A Place of Birds Read online

  Returning to the operating room, her arms full, she saw Edward bent over the boy while the two fishermen hovered uncertainly near the door.

  ‘Get them out of here,’ he muttered.

  Setting bowls, bandages and bottles down on a metal trolley, she ushered the men into the passage.

  ‘Doctor Arundell thinks it would be better if you went home now, Mr Treneer.’

  The fisherman’s craggy face was ashen and there was agony in his eyes. ‘I can’t jest leave’n.’

  ‘Your son is in good hands,’ Susanna tried to reassure him. ‘The doctor will do all he can.’

  ‘I knaw that. That’s why I sent Jacko to fetch’n. The other doctors got no time fer the likes of we.’ George Treneer craned his neck to see past Susanna. ‘Can’t I do nothing to help?’

  ’Honestly, Mr Treneer, it’s best if you go home. You know how news travels in this town.’ Susanna laid a hand on his arm. ‘Think how your wife will feel if she hears it from someone who wasn’t even there. You should be the one to tell her. She’ll need your comfort. And your reassurance that Colin is receiving the very best care.’

  Reluctantly he nodded. ‘Ais, I s’pose you’re right.’ He glanced at her hand on his arm then raised moist eyes to hers. ‘Yer father should be proud of ’e.’

  She gave him a brief smile and said nothing. According to her family her fondness for physical contact was yet another of her failings. Yet instinct told her that a simple touch often provided greater comfort, conveyed more sympathy, and showed deeper concern than a hundred earnest words.

  Clearing his throat awkwardly the other man spoke for the first time. ‘Lose ’is leg, will ’e?’

  She understood what lay behind the question and why George Treneer had been unable to ask it. Shooting nets in rough seas and gutting fish on a heaving slippery deck required two strong legs.

  ‘Doctor Arundell will do everything in his power to avoid that,’ she replied firmly.

  ‘When can I come and see’n?’

  She spread her hands. ‘I don’t –’

  ‘Susanna!’ Edward’s summons was urgent.

  ‘Perhaps tomorrow evening, just for a moment, if he’s strong enough. Please excuse me, I have to go.’ Heart pounding, she gritted her teeth and returned to the operating room.

  Chapter Two

  Edward had taken off his frock coat and rolled up his shirtsleeves, exposing pale sinewy forearms dusted with freckles. A clean white apron covered him from chest to knee.

  ‘There’s one for you by the sink,’ he said. ‘Hurry up and wash your hands.’

  Susanna had never seen any of the doctors who visited her family wear aprons or wash their hands, but Edward would not be giving her these strange instructions without a very good reason.

  Moments later she approached the table. Edward was bent over the shaking boy, his voice low and reassuring.

  ‘This will put you to sleep for a while and the pain will stop. Just breathe naturally. That’s it.’

  Drop by careful drop he was pouring liquid through a metal spout attached to a large brown bottle onto a gauze-lined mask made of thin perforated metal which he held over the boy’s nose and mouth.

  ‘Here, you take over. Two or three more drops should be enough.’

  ‘What is it?’ her voice sounded thin.

  ‘Ether. I must get the dirt out of that wound otherwise there’ll be precious little chance of saving his life, never mind his leg.’

  Susanna wanted to run, to get out before she saw things she would never be able to forget.

  The boy’s eyelids were half-closed. Tremors racked him. Despite the coolness of the room his ashen face glistened with perspiration.

  But if she ran how would she live with herself? Edward needed her. There was no one else. Rigid with tension she took his place.

  ‘That’s fine,’ he reassured, moving away to complete his preparations.

  Her hands were shaking so badly it took every ounce of her concentration to hold the metal spout steady over the mask. The sweet pungent scent of the anaesthetic enveloped her in waves. She went hot then cold and her long-sleeved high-necked dress of brown serge clung heavily to her clammy body.

  ‘Don’t get too close.’

  As Edward’s warning penetrated the fog in her head, Susanna realised she had been breathing in the fumes and turned her face aside.

  The boy had stopped groaning and lay utterly still, eyes closed, his face as white as the sheet beneath him.

  Lifting the boy’s arm Edward allowed it to fall back on the table. ‘He’s well away. You can put those down,’ he indicated the bottle and mask. ‘There, on the trolley. Susanna?’ She glanced up nervously. ‘You’re doing fine.’ He placed an empty bucket on a stool alongside the table. Picking up another bottle he poured some colourless liquid into an enamel bowl full of water. The strong acrid smell of carbolic caught in Susanna’s throat.

  ‘Now come round here.’ Gently he lifted the boy’s leg so it extended beyond the edge of the table and over the bucket. Then to her horror he parted the torn flesh with his thumbs to expose the glistening jagged edge of the broken bone.

  ‘Use that small bowl as a dipper and pour the antiseptic over the wound. But not too fast.’

  Nausea tightened her throat and prickled her skin with sweat. Blackness crowded the edge of her vision and she felt herself sway.

  ‘Susanna,’ he said sharply. ‘Come along, pull yourself together.’

  Her green eyes, huge and shocked, flew to his face. ‘D-don’t sh-shout at me,’ she stammered. ‘You’re used to all this, I’m not.’

  ‘I’m not shouting,’ he said carefully, ‘and I’m not angry.’ The skin around his nostrils was pinched and white. ‘But this is no time to have an attack of the vapours. Stop worrying about how you feel. Think about the boy. And if you can’t face that, don’t think at all. Just do exactly as I tell you. All right?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ The words emerged jerkily as her breath caught and with a shaking hand she carefully irrigated the wound with antiseptic solution.

  Several tense and silent minutes later he told her to stop. The sound of the broken bones being restored to their proper position made her flinch.

  Heart thumping, eyes steadfastly lowered so as not to betray the chaos inside her, Susanna allowed him to place her hands on the boy’s leg.

  ‘Make sure you hold it perfectly still.’

  She nodded, not trusting herself to speak as he spread a fawn-coloured dough-like material with a pungent, biting smell onto the wound and over a wide area around it.

  ‘The putty will stop the carbolic acid being washed out of the dressing by normal wound discharge.’

  After a moment it dawned on her that in explaining what he was doing he was treating her as an equal. She darted a look at him, but he had turned away to reach for a towel.

  After wiping his hands Edward picked up a square of thin tin sheet from the trolley and moulded it over the putty. ‘This was originally used to line the chests that carry tea from China. And if it keeps moisture out, it should also hold it in. It’s important that the carbolic doesn’t simply evaporate.’

  He splinted and bandaged the leg. ‘That’s it.’ He straightened up. ‘Now all we can do is wait.’

  The crisis was over. But its aftermath of exhaustion and elation left Susanna dizzy and light-headed. She clung to the trolley, her legs tingling and rubbery.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  Edward’s voice seemed to come from far away. With a tremendous effort she fought off the blackness that threatened to engulf her and sucking in a deep breath raised her head and gave him a glassy smile. ‘I’m fine.’

  He nodded then gave a rueful shrug. ‘I-er-I shouldn’t have shouted at you. You did remarkably well. In fact I have to say you’re a constant surprise.’

  ‘Why? I’m not stupid. Or is it because I’m young? Time will soon remedy that.’ Her frustration tumbled out, unstoppable. ‘I want so much to learn but you w
ould not believe the difficulties I face.’

  ‘I have never,’ he said gravely, ‘met a young woman like you.’

  Normally she was able to keep her feelings well hidden. Emotion was considered untidy. Control was all. But she had been waiting and hoping for so long. Hot-cheeked and flustered she began to gather up the debris.

  Bending over the still unconscious boy Edward gently lifted one closed eyelid then checked his pulse. ‘Hold the door for me will you?’ He moved to the head of the table. ‘I’ll wheel our young patient along to the ward.’

  ‘How long will Colin be staying?’

  ‘It will be four days before I know whether or not the wound is infected,’ he answered obliquely.

  ‘Is there anything more I can do?’

  ‘No, thank you. You’ve done quite enough.’

  She lifted one shoulder, a small uncertain movement. ‘I’m sorry. Only it was such a shock –’

  ‘For heaven’s sake, Susanna, don’t apologise.’ He made a wry face, the corners of his mouth turning down. ‘You’ll make me feel even worse. You were quite remarkable. Very few young women could have done what you did. In fact, I can’t think of one.’

  Eyes lowered she held the door open, pierced by guilt for her sinful pride.

  He manoeuvred the wheeled table out into the passage then paused. ‘Actually, there is something you could do. Will you take a message to Mrs Bennett? Tell her I won’t be back for dinner.’

  Ever since meeting Edward she had wondered what his home was like. To see for herself his treasured possessions was something she had dreamed about.

  ‘One more thing, there are several medical journals on the desk in my study. Could you bring them back for me?’

  Crossing the Infirmary yard she drew in a deep breath to clear the ether fumes and those other dreadful odours from her lungs. The sky was pearl-coloured and fast-moving ragged-edged clouds threatened rain before nightfall.

  Grove Place was a terrace of tall dignified town houses set in small front gardens with paved paths leading to wide stone steps and pillared porches. Susanna lifted the polished brass knocker set high on the white-painted front door and let it fall twice. Across the busy road, crowded with horse buses and private carriages taking shoppers home from town, waves slapped against the sea wall.

  The gusting wind, redolent of seaweed, tar and horse-droppings, whined in the rigging of two huge five-masted barques anchored in the inner harbour. She knew from her brother William that they had recently arrived from South America, one carrying nitrates and guano, the other a mixed cargo of wool, cotton, and hides. They dwarfed a trio of brigs moored nearby.

  Quay punts bustled to and fro on the grey choppy water, ferrying men and supplies from jetties to ships. Boats of every size and rig were built and repaired in the yards that stretched along the bar as far as the Docks. To her left the town of Falmouth ran along the water’s edge past the Gasworks, Market Strand and Pye’s Cellars as far as the Greenbank Hotel where the inner harbour narrowed and the tidal reaches met the Penryn river.

  Since childhood the ever-changing scene on the water had fascinated her. She had once confided to her mother that she wished she had been born a boy so she could see the places Uncle George and her father talked about. Even their names had an exotic, mysterious sound; Foochow, Samarang, Madras, Singapore.

  Her mother had told her not to be so silly. Men might travel and explore. It was in their nature. But a woman’s place was at home taking care of the family. Instead of indulging in fanciful notions she should put more effort into thinking of others. The Friends ran many charities and an extra pair of hands was always welcome.

  Accepting that such desires indicated a serious weakness in her character Susanna tried hard to banish them. But occasionally she was overwhelmed by a longing for escape so intense that she ached.

  Behind her the door opened. ‘Can I help you?’

  The maid wore a small lace-edged apron over her black afternoon dress and a frilly cap sat on top of her fair frizzy curls.

  ‘I’d like to see Mrs Bennett, please. I have a message from Doctor Arundell.’

  The red floor tiles gleamed with polish. A faint scent of beeswax and lemons hung on the air. At the far end of the hall a thickly carpeted staircase with cream-painted balusters curved past a large window and out of sight.

  Shown into the drawing room, Susanna was left alone as the maid bustled out. She had never seen a room with such colour. The richness of it all took her breath away. Beneath heavy drapes of crimson brocade looped back by ties of braided silk, lace curtains with scalloped edges shrouded the large windows, assuring privacy.

  The paintwork and ceiling were palest cream, the walls dark green. A gilt chandelier with five branches, each topped by a frosted glass bowl, was suspended from the carved ceiling rose. A mahogany bookcase covered one wall. The others were hung with pictures; delicate watercolours in pastel shades, and oil paintings with pigment so lavishly applied the artist might have been sculpting his vision onto canvas. Plants cascaded glossy green leaves over the lace mats or polished surfaces on which they stood.

  She moved silently across the Indian carpet and, unable to resist the urge to touch, drew her fingertips across the back of a red velvet armchair piled with squashy cushions and through the silky fringes of a Paisley square thrown over the back of the matching sofa.

  A massive fern-like plant in a shiny brass pot filled the empty fireplace. Candlesticks, tiny ornaments, and miniatures encased in silver lined the mantelpiece. Hanging above it, a large and ornate gilded frame caught and held her attention.

  Her parents were strict in their observance of the rules governing Quaker life. There were no pictures in their home, no ornaments, and no mirrors. These were condemned as an invention of the devil, encouraging the sins of vanity and pride.

  Guilt wrestled with curiosity: and lost. She saw high cheekbones, a small straight nose, wide, full-lipped mouth and narrow chin. She studied dark eyebrows arched like the wings of a bird, and thick lashes that fringed almond-shaped eyes the colour of new grass.

  Lifting her hand she watched the image touch the hollow of one flushed cheek and felt the smooth elasticity of skin warm beneath her fingertips. Who are you?

  The door opened and she swung round guiltily.

  ‘Good afternoon. I’m Constance Bennett. I’m told you have a message for me?’ The voice was cool, matching the expression. Artfully applied cosmetics made it impossible to guess her age. Honey-coloured hair was elegantly styled, her figure voluptuous.

  Susanna tried to ignore the unease and envy that pricked like thorns as she looked at the dress of violet and lavender silk trimmed with ribbons and lace and gathered into a fashionable bustle. Constance Bennett was no ordinary housekeeper.

  ‘Doctor Arundell asked me to tell you that there has been an emergency at the Infirmary and he will not be back for dinner tonight.’

  Constance inclined her head graciously. ‘Thank you. Ellen will show you out.’

  ‘He also asked me to collect some medical journals. They are on the desk in his study.’

  ‘Dear Edward,’ she gave a tinkling laugh but her eyes were cold. ‘He’s so forgetful. You mustn’t let him take advantage, Miss Elliot.’

  Not sure how to respond Susanna simply smiled politely as Constance glided out, returning a few moments later with the journals.

  Hurrying back to the Infirmary Susanna wondered at the housekeeper’s antagonism. Recalling the sitting room with its lush furnishings and vibrant colour she pictured herself taking tea there with Edward. The image entranced her.

  Edward was in the dispensary, pounding a reddish resin into powder with a brass mortar and pestle. Placing the journals on the bench, she edged closer, intrigued.

  ‘What are you making?’

  ‘A powder of kino and calomel for our patient with congestion of the lungs.’

  Our patient. Susanna thought she might burst with happiness. She screwed up her courage. ‘Could
I learn how to make medicines?’

  Edward smiled. ‘I think you could learn anything you put your mind to.’

  Glowing, Susanna gazed up at him. ‘What I meant was will you teach me? Please?’ She indicated the mortar and pestle in his hands. ‘If I did some of the basic preparation you would have more time for important things.’

  Edward eyed her thoughtfully. ‘This is not a job normally done by a woman.’

  ‘According to my family, there is much about me that is not normal.’ She shrugged, pretending it didn’t hurt. ‘But you said yourself you could not have operated on Colin Treneer without my help.’

  ‘An extra pair of hands would certainly be useful,’ he admitted. ‘But what of your other commitments? Your parents might –’

  ‘Nothing,’ she broke in quickly, ‘is more important than what I’m doing here.’

  ‘All right. Now you really should go home. It will be getting dark soon. Good night, Susanna. And thank you.’

  Brimming with happiness she flashed him a brilliant smile as she opened the door. ‘Goodnight, Edward.’ This was the most important day of her life.

  At the bottom of the lane she stopped on the pavement and looked back over her shoulder at the Seamen’s Home. Inside the three-storey red brick building furnishings were spartan. But she had seen tough men hardened by months at sea in atrocious conditions reduced to tears of gratitude for the luxury of a hot meal, a clean bed and medical aid. Many were decent God-fearing men who returned to their families as often as they could. But others eyed her in a way she found disconcerting.

  She had seen some a few days after their release from the Infirmary staggering through the streets, drunk and cursing. If they could not get a berth on a ship they often ended up among the ruffians and thieves who skulked in the narrow alleys and ope-ways of the waterfront at night, scavenging like rats.

  Yet each of them was somebody’s son.

  She was finding it ever more difficult to reconcile a loving merciful God with the squalor and suffering she saw every day.

  Fishermen wearing thick jerseys trudged up from the Town Quay, their oilskins folded into the large square basket each carried over his arm, their pasty dinners eaten many hours ago.