by Betty Neels
Louisa smiled. ‘No, I won’t. We’re leaving at eleven o’clock in the morning. Would you like breakfast in bed so that you’ll have plenty of time to dress? And do you want to go to the shops?’
‘No, but you can go for me—I want some more of that hand cream and I’m almost out of nail varnish. I suppose Simon will allow us to come here to shop as often as we want to?’
‘I expect so,’ said Louisa, thinking it most unlikely. ‘I’ll be up fairly early, I’ll get anything you want and be back in time to do your packing.’
Claudia nodded dismissal. ‘OK. See you in the morning.’
Louisa, back in slacks, boots and thick sweater after a night’s sleep, and wishful to keep Simon Savage’s mood as sweet as possible, presented herself in the dining room exactly on time. Claudia was still asleep and she took the precaution of asking the reception girl to get a menu sent up to her room within the next ten minutes. Claudia couldn’t be hurried and Simon had said eleven o’clock and meant it.
He was there now waiting for her, dressed for the cold, she noticed, and she wondered just how remote and bleak their future home was to be. He wished her a perfunctory good morning and waved her to the table along one wall, set out with a vast assortment of food: bread, toast, butter, jam, dishes of fish in various sauces and a great bowl of porridge.
She wandered slowly round and presently joined him at their table, a bowl of porridge in one hand and a plate laden with toast, egg, jam and cheese in the other. He got up and took them from her and asked: ‘Tea or coffee?’
‘Coffee, please.’ And after that she didn’t speak, but applied herself to her meal, quite undaunted by the open newspaper Simon Savage held in front of his cross face. It was a pity, she thought, that he always had to look so very disagreeable; life couldn’t be all that bad. Perhaps he had been crossed in love? She giggled at the very idea—no woman would dare—and choked on it as the paper was lowered.
‘You were saying?’ Simon Savage enquired coldly.
‘Nothing.’ She gave him a sweet smile. ‘I don’t talk at breakfast either.’
He folded his paper deliberately and very neatly. ‘Take care, Louisa, I’m not the mildest of men.’
She poured herself another cup of coffee. ‘We don’t agree about much, Mr Savage—about that, though, we do! Will I be able to get all I want from that big shop across the square?’
‘Sundt? I imagine so, provided it’s nothing out of the way.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Don’t let me keep you.’
Claudia was having breakfast when she went back upstairs. Louisa warned her to get up as soon as she had finished, got into her jacket and woolly cap, and went out of the hotel. The shops were open, although it was still not light, and inside Sundt was warm and brightly lighted. Louisa bought everything on her list and spent ten minutes going from counter to counter. She would have to send her stepmother a Christmas present, she supposed, and cards to her friends at the hospital, as well as the aunts and uncles she so seldom saw. She had written once to her home, and told her stepmother that she was in Norway with a patient, but she had given no address and her friends to whom she had written were sworn to secrecy. She had never felt so free, nor, strangely, so happy.
She would have liked to have lingered in the shop, but a glance at her watch told her that there was little more than an hour before they were to leave. And it was as well that she went back when she did, for Claudia was still lying in bed, doing absolutely nothing. Louisa, by now well versed in the right tactics, persuaded her out of her bed, under the shower and dressed with half an hour to spare, and that would be barely enough time for the elaborate make-up without which Claudia refused to face the outside world. Louisa packed neatly and with speed, rang for their cases to be taken down and left in the foyer, so that Simon Savage’s impatience would be tempered, and applied herself to getting Claudia downstairs on time. As it was they were only five minutes late, a fact which Simon silently registered by a speaking glance at the clock.
It was going to be a lovely day, the blue sky turning the snow even whiter than it already was, and as the Land Rover left the city’s centre, the mountains came into view once more, their grey bulk almost covered with snow, making a magnificent background to the tree-covered slopes that skirted them. Simon Savage turned off at the bridge at the end of the main street and took a road running alongside the fjord, and presently stopped.
There were fishing boats and motor launches moored here, and Louisa saw the same man who had met the boat with him on the previous day coming to meet them. She half expected Claudia to make a fuss as they got out, but beyond a furious look at the two men she did nothing at all, and they were ushered on board a motor launch without further ado. It was a roomy enough vessel with a fair sized cabin, comfortably warm and well fitted out. Claudia, huddled in her thick clothes, curled up at once on one of the cushioned benches and demanded coffee, and Simon without turning his head told Louisa to pour coffee for them all. ‘There’s a galley,’ he told her curtly. ‘You’ll find everything there.’
It was a small place, more like a cupboard, but it did hold an astonishing number of things, and the coffee was already bubbling in the percolator on top of the spirit stove. She found mugs, set them on a tray, found milk and sugar too, and went back into the cabin. They were all there; the man introduced as Sven smiled at her as he took his mug, but Simon gave her austere thanks without looking at her, and as for Claudia, she turned her head away.
But when the men had gone, she sat up, accepted the coffee for a second time and looked around her. ‘What a dump!’ she declared, looking about.
Louisa, who knew next to nothing about boats, thought it to be the height of comfort, but she knew better than to argue with Claudia; there was a mood coming on, unless she could forestall it…
She fetched rugs from a shelf, persuaded Claudia to take off her fur coat and her cap and gloves, and tucked her up cosily. ‘You’re tired,’ she observed. ‘Close your eyes and have a nap. I daresay we’ll be there by the time you wake up.’
Just for once Claudia forgot to be arrogant. ‘It’s going to be sheer hell,’ she whispered. ‘It’ll kill me!’
‘It’ll cure you—think how happy that will make Lars.’
Claudia closed her eyes. ‘Do you think it’s very silly of me to make plans? Wedding plans, I mean. Do you think he’ll risk marrying me? I’m an alcoholic…’
‘Not any more,’ declared Louisa stoutly. ‘Now close your eyes and make plans.’
Which Claudia did, and presently slept.
The launch was doing a good turn of speed, although the water was choppy. Louisa peered out of the windows and discovered that she couldn’t see much for spray, so she put on her jacket again, pulled her woolly cap down over her ears and went outside. Simon Savage was at the wheel, well wrapped against the cold, but when he saw her he said something to Sven, who took it from him and crossed the few feet to the cabin door. He didn’t say anything, only pulled her hood up and over her cap and tied the strings under her chin, then kissed her gently.
‘You look like a nice rosy apple,’ he told her by way of explanation.
She was too surprised to say anything, which was perhaps just as well, for he went on in a matter-of-fact voice: ‘If you look behind you’ll see Tromsdaltinden. The snow came early this year, so it will be a long winter. Any number of people go there on a Sunday to ski. There’s Finmark to the east, and in a few minutes you’ll be able to get a glimpse of the Lyngen mountains—these are islands on the port side, look ahead of you and you’ll see the fjord divides—we take the left arm, it runs between two islands, and it’s there that we’re building a bridge.’
Louisa, oblivious of the icy wind, took the glasses he handed her and then looked her fill. ‘People live along here—I can see houses.’
‘Settlements—fishing folk mostly—they’re not far from Tromso, and there are Hansnes and Karlsoy to the north; small villages, but there’s a road to Tromso from Hansnes. Once
the bridge is open it will shorten the journey to Tromso.’ He gave her a long considering look. ‘You like it here, don’t you?’
‘Yes. It must be lovely in the summer.’
‘It is. That’s when we do most of our work.’
‘Do you ever go home between bridges?’ The moment she had spoken she was sorry. He turned away from her and said shortly: ‘You’d better go inside and see if Claudia is awake; we shall be landing very shortly.’
Louisa went at once. Just for a few minutes she had thought that they were beginning to lose their dislike of each other, and she had to admit that for her part she was on the verge of liking him, ill-temper and all, but it was obvious that he didn’t share her feelings. Oh, well, once they were ashore, he’d be working, she supposed, and they wouldn’t have to see much of him. It struck her then that life might be a little difficult for the next few weeks, with Claudia to keep amused. She would have to think of something to occupy them during the short days. She remembered vaguely that Claudia had told her that she had learned to ski as a child and there would surely be a suitable slope not too far away.
She looked out of the window; there were plenty of mountains, but they all looked quite precipitous. Craning her neck, she could just see the bridge ahead of them; some way off still, graceful and narrow, standing tall on its pillars. She would have liked to have gone back outside and taken a good look, but she suspected that Simon had got fed up with her company and sent her inside unnecessarily soon. A pity, because there was a lot to see now—houses, their painted wood bright against the snow, scattered along the fjord’s edge, the mountains at their back doors, and as far as she could see, no road. Racks of cod, minute coves sheltering a fishing boat or two, a solitary church, its short pointed spire covered by snow…
She put the coffee pot on the stove to warm up and wakened Claudia. She managed to keep the excitement out of her voice as she said: ‘We’re almost there,’ because she knew that Claudia didn’t share that feeling; indeed she groaned and declared that nothing would make her set foot on such a solitary snowbound spot.
‘Well, if you don’t go ashore here, Lars won’t know where to find you,’ observed Louisa matter-of-factly, ‘and I’m sure it’s not nearly as bad as you think. I’ve some coffee for you, drink it up and get wrapped up again.’
‘You’re nothing but a bully,’ complained Claudia, ‘every bit as bad as Simon. I’m hungry.’
‘We’ll get lunch as soon as we land,’ declared Louisa, and hoped that they would: it wouldn’t take much to send Claudia off into one of her moods. They were very close to the land now; through the windows she could see a cluster of houses beyond a small quay, more cod drying on wooden racks and a larger building with ‘Hotel’ in large letters on its bright yellow painted wall. The houses were brightly painted too, blue and red and pink; they made cheerful spots of colour against the snow and the grey granite mountains all around them.
The cabin door opened and Simon poked his head inside. ‘We’re here’, he told them. ‘Come along— Sven will bring the luggage along.’
There was no one on the quay, just a few wooden sheds and a stack of boxes. The road ran left and right and they turned to the left between two rows of small houses. There was a shop and then the hotel, but they went on past it to the last half dozen houses or so. Simon turned off the road here and clumped through the snow to one of these; square, like all the rest, and like its neighbours, standing on its own, facing the fjord, the mountains nudging its small plot of ground. He opened the door and went in shouting something as he did so and turned to hold it wide for them to go in too. The hall was very small with a door on either side, and from one of these an elderly woman came hurrying out.
Simon performed introductions in a perfunctory fashion and added: ‘Elsa speaks a fair amount of English; she comes each day and cleans the house and cooks for me.’ He opened the other door and ushered them into a small square room, warm from the wood-burning stove against one wall and furnished with simple comfort. ‘Get your things off,’ he suggested, ‘Elsa is bringing coffee, then you can see your rooms before lunch. I’ll be out this afternoon, but you’ll have enough to do, unpacking and finding your way around.’
The coffee came, hot and delicious, and Sven came in with the bags and sat down to drink his, too; and presently Elsa led them upstairs to two small rooms, simply furnished and warm, with bright rugs and curtains. There was a bathroom too, and Louisa, who had expected a lack of modern amenities, was impressed. Claudia wasn’t—she went and sat on the edge of her bed, making up her face. ‘What a dump!’ she declared. ‘It’s ghastly—we can’t all use that poky little bathroom.’
‘Don’t see why not,’ said Louisa cheerfully. ‘We don’t all want it at the same time, I don’t suppose. Let’s get tidy and go down to lunch.’
Something Claudia refused to do. ‘I’m tired to death,’ she moaned, ‘I’ll have something on a tray and go to bed with a book.’
And nothing Louisa said would change her mind. She left her sitting there and went downstairs and found the table laid and Simon at one end of it, bent over a large map and a bundle of papers. He looked up briefly as she went in. ‘Where’s Claudia?’ And when she explained: ‘She can come down for her meals or starve, I don’t care which. Tell her that.’
Louisa eyed him with disfavour. ‘No, you tell her,’ she said quietly, and then: ‘You’re too hard on her, you know.’
Simon gave her a baleful stare. ‘Don’t preach to me, Nurse.’ But he went past her and up the stairs and presently came down again, looking grim, with a seething Claudia behind him. Louisa made an uneasy third at table, sitting between the two of them, eating her cod and potatoes in a heavy silence.
With a muttered excuse Simon went away the moment he had finished eating, and Claudia burst into tears. Louisa gave her another cup of coffee, allowed her to cry her fill and then suggested that they should go upstairs.
‘I’ll unpack,’ she said with a cheerfulness she didn’t feel, ‘and you can have a nap or read, and we can have tea here, by the stove.’ She urged a reluctant Claudia upstairs, bathed her face for her, settled her under the duvet, found a pile of books and started to put away clothes. By the time she had finished, Claudia was asleep and she was able to go to her own little room and do her own unpacking. That done, she went to look out of the window. It was almost dark, but there were lights in all the houses, making the snow sparkle. Tomorrow she would persuade Claudia to explore a bit—a shop, even a small general store, would be somewhere to go, and perhaps they could get coffee at the hotel. And she was longing to get a closer look at the bridge. She sighed and pulled the curtains, then went downstairs to look for Elsa and ask about tea.
Claudia had calmed down by tea time and when Louisa, who had been prowling round the little house, mentioned casually that there was a telephone in the hall tucked away in a dark corner under the stairs, she declared that she would ring up Lars at once, but before she could get there, there was a call from him. Louisa, roasting herself by the stove and watching the television programme she couldn’t understand, heard Claudia’s excited voice and heaved a sigh of relief. The call lasted ten minutes or more, during which time Simon came back, said hullo, in a perfunctory manner, and declared his intention of going across the hall to the small room he used as his office. At the door he paused. ‘Any idea how you’re going to fill in the time here?’ he asked.
‘I’ve brought embroidery and knitting and books for both of us. We’ll go out each day—Claudia told me she could ski, but I can’t.’
‘You can learn—there’s an easy slope close by. We’ll make up a party on Saturday. The shop has books and the papers come with the postman by launch every third day.’
‘And perhaps we could go to Tromso once in a while,’ asked Louisa, encouraged by these suggestions.
‘Perhaps.’ He was non-committal about it. ‘Claudia will probably give you the hell of a time.’
‘Yes, I expect that, but I exp
ect her to get better too.’ She spoke defiantly and he laughed.
‘I hope you’re right.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘And understand this; any hint of backsliding and I want to know at once. Is that understood?’
‘Oh, I understand you very well,’ said Louisa, her voice a little high with suppressed feelings. ‘What a very disagreeable man you are, Mr Savage, with your orders and arrogance. I should very much dislike having you as a patient.’
His dark eyes snapped at her. ‘You surprise me, Louisa. I should have thought it would have been the very thing, because I would be entirely at your mercy and you could wreak revenge to your heart’s content.’ His silky voice had a nasty edge to it. He opened the door. ‘Perhaps we’d better keep out of each other’s way?’ he wanted to know.
She agreed stiffly and when she was alone again, wondered why the prospect left her with the feeling that life would be rather dull.
CHAPTER SEVEN
CLAUDIA WAS STILL asleep when Louisa went down to breakfast the next morning, to find Simon already at the table, spooning up porridge as though he had a train to catch. He got up as she went in, however, wished her good morning and asked her if she preferred coffee to tea. ‘And where’s Claudia?’ he asked indifferently.
‘In bed, asleep. I shall take her breakfast up later.’
She met his cold eyes. ‘I see no reason why she should be pampered. I brought her here in the hope that the simple life led here would effect a cure.’ He sounded impatient.
‘Probably you did,’ she said equably, ‘but there’s no reason to rush things, is there? Why put her back up when there’s no need? I shall take her breakfast up.’ She began on her porridge and dropped the spoon at his sudden roar.
‘Are you defying me, Nurse Evans?’