by Betty Neels
Emma banged the teaspoons into the saucers. ‘You ask so many questions,’ she snapped. ‘How should I know? In Holland, of course, in one of those square houses…’ She remembered all at once the house they had stopped to look at. ‘Like a house outside Oudewater,’ she went on, talking more to herself than to him. ‘It was tall and red brick, and it had a big double gate of wrought iron—very elaborate—and a great front door. There were rows of windows—I remember Mother said it would take hundreds of yards of curtains and I said that perhaps they were still using the ones which had been hung when the house was built.’
He gave her a look which defied understanding. ‘Most of them are. They’re taken down and cleaned and repaired from time to time and of course they’re faded, but I like them like that,’ and in answer to Emma’s open-mouthed stare, ‘You see, it’s my home.’ He smiled suddenly. ‘You liked it, Emma?’
She nodded, the memory of her longing to see its interior strong inside her. As though he had known her thoughts, he said, ‘It’s very beautiful—a little severe from the outside perhaps, but inside—one day you shall see it, Emma.’
She still goggled at him, like an earnest child trying her best to understand. She said at last, ‘Well, I don’t think that’s very likely. I thought—they said you worked in Utrecht.’
‘So I do, but Oudewater is only ten miles or so away from Utrecht. I go to and fro each day unless I’m away lecturing or travelling.’
Emma took the milk off the stove just in time. ‘Do you travel much?’
‘Occasionally—not as much as I used to, and now I intend to settle down and shall hope to travel even less.’
Emma, longing to know more and afraid to ask in case he would say in so many words that he was going to get married, said pleasantly:
‘That’ll be nice. Would you carry the tray? I’ll bring the coffee.’
Later, in bed, she regretted her cowardice in not asking the one question she really wanted to know the answer to. It looked as though she would never know now unless she plucked up the courage to ask, for he was singularly unforthcoming about his own affairs. She sighed and turned over restlessly and Kitty asked, ‘Emma, why are you awake? Are you worrying about Mrs Coffin, dear? She’s in good hands. It must have been horrid for you. Now go to sleep. I’ll get up in the morning and see to the chickens and bring you a cup of tea. How’s that for a noble deed?’
Emma smiled into the dark. ‘Lovely—only don’t let me sleep late, will you? Not in this gorgeous weather, it’s such a waste of time.’
She didn’t sleep late, but she didn’t waken when Kitty went downstairs either. Not until her sister stood over her with the promised tea did she open her eyes. Kitty was in old slacks and shirt too and contrived to look bewitching in them. She perched on the end of the bed and said, ‘Hullo there, here’s your tea. I’ve done the henhouse—at least, Justin did it for me while I got the eggs. He’s outside now mending that fence at the bottom of the garden. He’s handy about the place, isn’t he? It’s a heavenly day—we thought we might take a picnic up on to Bulbarrow. He doesn’t know Dorset—we could go to Blandford and out on that road to Sturminster Newton and turn off at Shillingstone, then go through Haselbury Bryan and across Blackmoor…’ She rattled on while Emma drank her tea and listened with half an ear. A picnic would be fun, but they would have to come home after tea at the latest and what on earth would they do to entertain their guest in the evening? He had said that he liked a simple life, but wasn’t their life just a little too simple?
She need not have worried. They spent the whole day crossing and recrossing the byways of Dorset, stopping to eat first a picnic lunch and then later boiling a kettle and having tea, accompanied by one of Mrs Hastings’ satisfying cakes, before they went home, and although the professor should by rights have sat reading a book or watching television while they got the dinner, he did nothing of the sort, but laid the table and went down to the Brace of Pheasants for a bottle of wine, then settled himself in the garden once more to help Kitty sort out her notes. And after dinner he washed up while Kitty dried the dishes and Emma went to shut the hens up for the night and Mrs Hastings pottered to and fro, happily doing nothing. They played Scrabble for the rest of the evening, and try as she would, Emma could detect no signs of boredom in the professor’s manner.
Little Willy arrived shortly after eleven the next morning, which meant that he had either driven the whole way at ninety miles an hour or had left considerably earlier than ten o’clock, but no one, least of all the professor, asked him about it, and he joined the rest of them in the little back garden and drank his coffee rather shyly, although everyone was at great pains to put him at his ease. Presently their combined efforts had their effect and he was laughing and talking as though he had known them all, and not just Emma, for years, and when he made some remark to the professor and addressed him as sir, he was begged not to be a fool, but call him Justin like everyone else.
He grinned sheepishly and said, ‘Thanks, I will, though I don’t suppose it’s the right thing to do, because I shall have to call you sir again tomorrow.’
The professor rolled over lazily, selected a blade of grass and began to chew it. ‘That’s what Emma says, and by all means call me sir tomorrow, but not, I beg of you, today.’ He rolled back again and closed his eyes. ‘Would it be a good idea to go somewhere for a swim? Is there anywhere quiet within fifty miles or so?’
Emma and Kitty said ‘Lulworth’ together and Mrs Hastings added:
‘You young things go, I’m going to laze about reading the Sunday papers. What do you want to do—take sandwiches, or come back for a late lunch?’
‘Sandwiches,’ said Justin promptly. ‘If you’ll tell us what we can have Will and I can see to them—he’s handy with a knife too.’
There was general laughter at this and a concerted movement indoors where the sandwiches were cut, swimsuits found, and Mrs Hastings, who was a good mother, gave advice about not lying about too long in the hot sun and not to swim immediately after they had eaten.
But the sea, when they reached it, looked too inviting for them to bother with lunch and they dispersed to change into swimming gear and plunged in. At least the professor and Little Willy and Kitty plunged, while Emma, who could swim, but only in an unspectacular way, advanced more cautiously and swam, with equal caution, not too far and then back again until the professor, who had watched her repeat her prudent sorties several times, came back to join her. He said in a matter-of-fact voice:
‘You swim quite well, Emma—you could manage half a mile, you know. If we swim together, I’ll help you if you get tired.’ He was lying on his back in the calm water looking at the sky and not at her at all.
‘That won’t be much fun for you,’ declared Emma. ‘I’ve no nerve, you know: I’m liable to panic and drop like a stone.’ She began to swim sedately away from him; she had watched him in the water—he swam with the speed and strength to make her own efforts appear ludicrous.
His voice came from close beside her and turning her head cautiously she saw that he was idling along beside her, keeping pace with her hardworking efforts.
‘I’ll be your nerve,’ he promised, ‘and if you feel like sinking, just mention it and I’ll swim for both of us. It’s just a question of you trusting me.’
Put like that there was nothing more to be said. She turned her face seawards and presently, when the professor said in her ear, ‘Tired?’ she nodded.
‘We’ll rest a bit then. Turn over on to your back.’
‘You must be joking,’ she said flatly. ‘I’ve tried and I fold up in the middle.’
She heard him chuckle. ‘Not this way, you won’t,’ and he flipped her over so that she lay beside him with his arm under her shoulders. ‘Relax a little,’ he besought her, ‘you’re as stiff as a poker. Turn your head and look at me, Emma.’
She did so, cautiously, astonished that nothing awful happened, and he smiled at her. ‘See? Now I’m going to show you h
ow to do the crawl, there’s no earthly reason why you shouldn’t.’
‘No?’ Emma felt uncertain and at the same time compelled to go on. ‘Are we a long way from the beach?’ She kept her eyes on his face because she was afraid to look and then panic.
‘No. We’ll turn and go back now.’ He flipped her over and kept a steadying hand on her still. ‘Now do as I say.’
She did, and incredibly, she neither fell like a stone nor panicked, although she was secretly much relieved to feel the ground under her feet once more.
She tried again before they left the beach and this time, when commanded by the professor to tread water and see how far she had swum from the shore, did so and was astonished and a little scared to see just how far it was.
‘You see?’ his voice was reassuringly calm. ‘You swim very well, only you didn’t know it. You must practise your crawl too.’
She said meekly that she would and thanked him and sat quietly beside him while he drove back, trying not to think about him and failing utterly.
It was after they had eaten the vast tea Mrs Hastings had ready for them, while they were all lying on the grass soaking up the sun and talking about nothing in particular, that Kitty remarked:
‘Oh, lord, how awful to have to go back to London, and so early in the morning too. I can’t bear it!’
‘Why don’t you go up with Will this evening?’ asked the professor gently. He looked across at Little Willy, who had come erect and was staring at him. ‘You have to go up this evening, don’t you, Will? I’m surprised you hadn’t thought of it before.’
He closed his eyes, apparently no longer interested in the subject, but Kitty exclaimed, ‘Will, are you really going up to town? May I come with you, then? It’ll be marvellous to go the whole way by car—the train’s always packed on Monday mornings.’
Will said quickly—almost too quickly—’ Yes, I am. I—I should have asked you before, but I didn’t think it would be any good. I’d love to have you. Would it be OK if we left about half past eight?’
‘Smashing,’ said Kitty, and she sounded very happy. ‘Mother, you don’t mind?’
Emma, sitting between Little Willy and her mother, glanced across at the professor, still lying prone. His eyes were shut, his handsome face turned up to the still warm early evening sun. He looked, she thought with sudden suspicion, extremely pleased with himself.
She gave vent to her suspicion the following morning as they drove back to Southampton. The professor had been unusually talkative about a variety of subjects, almost as though he didn’t want her to introduce any other topic than those which he might choose, but she took advantage of a pause while he negotiated a particularly tricky snarl-up of the traffic and asked him, ‘Did Willy really have to go to London? I found it very strange that he hadn’t said a word to me.’
The professor, judging his distance to an inch, extricated the Rolls from the traffic around them, and gave her her head. ‘And was there any reason why he should?’ His voice was mild and only faintly interested.
‘No, not particularly, only—it seems funny—I mean what could he possibly want to go to London for?’
‘Not your business, surely, Emma.’ Her companion’s voice was silky and she flushed.
‘No, of course it’s not, it’s just…’ She paused, unable to put into words something which was only a dim idea in her head.
The professor, still silky, went on easily, ‘A suspicion? Quite right, Emma. He had no idea he was going to London until I told him so.’
‘Why on earth…?’ began Emma, thoroughly bewildered.
‘My dear girl, surely you could see for yourself that Will is besotted with Kitty? It seemed a good chance to give him a helping hand.’
A helping hand or a clever move on the professor’s part to bring his rival into the open? Emma pondered the idea and discarded it as unworthy of him. She laughed instead. ‘Well, what a thing to do—I thought he was interested, but not—not besotted. He’s so shy, and nice,’ she added fiercely.
If he heard the fierceness he gave no sign. ‘I realize that interfering in such a matter is unpardonable. I must confess that it’s something I wouldn’t tolerate in anyone else.’
Emma stopped laughing. ‘No,’ she said, still fierce, ‘you’re too arrogant—you’re the last man on earth to need it.’
‘Meaning I’m an experienced philanderer?’ the silk was back in his voice, so was laughter, ‘able to conduct my own affairs?’
Emma peeped at him. Despite the laugh he was frowning, his brows jutting alarmingly above his haughty nose. ‘No,’ she said placatingly, ‘that isn’t quite what I meant. I think what I was trying to say was that you’re more experienced and you’ve lived longer…’
She stopped at his shout of laughter. ‘Now I’m Methuselah! Oh, Emma, how you do cut me down to size!’
Which remark surprised her very much. She had tried not to think about it several hours later, when, in company with a remarkably cheerful Willy and the rest of the theatre staff, she was standing at the theatre table and the professor had given her a wholly impersonal look above his mask and asked in an equally impersonal voice, ‘Ready, Sister?’ and she had answered with a calm which by no means reflected her feelings:
‘Quite ready, sir.’
CHAPTER FIVE
IT WAS while they were all—Emma, the professor, Mr Bone, Little Willy and Peter Moore, having a quick, late cup of coffee after the list that the telephone rang, and when Emma answered it, Kitty’s voice, gay in her ear, said, ‘I bet you’re surrounded by men.’
‘Well,’ said Emma cautiously, ‘as a matter of fact, I am—we’ve only just finished.’ She frowned at Will who was preparing to go as Kitty went on. ‘Good, be a darling and let me speak to Will.’
Emma handed him the receiver with a brief ‘For you, Will,’ and was rewarded by a glowering look and a frown in his turn so that she felt constrained to ask, ‘Shall we go?’
‘Of course not.’ He was listening to Kitty now and looked, as far as his rather craggy face would permit, excited. But the conversation wasn’t the least exciting, it consisted of yes and no and then no again until he grinned suddenly and handed the receiver in his turn to the professor who took it without any show of interest and after saying, ’Justin here’, listened without a word while Kitty talked at great length. His answers were as sparse and unilluminating as Will’s had been, only he finished up by saying that he would be delighted before handing the receiver back to Emma, who, consumed by curiosity, was unable to forbear from asking, ‘Kitty, is anything the matter?’
‘Nothing—just something I wanted to ask.’
‘Oh, surgical advice.’ Emma felt relieved without knowing why.
‘Something like that. ‘Bye for now, darling.’
Emma put the receiver down and looked round the circle of faces deciding which one she would question first, but before she could speak Justin said smoothly,
‘I should like to switch the first case to second place tomorrow if you could arrange it, Sister. Shall I warn the ward or will you?’ And when she said that yes, she would see to it he got to his feet and the others got up with him. They filed out after him, echoing his polite, ‘Good afternoon, Sister Hastings.’
When they had gone Emma sat on, idle behind her desk. They had wished her farewell in the same tones they used for Sister Cox; polite, impersonal and giving the impression that they really didn’t care if they never saw her again. The grim thought that she might be getting like Mad Minnie crossed her mind, but when she asked Little Willy about it the next morning he told her not to be a fool and wasn’t she getting too sensitive these days?
The days piled tidily one on top of the next and Emma, seeing Justin each day, tried to find the delightful companion of the weekend lurking behind his placid face, but failed. He was kind, pleasant and considerate and on only two occasions did he demonstrate any sign of the temper which was supposed to match the fieriness of his hair. The first time was when Pet
er Moore swore vividly when he dropped the retractors, using words which Emma, a broad-minded girl, winced at, and even the professor hadn’t said very much, merely pointing out in an icy voice that Mr Moore might contain his feelings until he was in more suitable company; but he had cast him a withering glance from his green eyes which had caused that young man to get scarlet in the face and tender a hasty apology. The second time had been Nurse Cully’s fault, for she had considered that Jessop was being too slow in offering the receiver for that portion of the patient’s anatomy which the professor had seen fit to remove and she had snatched the receptacle from Jessop’s hand at exactly the wrong moment and just too late to catch the professor’s offering, which had fallen messily to the floor as a consequence, and to make matters worse, Cully had giggled. Without pausing in the tying of ligatures, he had flashed her another withering look and remarked tartly that perhaps it might be as well if she were to attend to her own work and allow Nurse Jessop to perform her own tasks.
He had followed this up with an austere apology to Emma for encroaching upon her preserves, delivered so coldly that she felt, most unfairly, that the whole episode had been her fault in the first place. Her ‘Don’t mention it, sir,’ was just as tart and delivered with great dignity, disconcertingly answered by a chuckle behind the professor’s mask.
Later, when they were scrubbing-up for the next case, he apologized again, this time very handsomely, adding the opinion that it was a pity that Sister Cox hadn’t been there so that she could have had proof of the ill-temper he was reputed to inflict upon those who worked for him.
‘Oh, you’re not ill-tempered,’ said Emma generously. ‘Why, we’ve had surgeons who threw instruments on the floor if they got put out—so time-wasting.’
‘You will be relieved to hear that I don’t, as a general rule, throw things about,’ Justin replied. He stood upright and allowed Cully to tie him into his gown. ‘Are you going home for the weekend, Emma?’