by Betty Neels
“And now tell me why you were laughing,” demanded the professor.
She had steeled herself to face his wrath although she wasn’t at all sure why he should have been so very angry with her; she still thought that she had done the right thing in remaining with her patient, and she had several arguments ready proving this. His question took her off guard; it was only when his voice sliced through these ruminations with a peremptory “Well?” that she pulled herself together sufficiently to explain about being burned to a crisp; it sounded very silly, but he heard her out, his face quiet, and then astonished her by saying: “You did quite right not to panic—you probably saved his life.”
Charity stared at him. “But you were furious—you told me I should have evacuated…you shouted…”
“My feelings were strong at the time,” he told her, his voice surprisingly mild. “I spoke in an unguarded moment.”
She did one or two observations and charted them while she pondered this remark. What had he to be guarded about, unless it was against showing his dislike of her? She pursued the thought no further; her patient had opened his eyes.
“Mr Boekerchek is back with us, sir,” she said quietly.
The American was looking intently at her. “Say, what’s the almighty row?” he wanted to know in a thin thread of a voice. There was certainly a row going on, although distant; purposeful feet tramping to and fro, orders being given, and a great deal of banging and thumping.
“Where’s my room?” asked Mr Boekerchek testily.
The professor went over to the bed and speaking in a calm, matter-of-fact voice, gave his patient a watered-down version of the morning’s happenings. “We’ll move you back very shortly,” he added. “In the meantime you can be comfortable here.”
Mr Boekerchek nodded weakly. “As long as you and Charity say it’s OK,” he stated in a whisper, and dropped off into a refreshing nap.
The professor moved to the door and Charity saw from his glance that he wished to speak to her. “He’ll do,” said Professor van Tijlen. “We will get him on his feet as soon as we can have him out of here—a quiet stay in the country—the sooner the better.”
His eyes were on her as he spoke and they looked cold. She annoyed him, she thought unhappily, just by being there she annoyed him; no wonder he was so anxious to get his patient away. She wasn’t a conceited girl, but most people liked her, and here was one—the only one who mattered—who didn’t.
She agreed with him in a quiet voice and turned away from his hard stare to check the cardiogram. He had gone before she had finished.
It was remarkable how quickly the hospital settled back into its well-ordered discipline. Naturally enough, there was a good deal of excitement among the staff and a spate of exaggerated accounts given by the patients to their visitors. Mrs Boekerchek, who had heroically refrained from saying anything at all to her husband when she arrived an hour or so later, besieged Charity with questions as she walked with her to the lift, leaving Dof writing up notes by the patient’s bedside.
“The professor telephoned me,” she explained. “How thoughtful he is, honey—he explained about Arthur being poorly and that I wasn’t to come because it wouldn’t help.” She stopped to sniff away a few tears. “Then he telephoned again to tell me that there’d been a fire but that Arthur was OK and getting better.” She looked up at Charity’s kind face. “He will get better, won’t he, Charity?”
“Of course, Mrs Boekerchek, the operation was entirely successful—the professor is satisfied, and he’s the one to know.”
“He’s coming to see me as soon as he has the time—to explain it all. I guess I’m silly not to understand all that’s being done for Arthur.”
“No, you’re not,” said Charity warmly. “You just go on coming to see him in your pretty clothes and with your hair just so—that’s what he needs now.”
Mrs Boekerchek stretched up to kiss her. “What a dear girl you are,” she declared, and added: “You and the professor, you’re a darling pair.”
If only we were, Charity wished as she bade her companion goodbye. It was a pity that Mrs Boekerchek couldn’t listen in to some of the professor’s conversations with herself—on the other hand, perhaps it was a good thing.
It was two days later after he had examined Mr Boekerchek and pronounced him vastly improved that he paused on his way out and spoke to Charity, making no attempt to lower his voice. “Miss Dawson, my grandmother has asked me to persuade you to take tea with her again. She is sometimes a little lonely and I should be grateful if you could spare the time to do so.”
He nodded briefly and strode off before she had time to frame a reply. It was Mr Boekerchek who said: “Well, now, isn’t that just dandy? You go this very afternoon, honey—I’ve got that fellow coming from the Embassy, and you’re free anyway, aren’t you?”
It seemed she had no choice in the matter, the professor with his high-handed requests and not waiting for an answer, and now Mr Boekerchek behaving as though it was the greatest treat for her. She would go that very afternoon, she decided, but only because she wanted to see the old lady again, not because the professor had asked her to.
Mevrouw van Tijlen was glad to see her, and so, in his discreet way, was Potter. During the course of the afternoon, the old lady told Charity a little about him. “Over here during the last war,” she explained, “got wounded and took shelter, married the girl who looked after him.”
“Mrs Potter is a Dutchwoman?”
“Yes, they’ve been with Everard ten years now—dote on him, too. Do you dote on him, girl?”
Charity choked over her tea. “Mevrouw van Tijlen, I don’t know the professor, only as someone working for him. He’s a splendid surgeon.”
“Humph! And that’s no answer, but I’m a nosey old woman, aren’t I?” She fixed Charity with a blue, beady look. “Have you wondered about the gemel ring?”
Charity put her cup and saucer down carefully, they were paper-thin porcelain and probably extremely old. “Yes,” she said with admirable calm. “It has—it’s unusual.”
Her hostess nodded. “Give me a slice of that cake, child… The ring is old—the van Tijlen men give it by tradition to the girl they intend to marry. It has been in that cabinet for years now, and when I ask Everard when he will make use of it, he laughs and says he will not take it from there until he finds the girl he will marry. And a good thing, I must say,” said the old lady fiercely, “for I would not wish him to offer it to any of the chits he has brought here from time to time.” She snorted indignantly. “He is forty, almost forty-one, and when I tell him to get married he says he has too much work to do and laughs.”
To Charity’s consternation, her old face crumpled and two tears trickled down her cheeks. “He says that he is too old for any young girl to wish to marry; they enjoy going out with him and spending his money, but to settle down—that is quite another matter.” She sniffed and added defiantly: “He is no monk, Charity Dawson!”
“Well, I should hardly expect him to be,” said Charity reasonably, “as long as he marries the right girl in the end.” And that one won’t be me, she told herself silently. She got up from her chair and went to sit by Mevrouw van Tijlen. “Don’t worry about it,” she begged her. “He’ll meet the right girl one day and once he’s discovered that he loves her, he’ll marry her and—and love her for the rest of his life.”
She spoke cheerfully, although the thought of Everard loving someone else for the rest of his life made her feel utterly forlorn. The old lady chuckled: “Just like a fairy story.”
Charity nodded and agreed, her voice very cheerful, only her face was wistful.
Save for his daily visit, she didn’t see the professor at all, and one week later Mr Boekerchek left the hospital, and she, naturally enough, went with him. Everyone came to say goodbye to her, excepting for the professor, who for some unaccountable reason didn’t come near her.
CHAPTER SIX
MR BOEKERCHEK had been given
the use of a house in the Hoge Veluwe north of Apeldoorn, about a mile from the small village of Gortel. It was forty-odd miles away from Utrecht, in delightful wooded country and wild heathland, with few main roads and, save for Apeldoorn, no large towns. The house was a middle-sized villa with a steep roof from which small windows peeped, a great many narrow iron balconies and a beautiful garden. It had been built between the wars, and although its architect had been carried away on a wave of unnecessary embellishment, it had a surprisingly charming interior.
The rooms led from one to the other, nicely proportioned and many-windowed. The kitchen was enormous, but as its present owner had equipped it with every modern gadget on the market, its size presented no problem, and at the back of the house was a garden room where Mrs Boekerchek declared that she would spend her days arranging the flowers growing in such profusion in the garden. And as for Mr Boekerchek, he was so glad to be still alive and well on the road to recovery once again that he meekly agreed to the rules and regulations his own doctor imposed upon him and made no murmur at all when Charity saw that they were carried out; probably, in a week or two, when he was feeling quite well again, he would want his own way, which, his wife had confided, he had always had but now he led the gentle life he had been ordered and as Charity told him, butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth.
She didn’t much like the doctor who had taken over from Dr Donker while he was on holiday; a thin stooping man with a reedy voice who had a habit of tut-tutting after every remark anyone might make. He sucked in his breath at Mr Boekerchek’s scars, shook his head over the meticulous notes sent by the professor, and eyed Charity with the dim suspicion that a girl as pretty as she was was bound to be a poor nurse. As the quiet days passed, she began to long for the professor, not just for herself, but for Mr Boekerchek, so that he might breathe some self-confidence into him; she was doing her best, but it seemed to her that as fast as she encouraged him in some small activity well within his powers, along came Dr Segal to tut-tut his objections. Mr Boekerchek had been very ill, but there was no reason why he should remain so for the rest of his life.
She would have liked to confide in someone, but who? Mrs Boekerchek was happy; her husband was better and she supposed that his convalescence would be a protracted one, for like a great number of people, she had a dread of anything to do with illness and was only too glad to leave the horrid details to someone else. She had been a little surprised when Dr Segal had vetoed any suggestion of her husband taking short drives in a car—even pottering in the garden with her, but as she confided to Charity, doctors always knew best.
So Mr Boekerchek spent a good deal of his day sitting in a comfortable chair in the garden, while his wife and Charity weeded and hoed and cut the flowers, Charity would have liked to work in the kitchen garden too, but the dour old man who came three times a week to trim the hedges and tend the vegetables disapproved of that, even though kindly Mrs Boekerchek had tried to persuade him in her indifferent Dutch.
Charity, therefore, when she wasn’t keeping an eagle eye upon her patient, contented herself with gardening and short walks in the woods around the house. Summer was almost over, but the glorious weather still held, after the first few days she had got into the habit of attending to Mr Boekerchek’s early morning wants and then, while he drank his tea, scanned the papers and read his post, going for a walk before going to the kitchen to see to his breakfast. This particular morning she had strolled a little further than usual; there was a hint of chill in the air and it had rained during the night; very soon it would be autumn, and very soon she would be going back to England. Another week or so and Mr Boekerchek would go back to den Haag, not to work immediately, of course, but to get back slowly into the swing of normal life.
She toyed with the idea of staying on in Holland for a few days after she had given up the case, telling herself it was a splendid opportunity to see something of the country, and knowing in her heart that if she did so it would be in the ridiculous hope that she might see Everard van Tijlen again. “Stupid fool,” she admonished herself, and hurried back to the villa.
She went in through the back garden and so failed to see the Lamborghini parked at the front of the house, so that her surprise was complete when she came face to face with the professor in the long narrow hall.
It was like being a little girl again, wishing for something and getting it with glorious unexpectedness, but she took care to disguise her delight—so effectively that her “Good morning, sir,” was, to say the least, austere.
“Hullo,” said the professor carelessly. “You don’t look pleased to see me, but I can’t expect that, can I?”
Charity had no answer, wondering why he made such a point of reminding her that she disliked him, instead she asked: “Oh—is there something wrong?”
He stood in front of her, his hands in his pockets. “No—are you anticipating disaster, or is my appearance the recognised signal for you to expect the worst?”
She stared miserably at him; seeing him again was wonderful, but it was also disastrous, for he appeared to be impatient with her, as well as not liking her. She edged away from him. “I’ll let Mrs Boekerchek know that you’re here—I don’t think she was expecting you. We—we haven’t had breakfast yet, perhaps you would care to join her?”
He nodded. “I’m early, I know—it is the only time I can spare. I’ll take a look at Mr Boekerchek later. Keep him in bed, will you?”
It was an excuse for her not to go to breakfast, though there was nothing special for her to do before the professor trod up the stairs to Mr Boekerchek’s room. The men shook hands and the professor observed: “You look fit. I’ve no business to be here, really—your own doctor has charge of you, but I wanted to satisfy myself that you were almost ready to get back into harness again.” He sat down on the bed. “Getting out each day?” he asked. “Going for walks, taking little drives?”
Mr Boekerchek said a little testily that no, he wasn’t. “Charity suggested that she should drive me around a bit, and that I might potter around in the garden, but Segal won’t hear of it.” He cast a worried look at his visitor. “Say, I’m better, aren’t I? I’m not having the wool pulled over my eyes?”
The professor grinned. “Not by me. As far as I can tell you are practically a hundred per cent fit. Thousands of men have coronaries and recover to lead a normal life again—there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be one of them.” He got to his feet. “Shall I have a look at you?”
He went over the American carefully, completely absorbed. “Nothing wrong at all,” he said at length. “Let’s see you up and walking.”
Charity draped her patient’s dressing gown around him and watched him walk around the room and then, obedient to a nod from the professor, took Mr Boekerchek’s pulse. There was nothing wrong with it; he was as good as he ever would be. The professor said so with an assurance which held no doubt, then stayed to talk for a few minutes before bidding Mr Boekerchek goodbye. As he went to the door, he said over his shoulder: “I would be obliged if you would spare me a few minutes, Sister.”
She would spare him the rest of her life if he wanted it, only he didn’t. She followed him out on to the landing and closed the door.
“Do you want me to speak to Dr Segal?” he wanted to know. His tone was impersonal; a surgeon talking to a nurse.
“Yes, please. Mr Boekerchek is getting a little fed up with inaction, and very impatient. If I could drive him round the country, or if he might walk in the woods…”
He nodded. “I’ll see about it.” He looked at his watch. “I’ll go on to den Haag now. When is Segal due for a visit?”
“Tomorrow.”
He nodded again and they went downstairs. “Mrs Boekerchek is in the sitting-room,” Charity suggested, and turned to go upstairs again.
“You will be going back to England shortly?” he asked her, his hand on the door.
“Yes—I don’t know exactly, but very soon, I should imagine.”
�
��Back to Budleigh Salterton?”
“Yes—for the time being at least.”
He grunted something and went into the sitting-room without saying goodbye, and she went back up the stairs and bustled Mr Boekerchek out of his bed and into his clothes, and pretended to herself that she hadn’t heard the whispered roar of the Lamborghini as it sped away from the villa.
“And that’s the last of him,” she told herself fiercely, longing to have a good cry. But one didn’t cry over spilt milk.
Dr Segal came the next morning and after fussing around his patient, declared rather pompously that after consultation with Professor van Tijlen, he considered that Mr Boekerchek could increase his activities considerably. Car drives, he suggested, just as though no one had suggested them already, walks in the woods, more visitors. He even, when pressed to do so, gave a date when he felt that his patient might safely return to his own home in den Haag: Ten days, he pronounced, provided that Mr Boekerchek would promise not to return to his office immediately, and then only for an hour or so each day to begin with.
He was barely out of the house before Mrs Boekerchek and Charity had their heads together, planning a picnic tea, while the invalid occupied himself happily in telephoning den Haag to ask that his car should be brought over then and there.
It was a Cadillac, far too large for Charity’s taste, and the chauffeur who drove it over was patently worried that she would be unable to handle it. But a short drive round the surrounding country roads put his mind at rest; he could find no fault with her driving. She dropped him off at the nearest railway station and went back to the villa, and after a light-hearted lunch with Mr and Mrs Boekerchek, drove them deep into the Veluwe, responding with patience to her patient’s well-meaning advice about her driving while carrying on a lively conversation with his wife concerning her autumn outfits.