Lady Crediton was what I call a battleaxe. She looked at me and did not entirely approve of my appearance although I was doing my best to look demure. Her appearance was entirely forbidding — or it would have been to anyone less experienced than I was. I thought to myself: Well, Dr. Elgin has recommended me and I’m here and they want a nurse, so at least they’ll have to give me a chance to prove my worth. (And I was going to prove it for I found Castle Crediton much to my taste.) The place had appealed to me as soon as I heard of it, and when I learned that there was the possibility of working there, I was elated. Besides, I don’t want to be too far from Anna.

“So, Nurse Loman, you have joined our household.” She spoke precisely in a rather gruff masculine voice. I could understand the husband seeking consolation elsewhere. She was clearly a very worthy person, almost always right and taking care that those about her realized it. Creditable, but very uncomfortable to live with.

“Yes, Lady Crediton. Dr. Elgin has given me particulars of my patient.”

Her ladyship’s mouth was a little grim, from which I gathered the patient is no favorite of hers. Or does she despise all patients because they haven’t earned her obvious ruddy health?

“I am glad that he has given you some indication of how we are placed here. Captain and Mrs. Stretton have their own apartments here. The Captain is not in residence at the time, but Mrs. Stretton and her son, with their servants occupy the east wing. But although this is so, Nurse Loman, I myself am … shall we say the Chatelaine of the Castle, and as such what happens in all parts of it is my concern.”

I bowed my head.

“If you have any complaints, any difficulties, anything you wish to be explained — apart from ordinary domestic matters, of course — I must ask you to see me.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“Your patient is in a way a foreigner; her ways may not always be like ours. You may find certain difficulties. I shall expect you to report anything unusual to me.”

It was becoming rather mysterious and I must have looked puzzled for she said: “Dr. Elgin tells me that you are extremely efficient.”

“That was kind of him.”

“You have been nursing at the Queen’s House and were involved in that unfortunate occurrence. I met Miss Brett once when I allowed her to have an escritoire for which I had no use. She gave me the impression that she was a very precise and efficient woman.”

“She was,” I said.

“It seems very odd, that affair.”

“She changed a great deal when she became crippled; she suffered much pain.”

Lady Crediton nodded. “It was most unfortunate, Nurse Loman, and I will tell you frankly that I did consider whether I should be wise to employ someone who had been involved in such an unsavory affair.”

She was one of those women who would call her own outspokenness frankness and that of other people rudeness. I knew the type. Rich old women very often who had had too much of their own way for too long.

I decided to be affronted. I rose and said: “I have no wish to discountenance you, Lady Crediton. If you feel that having nursed Miss Brett you would rather I did not nurse your … your patient, I would not wish to remain.”

“You’re hasty,” she said. “Not a good quality for a nurse.”

“I must beg to contradict you. I spoke with no haste. However much I considered your remarks I should still say that if you would prefer me to go I should prefer to do so.”

“If I had not preferred that you stay I should not have asked you to come here in the first place.”

I bowed my head again. First round to me, I thought.

“I merely want to tell you that I deplore the unpleasantness of what happened to Miss Brett and it is impossible to be involved in such unpleasantness without being connected with it.”

“If one is involved one must necessarily be connected, Lady Crediton.”

Oh yes, I was scoring fast; but I sensed I was only doing so because she was trying to tell me something and did not know how to. She need not have worried. I understood. She did not like “the patient”; there was something strange about “the patient.” Something wild perhaps which might involve her in some “unpleasantness.” This was growing interesting.

I went on boldly: “One of the qualifications of a person in my position is discretion. I do not think Dr. Elgin would have recommended me to this case if he had not believed I possessed that quality.”

“You may find Mrs. Stretton a little … hysterical. Dr. Elgin will have told you what is wrong with her.”

“He mentioned some lung complaint with asthma.”

She nodded. And I realized that she accepted me. I thought she liked someone to stand up to her and I had done exactly that. I had her approval as the patient’s nurse.

“I daresay,” she said, “that you would wish to see your patient.”

I said I thought that would be desirable.

“Your bags …”

“Were brought into the hall.”

“They will be taken to your room. Ring the bell please, Nurse Loman.”

I did so and we waited in silence for the call to be answered. “Baines,” she said when it was, “pray take Nurse Loman to Mrs. Stretton. Unless you would prefer to go first to your room, Nurse?”

“I think I should like to see my patient first,” I said.

She inclined her head and we went out; I could feel her eyes following me.

We went through a maze of corridors and up little flights of circular stairs — stone some of them and worn in the middle — fake I thought. Stone doesn’t wear away in the space of fifty years. But I found it fascinating. A house pretending to be what it was not. That made it very human to my mind.

Then we went into the Stretton apartments, high up in one of the towers, I guessed.

“Mrs. Stretton will be resting,” said the manservant hesitantly.

I said, “Take me to her.”

He knocked at a door; a muffled sulky voice said: “Who’s there?”

“It’s Nurse Loman who’s come, madam,” said the servant.

There was no answer so he opened the door and I went in. In my profession we take the initiative. I said to him: “That’s all right. Leave me with my patient.”

There were Venetian blinds at the windows and the slats had been set to let in the minimum of light. She was lying on the bed, thick dark hair hanging loose, in a purple robe with scarlet trimming. She looked like a tropical bird.

“Mrs. Stretton?” I said.

“You are the nurse,” she said, speaking slowly. I thought: What nationality? I hazarded some sort of half-caste. Perhaps Polynesian, Creole.

“Yes, come to look after you. How dark it is in here. We’ll have a little light.” I went to the nearest window and drew up the blind.

She put a hand over her eyes.

“That’s better,” I said firmly. I sat down by the bed. “I want to talk to you.”

She looked at me rather sullenly. A sultry beauty she must have been when she was well.

“Dr. Elgin has suggested that you need a nurse.”

“That’s no good,” she said.

“Dr. Elgin thinks so, and we shall see, shan’t we?”

We took measure of each other. The high flush in the cheeks, the unnatural brightness of the eyes, bore out what Dr. Elgin had told me of her. She was consumptive and the attacks of asthma must be alarming when they occurred. But I was interested in her more as a person than a sick woman because she was the wife of Anna’s Captain and I wondered why he had married her and how it had all come about. I should discover in due course, I had no doubt.

“It’s too cold here,” she said. “I hate the cold.”

“You need fresh air. And we must watch your diet. Dr. Elgin visits you frequently, I suppose.”

“Twice a week,” she said.

She closed her eyes; quiet, sullen, and yet smoldering. I was aware that she could be far from quiet.

“Dr. Elgin is working out a diet chart for you. We shall have to see about getting you well,” I said in my bright nurse’s voice.

She turned her face away.

“Well,” I went on, “now that we’ve met I’ll go to my room. I daresay it is close to yours.”

“It’s the next to it.”

“Ah, good. I can find my way there then without bothering anyone.”

I went out of the room and into the next one. I knew it was mine because my bags were there. The shape of it indicated that it was part of the tower. I went to the window which was really a door — of the french window type — opening onto a balcony or rather a parapet. Anachronism, I thought. I must ask Anna. What a view from the parapet — the deep gorge and the river below and on the other side the houses of Langmouth.

I unpacked my bags and as I did so the door was cautiously opened and a small face peered round at me. It was a boy of about seven. He said: “Hello. You’re a nurse.”

“That’s right,” I replied. “How do you know?”

“They said so.”

“Who are you?”

“I’m Edward.”

“How do you do, Edward.” I put out my hand and he shook it gravely.

“Nurses come for ill people,” he told me.

“And make them well,” I added.

His enormous dark eyes regarded me as though I were some goddess.

“You’re clever,” he said.

“Very,” I admitted.

“Can you do twice one are two?”

“Twice two are four. Twice three are six,” I told him.

He laughed. “And a, b, c?”

I went through the alphabet with great speed. I had impressed him.

“Are those your clothes?” I told him they were. “Have you medicines for making people die?”

I was taken aback. “Like the furniture lady,” he added.

He was sharp; I could see that. I said quickly: “Only for making people well.”

“But …” he began; then he was alert.

“Master Edward,” called a voice.

He looked at me and hunched his shoulders; he put his fingers to his lips.

“Master Edward.”

We were both silent, but he had left my door open and his governess came in. She was tall, angular, and wore a most unbecoming gray blouse with a brown skirt — hideous combination; her hair was gray too, so was her skin.

“Oh,” she said, “you’re the new nurse. I hope Edward has not been annoying you.”

“Entertaining me rather.”

“He is really far too precocious.”

She had rabbity teeth and rabbity eyes. We took an instant dislike to each other.

“Come along, Edward,” she said. “You must not disturb your Mamma.”

“His Mamma is my patient, I believe,” I said.

She nodded.

“I shall soon learn my way around,” I added.

“You’ve just come from the Queen’s House.” Her eyes were alert. Young Edward looked from one to the other of us.

“My last case was there.”

“H’m.” She looked at the child, and I thought: How gossip spread! And thought of Anna and the horrible things which had been said about her. They were even inclined to regard me with some sort of suspicion; how much more so they would have regarded Anna!

She sighed. She dared not talk in front of the child. I wished he was not there so that I could discover more, but I had plenty of time.

She took him away and while I unpacked, a parlormaid brought tea to my room. Baines came with her ostensibly to see that she served it in the correct manner but actually to inform me that my meals would be taken in my own room. I realized that this was an edict from Lady Crediton and that he only ventured into this part of the house to deliver such commands.

I was beginning to learn something about the ways of Castle Crediton.


April 30th. This is my third day and I feel as though I have been here for months. I miss Anna. There is no one here with whom I can be friendly. If Miss Beddoes, the governess, were a different type, she might be useful, but she’s a bore, always anxious to impress on me that she has come down in the world. A vicar’s daughter, she told me. I said: “Snap. So am I.” She looked startled. I’m sure she was surprised that one so lacking in decorum should have come out of a vicarage. “What can one do,” she demanded. “One has never been brought up to work for a living, and suddenly it is a necessity.”

“Ah,” I replied, “that’s where I was more fortunate. I knew from my earliest days that I should have to battle for my bread in a cruel world, so I prepared myself.”

“Really,” she replied with cold disdain. But she does regard me a little more kindly since we both came from similar stables, or as she would say, were “distressed gentlewomen.”