Anne Bennett - To Have and To Hold

‘Let me see what you’ve done,’ Carmel demanded. ‘Your keep talking about it and it is my hair.’

‘It’s lovely,’ Jane said, as Lois went for the mirror. ‘Truly lovely. You lucky thing.’

Carmel looked at her reflection and couldn’t help but be pleased at what she saw. As the waves had been shorn, it had taken the weight from the head so the rest had sprung into curls that encircled her head and framed her face. The result was very pleasing indeed.

Carmel had never been encouraged to think of herself as pretty or desirable. She had neither the money, clothes nor even the time to make the best of herself, so until she arrived here she had never thought much about her appearance at all.

But now she saw that the face reflected in the glass looked quite pretty, and much of that was because she was smiling.

‘You have done a wonderful job,’ she said to Lois, full of admiration. ‘I look a different person.’

‘Yeah, but just as stunning,’ Jane commented glumly. ‘What chance have we got of attracting the chaps when you look like you do?’

‘You have a free playing field as far as chaps go,’ Carmel told her. ‘For as I said, I want no truck with any of them.’

‘You didn’t mean it, though, did you?’ Sylvia said. ‘I mean, we’ve all said that in the past when we have been let down or something, but it doesn’t last.’

‘Believe me, this is more deep-seated than that,’ Carmel said. ‘And I have never gone out with a either a man or a boy to give them any opportunity to let me down.’

‘Never?’ Jane and Sylvia said, incredulous and in unison.

‘Nor have I,’ Lois admitted. ‘Mummy would never have allowed it. I was barely allowed to leave the house for any reason.’

‘Oh, I see we shall have to take you two in hand,’ Jane said. ‘For neither of you knows what you have been missing.’

‘That’s right,’ Sylvia said. ‘You’d better believe it. We are going to teach the pair of you to live.’

‘I told you—’ Carmel began.

‘Shut up,’ Jane said. ‘We’re not talking fellows here, we are talking about girls having fun.’

‘Oh, well, in that case…’

‘How else will we be able to withstand the dreaded matron?’ Jane remarked.

‘Oh, how indeed?’ Carmel agreed with a smile, and the girls burst into laughter.

Carmel knew from talking to others that she was one of the few there who had left school at the statuary leaving age of fourteen and was not kept on till sixteen, or even later. Despite the excellent tuition from Sister Frances that had enabled her to pass the exam, she worried that she wouldn’t be able to understand the classes and would make an utter fool of herself.

However, she saw much of what she was taught was common sense and she enjoyed the first six weeks, despite the long hours. The working day began at 7.15 a.m. and didn’t end until 8.30 p.m. Anatomy, Physiology and Hygiene were taken by a sister tutor in the lecture room. Senior doctors used the same room to teach the theory of nursing in their specialist subjects, and so the students learned about ear, nose and throat problems, ophthalmics, gynaecology, midwifery, paediatrics and how to care for post-operative patients. They had many visits to the wards to observe what they had been told about in action.

They visited a sewage farm too, in order, Carmel supposed, to see the benefits of cleanliness in the hospital and for a similar reason they went another day to Cadbury’s to view their ventilation system. The place Carmel liked most, though, was Oozels Street, where they had cookery classes so they could manage the special diets some patients might have.

Both because of fatigue and lack of funds, most girls tended to stay close to the hospital during their free time in the early weeks, despite their proximity to the city centre. There was nothing more frustrating, Carmel thought, than looking into shops when a person hadn’t a penny piece to spare to buy anything, or smelling the tantalising aroma seeping out from the coffee houses when there wasn’t the money to sample a cup. Most of the girls were in the same boat, though some, like Lois, had an allowance, but she didn’t make a song and dance about this.

The Hospital was well aware of this, and organised whist and beetle drives for the girls, and they were promised a dance nearer to Christmas. They often met up in the common room to chat or play dominoes or cards. Carmel hadn’t a clue at first, but she quickly caught on and was soon a dab hand at rummy or brag. Often the four friends would just go back to their room, Carmel and Lois feeling incredibly fast as they experimented with some of the cosmetics that Jane and Sylvia had or tried out different hairstyles on one another.

Sometimes they would just chat together. It was soon apparent to the others that though they would talk freely about their families, Carmel never mentioned anything about hers and she neatly side-stepped direct questions. They knew she wrote dutifully to her mother every week for she had told them that much, and to the nun Sister Frances, whom she seemed so fond of. She received regular replies, but never commented about anything in the letters.

As far as Carmel was concerned, her life began when she entered the nurses’ home. Despite her lack of money, a state that she was well used to anyway, she was very happy, and couldn’t remember a time when she had felt so contented. Warmed by the true friendship of the other three girls, she didn’t want to be reminded of the degradation of her slum of a home, and certainly didn’t want to discuss it with anyone else.

In fact, she often found it difficult to find things to write to her mother about. Sometimes the letters centred around the church she now attended, St Chad’s Cathedral. She wasn’t the only Catholic studying at the hospital, although she was the only one in the first year, and they all had dispensation to attend Mass on Sundays. Fortunately St Chad’s was only yards from the home, on Bath Street, which was at the top of Whittall Street. The first time that Carmel saw it she was impressed by the grandeur of the place, though she had to own that for a cathedral it wasn’t that big, and very narrow, built of red brick with two blue spires.

She had made herself known to the parish priest, Father Donahue, but he already knew more about her than she realised. St Chad’s Hospital was primarily a hospital for sick or elderly Catholic woman and Father Donahue called there regularly to hear confession, administer communion, tend or give last rites to the very sick or dying and sometimes took Mass in the chapel for the nuns and those able to leave their beds.

The four nuns who had travelled to Birmingham with Carmel had told the priest all about her and the type of home she had come from. Father Donahue never mentioned this to Carmel, but it gave him a special interest in the girl and he always had a cheery word for her. She would write and tell her mother this, and about the nuns in the convent that she visited as often as she could and who always made her very welcome.

Eve’s replies told Carmel of her father still raging over what he called ‘her deception’. Carmel knew what form that raging would take and that her mother would bear the brunt of it. She would hardly wish to share that with anyone, or what her deprived siblings were doing and the gossip of the small town she was no longer interested in.

One Sunday morning, as Lois watched Carmel get ready for Mass, she suddenly said, ‘My Uncle Jeff is a Catholic.’

‘How can he be? You’re not.’

‘No. He’s married to Dad’s sister, my Aunt Emma, and she turned Catholic to please Jeff. The boys have been brought up Catholic too—the dishy Paul and annoying Matthew.’