Authors: Maeve Binchy
So on Monday, June 6th, Anna queued up with all the other patients, and when it was her turn, Dr Smith gave her a quick examination, confirmed that she was pregnant, and asked her to sit down and discuss it for a few minutes. This surprised Anna because she thought English doctors just wheeled you in and out.
Dr Smith said, ‘Why do you want a termination?’
Anna said, ‘You wouldn’t have time to hear the whole story, the waiting room is full of people.’
Dr Smith said, ‘You had to wait until I talked to other people; they’ll wait until I talk to you.’
So Anna told him the bones of the story. She said that she could never support a child on her own, she couldn’t give a child the love and attention it should have, that Michael would feel trapped, and wouldn’t want any part of it.
She explained about her parents who lived in a small country town, and how they would be disgraced if the baby was acknowledged, and how she couldn’t really hide it from them even if she wanted it, which she didn’t.
Dr Smith listened to her, and produced a form which he had to fill in in order to get her a termination of pregnancy. He explained that it was very difficult to get an abortion, or termination as he kept calling it, on the National Health if you were not a resident in some area paying a regular contribution in the form of a stamp. People didn’t like doing terminations, he said kindly, not that there was anything terrible about it. It was just that it was sort of anti-medicine, in a way. It had nothing to do with creation or curing, or healing; it seemed to have something a little bit to do with destroying.
Anna was upset to hear this. She didn’t like the word ‘destroy’. She thought that since it was permitted by law, people did it all the time.
Not all the time, Dr Smith thought. In fact, he knew several London hospitals which restricted terminations to four a week, even though the demand might be much higher.
‘So where do the others go?’ asked Anna.
‘That’s why we are filling in this form,’ said Dr Smith. ‘Presumably you have enough money?’
‘Presumably,’ said Anna coldly.
‘I don’t make any money out of it,’ said Dr Smith, equally coldly.
He telephoned a gynaecologist, Mr Brown, and made an appointment for the next day at three p.m. ‘Be there at two-thirty,’ he said. ‘You will have to discuss the arrangements with his secretary and she will tell you how much it costs. You’ll have to pay tomorrow afternoon, and in cash, not in a cheque. I think it will be £150 to £170. That will include everything – nursing home, anaesthetist, operation, meals, the lot.’
Anna wondered aloud why it had to be in cash. She thought abortions were legal in Britain; it smelled of the back street and the charlatan to pay somebody in five-pound notes.
‘It’s certainly not back-street,’ said Dr Smith. ‘It’s Wimpole Street, off Harley Street. It’s not a charlatan either, he is a highly respected surgeon. There’s nothing dirty or shoddy about it, he’ll send you to the Welbeck or the Wellington or the Harley Street, or any of the best places. It’s all legal; these are first-class nursing homes. You won’t think that they are anything but luxury and highly professional when you go there. Only a very small number of the patients are there for terminations, other people are having appendix or gallbladders done.’
Anna was still worried about having to pay in cash.
Dr Smith had no explanation. ‘It’s just the way they do it. These men find that people are seldom grateful for their surgery and care, and that often they don’t pay afterwards. So they insist on keeping everything businesslike, that’s all.’
Next day at two-thirty, Anna went to Mr Brown’s consulting rooms in Wimpole Street. His secretary looked like Jane Fonda and spoke like a deb, on a bad day. ‘Let’s be practical,’ she said nauseatingly.
‘Here’s the damage, would you like to pay me now?’ It was £173.50. ‘You get a super lunch,’ said the awful deb, consolingly.
‘It’s a bit dear for lunch,’ said Anna.
‘It’s not only for lunch,’ said the awful deb wisely.
Mr Brown was very elegant-looking. He had well-manicured hands, Anna noticed. He had that kind of half-grey hair that only wealthy people had; poorer people were grey at random, rich people were grey at the edges. It was all to do with expensive barbers.
Mr Brown examined her again. Not that he didn’t trust the word of her eminent GP, he said winsomely, but one had to be sure for oneself.
He confirmed that she was indeed seven to eight weeks pregnant; how wise of her to come in such good time, so many women are very silly about all this. She didn’t have any doubts, no? Good, good.
Anna sat there wondering how much he earned. She knew a little about property and salaries. He must have to pay out at least £7,000 a year for the rooms and secretary. He probably took home at least another seven thousand to support the wife in the pearls with the Irish wolfhound, in the picture on the desk. He was probably taxed on an estimated £20,000. He probably earned a conservative £30,000.
He asked her to be at the nursing home, fasting, at nine next morning. Just bring overnight things, nothing to worry about. Simple at this early stage, she’d have forgotten about it in July. But why not get herself fixed up with some kind of protection while she was in Britain; they didn’t have such things in Éire, did they?
Anna went back to Marianne’s flat, and looked at telly, and refused to talk about it. Marianne was relieved. Marianne thought it was killing, and she wanted to put it out of her mind forever, but she didn’t want to hurt Anna.
Next morning, Wednesday, June 8th, Anna arrived by taxi at a nursing home in Putney. It was a lovely Georgian house, or three Georgian houses knocked into one. It had thick pile carpets and tasteful pictures, and recent magazines in the waiting room. At nine-fifteen a.m. she was in a bed in a bright sunny room.
It was a room for two. The other girl was a little drowsy; she had her pre-med, the injection to make her sleepy. She said her name was Sandra, she was Australian, and that her brother-in-law was coming to see her at lunchtime. She said that this was her second termination, and there was nothing to it. Anna wished she looked more cheerful, but then Sandra was very sleepy, so she decided to forget it.
Someone came and listened to her chest. A bossy Irish nurse gave her a hospital gown instead of her own nice nightdress, which she had bought for the occasion.
‘Keep that for when you’re back home again,’ the nurse said. ‘You don’t want it ruined on you.’
That alarmed Anna, but she was determined to keep her mouth shut, and not to ask questions or tell tales herself. She thought the only way to go through this was with some kind of appearance of dignity.
Then she got her pre-med, and she felt drowsy and she thought about Michael for a bit. She had told him she was going to London for a week to stay with Marianne and that had pleased him. He had said it would cheer her up, she had seemed moody of late. She wondered if Michael would have liked a son or a daughter, and if they would have made good, laughing parents for a child. Her own parents had always been very gloomy; Michael’s had been so old that they were like grandparents. By the time they brought the trolley in to take her to the theatre, she wondered should she have told Michael and given him a choice. But it was too late now.
In the theatre, she smiled up at Mr Brown, and he smiled down at her.
‘You get your money’s worth in terms of civility,’ she said.
‘The Irish have a great charm,’ he said. And then she was asleep.
She remembers them helping her back into bed, but she went to sleep very quickly again.
She woke and they were doing an examination.
‘All fine,’ said the bossy Irish nurse. ‘What would you like for lunch?’
Anna said she’d like something light, and she got an omelette and salad and sauté potatoes, with a crème caramel and a silver pot of coffee. Sandra was awake and eating steak and beans to build her strength up. ‘It wasn’t bad now, was it?’ she asked cheerfully.
For the first time, Anna thought about it. She felt no pain, no discomfort, nothing. It was like coming around from the anaesthetic when you had a tooth out. No, she agreed, it wasn’t bad.
Sandra’s brother-in-law came in, and had a whispered conversation with her. It seemed mainly hostile; it seemed to be all about some lie Sandra had told a friend of his, he couldn’t understand why girls told lies. Men didn’t tell lies.
When he had gone, Sandra explained that she had been having an affair with her brother-in-law’s boss, and she had got pregnant. Her brother-in-law was so anxious to keep his boss’s respect that he had paid for the abortion. But he had made Sandra swear to keep it secret. People were so stupid about things, Sandra thought.
Nobody came to see Anna, and the day seemed long. She had afternoon tea, and she had grilled sole for dinner. She paid an extra £3 to have a television in the room, and she and Sandra looked at a few programmes because it was better than talking.
The Irish nurse came in to know if they wanted her to order taxis in the morning. They would get another examination at seven-thirty and then they should be packed and on their way.
Their beds would be taken again by nine-fifteen tomorrow.
‘You sound very disapproving of it,’ said Anna suddenly.
‘No, I’m not,’ said the nurse. ‘It’s not my business to approve or disapprove. I just think someone who’s educated like you are should have been able to avoid it.’
‘If we all avoided it, how would you earn a living?’ asked Anna furiously.
‘Somewhere where we didn’t behave as if we were working in a posh execution yard,’ said the nurse.
‘I bet you don’t tell them at home that this is where you’re working,’ said Anna.
‘I’d tell them sooner than you’d tell them where you’re visiting,’ said the nurse.
Anna apologised; she said she was upset, she didn’t mean to shout.
‘That’s all right,’ said the nurse. ‘I’m upset a lot of the time, I only shout some of the time.’
And she gave them sleeping tablets, and the two girls fell asleep.
Next morning it was all flurry. They were woken at seven, asked to wash in readiness for Mr Brown. He came in and behind screens gave each of them a quick examination and quick smile. All was fine, absolutely fine.
And so on Thursday, June 9th, at nine o’clock Anna went to Marianne’s flat just before Marianne left for work. She said she’d like to stay the day, but would go home that night. Marianne felt guilty that she hadn’t done more. ‘Stay and we’ll have dinner together, anyway,’ she urged.
But when she got back from work Anna was gone, leaving a nice thank-you note. Anna went back to work next morning. She didn’t want to sit at home thinking about it. They were surprised to see her in the office, but she said that London was so tiring she couldn’t stick it any more.
That’s all a month ago; she still sees Michael a few nights a week. He still thinks that an involvement of any more permanent nature would change everything and take away the magic. And Anna agrees; it would be awful to take away the magic.
A
ll over London there were long, idiotic queues outside bakeries and even in supermarkets because of the bread strike. The English are mad about queuing, mad about it. At the slightest hint of there being more than three people anywhere, a queue will form. I think it reminds them of the camaraderie during the war when it really was necessary to stand in great long lines for food, any food. Because the queues you see nowadays are senseless. There’s not a serious shortage of bread at all and, even if there were, aren’t there other things, not necessarily cake, which people could eat?
The bread strike is, as people say, crumbling. In as much as anyone can understand what was happening it seems that at least a third of the workforce has passed pickets, and most shops have at least some bread every day. But the happy lines of queues are talking in blockade terms and have put on their siege mentality again.
‘I’ve heard they have some in Islington,’ says an old man. ‘Now I have to get one for the lady in number six, and one for the sisters in number eight and one for my next-door neighbour, but if you like I’ll try and get you one, too.’
It’s a sort of game of triumphing over desperate odds and beating the system and ganging together. I’m hopeless altogether at it, because even though I like a 400-calorie hunk of bread and butter as much as the next glutton, I can’t believe that you’d have to queue for it. Anyway, there’s grand Indian bread, little packets of six flat oval things and they’re lovely if you heat them up. At 30p a packet they’re a bit dearer ounce for ounce than ordinary bread, but not that much.
I suggested to a queue fanatic that she buy this instead of standing on her old legs for an hour in the November winds. No. That wouldn’t do at all. Indian bread would taste of curry and have a foreign smell. No it didn’t, I said. It was like that flat Greek bread, it was exactly the same as our bread but it just had no yeast or baking powder in it. Her face fell in disappointment. She had been looking forward to the queuing, it would be a happy communal event. People would establish a common bond through groaning about workers who are never satisfied these days.
And in the little shops which sell sandwiches and plastic cups of coffee to workers at this end of town, which is office worker land, the bread hunt is on.
‘Chubbies sandwich bar has real bread,’ said an over-excited girl in the lift. ‘I’m going up to get four cheese sandwiches, then I’ll take the cheese out and we’ll have proper bread at home.’
Some offices were even doing a shift system, with office workers replacing each other in the queues when lunch-hour was over for the one who had been standing there.
‘What do you think is the best way to hoard bread?’ I heard a woman asking someone quite seriously. ‘I never understood what was so wrong with Mrs Thatcher hoarding things that time. People made such a silly fuss about it all but I think she was quite right. It’s only sensible to stockpile if these Marxists are going to stop us getting our daily bread.’