Secrets to Keep

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE





Ty was feeling wretched. The inside of his head was pounding like a drum. His eyes felt gritty, his chest tight. He was having difficulty breathing, his skin clammy to the touch. He felt mentally and physically exhausted. He had taken a dose of quinine a while ago to help stem the building fever, but it didn’t seem to have had much effect. He wanted to do nothing more than crawl back into bed. But he couldn’t. He had a waiting room full of people to see and suspected the list of house calls that Aidy would be compiling was steadily mounting. It was New Year’s Eve and, apart from the fact he hadn’t anyone to celebrate the occasion with anyway, it looked as though he would be seeing in 1931 from under the covers of his bed.

Trying to gather strength he just didn’t have, he called out as loudly as he was able, ‘Next!’

In the waiting room Aidy was vaguely aware of what a new arrival was saying to her. Despite promising herself that she would take no further interest in the doctor on a personal level after his humiliating treatment of her on Christmas Day, unfortunately she had no control of her protective instincts which were causing her to be very concerned for him now. Since the incident on Christmas Day they had both been merely civil with each other, and Aidy had made a point of having as little face-to-face contact with Ty as she could. Regardless, she would have to be blind not to have noticed that her employer wasn’t at all well. He looked exhausted, in fact. She wasn’t surprised. He worked long hours, was out in all weathers, and she felt sure he didn’t eat regularly or get as much sleep as he needed. She knew from the stilted update he had given her that morning so she could keep the practice records straight that he had been called out during the night to attend to a very sick child. The result was that he had had to perform an emergency tonsillectomy on the kitchen table, the poor child having to be restrained meanwhile by its frantic parents while Ty removed the infected glands. Hopefully the patient would make a full recovery … but would the doctor? From the way he looked, it seemed he was in danger of succumbing to illness himself. But as much as Aidy wanted to urge him to bring a locum in to cover for him temporarily while he had a few days’ rest, she would not risk the humiliation of being told to mind her own business.

Pushing thoughts of her employer from her mind, she turned to the new arrival and said apologetically, ‘I beg your pardon, I didn’t quite catch what you were saying?’

The threadbare middle-aged woman before her gave an irritated huff and repeated, ‘I want to see the doctor because …’ She lowered her voice so that hopefully only the receptionist could hear about the embarrassing condition. ‘I have terrible constipation, ducky. I ain’t opened me bowels for nearly a fortnight now, and I feel like me stomach’s gonna burst. I’ve tried everything I know of, but nothing has worked. Trouble is, I ain’t seen a doctor for years so I’m not sure what the fee is. I don’t even know if I can afford it. Well, if it’s more than two bob, I can’t.’

Inside his surgery, no patient appearing, Ty gave an irritated sigh as he rubbed his aching head. Obviously his last summons had gone unheeded as his croaky voice hadn’t projected far enough to be heard in the room across the corridor. It was full of patients waiting to see him, judging from the sound of chattering voices coming from it. There was nothing else for it, he would have to go and fetch the next patient in himself.

Back in the waiting room, Aidy was thinking that this woman was one for her grandmother. ‘You don’t really need to trouble Doc,’ she told her. ‘It’s my grandmother you want to go and see, and a visit to her won’t cost you as much as Doc’s fee would.’

The woman looked knowingly at her. ‘Oh, is your grandmother the old woman?’

Aidy nodded. ‘She’s got a potion that’d shift a constipated elephant so she’ll fix you up no trouble.’

‘I’ve heard good things about her but never had any need to go to her before. If I’ve got any ailments, I usually manage to sort meself out. I swear by Epsom Salts and Friar’s Balsam, but neither has worked its magic on me this time. So where can I find yer grandmother then, lovey? I’ll mek me way straight round there now.’

Aidy heard someone clear their throat beside her and automatically turned her head. Her employer! Sheer panic filled her. She could tell by the look on his face that he had been privy to her conversation with the woman.

Ty said to the patient, ‘Would you excuse my receptionist for a moment? I need to speak to her in private.’ To Aidy he ordered, ‘Come through to the surgery.’

He was holding the door open for her, and as she passed through shut it firmly behind her. Before she had a chance to turn and look at him he was saying in an accusing tone, ‘You lied to me when I asked you if you knew who the locals referred to as the old woman. You said you didn’t have a clue who she was. When all the time you knew damned well who she was and where she lived … she’s your grandmother. And now I find that you’re actually poaching my patients so they will buy her useless potions off her.’

Aidy erupted, ‘If you would just let me …’

He held up a warning hand. ‘I don’t want to hear any excuses for your behaviour. Nothing could excuse it. I’m just wondering, over the months you’ve worked for me, how many patients you have stolen from me in this way? Not to mention putting their health at risk, sending them to a fraudster making false claims for her filthy mixtures.’

Beads of perspiration were forming on Ty’s brow from the fever that was building inside him. His headache was so bad it hit him like a gong. Discovering his receptionist had been acting behind his back for her own benefit had wounded him deeply. He might have been curt in his manner towards her, but otherwise felt he had been a very fair employer. She had taken advantage of that to double cross him. To think he had actually started to look upon her as … Thank goodness he had had the sense to put a stop to that before it had gone any further.

In no uncertain terms, he told her now, ‘Your employment at this surgery is terminated with immediate effect. Please collect your belongings and leave. What pay you are due can be collected on your behalf on Friday, along with your cards. I’d prefer you didn’t come here again, unless of course you have need of my medical services. Leave your door key in the top drawer of the desk.’

She had to make him listen to her, hear her explain that she had not been defrauding him but helping him by what she had been doing. Aidy implored him, ‘But, please, will you just …’

His look was enough to stop her cold.

At just before four o’clock that afternoon, Ruth was humming happily as she let herself into the kitchen, stamped her booted feet to rid them of rainwater and took off her coat which she hung on the back of the door. Picking up her handbag, she made her way into the back room and stopped short, a worried expression clouding her face to see Aidy and Bertha sitting at the table. Bertha seemed deeply troubled. Aidy was cradling her head in despair.

‘Is it one of the children?’ Ruth exclaimed.

Bertha looked shocked for a moment, so consumed by worry she hadn’t heard Ruth come in. ‘Oh, hello, love. No, the kids are fine. We sent them all out to play soon as they got home from school. We didn’t want them getting wind of this and worrying their little heads over it.’

Ruth was getting extremely worried herself now. She stepped over to the table and pulled a chair out. ‘If it’s none of my business, please tell me to go away but has someone died or …’

Bertha shook her head. ‘Aidy’s been sacked.’

Ruth was stunned. ‘Sacked? The doctor’s sacked her! What good reason would he have to do that?’

Aidy’s head jerked up. ‘He thinks I’ve betrayed him. If only he had let me explain, I’m sure he’d have seen I wasn’t doing any such thing but actually trying to help him. And yes, okay, Gran too with the extra money she earned from what I did …’

‘Just what did you do, Aidy?’ Ruth asked her, bemused.

‘Well, as you know, Doc’s always really busy. He can hardly handle the number of patients he gets through his door and has to visit in their homes. Most days he never ever has time to stop and have his lunch. And, of course, now he’s lost you, Ruth, and there’s no sign of a replacement for you, he’s even more pushed.

‘You see, many of the patients who come in insist on telling me what they need to see the doctor for, even though really it isn’t my business. But sometimes patients come in with minor ailments that I know Gran would have a potion or ointment for that would be just as good as anything he could prescribe. I can also tell when they haven’t got the money to pay him his fee anyway, or only in dribs and drabs over God knows how long. The ones I sent Gran’s way were that sort, I swear. Where’s the harm in that?

‘Anyway, there’s no point in going over it now. Doc has sacked me, and that’s that. The good thing is that at least I don’t have to put up with his coldness any longer. Apart from that, though, I really loved the job.’ Aidy gave a wan smile. ‘I’m worried ’cos there’s not much work going, is there? But then, I’m in a better position than I was when I got dismissed from the factory. I now have office skills to my credit and basic nursing, thanks to Sadie Billson. I know at least enough to apply for a ward orderly’s job or such like.’

Ruth leaned over and patted her hand. ‘And you’ll be snapped up. I can give you the names of the nursing homes I tried. They weren’t needing qualified nurses but they might want an orderly. And while you’re looking we have my money coming in, and the bit that Bertha makes, so we aren’t quite destitute.’

Aidy smiled warmly at her. It seemed her lapse of memory was turning out to have been a blessing in disguise.

Later that evening, they were just finishing their dinner of soup and slices of thick, homemade crusty bread scraped with margarine, when the back door was hammered upon.

Aidy had had her fill so she rose to respond to it. It would more than likely be someone wanting a remedy from her grandmother.

Opening the door, she found Elsie Stringer on the doorstep. She was a neighbour from the end of the street and an occasional customer of Bertha’s. Aidy was just going to ask her to step in and tell her that Bertha would be with her in a minute, when she had finished her meal, when the other woman blurted out, ‘I volunteered to fetch you. Yer late! It’s nearly half-past six. We’re all getting frozen, standing outside that surgery waiting fer you to come and open up.’

‘But, I don’t work at the surgery any longer, Mrs Stringer.’

‘Oh! Who’s yer replacement then, ’cos she’s late?’

‘I shouldn’t think Doc’s had time to take anyone else on yet. I only left this morning. He’s probably out on an emergency. Has no one informed you when to expect him back?’

‘I was there waiting for the door to open at ten to six and no one’s been near with a message from the doctor.’

‘Oh, well, maybe it hasn’t been possible. You’ll just have to wait until Doc gets back himself and lets you all in.’

Elsie didn’t look too pleased at the thought of having to wait outside in the cold until the doctor showed up. However long that would be. ‘Well, shame on you for walking out and leaving him high and dry like that. I thought you had more about yer, Aidy Nelson.’

She stalked off, abruptly.

Despite having plenty to keep her occupied that evening, Aidy couldn’t quite get the reason for Elsie Stringer’s visit off her mind. It was really unusual for Doc to be late for evening surgery. He’d only ever been so once while she had been working for him, and then had got a message delivered to inform her of his delay and a rough estimate of the time he’d be back. But what was really concerning her was that the doctor himself had not been at all well that morning, and she wondered if his absence was in fact due to that. But if that were the case, would he not have put a notice on the surgery door? Despite the fact that anything to do with Doc was no longer her business, she could not quell the niggle of worry inside her.

When George came in at seven-thirty from playing out, she asked him, ‘Could you pop to Elsie Stringer’s for me and ask her if the doctor eventually turned up for surgery?’

He pulled a face and wailed, ‘Ah, Sis, it’s cold out there! Do I have to?’

‘It didn’t seem to be cold when you were playing football out there for the past two hours!’

‘Weren’t playing football … we been playing cops and robbers in the old factory.’

‘I’ve told you not to play there, it’s dangerous,’ she scolded him.

‘No, you didn’t, Sis, honest.’

‘Well, I’m sure I did. Look, I’ve no time for this. Go on that errand like I asked you or …’

George was gone.

He returned ten minutes later and plonked himself down in an easy chair, hanging one leg casually over its arm. ‘Mrs Stringer said the doctor hadn’t shown by the time she gave up and came home at seven-thirty. Can I have some hot cocoa?’

‘Me too, please,’ said Marion who was sitting at the table with Ruth, cutting out clothes for the paper doll she had got for Christmas.

‘And me,’ said Betty, who was standing behind Ruth and playing hairdressers with what hair she had, painstakingly twirling sections into kiss curls and securing them with grips.

‘I’m just making you all one,’ Bertha shouted in from the kitchen.

Ruth carefully turned her head so as not to disturb her hairdresser too much. ‘You’re worried about the doctor, aren’t you, Aidy?’

Busy with a pile of rumpled clothes, she spat on the iron to check its heat and replied: ‘I couldn’t give a damn about the bloody man.’ Then she sighed. ‘All right, yes, I am, though he really doesn’t warrant me bothering. Only it isn’t like him not to turn up for surgery or at least send a message. He wasn’t well this morning …’

‘Well then, he’s probably recovering in bed,’ Ruth suggested.

‘He wouldn’t have just gone to bed and not informed the patients surgery was cancelled tonight.’

‘Mmm, from what I know of Doctor Strathmore as a man, I agree with you there – he wouldn’t have. Well, I was actually thinking of taking a walk. I could go by the surgery and check for any signs of life.’

‘I think I’ll come with you. I could do with a walk myself.’

Ruth smiled to herself. Aidy might have every reason to be angry with her ex-employer for the way he had treated her while she worked there and for not hearing her out before he had sacked her. But, regardless, she certainly had a soft spot for him, whether she realised it or not.

A short while later they both stood staring over at the doctor’s house. It appeared to be in complete darkness, no light shining through any window.

‘That doesn’t mean to say Doctor Strathmore isn’t home and tucked safely up in bed, nursing his cold or whatever it is he’s suffering from,’ Ruth told Aidy.

She looked pensive. ‘No, it doesn’t. But you know when you have a feeling that something isn’t right? I’m going to go around the back … see if I can see anything through the windows.’

‘And what if the doctor looks back at you from the other side?’

‘Then I’ll shout “Boo!” and scarper off quick and hope he thinks it’s kids larking about.’