A Surgical Affair Read Online Free Page A

can’t I call you ‘dear’?” he laughed. “It’s a term of friendship.”
    Diana felt guilty about overhearing this conversation, but she told herself that if Mark had wanted privacy there were two phone booths in the corridor that could be used for outside calls. Obviously he preferred sitting in an armchair to standing up, so why should she leave the room for him?
    “What have you been doing with yourself? Modeled any mink bikinis lately? I saw you in Vogue, in a kind of Cossack hat.”
    “So she’s a photographic model,” thought Diana, “like the ones in this magazine. Must be very beautiful. An apartment in Chelsea, too. Probably uses a black cigarette holder and has a French poodle called Alphonse.”
    “We’re very busy right now, Denise.”
    Denise! Diana nearly laughed out loud. It seemed such a perfect name for a model. It probably wasn’t her real name. She had probably been born something very ordinary like Jean or Joyce. Her life must be very exciting—fashion shows, trips abroad, society parties. Diana thought that her favorite word would be “hectic.”
    “On Wednesday I’m playing squash with Alec Neal, and—he took you out to dinner, did he? My best friend! Let’s hope it was only because I was working.”
    Diana decided that if Mark was really fond of Denise he would want to telephone her in private.
    “Yeah, I’m working night and day. You know they couldn’t run this place without me. I kinda miss you too. I’d better go. There’s a patient I must see ... So long.”
    As she watched Mark stroll from the room, his hands deep in his pockets, Diana wondered if she would ever meet Denise and see for herself what she was like.
    That evening they were in the theater again, taking out the appendix of a seven-year-old boy.
    Although Mark made only a very short incision to enter the abdomen, he took out the red, angry-looking appendix neatly and swiftly, in 20 minutes. They worked well together, quietly, with the occasional joke or glance over the mask. And Diana soon learned not to let her fingers get in his way or block his view.
    She visited Charity Ward at midnight and whispered final instructions to the nurse in charge. Then she went to bed, tired and contented, and fell asleep as soon as her head touched the pillow.
    Diana’s first day at Mansion House Hospital was over.

 
    CHAPTER THREE
    It was breakfast ti m e in the residents’ dining room, two weeks later. As always, conversation was brief and desultory. This pleased Diana, who disliked a lot of noise early in the morning.
    “A real English pea-soup fog,” remarked Dr. Pallie, gazing out of the window at the drifting grayness. He was an anesthetist, tall and distinguished-looking.
    “Not so good for my patients with bad chests,” said Tony Spring grimly, as he took a kipper from the hot plate.
    “If they are in the ward, it is all right. But outside, there is much danger,” agreed Dr. Pallie.
    “Barker, my chief, would like to send all his chest cases to Africa for the winter. Our work would be cut down by half then.” Malcolm Smith, another house physician, came into the room, followed by Bill Evans.
    “After last night’s so-called stew, which you could hardly see and hardly cut, I’m ready for this,” said Evans, eagerly helping himself to the porridge.
    “Good lord! Mary Jay’s engaged.” It was Mike Simons, the tall, dark-haired obstetric registrar, who had been absorbed in his newspaper. “Isn’t that Cole’s Theater Sister? The young red-haired one?”
    Diana looked up from the letter she was reading. “ Yes, that’s right. Who’s she engaged to? Anyone we know?”
    “A Naval lieutenant. Good for her.”
    “I hope she doesn’t leave to get married. She’s an excellent Sister,” remarked Tony, “and gets on well with Cole, which is quite an achievement!”
    “This’ll put Mark Royston’s nose out of joint. He always fancied Sister Jay,” Evans said gleefully. “There’s one nurse he