Touch of Tenderness (Nurses of New York Book 3) Read online

“Miss Anderson seemed to believe it was,” Dr. Wentworth replied. “I’m going to write a letter to Dr. Wayment and ask for more particulars. I’ve also heard that Dr. Smith of Boston has undertaken some studies, and I’ll write to him as well.”

  “Are we … finished with the cadaver?” Libby asked. Now that their attentions were turned to the tissue samples, it seemed to her that maybe they could be finished with the more gruesome part of their task.

  “Yes, I believe we are.” Dr. Wentworth paused. “I have to wonder, though, at the pain the patient would suffer upon being subjected to this type of treatment. Would opium reduce that pain? What could be done?”

  “And how could that be safely tested?” Dr. Russell replied. “This is the part of medicine that always leaves me frustrated. So many advances to be made, so much to discover, and yet, what all must be done for those results to come to light? How much suffering must there be, how many risks taken?”

  With this sobering thought, the two doctors sutured the patient back up, and Libby burned the linens. She knew they’d learned some useful things just now, but just how useful, she wasn’t sure, and she wished beyond all else that Mrs. Stanford had lived. Someday. Someday they would know more, and more lives could be saved.

  Chapter Six

  Weary to the bone, Libby accompanied Dr. Wentworth on his rounds, the last stop being in Mr. Franklin’s room. Mr. Franklin was sitting up in bed chatting with the man across the aisle from him when they entered, but he paused when he heard them approach.

  “Miss Green, is that you?” he asked.

  “That’s right. How did you know?”

  “Your footsteps are very light and quick, and I noticed yesterday that you smell faintly of lavender.”

  For some reason, these observations made Libby’s cheeks feel warm. “Very good. How are you feeling?”

  “Well, last night was rough, but today, the pain seems to be going away a little.”

  “That’s good,” Dr. Wentworth said. “It means that the corneal abrasions are beginning to heal. Miss Green will change your bandages now, but don’t open your eyes. We want fresh gauze on there at all times, but the eyes aren’t ready to be subjected to air. Is there anything else you need?”

  “No, thanks. I believe I’m all right.”

  “Very good. I’ll leave you to Miss Green’s excellent care.”

  Libby took the bandage from around Mr. Franklin’s head and slowly pulled it away from his face. “Remember what Dr. Wentworth said. Don’t open your eyes.”

  “All right.”

  She replaced the gauze pads in each eye socket and then put a fresh bandage around his head. “That was almost easy,” she joked. “You’re by far my least complicated patient today.”

  “Oh? What other things have you been doing?”

  There were a few things she could say without breaking the rules of confidentiality. “I assisted in an autopsy, for one. Well, I suppose it wasn’t a full autopsy, by any means—we focused mainly on the stomach. A complete autopsy would involve all the organs.”

  Mr. Franklin shook his head. “I would make a terrible nurse.”

  “I believe you would. Nurses are generally female, it seems.”

  He laughed. “Quite right. So, what else have you been doing? I’m bored out of my mind and need something else to think about.”

  “Hmmm. Let me think. You don’t want to hear me talk about bedpans, I’m sure, and that sums up most of my day. A few bandage changes, a cut finger, but mostly bedpans.”

  “You do live an exciting life,” he teased.

  “Actually, being a nurse is very exciting. There’s always something new and different to learn. I haven’t been bored a single day since I got here.” She paused. “I’m sorry—now I’m the one being insensitive, after you were just telling me how bored you are, and nothing to be done for it.”

  “No, it’s all right. I wonder, though, if you by any chance write music. I don’t mean compose it—I mean, do you know how to transcribe notes onto sheet music?”

  “I don’t,” Libby replied. “I wouldn’t have the faintest idea how. I don’t even play an instrument.”

  “Shocking! I thought all young ladies had to learn to play an instrument as part of their education,” he said, his voice light.

  “Well, that was the case for many young ladies, but my parents kept finding me with my nose in a book when I should have been practicing, and gave it up for a lost cause.” Libby patted his shoulder. She didn’t usually make physical contact with her patients unless it was to change their bandage or so forth, but he couldn’t see the smile she was wearing, and she wanted him to know he was among friends. “It’s time for my shift to end. I’ll see you tomorrow, all right?”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  ***

  The nursing students were gathered in the parlor, most slumped down on the couches and looking anything but ladylike. Mrs. Everett had fed them a good dinner, complete with chocolate cake for dessert, and now it was time to swap stories, their favorite evening activity. It helped them relax and let go of the pressures of the day. Often, they helped each other find the humor in their embarrassing moments, or commiserate over the injustices they often experienced or witnessed.

  “I dropped a bedpan in the middle of the hall,” Tess said. “Dropped it. I’ve never been so humiliated.”

  “Oh, no,” Phoebe said. “That’s awful.”

  “And that’s not all,” Tess continued. “The new doctor was coming the opposite way when it happened, and it nearly landed on his shoes.”

  “The handsome new doctor?” Laura sat up straight, suddenly interested.

  “Well, considering that we only have one new doctor at St. Timothy’s right now, I’d have to say, yes, the handsome new doctor,” Tess said wryly. “I was a bit too busy worrying about the bedpan to notice what he looked like.”

  “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve seen a really handsome man?” Laura slumped back on the couch. “And Dr. Gregory doesn’t count because he’s Sophie’s.”

  “Yes, he is mine, isn’t he?” Sophie grinned. “It’s all right if you think he’s handsome, though. I’ll allow it.”

  “You’ve been fairly quiet tonight, Libby,” Jeanette said. “What dreadful things happened to you today? And keep in mind, you’re competing with Tess’s bedpan accident, so make it good.”

  “I assisted in an autopsy,” Libby said, trying to sound like it wasn’t anything of consequence.

  “What? Oh, that’s so disgusting,” Meg said with a dramatic shudder.

  “I wish I could have seen that,” Tess said, leaning forward with her eyes alight. “Was it an old cadaver or a fresh one?”

  “Must we go into details?” Millie asked. “Maybe I should go help Mrs. Everett with the dishes.”

  “I’m sorry, Millie,” Tess said. “Please stay. I won’t ask anything else shocking.”

  Millie looked somewhat mollified and settled back in her chair.

  “Well, if I can’t say anything shocking, I won’t have much of a story,” Libby joked. “I will suffice it to say that it was very interesting, very difficult, and very educational.”

  After the other girls finished sharing their stories, they all agreed that Libby’s autopsy won for the most disgusting event of the day, but that wasn’t what was foremost on her mind.

  “Do any of you know how to write sheet music?” she asked when there was a lull in the conversation.

  “My brother does,” Meg replied. “Why on earth would you need someone who can do that?”

  “I have a patient, Mr. Franklin, who has temporarily lost his eyesight, and he needs help writing down a song he’s been working on. Do you think your brother would be willing to help him?”

  “I don’t know. He’s fairly busy, but I could ask him. It might be a waste of time without a piano, though.”

  “What if we brought Mr. Franklin over here?” Libby asked, the idea blooming in her mind even as she spoke the words. “We
have a perfectly nice piano right here in the parlor, and he’s able to move about—he’s only a patient at the hospital because his eyes are bandaged, and he has no one to take care of him.”

  “Well, if you can get permission to bring him here, I suppose I can ask my brother to come by.”

  Libby wasn’t surprised at Meg’s reluctance. Meg didn’t often do things for others, which made her decision to become a nurse seem a little odd. “Thank you,” she said. “I think it would be a wonderful thing for Mr. Franklin if that were resolved.”

  Meg gave a short nod, and the girls went off to bed.

  Libby couldn’t sleep for several minutes, hoping beyond hope that Dr. Wentworth would say yes and that Mr. Franklin would be willing to come over to the house. Then her mind wandered back to the autopsy, and that kept her awake even longer. Gracious—how did doctors and nurses ever sleep when this type of thing was what they faced every day?

  Chapter Seven

  When Libby presented her idea to Dr. Wentworth the next afternoon, he was agreeable, and she climbed the stairs to the second floor faster than she ever had. She couldn’t wait to tell Mr. Franklin the good news. When she rounded the corner into his room, though, she found him deep in conversation with Nurse Walters, a pretty young woman who had finished nursing school a year before and now worked full time at St. Timothy’s. Libby hung back, waiting for them to finish, but after a moment, she realized they were going to be chatting for quite some time, so she went about her regular tasks, deciding to come back later.

  She had just finished making a bed in the women’s wing when she was summoned to go help Dr. Wentworth. She found him in an examination room, bent over a small boy who appeared to be having a seizure. The child was writhing from side to side, and it was all Dr. Wentworth could do to keep him from falling off the table.

  “Some chloroform on a cloth, Miss Green,” he called out, and she moved over to the cabinet to grab what was needed. He held the cloth to the child’s nose and mouth, but the convulsions took another moment or two to subside. The boy’s mother stood in the corner, weeping.

  “This is the third fit Tommy’s had this year,” she said, wiping her eyes with the ratted handkerchief she held in her left hand. “My husband’s folks think he’s possessed of the devil and don’t want nothing to do with him.”

  Dr. Wentworth smiled reassuringly. “Mrs. Hart, I can’t imagine that your son would be possessed of the devil. We’re not entirely certain at this point what causes fits such as these, but I’m willing to stake my entire professional reputation on my belief that Satan is in no way involved.”

  “And would you be willing to tell my husband’s folks that? They’re sure he’s been touched by the finger of darkness.”

  “I’d be more than happy to tell them whatever I discover. He seems to be calm for just now. Are you willing to leave him here overnight and allow us to observe him?”

  Mrs. Hart looked down at her son, now sleeping. “Could I stay with him? I promise, I won’t be a bother. I just don’t want him all alone in a strange place.”

  “Of course you could. Miss Green, would you please go arrange for a bed in the women’s wing—we’ll put him there because he’s so young, and his mother will be with him.”

  “Absolutely.” Libby gave Mrs. Hart a smile of her own before leaving the room. With a little creative management, she and the nurse in charge were able to set up a bed and a cot side by side in the corner to give the little family some privacy.

  Dr. Wentworth was hunched over his desk when Libby entered his office a moment later. “Would you like me to sit with them tonight, Dr. Wentworth?”

  He shook his head. “No, I’ll be here personally, and I’ll manage with the night nurse. Have you ever seen a seizure before, Miss Green?”

  “Just once, sir, and I admit, it was a dog and not a person.”

  He motioned for her to take a chair, and she did.

  “I believe our young patient has epilepsy.”

  “Epilepsy, sir?”

  “Yes. From the Greek ‘epilepsies,’ among other related roots. Basically, it means to be set upon by a seizure. In ancient times, it was commonly believed that one who had these ‘fits’ were possessed of demons. Hippocrates, on the other hand, believed it could be cured, but no one shared his opinion and continued to tout demonic involvement. Our modern scientists aren’t satisfied with that answer, and neither am I. I can’t bring myself to prescribe a lifetime in an asylum for that little boy—there must be another answer.”

  “I don’t believe it’s demons either, sir. I am a religious person, and I do believe in both heaven and hell, angels and devils, but would a demon have reacted to the chloroform? That says to me that we’re dealing with a physical issue.”

  Dr. Wentworth sat back and contemplated her. “I sometimes wonder if you’re more suited to be a doctor than a nurse, Miss Green.”

  She blinked at him, not comprehending. “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  “A doctor, Miss Green. Have you ever thought about becoming a doctor?”

  “No, sir. I mean, I know female doctors exist, but there aren’t many of them, and I always saw myself as a nurse, nothing more.”

  “Nursing is a fine and credible profession that requires a great deal of intelligence and diligence. You would do very well. But as a doctor, you’d have the ability to research and experiment, write papers and be published in medical journals.” A strange look passed over his face, and he sat bolt upright in his chair. “That’s it!”

  “I’m sorry, sir?”

  “Medical journals. I receive every issue of the Lancet, and I’m quite sure I saw something about epilepsy about two years ago.” He turned in his chair, pulled open a cabinet door, and began piling things on top of his desk. “Help me look through these, Miss Green. It would have been . . . oh, I can’t even remember the time of year. Just flip through each issue.”

  She began to flip, looking for articles on epilepsy, while he emptied the entire contents of his cabinet. Then he began to fill it back up again with issues that were either too old or too new.

  “Is this it?” Libby asked, passing the paper across the desk. Dr. Wentworth ceased his frantic scrabbling and sat back.

  “Yes, this is it! This is exactly what I was looking for.” He skimmed the article, a look of great satisfaction on his face. “A fellow by the name of John Hughlings Jackson presented the theory that epilepsy is the result of erratic electrical discharges throughout the entire body, but he didn’t know the cause or the solution.”

  “If he doesn’t know the reason or the cure, how does this knowledge help us?” Libby asked.

  “It gives us a place to start. The chloroform was an emergency measure at best—it only relaxed some of the convulsing muscles temporarily. Now we need to look at the rest of it—why? Why does the body spasm? Where are the impulses being generated that tell the muscles to contract? Is it muscular, skeletal . . . is it an organ? You see, Miss Green, there’s so much left to learn. As a doctor, you would have access to research and studies and all sorts of things that you wouldn’t have as a nurse. Think about it, will you?”

  Libby hardly knew how to answer. The thought had never entered her mind, but now, after assisting with the autopsy and then watching Dr. Wentworth become so excited over this new realization about epilepsy, she realized that she could become very passionate about research and experimentation. “I will think about it, sir, but it’s a new idea, and I’ll need time.”

  “Of course, of course. It’s not a decision to be made lightly or in a hurry. But if you do decide to apply to medical school, I’d be delighted to write you a letter of recommendation.”

  Libby’s head was swimming as she went back upstairs to see if Mr. Franklin was free. Of course she’d heard of Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman ever to graduate from medical school. That had only been twenty-six years ago, and in the interim, while several women had applied for medical school, there hadn’t been a huge rush of them—at leas
t, as far as Libby knew. Female doctors were still looked upon as being rare and unusual commodities at best.

  She paused on the stairwell, overwhelmed by the thought. Dr. Libby Green. Could such a thing really happen? A shingle with her name over the door, patients lined up to see her . . . No. She shook her head. That was too far-fetched. She was a nurse, nothing more, and it was enough.

  Nurse Walters was nowhere to be seen when Libby approached the men’s ward, and she was quite glad of that. She wasn’t sure what to make of the flash of jealousy she’d had earlier. Mr. Franklin had the right to visit with any nurse he liked. He’d said he was bored—of course he’d take whatever opportunities for entertainment he could find. It didn’t matter that Nurse Walters was pretty.

  Then Libby caught herself and smiled. It really didn’t matter that Nurse Walters was pretty—Mr. Franklin wouldn’t know that until his bandages were removed.

  She approached his bed, and he turned and smiled in her direction. “Hello, Miss Green! I was hoping you’d be by. I have some good news.”

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  He held up a sheet of paper. “My parents sent a return telegram. Would you like to read it? I’d read it to you, but . . . blindness and all that.”

  She took the paper and read it aloud. “‘Leaving on tomorrow’s train. Take care.’ Oh, that is good news. I’m sure you’ll be glad to see them. Er, to have them here.”

  He laughed. “If we spend all our time trying to avoid saying anything that has to do with eyesight, we’d feel awkward no matter what we did. I’m not in the slightest bit worried about it. So yes, I’ll be very glad to see them. I thought I was doing well here by myself, but truth be told, I miss them.”

  Libby sat on the chair at the side of his bed. Part of her assignment this week was seeing to Mr. Franklin’s wellbeing, after all. “How long will it take them to arrive?”

  “Six days of train travel, and if they caught ‘tomorrow’s’ train based on when they sent this telegram . . . oh, let’s say they’ll be here in a week, perhaps eight days. I do wish I wasn’t making them come all this way—it’s not an easy trip, or a cheap one.”