unaware of that, just as she could see nothing remarkable about her green eyes and golden hair. She said humbly: ‘She sounds quite something. I expect you like taking her out.’
He smiled at her across the table. ‘Oh, I do, although I find it rather exhausting. She likes to dance until the small hours, on top of dinner too.’ It was hardly the moment for him to ask Philomena if she would like to go on somewhere and dance.
She schooled her voice to polite regret and seethed under the green dress. ‘I’m on early,’ she explained in a slightly wooden voice. ‘It’s been a delightful evening and I’ve enjoyed it so much. I really should get back…’
He glanced at the paper-thin gold watch on his wrist. ‘I did put it badly, didn’t I? I’m sorry. Won’t you change your mind? It’s early—barely half past ten.’
And now he was being polite, which made it even worse—he must be thinking of that cousin and wishing she were opposite him now. Philomena stifled a strong urge to burst into tears for no reason at all and repeated, just as woodenly, her regrets.
He was too well mannered to persist. He said all the right things and asked for the bill and while he paid it she looked around her, making a note of her luxurious surroundings so that later, when her friends asked her where she had been, she would be able to give a glowing account of her evening. It had been a lovely evening, she chided herself silently, and why on earth should she expect a chance acquaintance who had been kind enough to ask her to share his dinner to be more than casually friendly? And kind. She mustn’t forget that. She was aware, because her stepmother had told her so on many occasions, that she had very few social graces. It hadn’t been said unkindly—her stepmother was too easy-going to be unkind—merely a stated fact; probably the doctor had been bored stiff for the entire evening…
‘Why do you look so stricken?’ asked her companion quietly.
Philomena composed her ordinary features into a smile. ‘Oh, I suppose I was thinking about work tomorrow—rather a comedown after this.’ She waved a small, practical and well-kept hand at their surroundings. ‘An evening to remember—I can never thank you enough.’ She added inconsequently: ‘Celebrating after the occasion is never celebrating, is it?’
‘No, Philomena, it isn’t. Shall we go?’
The streets were quieter now and the short journey seemed even shorter than it was. She couldn’t remember afterwards what they talked about, but it couldn’t have been anything important. He got out and opened the car door for her when they reached the hospital, and walked with her to the entrance. The old building loomed dark and almost silent around them, its small night noises almost unnoticed; the hiss of steam from the boiler room, a child’s cry, the quiet voices coming from the Accident Room in the far corner and the bang of an ambulance door.
‘Oh, well,’ said Philomena, her hand on the door, and then took it away to offer to her companion. ‘Thank you once again, Walle.’ She smiled up at him, looming beside her in the dimness. ‘I hope you enjoy your seminar.’ She had quite forgotten the shopping.
His hand closed round hers. ‘Goodnight, Philomena. I’m not much good at quoting, but your Shakespeare had the right words: “Fortune, goodnight, smile once more, turn thy wheel.” King Lear, and rather apt, I would say.’
He opened the door for her and she went past him with a murmur. She longed to look back, but she didn’t, hurrying through the hospital while his words rang in her ears. Had he been polite again, or had he meant it? Probably polite, she decided sensibly as she opened her room door, just to round off her evening for her.
She would have liked to have sat and thought about it, but there was no chance; several of her friends had returned from their own celebrations and someone had made the inevitable pot of tea; it was nice to be able to throw a careless ‘Kettner’s’ at Jenny when she asked where she had been, and to see the looks of interest turned upon her person. Everyone broke into talk then, saying where they had been and what they had eaten, and just for once, instead of playing the role of interested listener, Philomena was able to toss back champagne, paté maison, lobster and Vacherin into the pool of conversation. She retired to bed presently, nicely sated with her companions’ cries of ‘Oh, Philly—how super!’ She should have slept soundly in deep content, but she didn’t; she lay awake for hours thinking about Doctor van der Tacx.
CHAPTER TWO
OF COURSE, Philomena overslept; she didn’t doze off until the early hours of the morning and although she heard the night nurse’s thump on her door, she turned right over and went to sleep again. The subdued thunder of nurses’ feet and the banging of doors brought her awake again, and by dint of bundling her hair up anyway and doing nothing at all to her face, she managed to get down to the breakfast table in time to swallow a cup of tea and gobble bread and butter and marmalade before making for Men’s Surgical. Sister had her days off, which made them short-handed for a start, and as well as that, there was a theatre list. Philomena took the report from the Night Staff Nurse, scanned the notes of the two new admissions since she had gone off duty, and plunged into the ward, to be instantly swallowed up in its routine. Drips to check, dressings to do, theatre preps, blood pressures—she didn’t do them all, of course, but she had to check that they were being done. She was glad when she could escape to the office and drink her coffee, and even that precious five minutes was blighted by a telephone call from the second part-time staff nurse to say that her youngest had the measles and she wouldn’t be coming in that afternoon. A sad blow for Philomena, for the other part-timer was on holiday, so it would mean that she would have to stay on duty all day and the next day as well, unless the Office sent someone to relieve her. But nobody suggested that when she telephoned the Office, only a harassed voice wanted to know if she thought she could manage. She replied that yes, she could and wondered fleetingly what would have been said if she had declared flatly that no, she couldn’t.
The Registrar, Toby Brown, came in then, so that she had no time to feel sorry for herself; they did a round of the ward and she pointed out a little worriedly that Commander Frost didn’t seem so well. He was naturally peppery, they both knew that, but now he seemed strangely subdued.
‘Are the X-rays back?’ asked Philomena. ‘I wonder what they found? He’s having trouble with his breathing…’
‘The chief’s got them—said he’d meet me here presently—they’re not too good, I gather.’ He gave her a brief glance. ‘I say, Philly, you look like a wet week and I’ve quite forgotten to congratulate you—sorry. You deserved it, nice, hard-working girl that you are.’
She was digesting this sincere but not too flattering remark when Mr Dale arrived and she hurried to meet him. Her step faltered only very slightly when she saw that Doctor van der Tacx was with him. She had thought about him quite a lot since the night before, but somehow she hadn’t expected to see him again. Mr Dale muttered something and glanced at them both, and the Dutch doctor said at once: ‘We’ve met already,’ and smiled at her, then transferred his attention to Mr Dale again. Toby joined them then and they all went off to take a look at Commander Frost. After they had examined him, Mr Dale said: ‘All right, Staff Nurse, we shall just have a little chat—there’s no need for you to wait.’
Her ‘Very well, sir,’ was brisk as she made herself scarce, but his words sounded an ominous note in her ears; little chats usually meant bad news delivered in a carefully wrapped up way so as not to alarm the patient, but she doubted very much if the Commander would stand for that. And she was right, for doing a dressing on the other side of the ward presently, she could hear the old gentleman voicing his opinion about something or other in no uncertain manner, followed by Mr Dale’s surprisingly conciliatory voice and the deeper murmur of the Dutch doctor. Presently they came from behind the curtains and in answer to Mr Dale’s demand for her presence, Philomena handed over to the nurse assisting her, and led the three men into the office.
‘Operating this afternoon, Philly,’ said Mr Dale, who had called her Philly unofficially for years. ‘Commander Frost—hasn’t a chance unless I do, and not much of a one then. Better than lingering on, though. Bronchus quite useless