Rosie Dixon's Complete Confessions

“Nurse! What have you done? Are you all right, Mr Arkwright?”

It is the first time that I have heard Staff Wood say anything nice to anyone and I realise that “Mr Sunshine” is a male version of what Natalie is going to be like in about seventy years time. What a revolting thought.

“Don’t just stand there, Nurse. Can’t you see that Mr Arkwright is in pain?” For one wonderful moment I think she is going to tell me to shoot him, but in the end I have to strip the old swine’s bed and change his pyjamas. Since this manoeuvre is performed behind screens there are ample opportunities for Mr Sunshine to demonstrate that his reflexes are as quick as ever and few of them are missed. When I limp away with a pile of sodden bedding my bottom is black and blue.

“Is he always like that?” I murmur to Nurse Martin.

Nurse Martin, having been on the ward for three whole weeks, looks surprised that I should have the barefaced cheek to address her unprompted. “Always like what?” she says haughtily.

“Grabbing and mauling,” I say.

Nurse Martin makes a convincing job of looking amazed.

“‘Grabbing and mauling?’ Why, he’s a sweet old man. They call him—”

“Don’t tell me,” I say. “‘Mr Sunshine.’ O.K., it must be me.”

“It certainly must,” snaps Nurse Martin. She looks at me as if I have still got a bat’s leg sticking out of the corner of my mouth.

The next face from the past I bump into belongs to the bearded character who took my cab. He is dressed in a white coat and is skimming through a patient’s notes as if trying to produce a picture.

“If you don’t get out of bed soon I’m going to have to kick your fat arse off it,” he bellows. “We need that bed for someone who’s ill. I want to hear that you’re feeling much better when I come round tomorrow, right?”

There is a mumble of assent from the bed and the doctor turns to find himself face to face with me.

“Why, if it isn’t Kung Fu,” he says. “You want to be more careful with those karate chops, I practically had to give that cabby the kiss of life before I could get up to town.”

He runs his fingers through his mop of dark hair and goes on to the next bed. “You’re not still here? I thought I discharged you yesterday. You stick around here much longer and we’ll have to start charging you rent.”

Blackbeard’s bedside manner differs considerably from that practised by Doctor Eradlik and I think how coarse he is. Definitely not like most of the young doctors I have noticed at Queen Adelaide’s. They tend to be rather smooth and wear striped ties underneath their white coats. Blackbeard’s white coat makes its owner look as if he helps out in a fish-and-chip shop on his evenings off. I am very surprised to find that he is some kind of doctor.

After the Arkwright botch-up Sister Bradley must decide that I am totally useless because she gives me the job of re-doing the labels that cover most of the surfaces of the sluice, linen-room and kitchen. These are neatly printed in biro and protected by sellotape which is now beginning to peel and turn yellow with age.

Halfway through the afternoon I have to copy out “No unlabelled specimens will be left standing” four times before I get it right and it occurs to me that I am becoming more exhausted than a blackleg in a prostitutes’ strike. I can hardly keep my eyes open.

“Hi, there.” The voice is upper class but deep and warm. I look up and my heart skips a couple of beats as I see Doctor Fishlock smiling down at me. “I wondered where I was going to find you.” He says it like he has been looking since puberty.

“Hello,” I simper, “I’m doing the labels.” He would have to have his eyes closed not to know that, but I never find it easy to chat to dishy men. I always imagine that they must be thinking what a fool I am. Of course, while I am thinking that, I am behaving like a fool and they soon become perfectly entitled to their opinion.

“How’s it going?” Doctor Fishlock pulls up a chair and settles down on the other side of the table. “I know just how tough these first days can be.”

I warm to him immediately because that is just the kind of kind, considerate thing that Doctor Eradlik would have said. He even stretches out an arm and pats the back of my hand. Surely this can’t be the man that Penny was talking about? He seems too gentle, too refined for those acts of wild animal passion. Sometimes I think her excitable imagination gets the better of the truth.

“It’s not too bad,” I say. “No worse than I expected.”

“That’s the girl.” Robert’s eyes glow like the embers of a cherished fire. You see how my imagination is calling him Robert already. There is something about the man that makes me feel I have known him all my life—well, not all my life. I don’t want to sound unhealthy about it. “I have the feeling that this isn’t the first job you’ve done. There’s a poise, a style about you that makes me certain that I’ve seen you somewhere before. Weren’t you on the cover of Vogue?” I cut through the oilcloth that covers the table and drop my sellotape on the floor. We both dive down to pick it up and our heads clash. Funny how Ali McGraw never does that.

“Crazy,” says Fishlock, gazing into my eyes until I can feel them going soggy at the edges. “You make me feel all fingers and thumbs. You’re like a feather dancing in the sunlight.”

What a fantastic bloke! Nobody has ever talked to me like that outside my imagination and there you have to knock before you can come in.

“My name’s Robert Fishlock,” he purrs. “Do you think you’re going to be fit enough to have a little drink with me, this evening?”

“Oh, Doctor Flashcock! I’d—” I break off in horror when I realize what I have said. Penny called him that and it must have stuck in my mind. Robert’s eyebrows shoot up towards the ceiling. “My name’s Rosie Dixon,” I say hurriedly. “And I’d love to if I get finished in time and Sister Tutor doesn’t need us, and—”

“Splendid,” drawls Dreamboat, patting my wrist again. “Why don’t you come round to Bedside Manor. It’s only just round the corner from The Virgins’ Retreat.”

“That’s where you live, is it?”

“In congenial squalor. Twenty-three Prendergast Villas. Eight till late—anytime you can make it.” He turns on that hundred watt smile and my heart turns to toasted cheese.

“Keep your pecker up. The first few weeks are always the worst.” He brushes his index finger along my lip and stands up. “I’d better be going. There’s a chronic polycythaemia with multiple scattered thrombi that I want to keep an eye on.”

“I hope it’s all right,” I say.

“I think he’ll come through.” One more smile and I am left alone with my labels. But what a difference in the way I feel! I amaze Sister by finishing the labels without a single mistake and skim round the ward with the teas as if on wings. Mr Arkwright has a trolley across his bed and I find that by seizing this, putting his tea on it and pushing it towards him I can avoid actual bodily contact. Mr Sunshine leans back against his propped-up pillows and watches me like an aged lion waiting for a schoolgirl to stick her hand through the bars of the cage.

When I come off duty I am tired but happy. I helped to take the temperatures and Staff Wood called me “Nurse Dixon” instead of just plain “Nurse.” Sister Bradley has not learned my name yet but it is early days.

When I get back to the room, Penny is lying stretched out on the bed still wearing her uniform.

“How did it go?” I say.

“Ghastly! I feel absolutely shattered. I never knew human beings could go to the lavatory so often. Some of them don’t seem to be fitted with washers. It goes in one end and straight out the other.”

“What are the other nurses like?” I am cheered to find that Penny and I seem to have shared the same experience.

“Pretty frightful. Trying to boss you around the whole time. The place is like a women’s prison. I can’t stand being told what to do by a woman.”

“I suppose they have to have a system.” Since Doctor Fishlock appeared I am feeling far more favourably disposed towards everybody.

“Did you say ‘system’ or ‘cistern’?” Penny holds up a hand in front of her face. “Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this crap clean from my hand?”

“Um-yes,” I say nervously. Penny does talk in a very funny way sometimes. “Are you going to have any supper?”

“I couldn’t face it. I’m not going anywhere unless Mark rings. I don’t suppose that pin-pricked little freak downstairs would pass on a message if he had one. Do you know, he actually had the cheek to wink at me this morning. I’m surprised his eyeball didn’t fall out under the strain.”

“I’m going out tonight,” I say, trying to sound very offhand about it. “You’ll never guess who with.”

“Doctor Flashcock?”

“How did you know that?”

“He was asking me questions about you last night. It was obvious that he had a yen for you.”

“You never told me.”

“Oh, didn’t I? Well, there was no point in raising your hopes, was there? I hope you’ve taken your pill to-day.”

“I’m not going to bed with him!” I say firmly. “We’re just having a drink.”

“I don’t see why you have to be so terribly coy,” sighs Penny. “It happens all the time, you know.”

“I wouldn’t go to bed with a boy on the first day,” I say indignantly.

“Not unless you were really in love—yes, I know. I had a friend like you once. She used to believe that she was a virgin until she had ten orgasms in one evening. She never got further than eight.”

“I’m not like that.”

“What are you like, then? You’re not a virgin?”

It is such a difficult question to answer, isn’t it? I suppose technically I am not a virgin but that is such a soulless way of looking at it. In my mind I have never consciously done anything to lose my virginity.

“Yes and no,” I say.

Penny groans. “Thank God I’m too tired to argue with you. I can tell you that it’s going to be more ‘yes’ than ‘no’ before the evening is over.” She dangles her arms over the edge of the bed and closes her eyes.

I am slightly disappointed that she seems so relaxed about me going out with Robert but, then, she seems so relaxed about lots of things. Whatever I do I must get away from her because she is making me feel so tired. Every time she yawns, I yawn and when I lie down on the bed for an instant I can hardly get up again.

It is a hospital rule that the nurses eat the same food as the patients and when I look at what appear to be teeth marks on my piece of gristly beef I wonder if someone is applying the instruction literally. The pros, or probationers, all sit at the same table and it is noticeable that there is much less conversation amongst us than at the tables occupied by the more senior nurses. Senior inmates also seem to have much heartier appetites. Perhaps they have got used to the food.

There is no sign of Robert and I am glad that I don’t have to exchange any words with him before our date. I rest my head on my hand and gaze across the room. Gosh, but I do feel tired.

“Wake up, Nurse.”

I jerk my eyes open to find that the table is half empty and that someone is collecting the plates. I must have dropped off to sleep. I scuttle away feeling embarrassed and return to The Virgins’ Retreat. Penny is now fast asleep and I am able to get ready in peace. I never like having to make myself up with somebody else around and it used to be agony at home with Natalie always trying to make funny remarks. I wonder how she is, little baggage. Probably rifling my drawers to see if I have left any make-up behind. Well, she will be unlucky. I took great care to bring everything with me. I have sent Mum and Dad a postcard showing the statue on the lawn outside the hospital and I hope Dad will not get the wrong idea. It features a man wearing a bowler hat brim and wings and his willy wonker is very much to the fore. I believe there were a lot of complaints when it first went up—I mean, when the statue first went up, of course.

I pop a few drops of ‘Passion’s Plaything’ behind my ears—just to cheer myself up, of course—and close the door softly on Penny’s snores. My bath I took before supper just in case I came up in a red flush. It was my neck I was worried about, naturally. I need not have bothered because the water was colder than an eskimo’s jolly lolly. Probably just as well otherwise I would have fallen asleep in it.

G.B.H. peers at me through his peep-hole as I go out and I shudder to think of Penny being forced to submit to him. I am certain she must have exaggerated as usual. I would rather have been dragged before Matron by white horses than let him so much as touch me.

23 Prendergast Villas is a semi-detached house in a street facing the common and my finger trembles as I press the door bell. I do hope my lipstick has not started matting. A shadow swims up behind the stained glass and the door opens.

“Rosie. How super to see you.”

Robert is wearing a green velvet smoking jacket with gold piping and a white frilly shirt. He looks as if he is about to compere Come Dancing.

“I hope I’m not too early,” I simper.

“You could never be too early. Are you going to wear that jacket or shall I take it?”

“Um, well, it is nice and warm, perhaps I can take it off.”

Careful, Dixon. You’re yawning already. Robert slides my jacket from my shoulders and, holds it up to the light.

“It’s beautiful,” he says. “What is it? Worth?”

“About four pounds,” I say. “I got it at C & A. It’s not real.”

It is only then that I realise he did not say “What’s it worth?” Oh dear.

“Amazing.” Robert looks faintly disturbed. “Come upstairs and have a drink. I’ve mixed us a teeny-weeny dry martini.”

He leads the way upstairs and I am impressed at how well furnished the place is. Lots of cream coloured carpet and white walls. Not like our semi where everything is scuffed brown and the shiniest thing is the threadbare hair-cord on the stairs.

“Is this all yours?” I ask.

“I own it but I share with a chappie in advertising—you know, we take the hippocratic oath, they take the hypocritic oath.” He looks at me expectantly and I am quick to smother a yawn and try to smile. I can never remember being so tired. Maybe it is because the house is so warm.

Robert steps to one side at the top of the stairs and waves me into a room containing comfortable leather backed chairs and a sofa. There is a sheepskin rug in front of the roaring fire and on the walls coloured drawings of people fox hunting. “Sit down and I’ll get you that drink. I know just how tired you can feel when you’re not used to it.”

He pokes the fire as if he has a grudge against it and I notice a hairy wrist protruding from his frilly white cuff. How sexy! I can see why Penny responded.

“Tell me if it’s not right.”

He hands me a small glass which has an olive on a stick protruding from it and I wonder what to do with the olive.

“I’m certain it’s lovely,” I say.

In fact, the first sip tastes like cough medicine and I can hardly swallow it. The only Martini I can remember having was red but I am certain that Doctor Fishlock knows what he is doing.

“Bung ho!”

“Cheers.”

It is very difficult to keep the olive in the glass when one is drinking and I look carefully to see what Robert is doing with his. He does not have one.

“If you don’t like olives you can always chuck it in the fire.”

“Oh no. I think they’re delicious.” I sink my teeth into the firm flesh and— “Ouch!”

“The stones are a damn nuisance, aren’t they?” sympathises Robert. “Now tell me. Where do you come from?”

“Woodford,” I say. Actually it is Chingford but I think Woodford sounds better.

“Oh. Winnie’s old seat.”

I try a small laugh but Robert is swift to realise that I have no idea what he is talking about. “Winston Churchill. It used to be his seat when he was in the House of Commons. Do you know the Wrights?”

“I don’t think so.”

“I used to play squash with the eldest son. I think they lived at Woodford. It’s on the way to Epping, isn’t it?”

“Yes. It’s er-um very nice.”

We nod enthusiastically and it is clear that we both think that Woodford is a very nice place. I stare into the glowing heart of the fire and realise that I am tipping my drink onto the rug. I expect that by this time Robert’s love truncheon was racing in and out of Penny’s spasm chasm like an express train with hiccups. Not, of course, that I am envious. Oh dear me, no. I am far too tired for one thing. Apart from my natural reluctance to get stuck into the pudding before I have had my soup.

Robert takes my empty glass and smiles at me. “It’s ridiculous, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I say, wondering what he is talking about and wishing I didn’t drink so fast when I was so nervous.

“I’ve invited you round here because I think you’re the most beautiful girl I’ve seen in ages and here we are talking about Woodford.”

I wonder how Penny got round here. She was obviously best at something. This sofa is so comfortable that I don’t think I will ever be able to get out of it. If only I could stretch out and go to sleep.

“You look gorgeous when you half close your eyes like that.” Stick around, Doll, I think to myself. You could go out of your mind when you get the full treatment. I look down and find there is another drink in my hand. It must be strong to taste like that. I could get drunk on the olives.

“I’m afraid I’m not saying very much,” I say. Good old Dixon! Slow on chat but strong on honesty.

“Don’t worry your beautiful head about it,” purrs Robert, “it’s a delight just to sit here and feast my eyes on you.”

“You are nice,” I say. I hope he likes the inside of girls’ mouths because he gets a perfect view of mine as I release my forty-fifth yawn of the evening.

“You poor girl. I can see you’re exhausted. Let me try something.”

The words “no” and “not yet” are framed on my lips but it is my temples that he caresses lightly. “Massage,” he murmurs. “Tell me if it helps.”

“Uuuhm. That’s nice.” It is too.

“Close your eyes.” Never has a request been easier to comply with. My peepers are jammed shut faster than a spinster’s legs at a Congolese bachelor party. “Tell me if it feels better.”

“Uuuuhm.”

“Put your feet up on the sofa. Here, let me.” My legs are gently lifted onto the settee and the delicious pressure on my breasts continues—my breasts? Oh well, I suppose he knows what he is doing. The room is so warm that I can barely keep awake. And talking of “barely”, don’t I feel supple fingers tweaking my naked flesh? If I was not certain that I would never allow such a thing to happen 1 would swear that my nipples had been exposed.

“That’s better, isn’t it?”

“Uuuuuuuuhhhhmm.”

Amazing the tricks that your imagination can play when you are practically asleep. I can actually hear the sound of clothing being removed. I stretch out my hand and feel—oh, yes. Now I know I must be dreaming.

“Is that nice?” murmurs Robert from somewhere inches deep in my subconscious.

“Uuuuuuuuhhhmm!” I murmur. “Absolutely uuuuu uuuuuuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmmm ! ! ! !”

CHAPTER 6

I must have been very tired because it is twenty to eleven before I wake up again. I hardly have time to thank Robert for his hospitality and the comfortable settee before I am racing back to the nurses home. Whatever happens I must get there before the door is locked. The thought of having to endure what Penny went through is too horrible to dwell on.

“Your friend still out?” G.B.H.’s ugly mug settles into an expectant leer as he leaps towards the door.

“She had an early night,” I say, savouring the look of misery that spreads across the dirty old devil’s face.

To my surprise, Penny is awake when I pant into our room. She looks me up and down and smiles. “Is that display of exhaustion solely as a result of climbing up the stairs?”

I smile sheepishly. “You probably won’t believe this but I fell asleep.”

“I find that very easy to believe. After the tonk-bonking I took from that white spade I felt pretty tired myself.”

I shake my head and start getting ready for bed. “You don’t understand, Penny. I fell asleep before anything happened. I must have been completely exhausted.”

Penny continues to smile and gazes pointedly at my panties. “Interesting. How come your knickers are on inside out?”

“What?”

“When you went out they said ‘Chase me Charley, I’m the last bus home’ or something like that. I noticed particularly. Now they say ‘YADSENDEW’.”

What is she talking about? “Yadsendew”? I don’t have any Chinese panties. I have the ones with the days of the week on them that Geoffrey gave me but— then it dawns on me: ‘yadsendew’ is Wednesday spelt backwards. Oh dear, I do have my panties on inside out. How could that have happened? I must have gone to the loo in my sleep—I mean, I must have gone to the toilet and forgotten all about it because I was so sleepy.

“Oh yes,” I say casually. “I expect it happened while I was spending a penny.”

Penny looked puzzled. “Do you usually take your knickers off when you spend a penny?”

“It depends on what kind of mood I’m in,” I say. “Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.”

Penny shakes her head. “Thank you, and goodnight. I’m going back to sleep. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

Penny turns her back on me and burrows into the pillows and I finish undressing and get into bed. It is as I am switching off the lamp that an unpleasant thought occurs to me. Is it possible that I could have been tampered with while I was asleep? I hardly like to think about it but the opportunity was there for someone unscrupulous enough to take it. Robert seemed such a gentleman but he had made love to Penny the previous evening. Perhaps he thought I was the same kind of girl. We did not have a lot of time to talk to each other.

Anyhow, it can’t be helped and the main thing is that if anything happened it did so without my knowledge or consent. My virtue is still intact. Cheered by this thought, I fall into a deep and contented sleep.

In the following days we divide our time between ward service and attending lectures.

The lectures include such subjects as Anatomy, Hygiene, Nursing and Physiology and I soon realise that any State Registered Nurse must know as much about sewage and activated sludge as the average plumber. Certainly a knowledge of sewers would be a help when looking into the minds of some of the patients on Everard Hornbeam but I would have expected this to be covered under the heading of psychology. Our nursing lectures take the form of winding hundreds of miles of bandages round each other and Sister. Tutor goes spare when we successfully lash one of the class to a chair so that she cannot move.

Some of the girls take it very seriously but Penny breezes through as if she does not have a care in the world—which of course she hasn’t. She calls us “The Bistoury Kids” and when asked by Sister Tutor why she is late for a lecture says that she got stuck in the service lift. She is also completely nuts. When S.T.—this is Penny’s name for Sister Tutor and stands for—well, you can guess what it stands for—starts talking about cells, Penny says “Stone walls do not a prison make nor iron bars a minute living organism consisting of a nucleus and protoplasm enclosed in a stroma or envelope.” She is mad, I tell you. Stark raving mad. Despite all the technical knowledge I am being exposed to, I still spend my time on Everard Hornbeam preparing diabetic feeds and checking the linen cupboard. I have yet to pluck a patient from the brink of death in typical Doctor Eradlik fashion. Mr Arkwright continues to try and play “naughty nanas” with me and I make tactful inquiries concerning his longevity. I am told that he is as well as can be expected which does not help very much.

Taking Mr Arkwright’s pulse is always a problem unless you hold both wrists at once and this can prove confusing. I can also think of places other than his mouth in which I would like to stick a thermometer. Not that he is a bad old stick and it is nice to know that someone fancies you. I am very choked that Doctor Flash—I mean, Fishlock does not follow up our first meeting. He is probably frightened that I am going to fall asleep again. If only I had not been so tired. He does not keep in touch with Penny either and she says that he only makes a play for pros. I am a bit unhappy about this until I realise that she means probationers.

My favourite times on the ward are visiting hours, both because they provide a breathing space and because I like matching the crowds milling outside the wards to the patients they have come to visit. Sister Bradley hates visiting hours because they make her ward untidy. I feel that she would like to be dashing around with a tin of furniture polish removing each scuff mark as it occurs.

At five to six you can stand in the ward and see the faces pressed against the glass potholes in the closed doors like gold fish waiting for ants eggs. Sticky babies are being held up and tiny hands wave aimlessly.

“Stand by for the stampede” says Nurse Wilson, grimly.

“Spittoon mugs away, please, Mr Chapman,” says Nurse Martin sweetly.

“Will somebody please wipe this locker. It’s got orange juice all over it,” says Sister, severely. “Sit up straight, Mr Homer. You don’t want your daughter to think there’s something wrong with you, do you?”

“Bless the lord for sparing me for this day,” says Mr Buchanan who is being discharged on Monday. “It just proves that faith can move mountains.”

“So can Senokot,” says Staff Wood who is not big on sentiment.

“Have a wine gum, Nurse,” whispers Mr Evans. “They’re not habit forming.”

“You are naughty, Mr Evans. You know you’re not allowed sweets.” I do not have time to say any more before Sister looks at her watch and nods at Staff Wood. Staff Wood raises an eyebrow to Nurse Wilson and Nurse Wilson inclines her head towards Nurse Martin. Now comes Nurse Martin’s biggest moment of the day. “Open the doors, Nurse,” she says to me.

There is a ripple of excitement and I step forward and release the bolt. Nurse Wilson has suggested running a book on the first three patients to be touched by a relative but I think you would need a camera to separate them. They come through the door like the Grand National field and I am nearly squashed against the wall.

Mr Chapman is a thin old man whose skin is stretched over his bones like paper over the fuselage of a model aeroplane and I am surprised to see him approached by a big-busted beauty wearing a suit that looks as if it was borrowed from her kid sister.

I had thought that she must be the property of Jim North the ward wit. Jim is the youngest patient on the ward by ten years and spends his time combing his hair and making scandalous jokes. Nurse Wilson is rumoured to be bonkers about an Indian houseman called Singh and Jim is determined to squeeze every last ounce of amusement out of the situation. “Do you know what Nurse Wilson’s favourite song is?” He says. “‘Singh went the strings of my heart.’ She can’t help singhing it everywhere she goes. Do you get it? ‘Singhing it.’” Mr Chapman usually nods slowly and reaches for his head phones.

Jim once confided to me that he had an audition for Opportunity Knocks. “It was won by a soprano from Leeds with big tits” he says. “Opportunity Knockers, that’s what I called her.”

Mr Chapman’s visitor turns out to be his daughter who is a dancer. Nobody ever finds out what kind and when Nurse Martin suggests ballet, Staff Wood sniffs and says that she thinks it is bally unlikely. It is the first joke that any one can remember her making.

Jim North has to make do with his Mum and Dad and a younger sister who brings a bunch of grapes every time she comes and leaves with a bag full of pips. I don’t think Jim ever has one of them.

Sweet-toothed Mr Evans always has too many visitors round his bed and all of them are passing him boxes of Maltesers and bars of chocolate. Whether they do it because they love him or they want to kill him, I don’t know.

Mr Buchanan only has one visitor. An enormous woman who seems to surround him as she sits beside his bed and listens to him twittering on. “Funny how it’s going to be Guy Fawkes night, soon. I never thought I’d be spared to see another firework. I remember when I had that turn on the Summer Bank Holiday. I said to myself, Ernest, I said—”

“I’ll bring your suit in on Monday morning.” The woman’s voice does not contain a hint of enthusiasm. I think she believes, like the rest of us, that Mr Buchanan is going to live for ever.

Whether he does or not I never begin to find out because he is discharged on Monday as planned. He insists on shaking hands with everyone and winces at every squeeze. “Never thought I’d go out of here on my pins,” he says. “Still, I expect they need the beds. When you get to my age you can’t expect people to have a lot of time for you. It’s all youth these days, isn’t it? I just hope I won’t be back here too soon, getting under everyone’s feet.”

“So do I,” mutters Staff Wood. “He won’t last long if he gets under mine.” Staff Wood has very large feet and I know what she means.

My month’s probation is up almost before I have realised it and when I am told that Matron wants to see me, I wonder what she can want.

“Well, Nixon,” she says when I knock timidly and obey her bark to go in. “Reports I have received suggest that you are a willing gel. Not exactly one of the brightest stars in the infirmament—” she pauses and looks at me hopefully. What does she expect me to do? “—but no matter, there’s plenty of time. Sign here.”

She pushes a piece of paper towards me and I suddenly realise that I am on the permanent staff. Now it is a month’s notice on either side. I am so chuffed at having been accepted that I sign without seriously considering whether or not I want to continue.