| Description | Letter from Amelia Nyasa Laws, Metz, to her relatives, appreciating some peace, Mlle. Chiry has been summoned by her mother to Paris on 'urgent business' which Amelia thinks is a plot to remove her from the hospital, she and Mme. Poilevey have become thinner in the service of Dr. Job and could easily lose their health, overworked doctors put pressure on overworked nurses with unfortunate results, there has been a rush of influenza cases, to the annoyance of the convalescent tubercular cases into whose ward the overflow was put, Amelia refused to help out, there is a newcomer on the nursing staff but she is lodged downstairs, Amelia thinks that Mlle. Chiry will not return, in which case she will apply for the single room, Mlle. Stoufflet might agree, complaints again about leave, they may go out with permission from 12 to 2 but that is the hour when the shops are shut and the trams do not run, she does not like the conversations at mealtimes which tend to be about the doctors, in petty detail, Mlle. Stoufflet did not trust Mlle. Chiry and therefore did not quite trust Amelia, so Mlle. Chiry's departure will be advantageous in several ways, Mlle. Stoufflet spies on all of them, the work, however, is exactly what Amelia wanted, though she is busy at the moment because of Mme. Remy's absence, several of her patients have had fits already, the doctor must be summoned each time to study the case and orderlies must be fetched to hold down the patient, thus interrupting her massages, the ones who suffer from fits are distributed amongst the others of calmer disposition who can watch them and not be frightened by them, they have a new Arab patient who has a record of trying to escape every night, trying to negotiate a padded cell for him, 'One of the padded cells is occupied by Lacroix, a kindly man always ready to render service, but if with others possessed of the desire for murder at the slightest provocation. I asked him if he would mind going into the cell next door as a stranger needed his nice, padded cell. He said he would give up his room but the next one was draughty and if he were with others he would certainly kill one of them by morning', still problems accommodating the escaping Arab. |