by Betty Neels
‘Julie is anxious to visit all her friends and continue with her old life,’ she announced worriedly, ‘but I think that is something the professor might not like. Did he say anything…?’
Suzannah, who had an excellent memory, quoted the parts of the letter which she felt could be mentioned harmlessly. ‘He was most anxious that Juffrouw van Dijl should live quietly for at least two weeks; a few friends, but not any parties or dancing, and early nights with a rest after lunch each day. And she is never to go anywhere on her own, at least until he has seen her again.’
‘You heard that, lieveling? It is hard, I know, but we will make it up to you as soon as we may do so. You have been so ill, and another week or two will restore you completely.’
Juffrouw van Dijl said something fierce in Dutch and turned to Suzannah. ‘And suppose I refuse all this silly cosseting?’
‘Professor Bowers-Bentinck has instructed me to tell him immediately if his instructions aren’t carried out.’
Julie van Dijl tossed her lovely head. ‘Oh, he did, did he?’ She smiled. ‘Dear Guy, he wishes me to get well quickly, so I will do as he says. But you will not stay a day longer than is necessary. I will put up with you because he wishes it, but only because of that. You had better go to your room and unpack…’
‘Thank you, but first I must make sure that you go to your room too and rest. Do you wish me to unpack for you?’
‘Certainly not. I have a maid. And I am not tired…’
Suzannah said in her calm voice, ‘Perhaps not, but you have just said that you would do as the professor asked.’
Juffrouw van Dijl made a face and got up out of her chair, and her mother gave a relieved smile. ‘We shall see you later, Julie. I’m sure Professor Bowers-Bentinck knows best, he is one of the most successful surgeons there is and he is, after all, a family friend.’
Her daughter gave her an impatient look, not speaking, and strolled out of the room with Suzannah trailing her.
The man who had opened the door was in the hall and with him a tall, bony woman, who exclaimed with pleasure at the sight of Juffrouw van Dijl and hurried her up the solid staircase. Half-way to the floor above, she turned and beckoned to Suzannah, who had been wondering what she should do. The man, some kind of butler she imagined, had ignored her and she didn’t think she was supposed to go back to Mevrouw van Dijl. She went upstairs thankfully and crossed the wide landing to where the other two were waiting for her.
Julie van Dijl’s room was a splendid one, overlooking the side of the house; it would have been a fitting background for a film star with its lush carpet, satin curtains and canopied bed. Suzannah stood uncertainly on its threshold.
‘You have the room next to mine, through that door.’ So she crossed the room and opened another door. The room beyond was very much smaller, nicely furnished but impersonal, rather like a hotel-room. But the view from the window was pleasant as it overlooked the garden too. Suzannah took off her jacket, peeped round another door leading to a small bathroom and went back to Julie’s room.
She was surprised when she said, ‘Your room’s all right? The nurse was there when I was ill.’ She was still more surprised when Julie added in an almost friendly voice, ‘I like the door to be kept open at night.’ She hesitated. ‘In case I should want anything.’
‘Of course. Can I do anything to help you now?’
The maid was unpacking at the other end of the room, her head bent over the piles of clothes she was folding carefully.
‘I think that I am now tired. I shall lie down.’ A signal for Suzannah to take the soft quilt from the daybed by the window and spread it out invitingly. She plumped up the pillows too, and then tucked her charge in without fuss. ‘A book to read?’ she asked.
‘No, you had better unpack. I suppose you want tea.’ She said something to the maid, who went away, annoyed at being hindered from her unpacking. ‘We dine at seven o’clock—much earlier than in England— Anna will help me change. I suppose you have something fit to wear?’
Suzannah reminded herself that Julie van Dijl had been very ill. ‘I have a dress,’ she said calmly. ‘I hadn’t expected to take my meals with your family.’
Her companion said peevishly, ‘Professor Bowers-Bentinck said that it was correct for you to do so.’ She made an impatient sound. ‘I am like a bear on a chain.’
‘No’, said Suzannah gently, ‘you are someone who has made a miraculous recovery and needs to be cherished until you are quite well and strong again.’
Julie van Dijl said pettishly, ‘How good you sound—a little prig…’
‘I really don’t know. I’ve never been quite sure what a prig was. But I have the professor’s instructions and I shall do my best to carry them out.’
In her room she unpacked, drank the tea which had been brought, and took herself off to the bathroom where she lay for a long time in the blissfully hot water and thought about the weeks ahead of her. They weren’t going to be easy…
Julie’s father was at dinner, a stout, middle-aged man who had very little to say, although he was kind enough to Suzannah, but he left the talk to his wife and daughter and it was Julie who dominated the conversation. Naturally enough, it was mostly of herself and her stay in London and the hospital; she had little to say that was good about that. The fact that the professor had saved her life, aided by the skill of the nursing staff, seemed to have evaded her—probably she had been too ill to realise the care she had received. She enlarged at length about the awful food, and the fact that, even in a private room, she had not been allowed visitors for weeks. Her parents had been there, of course, but she didn’t count them. ‘All my friends,’ she complained, ‘coming to cheer me up, and that awful dragon of a sister sending them away.’
‘But now you are back home, lieveling,’ her mother pointed out, ‘and almost your old self.’
She had smiled across the table at Suzannah as she spoke, wordlessly apologising for her daughter’s criticism. ‘I am sure that Guy will find a great improvement when he comes to see you.’
‘Well, I intend to have some fun before then, Mama.’ Julie shot a defiant look at Suzannah, who pretended not to see it. The salary was a most generous one; she began to see why.
The first few days passed tolerably well; various friends came to see Julie, and her wardrobe was combed through and pronounced unwearable, but she showed no desire to go anywhere or do anything other than lounge around in her room, reading magazines and chatting with her friends. Suzannah coaxed her to take a short walk each day and saw her firmly into her bed each evening. The worst part was getting her to rest after lunch, something which was only achieved after a stormy tussle ending for the most part in tears. But once tucked up on her day-bed with a novel or magazine she slept within minutes, leaving Suzannah free to take her few hours of freedom.
She didn’t dare go too far. She had begged a street map from the butler, who, sour though he might look, was helpful, and set about exploring the neighbouring streets so that within a few days she had a good idea of where she was; ten minutes’ brisk walk from the Scheveningseweg, the main road between den Haag and Scheveningen. There were parks to the left and right of the road, and trams trundling past every few minutes as well as buses. On her day off it would be an easy matter to get into the heart of the city. She looked forward to this; she realised after the first few evenings that a second dress was essential. Indeed, Juffrouw van Dijl had remarked tartly that when they had guests for dinner she would have to wear something more suitable. ‘Even if you are in the background,’ she pointed out, ‘you can’t look like a shop girl.’
Suzannah took her tongue between her teeth while rage bubbled. She said lightly, ‘I should imagine that shop girls dress a good deal better than I. As soon as I have a free day I’ll go shopping; something dark and very plain.’
Julie had looked at her suspiciously, wondering if she had meant it. ‘But your hair,’ she complained. ‘It is so red…’
‘Yes,
isn’t it? But don’t ask me to dye it, because that’s something I will not do.’
But before she had her day off Julie decided that she had to go shopping. ‘You’ll come with me, of course,’ she said. ‘I haven’t anything fit to wear. There are several boutiques I go to, and we can stay in town for lunch.’
Suzannah made no demur; for one thing it wouldn’t have been of much use, and for another, according to the letter of instructions she anxiously re-read each evening, Julie was to lead a normal life if she wished, provided she rested, went to bed at a reasonable hour and didn’t tire herself.
Easier said than done, reflected Suzannah, but Julie showed no signs of tiredness, nor did she complain of headaches. Suzannah kept a brief record of each day and its happenings, for she felt sure that when the professor did come he would require her to give a detailed account of his patient’s activities.
The day’s shopping left Julie van Dijl more or less satisfied and Suzannah frankly envious. They had been driven to the heart of den Haag and deposited in Lange Voorhout, where a number of exclusive boutiques rubbed elegant shoulders. Julie van Dijl appeared to be a well-known client with them all: dresses and suits and ballgowns were displayed in a seemingly unending flow of colour and fabric while she chose what she liked without—as far as Suzannah could see—once asking the price. They sat on little gilt chairs and drank delicious coffee, and after a time Suzannah, sitting just behind Julie, ignored by everyone and not minding at all, began playing a kind of game with herself, deciding which of the outfits she would buy if she were in Julie’s shoes.
They lunched in Le Baron restaurant at the Hotel des Indes, a stone’s throw from the boutiques they had been visiting, and over the meal Julie van Dijl became quite friendly.
‘I shall have that gold tissue dress with the roses,’ she observed, ‘and the pink satin with the tulle stole. I shall need at least two suits, and I liked the satin blouses with them… That grey knitted three-piece was quite nice, but the colour’s wrong.’ She paused to glance at Suzannah’s bright head. ‘Right for you though, but of course you would never wear anything like that. I dare say you shop at Marks and Spencer.’
Suzannah said without heat, ‘Yes, when I can afford to.’ A remark which left her companion without words for a few moments.
‘What will you do when you leave here?’
‘I have no idea at the moment, but there is always a job, you know—mother’s help or domestic work…’
Julie said slowly, ‘Guy—Professor Bowers-Bentinck told my mother that you were to have gone to a university. I suppose you are clever.’
‘Oh, no. The best I could hope for was a degree in English so that I could get a teacher’s post…’ She paused because Julie had gone off into peals of laughter.
‘But you don’t look like a schoolteacher. Did you wish to be one?’
‘Not particularly; it was a way of earning a living.’
Julie looked at her in astonishment. ‘But if you do not wish to work, why do you not marry?’
‘No one has asked me,’ said Suzannah. The mildness of her voice belied the temper swelling inside her. ‘Do you want to see if you can find anything instead of the three piece you don’t like?’
There was one more boutique which Julie declared might have something to suit her, and happily she found what she was looking for there; just in time to walk the length of Lange Voorhout and find the car waiting for them.
Julie, content with her shopping, was easily persuaded to go to bed early and have her dinner there on a tray, which left Suzannah and Mevrouw van Dijl to dine together. At first the conversation was rather stilted, but presently Mevrouw van Dijl began to talk about her daughter. ‘She is spoilt,’ she said with an air of apology, ‘but her father is so often away from home, and when he returns there is nothing he will not do for her, and of course she never listens to me. Her two brothers are both away, but they spoil her as well.’ The good lady sighed. ‘She needs a husband…there was someone, but he is in the diplomatic service and was posted to Shanghai—or was it Hong Kong? Anyway, too far…’
‘He’ll come back,’ comforted Suzannah, ‘I mean, they only stay in one place for a few years, don’t they?’ She frowned in thought. ‘And surely they get leave?’
‘Julie made me promise not to tell him about her—her disability.’
‘But it’s not a disability,’ said Suzannah strongly. ‘It was a tumour which Professor Bowers-Bentinck removed and she is completely cured.’
‘Yes,’ agreed her companion doubtfully, ‘so we have been assured. Julie is very—how do you say?—enamoured of him.’
‘Well, that’s only natural, isn’t it? He saved her life; besides he’s very good looking and I dare say charming to her. But that won’t last, at least, if she loves this other man, it won’t.’
‘You are a sensible girl,’ observed Mevrouw van Dijl. ‘Julie is a dear girl, but she is used to having her own way. You are not unhappy with us?’
‘Certainly not, Mevrouw. Julie is making a splendid recovery. I’m sure Professor Bowers-Bentinck will be delighted with her progress.’
Which wasn’t quite true; not that she was unhappy, but her days were filled with small pinpricks, some of them intentional. Alone with Julie she was treated almost—though not quite—as a friend, but when Julie’s friends came to see her or she went to see them, Suzannah was ignored or treated with a careless indifference which she found hard to bear. She had been warned that she would expect to remain in the background and she hadn’t expected anything else, but to be delegated there with an, ‘And you can make yourself scarce, Suzannah,’or, what was worse, ‘Go away until I ring for you,’ was lowering.
But she was treated with courtesy by Julie’s parents and the servants, and she began to wonder if Julie was being deliberately ill-mannered for some reason of her own. There was nothing to be done about it; she had accepted the job and the professor had told her that Julie was unpredictable at times.
She felt much better about it when at the end of the week she found an envelope in her room with her first week’s wages. Moreover, she was to have a free day on the morrow. She accompanied Julie to a friend’s house that morning and gave no sign of rancour when she was told casually to make herself scarce for an hour. She didn’t go far, of course; she was there to keep an eye on her charge, which meant keeping out of sight but never so distant that she couldn’t be summoned in a moment. She went and sat outside in the rather chilly autumn morning, listening to the murmur of voices and laughter from the drawing-room behind her.
Armed with her pay packet, she took a tram to the city centre on the next day; Julie was to spend the day with her parents at an aunt’s house in the country and Suzannah, freed from her duties, spent a blissful few hours roaming round the shops. The grey jersey dress was no longer adequate; she had worn it each evening and was only too aware of the faintly mocking look which Julie cast at it. Boutiques were out of the question; she roamed C & A and then de Bijenkorf—rather more pricey, but she liked the clothes there.
The pretty dresses there were tempting, but she had to bear in mind that since she must keep in the background, something unassuming was called for. She found it presently—a soft grey-blue crêpe, long-sleeved with a discreet neckline, a mid-calf skirt and nothing about it to date it for a year or two. It was within her means, too; she found a coffee shop and made a frugal lunch in a glow of satisfaction.
She wore it that evening at dinner and Mevrouw van Dijl said kindly, ‘That’s a pretty dress, Suzannah, I like the colour,’ so that she smiled with a pleasure which refused to be damped by Julie’s rude,
‘Spent all your money, Suzannah? Why don’t you buy something pretty?’
Which made Suzannah wonder why she stayed to put up with such rudeness, even making allowances for Julie’s recent illness. But the professor had said that the girl needed someone with her, although Julie had shown no signs of the depression he had mentioned. There had been plenty of ill tempe
r, though!
Some of Julie’s young friends had come in after dinner and stayed rather late, and by the time that Suzannah had made sure that Julie was in bed and half asleep it was well past midnight. She curled up in her own bed and closed her eyes and slept at once.
She wasn’t sure what had wakened her. She sat up in bed to listen and then got out of bed; Julie was muttering and moaning softly. Suzannah went into her room and saw by the light of the bedside lamp that she was asleep but restless. As she reached the bed, Julie started up and burst into tears. ‘Suzannah, don’t go. I’ve had a dream—I’m not ill again, am I? I feel awful—I’m not going to die? Guy said I’d been cured, but perhaps he was only saying that…’
Suzannah sat on the side of the bed and put an arm round the girl.
‘I’m quite sure that the professor wouldn’t tell you something that wasn’t true. He said you were cured, so you can take it that you are. You’re not ill—you had a lively evening and you got overtired. I’m not in a position to say, but I think that perhaps you have been doing too much all at once. I know it’s lovely to see all your friends again, but you have so many…’
‘I don’t care if I never see any of them again. There’s only one person I want to see, and he’s miles away.’
‘But I expect he’ll come back some day?’ suggested Suzannah comfortably, ‘If you didn’t do quite so much…by the time he does see you, you will be perfectly well and prettier than ever.’
She fetched some water and Julie gulped it down. ‘Don’t tell Mother.’
‘No, but if Professor Bowers-Bentinck comes to see you and asks, I must tell him exactly how you are—or you can…’