style="font-size:15px;"> Charity’s green eyes glinted dangerously. “But perhaps I might not wish to go to Holland, Miss Evans,” she prompted gently. “I wasn’t aware that I had been asked.”
Her superior’s face went a rich puce; at any moment, thought Charity naughtily, she’ll begin to gobble—she had never liked Miss Evans; few of her staff did, she wasn’t too good at her job, but she was nearing retirement; for the most part they allowed themselves to be dictated to and quietly went their own way without minding overmuch. But this time, Charity did mind. She got to her feet.
“I’m afraid that I must refuse to go, Miss Evans,” she said politely. “And now, if you will excuse me, I should go back to the ward—it’s theatre day.”
She was immediately immersed in the tasks which awaited her—drips to supervise patients to send on time to the theatre, dressings to do, nurses to keep an eye on—she urged on her team of helpers, the faithful Bell at her right hand. There was certainly no time to think about her interview with Miss Evans; that she would hear more of it was a foregone conclusion. Which she did, very shortly and hardly in the manner which she would have expected.
The last case came down to the ward just after twelve o’clock. Mr Howard, whose operating day it was, worked fast and expected everyone else to do the same; he arrived hard on the heels of his patient, still in his theatre trousers and a terrible old sweater, his cap pulled untidily over his hair, his mask dragged down under his chin. He marched up the ward to where Charity was connecting the quiet form in bed to the various tubes vital to his recovery, and said impatiently: “Morning, girl—I’ll see that first case—wasn’t very happy about him.”
They were bending over the unconscious man when Mr Howard asked: “What’s all this I hear about you going to Holland, eh?”
Charity reconnected a tube and said with calm: “Matron had arranged for me to go, but I refused.”
He let out a barking laugh. “Did you now? Why?”
“I was told nothing about it until the arrangements had been made. That annoyed me, sir.”
They had moved on to the second of the patients and Mr Howard was deep in his notes when a student nurse slid silently to Charity’s side.
“There’s someone to see you, Sister,” she breathed, “he says it’s important. He’s an American.”
Mr Howard, for all his sixty years, had splendid hearing. “Run along, girl,” he advised Charity. “I don’t doubt you’re about to get a handsome apology, so you can come down off your high horse and offer your services, after all.” He cast her a quick, friendly look. “Not that I shan’t miss you.”
“How did you know…?” began Charity, and was told to hush and get on with it and leave the student nurse, pale with fright, in her place.
The man waiting for her was elderly, with a narrow, clever face and a penetrating voice which he strove to quieten out of deference to the patients. He wasted no time after he had introduced himself. “If I might have a word?” he begged, and on being shown into Charity’s office and bidden to sit, did so.
“I’ve come to apologise, my dear young lady,” he began. “I had no idea that you had been told nothing of our request—indeed, I was led to suppose that you knew of it and had consented to go.” He coughed gently. “However, the—er—misunderstanding has been put right, and I hope that if I ask you personally to come as nurse to our Mr Boekerchek, you will agree to do so.”
He was rather nice, despite his American accent and enormous horn-rimmed spectacles—he reminded her of Mr Boekerchek, they both had nice smiles. She found herself smiling in return. “I’ll come whenever you want me to,” she told him, and was surprised at herself for saying it. “Miss Evans told me that you had asked if I would leave tomorrow.”
He nodded. “It is an urgent matter, if you could arrange to go to The Hague as soon as possible. Mr Boekerchek has a rare condition—multiple insulinomata—the fainting fit which he experienced when you so kindly went to his aid was an early symptom of it, I believe. When he was told yesterday that surgery was imperative, he agreed to undergo it on condition that you could be found to act as his nurse.” He grinned engagingly. “He is certain that you will bring him good luck.”
Charity was thinking about multiple insulinomata, and trying to remember all she knew about it. She had only seen two or three cases of it and none of them had recovered—she recollected the squint and the tingling hands and knew now why they had aroused her interest; they were two of the earliest symptoms. Probably Mr Boekerchek’s condition had been discovered in good time; she enjoyed a challenge, if she could, and she would do everything to help him to make a complete recovery. “I’ll do my best,” she told her visitor. “I can be ready by tomorrow and if possible I should like to drive myself, only I’ve no papers for the car.”
He brushed that aside. “That can easily be attended to. If you will let me know what time you intend to leave, everything will be arranged and all you need will be sent here to you this evening.”
She blinked. “How nice—there’s a ferry leaving at midday from Dover.” She added doubtfully, “It’s the holiday season…”
“Don’t worry about that.” He was comfortably efficient; obviously she was to have no worries on the journey. He left in another five minutes, the tiresome details dealt with, leaving her with nothing further to do but pack; fill up with petrol and telephone home, all of which she was forced to do that evening when she came off duty, having had not a moment to call her own until then.
She didn’t see Miss Evans again before she left, a message telling her to take what uniform she needed with her, and to notify the Office as soon as she knew the date of her return, was all the official acknowledgment she received of her departure, an omission easily made up for by the enthusiastic help of her friends, who assisted her to pack, provided the odds and ends she had had no time to purchase for herself, and even volunteered to tell Clive, whom she had completely forgotten in the excitement of the moment. She dashed off a note to him the next morning just before she left and then forgot about him almost immediately.
CHAPTER TWO
IT WAS A smooth journey, even if crowded, but Charity hardly noticed that; she was immersed in a copy of The Lancet she had borrowed from Mr Howard after she had asked him urgently on the previous afternoon to tell her all he could about her patient’s complaint.
“Oh, so you’re going after all?” he had snorted at her. “I can do better than tell you, there was a first-class article about it in last week’s Lancet.” And he had brought it down to the ward that evening, when he came to do a final check of his patients.
She studied it now, learning it almost word for word, so that later on she would know what everyone was talking about. It was a well-written article, written by a professor at the Utrecht School of Medicine, a certain Everard van Tijlen, a man, she considered, reading it through for the last time, who knew what he was about—a fine decisive style and sound knowledge of the subject. She put it away in her case and went up on deck to watch the flat coast of Belgium creep nearer.
She made good time from Zeebrugge to the Hague; it was only a little after seven o’clock when she drew up smartly before the address she had been given. The block of flats was large and modern and obviously luxurious and in a pleasant part of the city. She wasted no time, but got out, locked the car, went into the foyer and asked to be taken to the fifth floor by the porter.
Mr
