An Irish Doctor in Love and at Sea (49 page)

Fingal's laugh rang so loudly he had to remind himself of where he was, and clapped a hand over his mouth.

“Everybody knows you don't simply look after the sick. You minister to the entire village and townland. I envy your ability. I'd like to be more like that. I'd like really to earn the trust these people have placed in me. And I want to be a better doctor.”

For the first time in a long time, Fingal Flahertie O'Reilly was at a loss for words, but there certainly was a lot more to Ronald Fitzpatrick than had originally appeared on the surface.

A stern-looking Kitty walked in. “Doctor O'Reilly,” she said, and he could tell that being his wife was entirely secondary to her being the senior nursing sister. “I'd have expected better of you on a neurosurgical ward. I could hear the guffaws of you in my office. You sounded like a wounded heifer.” There was steel in her voice.

O'Reilly lowered his head. His “Sorry” was meek indeed.

“And,” she said, consulting a round pocket watch pinned to the left shoulder strap of her white apron—all the Royal nurses wore one there—“even if you are a professional colleague, I believe visiting hours are over, and that you have an appointment at the Royal Maternity Hospital with a Doctor Whitfield soon.”

O'Reilly rose. “Thank you, Sister,” he said as he watched her leave the room. She was right. Lorna Kearney would be at RMH at two thirty today for her first amniocentesis and he was going to be there with her. Together they'd take another step along the road to managing the incompatibility between her immune defences and her unborn baby.

“You may be right, Ronald, about me looking after the village as well as the sick. Lately, though, I've been wondering if I get a little distracted by it all. Medicine's changed one hell of a lot since we graduated. I've been getting a bit rusty. Not very up on the latest procedures. Take this Rhesus isoimmunisation. Do you know anything about analysing amniotic fluid to predict how seriously a baby might be affected?”

“I was never very good at obstetrics. Pregnant women have always made me somewhat nervous,” Ronald said with a shy smile. “And you're right. I don't know anything about amniocentesis.”

“I'm going to watch one. Learn a bit. I'll tell you all about it next time I see you.” He headed for the door.

“Thank you for coming, Fingal,” Fitzpatrick said, “and will you please thank Mrs. O'Reilly for me for the
netsuke
article?”

“Of course,” O'Reilly said. “I've got to trot,” he said, “but you keep on getting better, and if I can, I'll pop in again.” Without waiting for a reply, he left and marched straight to Kitty's office. He poked his head in, saw her sitting at her desk, and shut the door behind him. “Kitty, I really am sorry.”

She shook her head. “You can be a great glipe sometimes, but you're forgiven.” She raised one eyebrow. “What was so funny anyway?”

O'Reilly chuckled. “He said I was the sage of Ballybucklebo. It hit my funny bone.”

Kitty laughed quietly. “See what you mean,” she said. “You know, I've got to know him a lot better since he was admitted. When you get through the armour plating—”

“Sounds like you're trying to sink a battleship,” and for a moment he vividly recalled what happened on
Warspite
after the German 250-kilogram bomb had hit.

“You know what I mean. Ronald had built up his protective walls, but inside I reckon there's a pretty decent human being. It just takes a bit of getting through to him,” she said.

“I agree. Now don't laugh, but how do you think things might work if we formed some kind of association with Ronald, if only for being on call? He should be back in harness in about another two months, but he'll need to work into it gradually. We could help. And I'm beginning to think I should be starting to make arrangements for Barry and me to go on regular refresher courses. You went to one in London last year, and if we were affiliated with Ronald, he could get away once in a while too.”

Kitty frowned, pursed her lips. “There is the business of some of our patients preferring a woman doctor…”

“Don't worry about that. Jenny's promised to sort that out, and she's never let us down about anything. There'll still be a well-woman clinic to run, and the customers all seem pretty happy with Jenny. We do need another woman.”

She smiled at him. “I'll bet Ronald would be thrilled with the idea now he knows we're not out to pinch his patients. He's told me that being ill helped him to see that he wants to be a better doctor. You should talk to him, Fingal.”

“Not now. But soon.” O'Reilly felt a pang of something that felt suspiciously like jealousy and yet at the same time he was happy that Ronald had confided in Kitty as well as in himself. He looked at his watch and suddenly felt weary. “Listen,” he said, “I have to nip over to RMH, but why don't you and I forget about the practice and Ronald and medicine for tonight? I'll meet you in the Culloden Hotel about six?” The thought of an evening within the solid stone walls of the old Gothic mansion turned hotel felt like good medicine. “We can have a drink, maybe even dinner if whatever Kinky has prepared could wait until tomorrow? I'll find that out when I get back to Number One.”

“Sounds good,” Kitty said. “Blow the work. I'll drive straight there and see you at six, at least for a drink.” And her smile was inviting. “All work and no play make Jack a dull boy—and I'd hate to have to live with a dull Fingal O'Reilly.”

He could still hear her throaty chuckle when he was several yards along the corridor.

 

40

'Ere the Parting Hour Go By

Fingal had left the flat in the Crescent and taken a shortcut past the Paddock at the west end of the Haslar grounds. To his right he noticed the stand of firs where he'd cut the small Christmas tree, now stripped of its finery and consigned to the rubbish tip this morning, Little Christmas, January the sixth. On this day tradition dictated Christmas decorations should be taken down.

How fast the days had flown.

He realised he was approaching a familiar figure, stiff-backed, neat in her fall, tippet, white apron, and navy blue uniform, who was standing staring over the huge, empty, barren field. He wondered what she was doing. “Elizabeth?” Fingal called.

The woman turned. Senior Sister Elizabeth Blenkinsop smiled a greeting, but her eyes were far away. “Morning, Fingal.”

He caught up. “Morning, Elizabeth. Not a bad day for the time of year.”

“And it's your last, isn't it?”

“'Fraid so. We'll be leaving at noon.”

“I knew you weren't actually on duty today.”

“I'm not. I'm just going to pop in to say my farewells to the staff.”

“Nice of you. Let's walk back together.”

“Grand, but before we go, if you don't mind me asking, what brings you out here?” Fingal said. “There's not much to see.” Which was true.

“No, there isn't. It's a desolate place. But it's not what I see,” she said. “It's what I feel.” She frowned. “I'm not a superstitious woman, I don't believe in the supernatural. But out here I can sense the sadness of all those interred here and”—she straightened her shoulders—“I get a feeling of England's permanence too.”

Fingal frowned. He wasn't quite sure he understood. “Please go on,” he said.

She inhaled. “Do you know the history of this place, Fingal?”

“Not really, no.”

“I believe it was 1753 they started using these fields, all nine acres of them, to bury those who died in the hospital. Our historians estimate at least ten thousand people are still buried here. The staff used the Paddock until 1859. Until then apparently there were fleets and fleets of headstones, but the tombstones were all transferred to a garden of remembrance at Haslar and the people in charge established a new naval cemetery at Clayhall.”

“Good Lord,” Fingal said. It was hard to imagine. All he could see was a large, unkempt field with a few detached houses at one side, a long redbrick wall at another.

“And,” she said softly, “nearly all of them were far from home, lonely, afraid.” She looked him straight in the eye. “That's the sadness I feel. Their sadness.” She touched his arm. “I've watched you, Fingal, and I know you think the way I do. Every single patient needs to feel they are cared for as an individual, and sometimes when I've been dog tired or we've been rushed off our feet, not able to do that, I come out here, think of all those terrified boys, and remind myself of what I ought to be trying to do.”

Fingal swallowed the lump in his throat, said nothing, but realised that for many nursing spinsters, their patients filled the place of the families they never had. Not all, though, felt the same sense of duty as Elizabeth Blenkinsop.

“A lot of England's history is here, too,” she continued, her voice hardening. “A sense of going on. When the
Royal George
capsized in 1782 at Spithead, six hundred drowned sailors were buried here. There are typhus and dysentery victims from Sir John Moore's retreat to Corunna during the war in the Iberian Peninsula, veterans who fought with Nelson at the Nile and Trafalgar, soldiers from Waterloo.” She smiled. “I remind myself what we're fighting for, defending England from that horrid little Austrian corporal and his bullies.” Fingal watched as the normally restrained nurse actually stamped her foot. “All of our fighting troops deserve the very best care we can give. That is our duty, and sometimes I need to remind myself of that.” She turned and began to walk. “Now,” she said, her voice lightening, “you've heard the sermon from a garrulous woman. Let's go to Collingwood Ward, perhaps Angus will drop in, and I'll make us a cup of tea.”

*   *   *

“We shall miss you, Fingal,” Elizabeth Blenkinsop said as she poured him a second cuppa.

And as she'd suggested he might, Angus had dropped in too. “Just so,” he said, shifting his weight on the plain wooden chair, “and we wish you well, and trust you'll keep in touch.” Fingal and Deirdre had dined with him and Morag on Saturday night to say a proper good-bye.

The door flew open. “Do you know anything about this, Mahaddie?” Surgeon Commander Fraser stormed into the room, brandishing a letter. “Do you? It has your hallmark all over it. Yours and O'Reilly's.” The surgeon did not acknowledge Elizabeth's presence in the room.

“Eh, and a good morning to you too, Surgeon Commander. And what would
this
be, exactly?” The Highlander allowed one bushy eyebrow to arch.

“The most ridiculous order I've ever received.” A vein throbbed at Fraser's temple and his face was puce.

“You're not in my department, Surgeon Commander.”

While Fraser had dropped both his and Angus's rank, the little Scot was being punctilious.

“And unless you tell me what the order is, it would be hard for me to say if I knew anything about it, now wouldn't it?” His voice was calm, quiet, and held a touch of the sardonic. “You're getting yourself awfully fashed.”

“Speak English, for God's sake. Of course I'm blazing. Reykjavik. Bloody Reykjavik. To leave on a Sunderland flying boat from a water aerodrome in northern Scotland next week. I won't stand for this, Mahaddie.”

“Well, then, maybe it's the admiral you should be having a wee word with?”

“I fully intend to have more than a ‘wee word' with Admiral Bradbury.” The man spun on his heel and stormed out, slamming the door behind him.

“Och, the poor wee man. Looks like he's got a posting he doesn't much like.” Angus shook his head. “You'll remember we invaded Iceland on the tenth of May last year?”

“I do indeed,” Elizabeth said, “to keep the Germans out. U-boat and long-range bomber bases there would have been disastrous. They would have straddled the North Atlantic convoy routes.” Despite the seriousness of the information, Sister Blenkinsop was clearly having trouble keeping a straight face.

“
Warspite
was preoccupied then in the Sea of Norway and at Narvik,” Fingal said, remembering how three days later, the great battleship and her escort destroyers had stormed into Westfjord, all guns blazing.

“It seems,” said Angus, “we're strengthening the Iceland garrison. They must have need of a naval medical officer. Probably in an administrative capacity. I'm guessing, of course.” The hint of a smile flickered at the corners of his mouth. He rose and offered his hand.

Fingal rose and shook it. “I'll write,” he said. “And thanks for everything.”

“Aye. You'll do fine back on your ship. I can teach you no more about giving anaesthetics, and remember me to Richard Wilcoxson.” And with that the little Scot broke the handshake, said, “I'll be off, Elizabeth,” and left.

“Sit down, Fingal, and finish your tea,” she said, and burst out laughing before saying, “Never play poker with a Highland man. I don't know how Angus kept a straight face. It's the kind of thing he'd want to keep to himself. No hint that he'd taken any part.” She chuckled. “I don't know for certain, but Angus has a very close friend in the Admiralty. A vice admiral, in charge of things like promotions and postings.”

And Fingal remembered Surgeon Captain Mahaddie's words in the mess before he went on a week's leave before Christmas. “It might just be time to have a word with my friend in London.”

She stopped chuckling. “It doesn't happen often, but Angus had a drop too many one night a couple of years ago. We were having a drink together in the mess. He said he was drinking to old comrades and asked me if I knew what the day's date, April the twenty-third, meant. I hadn't a clue. He told me on that day in 1918, the Royal Navy tried to seal the Belgian port of Zeebrugge by sinking blockships there. The Germans were using the harbour as a U-boat base. We lost more than five hundred men.” She glanced down at her desk, then back at Fingal. “I don't think he'd mind me telling you he won his DSO there by saving a man's life.” She smiled. “That man, a vice admiral in London now, is the one who got your promotion through and I'm damn certain has arranged a frosty future for a certain surgeon commander of our acquaintance. And he can moan all he likes to our officer commanding, but vice admirals outrank rear admirals.”