by Betty Neels
The guests began to leave as soon as the bridal pair had gone; car after car slid away into the winter darkness until there were only a very few left, their owners delaying their departure for a last-minute chat or waiting for each other. Mary Jane felt rather lost; the drawing room was in the hands of the caterers, under the sharp eye of Jaap, being returned to its usual stately perfection. Sientje was in the kitchen, the daily maid had gone long ago. Mary Jane stood in the hall, remembering how cheerfully Fabian had asked ‘Tomorrow?’ when she had asked him on the way to the wedding if he would arrange for her to travel home. ‘I’ll send the tickets here to you,’ he had told her casually, ‘in plenty of time for you to catch the boat train from Groningen. Jaap will drive you to the station.’
Now she wondered if that was to be his goodbye. She had helped him when he had asked her to; her own affairs were in order, there was nothing more for him to do; did he intend to drop their uneasy acquaintance completely? Just as well, perhaps, she mused, they had never got on well. She wandered into the empty sitting room and sat down by the window, staring out into the dark evening, her mind full of useless regrets, her fingers playing with the diamond brooch Fabian had given her and which she had pinned to her coat. She had written and thanked him for it. It had been a long letter and she had tried very hard to show her gratitude, but he had never answered it, or mentioned it—she wasn’t sure if he had even noticed that she was wearing it today. She got up and strolled back into the hall, empty now. Not quite empty, though, for Fabian was there, sitting in the padded porter’s chair by the door. He walked over to meet her and said easily, ‘Hullo—I’m just off. You’re fixed up for the evening, I hear. Dirk told me earlier that he intended taking you out to supper.’ He smiled. ‘He’s good company, you’ll enjoy yourself.’
‘Oh, indeed I shall,’ she assured him, her voice bright. How pleased he must feel, thinking that she was settled for the evening and that he need not bother…’I hope you have a pleasant evening too,’ she assured him untruthfully, ‘and thank you for seeing about the tickets. I’ll say goodbye.’
She held out her hand and had it engulfed in his, and it became for an amazing few seconds of time the only tangible thing there; the hall was whirling around her head, her heart was beating itself into a frenzy because she had at that moment become aware of something—she didn’t want to say goodbye to Fabian, she didn’t want him to go, never again. She wanted him to stay for ever, because she was in love with him—she always had been. But why had she only just discovered it? And what was the use of knowing it now? For even as the knowledge hit her he had dropped her hand and was at the door. He went through it without looking back.
CHAPTER EIGHT
MARY JANE STOOD staring at the door for a few seconds, hoping that he might come back; that he had forgotten something; that he would ask her to go out with him that evening, Dirk or no Dirk. Anything, she cried soundlessly; a violent snowstorm which would make it impossible for him to drive away, something wrong with the Rolls, an urgent message so that she could run after him with good reason… Nothing happened, the hall was empty and silent, there was a murmur of voices from the drawing room where there was still a good deal of activity, and from outside the crunch of the Rolls’ wheels on the frozen ground. They sounded remote and final; she waited until she couldn’t hear them any more and then went in search of Jaap.
If the old man was surprised at her decision to go to bed immediately, he didn’t show it. They had become used to each other by now, so it wasn’t too difficult to let him suppose that she had a headache and wanted nothing for the night. He wished her good night and went back to the caterers.
She slept badly and got up early, which she realized later had been a silly thing to do, for the morning stretched endlessly before her. She wouldn’t be leaving until the late afternoon, and somehow the time had to be helped along. She spent some of it with Jaap and Sientje, but conversation was difficult anyway, and they had their work to do—they were to go on a short holiday and return to make the house ready for Cousin Emma and her husband, who had agreed to the happy arrangement of leaving his own house for his son’s use and carrying on his practice from Midwoude. Mary Jane, sensing that much as Jaap and Sientje liked her, they wanted to get on with their chores, offered to clear away the silver and glass which had been got out for the wedding, and then went around freshening up the floral arrangements; probably Jaap would throw them out before he closed the house, but it gave her something to do. But even these self-imposed tasks came to an end, and she ate her lonely lunch as slowly as possible, hoping that Fabian would telephone; surely he would say goodbye? But as the minutes ticked by she was forced to the conclusion that he had no intention of doing so. Perhaps he would be at the station—if she could see him just once more before she went away… She told herself it was foolish to build her hopes on flimsy wishes, a good walk would do her good and she had plenty of time. She went and got her coat, tied a scarf over her head, snatched up her gloves, and went in search of Jaap. He seemed a little uncertain about her desire to go out, but she could understand but little of what he said and she wasn’t listening very hard; she wanted to get out and walk—as fast as possible, so that she might be too tired to think about Fabian. She made the old man understand that she would be back in good time for him to drive her to the station, and fled from the house before he could detain her longer.
The afternoon was bleak and frozen into stillness; the ground was of iron and she quickly discovered that it was slippery as well. She walked fast into an icy wind, down to the village, and when she looked at her watch and saw that she still had time to kill, she walked on, towards the path which led eventually to the lake. Here the bare trees gave some pretence of shelter even though the ground under her feet was rough and treacherously slithery, something she hardly noticed, trying as she was to outstrip her unhappiness, forcing herself to think only of her future in the house her grandfather had left her. She came in sight of the frozen water presently and paused to look at her watch again. She would have to return quite soon and she decided not to go any further.
There were people skating on the lake, turning the greyness of its surroundings into a gay carnival of sound and colour. Mary Jane drew a sighing breath, the memory of her afternoon with Fabian very vivid, then turned on her heel and started to retrace her steps along the path, and after a short distance, lured by the cheerful sight of a robin sitting in a thicket, turned off it and wandered a little way, absurdly anxious to get a closer view of the bird. But he flew just ahead of her so that when she finally retraced her steps the path was hidden. She hurried a little, anxious to find it again because it would never do to lose the boat train. She didn’t notice the upended root under her foot—she tripped, lost her balance on the smooth ice, and fell, aware of the searing pain in the back of her head as it struck a nearby tree.
It was like coming up through layers of grey smoke; she was almost through them when she heard Fabian’s voice saying ‘God almighty!’ and it sounded like a prayer. With a tremendous effort she opened her eyes and focused them upon him. He looked strange, for he was in his theatre gown and cap and a mask, pulled down under his chin.
‘You sound as though you’re praying,’ she mumbled at him.
‘I am,’ and before she could say more: ‘Don’t talk.’ His voice was kind and firm, she obeyed it instantly and closed her tired eyes, listening to him talking to someone close by. He had taken her hand in his and the firm, cool grip was very reassuring; she allowed the soft grey smoke to envelop her once more.
When she wakened for the second time, the room was dimly lit by a shaded lamp in whose glow a nurse was sitting, her head bowed over a book. But when Mary Jane whispered, ‘Hullo there,’ she came over to the bed and said in English, ‘You are awake, that is good.’
Mary Jane suffered her pulse to be taken, and in a voice which wasn’t as strong as she could have wished said, ‘I’ll get up,’ and was instantly hushed by the nurse’s horri
fied face.
‘No—it is four o’clock in the morning,’ she remonstrated, ‘and I must immediately call the Professor—he wishes to know when you wake, you understand? Therefore you will lie still, yes?’
Mary Jane started to sit up, thought better of it because of the pain at the back of her head and said weakly, ‘Yes—but no one is to get up out of his bed just to come and look at me. I’m quite all right.’
‘But the Professor is not in his bed,’ explained the nurse gently. ‘He is here, Miss Pettigrew, in the hospital, waiting for you to wake.’
She went to the telephone as she spoke and said something quietly into it, then came back to the bed. ‘He comes,’ she volunteered, ‘and you will please lie still.’
He was there within a few minutes, this time in slacks and a sweater. To Mary Jane’s still confused eyes he looked vast and forbidding and singularly remote, and the fact disappointed her so that when she spoke it was in a somewhat pettish voice. ‘You stayed up all night—there was no need. I’m perfectly all right.’ She frowned because her headache was quite bad. ‘It was quite unnecessary.’
He said tolerantly, ‘It’s of no matter,’ and took her wrist between his finger and thumb, taking her pulse. ‘You feel better? Well enough to talk a little and tell me what happened?’
She blinked up at him. His face looked drawn and haggard in the dim light and she felt tender pity welling up inside her so that she could hardly speak. ‘I’m sorry,’ she managed, ‘I mean I’m sorry you’ve had all this trouble.’
‘I said it didn’t matter. What happened?’ His voice was quiet, impassive and very professional. He would expect sensible answers; she frowned in her efforts to be coherent and not waste his time.
‘I went for a walk,’ she explained at last. ‘You see, I hadn’t anything to do until it was time to leave. I went to the village and there was still lots of time—I went down the path between the trees to the lake. There was a robin, I went to look at him and I slipped and hit my head—I can remember the pain.’ She stopped, thankful to have got it all out properly for him. ‘I don’t know how long I was there. Did I dream that I saw Jaap and it was very cold?’
Fabian had pulled up a chair to the side of the bed. ‘No—you were cold, and it was Jaap who found you when he went to look for you because you hadn’t gone back to the house and he was worried, only he didn’t find you straight away because you were a little way from the path. You have a slight concussion—nothing serious, but you will stay here, lying quietly in bed, until I say otherwise. And you will do nothing, you understand?’
She muttered ‘Um’ because she was drowsy again, but she remembered to ask, ‘Where’s here?’
‘The hospital in Groningen.’ And she muttered again, ‘Thank you very much,’ because she was grateful to be there and wanted him to know it, but somehow her thoughts weren’t easy to put into the right words. Forgetting that she had already said it once, she thanked him again. ‘I’m such a nuisance and I am sorry.’ A thought streaked through the fog of sleep which was engulfing her. ‘I’m going home today,’ she offered in a groggy voice.
‘Yesterday—no, Mary Jane, you are not going home, not just yet. You will stay here until your headache has gone.’
She managed to open her heavy lids once more. ‘I don’t want…’ she began, and met his dark eyes.
‘You’ll stay here,’ he repeated quietly. ‘Nurse will give you a drink and make you comfortable and you will go to sleep again.’
She was in no state to argue; she closed her eyes and listened to his voice as he spoke to the nurse, but he hadn’t finished what he was saying before she was asleep again.
It was afternoon when next she woke, feeling almost herself, and this time there was a different nurse, a big, plump girl with a jolly face, whose English, while adequate, was peppered with peculiar grammar. She turned Mary Jane’s pillow, gave her a drink of tea and went to the telephone.
Fabian was in his theatre gown again. He nodded briefly with a faint smile, took her pulse and, satisfied, said: ‘Hullo, you’re better. How about something to eat?’
She didn’t answer him. ‘You’re busy in theatre,’ she observed in a voice which still wasn’t quite hers. ‘What’s the time?’
‘Three o’clock in the afternoon.’
‘Have you a long list?’ She hadn’t meant to ask, but she had to say something just to keep him there a little longer.
‘Yes, but we’re nearly through. How about tea and toast?’
She nodded and started to thank him, but sneezed instead. ‘I’ve a cold,’ she discovered.
‘That’s to be expected. The temperature was well below zero and you were half frozen. I’ll see that you get something for it.’
She sneezed again and winced at the pain in her head. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ she said meekly. ‘I’m quite well excepting for a bit of a headache.’
He gave her a smile which he might have given to a child. ‘I know. All the same, you will stay where you are until I say that you may get up.’
Mary Jane nodded and closed her eyes, not because she was sleepy any more, but because to look at him when she loved him so much was more than she could bear. When she opened them he had gone and the large cheerful nurse was standing by the bed with tea and toast on a tray.
It took two more days for her headache to go, and even though she felt better, the cold dragged on. Two days in which Fabian came and went, his visits brief and impersonal and kindly, during which he conferred with the nurse, made polite conversation with herself, read her notes and went away again. On the morning of the third day he was accompanied by a young man whom he introduced as his registrar, a good-looking, merry-faced young man, trying his hardest to copy his chief’s every mannerism; something which might have amused Mary Jane ordinarily, but which struck her now as rather touching. He listened attentively while Fabian explained what had happened to her and agreed immediately when Fabian suggested that she might be ready to leave hospital. He stayed a little longer, talking to Mary Jane, and then at a word from Fabian, took himself off.
She had got up and dressed that morning and had been sitting by the window watching the busy courtyard below, but she turned round now to face Fabian. She had had a few minutes to pull herself together; she said in a matterof-fact voice, ‘I should like to go home tomorrow if you will allow it and it isn’t too much trouble to arrange. I’m perfectly well again. Thank you for looking after me so well…’
He made a small, impatient sound. ‘You will do nothing of the kind, that would be foolish, at least for the next few days. As soon as I consider you fit for travelling I will arrange your journey. In the meantime you will come to my house—my housekeeper will look after you.’
She sat up very straight in her chair, which caused her to cough, sneeze and give herself a headache all at the same moment. Her voice was still a little thick with her cold when she spoke. ‘I don’t think I want to do that—it’s very kind of you, but…’
‘Why not?’ he sounded amused.
‘I’ve been quite enough trouble to you as it is.’
His ready agreement disconcerted her. ‘Oh, indeed you have—you will be even more trouble if you don’t do as I ask now. I shall be in Utrecht, and Mevrouw Hol will be delighted to have someone to fuss over while I am away. You shall go back to England when I return.’
Her reply was polite and wooden. If ever she had needed to convince herself of his indifference to her, she had the answer now. His obvious anxiety to get her off his hands even while he was treating her with such care and courtesy and arranging for her comfort, told her that, and he didn’t care a rap for her…
‘What are you thinking?’ he demanded.
‘Oh, nothing, just—just that it will be nice to be home again. Are you going to Utrecht straight away?’
He was leaning against the wall, staring at her. ‘Tonight. You will be taken to my house tomorrow morning, Mevrouw Hol is expecting you. Her English is as fragmental as
your Dutch; it will be good for both of you. She is a very kind woman, you will be happy with her. She has the same good qualities as your Mrs Body—to whom, by the way, I have written.’
Mary Jane was startled to think that she had quite forgotten to do that.
‘Oh, I forgot—how stupid of me, I’m sorry.’
‘You have had concussion,’ he reminded her, and added with a little smile, ‘And you have no reason to be apologetic about everything.’
She coloured painfully and just stopped herself in time from saying that she was sorry for that too. Instead she wished him a pleasant time in Utrecht, her quiet voice giving no clue to her imagination, already vividly at work on beautiful girls, dinners for two…perhaps he had another house there. He strolled to the door, his eyes on her still.
‘But of course I shall,’ he told her. ‘I always do.’ He opened the door and turned round to say, ‘We shall see each other before you go, I have no doubt.’ With a careless nod he was gone, and presently, by craning her neck, she was able to see him crossing the courtyard below, Klaus Vliet, his registrar, beside him. She couldn’t see them very clearly because she was crying.