Page 41 of A Helpin g Hand for the Village Nurse

‘Don’t need anything.’

‘Of course you do!’

Florence rested impatient hands on her hips and regarded Ottilie as if she felt sorry for her. ‘You mean to tell me you’ve never skinny-dipped?’

‘Never!’ Ottilie said, uncertain that she liked the way Flo was looking at her – as if she thought her a bit of a wet weekend. ‘Certainly not on a hillside in England!’

‘All the more reason to do it. What’s life if we don’t live it to the full?’

Along with the pity for Ottilie, Florence had a strange sort of spark in her eyes, and for a startling instant Ottilie saw the woman she’d once been: fearless, daring, greedy for life, a woman miles ahead of the conservative times she’d been born into. For all her disapproval, had she been a young woman she’d have been a social-media influencer, off having adventures around the world and broadcasting them to an army of admirers who had their own adventures vicariously through her, who would be just like her if only they dared. She’d have been skydiving and swimming with sharks and cutting her way through rainforests and anything else that came her way. Ottilie also saw that she really wasn’t joking, and her fears were confirmed when Flo perched on a rock and began to take off her shoes.

‘Paddle!’ Ottilie said helplessly, knowing already that she’d lost the battle. ‘Dangle your feet in and that’s it.’

‘Too deep to paddle. It’s all or nothing.’

‘Flo, please…we’ve just been to the hospital and we’ve no idea what those scans might uncover?—’

‘If my heart’s going to give out then I can’t think of a better way to go. If you’re so worried, come in with me. That way you can save me if I have a funny turn. You swim, don’t you?’

‘Yes, but?—’

By now, Flo was unbuttoning her blouse. Ottilie desperately scanned the hillside. It was deserted, but surely Florence wasn’t going to take everything off?

‘You’ll have to go home in sopping underwear,’ she said, grasping for something else that might put Flo off.

‘Which is why I’m going to take it off,’ Flo replied with such obvious practicality that Ottilie felt quite stupid for even suggesting she might keep her undies on.

‘Are you mad?’

‘Possibly,’ Flo said with a half-smile. ‘I am old after all. You get a bit mad as you get older, don’t you?’

‘I thought you were supposed to get more sensible.’

‘Sensible!’ Flo snorted. She had the slightly manic look again that Ottilie found unnerving. Whenever Ottilie felt she was beginning to work her out, Flo would do or say something that took her back to square one. The more she knew Flo, the less she felt she knew her. But she couldn’t deny that there was something about her she rather liked, something that drew her in. She’d never met anyone like Flo before, and she only wished she’d known her in her youth, because she would have been dazzling. But her next sentence knocked the wind from her sails.

‘I’ll leave sensible to you, Nurse Ottilie.’

The comment cut her to the quick. Worry, intrigue, admiration – all the things she’d felt for Flo a second before was replaced by offence.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘What I said. You’re far too sensible.’

‘Why does it feel as if sensible is code for boring?’

‘I didn’t say boring – you did.’

‘You think I’m boring?’

‘I think you’re cautious.’

‘I have reasons for being cautious…And there’s nothing wrong with cautious.’

‘No one ever had fun being cautious, did they?’ Flo said with a grin as she shrugged off her blouse. ‘So are you coming in or not?’

Ottilie stared at her, torn. Was she really boring? Was that how Flo saw her? Was that how everyone saw her?

‘You say you came to the Lakes for a change,’ Flo said, ‘so change. You want to be a local, then be a local. This is what we do.’

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