by Betty Neels
‘Well, yes, I know.’ She gave him a wide smile. ‘Thank you very much, Doctor. Goodnight.’
The door was open, but she couldn’t get past him unless she trod on his feet. He stood looking down at her and then smiled suddenly so that her heart turned over and took her breath. He watched the slow colour creep into her cheeks before he stood aside and she scuttled past him.
Her mother was home, sitting at her desk, writing. ‘There you are, darling, just in time to make me a cup of tea. I’ve been so busy all day.’
That makes two of us, thought Serena naughtily, but she took off her things and went to the kitchen, where she got a tea-tray ready and presently took it back to the sitting-room.
‘Arthur’s been so kind,’ said her mother. ‘I know you’ll be grateful; he’s arranged for the things you want for your flat to be collected and delivered; they’re coming in the morning. I expect you’re dying to get settled in.’
Serena agreed pleasantly. ‘I’ll pack my things on Saturday and Sunday and go there on Monday after work.’ She added with unconscious wistfulness, ‘Unless you’d like me to stay until the wedding?’
Mrs Proudfoot spoke hastily. ‘Of course not, darling, I’d be the last one to hinder you. In fact, I thought you might have wanted to move before the weekend...’
‘I’m working.’
‘Of course—how silly I am!’ She gave a little laugh. ‘There’s so much to do, it’s so fortunate that Arthur’s here to help me—you know how helpless I am about business.’ She sipped her tea and nibbled a biscuit. ‘Don’t forget, darling, that you’ll always be welcome at Ludlow.’ She put down her cup. ‘I almost forgot—we’re going away for Christmas and the New Year. Arthur thinks a warm climate will do me good. You know I can never stand the miserable winters we have here, but I dare say you’ll have a lovely time. Are there other young people in the other flats?’
Serena just stopped herself in time from reminding her mother that a flatlet wasn’t a flat, it was a bedsitter, gone upmarket. ‘Some nurses from the Royal.’
‘There, didn’t I say so?’ Mrs Proudfoot sounded triumphant. ‘I knew you’d find something to please you. A pity that I simply haven’t the time to come and see it before we go... Still, I did tell you we’ll come to town from time to time, and you won’t want visitors until you’ve settled in.’
Serena poured second cups and her mother said presently, ‘I did mention that I’d let you have some money for a flat, Serena. You have enough to go on with, haven’t you? It will be some time before the money is dealt with, but I won’t forget; if you’re in dire straits you might let me know.’
The week wound its busy way to a close, and beyond brief instructions as to her work, good mornings and good evenings and his usual courteous thanks at the end of them, Dr ter Feulen had nothing to say to Serena, and, being a sensible girl, she had hardly expected anything else.
She spent her weekend packing her possessions and on the Saturday went to Park Street to arrange the furniture which had been delivered. The room looked much better once she had disposed the small easy chair, the lamp table and the colourful rug from the dining-room which her mother had never liked. She spent the afternoon hanging one or two pictures, arranging her china and kitchen equipment, putting up lampshades and making up the divan and covering it with a bedspread from her room at East Sheen, then, still with time to spare, she went to the shops and stocked up on basic food, arranged for the milkman to deliver and bought a bunch of dahlias in vivid reds and golds. It would do very well, she told herself, and she had been lucky to find it, and at a fairly reasonable rent too. She closed the door, put the key in her pocket and took a bus back to East Sheen.
Her mother had said she would be home on Sunday. Mr Harding had to drive down to Tunbridge Wells to see an old friend and she had declared prettily that she wanted to spend the day with Serena. But she wasn’t there when Serena got back; instead there was a note on the kitchen table. Arthur had called and persuaded her that a quiet weekend in the country was just what she needed. ‘So we shall be back tomorrow in the early evening,’ the note ended, ‘and we can all have supper together.’
So Serena was faced with a Saturday evening with nothing to do but watch TV, wash her hair and go to bed with a book, and since she was on her own there wasn’t much point in getting up early on Sunday morning. She pottered around the house, read the Sunday papers, did her nails and made a cake. There was still a lot of the day left. Her mother had said they would have supper, all of them together, so perhaps she should do something about that. She poked around the fridge and larder and assembled the ingredients for a quiche and a salad, and then went to her room to make sure that she had packed everything in the case she had left for the last-minute items. She would have to take it with her on the bus in the morning.
The evening was well advanced when her mother and Mr Harding returned.
‘Darling,’ called her mother, ‘we’re here at last! It was so late that we stopped and had dinner on the way back—I knew you wouldn’t mind. Did you cook yourself something?’
Serena came out of the kitchen, kissed her mother and wished Mr Harding good evening. ‘No,’ she said equably, ‘I understood you’d both be back and we’d be having supper together, but don’t worry, I can boil an egg.’
She met Mr Harding’s faintly worried look with a pleasant smile and went back to the kitchen, where she gave vent to her outraged feelings by hurling eggs, milk and butter into a saucepan and scrambling eggs. Then she cleared the table she had set so carefully and fetched a tray, made a salad and dished up the eggs. There was sherry in the kitchen dresser. She fetched the bottle and a glass and tossed off a glass, then refilled it. She was halfway through the eggs when Mrs Proudfoot came into the kitchen.
‘Darling, I thought you were making coffee...’
Serena took a good sip of sherry. ‘I’m having my supper, Mother.’ She said it cheerfully, but she wished above all things to burst into tears and wallow in self-pity. Instead she daringly poured a third glass of sherry; she would be sorry for that later, but it did give her Dutch courage. And that reminded her of Dr ter Feulen; she would see him in the morning, and that was something to look forward to. She finished her eggs while her mother made the coffee, muttering in a hurt way about the ingratitude of children and how exhausted she was. Serena, deep in thoughts of Marc, scarcely heard her.
* * *
SHE TOOK HER mother a cup of tea before she left in the morning, with the assurance that she would be at the register office on Thursday.
Rather belatedly Mrs Proudfoot wanted to know how she was to manage until then. ‘I shall have to cope alone,’ she uttered helplessly. ‘I suppose you couldn’t pop in after work? I’ve got all my packing to do...’
Serena said firmly that no, she couldn’t, at the same time reflecting that she was becoming very hard-hearted. ‘I don’t leave until half-past five or six o’clock, Mother, and by the time I got here it would be time for me to go back to Park Street.’
She kissed her parent, reiterated her promise to be at the wedding and took herself off to work burdened with her case.
Dr ter Feulen was distantly polite in his manner when she went to his clinic. She could only assume that he had thought better of inviting her to his home and was anxious to let her see that. It shattered her loving heart, but pride stiffened her. Let him be as distant and polite as he wished. Two could play at that game!
Not that there was any time to play at anything. Her small beaky nose was kept to the grindstone all day. She handed in the last of her work just before six o’clock, but this time she left it in the empty consultant’s room, and with the case dragging heavily, made for home. He was standing just outside the entrance, impervious to the cold evening, talking to his registrar, and as she slipped past he turned to speak to her.
‘Going home, Serena? My regards
to your mother.’
She thanked him and hurried away before he could say anything else, then remembered just in time that her usual bus-stop for East Sheen was on the right of the hospital entrance. Now she would travel in the opposite direction, and if he happened to be looking he might wonder...
She turned right towards the East Sheen bus as if to join its queue, and then slid her way behind it, crossed the street and caught a bus which would take her the short distance to Park Street. She would walk in future, she decided, sitting squashed between two ladies exchanging details of their operations just as though she were not there. The exercise would be good for her and she would save the fare.
Primrose Bank didn’t look too bad as she climbed the two steps to its front door and unlocked it; there were lights on in most of the windows and it was pleasant and warm as she went in. Her own room didn’t look too bad either. She went and switched on the lights, turned on the gas fire and drew the curtains, took off her coat and got herself some supper. She looked around her as she ate; the chairs and tables she had brought with her fitted in very nicely and the TV set, which at the last moment her mother had rather grudgingly agreed to her having, gave the room a pleasant appearance of being lived in. She washed up, put everything ready for the morning and switched on the nine o’clock news. Only later, when she was in bed, she had the frightening feeling that she had been uprooted. There was nothing left of her former life; she would have to start again.
‘And I will too!’ she declared loudly and defiantly.
It was on the Wednesday, just as she was packing up for the day, that Dr ter Feulen walked into her room. His abrupt, ‘What is the matter, Serena?’ took her quite by surprise, so that she just sat silent, goggling at him.
‘Matter?’ she managed after a silence which just had to be broken. ‘What should be the matter? Nothing.’
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Never mind, I shall find out.’
She said strongly, ‘There’s nothing to find...’
He smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile, she considered. She remembered that he had told her never to lie to him and although it wasn’t much of a fib she felt guilty.
He watched her blush. ‘I believe I told you never to fib to me, Serena, so I shouldn’t waste time doing it if I were you.’
She was startled that he had read her thoughts, but she couldn’t think of anything to say to that. He went away without another word and left her sitting there with the nagging thought that he might be able to discover about her mother remarrying, but on consideration she didn’t see how he could find out. She went back to her room and laid her clothes ready for the wedding on the morrow.
Her winter coat was by no means new, but the jacket would look all wrong with the green jersey dress; there was a velvet beret to go with the coat and her shoes and gloves were good. She busied herself polishing the furniture and tried not to think about the doctor.
* * *
* * *
IT WAS A cold bright day the next morning. She worked feverishly all the morning to get as much done as possible, and for once stopped typing at noon precisely. She had eaten a sandwich with the morning coffee and there was no need to stop for lunch. She caught a bus and got to the register office in good time.
Her mother looked charming and very pretty. Mr Harding had given her a pale mink coat and she carried a bunch of violets. There were a dozen or so guests at the ceremony. Serena knew them all, and at the hotel, over the canapés and wine, she laughed and chatted and agreed that her mother looked as young as her daughter and what a lucky girl she was to have such a splendid job—and a flat. They nodded and smiled at her and said that they had heard all about it from her mother.
Mr Harding bore his bride away after an hour or two and everyone went home. It was almost four o’clock by now and Serena had to wait for a bus, and when she did get one it stopped every few yards, so that she was in a fine state of fidgets by the time she got to the Royal. Most of the clerical staff had already gone home, but she had said that she would finish any work there was. She uncovered her typewriter, took off her coat and beret, flung them over a chair and sat down.
The doctor had taken her at her word. There was a good-sized pile of notes to be typed up. Serena set to work.
CHAPTER SEVEN
MARC TER FEULEN had splendid eyesight. He had seen Serena dodging behind the bus queue, weighed down by the case she was lugging with her. She was up to something, and he found himself wondering what it was and, moreover, anxious to find out, but it wasn’t until the day after the wedding that he found the time to satisfy his curiosity.
It was almost seven o’clock when he got into the Bentley and drove himself to East Sheen. Serena would be home by now, although at the back of his mind was the vague doubt that she wasn’t.
There were lights streaming from all the windows as he stopped the car, got out of it and rang the doorbell. The young woman who came to the door certainly wasn’t Serena. She looked at him enquiringly and he asked with inborn authority, nicely mingled with courtesy, ‘Mrs Proudfoot no longer lives here?’
‘Got married yesterday and gone to live somewhere—Ludlow, I believe.’ She eyed him with faint suspicion. ‘Are you a friend of hers?’
He put out a large hand. ‘Dr ter Feulen. I’ve been out of the country for a few weeks. I had no idea that she was marrying again. Serena—her daughter?’
He saw the faint suspicion leave her face. ‘Oh, you’re a doctor. Well, I suppose it’s all right to tell you where Miss Proudfoot has gone. Went ever so quickly too, but Mrs Proudfoot sold this house without telling her, so my husband said, so she had to find something.’ She held the door open. ‘Come into the hall, I’ll find the address for you.’
When she came back with it she said doubtfully, ‘I suppose it’s all right letting you have it? It’s near the Royal Hospital.’
The doctor said gently, ‘If you would prefer that I shouldn’t have it I can get it easily from the Royal. I—er—know several people on the staff.’
‘Well, of course you would, being a doctor.’ She handed him the paper. ‘A nice young lady, my husband said, and very quiet.’
He agreed gravely. ‘She will doubtless tell me all about the wedding.’ He smiled at her, shook hands and wished her a goodnight and got back into the Bentley.
He was hungry and tired, for he had had a busy day and there was no reason why he should spend what should have been a quiet evening tracking down Serena. ‘Tiresome girl,’ he muttered as he drove back the way he had come.
There was a fine drizzle falling and Park Street, dimly lighted, its pavements glistening with wet, looked depressing. The houses looked depressing too, even though they were for the most part well kept. He stopped outside Primrose Bank and examined the row of cards by the bells. The bottom one was blank, so he thumped the knocker.
Mrs Peck opened the door on its chain. Her ‘Yes?’ was brisk and unfriendly.
‘I am so sorry to have disturbed you,’ said the doctor, at his most urbane. ‘I’ve come to call on Miss Proudfoot. Dr ter Feulen from the Royal Hospital.’
Mrs Peck took the door off its chain and bade him come in. It was interesting, he felt, how the mention of the word doctor put people at their ease. ‘She’s got the basement room.’ She led the way to the door at the back of the hall and opened it, nodding at the further door. ‘That’s it.’
He thanked her, and she shut the door behind him as he knocked on the further door. Serena had opened a tin of beans for her supper and just put the saucepan on the little stove. She turned off the gas and with the saucepan in her hand went to open the door. Mrs Peck had said earlier that evening that she would leave another saucepan for her and that would be it, she supposed.
The doctor was leaning against a wall, and all she could think of to say was, ‘I was expecting Mrs Peck with a saucepa
n.’
He swept her quite gently back into the room, took the saucepan from her and put it on the table. ‘Your supper?’ he wanted to know, pleasantly.
She had retreated backwards until her back came against the table. ‘How did you know where I was?’
‘I went to East Sheen.’ She saw him smile suddenly. ‘Get your coat, we’re going to have a meal and you shall tell me all about it.’
‘No,’ said Serena tartly, ‘I won’t!’ and she didn’t look at him, not when he was smiling like that.
‘Just one room?’ he asked gently, and strolled round examining it.
He edged his large person into the kitchenette and the shower-room too. ‘All mod cons,’ he observed, and wandered back to where she was still standing. Then he said gently, ‘Get your coat, Serena.’
There was no point defying him—indeed, she didn’t, in her heart, wish to. She got her coat from behind the curtain hung across one corner of the room which served as a wardrobe and put it on. ‘My hair...’ she said crossly. ‘I’ve had no time...’
‘You look very nice,’ he observed, using the kind of voice he employed on his more nervous lady patients, and Serena was sufficiently soothed by it to go with him without another word.
Mrs Peck was in the hall, poking at a spider plant that took up all of one corner. The doctor paused deliberately by her. ‘I’m taking Miss Proudfoot out to supper and shall see her safely back here at a reasonable hour, madam.’
‘She could do with more meat on her bones,’ observed Mrs Peck, and smiled just a little.
Serena gave a gasp of rage as he swept her out of the house. On the pavement she stood still. ‘You seem to forget,’ she told him icily, ‘that I’m a woman of twenty-five, old enough to come and go as I like—if I wish to stay out until the small hours I shall do so!’
Which hadn’t been quite what she had meant to say, only the words had come out wrongly.