by Betty Neels
‘Are you going to invite me in for tea?’
It was the last thing she had expected. ‘Well, I hadn’t intended to but if you’d like to come in, do.’ That sounded rude; she amended it hastily, ‘What I mean is, I didn’t imagine you would want to come to tea.’
He said gravely. ‘You shouldn’t let your imagination run away with you, Claribel—and I should like to come to tea. That was an infernal afternoon.’
She laughed then, quite forgetting that she didn’t like him. ‘Yes, it always is, but it’s only twice a year. Such a pity it has to be on a Saturday, though.’
They got out of the car and he opened the door and stood aside for her to go in. The cats rushed to meet them and he bent to tickle their heads and then stood up; his size made the room even smaller. She said, ‘Do take off your coat—there’s a hook in the lobby. I’ll put the kettle on.’
She threw her coat on the bed and changed her shoes, decided her face and hair would have to do and went into the tiny kitchen. There was a cake she had baked that morning and one of her mother’s homemade loaves. She sliced and buttered, cut the cake, added a cup and saucer to the tray and made the tea.
Mr van Borsele was sitting in the largest of the chairs with a cat on either side of him. He got up as she opened the door, took the tray from her and set it on the small table on one side of the fireplace and went to fetch the cake. The cats followed him in what she considered to be a slavish fashion and when he sat down again, resumed their places on either side of him.
‘You like cats?’ Hardly a conversational gambit, but they would have to talk about something.
‘Yes. My grandmother has two—Burmese.’ He accepted his tea and sat back comfortably and she found herself wondering what his grandmother was like—somehow he was such a self-contained man, obviously used to getting his own way, that it was hard to imagine her—a small, doting mouse of a woman, perhaps? And his wife? If he was married.
He was watching her, his dark eyes amused. ‘I have two of my own,’ he told her. ‘Common or garden cats with no pedigrees, and two equally well-bred dogs who keep them in order.’
She passed him the bread and butter. ‘And your wife? She likes animals?’
The amusement deepened but he answered gravely, ‘I am not yet married.’ He took a bite. ‘Homemade bread. Are you a cook, Claribel?’
‘Well, I can, you know, but my mother is quite super.’
She watched him consume several slices and made polite conversation. She didn’t like him, she reminded herself, but there was something rather pathetic about a very large man eating his tea with such enjoyment. As she offered him the cake, she wondered briefly where he was living while he was in London.
‘Do you go home frequently?’ He sounded casually polite and she found herself talking about Tisbury and her friends there and how she loved her weekends. He led her on gently so that she told him a good deal more than she realised; she was telling him about Sebastian and how clever he was when the phone rang.
She was going out that evening—one of the girls she worked with was getting engaged and there was to be a party; she wanted to make sure that Claribel would be there.
‘Yes, of course. I haven’t forgotten. Eight o’clock. I’ll be ready at half past seven.’
‘I’m so happy,’ burbled the voice at the other end.
‘Well, of course you are.’ Claribel smiled at the phone as she put down the receiver.
Mr van Borsele was watching her with an expressionless face.
As she sat down again he said easily, ‘A date this evening? I’ll be on my way. A pleasant hour, Claribel, between this afternoon’s tedium and the evening’s pleasure.’ He added thoughtfully, ‘Surprising, really, for you still aren’t sure if you like me, are you?’
He stood up and she got to her feet, facing him. She gave him a clear look from her beautiful eyes. ‘No, I’m not sure, but it doesn’t really matter, does it? There must be any number of women who—who admire you!’
‘Probably.’ He spoke without conceit. ‘But I’m really only concerned with one girl, not untold numbers.’
‘Oh, well in that case it doesn’t matter what I think about you, does it, Mr van Borsele?’
He shrugged into his coat, offered a gentle hand to Enoch and Toots and went to the door. He didn’t answer her, only wished her the politest of goodnights as he left.
Several times during the evening she found herself wishing that Mr van Borsele had been there, which, considering she didn’t like him, seemed strange.
Back in her flat, lying in bed with the cats curled up at her feet, she decided it was because he was so much older than the young men who had been at the party, mostly newly qualified housemen or final-year students. ‘After all, I am getting a bit long in the tooth,’ muttered Claribel to her unresponsive companions.
Of course she knew other older men. There was one in particular, Frederick Frost, the junior registrar on the orthopaedic wards, a serious man who had given her to understand that he had singled her out for his attention. She had gone out with him on several occasions now, and liked him well enough although she found him singularly lacking in romantic feeling. He would be a splendid husband; he would also be very dull.
Sometimes she lay in bed and wondered if she had been wise to refuse the offers of several young men who had wished to marry her. She hadn’t loved any of them; liked them well enough, even been fond of them, but that was all. Somewhere in the world, she was convinced, was the man she could love for always; she had no idea what he would look like but she supposed that when she met him she would know that he was the one. Only here she was, the wrong end of the twenties, and it looked as though she would never meet him.
Frederick had asked her to spend Sunday afternoon with him; she came back from church in the morning, ate her solitary lunch and took a bus to Hyde Park where they were to meet. Frederick believed in good fresh air and exercise; he walked her briskly from the Marble Arch entrance to Green Park and thence to St James’s Park, talking rather prosily all the way. Claribel, brought up in the country and fond of walking, nonetheless was relieved when they finally reached the Mall and Trafalgar Square and entered a modest café for tea and toasted teacakes.
Frederick was on duty at the hospital at six o’clock. He saw her on to a bus, assuring her that she looked all the better for the exercise they had taken that afternoon, and invited her to repeat it on the following Sunday.
Claribel’s feet ached and her head buzzed with the various diagnoses he had been entertaining with her; she said hastily that she would be going home, thanked him prettily for her tea and sank thankfully on to a seat in the bus.
The cats were pleased to see her and her little room looked cosy as she went indoors. She kicked off her shoes, took off her outdoor things and turned on the gas fire. She would sit and read for an hour before getting her supper.
It was barely ten minutes before the knocker on her front door was given a sound thump. She got up reluctantly, dislodging the cats, and went to open the door.
Mr van Borsele loomed over her. ‘I thought I told you never to answer the door without making sure that you knew the caller,’ he said testily. ‘Well, won’t you ask me in?’
‘Why should I?’ she snapped. ‘Banging on my door… Next time I shan’t open it.’
‘What makes you think there will be a next time?’ he asked smoothly.
Only by a great effort did she stop herself from grinding her teeth. ‘There won’t be if I can help it,’ she assured him coldly.
‘Having cleared up that knotty point, may I come in? There’s something I wish to discuss with you.’
‘Could it not wait until Monday?’ She added crossly, ‘It’s Sunday, you know.’
‘Monday will be too late.’ He suddenly smiled at her with great charm. ‘If I might come in?’
She stood back reluctantly and remembered that she wasn’t wearing her shoes. At the same time Mr van Borsele observed, ‘Been walking?
Don’t bother to put your shoes on for me.’ He studied her stockinged feet. ‘You have nice ankles.’
He was impossible! She said stonily, ‘You wished to say something urgently, Mr van Borsele?’
‘Ah, yes. There is an orthopaedic clinic in White-chapel; it seems there is a flu bug there which has laid low the visiting consultant and three of the physiotherapists. They have asked us for help, and Miss Flute suggested you might accompany me—she can get a part-time girl in to do your work at our clinic for the morning, and I happen to be free until the afternoon. The clinic starts at eight o’clock and lasts until about noon.’
‘Why me?’ asked Claribel.
‘You seem to be a sensible young woman, able to cope.’
‘Am I given any choice?’
‘Not really. It’s a busy clinic; takes fringe cases from several hospitals; I believe the patients come quite long distances.’
Claribel eyed him carefully; he didn’t appear to be anything else but serious but one couldn’t tell. She said slowly, ‘Very well, Mr van Borsele.’
‘Splendid. One does appreciate a willing volunteer.’ His voice was all silk so that she darted a suspicious look at him. He met her eye with a look of bland innocence and she was sure that he was finding something very amusing behind it.
‘I am not a willing volunteer,’ she protested. ‘You yourself have just said…’
He interrupted her in a soothing voice, ‘No, no, of course you’re not; merely doing your duty, however irksome. I will call for you at seven o’clock precisely; that will give us time to find our way around.’
He had been standing all this time and so had she. ‘You have had a pleasant afternoon? A few hours in the country, perhaps?’
She thought of her aching feet. ‘Hyde Park and Green Park and St James’s Park.’
‘Delightful in pleasant company.’
She thought of Frederick. ‘I dare say,’ she sighed.
‘Never alone, Claribel?’
‘No,’ she added, forgetting to whom she was talking. ‘I would have liked to be at home.’ She looked up at him with her lovely eyes and was startled at the look on his face, gone so quickly that she supposed that she had imagined it.
He said casually, ‘One can be lonely even with companions. Do you suppose we might dine together this evening? I had to cancel a date so that I could get arrangements made for the morning and I’m sure we could remain polite towards each other for a couple of hours; we don’t need to talk unless you want to.’
While he spoke he contrived to look lonely and hungry and in need of companionship; Claribel was aware that he was doing it deliberately, but all the same it would be heartless to refuse. Besides, there was only cold ham in the fridge… She said quickly before she thought better of it, ‘Very well, Mr van Borsele, I’ll dine with you, but I have to see to Enoch and Toots first.’ She remembered her manners. ‘Do sit down, I’ll only be ten minutes.’ At the door she paused. ‘Nowhere posh—I’m not dressed to go out.’
He cast an eye over her person. ‘You will do very well as you are. Only put your shoes on.’
He took her to Chelsea, to a restaurant just off the Kings Road: English Garden, quite small but pleasantly surrounded by a conservatory full of greenery and flowers. They ate traditional English food, beautifully cooked and served, and rather to Claribel’s surprise she found herself enjoying not only the food but her companion’s conversation. Not that she discovered anything much about him from his talk; he talked about Holland, touched lightly on his work, went on to discuss several West End plays he had been to and then led her on, ever so gently, to talk about herself. It was only later that she realised this, annoyed with herself for telling him so much, especially as she hadn’t found out anything at all about him. She had asked, in a roundabout way, how long he would be in London, but somehow he hadn’t answered her. Lying in her bed, thinking about it, she promised herself that she would have another go in the morning.
Perhaps he wasn’t as bad as she had first thought, she decided sleepily; he had driven her back to her flat, opened her door for her and then bidden her a cheerful goodnight. She had been debating whether to ask him in for a final cup of coffee as they drove, but the very briskness of his manner decided her against it.
She was ready and waiting for him when he arrived the next morning. They exchanged good mornings but, beyond a few civil remarks about the weather, which for early April was chilly and damp, they had nothing to say to each other, and once at the clinic they each went their own way, to meet again presently on a strictly professional basis.
Even if they had felt inclined, there was no opportunity to talk. The clinic bulged with patients of all sorts, a good-natured crowd with its crutches and slings and neck braces, sitting patiently and rather noisily in the waiting-room. There were two physiotherapists there besides Claribel. They shared out the work between them and long after Mr van Borsele had seen his last patient, they were all hard at it. It was after one o’clock when they began to clear up and tidy away the apparatus.
He’ll be gone, reflected Claribel as she got out of her overall. I’ll have to get a bus—it’ll take hours. She dragged a comb through her hair, dabbed powder on to her nose and got into her coat. The other two girls were waiting to leave. She said goodbye and went out through the side door and saw the Rolls parked in front of it. Mr van Borsele was at the wheel, looking impassive. He got out and opened the door, and ushered her in without a word.
‘There was no need to wait,’ protested Claribel, faintly peevish, and was taken aback when he replied,
‘Well, of course there wasn’t, only I chose to do so.’
‘Well, really…’
‘I have found,’ remarked Mr van Borsele blandly as he sent the car smoothly to join the traffic, ‘that the English language is littered with useless phrases.’ And, while she was getting over that, ‘Unfortunately there is not sufficient time to have lunch, but one of the registrars assures me that Nick’s Diner, just round the corner from Jerome’s, can offer a sound beef sandwich and good coffee. We will go there.’
He had no more to say and for the life of her Claribel could think of no conversation suitable for the occasion. She knew very well that if she raised any objections she would be either ignored or talked out of it; she held her tongue.
The streets were comparatively empty; she got out, still wordless, when Mr van Borsele parked tidily in the consultant’s car park and walked beside him as he strode out of the hospital forecourt into the dingy street beyond. Nick’s Diner was down a side street, one side of which was taken up by St Jerome’s looming walls. It was small and rather dark and the plastic tables were crowded close together, but it was clean and the aroma from the coffee machine caused Claribel to wrinkle her pretty nose.
The little place was full but as they went in two medical students got up from a table near the door. ‘Over here, sir,’ they chorused and ushered Claribel into a chair, accepting his thanks with a kind of reverence which made her smile a little, and rushed out. Probably they had skipped a lecture.
The proprietor, a small wizened man who had been there so long no one could remember when he first appeared, joined them at once, gave the table a wipe and bent a differential ear to Mr van Borsele’s request for beef sandwiches and coffee.
‘Couldn’t ’ave chosen better,’ he assured them. ‘Nice bit o’ beef I’ve got—cuts like silk—and good ’olesome bread to go with it, too; none of that white flannel stuff from a factory. Be with you in a couple of shakes, sir.’
Sir sat back and looked around him and then across the little table at Claribel. ‘Hardly a place I would like to bring anyone. You’re not feeling insulted or having injured feelings, I hope?’
‘Me? Heavens, no.’ She added waspishly, ‘I’m not a snob.’
‘I hardly imagined that you were. Nor am I, although I can see that you think that I am. But one would normally choose a rather more fitting background for a girl as pretty as you are, Claribel.�
��
He watched her blush.
‘Why are you called Claribel?’
‘My mother liked—still likes—historical romances. Just before I was born she was reading a tale where the heroine was called Claribel—so I was christened that. She rather wanted Mariabella, which is another version of it, but Father put his foot down.’
‘And your brother?’ The question was put casually.
‘Sebastian? Oh, Mother was into Shakespeare in a big way.’ She bit into a sandwich. ‘Why were…’ she began, but stopped just in time and took another bite; she must remember that he was a consultant and, from what Miss Flute had let drop, an important one in his own field.
‘My name, as you know, is Marc, spelled with a c, and, since the conversation tends to be rather more personal than usual, I am thirty-six years old. At the moment I am not prepared to divulge more details of my life.’
She chocked on some of the wholesome bread. ‘I am not in the least interested in you, Mr van Borsele.’ She spoke with a cold dignity marred by having a mouthful of sandwich.
He laughed. ‘What a touchy girl you are! How old are you, Claribel?’
She said indignantly, ‘Don’t you know that you never ask any girl how old she is?’
‘Yes, I know, but you aren’t any girl, Claribel. You look about eighteen, but of course, you’re not.’ He waited for her to reply, his eyebrows raised.
He was utterly impossible and getting worse all the time; she couldn’t imagine Frederick saying a thing like that. Come to think of it, she couldn’t imagine Frederick… He had become so vague she could barely remember what he looked like. ‘I’m twenty-eight.’ She added coldly, ‘Is there anything else you want to know?’
‘Oh, a great deal, but unfortunately we are pressed for time.’
She put down her empty coffee cup. ‘I really have to go. Thank you for my lunch, Mr van Borsele.’
He got up with her, paid the bill, and followed her into the street. ‘What’s his name, this young man who walks you through London parks until your feet ache?’