ANNA DIDN’T LIKE to think of herself as a cowardly person, but the idea of having to say good-bye to Cap and Sophie a second time was more than she could face. Instead she went to the New Amsterdam and spent the day being short with her students and assistants and the staff, always with one eye on the door. If things went wrong again, sooner or later Jack would show up to tell her so.
The lunch hour she dedicated to paperwork, and at exactly one o’clock Kathleen Hawkins presented herself, as directed, at Anna’s door for the discussion about her training and nursing skills. Anna got no satisfaction out of this kind of interview, but she also would not procrastinate. She thought Hawkins would be glad to postpone this meeting indefinitely.
She was very young, Anna reminded herself, just twenty. More training, hard work, and supervised experience would make a nurse of her in the end. The question was whether Hawkins was willing to do what was necessary.
While the girl waited for Anna to begin, she kept her eyes strictly on her own folded hands, her posture erect.
“You know why you’re here, Nurse Hawkins?”
“Mrs. Campbell’s surgery and my poor performance.”
No excuses or rationalizations, which gave Anna some reason to think there was chance for improvement. She said, “There are two options. You can voluntarily repeat your last semester of training with additional course work in anatomy, or you can leave the New Amsterdam to find employment elsewhere. But without a letter of recommendation or referral.”
The girl’s shoulders sagged. For a moment she seemed to be on the brink of tears, but she pulled together her resolve.
“If I may remark—”
“You may not,” Anna interrupted her. “There is no excuse for your performance during an emergency surgical procedure.”
The girl stared at her, incredulous. “But the—”
“Yes, it was a terrible presentation,” Anna said, taking care to keep emotion out of her voice. “Enough to make an experienced surgeon blanch. But the patient comes first, and no matter how bad the situation, you have to push through your inclinations and keep your head. Which you did not.”
“The—smells disoriented me,” Nurse Hawkins said in a small voice. “I do know anatomy.”
Explanations and rationalizations. Anna had no patience with either, but she made an effort to soften her tone. “However well you think you know anatomy, that knowledge abandoned you at a crucial moment. It was your job to assist me, not to hinder me in my efforts. Do you think you met that very basic obligation?”
Mute, she gave a tight shake of the head.
“So, your decision?”
“You want me to decide between giving up nursing altogether and repeating a semester of training. But I can’t afford to do that, Dr. Savard. I couldn’t pay my rent.”
“Of course not,” Anna said. “You’ll have to move back into the nursing residence.”
The pale face flushed red.
“You have until tomorrow to reach a decision. If you want to continue at the New Amsterdam I will arrange for your reenrollment to begin on Monday. That should give you time to see to the practical matters. I realize this is difficult for you, but in the end I hope you’ll understand why I find it necessary.”
She watched the girl leave, and wondered whether she would see her again. She wondered too if she should have said something more encouraging. I hope you decide to stay, for example. But the truth was, she wasn’t sure that it would be good for anyone if she did.
There was a murmuring in the hall, not unexpected. Hawkins’s friends would have come with her to provide support, and no doubt they were now venting their outrage. One of them would be suggesting a letter of protest to be signed by all, while others argued that a letter would only draw more attention and make things more difficult. She hoped the calmer heads would prevail, but she could and would deal with whatever came her way.
For the next hour people streamed in and out. Clerks with questions and letters to be signed, students asking questions about assignments, assistants with updates on the conditions of the patients they were assigned. At four one of the boys who ran errands for the Mulberry Street police station popped in, dropped a note on her desk, and backed out again, as if she were a regent and he a commoner. Which might seem to him to be the case.
“Jimmy.”
He paused, one brow raised.
“Have you had your lunch?”
The other brow joined the first while he contemplated the question. If he told her yes, he had eaten, he would never know what she had been prepared to offer him. If he said no, she might cause trouble at the station house, where he was supposed to get his meals as the only payment for his services.
“Never mind,” she said, and reached down to take something out of her bag. “I have a half sandwich that’s going to waste. Can you find someone who might want it? Roast beef.”
He disappeared with the sandwich clamped tight in one dirty hand. Anna made a note to herself to speak to the Mulberry Street matron about providing water and soap for the messenger boys.
The note was in Jack’s strong handwriting: