Wish with the Candles. Betty Neels

may I introduce Staff Nurse Collins, Nurse Jessop and Nurse Cully—we have a nursing auxiliary too, but she’s not on duty until this afternoon, and two technicians and the porters.’

      He said with a little smile. ‘Yes, I met them yesterday evening when I came round with Mr Soames. I feel sure we shall enjoy working together.’

      The smile became brilliant as he went away, closing the door quietly behind him.

      Jessop spoke first. ‘Golly, Sister, he’s smashing—he doesn’t look bad-tempered either—they said he was.’ Her tone of voice suggested that if anyone thought otherwise they would have to settle with her first. And Cully, who was a little older and a little wiser, observed, ‘He’s quite old, isn’t he, but it doesn’t notice—it makes the medicos look like schoolboys.’ And Staff, who was engaged to be married and should have known better, asked, ‘Is he married?’

      ‘I’ve no idea,’ said Emma calmly, ‘and since he’s only here for a couple of months and doesn’t live in England, there isn’t much point in getting turned on, is there?’ She added in a quietly severe voice, ‘Now into theatre all of you, please—Sister will want us all to give a good impression.’ She paused as she went. ‘And Nurse Jessop, do try not to drop anything.’

      The first case was a lengthy one and Mr Soames did it with the professor assisting and Little Willy making himself useful. It was the repair of a hiatus hernia which involved a partial gastrectomy and some excision of the oesophagus. Mr Soames was good at it; he did a great many week after week, and being familiar with his work was completely relaxed—as was the professor. The two of them talked as they worked, frequently including Little Willy and Mr Bone in their conversation, and even Sister Cox, who didn’t agree with talking in theatre unless it was strictly business, so that her answers were short and a little snappy.

      ‘You don’t like conversation in theatre, Sister?’ asked the professor at his mildest. She shot him a darkling glance over her mask.

      ‘No, sir, I can’t say I do,’ she said huffily. ‘We’re here to work.’

      She snapped her Cheatles angrily above her head and Emma, interpreting their clatter, nodded to Cully standing ready with her receiver to take what Mr Soames held dangling from his forceps. He flung it lightly, forceps and all, in her general direction and she caught it with a dexterity which would have done justice to a first-class cricketer in a Test Match, and disappeared in the direction of the sluice, acknowledging Mr Bone’s thumbs-up sign with a soundless giggle. The professor, without looking up from the little bit of sewing he was engaged upon, remarked:

      ‘I must compliment you upon your dexterous staff, Sister Cox,’ and when she gave an impatient grunt, went on, ‘I hope I shall not put you out too much while I am here. I find I work much better if there is a certain amount of talk. It is relaxing, you know—so vital to our work, do you not agree?’

      Emma could see by the look on Mad Minnie’s face that she had no wish to agree but felt it expedient to do so. After all, the wretched man was important, though why they had to bring foreigners into the country to teach them something they could do better she did not know. Emma read her superior’s mind like an open book and suppressed a smile as Sister Cox’s eyes widened as the professor went on, ‘I daresay you find it most vexing to have to put up with a foreigner for even a short time. I’m sorry to hear about your—er—feet. I take it the operation is to be quite soon?’

      She looked as though she would explode. ‘In two days’ time,’ she handed him a grooved director which he accepted politely and didn’t use. ‘You’ll have to manage with Sister Hastings—by the time I’m back you’ll be gone.’ Her tone implied ‘and a good riddance too’.

      ‘Regrettably,’ said Professor Teylingen gently, ‘but I am sure your operation will improve you in every way, Sister Cox.’

      Mr Soames made a muffled sound behind his mask and Mr Bone and Little Willy dealt with sudden coughs and the nurses, who had the rest of the day with Sister Cox to face, saved their giggles until they could get down to the dining-room, where they would recount the conversation word for word, together with a thorough description of the handsome Mr Teylingen.

      The professor accepted another needle and gut into his needleholder and began to stitch with the finicky concentration of a lady of leisure working at her petit point, while Emma nodded to Staff to go and start scrubbing, ready to retire to one corner of the theatre and lay up for the next case. The professor, she noted, was a meticulous worker but a fast one, something which he chose to disguise under a deliberate manner which could be deceiving. He had also, to confound rumour, remained perfectly good-tempered throughout the lengthy operation, though there had been nothing to arouse his ire—no dropped dressings, no lotion splashed on the floor by Jessop’s too quick hand; nothing in fact to spoil the calm of the theatre’s atmosphere, only Mad Minnie’s tartness, of course. Emma had got so used to her that she had rather overlooked the fact that a stranger coming into their circle for the first time might find her a shade dictatorial. She picked up the dressing lying ready under the trolley and arranged it correctly around and over the drains and tubes which the two surgeons had stitched into the patient with all the care of a dressmaker stitching in a zip, aware as she did so of the close proximity of the professor to her.

      They had coffee at the end of the case while the nurses bustled around theatre, readying it for the next case, and Staff, sterile in gown and gloves, waited patiently by her trolleys. The office, thought Emma, was hardly the place for the social drinking of coffee by five people. She perched uneasily on the second chair while Sister Cox sat behind the desk, looking murderous, and the men lounged against the walls, drinking coffee far too hot and eating biscuits with all the enthusiasm of schoolboys while they discussed the case they had just finished. That the talk was highly inappropriate to the drinking of coffee, or for that matter, the drinking or eating of anything, didn’t worry Emma in the least; for several years now she had reconciled herself to taking her refreshment to the accompaniment of vivid descriptions of any number of unmentionable subjects. Now she listened with interest while the professor explained why he had found his method of performing the next operation so satisfactory—something which he did with a nice lack of boasting. She went away when she had finished her coffee and started to scrub up and was almost ready when the three men sauntered in to join her at the sinks.

      ‘Taking the case?’ inquired the professor idly, and when she had said that yes, she was, she added, ‘Are there any particular instruments you prefer to use, sir, or any you dislike?’

      He gave her a thoughtful look. ‘Very considerate of you, Sister Hastings. I like a blade and a blade holder—always. I like Macdonald’s dissector, I take a size nine glove if you have them and I prefer Hibutane solution. There is no need to bother about these today, though I should be grateful if the gloves could be changed.’

      Emma said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and went into theatre. She sent Staff for the correct size and stood quietly while Cully tied her into her gown and then opened the glove drum so that she could take her own size sixes. The operation would be a long one—the removal of an oesophagus in a patient with cancer; the man was still young enough to make the operation worthwhile, severe though it was, and as it had been diagnosed in good time, there was every chance of success. She went without haste to her trolleys and began the business of counting swabs and sponges, threading needles and checking the instruments before making sure that all the complicated machinery needed was in position and that the technicians were ready. Sister Cox wasn’t in theatre; she had gone to see the orthopaedic surgeon about her feet, so that the atmosphere of the theatre was a good deal lighter than it had been, although there was no let-up in the strict routine. Emma reflected that it was nice to see Cully and Jessop so relaxed, and Jessop, by some miracle, hadn’t dropped anything at all.

      The patient was wheeled in with Mr Bone at his head and propelling his anaesthetic trolley with him. He winked at Emma as the porters arranged the patient on the table and she returned the wink, for they had been friends for several years and indeed she was one of the few who knew that his wife had been in a nursing home for years and was very unlikely to come out of it—a wife whom he dearly loved. The three surgeons walked in and behind