But I doubt he heard a word I said, he was so upset. And he bitterly resented the fact that Duncan could help more than he could. I felt for him terribly. What he must have gone through over Pappy and Ezra is something I find hard to think about.

The second mug of coffee calmed him down a bit, he recovered enough to look me up and down with—contempt?

“You look very satisfied,” he said harshly.

“Satisfied? What do you mean?”

“Pappy’s plight notwithstanding, you look as if, once the big surgeon had tidied Pappy’s future up, you and he had a fine old time of it,” he sneered.

I whacked him with my open hand so hard that he staggered. “Don’t you dare come the judge of me!” I whispered. “Don’t you damned well dare! Or come the judge of Duncan Forsythe either, for that matter! Your whole trouble is that you resent other people being able to do more for Pappy than you can yourself! Well, that’s too bloody bad! Live with it, don’t take it out on me!”

He was so white that the mark of my hand stood out on his skin like a naevus. “I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “You’re right. Don’t worry, I’ll live with it.”

I put my arm across his shoulders and gave him a quick hug. He returned it, slid out from under my arm, grinned at me and was gone.

Not a good start to the day. I had to go to Sister Agatha’s office and explain that Pappy would be away for two weeks.

“This is most irregular, Miss Purcell!” she said. “Why did Nurse Sutama not report to sick bay?”

“She went to her local practitioner,” I lied. “I expect he refers his patients to places like Vinnie’s and private hospitals in the Eastern Suburbs.” Oh, why does everybody have to make it so complicated?

“That is immaterial, Miss Purcell. Nurse Sutama is Staff and therefore entitled to a Queens bed no matter who her physician is. She would simply have been transferred to the care of one of our own Honoraries—who, as I am sure I do not need to remind you—are the very best.”

I persevered. “Sister Toppingham, truly I cannot give you any more information. All I know is that Nurse Sutama preferred to remain under the care of her own practitioner.”

“Most, most irregular!” Sister Agatha clucked, giving me a horribly shrewd glance from those pale blue eyes. She smells a rat, I’m sure of it. A starchy old biddy she might be, but you can’t be in command of a small army of young women for thirty years without realising that sometimes one and one add up to a total of three.

“I apologise, Sister,” I said, giving the standard answer.

“Quite all right, Miss Purcell, quite all right.” She bent to look at the papers on her desk. “You may go.”

I walked into another catastrophe, though of a routine kind. Disorientated patient, Harriet Purcell’s soothing skills required.

Luckily things died down about an hour later, and we sat to have a cup of tea. Sister Cas joined us—the wedding draws ever closer. But Chris had a bone to pick with me first.

“Why were you late?” she demanded.

“I had to report to Sister Agatha. Pappy’s still sick.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing much, but her local doctor’s put her into hospital.”

“Poor little beggar! Which hospital is she in, Vinnie’s or Sydney? Marie and I will call in on our way home.”

“You can’t. She’s in a sanatorium in the country.”

Chris and Marie exchanged a glance of complete comprehension and changed the subject to the wedding.

Thank God that Pappy isn’t involved with someone on the staff! Chris and Sister Cas were all right, but the news of Pappy’s sudden illness will go on the grapevine for sure. Everybody knows her, she’s been a fixture in X-ray for thirteen years. Chris and Sister Cas gave me a fit of the willies, I can tell you. It’s one thing to think vaguely about the prospect of discovery, even to decide you don’t care about discovery, but when suddenly discovery stares you in the face because a beloved friend’s business is going to become public property—oh, that puts the world in perspective!

What if Mum and Dad found out? God in heaven, I’d die if Mum and Dad thought their daughter was a home-wrecker! Because if Cathy F. finds out, that’s what I’ll be branded. A home-wrecker.

Saturday,

September 17th, 1960

When Duncan arrived at noon today, I broke it off.

“I just can’t bear the suspense,” I tried to explain without going into details like the hospital grapevine and walloping Toby for making nasty remarks. “I know I’ve picked a great moment, right on the tail of your wonderful care of Pappy—how ungrateful I must seem! But it’s Mum and Dad, don’t you see? Duncan, what I do with myself and my life is my business, but not if it involves a married man. Then it’s everyone’s business. How could I face Mum and Dad? If we continue, it’s bound to come out. So it stops.”

His face! His eyes! The poor man looked as if I had killed him. “You’re right, of course,” he said, voice shaking. “But I have a different solution. Harriet, I can’t live without you, I honestly can’t. What you say is inarguable, my love. The last thing I ever want is to make you feel that you can’t even look at your mother and father. So it’s best that I ask Cathy for a divorce immediately. Once the divorce is through, we can marry.”

Oh, dear God! That was the one response I hadn’t counted on, and the last I wanted to hear. “No, no, no!” I shouted, and beat my hands in a frenzy. “No, not that—never that!”

“The scandal, you mean,” he said, still ashen. “But I will keep you out of it, Harriet. I’ll hire a woman to pose as the co-respondent, and we won’t see each other again until I’m free. Let Cathy trumpet her injuries to the yellow press, let the yellow press do its worst! As long as you’re not involved, it doesn’t matter how sordid things get.” He took my hands in his, chafed them. “My love, Cathy can have whatever she wants, but that doesn’t mean you will want. There’s money enough, believe me.”

Oh, God! He didn’t see what I meant because it hadn’t occurred to him that I don’t want to play Missus Doctor. That I couldn’t play Missus Doctor, even for him. Maybe if I loved him that little bit more, I could make the sacrifice. But the trouble is that I only love him in some ways, not in all ways.

“Duncan, listen to me,” I said like steel. “I’m not ready to marry anyone, I’m not ready to settle down. Truthfully, I doubt that I’ll ever be ready to settle down, at least to the sort of life I would have had with David, that I would with you.”

Jealousy, even at this moment! “Who is David?” he asked.

“My ex-fiancé—he’s nothing,” I said. “Go back to your wife, Duncan, or find a woman who wants to live in your world if you can’t face it with Cathy. But forget me. I don’t want affairs with married men, and I don’t want you to dream of me as the second Mrs. Forsythe. It’s over, and that’s as plain as I can say it.”

“You don’t love me,” he said dully.

“Yes, I do love you. But I don’t want to build any nests in the suburbs, and I don’t want to feel grubby.”

“But children! You must want children!” he floundered.

“I don’t deny that I’d like at least one child, but it has to be on my terms, and I’d rather do without a child if that means asking a man to assume responsibility for my fate. You’re no Ezra, Duncan, but you come from the same world, you expect the same commitments, you compartmentalise women identically. Some for fun, some for procreation. I take it as a great compliment that you’d rather I was your wife than your mistress, but I don’t want to be either.”

“I don’t understand you,” he said, utterly bewildered.

“No, sir, and you never will.” I went to the door and held it open. “Goodbye, sir. I mean it.”

“Goodbye, then, my love,” he said, and left me.

Oh, that was awful! I must love him, because I hurt terribly. But I’m so glad it’s over before it could get worse.