‘We hope that everything fits,’ said Juffrouw Fiske. ‘You are small, are you not?’ She smiled widely. ‘We are quite often big girls. Someone will come and take you to your dinner at twelve o’clock, Miss Hawkins, and I hope that you will be happy with us.’
Nice people, decided Lavinia, busily unpacking. She had already decided that she was going to like the new job—she would like it even better when she had a home of her own and Peta with her. Of course, she still had to meet the people she was to work with, but if they were half as nice as those she had met already, she felt she need have no fears about getting on with them.
The uniform fitted very well. She perched the stiff little cap on top of her tidy topknot and sat down to wait for whoever was to fetch her.
It was a big, well-built girl, with ash blonde hair and a merry face. She shook hands with enthusiasm and said: ‘Neeltje Haagsma.’
For a moment Lavinia wondered if she was being asked how she did in Dutch, but the girl put her right at once. ‘My name—we shake hands and say our names when we meet—that is simple, is it not?’
Lavinia nodded. ‘Lavinia Hawkins. Do I call you juffrouw?’
Neeltje pealed with laughter. ‘No, no—you will call me Neeltje and I will call you Lavinia, only you must call the Hoofd Zuster, Zuster Smid.’
‘And the doctors?’ They were making for the stairs.
‘Doctor—easy, is it not? and chirurgen—surgeon, is it not?—you will call them Mister this or Mister that.’
Not so foreign after all, Lavinia concluded happily, and then was forced to change her mind when they entered an enormous room, packed with nurses sitting at large tables eating their dinner and all talking at the tops of their voices in Dutch.
But it wasn’t too bad after all. Neeltje sat her down, introduced her rapidly and left her to shake hands all round, while she went to get their meal; meat balls, a variety of vegetables and a great many potatoes. Lavinia, who was hungry, ate the lot, followed it with a bowl of custard, and then, over coffee, did her best to answer the questions being put to her. It was an agreeable surprise to find that most of her companions spoke such good English and were so friendly.
‘Are there any other English nurses here?’ she wanted to know.
Neeltje shook her head. ‘You are the first—there are to be more, but not for some weeks. And now we must go to our work.’
The hospital might be old, but the theatre block was magnificently modern. Lavinia, whisked along by her friendly companion, peered about her and wished that she could tell Peta all about it; she would have to write a letter as soon as possible. But soon, caught up in the familiar routine, she had no time to think about anything or anyone other than her work. It was, as the Directrice had told her, a short list, and the technique was almost exactly the same as it had been in her own hospital, although now and again she was reminded that it wasn’t quite the same—the murmur of voices, speaking a strange language, even though everyone there addressed her in English.
Before the list had started, Zuster Smid had introduced her to the surgeon who was taking the list, his registrar and his houseman, as well as the three nurses who were on duty. She had forgotten their names, which was awkward, but at least she knew what she was doing around theatre. Zuster Smid had watched her closely for quite a while and then had relaxed. Lavinia, while not much to look at, was competent at her job; it would take more than working in strange surroundings to make her less than that.
The afternoon came to an end, the theatre was readied once more for the morning’s work or any emergency which might be sent up during the night, and shepherded by the other girls, she went down to her supper and after that she was swept along to Neeltje’s room with half a dozen other girls, to drink coffee and gossip—she might have been back at Jerrold’s. She stifled a sudden pang of homesickness, telling herself that she was tired—as indeed she was, for no sooner had she put her head on her pillow than she was asleep.
It was on her third day, at the end of a busy morning’s list, that she was asked to go up to the next floor with a specimen for section. The Path. Lab. usually sent an assistant down to collect these, but this morning, for some reason, there was no one to send and Lavinia, not scrubbed, and nearest to take the receiver with the offending object to be investigated, slid out of the theatre with it, divested herself of her gown and over-shoes and made her way swiftly up the stairs outside the theatre unit.
The Path. Lab. was large—owing, she had been told, to the fact that Professor ter Bavinck, who was the head of it, was justly famed for his brilliant work. Other, smaller hospitals sent a constant stream of work and he was frequently invited to other countries in order to give his learned opinion on some pathological problem. Neeltje had related this in a reverent voice tinged with awe, and Lavinia had concluded that the professor was an object of veneration in the hospital; possibly he had a white beard.
She pushed open the heavy glass doors in front of her and found herself in a vast room, brightly lighted and full of equipment which she knew of, but never quite understood. There were a number of men sitting at their benches, far too busy to take any notice of her, so she walked past them to the end of the room where there was a door with the professor’s name on it; presumably this was where one went. But when she knocked, no one answered, so she turned her back on it and looked round the room.
One man drew her attention at once, and he was sitting with his back to her, looking through a microscope. It was the breadth of his shoulders which had caught her eye, and his pale as flax hair, heavily silvered. She wondered who he might be, but now wasn’t the time to indulge her interest.
She addressed the room in general in a quite loud voice. ‘Professor ter Bavinck? I’ve been sent from Theatre B with a specimen.’
The shoulders which had caught her eye gave an impatient shrug; without turning round a deep voice told her: ‘Put it down here, beside me, please, and then go away.’
Lavinia’s charming bosom swelled with indignation. What a way to talk, and who did he think he was, anyway? She advanced to his desk and laid the kidney dish silently at his elbow. ‘There you are, sir,’ she said with a decided snap, ‘and why on earth should you imagine I should want to stay?’
He lifted his head then to stare at her, and she found herself staring back at a remarkably handsome face; a high-bridged nose dominated it and the mouth beneath it was very firm, while the blue eyes studying her so intently were heavy-lidded and heavily browed. She was quite unprepared for his friendly smile and for the great size of him as he pushed back his chair and stood up, towering over her five feet four inches.
‘Ah, the English nurse—Miss Hawkins, is it not? In fact, I am sure,’ his smile was still friendly, ‘no nurse in the hospital would speak to me like that.’
Lavinia went a splendid pink and sought for something suitable to say to this. After a moment’s thought she decided that it was best to say nothing at all, so she closed her mouth firmly and met his eyes squarely. Perhaps she had been rude, but after all, he had asked for it. Her uneasy thoughts were interrupted by his voice, quite brisk now. ‘This specimen—a snap check, I presume—Mevrouw Vliet, the query mastectomy, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I’ll telephone down.’ He nodded at her in a kindly, uncle-ish way, said: ‘Run along,’ and turned away, the kidney dish on his hand. She heard him giving what she supposed to be instructions to one of his assistants as she went through the door.
She found herself thinking about him while they all waited for his report; the surgeon, his sterile gloved hands clasped before him, the rest of them ready to do exactly what he wanted when he said so. The message came very quickly. Lavinia wondered what the professor had thought when his sharp eyes had detected the cancer cells in the specimen,