by Betty Neels
‘I’ll have to clear the paths again but first I’ll take a look at Miss Murch; can you wash her and so forth presently? Give her as much to drink as she can manage.’ He eyed his black coffee. ‘No milk?’
‘Enough for Miss Murch. There are a few eggs too and I can make a jelly…’
‘Good. What about us?’ He was eating his porridge with every sign of enjoyment.
‘Soup for lunch—I’ll just have to make some bread…’
‘Can you make bread too?’
‘Well, yes. It’s quite easy. I thought we might have that chicken in the freezer—I can casserole it and Miss Murch can have some sieved.’
‘That takes care of today.’ He smiled at her across the table. She looked tired and her hair was pulled back far too severely. There was no need to make herself more homely than she already was. He frowned; homely wasn’t the right word—with eyes like hers she could never be that. Dressed in something pretty and with her hair less severely treated she could be quite attractive… He finished his bacon, swallowed the rest of the coffee and got up. ‘I’ll take a quick look upstairs and then go and see to the paths. Do we need coal and wood?’
‘There’s some in the boot-room but not enough for tonight.’
He was back presently with the hot-water bottle for refilling. ‘Miss Murch is awake,’ he told her. ‘Take these up as you go, I’ll take her a cup of tea and sit her up in bed. Her temperature is down slightly. I’ll give her her tablet. When you’ve washed her and tidied her bed and so on, give her another drink—anything she fancies. She should sleep again for a while.’
He went away again, leaving her to wonder how Miss Murch would react to her employer taking her cups of tea and shaking up her pillows.
Miss Murch wasn’t well enough to care who did what. She submitted to having her face and hands washed and being put into a clean nightgown and lay submissively while Patience made the bed around her and fetched her a warm drink. Thankfully she fell asleep again almost at once and Patience was able to go back to the kitchen and clear away the breakfast, wash up and clean the kitchen and then start on her breadmaking. There was flour enough and dried yeast among the housekeeper’s store; she made a dough, set the loaves to rise and put the kettle on once more. Since the oven was just right, she made a batch of scones, opened a tin of treacle and made a treacle tart. The scones were ready and smelling delicious when Mr van der Beek, obediently in socks, came for his coffee. He sat down at the table and the winged nostrils of his handsome nose flared. ‘Something smells appetising. May we eat it?’
Patience smiled and poured their coffee. ‘Scones. I’ll take them out of the oven if you’d like one.’
She buttered half a dozen lavishly and set the plate between them, found a bone for Basil to gnaw on the rug before the Aga, and sat down to drink her own coffee. ‘When would you like your lunch, Mr van der Beek?’ she wanted to know, watching the scones disappear.
‘One o’clock?’ He glanced at his wristwatch. ‘I’m going to do some work. Let me know if you need me for anything.’
Patience had her hands full for the rest of the morning; Miss Murch rang the bell continuously and not only for more hot-water bottles and another hot drink but to enquire if Patience had planned a suitable meal for Mr van der Beek and, if so, was she capable of cooking it to his satisfaction?
Patience made soothing noises; if he didn’t like the food he could go hungry, she thought privately. Miss Murch pampered him—bread and cheese would do him no harm…
Which was what he got for his lunch but since the bread was fresh from the oven and there was butter as well as cheese, and onion soup besides, he had no cause to grumble. Not that he did; indeed, he ate most of one loaf, declaring that she was a treasure and that he was glad to have discovered her.
‘But you didn’t,’ declared Patience, outspoken as usual. ‘Mr Bennett hired me on your behalf—you didn’t know I was here until we met in the hall.’
‘Don’t split hairs,’ he begged her, and went back to his study.
She took him tea and a plate of scones at four o’clock; he didn’t look up when she went in and his ‘thank you’ was uttered in an absent-minded voice. She went away soundlessly; he was deep in bones or internal organs and she supposed that instead of asking him to fetch more coal, which she had intended to do, she had better carry the buckets to and fro herself. The snow had stopped but there was still no sign of a thaw.
The chicken casserole had been on the Aga for hours, she had peeled the potatoes, and the treacle tart only needed to be eaten; with a minute to spare she went to her own room to tidy herself and met Mr van der Beek coming from Miss Murch’s room.
‘An improvement,’ he told her. ‘A couple more days in bed and we shall be able to get her down to the kitchen—I’ll carry one of the easy-chairs in and she can sit there and bear you company.’ He studied her face. ‘You look tired…’
‘I am tired. Dinner is for seven-thirty, Mr van der Beek.’
‘Splendid. We need a drink first. Come down to the kitchen…’
‘There are several things which need to be done,’ she told him.
She sounded peevish and he said at once, ‘Ah, coal and wood to fetch—I’ll see to that.’
‘I’ve already done so,’ her voice was cold as well as peevish, ‘otherwise the fires go out.’
‘Why didn’t you ask me?’
‘I intended to, but it hardly seemed the right moment when I took in your tea.’
‘My poor girl,’ he bent his head and kissed her gently on her cheek, ‘how thoughtless I have been.’
The kiss had been comforting but she didn’t allow it to go to her head.
She said matter-of-factly, ‘I dare say if you have people to do things for you you don’t need to bother about the running of a house, cooking and washing and ironing and dusting and hoovering.’
He admitted that it was indeed the case. ‘Come down as soon as you can and we will work something out.’
Miss Murch needed to be washed and her bed remade, bottles refilled once again and her hair brushed and plaited. She wasn’t a cheerful patient but Patience supposed that if she felt as ill as the housekeeper she would be just as gloomy and tiresome.
She went downstairs presently, her hair pinned back severely from her face, wishing that she had something to wear other than the skirt and sweater. Her spirits would have sunk even lower if she had known that Mr van der Beek, turning to look at her as she went into the kitchen, thought exactly the same thing.
The casserole eaten and mugs of milkless coffee on the table, Mr van der Beek produced a notebook and a pencil. ‘Now tell me absolutely everything that has to be done each day and that includes looking after Miss Murch.’
She took him at his word and really the list was quite a formidable one. He studied it for a moment. ‘I’ll leave the housework to you,’ he said finally. ‘I’ll wash the dishes, fetch the coal and wood, and, when we can get to them, the vegetables. I’ll engage to keep Miss Murch supplied with hot-water bottles and I’ll set the table for meals and see to the Aga and the fire in my study.’
‘What about your book?’
‘I’d like the afternoon free of any interruptions; I can work again after dinner in the evening. Miss Murch should be settled by then.’
It was on the tip of her tongue to ask if she should sit like Cinderella in the kitchen until bedtime but all she said was, ‘Very well, Mr van der Beek.’
In fact the kitchen was delightfully warm. Once the dishes had been washed and Miss Murch had been settled for the night and Mr van der Beek had shut himself in the study, Patience curled up in one of the Windsor chairs by the Aga. It wasn’t possible to read by the light of the one candle she had allowed herself; besides, unless she went and searched the bookshelves in the study, she had nothing to read. Presently she d
ozed off.
It was nearly midnight when Mr van der Beek put down his pen, satisfied with what he had written and desirous of a drink. The sight of Patience asleep, her mouth slightly open, brought him up short in the kitchen doorway. The candle was guttering and he blew it out and put his lamp on the table. As he did so she woke and he put a hand on her arm. ‘I am the most thoughtless fool,’ he observed, ‘and deserve nothing but your scorn. Until we are living normal lives again you will use the study when you have a chance to sit down.’
She had got to her feet. ‘Thank you, but that wouldn’t do. I might disturb you while you work.’
There was nothing about her, he considered silently, which would disturb him. He said gently, ‘Go to bed, Patience. Throw your hot-water bottle down when you get upstairs, I’ll bring it up when the kettle has boiled.’
She muttered, ‘Good night,’ hardly awake, won-dering sleepily what his fine London friends would say about that. But she threw the bottle down the stairs and he caught it neatly, and when she got back from a rather sketchy bath it was in her bed; there was a mug of hot tea on the bedside table too. She sipped it gratefully, reminding herself that the tea was getting low and she would have to keep it for Miss Murch.
There had been no more snow during the night but there was no sign of a thaw, Miss Murch was better and Mr van der Beek had shovelled his way round to the stables which were used as a garage and listened to the weather forecast on his car radio. The cold spell would last another few days, said a cheerful voice, doubtless from some snug centrally heated retreat; most of East Anglia was without electricity and the telephone, and the voice, even more cheerful, embarked on a list of blocked roads.
Patience counted the candles; there was enough oil for Mr van der Beek’s lamp just as long as he didn’t sit up until all hours. Coming silently into the kitchen, still obediently in his socks, he found her small person protruding from the store cupboard—she was showing a good deal of leg and he paused to admire them, listening with some amusement to her muffled mutterings. ‘Dry lentils—if he’ll get me a few carrots we can have soup—I’ll have to make some more bread and the flour’s almost finished… A tin of prawns; good, there’s some rice, I’ll make something of those. Mandarins in orange liqueur—they’ll be nice. Stem ginger, now that’s no use at all; duck mousse with port wine—and canned oysters—I don’t know what to do with them; Paxo stuffing— Oh, I’m so surprised she doesn’t make her own.’ He watched as she emerged backwards out of the cupboard, still talking. ‘He’ll have to eat what he’s given or go hungry.’
‘He’ll eat it, don’t worry,’ said Mr van der Beek and smiled as she spun round like a top. ‘Only not the stem ginger, something I have never really relished.’
‘How long have you been standing there?’
‘I was admiring your legs—they’re charming, Patience.’
She stood before him in her dowdy clothes, pushing the hair out of her eyes. She had gone very red but she gave him a steady look.
‘Do you always blush when you are paid a compliment?’ he wanted to know blandly.
‘I don’t know.’ Despite her red cheeks she spoke matter-of-factly. ‘I can’t remember being paid one. What was the weather forecast?’
He told her. ‘The food’s getting low? I’ll take the shovel and get to the shed and fetch up some potatoes and onions. I’m sure you can perform clever culinary miracles with them.’
For the next two days there was no snow and almost no wind; a thaw was predicted and not before time. Miss Murch, well enough to spend the day in the kitchen in her dressing-gown and wrapped in a blanket, had nothing good to say about anything, which was unfair, for Patience, well supplied with the potatoes Mr van der Beek had hauled up to the house, a feat requiring some strength—which he had, and unlimited patience, which, strangely enough, he also had—took pains to present that vegetable in a variety of guises and had become adept at making scones and a dough which was almost bread but not quite.
The stores were low indeed when on the following day Mr van der Beek came in from fetching wood to say that there was a snowplough down the lane. Halted for the moment by a deep drift, but rescue was in sight.
‘Once they’re through, I’ll drive you home,’ he promised.
‘Miss Murch isn’t well enough to cope,’ Patience pointed out.
‘I’ll take the Land Rover and ferry Mrs Perch and Mrs Croft to and fro for a few days—you take two or three days off. You deserve them.’
‘You’ll never get through the lane. Not even in a Land Rover.’
He didn’t bother to answer her. It was Miss Murch who spoke. ‘You may go to the butcher and the grocer for me, Patience; I will give you a list. You seem to have used almost all my stores.’
‘Well, we had to eat,’ said Patience weakly.
‘We still have to for another day at least,’ declared Mr van der Beek. ‘Patience has done wonders—I for one have enjoyed every morsel she has offered me.’
‘I have been rather poorly,’ said Miss Murch with dignity. ‘It will be a pleasure to have milk in my tea again.’
Patience caught Mr van der Beek’s eye and he gave her a bland look; she imagined he would look like that if one of his patients made some observation of which he didn’t approve.
Twenty-four hours later she was perched beside him in the Land Rover, holding her breath as he ploughed his way through the frozen snow, skidding from side to side, getting out with the shovel from time to time to clear a smoother path, not saying a word when they got stuck in a drift and had to reverse. Her only comfort was Basil, perfectly happy since he was with his master, sitting just behind her and licking the back of her neck from time to time.
The main street of the village had been more or less cleared but the snow was piled high everywhere else. Mr van der Beek stopped outside her home and got out, commanding her to stay where she was. The tiny front garden was buried under its white blanket although there was a narrow path made by a variety of footprints. He banged the door knocker and presently the door was opened and Aunt Polly, swathed in a variety of woolly garments, poked her head out.
He greeted her gravely. ‘I have brought Patience back,’ he told her. ‘I hope you haven’t been too worried about her; it was quite impossible for her to come down to the village.’
Aunt Polly beamed at him. ‘My dear young man, how very relieved we are that she is safe and in good hands. Do come in—she is with you?’ She peered round his massive person.
‘In the Land Rover. I’ll fetch her.’
Patience, impatient to be home, skipped out of the Land Rover and fell flat on her face, to be hauled to her feet and dusted down as though she were an old coat. ‘I told you to stay where you were,’ he reminded her mildly. ‘Do you suppose your aunts will mind if Basil comes in too?’
‘No, of course not.’ She put a cautious foot on to an icy patch and he caught her by the arm, whistled to Basil and handed her over to her aunt. The three of them, as well as Basil, filled the small hall, and when they were joined by Aunt Bessy Patience took charge, begged Mr van der Beek to take off his sheepskin jacket and urged him into the sitting-room. The fire in the grate was small, but since the room was small too it felt pleasantly warm. Basil threaded his way cautiously towards it and settled himself before it.
‘That’s Basil,’ said Patience, introducing Mr van der Beek.
‘Do sit down,’ begged Aunt Bessy. ‘Such trying weather, is it not? Patience, dear, will you make a pot of tea? Mrs Dodge left some scones and of course we have plenty of milk—the tractor comes down from Slade’s Farm each morning and the young people in the village fetch the milk from it and bring it round.’
Mr van der Beek got up when Patience did. ‘Patience has been very hardworking during these last few days—my housekeeper has had the flu and we depended on her entirely. I’ll carry the tray
in.’
There was no gas or electricity but a small oil stove with a kettle already boiling on it. ‘Milk in our tea,’ murmured Mr van der Beek, taking the tray from her.
She paused as she buttered scones. ‘You must take some back with you…’
‘Among other things. I have a shopping-list from Miss Murch which will take me the rest of the day to work through. I must go and see Mrs Croft and Mrs Perch too and persuade them to come for an hour or so. You are to stay at home for two days, Patience; I’ll fetch you on the third morning. Do not attempt to walk even if there is a thaw by then.’
They went back to the drawing-room and listened to the old ladies chatting about the weather and how old Mr Soames had fallen and broken an arm and some naughty boys had thrown snowballs at Major Thomas’s sitting-room windows and broken a pane of glass. Presently they turned their attention upon their guest.
‘You are not married, Mr van der Beek?’ asked Aunt Bessy.
‘Er—no, Miss Martin.’
‘A doctor—a surgeon, are you?—should have a wife. It adds stability to his lifestyle. Personally I would never go to a doctor who wasn’t a family man.’
Mr van der Beek looked astonished but observed at his smoothest that a married man certainly gave one the feeling of confidence.
‘Then you must find yourself a wife, young man,’ said Aunt Polly. ‘You are nicely settled in at the house? Once the winter is over you will enjoy the garden—the roses in summer are delightful.’
‘I shall be gone by then,’ he pointed out, and presently took his leave.
The aunts settled down again by the fire. ‘It is so nice to have you home, dear,’ they told Patience. ‘You like the work there? You are not doing menial work, I hope? Is the house being well looked after? The housekeeper must have more than enough to do until Mrs Croft and Mrs Perch can go back.’
Patience assured them that she had almost nothing to do, that the house looked splendid and that the housekeeper was a most efficient woman. ‘I’ll get the supper, shall I?’ she suggested, and wondered what Mr van der Beek would eat that evening. By bedtime she was missing him quite badly. Not that he had been particularly friendly, but he had been surprisingly helpful around the house and now and again very kind. She supposed that once the weather was back to normal and life too he would revert to his coolly distant manner, shut up in the study all day and taking no notice of anyone. He must have found the last few days very trying.