A Cuppa Tea and an Aspirin (36 page)

The place was too neat, too quiet. It was not a hospital, so one would imagine that there would be some signs of normal residency. But no books or newspapers lay around, no picture postcards were pinned on walls adjacent to beds, such as he had seen in the homes of seagoing men. Nothing to suggest mental stimulus. He had not even seen a radio or a piano.

He had asked her if there was a sitting room where mobile patients might fraternise, but she had assured him that they were far too disabled to make use of such a place.

And there was no lift, so patients could not, without difficulty, walk very far – even if they could walk.

Some of the patients might be quite gifted, and, if given encouragement, might be able to play the piano for the other residents or get them together for a singsong or a game of cards. Something to
lighten their lives should have been a priority of the home owner.

It had not occurred to him, at first, that she was the owner, that it was in her financial interest to keep her staff minimal and beds full at all times, preferably with patients who would have little opportunity to complain. He had imagined her as managing the Home for a corporate owner.

Now, as he encouraged them to speak out, the patients had been carefully polite, though pointed, in their remarks.

He was amazed that these pathetic women – and most of them were women – who still had their mental faculties, had not had complete mental breakdowns.

It would not cost much to make them happier. If they had a home to go to, one or two could certainly be discharged.

He wondered what further discoveries he might make if Matron were not present. Getting rid of her was impossible, however, because he was supposed to be chaperoned. He could not very well even demand the help of a nursing aide instead of her, while she was available.

An ordinary visitor would, however, not be chaperoned.

It was this latter thought which, on his return
home, made him pick up his phone to talk to the pastor of the nearest church: he remembered from the records that over half of the patients were Protestants of one denomination or another; a minority were Roman Catholics.

The pastor was shocked at his descripton of the sterility of life in the home, and at the lack of physical therapy or mental stimulus.

‘And they are united in saying that the food is awful.'

‘I must say that I have never visited it,' admitted the pastor. ‘It is privately owned, you say? I do not usually go to such places unless invited.'

‘It's like a human warehouse,' the doctor told him passionately. ‘Some of those patients could be sent home. But it is obvious that they are afraid to speak up, and ask for what they need.

‘The six I have examined thoroughly had no bruises, thank God. But most of them are anaemic and some of them are, I believe, being forced to take sedatives.

‘I'm going to talk to the Ministry of Health; and I'll examine every single one of them within the next week or two, to see what can be done to help the poor souls in there.'

‘More strength to your arm,' responded the minister.

‘But they need someone to talk to freely, without the Matron listening in. Could you chance a snub from the owner, and go to see them?'

With some amusement at being asked to conspire with the doctor to get more information out of his patients, the pastor was at the same time a little worried about the breaking of the usual confidentiality between himself and his fellow believers.

He promised, however, that he would try to visit each one as a private person. ‘Many of them have probably got relations keeping an eye on them,' he warned.

‘As far as I can see, very, very few. But nobody minds a pastor visiting in a hospital, do they? Or a priest?'

‘No. I visit public hospitals regularly and talk with each patient. They seem to enjoy a visitor, and the nursing staff are very cooperative. Quite often they need spiritual help.'

‘Well, go for this, too. At worst, you could tell the Matron that I had asked you to visit all the Protestants. The woman can't very well object to a pastor being concerned with the spiritual welfare of her charges, can she? Keep a note for me of anything that you think I could help them with.'

‘OK. Would you like me to talk to Father Thomas for you? You said there were some Catholics there.'

‘Rather! I need all the help I can get. There's an old dear there called Connolly – I'm sure she would welcome a priest. She was so tense that she was clutching her rosary all the time Matron and I were seeing her.'

The doctor rang off. He leaned back in his chair to rest for a few minutes, before his evening surgery began.

While he sat looking at his loaded desk, he considered the Matron of the warehouse. She wasn't a wicked woman, he felt: she simply lacked any real warmth or compassion. She looked on her home as a business, say a boarding house, to be run efficiently and make money. She had probably imagined, when she began it, that visitors and relations would fill the emotional and social gaps.

When his wife brought him a cup of tea, he asked, ‘Where, in the name of God, could I get at least two wheelchairs, preferably electric, free?'

‘For free? Who for?' She sounded incredulous. She put the cup down in front of him.

‘Yes. And probably a piano, some radios, a television set, some packs of cards, some board games – and, most of all, friendly volunteer visitors – and good therapists. Maybe the National Health would provide a physiotherapist, though the patients are supposed to be beyond help.'

His wife looked at him aghast. ‘Gosh! Is it that place you called the warehouse, which you've been so worried about lately?'

‘Yes, I'm doing a very careful survey, and it's pitiful.'

‘Sounds as if you need Father Christmas.'

The doctor's wife saw the earnest appeal in her husband's tired eyes, the prematurely lined face, and she appreciated the tangle he was in.

Something had to be done. But say the wrong thing and he could be sued for libel: from what he had told her about the Matron, she sounded both shrewd and ruthless. He should never have agreed to take the job in the first place, dear fool.

Simply to cheer him up, she grinned mischievously, and promised, ‘I'll find out. There are hordes of charities in the city I can ask.'

‘Could you, love? It would be so worthwhile. There are probably other places, equally bad.'

‘Well, to be honest, now that Josh and Emelda are married, I really need something to do. It will give me an interest.'

‘It could be a lot of work,' he warned.

‘Let's talk about it in detail tomorrow, when you may not be quite so busy. I would need to know more about the place and to visit it myself.'

And so it was agreed.

And thus the word went round; she knew her Liverpool.

A small advertisement for a wheelchair for a woman who could not afford one produced five within a few days, most of their owners having departed for the cemetery.

In no time the doctor's wife had formed a small committee, consisting of a physiotherapist, Lavinia; a speech therapist, Edwina, and several other friends who had kindly volunteered. It was agreed that Lavinia and Edwina would visit the care Home and report back.

‘At least, we two can go as private visitors and take a look,' Edwina said, unaware that this willingness had drawn an approving smile from a Dear Lady.

1965

‘Well, I'm buggered!' exclaimed Martha to Sheila, after the pastor had called on them two days after the doctor's visit. She cackled with laughter. ‘Never in me life did I imagine I'd be talking to a Prottie sin-shifter!'

A dozing Sheila smiled vaguely. ‘He were nice, though,' she said with an effort. ‘And he can't help being a Prottie: he were probably born one.'

‘Oh, aye. Nice, he is. You saw how I told him I got out of bed after Angie finished with us last evening, and went for a little walk down the passage, though me poor knees creaked something awful. And I said how much I wished I had a walking stick.

‘And he said he got a spare and would bring it in if the doctor said I could walk. I can't get over it.'

‘Right.' Sheila made an effort to rouse herself. She felt so lethargic after the pills she was being forced to swallow each night that even Martha could not get any further response from her. She closed her eyes and was soon asleep again.

Two days later, for the same reason, she missed two ladies who tiptoed into the ward.

Downstairs, they had told Rosie, the cleaning lady, who had answered the door bell and had let them in, that they were visitors to see Mrs Connolly, first floor.

She had directed them up the fine mahogany staircase to Martha's room, and had then continued mopping the tiled floor of the entrance hall. After a moment, though, she stopped work. Should she have let them in? she worried: it was not her job and Matron might not like strangers coming in.

She hesitated. She knew that Matron was in the basement kitchen, talking to the cook.

She decided that she would do nothing: the ladies would probably leave within half an hour. Matron would never know about them. She resumed her mopping.

Matron, therefore, had no idea that her domain was being inspected.

Since they had never seen Martha, Edwina, speech
therapist, and Lavinia, physiotherapist, stopped by the first bed they came to, which smelled like a latrine. The person in it opened her eyes, stared bewilderedly at them and muttered inarticulately.

‘She said she's Florence,' explained the speech therapist. She smiled at the patient and nodded at her understandingly.

‘Mrs C can talk properly,' whispered the physio. They both smiled again at the incapacitated patient and then passed to the dementia victims tied by short ropes to their beds. On seeing strangers, they retreated to the length of their ropes and gibbered threats at the strangers.

Slowly, softly and distinctly the speech therapist replied gently to them. Nobody ever spoke to them like that, and, after looking at each other like frightened monkeys, they relapsed into surprised acceptance of their presence.

‘Who you wanting?' asked a harsh voice from the other side of the room.

They both jumped and turned. ‘Mrs Connolly?'

‘Oh aye, that's me. Come on over. Who are you?'

They approached a little shrimp in an untidy bed, the only untidy bed in the room.

No doubt about this one being able to talk. She was already saying, ‘One of you can sit on the
commode, and you bring that chair from the other side of Sheila's bed.' The shrimp pointed to a chair on the far side of the next bed. ‘It's nice to see yez.' She then inquired again, ‘Who are you?'

They explained that Dr Williams had said that she might like a visitor, so they had come.

The physiotherapist sat on the commode and hoped that she would not smell too badly when she left. She leaned over and put a small parcel in Martha's lap. ‘I'm Lavinia,' she said, ‘and this is Edwina.'

Martha bobbed her head in acknowledgement. This was proving to be quite an entertaining day, she decided. She looked down at the parcel.

‘It's for you,' Edwina assured her. ‘We thought you might enjoy a few chocolates.'

The pinched little face, surrounded by a loose mass of white hair, was turned slowly upon the two women. The light-blue, bloodshot eyes were filled with tears.

‘Well, I never! That's real nice of you.' Then Martha burst out with sudden confidence, ‘I haven't never had a present since I been here – nor a visitor till a few days back. A priest come – a Prottie. It were a real surprise.'

She paused to look down at the pretty box in her lap, and then said, ‘Can I open them?'

The parcel was unwrapped, the little box opened and, upon Martha's insistence, the visitors had a chocolate each pressed upon them. Martha felt that they were now her guests, and she beamed at them, as she popped a chocolate into her own toothless mouth, and slowly savoured the first one she had tasted for years.

She then put two chocolates down on the clean sheet beside her pillow. ‘Them's for Sheila when she wakes up,' she explained, and gestured towards the next bed.

‘That's very thoughtful of you,' praised Lavinia.

Both ladies were then inundated with an almost unbelievable story of how Sheila in the next bed had been given a pill each evening for the past four days. ‘Just because she spoke up and asked for her pocket money and then swore at the Matron when she didn't get it. She's sleepin' most of the time, poor dear.'

Feeling a little smug at being able to tell the tale to an outsider, Martha leaned back and folded her hands on her stomach. She said indignantly, ‘You can't hardly believe it, can you? She done no harm and she tried not to take the pills, but she were held down. And her with no legs, poor soul!'

‘No legs!' Lavinia winced, and glanced round towards the sleeping woman.

‘That's right.'

‘Perhaps Dr Williams prescribed a painkiller?' suggested Edwina.

‘Rubbish! Not him. He were talking about a wheelchair for her.'

Martha looked righteously outraged, as she unclasped her hands and shook a knobbly finger at Edwina. ‘If Matron don't want to be bothered with you, you get a pill – so, believe you me, you mind what you do and what you say.'

Martha picked up the box of chocolates and again proffered it to each lady in turn. They both politely refused, but suggested that Martha herself have another one.

Martha did – on the theory that you never knew what Matron might get up to if she found contraband chocolates in the place: best to eat them now, before she heard about them.

After hearing the story of how she had broken her hip and lost her home, Martha's visitors took their leave.

Martha's expressions of thanks for their visit were almost pitiful. As she clung to their hands, they promised to come again.