The Silent Valley

by Jean S. MacLeod

  How like Stuart that was! Della should not have wired him forcing him into this situation, yet there was relief in the very thought of him and the knowledge that she need not make that nightmare journey alone. He would be there to share it with her.

  'Do you know anything about Sark's relatives?' he asked presently. 'I believe he spoke about some aunt or other, but his parents are the people we should contact first.'

  'He hasn't any parents,' Jane explained. 'This aunt he speaks of brought him up from infancy, I believe. He's very fond of her.'

  'He realises, of course, that he can't go back there? No inexperienced person could possibly nurse him. We must find a bed for him at Conyers.'

  Until they were half way home Jane did not appreciate the fact that she was going back to Conyers. Tom was her one concern, but she knew that she would never have been able to make this flight if it hadn't been for Stuart.

  He had arranged everything. He had even managed to make the parting with the Freys easier, somehow, encouraging Hilde not to break down in front of Tom. Della had come down from the clinic in the sleigh to stay the night before their departure, and she had parted with Stuart with what seemed unnatural brevity to Jane.

  'You'll be seeing Dad, of course, Stuart,' she had said. 'Give me a good school report, won't you?'

  'I'll do my best!' he returned with a slow smile. 'Meanwhile don't forget that reports can also be sent by post!'

  Della had laughed and blown him a kiss, flippant in the face of unaccustomed emotion, but when it had come to parting with Jane and Tom she had nothing to say.

  'We may meet.' Her lips seemed to stiffen and her eyes were suddenly opaque. 'Until then—au revoir!''

  Tom had held her hand for a moment and let it go. He did not say good-bye.

  When the plane landed an ambulance was waiting. There were absolutely no hitches because Stuart had thought of everything. The long journey by road began with him sitting next to Jane, facing Tom across the narrow, confined space.

  'We should get in about six,' he said. 'I phoned Matron from the airport.'

  Jane felt slightly sick. Reaction was setting in, but she was determined not to let it get a hold. What did it matter that she had been ignominiously dismissed from Conyers only a few short months ago? She was not returning there in her professional capacity. She was going back as Tom's fiancée.

  The ambulance drew up at the side door of Conyers. It was the visiting hour and the corridors would be busy. An orderly came round and opened the door for them and Stuart helped her out.

  Momentarily Jane laid a hand on Tom's arm as they lifted him down.

  'O.K., Jane!' he said. 'No need to mention the stiff upper lip!'

  She walked across the grey paving-stones to the door, and it was only then that she noticed Matron standing there in the shadows. Jane thought the older woman was about to faint.

  'Matron!'

  Agnes Lawdon pulled herself together with an effort.

  'Will you bring the patient in,' she said in a stilted monotone.

  How different her voice sounded, Jane thought. Surely Tom could not have meant so much to her? A woman like Matron had been trained to shock over a period of many years.

  She stood now, tight-lipped and very pale, watching while her patient was lowered carefully on to the bed, and Jane passed her to go to Tom's side.

  'Where will you be?' he asked. 'Have you anywhere to stay?'

  'I'll find somewhere,' she said. 'You mustn't worry about that.'

  'Jane.' His voice was very tired. 'Will you go down to Crale for me and have a talk to Aunt Ada?'

  'Yes,' she promised. 'I'll go tomorrow, but she may be here before then.'

  'Did you write to her?'

  'Yes. I thought I should.'

  'Good girl! You think of everything.'

  Stuart drew her gently away.

  'He'll sleep now,' he said. 'You can leave him to Matron.'

  The silent figure by the door moved forward as he slid the hypodermic needle into Tom's arm. It was almost as if Agnes Lawdon had forgotten them—or dismissed them—as she stood looking down at the bed, and Jane followed Stuart swiftly from the room.

  'I've booked accommodation for you at the White Hart,' he said. 'They'll take care of you there, Jane.'

  Tears stung her eyes at his kindness and constant thought for her.

  'You must want to see Sir Gervaise,' she said. 'He'll be expecting you.'

  'He wired me that I must stay there, but it's rather far out. I'd like to be on hand.'

  In case Tom needed him? In case she needed him? It was the same thing now, but he would never know how much she needed him, his advice, the assurance of his protection at this moment of her greatest uncertainty!

  'You've already done so much, Stuart—more than you need have—and—there's Della. She needs you, too.'

  'My responsibility for Della is almost over,' he said. 'You know, Jane, how much I owed to her father, and I feel that I have almost discharged that debt now, thanks to Doktor Frey and the Loti treatment.'

  'But you will go back to Switzerland,' she said as if she expected it.

  'Not because of Della. I think she will be coming home very soon.'

  He beckoned a taxi at the end of the lane and took her to the hotel.

  'I'll come for you in the morning and take you across to Conyers,' he promised as she signed her name at the desk. 'Try to get some sleep, Jane. You look all in.'

  When, finally, she dozed off in the greyness of the winter's dawn, her sleep was troubled by fantastic dreams in which she and Stuart and Della featured in unreal situations and she seemed to be pursuing Tom into some black abyss from which there was no return.

  Day broke and the hotel stirred into life. She lay listening to the sound of the lift and the clatter down below in the kitchens, and then, at eight o'clock, when she could remain inactive no longer, she got up and began to dress.

  Almost immediately the telephone beside her bed began to shrill. She stood staring at it for a moment, stark fear paralysing movement, thinking that it might mean that Tom had not survived the night. Would Matron ring her in that event—or Stuart?

  it was Stuart's voice at the other end of the line.

  'I've managed to borrow a car,' he said. 'If you like, I'll run you down to Crale. I heard you making the promise to Tom.'

  'Oh!' she gasped with relief. 'If you would! It's such a. difficult journey by train and bus.'

  'I've been to Conyers this morning, by the way,' he said.

  'How is Tom?' she asked breathlessly.

  'Not too good. He had an unsettled night, which was to be expected, of course. Matron stayed up with him, apparently. She's a strange sort of woman.'

  'I've never really known her,' Jane said. 'I don't think anyone has—not really. When do you want me to be ready?'

  'I'll pick you up in an hour's time,' he said. 'It's no use going to see Tom till the afternoon. We've given him something to let him sleep.'

  Jane was ready when he came for her, driving the big yellow car in which he had first brought Della to Conyers. He made room for her in the front beside him, wrapping a warm travelling rug about her knees and glancing critically at her pale face as he drove away.

  'I hope you've had some breakfast, not just tea and toast,' he said.

  'I had an egg, but I really didn't feel like eating, Stuart.'

  His mouth, grim and disapproving, was mirrored in the windscreen, but he did not answer her as they left the town behind and drove swiftly through the bleak countryside.

  'I've asked Sir Gervaise to have a look at Tom,' he said. 'He'll be the final authority, I'm afraid.'

  His tone said that he didn't hold out much hope, and Jane saw it underlined again in the tightly-compressed mouth and the slight dilation of the fine nostrils, but he had put Sir Gervaise's skill at her disposal and for that she had to thank him.

  'You've done so much, Stuart. I shall never be able to thank you sufficiently for—for these past tw
o days.'

  At eleven o'clock he pulled the car up before a wayside hotel and ordered coffee and biscuits. Jane drank the strong coffee thankfully, conscious of the chill in the Channel haze that struck coldly on her limbs, the damp, chill cold of England which she had almost forgotten in the crystalline air of the Alps.

  She thought of Della still at Oberzach, at the clinic on the plateau where Stuart's lonely chalet awaited his eventual return. He would go back. She felt certain of that. He had only returned to England out of kindness, because of Tom's accident.

  They drove on, reaching Crale just before twelve. Rose Cottage looked deserted and curiously woebegone as they approached it, -its windows tightly closed and the sea haze wrapping it round. The garden which had been such a gay riot of summer flowers when Jane had last seen it lay forlornly under the pall of dank mist.

  The door was opened to them immediately, however, and Ada Sark smiled when she saw Jane, although the marks of strain were heavily etched on her face.

  'I got your letter,' she said. 'Will you come in?'

  'This is Mr. Hemmingway.' Jane introduced Stuart. 'He helped to bring Tom home.'

  'You wrote that you were taking him to the nursing home,' Mrs. Sark said, showing them into the parlour, as befitted the occasion, and stooping to light a noisy gas fire. 'How badly is he hurt?'

  She was looking more at Stuart than at Jane, as if she sensed that he would not beat about the bush, and he answered her appeal for truth.

  'He's been pretty badly hurt, Mrs. Sark. We brought him home for that reason.'

  There was a painful, dazed sort of silence and then Ada nodded her grey head.

  'I see,' she said. 'Can you tell me how it all happened?'

  'He was skiing under rather bad conditions. He had not nearly sufficient experience.'

  'Foolhardy,' Ada muttered. 'He was always like that, full of adventurous notions.'

  'He'd like to see you,' Jane said in a choked whisper. 'He asked me to bring you. Do you think you could come back with us right away?'

  'As soon as I've made you a bite to eat,' Ada agreed, but Stuart cut in:

  'No, please don't bother about food, Mrs. Sark. We'll get something in Bristol on our way back. When you are ready we'll push off as quickly as possible before this sea fret gets any worse.'

  Ada did not protest, hurrying off to do as Stuart asked, and although Jane wanted to thank him she could not. He was being kind—and distant. He was doing this for her as he would have done it for anyone in similar circumstances, a girl stunned by the knowledge that the man she had promised to marry was about to die.

  Mrs. Sark had little to say on the journey northwards. She sat in the back of the car with her hands tightly clasped together over her handbag, as if she would offer a continuous prayer for Tom's recovery even in the face of Stuart's verdict, and she was out of the car before he could help her when they finally reached the nursing home.

  Jane took her arm as they followed Stuart's tall figure through the swing doors.

  'Matron is expecting us,' he said. 'Will you wait here for a few minutes till I find her?'

  Ada blew her nose nervously as she turned to Jane.

  'In all the years I've known Agnes, I've never been here before', she confessed. 'I hate these places,' she added vehemently. 'I don't know how she has stuck it all these years, though the money was good when she got on a bit.'

  Jane remembered that Ada Sark and Matron had known each other for the greater part of their lives. They had, in effect, been friends, although friendship was a thing she had never connected with Agnes Lawdon. They did not seem the types to have struck up a lasting friendship, but she knew that these things happened. There was her own friendship with Della, for instance, blossoming in spite of their divergent temperaments and the fact that they were both in love with Stuart.

  The sound of brisk footsteps in the corridor made her turn towards the waiting-room as Agnes Lawdon came in, but the older woman did not seem to see her. Her eyes were fixed on her other visitor and she said quietly:

  'Well, Ada ! I'm glad you've come.'

  Jane stood back, but Mrs. Sark clung to her arm.

  'You'll come, too, dearie?' she begged. 'He was very fond of you, in his way.'

  Matron looked at Jane, but there was no antagonism in her eyes now, only a complete and utter weariness not wholly explained by the fact that she had sat up with a critically ill patient throughout the night.

  They walked to the door of Tom's room, passing Stuart on the threshold.

  'Don't wait too long,' he cautioned, looking at Jane.

  Ada Sark approached the bed, drawing Jane with her. Tom lay prostrate on his back, but he turned his head slightly when he saw them.

  'Aunt Ada—kind of you to have come,' he said. 'What's it like at Crale? All the boats hauled up and the shore deserted?'

  'And a sea fret in over the land!' Ada Sark's voice had all but broken. 'It's not the time of the year for Crale, lad, or for boats, either.'

  There was a pause before Tom said awkwardly:

  'I've never thanked you—never properly.'

  'That's all right, lad,' Ada said steadily. 'Crale was your home. There's no need to be thanking me.'

  A movement at the door made Jane turn in time to see Agnes Lawdon hesitate before she approached them. Her face looked grey and pinched in the rapidly waning light and she halted before she reached the bed.

  'We'll have to leave him to sleep now,' Jane said, touching Ada's arm. 'We can come back later.'

  They went to the White Hart for tea. Matron had offered it to them in her room, but Jane had thought Mrs. Sark might want to rest afterwards and Stuart had arranged for her to stay at the hotel overnight.

  Infallibly kind, completely thoughtful, but still distant, he had attended to the details of that long day for which Jane had found no heart, and at the end of it he would not let her sit up with Tom.

  'It would be pointless, Jane,' he told her with all the old firmness in his voice. 'If there's any need, I'll send for you. I promise you that.'

  She was forced to obey him. It seemed that Stuart was directing her entire world just now for a reason which she could not understand but which had ceased to puzzle her. Complete physical exhaustion had taken its inevitable toll and she felt that she could not even think.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  'It's a last resort, but I feel that the effort should be made.'

  Stuart sat back in the car beside Sir Gervaise Cortonwell, watching the chauffeur turning it expertly into the early-morning traffic of Norchester's High Street while the older man digested what he had just been told.

  'You appear to have more than the usual interest in this case, Stuart,' Sir Gervaise observed. 'Of course, you knew the fellow in Switzerland, didn't you?'

  'I knew him slightly before he went there, too,' Stuart said. 'He was house physician at Conyers.'

  'Indeed?' Sir Gervaise was beginning to simulate a little more interest. 'Is he a local man?'

  'I'm not sure. He appears to have been brought up by some people down at Crale who adopted him as a child, and I believe he qualified somewhere in the midlands—Manchester or Leeds, perhaps.'

  'H'm! And I take it that you consider the case fairly hopeless from all you've just told me?'

  'I'd like your final opinion,' Stuart answered.

  The car drove on.

  'I've never had much contact with Conyers,' Sir Gervaise mused. 'Preferred to do my job at the City General, where my reputation was made, or send my patients in to Bristol. Still, I dare say they're efficient down there.'

  'Most efficient,' Stuart assured him. 'Matron is everything one could reasonably expect.'

  'We've never met,' Sir Gervaise said somewhat pompously. 'I believe she's only been here a year or two. I don't even remember having heard her name.'

  'She's a Miss Lawdon, I think.' Stuart was giving his attention to the traffic, conscious of a dislike of being driven by someone else which he could never quite ov
ercome. 'I've heard it mentioned once or twice.'

  'Lawdon?' Sir Gervaise pondered. 'I knew someone by that name once, but it couldn't possibly be the same. It was years ago.' He appeared to dismiss the thought. 'No, it couldn't possibly be the same!'

  'It's an unusual name,' Stuart said, and left it there.

  When they reached the nursing home and drew up at the front door he could see Agnes Lawdon standing behind the discreet net curtain of her office, looking out at them with the satisfaction of knowing that she could not be so keenly observed from their point of view. She was probably wondering about Sir Gervaise, of whom she must have heard many times. He thought of the slight starchiness of her manner which would be more in evidence than, ever as she was presented to the great man, and then he led the way up the steps and through the swing doors into the hall.

  Matron came slowly from the room facing them and Stuart heard a sound that was neither a gasp nor a denial but something between the two. It came from the man by his side, and when he turned to look at him Sir Gervaise's face was grey.

  'Good morning,' Agnes Lawdon said steadily.

  There was nothing in her manner to betray the fact, but Stuart knew that Sir Gervaise had been recognised in turn.

  'This is Sir Gervaise Cortonwell,' he introduced them with a feeling of futility, conscious of irony and something that was almost ludicrous in the situation. They had both tried not to give themselves away, and if Agnes Lawdon had succeeded where his patron had failed it was possibly because she had known all along whom she was about to meet. 'How has my patient been these past few hours, Matron?'

  'It's difficult to say, Mr. Hemmingway.' Her voice was quite steady, her eyes dark and calm on his. 'There appeared to be a slight relapse round about midnight and again shortly after two o'clock, but—he has survived the night.'

  That fractional pause was the one concession she had made to emotion, if indeed she was capable of feeling acutely at all. Women in her profession often steeled themselves to reject pity, Stuart thought, sacrificing their womanhood in the process.

  They turned and went quickly along the corridor, following the erect figure until she paused before a door at its far end. Her fingers fastened over the handle and lay there irresolutely for a moment before she pushed the door open and led the way in.