The Nightingale Girls by Donna Douglas

now.’
    Dora turned away to finish unlacing her shoes. Millie felt hot shame wash over her.
    ‘I – I’m sorry,’ she mumbled. She’d put her foot in it as usual. How could she be so stupid? Dora was right, it was very high-handed of her to go around bestowing her bounty on all and sundry. She was as bad as her grandmother, ordering their kitchen scraps to be distributed among the estate workers and then expecting them to be grateful.
    Millie got changed in silence. She felt so wretched, she couldn’t even summon up any anger when she realised Sister Sutton had been in her drawers again and confiscated her lipstick. She was leaning on the chest of drawers, trying to dab some powder on her face, when she heard the creak of floorboards behind her and saw Dora’s face reflected behind her shoulder.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ she mumbled.
    Millie met her eyes in the mirror. ‘So am I. I didn’t mean to offend you, truly.’
    ‘I know. You only wanted to help, and I shouldn’t have flown off the handle like that.’ Dora smiled sheepishly. ‘Can we start again? Be friends?’
    She held out her hand. Millie took it gratefully. ‘Yes, please. And I promise I won’t ever try to offer you anything again.’
    ‘Oh.’ Dora’s mouth twisted. ‘Well, that’s a shame, because I wouldn’t say no to borrowing those books? Just a loan, mind, when you’re not using them?’ she added hastily.
    ‘Please, have them . . .’ Millie began, then stopped herself. She could see from the proud tilt of Dora’s chin that she would never accept anything that even hinted at charity. ‘Just borrow them whenever you like,’ she offered.

Chapter Eight
    EVERY THURSDAY, VERONICA Hanley met Sister Parker and Sister Sutton to make a quilt.
    None of them could remember how long they had been doing it, or why they had even started. But that didn’t matter. What Miss Hanley and the two elderly nurses looked forward to most was making themselves comfortable in the overstuffed armchairs of Sister Sutton’s cosy sitting room and putting the world to rights while they snipped and stitched. The arrangement suited Veronica Hanley, who couldn’t abide idleness in any form. She would never have allowed herself to sit and drink tea and gossip for the sake of it. But cutting out neat squares of fabric, hemming and pinning then stitching them together, gave her a sense of purpose.
    She knew the other sisters looked forward to their weekly get togethers as much as she did. Florence Parker and Agatha Sutton had been staff nurses when Veronica Hanley first came to the Nightingale as a student. They were sisters of their own wards by the time she had qualified, and she had worked as a staff nurse on Male Medical under Sister Parker for many years.
    Now the pair were in their sixties and approaching the end of their nursing careers, they had been given the less arduous jobs of looking after the students. It was a great kindness on the part of the old Matron, and so typical of her, thought Miss Hanley. She could never imagine Miss Fox, with her mad passion for modernising everything,sparing much thought for two elderly ladies. She would have retired them a long time ago, thrown them out like an old hospital mattress that had served its purpose and was no longer of any use.
    Miss Fox was all for doing away with anything ‘antiquated’, as she called it. Why, only this morning – Veronica Hanley stabbed agitatedly at the square she was hemming as she remembered the discussion they’d had.
    ‘Are you quite well, Veronica?’ Florence Parker enquired in her soft Scottish accent. ‘You’re wielding that needle like Brutus on the Ides of March.’
    ‘I am well, thank you, Florence.’ She stared down in frustration at the big, ugly stitches she had just made. She was determined not to allow that wretched woman to ruin her enjoyment of her afternoon, sitting with her friends around the crackling fire, Sparky dozing on the rug at their feet. Outside, the