“I came as soon as I could, which is much earlier than it might have been in the circumstances, my alabaster princess.”
“What were the circumstances?” I ask.
“The Patron’s Dinner. Jasus, I’ve never seen such a geriatrics’ picnic. Most of the old buggers who give money to this outfit must be lining themselves up with a place to die in. I only stayed because it would have been insulting to leave so much liquor.”
“You can’t have left much by the look of you.”
“Oh, Rosie. You’re a sharp tongued wench and that’s no mistake. I creep away for a little succour and you treat me like this.”
“You should have crept back to bed. You’re not fit to be on duty. You could be struck off if Sister came along.”
“I can’t let the lads down. They’ve stood up for me—I mean, stood in for me for long enough as it is.”
“It looks as if they will have to stand up for you.” Shameless staggers to his feet and for a moment I think he is going to keel over. He shakes his head a couple of times and sits down again—at least, one half of his bottom does.
“There you go again. I come to lay my fevered brow on your milk-white breasts and you’re all petulant with me. It’s your duty as a nurse to respond to my demands. Come and make love to me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t leave the patients.”
“Don’t worry about them. They’re all chronic malingerers.”
“All the more reason why I shouldn’t leave them.” I must read the patients’ records more carefully. I can’t remember anything about Malingerer.
Shameless lays his head on the table and stares up at me. “If I told you I was hopelessly and madly in love with you, you probably wouldn’t believe me?”
“No.”
“Well I am. I want to bury myself in you until I feel myself running away like bath water. I want to pull your tight little buttocks to me until I feel them fluttering like imprisoned wrens.” What a way to go on! I have never heard such language. Certainly, Geoffrey never said things like that. “I’d sentence each rosebud nipple to a thousand snake-tongued jabs. I’d ride you through the night like a wild mare fleeing through a forest fire, pink tongues of flame licking your gleaming flanks, the night owl’s shrieks shriving your broken moans.”
It is awful. I am shivering with embarrassment. If all Irishmen are like this it is a wonder that any of the motorways ever get built. “Shameless! You must go. Supposing someone comes?”
“Don’t say things like that. You inflame me.” He makes a grab at me and my reading lamp clatters to the floor.
“Don’t be a fool, Shameless. Go to bed. I’ll ring the senior house surgeon.”
“I want your body, Nurse.”
MacSweeney’s voice is rising and already a couple of patients are beginning to stir. I walk out of the ward into the imagined safety of the hall that leads to the corridor.
“You’re waking the patients, Doctor MacSweeney. If you don’t go I’ll have to call someone.”
“There’s only the consultants and you’re not allowed to call them unless Matron is being raped which is impossible.”
Shameless seizes me by the shoulders and I realise how strong he is. If he wanted to he could probably take me by force. Crikey! How horrible.
“How can you send me away when you know how I feel about you? Have you no heart? Jasus, a man could drown on those lips.” Shameless presses me back against a door and we are suddenly inside one of the private rooms. Fortunately it is empty—cancel that statement! Unfortunately it is empty. “This is where we belong,” husks the great drunken mick. “Let me assist you to remove those drab threads of neutered cotton that bar the natural expression of my feelings.”
I realise he means my panties when his hands disappear up my uniform. Thank goodness I am proof against his wild Irish blarney and rough celtic romanticism. Some girls might not be so firm. Some might even respond to his powerful, hairy wrists scuffing the inside of their thighs, the raw drink-sodden warmth of his lips invading their mouths, the hard—“Take that obscenity off. I want to see your tits.”
He is so coarse! Breasts would be bad enough, or even boobs—but, “tits”. Really! “Take it off, I said!” He reaches out and rips my blouse open so that my watch flies across the room and my apron flops down to my waiSt “You fantastic mammal!” His hands plunder my breasts and push me back onto the bed.
This is terrible! I am going to be raped—and by a doctor, too. At any second he is going to tear open his flies and attack me with his purple-headed bed snake. I will scream and fight until there is not a breath left in my body but it will do no good. He will rip aside the thin curtain of material that shields my reception area and thrust his hideous weapon deep into my defenceless body! It is too horrible to think about.
“Rosie! Quick! Matron’s coming!”
“Uuuuurgh.” No sooner has Labby stuck her head round the door than Shameless slumps to the floor, out like a light—or, more appropriately, a case of light.
“He was drunk. It was awful,” I explain.
“It’s going to be even more awful when Matron gets here.”
“What are we going to do?”
In the circumstance it is not surprising that there is a slight edge to my voice. My uniform torn down to my waist and a large heap of doctor at my feet.
“Get him under the bed.”
I don’t know if you have ever attempted to move a paralytically drunk fourteen stone Irishman but it is like trying to push a rolled up Persian carpet through a letter box. It is only when Labby accidentally squeezes Shameless’s balls and he cracks his head sharply on the edge of the bed that our job gets easier.
He has just disappeared from sight when I hear footsteps approaching down the corridor. I look around desperately for somewhere to hide but the only place is that occupied by Doctor MacSweeney.
“Get under the bed!”
“There isn’t room.”
“Hurry up!”
“Help me move the bed.”
We tug the bed away from the wall and it is possible for me to slide under it until I am jammed face to face against the boozed Shameless. He smells like a smash and grab raid in a distillery. No sooner am I uncomfortably wedged against his body than I hear the door open.
“Good evening, Nurse – hic.”
“Good evening, Matron.” The degree of surprise that Labby manages to get into her voice is well up to Chingford Rep. standards.
“I thought I’d have a look round on my way back from the—hic dinner. Oh dear, I seem to have got the hiccups. Could you get me a glass of water?”
“Of course, Matron. Would you like to come into Sister’s office?” Yes, push off into Sister’s office, fatso, my nerves can’t take much more.
“No, I think I’ll sit down here for a—hic minute. It’s been a very exhausting evening.” It hasn’t been so great for the rest of us I think to myself. There is a disturbing chatty edge to Matron’s voice that I have not heard before. She does not sound drunk as much as relaxed and expansive. Her ample weight descends on the springs, and my head is dangerously close to becoming sandwich filling. I have just dared to start breathing again when I feel a hand gently running up the inside of my leg. Oh no! This is too awful. I can’t move my