Chapter 10 Goodbye, Tiny Sea Creature
George heard footsteps on the stairs. She tried to stand up from the spot on the landing where, five minutes earlier, her legs had given way.
If only she could get into bed, she thought, she’d be able to manage.
Her bedroom was no more than a few yards away.
It may as well have been miles. Lying on her side, her knees to her chest, she shifted her weight onto her left hand and moved into a sitting position.
As her head rose, spots floated across her vision.
The pain in her abdomen kept coming in waves, as though something was squeezing and tugging at her insides.
In her mind’s eye she saw this thing as made of shining, sharp metal, like the device the doctor had used, but bigger and more complicatedly mechanical.
The backs of her stockings were soaked, with sweat or blood. Perhaps both.
The footsteps drew closer, and male legs came into view. Jimmy.
“George, what in God’s name…”
“My bed,” she croaked. “If you could help me to my bed, I’d be awfully…”
He crouched down and considered her curiously. “Have you fainted? Are you hurt? Don’t try to move. I’ll get help.”
“No!” The word came out as a half yelp, half sob.
He gazed at her, perplexed. “But—”
“Please don’t leave me. I mean, no need to trouble anyone else. I’m fine—it’s just…” As she trailed off, she thought she saw his brow twitch with sudden understanding.
“All right,” he said. “Put your arm around my neck, that’s it.” He picked her up like a baby, revealing a slick ruby crescent on the pale wood floor. The second she was less dizzy, she thought, she would clean it up.
Jimmy carried her into her room and lowered her onto the bed.
As her head sank into the pillow and she inhaled the familiar musty perfume of her bedclothes, she began to feel less frightened.
The pains didn’t abate. But she’d been told to expect some pain.
She’d just stay in bed until the thing was completed.
How relieved she’d felt on leaving the doctor’s flat. She hadn’t for a moment imagined worse was still to come.
When she’d arrived there and Dr. Jenkins opened the front door himself, she was surprised.
For some reason she’d expected the presence of a wife, or a nurse, or some sort of female assistant.
But no, there was only Dr. Jenkins. Her first impression was of a short, anxious-looking man with a corrugated forehead, gray-bronze hair in a thin comb-over, and a map-shaped purple mark on his left cheek.
“Come in, come in,” he’d said, glancing left and right into the dim hallway of the mansion block.
He took her coat and offered her a cup of tea.
But he asked in a way that made it clear he wanted her to refuse, and so she did.
“Well,” he said, smiling and running his eyes up and down her body. He was trying to ascertain, perhaps, if she’d told the truth about being nine weeks along. Did women often lie? George looked the same as usual—if anything, she’d lost weight from being sick—but how would he know the difference?
They stood in his entryway, which smelled of furniture polish and coats drying after being in the rain.
Eventually she realized that, before she was to be allowed farther into the flat, he wanted his money.
Flustered, she searched through her bag for the envelope, plump with crisp fivers.
She handed it over, and he fanned through the notes. “Very good, very good. Follow me.”
This was the next surprise; it was to take place in the kitchen, as was evident from the narrow table covered with a frayed piece of oilcloth.
At one end a floral towel had been laid, presumably for her head.
On the counter, three feet away, were the remains of Dr. Jenkins’s lunch: a plate with some bread crusts, a stubbed-out cigarette, an apple core, a Wagon Wheel wrapper.
Next to this was a tray—not a hospital tray, but a Bakelite tray decorated with a hunting scene—holding several metal instruments, including a large syringe, stainless steel with fingerprints on the handle.
George’s stomach roiled. She almost lost her nerve. For God’s sake, pull yourself together, she thought. You’re here now. Get it over with.
Dr. Jenkins had removed his suit jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves.
He leaned over the sink, washing his hands with Fairy dish soap and drying them on a limp tea towel.
To reassure herself, George thought back to what Fiona had said.
Fiona hadn’t been to him, but she knew several girls who had.
“Poor old Monica was almost four months gone. Ghastly business. But I must say, she’s none the worse for wear.
Could get into her wedding dress, which was the main thing.
It was a Norman Hartnell, you know. Of course you do, you were there.
Lovely ceremony, wasn’t it? I did think her bodice looked a bit snug, but that couldn’t be helped.
No one was any the wiser. So anyway, yes, this Dr. Jenkins is a bit of an oddball, by all accounts.
But perfectly businesslike. Or doctorly, rather.
Discreet, naturally. It’s one of those blocks on the wrong side of Chelsea Bridge.
He works at the Westminster Hospital, so he knows his stuff.
It’s almost as good as going to a clinic.
I’ll talk to Mon and write to you with his phone number. ”
When George rang him, she recited the script she’d been given. “I’m a schoolfriend of your cousin Genevieve. She said you might be able to help me with a problem.”
“How long have you had this problem? Approximately.”
When she told him, he tutted stagily. “Dearie me. In that case, it’ll be thirty pounds.
Up front, in small notes. Wednesday afternoon at two o’clock.
Does that suit you? Don’t tell anyone where you’re going.
But you wouldn’t do that, would you?” But I was told it would be twenty-five, she felt like saying.
She had the distinct impression he’d detected affluence in her voice and bumped the price up.
So far she’d only scraped together twenty pounds, and where the hell would she find another ten in two days?
In desperation, she decided to ask her sister Venetia. George slightly preferred Venetia to Arabella, the eldest, who was rather dotty and lived miles away in the country anyhow.
The following mid-morning, she caught the Tube to Regent’s Park and, pretending to be passing through the neighborhood, called at Venetia’s house in Chester Terrace.
Unflappable on principle, Venetia showed no surprise at the unannounced visit, even though the sisters hadn’t seen each other in months.
“You look well, darling,” she said, leaning in to kiss George.
“Have you lost weight? You’ll have some tea, won’t you? ”
Venetia’s appearance was unchanged. She had the type of thin face and high cheekbones that didn’t particularly age, although George calculated she must be forty-two now.
Certainly, all her children were grown-up, or just about.
George knew she was considered a contaminating influence on them, especially the youngest: sullen little weak-chinned Diana, who, her mother reported, was working as a chalet girl in Saint Moritz.
“Well,” said Venetia philosophically, taking a cigarette from the box on the table and tapping the end, “it fills in the time, doesn’t it?
Until the season. And we’re hoping she loses a bit of puppy fat while she’s there.
If not, I shall have to get her a prescription for Drinamyl.
Oh, don’t look at me like that, it’s for her own good.
She doesn’t carry it as well as you. It’s all in her hips and face, poor soul. ”
Any superfluous fat cells on Venetia’s skinny body, reflected George, would melt away from the sheer force of her contempt. “Diana’s doing all that, then, is she? Coming out.”
Venetia lit her cigarette and sucked on it deeply.
“I know you think it all very silly. And I can’t say I disagree with you.
But Dom is in favor. And I simply don’t have the fortitude to go against the tide.
That’s where I admire you, Georgie. You don’t worry about upsetting people.
You go your own way, the court of public opinion be damned. ”
It was hot and stuffy in the chintzy, over-furnished drawing room. Venetia was wearing buckets of scent—she always did—and George began to feel ill. She sipped some tea. “How is Dominic? Still at the bank?”
“Of course. He works far too hard. Some days he’s in the office until six o’clock! He’s terribly conscientious. Can’t bear the thought of letting anyone down.”