A Wartime Nurse by Maggie Hope Page B

consultant, will be here shortly to have a look at him.’
    ‘I know you, you’re Bea Wearmouth’s lass, aren’t you?’ Mrs Patterson spoke for the first time. ‘I heard she had one a nurse.’
    ‘That’s right, Mrs Patterson,’ said Theda. ‘Now, would you like a cup of tea while you’re waiting?’
    ‘By, I’m glad it’s you – we can talk to you. But never you mind bothering with tea for us, you’ve got plenty to do without that, I fancy. Eeh, I’m that glad you’ll be looking after the bairn, I feel better in my mind now. I’m not much good talking to doctors and nurses and such.’
    ‘Sit down, do, Mrs Patterson,’ Theda said gently. ‘And you too, Mr Patterson. You look pretty tired yourself. Have you been on fore shift?’
    ‘Aye, that’s right. I hadn’t been long in, just had my bath when the lad came running in to tell me Peter had had an accident. A good job I had an’ all. I didn’t have to come here in me black, like.’
    ‘It wouldn’t have mattered. Well, I’ll get Nurse to bring you some tea anyway. The doctor won’t be long and maybe there’ll be some good news about Peter. Then you can go to your bed; you look as though you could do with it.’
    ‘I couldn’t sleep anyroad.’
    The miner shook his head but sat down alongside his wife, and, bending forward, took his cap out of his pocket and began twisting it round and round in his hands. There was nothing more to say so when the tea tray arrived, Theda excused herself and withdrew, murmuring something about checking on Peter.
    He was just the same. The young auxiliary nurse she had set to watch him for any signs of change stood up as she approached the bed. Theda felt his pulse; it was thready but could have been worse.
    ‘Let me know if there’s any change at all,’ she said to the auxiliary. ‘Mr Kent shouldn’t be long anyway.’
    The girl nodded and sat down again, staring fixedly at Peter’s white face as though she was frightened she would miss something. Ah, well, better that than someone who let her attention wander with thoughts of her boyfriend or the like.

Chapter Six
    It was half-past nine and a wet, cold night with the raindrops mixed with hail when Theda descended from the bus at the end of the rows in Winton Colliery.
    ‘Got your flashlight, Nurse?’ asked the conductor solicitously before he closed the door after her. ‘You want nothing wandering about on a night like this without one.’
    ‘Yes, I have it here, thanks, Tom. Goodnight then, see you tomorrow.’
    The blue-shaded headlights of the bus gave a ghastly glow to the houses as it went around the corner on its way back to town, and then the blackness was absolute until Theda switched on her flashlight. Pointing it to the ground, more from habit than the fear of an enemy plane overhead spotting the light, she set off. It had been a long time since a German plane had been seen over this part of County Durham, she mused as she increased her pace to a fast walk towards West Row. In fact, the last one had been during the Battle of Britain and that was in daylight. It had dropped a bomb on the old pithead at Black Boy, missing the pithead further down which was in full production. The children had spent hours searching around for bits of shrapnel despite dire warnings from the authorities about the danger. There was not a child in the street that didn’t have a piece of shrapnel hidden away.
    They didn’t see danger, that was the trouble. Which was why Peter Patterson was lying in a hospital bed right now. She sighed. At least he had pulled out of his coma to open his eyes and see his mother and father hovering anxiously at the bottom of the bed.
    ‘Are you going to play war with me, Dad?’ his first words had been.
    ‘We’ll see about that,’ Mr Patterson had answered. ‘How do you feel now, lad?’
    ‘Sore.’
    ‘Aye, well, it likely serves you right.’
    Theda had ushered the parents away once the immediate danger was past; they were