A Kiss for Julie

As for Julie, he dictated to her at length, over one shoulder, never once looking to see if she knew what he was talking about. Luckily, she did; Professor Smythe had been a good deal slower but the words he had used had been just as long. She had taken care over the years to have a medical directory handy when she was typing up notes, although from time to time she had asked him to explain a word or a medical term to her and he had done so readily.

She thought that it would be unlikely for Professor van der Driesma to do that. Nor would he invite her to share his coffee-break while he told her about his grandchildren... He was too young for grandchildren, of course, but probably he had children. Pretty little girls, handsome little boys, a beautiful wife.

She became aware that he had stopped speaking and looked up. He was staring at her so coldly that she had a moment’s fright that she had missed something he had said. If she had, she would get it from Sister later. She shut her notebook with a snap and he said, ‘I’d like those notes as soon as you can get them typed, Miss Beckworth.’

‘Very well, sir,’ said Julie, and promised herself silently that she would have her coffee first.

Which she did, prudently not spending too much time doing so; somehow the professor struck her as a man not given to wasting time in Sister’s office chatting over coffee and a tin of biscuits. She was right; she was halfway through the first batch of notes when he returned.

‘I shall be in the path lab if I’m wanted,’ he told her, and went away again.

Julie applied herself to her work. It was all going to be quite different, she thought regretfully; life would never be the same again.

The professor stayed away for a long time; she finished her notes, placed them on his desk and took herself off to the canteen for her midday meal. She shared her table with two other secretaries and one of the receptionists, all of them agog to know about the new professor.

‘What’s he like?’ asked the receptionist, young and pretty and aware of it.

‘Well, I don’t really know, do I?’ said Julie reasonably. ‘I mean, I’ve only seen him for a few minutes this morning and on the ward round.’ She added cautiously, ‘He seems very nice.’

‘You’ll miss Professor Smythe,’ said one of the secretaries, middle-aged and placid. ‘He was an old dear...’

The receptionist laughed, ‘Well, this one certainly isn’t that. He’s got more than his fair share of good looks too. Hope he comes to my desk one day!’

Julie thought that unlikely, but she didn’t say so. She ate her cold meat, potatoes, lettuce leaf and half a tomato, followed this wholesome but dull fare with prunes and custard and went back to her little office. She would make herself tea; Professor Smythe had installed an electric kettle and she kept a teapot and mugs in the bottom drawer of one of the filing cabinets—sugar too, and tiny plastic pots of milk.

Professor van der Driesma was sitting at his desk. He looked up as she went in. ‘You have been to your lunch?’ he asked smoothly. ‘Perhaps you would let me know when you will be absent from the office.’

Julie glowered; never mind if he was a highly important member of the medical profession, there was such a thing as pleasant manners between colleagues. ‘If you had been here to tell, I would have told you,’ she pointed out in a chilly voice. ‘And it’s not lunch, it’s midday dinner.’

He sat back in his chair, watching her. Presently he said, coldly polite, ‘Miss Beckworth, shall we begin as we intend to go on? I am aware that I am a poor substitute for Professor Smythe; nevertheless, we have inherited each other whether we wish it or not. Shall we endeavour to make the best of things?

‘I must confess that you are not quite what I would have wished for and I believe that you hold the same opinion of me. If you find it difficult to work for me, then by all means ask for a transfer. Your work is highly regarded; there should be no difficulty in that. On the other hand, if you are prepared to put up with my lack of the social graces, I dare say we may rub along quite nicely.’

He smiled then, and she caught her breath, for he looked quite different—a man she would like to know, to be friends with. She said steadily, ‘I would prefer to stay if you will allow that. You see, you’re not a bit like Professor Smythe, but I’m sure once I’ve got used to you you’ll find me satisfactory.’ She added, ‘What don’t you like about me?’

‘Did I say that I disliked you? Indeed I did not; I meant that you were not quite the secretary I would have employed had I been given the choice.’

‘Why?’

‘You’re too young—and several other...’ He paused. ‘Shall we let it rest?’ He stood up and held out a hand. ‘Shall we shake on it?’

She shook hands and thought what a strange conversation they were having.

He was back behind his desk, turning over the papers before him.

‘This case of agranulocytosis—Mrs Briggs has had typhoid and has been treated with chloramphenicol, the cause of her condition. I should like to see any old notes if she has been a patient previously. From her present notes you have seen that she remembers being here on two occasions but she can’t remember when. Is that a hopeless task?’

‘Probably. I’ll let you have them as soon as possible. The path lab from the Royal Central phoned; they would like to speak to you when you are free.’

‘Ah, yes. There’s a patient there. Get hold of them and put them through to me, will you, Miss Beckworth?’

‘I’m going to hunt for those notes,’ she told him. ‘I shall be in the records office until I find them.’

‘Very well.’ He didn’t look up from his writing and she went to her own office, dialled the Royal Central and presently put the call through to his office. There was nothing on her desk that needed urgent attention, so she went through the hospital and down into the basement and, after a few words with the fussy woman in charge of the patients’ records, set to work.

It was a difficult task but not entirely hopeless. Mrs Briggs was forty years old; her recollections of her previous visits were vague but positive. Say, anything between five and ten years ago... It was tiresome work and dusty and the fussy woman or her assistant should have given her a hand, although in all fairness she had to admit that they were being kept busy enough.

She longed for a cup of tea, and a glance at her watch told her that her teabreak was long past. Was she supposed to stay until the notes were found or could she go home at half-past five? she wondered.

It was almost five o’clock when her luck turned and, looking rather less than her pristine self, she went back to the professor’s office.

He was on the telephone as she went in; she laid the folders down on his desk and, since he nodded without looking up, she went to her office and sat down at her own desk. While she had been away someone had tossed a variety of paperwork onto it. ‘No tea,’ muttered Julie, ‘and this lot to polish off before I go home, and much thanks shall I get for it—’

‘Ah, no, Miss Beckworth,’ said the professor from somewhere behind her. ‘Do not be so hard on me. You have found the notes, for which I thank you, and a dusty job it was too from the look of you.’

She turned round indignantly at that and he went on smoothly, ‘A pot of tea would help, wouldn’t it? And most of the stuff on your desk can wait until the morning.’

He leaned across her and picked up the phone. ‘The canteen number?’ he asked her, and when she gave it ordered with pleasant courtesy, and with a certainty that no one would object, a tray of tea for two and a plate of buttered toast.

She was very conscious of the vast size of him. She wondered, idiotically, if he had played rugger in his youth. Well, she conceded, he wasn’t all that old—thirty-five, at the most forty... He had straightened up, towering over her, his gaze intent, almost as though he had read her thoughts and was amused by them. She looked at the clock and said in a brisk voice, ‘I can get a good deal of this done this afternoon, sir. I’m quite willing to stay on for a while.’

‘I said that tomorrow morning would do.’ His voice was mild but dared her to argue. ‘We will have our tea and you will leave at your usual time.’

She said ‘Very well, sir’ in a meek voice, although she didn’t feel meek. Who did he think he was? Professor or no professor, she had no wish to be ordered about.

‘You’ll get used to me in time,’ he observed, just as though she had voiced the thought out loud. ‘Here is the tea.’

The canteen server put the tray down on his desk; none of the canteen staff was particularly friendly with those who took their meals there; indeed, at times one wondered if they grudged handing over the plates of food, and the girl who had come in was not one of Julie’s favourites—handing out, as she did, ill nature with meat and two veg. Now, miraculously, she was actually smiling. Not at Julie, of course, and when he thanked her politely she muttered, ‘No trouble, sir; any time. I can always pop along with something.’

The professor sat down behind his desk. ‘Come and pour out,’ he suggested, ‘and let us mull over tomorrow’s schedule.’ He handed her the toast and bit hugely into his. ‘What an obliging girl.’

‘Huh,’ said Julie. ‘She practically throws our dinners at us. But then, of course, you’re a man.’

‘Er—yes; presumably you think that makes a difference?’

‘Of course it does.’ Perhaps she wasn’t being quite polite; she added ‘sir’.

They had little to say to each other; indeed, he made a couple of phone calls while he polished off the toast, and when they had had second cups he said, ‘Off you go, Miss Beckworth; I’ll see you in the morning.’

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