey? You must be crazy!”

  She wasn’t in the least shaken. “No, I’m not crazy. No use getting mad with me, Lanna. You’ll have to face it sooner or later. You evidently didn’t know Midge as well as you thought.” She paused. “But she knew you.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I was with her when ... I was here on Saturday. She had time to talk a little.”

  Yes, she had talked to Simon about me—I knew that. But that was for Simon to tell me. If he wanted to. I blundered out of the room; anything to get away from this woman’s quizzical eyes and to prevent her from seeing how my hands were shaking.

  I didn’t go down again until I’d heard her and Alan go out, chattering on the drive before they climbed into their cars. It was nearly midnight by then. I cleared away the supper things and washed up, before I sat down by the fire again.

  I must have fallen asleep, because I didn’t know Simon was in the room until I felt him slipping a blanket over my shoulders. I opened my eyes.

  “You should have gone to bed,” he told me gently. “I didn’t expect you to wait up for me, Lanna.”

  I blinked. “Alan’s out, too. I thought you might like some coffee. What happened? Was Alfie Bridger more than you thought?”

  “No. Measles, nice crop of Kopliks, the lot. He was eating an ice lolly when I called, as a matter of fact.” He smiled. “I like kids.” He looked down at me, feeling the question I was biting back. “No, Midge didn’t,” he said evenly. “We would never have had any.”

  I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t. I knew it was true. She had never made any secret of the fact that children bored her. I was the one who had always played with dolls—not Midge. She used to say they were soppy.

  We said good night on the upstairs landing. He nodded toward the master bedroom. “You can have that room if you stay, Lanna. Have it redecorated, if you like. I want you to have everything you want, you know.”

  I smiled. “I’m not to be bribed! Besides, I like my blue room, thank you.”

  “Good night, then.” He touched my shoulder lightly, as he walked onto his room at the end of the corridor. I could still feel the touch of his fingertips long after I was in bed.

  CHAPTER TWO

  During breakfast Mrs. Cox popped her head in. “Twelve,” she told us gloomily. “Be 20 before they’ve done.” She roared off down the hall with her vacuum cleaner.

  “How many usually come to morning surgery?” I asked Simon. “There isn’t room in the waiting room for more than 12, is there?”

  He smiled. “You’d be surprised. They’re pretty enterprising. If they get cramped they trot out and purloin chairs from the hall. Anyhow, I don’t encourage large numbers. If you keep the waiting room reasonably small you automatically stagger the numbers. They look in and go away again, instead of waiting for hours and then grumbling about it.”

  “We’re planning a second consulting room,” Alan told me. “So that we can both cope at once.” He pushed his cup across for more coffee. “And you shall be receptionist and bully them into the line-ups.”

  He seemed to be taking it for granted that I would stay. I said, “And what about my ward? Do I bring it with me?”

  I was aware that on my other side Simon had stopped eating. Tensely he sat there waiting to hear me say I had made up my mind. It seemed to me that he was unduly anxious to have me—surely anyone could have been taught to do the kind of job they were offering me? And he had still not told me what Midge had said.

  “There’s Matron to be reckoned with,” I said absently. “Frankly I don’t see her cooperating.”

  Simon drew in his breath. “If that’s all that’s worrying you, Lanna, I’ll go and see her myself.”

  “You think that would make any difference?” I opened my eyes at him. “She’s man-proof, Simon. No, it would best be me.”

  “Well, will you see her?” he persisted. He turned to Alan. “I’m beginning to think she doesn’t like us much! I can’t do any more persuading. You can try your hand.”

  Alan’s teeth shone white across the table. "Not I! Lanna strikes me as a person eminently capable of making her own decisions. Never interfere with strong-minded women, that’s my motto. They tire quicker if you give ‘em their heads.”

  “Mrs. Tarsh, for instance?” Simon looked mischievous. “If she’d had her head last night she’d be here still!”

  “I’m sorry for her,” I said, to change the subject and steer them away from the idea of my staying on. “What’s her background?”

  Simon reached out for more toast. It was good to see him eating with a little more interest. “Colorful,” he said. “Her husband was very wealthy—made most of his money on some speculative building lark. Her daughter married into oil and lives in the Bahamas. Her son was a layabout and finished up in a back-alley brawl in Algiers. Of course, it’s understood that he died in action, in the army. She’s alone in a huge house full of expensive junk with a chauffeur-cum-general-dogsbody.”

  “No other servants?” I had imagined Mrs. Tarsh with a lady’s maid at least. “No women?”

  Alan shook his head. “Haven’t you realized? She detests women. She was on the stage in her early days, and she didn’t enjoy the competition. I wonder she wasn’t rude to you.”

  “She wasn’t,” I protested. “She smiled at me. Why on earth does she ladle so much stuff onto her face? Doesn’t she know how ghastly it looks?”

  “Lesser of two evils,” Simon told me. “She feels worse without it.” He stood up and pushed his chair in. “I’ll go and make a start, Alan. Will you take over later so that I can fit my hospital round in?”

  “Sure,” Alan agreed amiably. “I’ll take the whole bunch, if you like.” We watched him walk out.

  Alan grinned at me. “Did you hear me come in last night?”

  “No. What time was it?”

  “Nearly four. Mrs. P. wished twins on us. Quite a performance.”

  “You won’t get that at the airport,” I mentioned. “Won’t it be rather dull there?”

  He grimaced. “Very, I imagine. In fact I’ve not really committed myself. Maybe I’ll stay here instead and work my way into a partnership!”

  “Alan...” I hesitated. I had to talk to someone, and Alan was practically a newcomer. “Tell me, why is Simon so anxious for me to come here? I mean, anyone would do, surely.”

  “You think so? I see his point. It would be ... very pleasant if you could.” His dark eyes twinkled. “You don’t exactly dislike the idea, do you?”

  I would have liked to tell him just how much I liked it. He had a very understanding manner. But I said, “It’s not one bit convenient, after my pestering Matron for a ward, and—”

  “Pooh! You don’t want to stay in the hospital! You’ll only turn into a professional spinster, if you do. You deserve a better fate.”

  I stood up quickly and began to load the tray. “Do I? I wonder why you think I’m safer from it here than I would be in hospital?”

  Surprisingly Alan crossed to my side of the table and caught me in a quick little hug. “I don’t think; I know. Do stay, Lanna.” He blushed suddenly and shot out into the hall. He was really rather sweet, I decided. Young, but not brash. And intelligent enough to be a very good doctor indeed.

  Mrs. Cox clumped into the breakfast room with her cleaner and looked after him. “He’s a nut, isn’t he?” she said admiringly. “One of the best we’ve had, he is. I was afraid we’d get a lady doctor this time, after what the doctor—” She stepped and looked at me nervously.

  “Yes? After what?”

  She took the tray from me and turned her back. “Oh, nothing. Something the doctor said when Dr. Corey left. Will you make the beds, Miss? Then I can manage the rest. And are you going shopping? There’s a few things we could do with. You could take Mrs.—You could take the little car, I expect.”

  The little car—Midge’s car. I had forgott
en the pink and white Metropolitan that Simon had given Midge. “Yes, I suppose I could,” I said. “You must make me a list of what you need. And something for lunch, I suppose? Tell me, what happened to all Mrs. Pullar’s belongings ... her clothes and so on? The car will be the first thing of hers that I’ve seen. And it’s less than a week since—”

  Mrs. Cox shook her head. “Doctor told me to move the lot on the Sunday,” she explained. “Didn’t want to have anything to do with it himself, he said. Upsetting, I suppose. But it was mostly clothes—she wasn’t one for books and that. I just gave him her jewelry and took the clothes away.” She looked at me. “If there was anything you wanted ... I mean, I’ve still got a few of them at home. Our Lottie had most of them. All but the fur coat—the doctor put that away.”

  I nodded. “Yes, I saw that her bedroom was empty. There’s nothing I wanted, Mrs. Cox. I just wondered what had happened to everything so quickly.”

  I had half-expected to find some evidence of Midge’s existence in the car, but there was not so much as a handkerchief. Someone had cleared it out pretty thoroughly, for there was none of the personal clutter I had expected. It seemed that Simon had gone out of his way to wipe the slate clean. And it was not that he was an unsentimental man. Had he despised her so much?

  I managed most of the shopping in the little row of shops below the station, but it seemed I had to go into Walsall for the meat. I parked the car in the George parking lot, on the bridge, next to a dilapidated Rolls. And when I came back Mrs. Tarsh was standing fuming while her chauffeur knelt, changing a wheel on the Rolls. She hobbled up to me, a grin all over her face. “Well, Miss—?”

  “Dair,” I told her. “Lanna Dair. I’m Mrs. Pullar’s cousin.”

  “So they tell me. So it’s you with her car, is it? I thought perhaps that nice Dr. Murray was using it.” She turned to bark at the man. “You needn’t hurry yourself, Johnson. I’ll go back with Miss Dair.” She leered at me. “I can have a lift, can’t I? I expect you’ve been to the butcher’s, the same as we have. Johnson and I get tired of one another’s company.”