Secrets to Keep

CHAPTER TWELVE





The following day, mid-morning, Aidy looked dismayed and was feeling totally out of her depth before the enormous number of patients’ records spread out over the dining table. And these weren’t all of them by any means, only the ones Doc had dealt with to date, not returning them to their boxes as he had meant to sort them into some order himself. Now he’d hired a receptionist to do this type of work for him, only unbeknown to him Aidy had no idea how to go about it, never having done this kind of work before as she’d led him to believe she had.

She had arrived this morning to find that Doc had put a small table and chair in the middle of the waiting room for her. On the table was a ledger-type book and a pencil. In his abrupt manner, he told her that this was where she would sit during surgery hours. As people came in, she was to note their name and time of arrival. That way he hoped to avoid queue jumping and the resulting skirmishes. When the patient he was seeing left, she was to wait until she heard him call out ‘Next’ before she instructed whoever it was to go through. He was also entrusting her with a key to the waiting-room door. There were going to be times when she arrived to start work to find him out on a call. He made it clear that should he ever arrive back to find her anywhere in the house she should not be, then she would be instantly sacked. And should she lose the key, he would expect her to pay for a replacement.

He left her then to go into his surgery and prepare himself for the arrival of the patients. Aidy had looked thoughtfully at where he’d positioned her desk and chair for a moment, then glanced around the room. He hadn’t given any thought at all to where he had put her. She’d feel as if she was in the middle of a circus arena, being looked at by the crowd. And besides, she’d have a job to hear him call out ‘Next’ from that far away if any of the patients who were acquainted with one another were having a gossip while they waited their turn. She really needed to be positioned by the corridor with her back to the wall. That way she could immediately see who was entering from the outer door opposite, have a complete view of the rest of the waiting area, and more importantly, would hear Doc shout any instructions to her from inside his surgery. She immediately moved the desk and chair.

Quite a few of the patients who had come in that morning she was acquainted with, and had enjoyed chatting to them during their wait. It amused her, although she was very careful not to show it, to hear the grumbling of many of the departing patients. They didn’t like the new doctor’s abrupt manner and seeming lack of compassion for their suffering. Aidy obviously wasn’t the only one to find him a difficult man to deal with.

In fact, she had greatly enjoyed her first surgery and hoped the rest of her duties, as yet unknown to her, were this easy and enjoyable.

If she was expecting her employer to praise her for handling her first morning without any mishap, she was to be disappointed. Only minutes after the last person was out of the door, he had called through instructions for Aidy to lock the outer door and come through to his surgery. Once she was there he had immediately instructed her to make a start on sorting out the record cards. Realising she’d need space to do that, he told her to do it in the dining room. Meantime, he would eat his meals on the kitchen table. He didn’t offer to help her heave the cumbersome filing boxes, still packed with records, into the dining room, or assist her on her numerous trips back and forth, taking through the records of those patients he’d already seen, which she felt he could have done before he’d gone out on his morning round.

The hope that all her duties would be easy had faded when she saw the sheer number of record cards she was expected to sort into order and file back in their boxes. Never having done this kind of work before, she didn’t know where to make a start. Panic set in. If she failed to do this, she couldn’t blame the doctor if he sacked her. As she stared blindly at the cards, she inwardly scolded herself, telling herself to use her brain, work out for herself what she needed to do to complete her task. She stood there for what seemed like an age, staring at them, then suddenly it was as if a fog was lifting and she saw a way to do it. There were twenty-six letters in the alphabet, weren’t there? Everyone’s name must begin with one of them. All she had to do was sort all the records into piles, each starting with a different letter, then put them in the appropriately labelled section of the record boxes. It really was as simple as that.

By the time Ty returned at just before one o’clock she had managed to work her way through approximately a tenth of the five thousand or so cards. It was a laborious task and her eyes hurt from having to peer so hard in her effort to decipher the names on the cards. Doctor Mac hadn’t had the most legible handwriting. Her back ached too from continuously having to stretch over the table to add cards to the correct pile. And that was between answering the surgery door several times to patients who had arrived after morning surgery had finished but had persistently knocked, just to check if the doctor was in and would see them anyway.

The sudden shrilling of the telephone had her nearly jumping out of her skin. Hurrying into the hallway where it was situated by the front door, Aidy stood and stared at it for several long moments before she tentatively lifted the receiver out of its cradle and placed it to her ear, hesitantly saying, ‘Hello.’ A very posh-sounding woman on the other end had announced to her that she had the pharmacist who wished to speak to the doctor. When Aidy informed her he wasn’t at home, she was asked to wait for a moment and then the line seemed to go dead for a while before the woman suddenly came back on again and told her the pharmacist would like to leave a message with her for the doctor, and then a male voice was speaking to her. Aidy was very careful to make sure she took the message she was being given correctly, and in her endeavours to, repeated it back three times, much to the irritation of the pharmacist. But she hadn’t cared how annoyed she made him. She was more concerned with not allowing her employer to find fault with her work.

The morning round had been a particularly arduous one for Ty and consequently he was not in the best of moods on his return. The weather was atrocious, torrential rain pouring relentlessly down from a clouded sky. He was soaked to the skin. He was still trying to familiarise himself with the warren of miserable streets in the area. Several addresses had taken him an age to find, and at two he finally reached, the people who had requested a visit had not bothered to send someone to the surgery to inform him they no longer required his services on this occasion. He had known he was in fact needed, but they had obviously decided the health of the sick person he had been going to minister to was less important than his saved fee.

He didn’t think he’d ever get used to the dire state of many of the dwellings his patients lived in. Sometimes as many as ten children were sleeping in one damp bedroom, with only old coats for warmth.

Aidy heard Ty return. She was very put out that he did not come to greet her but went straight into the surgery, shutting the door none too gently behind him. She wasn’t sure what to do. Did she carry on with her task until he came to see her and request from her a report of what had transpired while he’d been out, or did she go and inform him in his inner sanctum? She had been working away all morning non-stop and it occurred to her that she hadn’t yet had a cup of tea. She would certainly welcome one. Ty hadn’t actually given her permission to go into his kitchen to make herself refreshments, but then again he hadn’t told her she couldn’t either, so she would. It seemed churlish of her to make one just for herself, so she decided to take him one through as well.

Having stripped off his wet overcoat and jacket, Ty was drying his dripping thatch of hair when Aidy tapped on his door and came in. He looked over at her, shocked for a moment, in his bad mood having temporarily forgotten she was there. He was too consumed by his own misery at that moment to be bothered to reprimand her for entering before he had given her permission to.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

Aidy took a deep breath, letting his rudeness wash over her, reminding herself that she needed this job. ‘I thought you could do with a cuppa, Doc.’

‘Oh! Er … put it on my desk. And it’s Doctor Strathmore.’

Her hackles rose that he hadn’t had the grace to thank her for making him the cup of tea. If he thought she was going to apologise for calling him Doc, he could think again. She responded lightly, ‘I’ll try and remember that.’

Having put the cup and saucer on his desk, she told him, ‘The chemist telephoned and left a message for you. You wrote out a prescription for Nancy Pointer only he can’t make out whether the number of pills you want her to have is thirty or fifty.’

‘Can’t the man read?’ snapped Ty. Flinging down the towel he was drying his hair with, he went to dig out her record card from the boxes, to check what he had written up for her, then remembered he wouldn’t have it as Aidy was putting all the records in order. ‘You’ll have her card. Fetch it for me so I can check what I prescribed her.’ Then he demanded, ‘Have you finished sorting them all out yet?’

Aidy looked at him blankly. Was he really expecting her to have done this mammoth task in only a couple of hours? She might be inexperienced when it came to doing office work but even she knew that the job she was facing was not one that could be completed in so short a time.

The look on her face registered with Ty and he realised he was being unfair. He said, ‘Just get it done as quickly as you can. Fetch Mrs Pointer’s card first, though.’

As she hurried out to do his bidding, Aidy was inwardly fuming. No please or thank you! She only hoped she could put her hand quickly on the blessed card so as not to give him any reason to grumble at her for taking so long. Deciding to try and find it first in the large pile of Ps she had made, she was jubilant to discover it only a dozen or so cards down from the top. When she returned with it, she found the surgery empty. Hearing sounds from upstairs, she assumed Ty was up there changing his wet suit for a dry one. Leaving the card on his desk, she was about to leave his surgery and return to her task when she noticed his discarded sopping wet macintosh and trilby hat, and automatically picked them up. She took them through to the kitchen where she draped them on a clothes horse which she placed in front of the range.

Aidy was grateful their paths did not cross again before she courteously went to inform him in his surgery that she was going off for her break and would be back prompt at a quarter to five. Ty was checking his bag was fully stocked before he departed on his afternoon round and didn’t even bother to stop what he was doing, but nodded his head to acknowledge what she’d told him.

When he came to depart, he was bewildered not to find his coat and hat where he had left them over the protruding arm of the weighing scales. He’d been meaning to hang them up to dry but it had slipped his memory. When he eventually found them draped on the clothes horse around the range, something he had not noticed when he had slapped together a hurried sandwich for his lunch a while earlier, he knew it was Aidy’s doing. He appreciated her kind gesture but he wouldn’t express that to her, not wanting her to think that their relationship was ever going to become anything other than the business arrangement it was. This woman posed no threat whatsoever to him emotionally, but he had vowed after losing his beloved wife that no woman or man would ever hurt him again. In order not to incur any risk, he would keep all other human beings at a safe distance.

Bertha was eagerly awaiting Aidy’s return that afternoon.

‘So how did you get on then?’

The rain was still pouring down torrentially. Having hung her saturated coat on the drying cradle in the kitchen, Aidy was already towelling off her wet hair. Sighing heavily, she answered, ‘I think I’d really like the job if it wasn’t for him. I’m not surprised he’s not married! No woman in their right mind would put up with his ways. I don’t think he’s ever heard the words please or thank you. Anyway, I’m sort of getting my own back on him as he’s demanding I call him Doctor Strathmore and I’m insisting on calling him just Doc.’

Well, at least, and thank God, Aidy had a job. And when she heard what Bertha had to tell her, she would be too. ‘Have you heard what’s gone off at your old place?’

Aidy looked at her gran quizzically and shook her head. ‘No. What has?’ Thinking there had been an accident, fire or something of the sort.

‘They’ve laid off roughly a hundred factory-floor workers. Mrs Fisher told me this morning when she popped in to visit me. Her neighbour works in the canteen and it was her who passed it on.’

Aidy was visibly shocked. ‘Oh! I’d no idea the firm was in trouble. But then, management never told us shop-floor workers anything. Oh, God, I do hope Col wasn’t one of them? The last thing she needs right now is to lose her job.’

‘Last thing all those who lose a job need,’ Bertha said.

Aidy whole-heartedly agreed, but with the fact her friend’s husband was under threat of losing his job at any time and she with no choice but to give up hers in a few months on the birth of her fourth child … well, the family would have no money coming in at all. The situation was more devastating for them than it would be for some. In light of this news, though, maybe it had been a blessing in disguise that Aidy had lost her job when she had. Had she not and been among those laid off now, then her job with the doctor would already have been filled by one of the woman she had got rid of, and there’d be even fewer vacancies to apply for now. She must try and find time to pay a visit to Colleen, and meanwhile pray that her friend wasn’t one of those laid off.

There was a knock on the back door and it was immediately heard to open. A female voice called out, ‘Cooee, Bertha, it’s only me.’

She groaned. ‘Oh, it’s that bloody Mona Knight after a potion for her chilblains! She’s popped in every day for a fortnight, asking after the same thing, and I keep telling her that I’ve run out until I’m back on me feet again and am able to replenish me stocks.’ A mischievous glint sparked in her eyes. ‘Oh, I’ve an idea! Tell her to come in here and then you go off and get one of me empty bottles, ducky. Put in a good measure of salt and a bit of gravy browning, then fill it up with water and give it a good shake. Won’t cure her chilblains but it’ll stop her badgering me for a bit while she finds out. I’ll tell her it’s a new potion I’m trying and she’s my tester.’

After the happy woman had departed, Bertha said, ‘I was so tempted to take money off her as it ain’t like we couldn’t use it, eh, love? But I couldn’t bring myself to do it, knowing that mixture won’t make a blind bit of difference to her chilblains. Oh, roll on my old bones mending! As soon as this plaster is off me leg, it’s a trip to the countryside for me, and all the kids are coming to help carry back what we can between us. Then I can start making as much as possible from me potions again to help you out more.’ She tapped the cast on her wrist. ‘Next week this is due to come off, so at least I’ll be two-armed again instead of one, able to do a bit more for meself and what I can to help you … peel spuds, shell peas, give meself a wash, that sort of thing.’

Any help her gran could give would be very much appreciated. Aidy was young and in good health, but working full-time as well as running a house by herself was starting to tell on her. Most mornings now she had to drag herself out of bed, and in the afternoons it took all her will-power not to curl up in the armchair for a rest before she began her chores, but resting in the afternoon, even for an hour, was a luxury she could not afford while she had no assistance at home.

Every minute of her afternoon today was accounted for. She was giving Bertha an all-over wash which her grandmother was so looking forward to; making the dough for next day’s bread so it could be raising while she was back at work that evening, ready to be baked on her return; several pairs of socks needed darning, and a patch putting on George’s other school shirt; the floors needed sweeping; coal needed breaking in the shed and the bucket refilled; and the evening meal needed preparing and cooking. If she had any time spare, the old gas cooker really could do with a scrub …

But none of the patients would have realised how tired Aidy was when she arrived, smiling, for work that evening to find several people already waiting outside for the doors to open, although she wouldn’t let them inside until she was instructed to by Ty not a minute before six. She went in search of him, out of courtesy, to let him know she had arrived, eventually finding him in the dining room, staring into space. Immediately she thought he had found some fault with the record cards she was in the process of sorting and tentatively asked, ‘Is everything all right, Doc?’

So consumed in his thoughts he hadn’t heard her come in, he looked startled for a moment before he said sharply, ‘If there were, and it concerned you, I would tell you. And how many times do I need to tell you that I wish to be addressed as Doctor Strathmore?’

Aidy hid a smile. ‘I will try and remember. There’s a queue forming outside and it’s still raining hard, so shall I let them in?’

Ty was lost in his thoughts again. Without realising, he spoke aloud. ‘This room would indeed make a far better surgery.’

Aidy was delighted that he was considering the idea that she had expressed to him at her interview. ‘Yes, it would, much better,’ she agreed. ‘I’m glad you’re thinking of taking up my suggestion.’

He looked at her sharply. He did indeed have her to thank for instigating the change he was thinking of making, which would not only make his life easier but add value to the practice when it came time to sell it when he moved on. More importantly to him, it wouldn’t involve any monetary outlay as he’d call upon those patients qualified to do the required tasks. Many still had outstanding bills that they insisted on settling with their labour. He wasn’t, though, about to give his receptionist any credit for her idea, in case she took his show of gratitude for more than it was.

He said curtly to her, ‘I trust there’s a good a reason you’ve disturbed me?’

Letting his brusqueness wash over her was starting to become second nature to Aidy. Breezily she responded, ‘I came to let you know I’d arrived and to ask if it’s all right if I open the surgery door early? Only the patients waiting outside are getting soaked and risking pneumonia.’

He reminded her, ‘You are merely the receptionist, Mrs Nelson. If there are any medical diagnoses to be made, then I will be the one to make them. In the circumstances, I have however no objection to your opening the surgery door early.’

Why was he constantly doing that, reminding her of her place? Why was his manner always so cold and unyielding? And not just to her. According to the patients, he was the same with them too. He was new to these parts. He’d never make any friends if he continued to act towards people like he was now. Then a thought struck Aidy. Maybe he acted like he did on purpose. Maybe he didn’t want to make any friends. Maybe he didn’t care whether people liked him or not. She wondered why.

It was Aidy’s opinion that it was part of her job to make people welcome when they came into the surgery, and if they wanted to chat to her while they waited she’d happily oblige. It amused her that most people who came in, especially the women, insisted on giving her all the details of the symptoms they were suffering. She’d only been employed as a receptionist for a matter of days now, but from what she had observed already it was plain to her that the number of patients demanding to see the doctor was far more than he could really cope with.

After listening to many of the patients’ symptoms herself, she was of the opinion that quite a few didn’t really need to see the doctor at all but could be helped by one of her grandmother’s remedies instead. She decided that once Bertha was up and about again and had restocked her remedies, she would suggest to these patients that they try her gran first before they resorted to the doctor. Not only would she be helping him by lifting from him some of the demands on his time, but also saving those patients a good deal of money in not having to pay a doctor’s fee and possibly the cost of a prescription from the chemist. She knew many of them would only end up as bad debtors to Doc in any case. She could save him the bother and, more importantly, put some money her grandmother’s way …

Bertha felt very guilty when Aidy arrived home just after eight. How she wished she was able to have a hot cup of tea waiting or to put her dinner before her, which was in the oven keeping hot. She was counting the days to when she would be able to help more. ‘Busy surgery, was it?’ she asked as Aidy flopped down into the armchair and took off her shoes.

‘Actually, no, it wasn’t. Only had half a dozen in. I think the awful rain had something to do with it. I expect people thought that whatever they had wrong with them would be made worse by a good soaking. I’m glad to say it’s stopped now, though. I used the remainder of my time doing a bit more sorting of the record cards.

‘It’s a pig of a job, Gran. It seems to me like there’s millions of patients on Doc’s books. It wouldn’t be so bad if the surgery closed for a few days and I could sort all the cards in one go, but at the same time I’m trying to sort the back log out, patients are coming in or calling Doc out, and their cards are yanked out then thrown back at me … It feels to me like I’m taking one step forward, two back. The way things are going, I’ll never get it done.’

Bertha eyed her proudly and said, ‘Well, you sound to me like you’re doing a grand job, love. I’ve no doubt the doctor is very pleased with you.’

Aidy sighed. ‘I wouldn’t know. I can only guess he is as he hasn’t said he isn’t. He’s a hard man to get along with, Gran, and if I didn’t need the job so badly, I’d tell him exactly what I think of him and his surly, superior attitude.’ She had enough to do putting up with him during work-time; she certainly didn’t want to spend the rest of her day talking about him. She changed the topic to people who did matter to her. ‘Were the kids all right tonight? I hate not being here to tuck them into bed.’

‘Well, that can’t be helped, love, and they understand. They’re all fine. Well, apart from the fact our George’s got a black eye. He said he got it playing football but Marion told me he got it fighting over something one of his mates said about you.’

Aidy looked sharply at her grandmother. ‘About me?’

‘Seems there’s a rumour going round that you bribed the doctor into giving you the receptionist’s job before he’d interviewed all the other women who applied.’ Bertha gave a snort. ‘As if you would need to do that!’

Without batting an eyelid, Aidy enquired, ‘Was it Bella Graves’s brother Harry George was fighting with, by any chance?’

Bertha nodded. ‘I believe that was the lad Marion mentioned.’

‘Ah, that explains it. Bella applied for the job, dressed like she was applying for a job as a madame, and she’s miffed ’cos she didn’t stand a chance of getting it and I did. I got the job ’cos I was the best person Doc interviewed for it.’ And wasn’t that the truth?

‘I’ve no doubt our George got that point across to Bella’s brother and stopped him at least spreading any more of that downright lie. Going back to the kids … Betty was a bit off colour tonight. Came in early, complaining she didn’t feel well, so I got her to make herself some hot milk and sent her to bed early. She must not have been feeling herself because she went up without a murmur. Probably got a cold coming. ’Course, then, not to be outdone, Marion announced she wasn’t feeling well either, and so she had to have some hot milk. But then she said going to bed wouldn’t make her feel better but what would was if she got in beside me for a cuddle and a story.’

Aidy smiled. ‘Which you agreed to?’ Bertha grinned back. ‘I was putty in her hands.’ A knock sounded on the back door and they both looked at each other as though to say, I’m not expecting anyone.

Aidy got up to answer it, hoping it was just a neighbour after something trivial. She had chores that she needed to attend to and if she didn’t make a start there was a danger it wouldn’t be this side of midnight she got into bed.

For a moment she stared at the stranger before her. She was just about to ask politely what they wanted when recognition struck. Her eyes blazed pure hatred then.