The Private Wing

  Other titles by Claire Rayner available in e-book from M P Publishing

  CHILDREN’S WARD

  COTTAGE HOSPITAL

  THE DOCTORS OF DOWNLANDS

  THE FINAL YEAR

  THE LONELY ONE

  NURSE IN THE SUN

  THE PRIVATE WING

  THE

  PRIVATE WING

  Claire Rayner

  ebook ISBN: 978-1-84982-054-7

  M P Publishing Limited

  12 Strathallan Crescent

  Douglas

  Isle of Man

  IM2 4NR

  United Kingdom

  Telephone: +44 (0)1624 618672

  email: info@mpassociates.co.uk

  Copyright © 1967, 1996, 2010 by Claire Rayner

  All rights reserved. The moral rights of the author to be identified as author of this work have been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  ISBN 978-1-84982-054-7

  All situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.

  Chapter One

  The man in bed four rolled over again, and, finding sleep no nearer on his left side than it had been on his right, gave up trying to sink back into the blissful slumber that had been so unpleasantly shattered by the snores coming from the bed opposite. Wadding his pillow beneath his head, he lay staring at the dim ward across the humped shape of his own feet under the red hospital blanket, and wondered. Sneak out of bed quietly for a crafty smoke in the john? Call plaintively to the junior nurse next time she came padding past his bed in the hope she’d take pity on his insomnia and slip him an early cuppa? Or just lie here watching the senior girl write her report?

  Certainly she was worth watching, the man in bed four thought approvingly. Sitting cocooned in the light thrown by the discreetly shaded lamp over her desk, she looked good enough to eat. Not a small girl, by any means. Bed Four began to catalogue her interesting points. Must be a good five foot seven, and there’s plenty of her to go with it. Long legs, a neat waist, but a most agreeably rounded pair of hips – he remembered how delightful it was to watch those hips swing past his bed when she made her round just after coming on duty – and a definite bust. No, no disappointing twigginess about the senior night nurse. She’d be worth getting hold of, she would, a real armful, Bed Four told himself lasciviously. And nice hair, too. He liked the way it curled round the edge of her cap and on the nape of her long neck, and he’d always had a taste for hair that colour. A brown so deep it looked black except when light hit it, like now. Now it showed definite dark reddish bits – very nice. Funny, thought Bed Four, I’ve never noticed the colour of her eyes. Really funny, that. Been here a week, and watched her every night, and never noticed.

  Almost as though she heard his thoughts, the senior night nurse looked up from her report writing to sweep a watchful glance along the rows of beds, and Bed Four grinned in the dimness. Of course! How could he think he hadn’t noticed? Marmalade eyes, that’s what she had. A sort of brownish yellow with specks in. Very tasty altogether.

  He slid the pillow more comfortably under his head, and a little drowsily began to construct a conversation in his head. As long as he could get at her without one of the other girls around, it shouldn’t be too difficult. When’s your day off coming? he’d ask her, and she’d tell him, and then he’d say Well, that’s a coincidence, me too, and how about a nice day out – say the races, eh, and a bit of dinner afterwards – and what his wife didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her and no one’d blame a man fancying so splendid a –

  At the desk, Tricia suddenly yawned hugely, and then rubbed her nose hard, to help keep the sleepiness away. Worst time of the night, this was. Half past four, and the sky still black in the tall windows that looked out over the main courtyard, the air chill as it crept in through the open fanlights above them. Another hour, and she’d be busy enough, heaven knew. Seven for the top theatre list to be prepped, a drug list as long as your arm, and a dressing round to get through before breakfasts and blanket bathing and bedmaking. Three hours of hard slog lay ahead, but right now, just dimness, and the breathing of the men lying asleep around her and a subdued rattle of dishes from the ward kitchen where the junior was cutting bread and butter and laying trays for breakfast.

  She yawned again, and stood up, and tucking her chilled hands into the bib of her apron began one of her regular prowls from bed to bed. Mr Southcott sleeping well. Good – she’d thought he’d be wakeful, with a major operation to look forward to in the morning. Mr Baskomb and young Jeff, both involved in the same road accident, but both getting on nicely and sleeping rather noisily but deeply. The man in the next bed woke with a start as she passed him, and said in a thick drowsy whisper, “Hallo, beautiful! Come and talk to me, won’t you? Can’t sleep a wink, I can’t …”

  “Move over and I’ll show you how,” Tricia whispered back tartly, and moved on to the next bed. Unpleasant man, that. He’d been making passes at every nurse in the ward ever since he’d come round from his anaesthetic and they’d all be glad to be rid of him. These gay Lothario types, making such bores of themselves; there was always one in any wardful. That at least would be something she wouldn’t miss, if she got theatres.

  She checked the rate of the drip on the blood transfusion running into the ankle of the man in bed seven, and then relaxed the clip very slightly; the third pint should be started before 8 a.m. Sister had said, and this one was still barely a third through; and thought again about theatres as she checked the blood pressure and pulse rate.

  Theatres. She’d be hard put to it to say why she wanted so much to finish her three years at the Royal as a student nurse working in the operating theatres. It would be hard slog – theatre staff always seemed to work harder than anyone else – and trying to study for Finals in the middle of it all would be no picnic. But she wanted theatres all the same. It wasn’t that she didn’t like ward nursing. This night duty had been marvellous, for instance. To be senior night nurse on the busiest men’s surgical ward in the hospital was great. Lots to do, masses of responsibility (Night Sister was so busy she was only too happy to leave a capable person to get on with the job) and some interesting patients. But there was so much more that was interesting in theatres. Ward nurses – especially on day duty – had to spend too much time on dingy jobs like bedmaking and getting people in and out of bed. But theatre nurses, even when they were only scrubbing instruments after a case, were always doing something really important.

  Day duty. It would be funny to get back to sleeping during the night and working during the day, after three months of the other way about. She checked the third drip at bed nineteen, found it running smoothly, and padded past the last eleven patients and back to the desk. All were sleeping well; even poor old Mr Suckling, who was dying and was a great deal too wise a man not to know it, was sleeping shallowly instead of lying staring into the dimness as he usually was at this hour of the morning.

  “Thinking of the infinite, I am,” he had told Tricia one morning at this time when she’d murmured a mechanical “Penny for ’em!” as she’d flipped his pillows to a more comfortable position. That had made her shiver slightly. She never had been and she never would be able to come to terms with death, no matter how often she saw it. That would be something else to be glad of, if she got theatres.

  She made a few more notes in the report, and then sat with her elbows on the desk, resting her face against her fists so her cheeks crumpled up like a chipmunk’s, and thought more. Day duty. That would mean being able to see a lot more of David. Lovely, said a corner of her mind, obediently. Is it? retorted a more rebellious corner. What’s so lovely about being nagged more than ever? But look what
he’s nagging you for! said the obedient corner, rather primly. To marry him! Like, can that be bad? He’s gorgeous, you know that. He loves you, the dear Lord only knows why, and as Ngaire keeps pointing out, he’s very well off. I mean, who are you to complain at being nagged to marry a man with as much money as he’s got? Oh, I don’t know, said the rebellious corner. And of course I care for him. I mean, I’m not the sort to marry someone just because of their money. No, no, soothed the obedient bit of her mind, of course not. It’s just one of the attractions I was pointing out, that’s all, and there’s another thing –

  “Pss’t!”

  Tricia jumped, and stared round, peering into the darker corners of the ward, and the surge of fear the sound had raised in her settled into a sharp annoyance as she saw the faint glimmer of a white apron in the doorway of the sluice at the far end of the ward, and she marched swiftly towards it.

  “Honestly, Ngaire! Are you out of your tiny excuse for a mind? You’ll get shot if Dracula’s Daughter catches you doing this again. You know what she said last time – ”

  Ngaire perched herself awkwardly on the edge of the wash-basin, and digging into her dress pocket brought out half of a chocolate bar wrapped in crumpled paper.

  “Have a bit – ” she said invitingly, and produced one of her wide disarming smiles that crinkled her face so that all her freckles seemed to run together. “I know – I’m awful, aren’t I? But it’s so easy, having the fire escape to nip up when I want to see you – I’m sorry, this is a bit soggy, isn’t it?”

  Tricia wiped her fingers on a paper towel, and said crossly, “Well, what do you expect? If you keep chocolate in your pocket of course it melts – ”

  “I used to stick it up my knicker leg when I was at school. It got a lot soggier there,” Ngaire said cheerfully. “Hey, listen, what do you you think of my hair? We’re ever so quiet on women’s med, so I nipped into the linen cupboard and had a go with a razor. Good, eh?”

  She pulled off her cap, and turned her head to and fro, to show the jagged edges of her black hair. On anyone else it would have looked disastrous, but on her neat round head the hair sat like a sleekly uneven helmet framing a ridiculously pretty face, dark blue eyes, freckles, and the incredibly white teeth that showed when she smiled – which was practically all the time.

  “Not bad,” Tricia said judiciously, and then turned to peer round the door into the ward. But the men were all still sleeping, and she came back to Ngaire who was busily licking the last of the chocolate from the silver paper wrappings.

  “But couldn’t you have waited till breakfast to show me? I mean, it isn’t going to grow that much in the next couple of hours.”

  “Well, no. I mean, that isn’t the only reason I nipped up – ”

  “I had a feeling it mightn’t be.”

  “Well, look, you didn’t think I’d let it go just like that, did you? He’s a lovely guy, and I had to let him know my next off duty, didn’t I?”

  “Oh, come on, Ngaire – you’ve done this so often! You see a patient in the ward, you fall hook, line and sinker, and then when you go out with ’em after they’re discharged, you fall out again as fast as you fell in. Do me a favour – don’t make me go through it all again!”

  “Oh, I know – it’s funny, isn’t it?” Ngaire said happily. “Like I told one of ’em – that Canadian boy you remember? – they look so different with their clothes on – but Jeff’s different. I mean, he’s a real beaut – don’t you think so?”

  “I hadn’t specially noticed,” Tricia said tartly. “I’ve only nursed him for two of the weeks he’s been on the ward, after all. How could I do as well in that time as you did in a mere three nights of relieving me?”

  “It’s experience that counts,” Ngaire said, quite unabashed. “So, look, give him this note for me, hey? He wanted to know what my name means, so I’ve signed it Daughter of the Morning. To tell you the truth I made that up, because I don’t know what it means – I never did get all those Maori names sorted out, but it sounds good, doesn’t it? And tell him if he dares spell it N-Y-R-E-E when he writes back, I’ll never speak to him again. I want it spelled the right New Zealand way. All right?”

  “Oh, all right! You and your affairs – you fall in and out of love like a yo-yo. It’s getting awfully boring. And for God’s sake get going. If the old bag comes round and finds your ward with only a junior on it she’ll have your guts for garters – and serve you right, too.”

  “Right. I’m going.” Ngaire slid to the ground and smoothed her crumpled apron, before heading for the fire escape door.

  “By the way, have you got any news on the Change list?”

  “How could I have? We won’t be told till breakfast,” Tricia said. “But I’m keeping my fingers crossed like mad.”

  “I tried to get a peep when I went to the office to pick up my D.D.A. key, but the old bat came in before I could get the desk drawer open,” Ngaire said cheerfully. “Told me I’d know soon enough, and to get on with tonight’s work, and never mind tomorrow’s. I told her I’d cut my throat if I was down to go somewhere like Emergency Services or Theatres, and all she did was say ‘Wait and See.’ Like doom. I bet she makes sure I do go somewhere like that, just so as to make me cut my throat. Tell you what – if I do, I’ll cut it in front of her, and she’ll get smothered in my berlood, and I’ll die with a horrible gurgle, right at her feet.” Ngaire crossed her eyes sickeningly, and let her tongue loll out of her mouth, while her head drooped to one side. “Then she’ll be sorry – ”

  “Oh, go back to your ward, you – you antipodean nut!” Tricia said, and laughed, and Ngaire winked at her, and slid out of the door to rattle her way cheerfully down to the floor below.

  And for Tricia, the next three hours or so passed with incredible speed, activity building to a crescendo of rush to have the ward ready for the day staff at eight-thirty. With her junior nurse and the second year girl who shared her time between Ngaire’s ward and Tricia’s, she dressed the previous day’s operation wounds, organised the operation preparations for the seven men to have surgery that day, dished out medicines, gave injections, served breakfasts, her sleek black legs almost twinkling under the blue and white of her uniform, as she bustled from bed to bed, kitchen to sterilising room, sluice to ward office.

  And all the while, as she exchanged the usual badinage with the livelier of the patients, and sent her junior scurrying about her jobs, she found herself thinking, “Last time – my last night duty as a student nurse. With a bit of luck, maybe my last time as a student ward nurse – if I get theatres. Maybe I’ll stay on theatres as a staff nurse, too, after Finals. That’d be great. Maybe even manage Theatre Sister before too long – ”

  But that thought she pushed away, almost as briskly as she snapped her wrist as she shook down thermometers before tucking them under the tongues of the patients who sat like obedient baby birds, mouths open, waiting for them. Because that was really the whole problem, as far as David was concerned. And that had to be faced pretty soon. She couldn’t keep him quiet much longer.

  And when she went off duty, her junior trotting behind her, to say a polite Good-bye to Night Sister (an absurd tradition for people going off night duty, since everyone saw night sister every day anyway at breakfast time, but one that was jealously upheld) she had the rare pleasure of being told, “I’ll miss you, Nurse Oxford. You have proved an extremely efficient and capable person to be in charge of a ward at night. A great improvement on the way you were during your first night duty!”

  Remembering one or two of the things that had happened then, Tricia blushed.

  “Yes, indeed, you’ve coped well. I hope you do as well in your next assignment, whatever that is.”

  “Which only goes to show what a hypocritical old Dracula’s Daughter she is,” Tricia said to Ngaire as they followed each other in the queue that shuffled along the servery counter in the dining room, loading plates with scrambled eggs and toast. “Seeing she knows perfectly well where
we’re all going. I wish the Royal’d come up to date and post Change lists in advance the way they do in some of the other hospitals.”

  “That’ll be the day, me old mate, I tell you. This place is as about as up to date as gaslighting when it comes to things like that. I mean, great on the old medical and surgical sides, but when it comes to really modern ideas like good staff relationships and that – ” Ngaire sounded very disgruntled.

  “Well, you asked for it,” Barbara Lloyd said from her place in front of Ngaire. “Honestly, Trish, would you believe it? This screwy friend of yours only took herself up to the medical staff quarters on her way up to breakfast, and when the old bat saw her and did her nut, Madam Ngaire’s only answer was to open her eyes wide and say ‘she only wanted to see a friend of hers’. I ask you!”

  “Ngaire, you didn’t!”

  “Well, look, why not? I wanted to tell Skip Peters I was coming off nights, and he could reach me at the Nurses” Home if he wanted to, and – ”

  Tricia, following Ngaire to the table under the window in the corner, said in an exasperated voice, “But my dear girl, what about young what’s-his-name – Jeff? That boy on Men’s Surg. Three. I thought you were going great guns with him?”

  “Well, so I am, but what’s that got to do with anything? I mean, Skip’s a real dishy guy, you know? And he drives a great car, one of those things that goes vroom-vroom all over the place, and so I just thought – ’

  “She just thought she’d pop up and see him,” finished Barbara. “How you ever managed to get as far as the end of your third year without someone getting desperate enough to dig a hole deep enough to drop you back home again, I’ll never know. Trish, you remember that time she climbed in one of the Private Wing windows? and nearly under Matron’s nose?”

  “Well, for God’s sake!” Ngaire protested, her mouth full. “I had to, didn’t I? I mean, how else was I to get to know him? All that week he’d been making signals at me across the courtyard – it wasn’t my fault I was on Radiotherapy and the kitchen window looked straight across at his – ”