As Yet Untitled - Part One, Chapter Seven.

Chapter Seven
 It was after a week of working at the hospital and learning the art of care within its austier grey walls that the first letter arrived at the house at Hyde Park addressed to Ida from Lady Beechwood. Lady Woodcount gave her the letter as she returned home dressed in her blue uniform with her brilliantly dark hair hidden away, her apron was smeared with a substance after which her aunt did not inquire.Though Ida smiled warmly at her aunt there was a tired paleness that had settled over her that concerned Lady Woodcount. The letter was written in her mother’s usual style. 
 “Dear Ida, 
I hope you are enjoying your time in London with dearest Emma, though I do wonder what keeps you there as everyone of importance has returned to the country. All is well here, although the gardens are suffering from lack of attention as Mr O’Neill and I are no match for the weeds that have taken advantage of our temporary lack of outdoor staff. You will be pleased to hear that Mary and Barnaby Harrington are in constant correspondence, Mary has never looked so blushingly well. I hope you will return to us soon, the house is terribly ghostly without you and Henry. Which reminds me, have you received any letters from him since he left? He sent me a note to say he had arrived safely but that is all. 
Sending all my love to you in the hope it will bring you home.
From your concerned but always loving mother.”
The letter may have been written in her mother’s usual hand but the contents could not have been more different to usual. If Ida had sent such a letter to her mother she would have replied by saying she sounded French. Aunt Emma broke into Ida’s thoughts by saying,
 “Ida you simply have to tell her the truth, the work you are doing is honorable and remarkable, she will be proud of you once the initial shock has worn off. Bite the bullet Ida.”
Ida did not feel that her washing of bedpans was faintly remarkable nor honorable.
 “If I manage another three weeks I will tell her, I promise Aunt. Please do not tell her before that.”
It was Ida’s tired eyes with their pleading look that finally persuaded Lady Woodcount. 
                                                            
                                                              *** 
 That night once Ida had changed for dinner, Helen had left with Mary leaving Lady Woodcount’s maid in charge of dressing Ida, she found she had a splitting headache. She did not know whether it was the way in which the maid had done her hair or whether it was simple fatigue. She tried to make conversation with her aunt but soon they subsided into silence. They did not linger over their meal but Ida ate well despite her tiredness, she had found her appetite had increased greatly since she had begun her training. Once they had moved from the dinning room to the drawing room Ida’s eyelids began to grow heavy until she was forced to excuse herself and retire to the solace of her bed. Sleep vanished from the horizon as soon as her head touched her pillow. Her mind was suddenly awake and most agitated by all that she had seen. The remembered images were vivid and shifting. For the first few shifts Ida and Lady Gascony had been given the most basic of tasks to do under supervision but as they steadily improved they were given more complex jobs. Ida lay in the comfortable darkness testing herself on all that she had learnt. She heard her aunt make her way to bed but still her mind would not settle, she began to trace the patterned walls and slowly this sent her to sleep. 
 When Ida had been working at the hospital for three weeks she found herself to be working with far greater assurity and fewer nerves. She had not missed the way in which she and Lady Gascony were progressing far slower than some of the women who had begun their training at the same time as them, it was as though no one quite trusted them, their hands were still to soft. However, the Matron had begun to appreciate their hard work and had noticed that their folding of hospital corners or rolling of bandages was as effective as that of the trained nurses. She decided it was time for them to progress. Thus Ida found herself following Lady Gascony and the Matron deep into a ward with great trepidation. Though she had not personally looked after any of the soldiers who were beginning stream into the hospital Ida had seen them as she made up fresh beds. The state in which they had been in only added to her growing fear. The Matron told them that the soldiers on the row had only arrived yesterday and would need their bandages changing as well as a fully body wash, she spoke without wasting energy, each vowel clipped. At the news of conducting full body washes Lady Gascony had turned and raised her eyebrows at Ida, she grinned, displaying the gap between her front teeth. Luckily the Matron did not see this as she was pushing open the door to the ward. 
 An older nurse showed the two young women how they were to change and dress wounds as well as the use of a flannel and warm water to ensure cleanliness of the soldier. The young man whom they washed seemed terribly embarrassed and stared with fixed, unblinking eyes at the ceiling above his narrow bed. Though his leg wound pushed Ida dangerously close to gagging he hardly winced throughout the whole process. As all the men had the dressings changed that morning before the doctor made his rounds Ida felt clumsy and incompatant. She had never been in such close quarters with the male body and found the impersonal intimacy uncomfortable. Many of those she looked after seemed to understand and made attempts to make the process less straining, others took hasty advantage of her inexperience. Ida gritted her teeth and attempted to block out their lewd comments and avoid their wandering hands. The Matron with her steely eyes missed nothing and was pleased with Ida’s quiet determination, though she would forget to tell her. Lady Gascony had created quite a stir with her loud drawling voice when she had calmly told a man off. The Matron guarded her nurses with a cold passion but she was aware that the men had been coarsened by being solely in the company of other men in their time away. 
                                                                      ***
 One bright, blustery morning as Ida and Lady Gascony met outside the hospital to begin their shift, Ida always found it be a relief to see the smooth body of the blue motor car pulling to a stop, Blanche had good news for Ida. She informed with her languid drawl that,
 “Celebrations are in order. We have lasted a month so tonight you must come to supper and we can toast to our good health”. 
Thus it came to be that Ida found herself at the London residence of the Gasconys. The house was looming and pale in the quiet of the Square, the lighting was drawing in as September came to a close. A liveried footmen admitted her at the arrival of her aunt’s carriage and she was shown into the Drawing Room where Blanche waited with Lord and Lady Gascony. Ida had felt intense intrigue towards the parents of Blanche, she had learnt from their hours folding in the linen cupboards that Blanche had no siblings but she had been evasive in regard to her mother and father. Lord and Lady Gascony could not have been more different from their child, while she was vivacious and elegant they blended into the interior of their house. Blanche’s head of vivid hair seemed alight with the essence of Summer’s fierce days and yet her mother’s auburn hair seemed pale and limp. Her father was a bland face whose tepid offer of a greeting made Ida want to whisper in his presence. 
 The dinner itself was an awkward affair with Blanche regularly causing Lady Gascony to titter into her soup. By the time they reached the end of the meal Ida felt exhausted by her efforts to make conversation with two so very quiet people. It transpired that Lord and Lady Gascony could not bare to stay in London any longer and were leaving in the morning, they retired to bed at an almost undignified early hour. Ida felt a little ashamed at the relief she felt at their leaving. 
 “Thank goodness that is over! Sorry to have put you through that but I knew you were too good to complain and I wanted to show them that nursing can be refined.”
 They spent the rest of the evening in great spirits and Ida found that the more time she spent with Blanche the more she liked her. Under her drawling voice and attitude she suspected that she would find a character of far greater depth than at first she had imagined. Her journey home through the slumbering city with a head slightly fuzzy from the drinks she had shared with Blanche post supper, found her content for the first time since leaving Devon.