Doctor Fane (hiatus)

The New Nurse VIII

"I mean, as your superior, it is my job to correct your mistakes."

"I quite understand." Her tone was cool.

"And we all make mistakes sometimes," he continued, feeling somehow that his apology had not been good enough and not knowing how to make it better. "And patients can be stubborn. Or ignorant. Sometimes half the job is deciphering what they really mean when they use completely the wrong words to describe the problem."

"Oh, yes," Miss Barnes said. "I agree."

"Even doctors don't always get it right, you know."

A corner of her mouth lifted and then was swiftly repressed. She said nothing. Nicholas had the sudden suspicion that her demurely lowered lashes concealed not humility but laughter. He was acutely embarrassed by the thought.

"Anyway, we've got the surgery on Friday," he finished lamely.

"I shall be very careful of Mrs Pearson on Friday," Miss Barnes said, still not meeting his gaze. "She shall not have the chance to sneak food."

"Very good then." Nicholas felt as though he had lost a game he had not known he was playing. He had intended to shake Miss Barnes's hand and wish her the best for her future at the cottage hospital. Instead, he shoved his hands in his pockets and scowled at her. Women were much easier to deal with when they told you exactly what they thought, rather than hide it behind coy expressions and false words, as though he hadn't the eyes or wit to see it. "Well then, Miss Barnes. That was all."

"Goodnight, Doctor."

He turned and left without saying goodnight in return. A few moments later, he heard peals of laughter erupt from the nurses' sitting room and had the instant — and not unfounded — suspicion that the women were laughing at him.

As he was just starting down the stairs, Matron Howard called his name, and he turned to see her standing in the doorway of her office.

"I thought it was me you were coming to visit," she said with a smile. "Come in, why don't you? I've just boiled coffee."

It was a habit of theirs to share an evening cup of coffee once or twice a week and discuss the hospital affairs. Nicholas swivelled and crossed the hall.

"It was Nurse Barnes," he said, shutting the door of her office behind him. "Doctor Culpepper thought I should apologize to her for losing my temper today. He thinks I was in danger of scaring her off."

"Hmph!" Matron Howard set two cups and saucers on a tray.

"What's that mean?"

"I'm not sure that girl has the spirit for the job." Matron Howard brought the tray over to the little table by the window and set it down. Coffee was just settling down from a roil in the glass bulb at the top of the spirit percolator she had sent down for from London. "She's such a mildew-mannered thing. I wouldn't blame it on you if she did leave."

"He blames Miss Jameson leaving on me."

"That dithering creature!" Matron Howard poured his coffee and passed it to him. "But at least Miss Jameson never cried in front of me. She saved that for when she was alone."

"She would hide in the lin... you mean Miss Barnes did cry?"

"Like a baby. No, it wasn't you that did it. It was last night. She came to ask me for an advance on her pay." Matron snorted. "That was some gumption."

"And she cried? Over that?"

Matron shrugged. "She said she hadn't eaten all day. That's hardly an excuse. What kind of fool doesn't eat?"

Nicholas sipped his coffee thoughtfully. It seemed then that Miss Barnes was weak, a fatal flaw in a nurse. "They all have flaws, of course," he said, half to himself. "Mrs Smith is lazy, and Miss Devon flirts. And Miss Jameson was..." One word alone could not sum up the hapless Miss Jameson's faults. Nicholas shrugged and left the sentence unfinished.

"I doubt she will stay here long," Matron Howard said. "She's moved from one position to another since she started. What does that tell you but that she can't see things through?"

"I don't know. She must have had a reason for leaving London altogether. Culpepper thinks she had a love affair gone wrong, but I can't see it. She's not the type."

"What is the type?" Matron asked curiously.

"Miss Devon, naturally."

Matron laughed. "No, no. Miss Devon has love affairs behind her, plenty, I am sure. That's why she's not the type. When they go wrong, she shakes it off. When a love affair goes wrong with a shy type like Miss Barnes, it cuts deep. But all the same, I don't think it was one. I think she's just a flake."

"You might be right." He took a sip of his coffee. "Culpepper likes her anyway."

"Which means that you don't. Well, you rarely like anyone, so I can't say I'm surprised."

"I like you," Nicholas protested. "I like Mrs Smith. I even like Culpepper."

"I ought to be more specific. You rarely like young, pretty women. Which is no compliment to myself, but I'm beyond the age to ask for flattery and far too honest to claim I ever was pretty."

Nicholas laughed softly. "It's no compliment to me either. And I don't think it's true. In any case, it is not that Miss Barnes is young, and I don't think she's pretty. She answered me back this morning, made a stupid mistake this afternoon, and this evening..."

"What did she do?"

Nicholas finished his coffee silently.

"Doctor?"

"If you must know, she laughed at me."

Matron looked amused. "How dreadful of her. It's there's one behaviour quite unforgivable in a woman, it's that she dares laugh at a man."

"Don't rub salt in the wound," Nicholas grumbled. "I don't like being laughed at."

"It's a bitter medicine," Matron said consolingly, "but I do believe it's good for you."

__

A/N 2021-06-04: Matron Howard is the kind of person who is really mean to people she doesn't like and really nice to those she does.

 I said before that this story is going to be somewhat episodic in nature. This is the end of the first sort of episode, which deals with Celia's arrival at the hospital. The next one is going to deal with Desdemona trying to get something she wants and Mrs Pearson's surgery.