As Time Goes By (13 page)

‘Mum …’

Immediately Sally was at her elder son’s bedside, reaching for his hand whilst she smoothed back his hair from his forehead.

‘What is it, love? Are you feeling sick again?’

‘No. I want to go home.’

He wasn’t the only one, Sally acknowledged. They had been at the hospital all day, confined to this small room, but the ward sister, still tight-lipped with a disapproval that Sally suspected had now turned into outright dislike of her, had refused to hand over the boys’ clothes, saying that they couldn’t leave until Dr Ross had been in to see them. And the truth was that much as she wanted to take them home, and healthy though they both looked, Sally was too much of a protective mother to want to risk Tommy having a relapse because of her impatience.

Harry, too young to understand properly what was happening, was hungry and grizzling, whilst Tommy was bored with being in bed and playing
the games Sally had made up to keep him occupied.

‘Mum, I’m hungry,’ Tommy complained.

All Sally had to give them were the egg sandwiches Doris had brought her when she had come to see how things were before returning home. Still too upset to feel like eating herself, Sally had put them in her bag.

Carefully dividing them into two, she gave Tommy the large portion before breaking the other one into small pieces to feed to Harry, who finished his in double-quick time.

She was just wiping the egg from round Harry’s mouth when the sister came in, a look of horror widening her eyes as she demanded, ‘What do you think you are doing?’

‘What does it look like?’ Sally retorted. ‘I’m feeding my kiddies. Starving, they were.’

‘Well, of course they are. Them was Dr Ross’s orders. No food until after he’d seen them.’ The thin lips pursed. ‘You do realise what this means, don’t you? Dr Ross will have to be told, of course, and he won’t be pleased!’

Unlike
her
! She certainly looked pleased to have caught her out in a wrongdoing, Sally reflected.

‘I hope you realise that if they take sick again it will be your fault?’

Sally’s anger turned to fear and guilt, which she disguised by snapping, ‘If I’d been told they weren’t to have anything to eat then I wouldn’t have given them anything.’

‘After all the trouble Dr Ross has taken with
them as well, insisting on paying for a private room for them himself when I told him I had no room on my ward for them. He won’t want to be having to pay for them for a second night.’

Sally had gone rigid with humiliation and shock. The doctor had paid for this room?

‘I’m taking my kiddies home right now.’

‘You can’t do that. They can’t leave here until Dr Ross has given his permission.’

‘These are my sons and I don’t need anyone’s permission to take them home with me, and if you don’t give me their clothes, then I’ll take them in what they’re wearing.’

‘Those nightclothes are hospital property.’

How dare someone, anyone, but most of all this doctor, who was a stranger to them, humiliate her by forcing on her unwanted charity? The whole of Liverpool probably knew by now that Sally Walker couldn’t afford proper medical care for her sons and had had to be treated like a charity case. It was all very well having all this talk about what was going to be done for folk after the war was over, with free medical care for them that needed it, but what about what was needed now? Sally’s pride was in open revolt. She stormed over to the cot, and reached into it to lift out her younger son.

‘Sister, Dr Ross is asking to see you.’

Sally’s heart sank and she could see the triumphant gleam in the sister’s eyes.

‘Stay here with this mother, Nurse. She is not to leave this room until I have seen Dr Ross.’

This nurse was a different one from the one Sally had seen last night, a pretty pert-looking girl with a wide smile.

‘You’re one of them singers from the Waltonettes, aren’t you?’ she said. ‘I recognised you straight off on account of my cousin Cedric being mad on you. Goes to the Grafton every week, he does, hoping you’ll be singing. Says you could put Gracie Fields in the shade and no mistake. These your kiddies, are they?’

Sally nodded.

‘That’ll disappoint him. Hoping you was single, he was. Not that he’d ever pluck up the courage to ask you for a dance, never mind a date,’ she laughed. ‘A proper softie, he is.’

Sally felt the small eddy of cold air against her calves and knew even without turning round and before she heard him speak who had entered.

‘Sister tells me you wish to take the boys home. I would prefer it if they stayed here for another night.’

‘In a private ward that you’re paying for?’ Sally shook her head and then stopped as she saw the betraying tide of colour seeping up under his skin. So now
he
knew how it felt to be wrong-footed. Good.

‘Sister also told me that you’ve given the boys food, although I specifically said they were to be put on a starving diet for twenty-four hours.’

‘No one told me.’

Ignoring her, Dr Ross had gone across to Tommy, who, to Sally’s surprise, seemed pleased
to see him, greeting the doctor with a wide smile as he placed his hands on his stomach and gently examined him.

‘Does that hurt?’

‘No. Tell me some more about your train set.’

‘In a minute. I want you to tell me first if this hurts.’

It seemed an age to Sally, waiting and watching anxiously before he had finished.

‘The reason I did not want them to eat was because I wanted to make sure your elder son’s system was clear of whatever it was that poisoned it in the first place. The Government takes this kind of thing very seriously indeed, especially in children.’

‘He ate something that disagreed with him. I’ve never heard of the Government worrying itself about a fish paste sandwich.’

‘Then obviously you don’t read the newspapers, Mrs Walker, because if you did you’d be aware that earlier this year there were reports all across the country of people suffering similar symptoms to your son’s. Several people died as a result of that outbreak.’

Sally put her hand to her mouth to stem her frightened protest.

‘However,’ Dr Ross continued, ‘fortunately Tommy seems to be fine.’

‘Does that mean I can take them home?’

‘Not yet. Before you leave I have some questions I want to ask you about the source of the possible contamination, but first I have another
patient I need to see. So if you’d just wait here for a few minutes …’

‘I’ll be needing their clothes then, so that I can get them dressed ready to leave,’ Sally told him, giving the sister a challenging look.

When in response he gave a brief nod in the direction of the nurse, Sally felt her tense stomach muscles start to relax.

‘But I want to see my doctor,’ Tommy wailed as Sally hurried him into his clothes, one eye on her younger son, ready dressed and waiting in the cot the other side of the door. Heaven alone knew how she was going to find the extra money to repay the doctor, but somehow she would find it, she assured herself grimly.

‘Come on,’ Sally instructed her elder son, picking up Harry. ‘We’re going home.’

They had taken less than half a dozen steps down the corridor when the doctor appeared at the other end of it. Sally exhaled grimly, tightening her hold of Tommy’s hand when he tried to pull free.

‘You can’t force me to let them stay,’ she announced fiercely.

‘Actually I could and would if I thought that there was any danger of them contaminating others. As it is, it’s essential that the source of the sickness is identified so that we can make sure that no one else is affected by it. Sister Brookes made mention of some fish paste sandwiches which she believed were the cause of
Tommy’s sickness. Where exactly did this fish paste come from?’

Sally gave a dismissive shrug, remembering what Doris had said about not implicating Daisy or her husband. ‘I’m sure I really can’t say.’

‘But surely you must have some idea? In these times of rationing most housewives know what they have in their store cupboards. My concern is that this fish paste could be part of a much larger consignment, which could pose the same threat to the health of others that your son suffered. If you can remember when you bought it …’

‘Well, I can’t,’ Sally told him, not without some qualms at the thought of others – especially children – suffering as her Tommy had, but she quietened her conscience by promising herself that the first thing she was going to do once she got home was go round to Daisy’s and ask her to get her husband to make sure that those who had had the tins were warned not to use them.

‘How are you planning to get home, only it’s raining heavily?’

Sally stared at him, surprised by his sudden change of subject. ‘We’ll get the bus.’

‘I’ve got a better idea. My car’s right outside the hospital – I’ll drive you back.’

‘No … no, there’s no need for you to do that.’

‘Your son has been very poorly; I think there is every need.’

Tommy took advantage of her confusion to pull away from her and run over to the doctor, clinging
to his leg as he reminded him, ‘You said you’d tell me some more about your train set.’

Sally was astonished by the smile that warmed Dr Ross’s face as he bent down to pick up her son. ‘So I did,’ he agreed, ‘but first I’m going to drive you home.’

‘In your car?’ Tommy was beaming from ear to ear with excitement at the thought, and Sally knew that she had no chance now of refusing the doctor’s offer.

She could almost feel the heat of the two holes Sister’s concentrated stare of dislike was burning into her back, Sally acknowledged a few minutes later when they left the ward escorted by the doctor.

His car wasn’t as shiny and posh as the one Bertha Harris had sent for her, but the apprehension she felt at climbing into it was equal. Predictably, of course, both her sons were round-eyed with delight and excitement, Tommy chattering away nonstop, firing questions at the doctor about the car whilst revealing a knowledge of its technical workings that astonished Sally.

‘You’ve got a very bright little lad there,’ the doctor informed her quietly under cover of Tommy earnestly explaining something about the car to his younger brother.

‘He gets it from his dad, and from Doris’s son, Frank. He’s with the Royal Engineers and Tommy’s always pestering him about engines.’

‘This country’s going to need young men like him when all this is over.’

Sally didn’t say anything. They were turning into Chestnut Close and she could well imagine the interest her return home in the doctor’s car would be causing those who witnessed it.

‘If you’d put the cost of the hospital room on your bill then …’ she began as soon as the car stopped outside her front gate.

‘There’s no charge for the room. Sister gave you the wrong information about that.’

‘Come on, Tommy,’ Sally instructed, wanting to get out of the car and inside her own front door as fast as she could.

‘Dr Ross said he’d tell me about his train,’ her son protested.

‘The doctor’s busy, and he has to go and look after other sick little boys.’

‘I’ve got enough time to come in for a little while,’ he contradicted her, much to her dismay. ‘There are still some questions I want to ask you.’

‘About the fish paste? I’ve already told you.’

‘No, with regard to who takes care of your sons when you are at work.’

He was getting out of the car before she could object, coming round to the passenger door to open it for her, taking Harry from her and holding him securely in one arm as he placed his free hand beneath her elbow to help her out.

Sally’s instinctive reaction was to pull away from him but she was too conscious of her neighbours’ curiosity from behind their lace-curtained front windows to do so.

‘Mum, I’m hungry,’ Tommy complained.

‘I’ll heat you up a bowl of soup,’ she told him, as she unlocked the front door.

Leaving the boys in the parlour, she hurried into the kitchen and lit the gas beneath the pan of soup, which she, like so many other housewives, had learned to keep going with stock and leftover vegetables.

When she went back into the parlour to check on the boys and put coal and a match to the ashes in the grate, she could see that the doctor was looking round the room – and no doubt finding it wanting compared to his own home, she decided. Immediately her pride fired up.

‘I dare say this isn’t what you’re used to.’

‘No,’ he agreed, ‘it isn’t …’

Sally’s breath hissed out of her lungs in outrage. A sudden yell from Harry focused her attention back on her sons, who were rolling around on the floor, squabbling over a toy. Quickly she went to separate them.

‘
This
is how Harry gets his bruises,’ she informed him. ‘Always scrapping, these two are. Doris and I do our best, but with their dad not here …’

‘All the more reason, I would have thought, to send them into the country as evacuees for the duration of the war. I realise that you’d miss them but at least you’d have the comfort of knowing they were safe and being properly looked after.’

‘They’re safe and being properly looked after now. No one could take care of them better than Doris.’

‘Sister Brookes may provide them with exemplary
care now but, as I understand it, her daughter-in-law is due to give birth shortly.’

‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ Sally challenged him.

‘I should have thought it was obvious. Blood is thicker than water, as they say, and I dare say that Sister Brookes will want to be on hand to help her daughter-in-law.’

‘So why should that make any difference to me? Molly doesn’t work.’

‘Sister Brookes isn’t a young woman. She confessed to me how desperately worried she was when Tommy fell ill. I should have thought you could see for yourself how selfish it is of you to oblige her to carry that kind of responsibility, never mind the risk you’re taking with your sons’ health. A city that has suffered the bomb damage Liverpool has is not an ideal place for young children to grow up in, especially when they could quite easily be living in safety in the countryside. Any good mother would see that for herself.’