Max’s, with Jack Straffen between herself and her mother-in-law, and Bridie between me and Max.
We were eating the salmon when the subject of marriage came up, I forget exactly how. But with a table of only six, all can take part in the same conversation. Brenda, I believe, said something about her first husband, Charles, whom she had divorced when Max was a child, and spoke of him in such a way that Max then asked Bridie Straffen why she thought some marriages survived and others did not. Bridie was decisive. She was a large clever woman from Dublin who’d spent the last twenty years successfully playing the role of superintendent’s wife here on the estate. She was boisterous and popular, and her capacity for alcohol was equaled only by her husband’s.
“I made him take the Oath.” She looked at Jack, who lifted his hands.
“What oath?”
I thought she meant the Pledge.
“The Hippocratic Oath,” she said. “‘Do no harm.’ Think of me as a patient, I told him, and we’ll survive. And we have.”
There was a murmur of amusement around the table. Everyone wanted to add to this. Stella’s voice was the clearest.
“‘Do no harm’?” she said. “Most of us are dying of chronic neglect!”
There was a silence. We were all embarrassed. There was too much in the remark, it was too private, it smacked of a bitter truth. She had gone too far. Bridie came to the rescue.
“Dear Stella, you take me much too literally. The point is not that they do harm but that they do as little as possible. They are human, after all. Even Max is human.”
Max had no choice but to agree, and within a few moments the conversation was back on the rails. But in that tiny ghastly silence I glanced down the table and saw Brenda fixing on Stella a bright gaze charged with hungry curiosity.
After dinner we wandered out through the French windows onto the back lawn, and there was talk about the extraordinarily warm weather, the continental summer we were having that made possible our being outside, in the moonlight, at eleven at night, with the air still as warm and fragrant as it had been during the day. Max told Jack what he’d been doing with the garden and the pair of them went off to have a look at the conservatory. In light of what Stella had said about Max’s ambitions I was not surprised to see him attending to the superintendent so assiduously. Jack was due to retire in the next year or so, and would appoint his own successor.
I settled down in a garden chair and listened to Brenda and Bridie talk about houses in general, which led them on to the great houses of Ireland, and from there to their mutual acquaintance the Earl of Dunraven.
When Max and Jack returned from the vegetable garden we all began the preparatory movements of departure. I noticed that Stella again seemed to be finding it difficult to maintain her composure. Her unease grew stronger as she listened to the conversation that followed.
Jack was telling Bridie and Brenda about the decrepitude into which the garden had sunk before Max and Stella came to the hospital. He was delighted, he said, that Max was bringing it back.
Max said, “With help. No one knows more about these big hospital gardens than John Archer. Nothing would have happened without John.”
“And Edgar Stark,” said Stella quietly, almost to herself, I thought.
Jack, Max, and I, we all turned toward her.
“I hear him hammering away all day,” she said, trying to deflect what she later called our terrible psychiatric gazes. “The man works like a demon.”
“A demon indeed.”
“What are you going to do about him?”
This last question was put by Max to Jack. Stella told me she had the familiar impression of an exclusive professional knowledge, something to do with Edgar in this case.
“Do tell,” said Brenda. “I’m intrigued.”
“All very tiresome,” said Jack in that slightly weary tone of voice he employed when something happened in the hospital that was
We were eating the salmon when the subject of marriage came up, I forget exactly how. But with a table of only six, all can take part in the same conversation. Brenda, I believe, said something about her first husband, Charles, whom she had divorced when Max was a child, and spoke of him in such a way that Max then asked Bridie Straffen why she thought some marriages survived and others did not. Bridie was decisive. She was a large clever woman from Dublin who’d spent the last twenty years successfully playing the role of superintendent’s wife here on the estate. She was boisterous and popular, and her capacity for alcohol was equaled only by her husband’s.
“I made him take the Oath.” She looked at Jack, who lifted his hands.
“What oath?”
I thought she meant the Pledge.
“The Hippocratic Oath,” she said. “‘Do no harm.’ Think of me as a patient, I told him, and we’ll survive. And we have.”
There was a murmur of amusement around the table. Everyone wanted to add to this. Stella’s voice was the clearest.
“‘Do no harm’?” she said. “Most of us are dying of chronic neglect!”
There was a silence. We were all embarrassed. There was too much in the remark, it was too private, it smacked of a bitter truth. She had gone too far. Bridie came to the rescue.
“Dear Stella, you take me much too literally. The point is not that they do harm but that they do as little as possible. They are human, after all. Even Max is human.”
Max had no choice but to agree, and within a few moments the conversation was back on the rails. But in that tiny ghastly silence I glanced down the table and saw Brenda fixing on Stella a bright gaze charged with hungry curiosity.
After dinner we wandered out through the French windows onto the back lawn, and there was talk about the extraordinarily warm weather, the continental summer we were having that made possible our being outside, in the moonlight, at eleven at night, with the air still as warm and fragrant as it had been during the day. Max told Jack what he’d been doing with the garden and the pair of them went off to have a look at the conservatory. In light of what Stella had said about Max’s ambitions I was not surprised to see him attending to the superintendent so assiduously. Jack was due to retire in the next year or so, and would appoint his own successor.
I settled down in a garden chair and listened to Brenda and Bridie talk about houses in general, which led them on to the great houses of Ireland, and from there to their mutual acquaintance the Earl of Dunraven.
When Max and Jack returned from the vegetable garden we all began the preparatory movements of departure. I noticed that Stella again seemed to be finding it difficult to maintain her composure. Her unease grew stronger as she listened to the conversation that followed.
Jack was telling Bridie and Brenda about the decrepitude into which the garden had sunk before Max and Stella came to the hospital. He was delighted, he said, that Max was bringing it back.
Max said, “With help. No one knows more about these big hospital gardens than John Archer. Nothing would have happened without John.”
“And Edgar Stark,” said Stella quietly, almost to herself, I thought.
Jack, Max, and I, we all turned toward her.
“I hear him hammering away all day,” she said, trying to deflect what she later called our terrible psychiatric gazes. “The man works like a demon.”
“A demon indeed.”
“What are you going to do about him?”
This last question was put by Max to Jack. Stella told me she had the familiar impression of an exclusive professional knowledge, something to do with Edgar in this case.
“Do tell,” said Brenda. “I’m intrigued.”
“All very tiresome,” said Jack in that slightly weary tone of voice he employed when something happened in the hospital that was
Similar Books
