Twilight, Julia Frankau [100 books to read in a lifetime txt] 📗
- Author: Julia Frankau
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“I swear to you, I swear to you I have never opened the packet. I have never looked at them. I made one parcel of them all, of the letters, diary, notes; wrapped them all together in brown paper, tied it up with string, sealed it.
“You’ve got it still!” I was in high excitement, all my pulses throbbing, face flushed, hands hot, breathless.
“In the safe at my bank. I took it there the next morning.”
“You are going to give me the packet?”
“But of course.” He seemed suddenly to recollect that I was an invalid, that he was supposed to be my doctor. “I say, all this excitement is very bad for you. Your sister will turn me out again. Can’t you lie down, get quiet, you’ve jumped from 90 to 112.” His hand was on my pulse again. I knew I was going beyond my tether and cursed my weakness.
“You won’t change your mind!” I was lying on my back now, quite still, trying to quiet myself as he had told me. “Promise!”
“I’ll get the packet in the morning, as soon as the bank is open, and come straight on here with it. You must find some place to put it. Where you can see it, know it’s there all the time. But you mustn’t open it, you must get stronger first. You know you can’t use it yet.”
“Yes, I can.”
“It would be very wrong. You wouldn’t do it well.”
“I’m sick of being ordered about.” But I could barely move and breathing was becoming difficult to me, I had a sense of faintness, suffocation, the room grew dark. He opened the door and called nurse. Ella came in with her. I was conscious of that.
“What does she have when she is like this? Smelling salts, brandy?” Nurse began to fan me; my cheeks were very flushed.
Ella opened the windows, wide, quietly; the scent of the gorse came in. I did not want to speak, only to be able to breathe.
Nurse telegraphed him an enquiring glance. Strychnine? her dumb lips asked. He shook his head.
“Oxygen. Have you got a cylinder of oxygen in the house?” He took the pillows from under my head.
I don’t know what they tried or left untried. Whenever I opened my eyes I sought for Ella’s. I knew she would not let them do anything to me that might bring the pain back. I was only overtired. I managed to say so presently. When I was really better and Dr. Kennedy gone, Ella said a bitter word or two about him. Nurse too thought she should have been called sooner. A good nurse, but dissatisfied up to now with all my treatment, with my change of doctors, with my resistance to authority, and Ella’s interference.
“Ella.” She had been sitting by the fire but came over to me at once.
“What is it? I am only going to stop a minute. Then I shall leave you to nurse. That man stopped too long, over-excited you. We mustn’t have him again, he doesn’t understand you.”
“Yes he does; perfectly.” My voice may have been faint, but I succeeded in making it urgent. “Ella, I want to see him again in the morning, nothing must prevent it, nothing. Don’t talk against him, I want him.”
“Then you snail have him,” she decided promptly. Notwithstanding my terrible weakness and want of breath I smiled at her.
“I suppose you’ve fallen in love with him,” she said. Love and love-making were half her life, the game she found most fascinating. They were nothing to do with mine.
“See that he comes. That’s all. However ill I am, whether I’m ill or not, he is to come.”
“You noticed his clothes?”
“Oh, yes!”
Nurse I suppose thought we had both gone mad. But she came over to me and lifted me into a more comfortable position, fanned me again, and when the fanning had done its work brought eau de Cologne and water and sponged my face, my hot hands. She told Ella that she ought to go, that I ought to be alone, that I should have a bad night if I were not left to myself. Ella only wanted to do what was best for me.
“I am sure you are right, nurse. I shan’t come in again. Sleep well.”
“You are sure?”
“Quite sure that Dr. Kennedy shall come in the morning, if I have to drag him here. It’s a pity you will have an executioner instead of a, doctor; he seems to do you harm every time he comes. You had your worst attack when he was here before. Good-night. I do wish you had better taste.”
She kept her light tone up to the last, although I saw she was pale with anxiety and sympathy. Days ago she had asked me if the nurses were good and kind to me, and if I liked them, and had received my assurance that this one at least was the best I had ever had, clever and untiring. If only she had not been so sure of herself and that she knew better than I did what was good for me, I should have thought her perfect. She had a delightful voice, never touched me unnecessarily, nor brushed against the bed. But she was younger than I, and I resented her authority. We were often in antagonism, for I was a bad invalid, in resistance all the time. I had not learnt yet how to be ill! The lesson was taught me slowly, cruelly, but I recognised Benham’s quality long before I gave in to her. Now I was glad that Ella should go, that nurse should minister to me alone. I wanted the night to come… and go. But my exhaustion was so complete that I had forgotten why.
I SEEM to be a long time coming to the story, but my own will intervene, my own dreadful tale of dependence and deepening illness. Benham was my day nurse. At ten o’clock that night she left me, considerably better and calm. Then Lakeby came on duty, a very inferior person who always talked to me as if I were a child to be humoured: “Now then be a dear good girl and drink it up “represents her fairly well. Then she would yawn in my face without apology or attempt to hide her fatigue or boredom. Nepenthe and I were no longer friends. It gave me no ease, yet I drank it to save argument. Lakeby took away the glass and then lay down at the foot of the bed. I thought again, as I had thought so many times, that no one ever sleeps so soundly as a night nurse. I could indulge my restlessness without any fear of disturbing her. Tomorrow’s promised excitement would not let me sleep. Their letters, the very letters they had written to each other! I did not care so much about the diary. I had once kept a diary myself and knew how one leaves out all the essentials. I suppose I drowsed a little. Nepenthe was no longer my friend, but we were not enemies, only disappointed lovers, without reliance on each other. As I approached the borderland I wished Margaret were in her easychair by the fireside. I did not care whether she was in her grey, or with her plaits and peignoir. I watched for her in vain. I knew she would not come whilst nurse snored on the sofa. Ella would have to get rid of the nurse from my room. Surely now that I was better I could sleep alone, a bell could be fixed up. Two nurses were unnecessary, extravagant. I woke to cough and was conscious of a strange sensation. I turned on the light by my side, but then only roused the nurse (she had slept all day) with difficulty. I knew what had happened, although this was the first time it had happened to me, and wanted to reassure her or myself. Also to tell her what to do.
“Get ice. Call Benham; ring up the doctor.” This was my first haemorrhage, very profuse and alarming, and Lakeby although she was inferior was not inefficient. When she was really roused she carried out my instructions to the letter. Once Benham was in the room I knew at least I was in good hands. I begged them not to rouse the house more than necessary, not to call Ella.
“Don’t you speak a word. Lie quite still. We know exactly what is to be done. Mrs. Lovegrove won’t be disturbed, nor anybody if you will only do what you are told.”
Benham’s voice changed in an emergency; it was always a beautiful voice if a little hard; now it was gentle, soft, and her whole manner altered. She had me and the situation completely under her control, and that, of course, was what she always wanted. That night she was the perfect nurse. Lakeby obeyed her as if she had been a probationer. I often wonder I am not more grateful to Benham, failed to become quickly attached to her. I don’t think perhaps that mine is a grateful nature, but I surely recognised already tonight, in this bad hour, her complete and wonderful competence. I was in high fever, very agitated, yet striving to keep command of my nerves.
“It looks bad, you know, but it is not really serious, it is only a symptom, not a disease. All you have to do is to keep very quiet. The doctor will soon be here.”
“I’m not frightened.”
“Hush! I’m sure you are not.”
A hot bottle to my feet, little lumps of ice to suck; loose warm covering adjusted round me quickly, the blinds pulled up, and the window opened, there was nothing of which she did not think. And the little she said was all in the right key, not making light of my trouble, but explaining, minimizing it, helping me to calm my disordered nerves.
“I would give you a morphia injection only that Dr. Kennedy will be here any moment now.”
I don’t think it could have been long after that before he was in the room. In the meantime I was hating the sight of my own blood and kept begging the nurses or signing to them to remove basins and stained clothes.
Nurse Benham told him very quietly what had happened. He was looking at me and said encouragingly:
“You will soon be all right.”
I was still coughing up blood and did not feel reassured. I heard him ask for hot water. Nurse and he were at the chest of drawers, whispering over something that might be cooking operations. Then nurse came back to the bed.
“Dr. Kennedy is going to give you a morphia injection that will stop the haemorrhage at once.”
She rolled up the sleeve of my nightgown, and I saw he was beside her.
“How much?” I got out.
“A quarter of a grain,” he answered quietly. “You’ll find it will be quite enough. If not, you can have another.”
I resented the prick of the needle, and that having hurt me he should rub the place with his finger, making it worse, I thought. I got reconciled to it however, and his presence there, very soon. He was still in tweeds and they smelt of gorse or peat, of something pleasant.
“Getting better?”
There was no doubt the haemorrhage was coming to an end, and I was no longer shivering and apprehensive. He felt my pulse and said it was “very good.”
“The usual cackle!” I was able to smile.
“I shouldn’t talk if I were you.” He smiled too. “You will be quite comfortable in half an hour.”
“I am not uncomfortable now.” He laughed, a low and
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