The Nightingale Girls - By Donna Douglas Page 0,132

outside her house, and the frustration and humiliation boiled up inside him again.

He didn’t blame her for rejecting him. He only blamed himself being such a fool, trying to make a move on her when she wasn’t interested in him. When he thought about the look on her face that night he’d kissed her, he just wanted to run away and hide forever.

He could understand why she didn’t want to know. She was so too far out of his league now. She was a nurse in her smart uniform, destined for better things than a lowly porter with a shady past. She deserved far more than him.

But that night . . . Just for a moment, before he’d kissed her, he could have sworn she’d wanted him as much as he wanted her.

‘Aye aye,’ Percy Carson grinned when he got back to the Porters’ Lodge. ‘I hope you’re not thinking of lighting up in here? Mr Hopkins will have your guts for garters.’

‘Let him try,’ Nick growled, clamping a cigarette between his lips. He usually managed to keep on the right side of the Head Porter but he was just in the mood to give Edwin Hopkins or anyone else what for.

‘I’ll have one too, since you’re offering.’ Percy Carson helped himself from Nick’s packet. ‘I s’pose you’ve heard about your girlfriend?’ he said, picking up the box of matches.

‘What girlfriend’s that, then?’

‘You know. That ginger nurse who’s always hanging around you?’

Nick froze. ‘What about her?’

‘Her old man got brought in earlier. Appendicitis. I took him down to theatre myself.’ Percy paused a moment while he lit his cigarette. ‘In a right bad way he was. If you ask me, he’s already a goner . . . Here, where are you going? You’re meant to be in Casualty at half past, remember?’

But Nick was already out of the door, letting it crash shut behind him. All he could think of was Dora’s face, pale and distraught as she called his name. Why the hell hadn’t he stopped to talk to her? He ran straight to the patch of ground behind the nurses’ home, but Dora had gone. All that remained was the smouldering tip of a cigarette.

Dora’s heart was beating fast under the starched bib of her apron as she walked back to the ward. She forced herself to go slowly, even though her mind was racing.

She wasn’t sure what she would find when she got back to Holmes. Alf must be out of theatre by now, she thought. Unless he was dead.

She felt wicked for thinking it, but at the same time she knew she was walking slowly because she wanted to savour the thought for as long as she could.

But as soon as she walked through the doors and saw Millie’s bright face she knew her hopes had been dashed.

‘There you are!’ She hurried up to her. ‘Your stepfather is in the recovery room. They’re bringing him up to the ward in a minute. I’m so glad you’re here. You can be the first to say hello. Won’t that be wonderful?’

Dora gritted her teeth and forced herself to smile.

‘I can’t think of anything I’d like more,’ she said.

Chapter Forty-Three

THE SUN SHONE brilliantly in a cloudless sky on the June day when Lady Sophia Rushton, only daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Claremont, married the Marquess of Trent at St Margaret’s, Westminster. People lined the street, kept back by policemen on horseback, all eager to catch a glimpse of the beautiful young bride as she arrived with her father.

‘It’s just like the Jubilee,’ Millie commented as she looked out of the window of the Rolls-Royce. Crammed inside the car with her were three other bridesmaids, while another car followed behind carrying two more and a brace of pageboys dressed as miniature guardsmen. She straightened the spray of cream roses in her hair. It was hot inside the car, and she could feel perspiration breaking out under her arms. She prayed it wouldn’t show on her apricot silk dress.

Inside the church, the cream of society waited. Sophia’s mother had spared no expense for her daughter’s wedding, and the vast, beautiful church was filled with the heavy, sweet scent of roses and gardenias. Millie joined the retinue of nervous bridesmaids, tweaking their flowers and adjusting their dresses as the bride arrived.

Sophia looked stunning in her dress of heavy silk embroidered lavishly with silver thread that sparkled in the sunshine. Her train was so long, it took all six of the