An Indecent Obsession Read Online Free PDF

Determined no one would be able to accuse her of dereliction, she got herself through the first few days on ward X.
    But what turned Honour Langtry from a caring custodian into someone who cared far too much to limit her role to mere custodian was the realization that at Base Fifteen no one was interested in the men in ward X. There were never very many X-type patients in a hospital like Base Fifteen, which had started off its existence much too close to the actual fighting to gear itself toward troppo-ness. Most of the men who wound up in ward X were transferred there from one of the other wards, like Nugget, Matt and Benedict. Severe cases of psychic disturbance were mostly shipped straight back to Australia; those who came toward X were less disturbed, more stealthy in their symptoms. The army had few psychiatrists, none of whom were attached to places like Base Fifteen, at least in Sister Langtry’s experience.
    Since there was little or no real nursing for her to do, she began to apply her considerable intelligence and that boundless energy which had made her such a good medical nurse to the problem of what she called the X pain. And told herself that to recognize what the men of X suffered as a genuine pain was the beginning of a whole new nursing experience.
    The X pain was travail of the mind as distinct from the brain; amorphous and insidious, it was based in abstractions. But it was no less an entity, no less the ruin of an otherwise sound organism than any physical pain or handicap. It was futile, ominous, uneasy and empty; its malaise was enormous, its effect far longer-lasting than physical hurt. And less was known about it than almost all other branches of medicine.
    She discovered in herself a passionate, partisan interest in the patients who passed through ward X, was fascinated by their endless variety, and discovered, too, a talent in herself for actively helping them through the worst of their pain. Of course she had failures; being a good nurse meant one accepted that, provided one knew one had tried everything one could think of. But unschooled and ignorant though she knew herself to be, she also knew that her presence in ward X had made a great deal of difference to the well-being of most of her patients.
    She had learned that the expenditure of nervous energy could be more draining by far than the most gruelling of physical work; she had learned to pace herself differently, to cultivate huge reserves of patience. And understanding. Even after she got over her mild prejudices against those character weaknesses she had to cope with what seemed a total self-centeredness in her patients. To someone whose adult life to date had been devoted to a busy, happy and largely altruistic selflessness, it came hard to realize that the apparent self-orientation of her patients was only evidence of lack of self. Most of what she learned was through personal experience, for there was no one to teach her, and little to read. But Honour Langtry was truly a born nurse; she battled on, stimulated, absorbed, quite in love with this different kind of nursing.
    Often for far longer than she hoped or expected, there was no tangible evidence that she had reached a patient. Often the breakthrough when it came made her wonder if anything she had done personally had actually contributed. Yet she knew she helped. Had she doubted that for one moment, she would have wangled herself a transfer months ago.
    X is a trap she thought, and I’m in it. What’s more, I enjoy being in it.
    When the beam of the torch slid onto the beginning of the ramp, she turned it off and walked up its wooden length as quietly as her booted feet would permit.
    Her office was the first door on the left down the corridor, a six-by-six cubbyhole which two louvered exterior walls saved from a submarine-like horror. It barely held the small table she used as a desk, her chair on one side, a visitor’s chair on the other, and a small L-shaped area of plank