The Liverpool Nightingales, page 6
Maud could hardly speak and a simple ‘Yes’ was all that she could say in the end. But her face was flushed and her heart was pounding.
‘So, to practicalities,’ said Miss Houston. ‘You will live in at the Nurses’ Home and you will be supplied with uniform, board and lodgings and be paid ten pounds per year. How does that sound?’
‘Yes, that sounds fine,’ said Maud. Suddenly she couldn’t stop smiling.
Miss Houston matched her smile and then leant forward across the desk again. ‘You will see people endure terrible suffering here, Maud, but there will be heartfelt joy as well. All of life is here within the walls of this hospital and there is no better work for a young woman like you. I think you will do very well indeed.’
‘Thank you,’ said Maud, meeting Miss Houston’s gaze.
‘Right, if you go back out to Emily, my clerk, she will take some more details from you and fill in a form. On your first day you will meet one of the superintendents, Miss Merryweather, and she will go through more of the rules and regulations and ask you to sign a contract. Have you any questions, Maud?’
‘No, I don’t think so,’ said Maud, standing up from her chair.
‘Right, let’s get you started as soon as we can,’ said Miss Houston, reaching across the desk to shake Maud’s hand.
When Maud got back to the ward, having sorted out all the paperwork with Emily, she saw the man in the bed next to Alfred’s sitting at the side with his back to them, his feet on the floor and a pair of new crutches resting beside him. He was having a smoke, his back curved over it almost protectively. Maud wasn’t happy about the cloud of smoke that was wafting over to Alfred’s bed but it was good to see him sitting up. The boy had been absolutely right: once the man had come through the shakes and started to sleep and eat he was like a different person. Yes, he still had the nasty injury to his leg and Maud had seen the long scar down his arm, but he looked like a new man.
Alfred smiled at her as she walked back down the ward, a big smile, and she noticed for the first time that his eyes drooped slightly at the outer corners, giving him a slightly sorrowful expression even now. She smiled back at him and felt the glow of connection between them. It was wonderful to see his face open up and look less pinched.
‘I can see by your face,’ he said, ‘even though you haven’t told me yet. You will be a nurse, won’t you?’
‘Yes,’ laughed Maud, ‘I will. And don’t you worry, as long as you are here I’ll come and see you, and if I am a nurse I can make sure that you are properly looked after.’
‘Sister Law has been to see me whilst you were away and she says that I will be going soon – being discharged, she called it – but only once they’ve seen me put some weight on. He’s going today,’ he said, pointing to the man in the next bed.
‘Well, I need to speak to Sister about that,’ said Maud. ‘We have to make sure that you go back to the right place. Miss Fairchild, from the big house, she has been making enquiries and there is a home for boys not far from here. It is a school as well. She knows the gentleman who runs it so she’s going to speak to him about you.’
‘Sister said that I should be going back to the workhouse.’
‘No!’ said Maud. ‘No, you are not. Miss Fairchild has given Mr Greer the money that he paid for you when he took you from the workhouse so the sweep isn’t out of pocket and he has no claim over you now. You are definitely not going back there.’
Maud saw the boy’s shoulders relax and then he smiled at her again. ‘You say that the new place has a school, so I can learn my letters and numbers. Is that right?’
‘Yes, I think so,’ smiled Maud. ‘That’s what Miss Fairchild said. You’re going to be much happier there, I’m sure of it.’
‘Good,’ said Alfred.
Maud melted to see the boy’s beautiful, trusting face, but seeing Sister Law moving down the ward in their direction, she and Alfred both stopped short their conversation and almost held their breath until she had passed them by. She halted in front of the man in the next bed, who still sat with his crutches resting beside him.
‘It is good to see you looking so much better,’ said Sister in a much gentler voice than they had ever heard her use, ‘and today you will leave the ward.’
‘Yes, miss,’ said the man.
‘Have you tried the crutches? Can you walk with them?’
‘Yes, miss.’
‘Good. Well, there is one more thing before you leave us. We know that you are an old soldier and that you fought in the Crimea. We have a small fund set aside for men like you, just a few coins to help you on your way. We have a number of Nightingale nurses working here and one of them served in the war, so they have started the fund to try to help out, in recognition of what you did out there.’
‘Pah,’ said the man, almost spitting on the floor.
‘Here,’ said Sister, sounding unsure of her ground now but nevertheless ploughing ahead. ‘Take these few shillings to help you on your way.’
He shook his head, ‘I don’t want your charity,’ he said, his voice gruff with emotion.
‘Look,’ said Sister, ‘we understand that the trials of war are not over for veteran soldiers once the last shot is fired on the battlefield. We know that you live with the consequences of war for the rest of your lives. So, please, take it,’ she said, pressing the coins into his hand, ‘and go to Lime Street Station. Take a train out to the country, to somewhere you can breathe fresh air. You need to find something different from this.’
The man grasped the coins but still sat shaking his head.
‘Now,’ Sister said, ‘remember, you need to get out of the city. If you fall into the path of loose women or you take to the drink again, you will surely die. Do you have any family? Do you have somewhere to go?’
The man sat thinking on the edge of the bed, his crutch propped beside him. Then he nodded and heaved himself to his feet. Sister Law grabbed his arm as he lurched a bit, trying to position the new crutches, and then he nodded at her again and set off down the ward. Sister watched him for a few moments to make sure that he could manage the crutches and then she turned back to the bed. Seeing Maud and the boy staring across at her, she scowled at them before starting to strip off the bed linen. Even before the man had reached the bottom of the ward the mattress was laid bare and ready to be made up again for the next patient.
‘Nurse, Nurse!’ Sister shouted up the ward with extra venom, just in case anyone overhearing her words to the old soldier had got the impression that she might be going soft. ‘Nurse!’ she shouted again, heading off down the ward when one didn’t instantly appear.
Maud and Alfred looked at each other and, once Sister was at a safe distance, they both started to giggle.
‘What are you two laughing about?’ said Alice, appearing at the bottom of the bed, out of breath as usual and with no chance of ever catching up on the mountain of chores that needed to be done on the ward each day.
‘Nothing,’ said Maud and Alfred together, giggling even harder and trying to stop themselves from snorting.
It was infectious, and soon Alice was giggling with them.
Then they heard Sister roaring down the ward, ‘Nurse Sampson! Stop that nonsense at once and get on with making the bed. Look sharp and make sure you fold those corners exactly right this time. I will be down there to check.’
‘Yes, Sister,’ cried Alice, turning her back on Maud and Alfred but still struggling to control her giggles.
When she turned back round her face was straight, which was more than could be said for the corners on the bed linen. Maud noticed immediately that they were crooked but didn’t want to say anything to Alice who, as she alone knew, had enough to deal with.
‘Well, how did you get on?’ said Alice to Maud, almost in a whisper.
‘I got in,’ said Maud. ‘And I start next week.’
‘That is so good,’ said Alice, beaming at both her and Alfred. ‘Which ward will you be starting on, do you know?’
‘They didn’t say, but even if I don’t start out on here I can still call in to see you, and I will keep an eye on Alfred, of course,’ Maud said. ‘They said that I will need to move into the Nurses’ Home at the end of the week. They gave me a list of things I should bring and they said I will be living in a single dormitory … what is that?’
‘Oh, it’s good,’ said Alice. ‘They are all on one floor, up on a gallery, and they are like very small rooms, partitioned off from each other so you have your own space. The walls are very thin, so you can hear everything, that’s the only problem. You soon get to know who snores, who talks in their sleep, everything, but I like it. They’ll probably be putting you in Louisa’s dorm. She left – well, she was told to leave – last week. It’s right by the door, so that means you only have somebody on one side. The trouble with that room, though, is that you’re first in line for any inspection.’
‘Inspection?’
‘Yes, when the superintendent comes down to check that your room is tidy and you are keeping yourself clean. The rest of us get some warning, but that room or Nurse Sellers, Nancy’s room, which is opposite to yours, is usually the first.’
So she’s opposite, thought Maud, relieved at least that though uncomfortably nearby, she wouldn’t have the presence of that particular nurse immediately through a thin partition. And being near the first in line for inspection was all right. Maud had always been a person to keep herself in order, so that should be fine.
‘And the other thing about that room is that you are next to Nurse Pacey, Edwina. Edwina is lovely but she doesn’t know how to do anything quietly. I should know; I’m at the other side of her. She keeps me awake and distracts me many a time, but then again, sometimes I need some noise to cover up my …’ Alice didn’t say the word but gave a small imitation retch.
‘Nurse Sampson!’ shouted Sister down the ward. ‘We need a mustard poultice to bed two …’
‘Best get going,’ said Alice, and then with a wry smile to Maud, ‘Are you sure that you know what you’re doing, choosing to leave your life in service to come to this madness?’
‘I do, or at least I think I do,’ said Maud.
Later that afternoon, just as Maud was preparing to leave, she saw Stella striding down the ward. There was already another patient in the man’s bed, an old man with long grey hair, who seemed very sick and hadn’t made a sound since the men with the stretcher had brought him in. Maud had been a bit upset when she had overheard the orderly at the head of the stretcher say something like, ‘This one won’t last long. We’ll soon be back to clear the bed again.’
Sadly, looking at the old man after they had left him there lying flat on his back with his mouth gaping open, Maud had to agree. His skin was white and pulled tight across his thin face and his breathing seemed shallow. Maud hadn’t seen many sick people until she had become a regular visitor on the ward, but she had sat with her grandmother when she was dying and she had enough sense to know that the old man looked like a corpse that was still breathing.
‘Has he gone then?’ said Stella, not realizing the patient she’d come to visit was not on the bed until she reached it.
‘Yes, he went earlier this afternoon,’ explained Maud. ‘Sister spoke to him and gave him a bit of money from a special fund for army veterans and she told him to make sure that he got out of the city into the country where he could breathe some fresh air.’
‘Well,’ said Stella, ‘to my old friend that probably would mean the taproom of his favourite public house, especially if he has some money in his pocket. I think I know where I might find him. What’s happening with you two then? When are you off home, young man?’
‘He’s going soon,’ said Maud, ‘and we are trying to get a place for him at the Blue Coat School for orphans. And I’m, well, I’m going to start here at the hospital as a probationer.’
‘Are you indeed?’ said Stella. ‘So you must have passed muster with that battle-axe of a sister of mine, then?’
‘I have seen her, yes,’ said Maud, ‘and she was very encouraging.’
‘I’m glad for you, I truly am. But you wouldn’t catch me here, not with all those rules and regulations and all that stuff those nurses have to see. It’s enough to make you gag.’
Maud smiled in return and then looked down at her hands. She didn’t really know if she would be up to it herself yet. After all, she’d always been a bit squeamish.
Seeing Maud’s discomfort Stella offered, ‘No, but that’s good, though. You have all the makings of a good nurse, from what I’ve seen. In fact, I like you so much that if my sister hadn’t stepped in and offered you a job I’d ’ave asked you to come and work at my place.’
Maud had some idea of what kind of ‘place’ Stella ran and she couldn’t help but laugh as she lifted her eyes to meet Stella’s smiling face.
‘Now, lad,’ said Stella, looking at Alfred, ‘I’ve heard a lot about that school they want you to go to, and boys like you can do very well there. You could end up being the captain of a ship or anything if you work hard at your lessons. So you make the most of it. Don’t end up like the poor fella who was in this bed. You make something of yourself.’
‘I will,’ said Alfred solemnly.
‘That’s my boy,’ said Stella. ‘And if either of you ever need anything, come and find me on Lime Street. Ask anyone round there where you can find Stella and Marie’s place – remember, Stella and Marie – and they’ll point you in the right direction.’
‘Thanks for that,’ said Maud. ‘We won’t forget. And I hope you manage to get something sorted out with Miss Houston. Are you friends yet?’
‘Not yet, but I’m working on it and I won’t stop until I succeed. You know what they say: life’s too short, and blood’s thicker than water – all that kind of thing.’
Stella looked down at the old man with the long grey hair lying on her friend’s bed. Then she lightly touched his hand. ‘Hope he goes peacefully,’ she said to no one in particular. Then she was striding past the bottom of the bed, wishing them well. And then she was gone.
‘I like her,’ said Alfred. ‘She is a good person.’
‘I think so too,’ said Maud, ‘although there’d be plenty in this city that would not agree with that opinion.’
‘Is that because she works in a brothel?’ said the boy.
Maud gasped at his knowledge. ‘Let’s say no more on that score,’ she said. ‘You need to be thinking about going to school, not knowing about suchlike.’
‘It’s just that some of the pauper nurses who were at the workhouse, they talked about working in a brothel and I didn’t know what one was so I asked them and they told me.’
There was nothing that Maud could say in return that would make any sense so she just shook her head. It seemed that Alfred knew all there was to know about most things, and anything new that he encountered he took on board in a very open way and dealt with it. It was almost like her grandmother used to say about people sometimes: ‘He’s been here before, that one … he’s an old soul.’ Thinking about her grandmother, Maud could picture her looking directly at her, then gazing back up over her shoulder at someone else – could it have been her mother? Maud couldn’t remember her mother, but she could remember the words because they were oft repeated: ‘She’s as deep as the sea, this one, as deep as the sea. You never know what she’s thinking. She’s one to watch all right, is our Maud.’
4
‘I have rarely known a nurse worth the bread she ate … who has not been trained under hospital discipline.’
Florence Nightingale
Maud walked up the stone steps to the Nurses’ Home and Training School with her heart racing. She hadn’t felt at all nervous when leaving the big house and saying goodbye to Miss Fairchild. But now, for some reason, as she ascended those steps her heart was pounding and her mouth felt dry. There was no going back now, although walking up those steps, in front of that tall building with its big front door, carrying a bag containing her few clothes and the copy of Florence Nightingale’s Notes on Nursing that Miss Fairchild had given her a couple of days ago, Maud could not quite believe what she was doing.
She knocked on the impressive wooden door and stood there waiting, but nobody came and she wasn’t sure what to do. In the end she was saved: someone else, who looked like she knew exactly where she was going, came straight up the steps and pushed open the door. Then, turning to Maud, she signalled for her to go inside. Maud didn’t even get a chance to thank the girl, who had raced off, a busy look about her, but thankfully a door to her left swung open and a woman wearing a bonnet appeared.
‘Welcome,’ said the woman. ‘I am Miss Mary Merryweather, superintendent of the Nurses’ Training School. Miss Houston told me to expect you. Come through.’
Maud didn’t have a chance to speak; she could only trot along behind the woman who led her directly into the building. It was immediately wonderful to Maud. So much so that she would remember for ever that moment when she walked across the coloured floor tiles and stood there for the first time. The space was open and when she looked up she could see all the floors above and the galleries that Alice had told her about. Looking right up to the top, Maud saw a huge skylight where the light flooded down. She had never been anywhere so light. She couldn’t move; she was completely transfixed. And there was a new smell, a smell of varnish. It was amazing.
‘Ah, well,’ said Miss Merryweather, pleased by the impression that the building had clearly made, ‘Miss Nightingale always makes sure that there is plenty of light and air coming in. These things are very important. I must say, I never tire of gazing up to the skylight myself, and I’ve been here since we opened. It must be seven years now, yes, seven years. The Training School was set up eight years ago and we were in another building to begin with but then we came here and well … isn’t it wonderful?’
‘Seven years,’ said Maud. ‘This has been here all that time and I didn’t even know about it.’
