Friday night was often busy at the first-aid post in the church hall, even if there wasn’t a raid. Gladys busied herself tidying the bandages, which the previous shift had left in a mess, humming as she did so. People got careless on Fridays. Even though the working week was hardly over, what with all the extra shifts, and then everyone pulling together to fire-watch or perform other home-front duties, the idea still remained: welcome in the weekend with a trip to the pub or night out at the cinema with chips after.
Then a fight might break out, or an accident happen, as well as the regular injuries from damaged buildings, ruined roads or pavements. You never knew who would walk through the door on a Friday, or in what state. That was why she liked to have all her equipment in order, the bandages rolled and arranged in order of size and shape. That could save precious seconds.
‘Aren’t you good, Gladys. You’re never still for a minute,’ said Mrs Freeman, who was the other nurse on duty. She had installed herself in an armchair in one corner of the draughty hall, and was drinking a cup of tea. She peered at Gladys over her glasses, which made her look rather like an owl.
‘I like things to be ready so we’re not caught out,’ said Gladys mildly. She quite liked Mrs Freeman, who was at least twice her age, and had once been a proper nurse in a hospital and so was very experienced. Of course, when she married she had had to give up working, and Gladys knew she had three children, all teenagers now. Yet Gladys wasn’t entirely sure that the older woman always said or did the right thing. She wasn’t very up-to-date with new methods, which Gladys followed assiduously in the Queen’s Nurses Magazine, and from listening intently to everyone in the Victory Walk home. It had also become apparent that Mrs Freeman was more than happy to sit down and supervise while Gladys ran around doing most of the work. Still, she wasn’t bad company, and didn’t go to pieces in a crisis.
Gladys looked up as a woman rushed in, all of a fluster, pulling her coat closed with one hand as she swept her pale hair off her forehead. ‘Oh, nurse. I do hope you can help me.’
Gladys immediately set aside the bandages. ‘Yes, what’s wrong? Please sit down, and take a deep breath. There, that’s better.’
The woman perched uneasily on the edge of the old wooden chair, looking as if she might spring up again at any moment. ‘I need advice,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to do for the best.’
Gladys nodded. ‘Are you injured?’ She couldn’t see any signs but it was as well to check.
‘Oh no. It’s not for me.’ The woman’s expression was confused, as if she hadn’t expected the question.
‘I see,’ said Gladys, although she didn’t, or not yet. ‘So, what is the trouble?’ She hoped the woman wasn’t making things up just to get attention. Sometimes that happened and Gladys was never sure how best to make the person go away.
‘It’s Ma.’ The woman clasped and reclasped her hands. ‘She went and got diabetes, you see. It’s ever so hard. I try to keep an eye on her but I got to work all funny hours now my kids went off to their other gran in the country. She don’t take her medicine right.’
Gladys looked across to Mrs Freeman, who must surely know this condition better than she herself did, but her colleague was taking no notice of what was happening on the other side of the hall. She was studying an old copy of the Radio Times.
Gladys exhaled slowly. This was something she knew a little about. She had read articles in the magazine and spoken to some of the other nurses. ‘That must be difficult,’ she said kindly. ‘Does she have to take insulin?’
The woman smiled hesitantly. ‘Yes, that’s it. I never remember the word, but that’s what it’s called.’
Gladys nodded. ‘And she’s under the care of a doctor?’
The woman nodded, more confident now. ‘Yes, but her usual one went off to the army and she don’t like the new feller. Reckons he don’t know what he’s talking about.’
Gladys frowned. ‘That’s not very likely, really. They have to train for years, you know.’ She knew how hard the local doctors worked, but supposed it must be hard if you didn’t want to take the medicine – it was easier to blame someone else.
‘Well, she won’t talk to him no more. Then she goes all funny, loses her balance and whatnot. I can’t make her see sense.’ The woman stopped and gave a small sniff, wiping her eye hurriedly with the back of her hand. ‘I can’t stay home and mind her, I just can’t. I got to do my job, we need the money as well as everything else.’
Gladys nodded in sympathy. She knew exactly how that felt. Then inspiration struck. ‘Would she talk to a district nurse?’ she asked. ‘There’s one in particular who has treated a lot of diabetic patients. She might be able to help her and then that would put your mind at rest.’
The woman brightened. ‘Do you think she would agree?’ she asked. ‘Ma doesn’t mind the nurses. She says they’re more sensible than the doctor.’
Gladys smiled. ‘This one’s very sensible. You want to speak to Bridget, that’s Nurse O’Doyle, at the Victory Walk Nurses’ Home. Do you know where that is? Your doctor can refer you.’ She knew that Bridget had once had a deep fear of needles, which she’d managed to hide even from her best friend Ellen for years. Bridget had persuaded Gladys to help her practise, and Gladys had borrowed one of her youngest sister’s squashy rubber balls so that they could try injecting it. She herself wasn’t qualified to give injections, but she’d watched Bridget, and knew that the Irish nurse now sometimes helped out at Dr Patcham’s special diabetic clinic.
The woman stood up again, far happier now that she’d got the worry off her chest. ‘Thank you, I’ll do that first thing Monday. I can watch her myself over the weekend, but knowing there’s someone to turn to, that’s such a help. Thank you,’ she repeated, as she stood and turned to go.
Well, thought Gladys, watching her leave, if that’s the sort of thing we have to deal with this evening, then it’ll be a doddle.
Just then, there came a loud crash. Mrs Freeman jumped up and dropped the Radio Times. ‘Good heavens, whatever is that?’
The blackout curtain blocking the front door billowed and two figures fell into the hall. It was dimly lit at the far end, and Gladys had to squint to make out what looked like a middle-aged man, his face hidden by the brim of his battered trilby, and a young woman on the verge of collapse. She swayed and reached out one hand to the distempered wall.
‘Right,’ grunted the man, ‘they’ll see to yer,’ and he hurried out again before his companion could protest. The woman – surely scarcely more than a girl – slumped to the floor. Gladys rushed across, realising that Mrs Freeman wouldn’t be able to see much with the combination of low light and her thick glasses.
‘My God.’ Gladys looked at the woman before her with a sick feeling of dread in her stomach. That bright blue coat was familiar. So was the hair and the once-glamorous clutch bag, its beads now hanging loose. So were the groans emanating from the figure’s throat.
‘Evelyn, what on earth has happened to you?’ She crouched and caught the unmistakable whiff of sour alcohol. ‘Evelyn, are you drunk? Oh God. Here, let me help you up. Come, sit over here. Are you all right? Did you get hurt, or what?’
Evelyn was a dead weight and floppy as a rag doll as she half-steered, half-dragged her over to the nursing station and deposited her on the wooden chair. Evelyn slumped forward and Gladys caught her before she fell onto the splintered floorboards. ‘Put your head down on my desk if it’ll help,’ she hissed, hoping against hope that Mrs Freeman hadn’t realised exactly what was going on. ‘Listen to me, Evelyn, don’t go to sleep. Are you hurt? This is a first-aid post, you know. It’s for people who have had accidents, not gone out and drunk too much.’
Evelyn raised her head a little and glared at her sister. ‘Why’re you here?’ she mumbled.
Gladys was instantly relieved that at least her sister could speak and had recognised her, and then furious that she was in such a state. ‘Because I work here,’ she said with barely concealed anger. ‘I’m a Civil Reserve nurse, remember. You’ve ended up at my post. So what are you doing? Did you fall over or something? Can you feel anything?’
Evelyn hiccupped and rubbed her eyes, smearing the boot polish that was a poor substitute for the hard-to-come-by mascara. ‘Ankle,’ she said after a pause. ‘Fell and hurt my ankle.’
‘Let me see.’ Gladys bent to look, noticing her sister was wearing high-heeled patent sandals that she hadn’t seen before. She herself could not have walked in them even when sober; no wonder Evelyn had lost her balance after goodness knows how many drinks.
Sure enough, one ankle was swollen and tender to the touch. ‘Argh, what are you doing?’ Evelyn protested as her big sister carefully felt around the joint. ‘Put it down, put it down.’
‘It’s for your own good,’ Gladys said brutally. ‘You came in here wanting help, well, that’s what I’m giving you. You’ve twisted your ankle, most likely sprained it. I’ll strap it up enough to get you home and then you’ll have to keep it raised up. We’ll soak a towel in cold water and wrap it round it. Did you hear me, Evelyn? Don’t drop off. You’ll need to rest it for days, if not longer, I should think.’
That made the younger woman sit up, alert now. ‘No, no, I can’t do that,’ she said, eyes frantic.
‘You’ll have to.’ Gladys reached for the right bandage, just where she’d left it earlier in the evening. ‘Sit still now while I take your shoe off.’
‘You don’t understand,’ Evelyn wailed. ‘If I’m not there they’ll choose somebody else and that’ll be it, I’ll have missed my chance.’
‘I understand ankles,’ said Gladys firmly. ‘You aren’t going anywhere until yours is better.’
Evelyn began to sob. ‘You don’t care, you’ve never cared, this is my big chance and you’re trying to stop me.’
Gladys finished bandaging the badly swollen ankle and fastened the end with a safety pin. ‘Keep your leg still or it’ll scratch you,’ she said as she completed the task, before coming to sit at the same level as her sister. ‘Now what do you mean? What can be so important that you won’t take the time to rest your injury?’
Evelyn sobbed again and would not meet her eyes. ‘They’ve got visitors coming to the pub tomorrow,’ she said between sniffing and wiping her nose with a ragged lacy handkerchief. ‘Proper important ones. Maybe one from America, even. They want me to sing for them. This is my big break, I know it.’
‘Broken ankle more like,’ said Gladys crossly. ‘Don’t be daft, Evelyn, you aren’t going to be able to walk on this by tomorrow evening. You’ll just have to sing for them another time.’
Evelyn twisted the handkerchief tightly around her fingers. ‘It’s no good. That Patty Walker, she’s always been jealous of me, and she wanted to do it. Now they’ll let her and she’ll end up on stage when it should have been me.’
Gladys sighed deeply. This was not the time to talk sense into her sister. She would probably have forgotten it all in the morning anyway, and wake up wondering what had happened to her ankle. Surreptitiously she checked her watch. Her shift was nearly over.
‘Come on, fasten your coat. I’ll help you home,’ she said, thankful it was not far to go. ‘Put your arm around my shoulder and hop on your good foot.’
Evelyn pulled a face. ‘Oh why would I even expect you to understand,’ she said, her expression turning vicious, ‘you’re just a bleeding nurse. A skivvy in the daytime and in the evening just a bleeding nurse.’ Her voice rose in frustrated fury, alerting Mrs Freeman at the far end of the hall, who rose and made her way over.
‘Everything all right?’ she said, her words kind but her tone steely. Now her thick glasses made her look stern.
‘All under control,’ said Gladys with a cheerfulness she did not feel. ‘It’s time I was going. I’ll take this patient with me – we are heading the same way.’ The last thing she wanted was for her colleague to realise Evelyn was a relative.
Mrs Freeman drew herself up to her full height. ‘If you’re sure, then maybe that’s for the best.’ Her face showed that she had caught the potent fumes of stale alcohol. ‘I’ll shut up everything after you, then.’
Gladys nodded in gratitude. ‘Thank you,’ she said, hauling Evelyn to her feet, grabbing her own bag and her sister’s gaudy but ragged one. She knew she would be in for a grilling the next time they were rostered together, but at that moment she didn’t care. She just wanted to get Evelyn home without any further mishaps. ‘Off we go, then.’
Evelyn glared at her but, having little choice, went along, hopping unsteadily on her one high sandal. Gladys shuffled around until she got the best angle to help her sister, through the creaking big door and out into the street, lit by little other than the anti-aircraft beams crisscrossing the night sky.
‘He’ll kill me,’ Evelyn muttered, now more sad than angry.
‘Who?’ asked Gladys.
Evelyn didn’t answer.
‘Was it the man who just dumped you here?’ Gladys persisted. She’d been too caught up in her sister’s predicament to wonder about the circumstances of her arrival, but now she thought about it, she was filled with anger towards the man who had simply disappeared. ‘Who’s he when he’s at home, anyway?’
Evelyn sniffed again. ‘That’s Max,’ she said. ‘His brother runs the pub. Max does the entertainment side.’
Gladys raised her eyes to the heavens. ‘Does that include getting his singers drunk?’ she asked.
‘Don’t be like that, he was only being kind. He’s very kind to me, he is, he’s kind a lot.’ Evelyn was rambling, and Gladys knew she would get little sense from her. But she was filled with disgust at someone who pretended to be on the girl’s side and then left her at the church hall door, without so much as checking if she was all right. Anything could have happened to Evelyn, she realised. Somehow she would have to try to persuade her never to go near this Max again.