To Break A Doctor's Heart

The doctor leapt up the three steps in one, and Claire gave a small gasp. It was the man from the restaurant!

She saw the light of recognition in his eyes, and then he was turning to the patient, his fingers feeling for a pulse, his eyes glued to the small screen, watching the line of the monitor as it rhythmically rose and fell, looking to Claire’s untutored eye like a graph from one of the financial papers.

‘Any fibrillation or VT?’ he asked the ambulanceman.

‘None seen, Doctor.’

‘Good. Let’s get him inside as quickly as possible. Put him into cubicle four, will you?’

He stood aside to let the stretcher be lifted down, then turned to Claire.

‘Are you a relative?’ he asked, very gently.

‘No. He collapsed in front of me.’

‘I’d like to speak to you, after I’ve examined the patient. Can you stay for a little while?’

‘Yes.’ Her voice was tremulous. ‘Yes, I can.’

‘Thanks,’ he said briefly, and jumped down from the vehicle and followed the stretcher.

One of the nurses showed Claire into a small, bare office, where she began to shake violently. The whole incident had been so shocking, and then to see him there!

‘Are you all right, my dear?’ asked the nurse, her voice concerned. ‘You’ve gone as white as a sheet. Would you like me to bring you a cup of tea?’

Claire nodded blankly, and thanked the nurse automatically as she came back with a cup and saucer, but it lay untouched on the desk as she sat there, hopelessly dazed.

Presently the door opened and he was standing there, looking down at her and smiling.

‘You!’ he said.

So he wasn’t going to pretend that he didn’t recognise her, she thought with relief. Instinctively, she felt that this man would always be honest with her.

Under his white coat she could see that he was wearing a checked cotton shirt and olive green cords. Again she was struck by the physical presence of him. He looked so alive, and strong and dependable.

He walked over to her and saw the tea-cup.

‘You haven’t touched your tea,’ he remarked.

Claire shook her head. ‘Will he . . . Will Mr Phillips be all right?’ she asked, her face chalky white.

‘Well, the next twenty-four hours will be crucial, but he’s in the best place possible,’ he answered noncommittally but kindly. He looked at his wristwatch. ‘Look, I can’t possibly let you go home in that condition, and I’d like you to tell me what happened. My SHO is putting a drip up on him just now. Let me take you over to the canteen—I need my lunch before this afternoon’s ward round, and I might be able to rustle you up a hot cup of tea. By the way, my name’s Luke Hayward.’

She looked up and gave him a watery smile. ‘Claire Scott,’ she said politely. ‘Thank you very much, I’d like that.’

She had never been in a hospital canteen before, and was slightly taken aback at the level of noise and activity which greeted her. Luke Hayward led her over to a small, quiet table, well away from the counter, and sat her down.

‘I’ll just go and find you some tea. Do you want any lunch?’

She shook her head.

While he joined the queue, she looked around at all the crowded tables. There were groups of chattering nurses, in a huge variety of different coloured uniform dresses and belts. Some sat with doctors. Other tables seated young women and men with short white coats, who Claire supposed must be the medical students.

Perhaps it was a naïve impression, she thought, but everyone looked so animated. She was used to spending lunch-breaks on a shoot with other models who sipped at mineral water, and filed their nails and looked bored.

Luke came back with a tray and placed a cup in front of her. For himself he unloaded an enormous plate full of food with masses of vegetables and potatoes, with fruit to follow. Claire’s eyes widened slightly. Surely he wasn’t going to eat all that! It was more the sort of meal you expected a labourer to eat. The men she usually mixed with picked at a chef’s salad and then consumed a bottle of wine!

Luke must have seen her expression, because his eyes twinkled.

‘Don’t worry,’ he told her, ‘I haven’t usually got quite such a gargantuan appetite, but I was called to coronary care first thing and missed breakfast, and only had a scratch supper last evening. Drink some of your tea now.’

She took a sip. It was the colour of treacle and tasted as though it were composed of treacle too, but she had never enjoyed a cup of tea so much.

Luke ate his meal quickly, like a man used to hurrying, then pushed his plate away and turned the full force of his grey-green eyes on her.

‘Feel better?’ he asked, and she nodded.

‘Do you want to tell me what happened?’

She recited the events of earlier that day as succinctly as possible. ‘But I felt so useless,’ she told him. ‘So impotent, because I wasn’t able to help him in any way.’

‘And just what did you do, exactly?’ he questioned.

‘After I’d told that young boy to call for the ambulance, I loosened Mr Phillips’ collar, wiped his face and sat there holding his hand until help arrived. That’s all,’ she finished glumly.

‘Claire,’ he said, quite seriously, ‘if you’d been a State Registered Nurse, you couldn’t have done any more for him. You did all the right things, and by instinct. Most important of all, he knew that someone was there, caring for him.’

‘Did I? Did I really?’ She looked anxiously into his eyes, but she could only see the truth reflected there.

He nodded, and she drank the last mouthful of her tea, and gave him an enormous smile.

‘You didn’t look very happy at dinner the other evening,’ he observed. ‘Why was that?’

Claire looked at his strong, firm features, the broad set of his shoulders and the penetrating eyes. Suddenly she found herself telling him everything. Telling him about feelings which she hadn’t even acknowledged to herself. And about those she had—about her general dissatisfaction with her life, and her job as a model. And how most of the people she mixed with cared for nothing more than money, and image.

Luke let her talk and talk. She hadn’t spoken to anyone like that for years, not since her father had died. And all the time he listened intently, occasionally nodding.

Eventually she stopped and looked at him, a rueful smile on her lips. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, her blue eyes shining brilliantly, ‘I didn’t mean to place you in the role of father confessor over lunch!’

He ignored the joke and sat there studying her for a minute longer, noting her ice-blue sweater and the glossy abundance of copper curls which fell around her shoulders. Then he leaned over towards her and spoke very softly.

‘Claire,’ he said, ‘forgive me if this sounds like a ludicrous suggestion, but—have you ever thought of becoming a nurse?’

She had not known that he had stood there for almost five minutes on the top step of the main entrance, lost in thought as he watched the tail lights of her taxi disappear into the traffic, wondering what on earth had possessed him to make such a suggestion to her, advising her to come and train at St Anthony’s. He had seen her eyes light up eagerly and she had looked up at him like a little lost puppy.

Was it because she too came from a divorced home, a family in splinters? He had found all the commitment and unity a family provided from hospital life. Could it fulfil her in the same way?

Damn and blast, why the hell hadn’t he just asked her for a date?