A Kind of Magic

by Betty Neels

  She had to admire Dr Cameron’s tactics the next morning. He was later than usual, and he looked tired. But he was as immaculate as usual, and just as impersonally pleasant, reassuring Mrs Macdonald that she was making a steady progress, explaining that the longer she stayed in bed off her foot, the sooner she would be able to walk without pain.

  ‘Another few days,’ he warned her, ‘and then I will see about getting you home. You are making the most remarkable recovery.’

  Mrs Macdonald gave a smug smile. ‘I pride myself upon my fortitude and common sense,’ she told him.

  It was an easy step from there to point out that Rosie, if she were to give her grandmother her full attention, should take necessary exercise.

  ‘If I might suggest,’ said Dr Cameron at his most urbane, ‘two or three hours in the fresh air each afternoon? I am sure that there is a chambermaid able to bring you your tea and answer your bell, but I hope that for your own good you will rest quietly after your lunch. Shall you be willing to try this for a day or so? Now that you are feeling so much better I dare say you have been thinking along these lines yourself.’

  To Rosie’s astonishment her grandmother replied quite sharply that of course she had.

  ‘Then that is settled, if—er—Rosie feels able, there are some splendid walks around the hotel.’

  Of which she was well aware, although she had no intention of saying so. She still didn’t like him, she told herself, but she had to admit that he was doing his best for her.

  He went away presently giving her a casual nod. ‘I’ll be in tomorrow—I have to pass the hotel.’

  She accompanied him down to the foyer, and as he went he said, ‘Be sure and get out for a walk each day.’ He stopped unexpectedly so that she almost tripped up.

  ‘You’re not very happy, are you?’ he asked, but didn’t wait for an answer.

  ‘A good thing, too,’ muttered Rosie crossly, ‘for it’s none of his business.’

  The new regime worked well; her grandmother offered no opposition when, having settled her for her afternoon nap, she got into her gilet and sensible shoes, reassured her that she had warned the chambermaid, rearranged the pillows, adjusted the window curtains to her grandmother’s taste, and at last took herself off.

  She took the road towards Loch Tulla, walking briskly. It was a fine afternoon, but it wouldn’t last—the sky above Ben Dorian behind her was ominously grey, but she didn’t care; to be out walking in well-remembered country was enough to make her happy. That evening, she reflected, she would phone her mother and tell her that nothing had changed in the wild and lonely countryside around her. Just for a little while she was blissfully happy, and some of the happiness was still with her when she returned to soothe a disgruntled grandparent who declared that she had been bored, in pain, and neglected.

  ‘Kirsty came to see you,’ said Rosie. ‘I met her as I came in, and she said that you had had a long nap and a splendid tea.’

  She wished she hadn’t repeated that, for her grandmother declared loudly that no servant was to be trusted. ‘Of course if you wish to disbelieve your own kith and kin…’

  It took her the rest of the evening to coax Mrs Macdonald into a good frame of mind again.

  When Dr Cameron came in the morning she half expected her grandmother to object to being left on her own in the afternoon, and she couldn’t help but admire his handling of her recalcitrant grandparent so that grudging permission was given once more with the rider that it was to be hoped that the state of affairs wouldn’t last.

  ‘Just as soon as you are fit to be moved, Mrs Macdonald,’ said the doctor, at his most soothing, ‘I will arrange your return home. You are doing splendidly, due largely to your co-operation and fortitude.’

  Rosie, watching the old lady’s pleased smile at that, thought Dr Cameron was a cunning rascal, obviously used to getting his own way once he had made up his mind.

  Beyond a civil good day as he went he had nothing to say to her, which rather annoyed her. Even if she didn’t like him their barbed conversation made her day more interesting.

  Two more days went by, and Rosie’s lovely face took on a healthy glow from the energetic walks she took each day. It was a pity that the weather was changing; there was more persistent rain and a strengthening wind—hardly a day for a tramp—but Dr Cameron had said that morning that her grandmother was well enough to return home, and this might be her last chance to take a last look… She borrowed an old mac from one of the maids, tied her head in a scarf, assured her grandmother, with not a vestige of truth, that the weather was clearing, and left the hotel.

  The steady drizzle didn’t bother her, nor did the great gusts of wind. The sky was leaden and the mountains loomed, grey and forbidding, but she had been brought up in surroundings such as these, and wasn’t deterred from her resolve to walk as far as possible towards Rannoch Moor. She had no hope of actually getting there, but at least she would be able to reach its very edge. She would walk for an hour and then turn back.

  The hour was almost up and she was a good four miles from the hotel when the drizzle turned to torrential rain. There was no escaping it; she was on a lonely stretch of road bordered by coarse grass and last year’s bracken, patterned with the vivid green of the new growth. The low-lying shrubs offered no shelter, and there was nothing to do but turn round and walk back. She paused to wipe the rain from her face with an already sopping hanky, and didn’t hear the Land Rover come to a halt on the other side of the road. Its door opened and Dr Cameron roared, ‘Over here, Rosie, and look sharp about it!’

  She sloshed across the road, her shoes full of water, relieved to see him, and at the same time vexed that he should bawl at her in such a fashion. He had the door open, and she climbed in and squelched into the seat beside him, and he drove off, far too fast she considered, before she had fastened her seatbelt. She mopped her face, glad that she would be back soon.

  ‘An emergency?’ she asked, and when he didn’t do more than grunt, ‘Thank you for picking me up, I’ll be glad to get out of these wet clothes.’

  They were approaching Bridge of Orchy; she could see the hotel, standing back from the station and the road. A cup of tea and a hot bath would be more than welcome. She gave a sigh of relief which turned to a surprised gasp as he drove down a side-road which joined the road to Oban.

  ‘Sorry I can’t stop,’ said Dr Cameron in what she considered to be a heartless manner. The next minute she felt ashamed of herself; what were hot baths and cups of tea compared with emergencies?

  She peered through the driving rain as he turned off the road on to a narrow country lane running through fir trees. She knew the lane, for it was within a few miles of her old home. They would pass close to Inverard unless he turned off again, and side-roads were few and far between.

  He didn’t turn off, but presently raced through an open gateway and slowed then because the drive was steep and narrow and winding.

  ‘Why are you coming here?’ She strove to keep her voice quiet.

  ‘Dr Finlay is out on a case. The medical men at Oban are tied up—I got a call on the car phone.’

  They had reached the end of the drive, and the house came into view. It hadn’t changed—white walls, gables, tall chimneys, shallow steps to the wide front door standing ajar, sitting cosily within its circle of trees and gardens, facing the mountains across a wide grass meadow.

  She gave a small sigh, and he turned to look at her.

  �
��Know this place? Who lives here? I was only given the address…’

  ‘Macdonald,’ and at his sudden understanding look, ‘I was born here. Donald Macdonald is my uncle.’

  He had the doors open. ‘Out you get and inside with you, and don’t waste my time. You can dry off somewhere…’

  He mounted the steps and went into the square hall with doors on all sides. One of them opened now, and a small elderly woman in a flowered pinny came to meet them.

  ‘The doctor—thank God for that. He’s in the drawing-room, we’ve not dared to move him.’ Her eyes lighted on Rosie, and her face broke into a wide smile. ‘Miss Rosie—in with ye, lassie, while I take the doctor along.’

  The doctor had cast down his Burberry and followed the woman through the door, and Rosie stopped to take off her mac and headscarf, and made haste to follow. Nothing had changed, she saw that at a glance as she crossed the charming room to the vast sofa where her uncle lay.

  ‘Is there anything I can do?’ She looked at the unconscious face of her uncle, and felt a pang of pity; he had treated her father with unkindness and she had never liked him, but now he lay, a lonely elderly man with no wife and no family to be with him.

  ‘Open my bag and get out the syringe in a plastic envelope, the small bottle with spirit written on it, and one of the woollen swabs beside it. Put them where I can reach them, and get someone to get a bed ready.’

  He didn’t look at her; he was bending over his patient, listening to his chest, so she did exactly as she had been told and then, leaving Mrs MacFee with him, hurried through to the dining-room through the open archway and up the small second staircase leading from it. Old Robert, the odd-job man, and a young girl with a tear-stained face were standing in the doorway leading to the kitchen, and Rosie said, ‘Come up with me, will you, and help me get a bed ready?’

  Her uncle’s room was at the front of the house; if he was to be carried upstairs, then it would be easier if they used the main staircase in the inner hall leading up from the drawing-room. Rosie ran through the passages and opened the door wide. ‘We’d better take the bedclothes off.’ She gave the girl a reassuring smile. ‘What is your name?’

  ‘Flora, miss, I’m the housemaid.’

  ‘Well, Flora, would you switch on the lights? And I should think one pillow would do.’ She frowned. ‘Perhaps you’d better fetch several more, though, for I’m not sure if Mr Macdonald should sit up or not.’

  She gave a quick look round, moved a bedside table to make it easier to reach the bed, and said, ‘I’m going downstairs again to tell the doctor to use the main staircase.’

  Dr Cameron was still bending over her uncle. He didn’t look up as she went in, but said in his calm way, ‘Is the bed ready?’ and when she said ‘yes’ he lifted his patient with apparent ease.

  ‘Lead the way…’

  She went ahead, turning every few steps to make sure that the doctor was all right. ‘Pillow?’ she asked urgently as they reached the bedroom.

  ‘One,’ Dr Cameron laid his patient on the bed. He was breathing rather fast, but that was all. He must be all of fifteen stone, reflected Rosie and, being a practical young woman, began to ease off her uncle’s shoes.

  Her uncle was still unconscious.

  ‘We will get him undressed,’ stated the doctor. ‘Trousers and jacket, leave everything else.’

  When that was done he turned to Rosie and said, ‘Go and telephone the hotel, reassure your grandmother. Will it upset her to be told?’

  ‘She hasn’t spoken to Uncle Donald since he came here to live, but I’d rather not tell her—not yet, anyway.’

  ‘Tell her what you think is best, and then come back here.’

  She was still wringing wet and with no hope of getting dry, at least for the moment. When she got downstairs she kicked off her shoes, stripped off her tights, and went to the telephone. It took a minute or two to explain to the manager where she was and why.

  ‘If you could tell my grandmother,’ she asked, ‘that I am quite safe, and will be back just as soon as Dr Cameron can leave his patient.’

  Mrs MacFee was at her elbow as she put down the phone.

  ‘You’ll get these wet things off you, Miss Rosie. Ye can sit in my dressing-gown while they dry—it’ll take but a wee while.’

  ‘I can’t just yet, Mrs MacFee, the doctor might need help.’ She raced back upstairs, and the housekeeper, tutting indignantly, went back to the kitchen to warm up the soup she was sure would be needed.

  ‘A fine, strong lass,’ she grumbled at Old Robert. ‘It won’t be my fault if she catches her death of cold—and why should she be here after all this time and them not speaking, her father and him?’ She nodded her head towards the ceiling. ‘That’s a braw man, that doctor. Fetch in some more peat, Robert, will you? The fire’ll need banking for the night.’

  ‘Woman, it’s but five o’clock.’

  ‘And a long night ahead of us, Robert.’

  ‘Stay here, will you?’ asked Dr Cameron as Rosie reached the bedroom. ‘I’ve some phoning to do. No need to do anything, but give a yell if he comes round.’

  She sat down close to the bed, her eyes glued to her uncle’s unconscious face. It was quiet in the room save for his slow breaths, so quiet that she had to strain her ears to hear them. It seemed an age before the doctor came soft-footed through the half-open door. He said nothing, checked his patient’s pulse once more, and then sat down on the other side of the bed.

  Presently he looked across at her.

  ‘Go down and get those wet things off; your Mrs MacFee is seething with anxiety for fear you will catch cold. Then come back here—I might need you.’

  He could have been giving orders to a nurse on a hospital ward. Polite, impersonal, and quite sure he would be obeyed.

  She did as she was told, and didn’t say a word. In the kitchen she was given a scalding cup of tea, and was told to go up the back stairs to Mrs MacFee’s room, strip off her clothes, and put on the dressing-gown she would find behind the door. It was a voluminous garment, very woolly, and she wrapped it around her person with a sigh of relief as Mrs MacFee came trotting in with her tights.

  ‘You put these on, my lass, and button up that gown all the way down. Come and sit in the kitchen by the fire—your things will dry in no time.’

  ‘I’m to go back upstairs,’ Rosie insisted.

  ‘Like that? Whatever next…?’

  ‘He’s a doctor, Mrs MacFee,’ said Rosie. ‘He’s concerned with Uncle Donald—I could be there with nothing on at all and he wouldn’t notice!’

  She gave the elderly cheek a quick kiss, nipped through the upstairs passages, and slid into the room without a word.

  If the doctor noticed her appearance he gave no sign. ‘He is regaining consciousness. Sit where he can see you.’

  So she sat close to the bed again, and sure enough her uncle’s eyelids soon fluttered and opened. He closed them again at once, and then after a minute opened them again. ‘Rosie?’ His voice was a thread of sound.

  ‘Yes, Uncle.’

  ‘Strange you’re here—I’ve been thinking about you…your father…’ He closed his eyes again, and she looked at the doctor, who looked calmly back at her and didn’t speak.

  ‘Never liked me much, did you?’ went on the weary voice. ‘Kicked me when I beat that dog. Sorry about that. So long ago. I’ve been a fool.’

  Rosie took one of his hands in hers. ‘That’s all over and done with, Uncle… The doct
or’s here, you were taken ill.’

  The tired face turned slowly on the pillow. ‘Don’t know you. Married to Rosie, are you?’

  Dr Cameron looked faintly amused. ‘Indeed not. Your own doctor was out on a case, and I got your housekeeper’s message on the car phone. Dr Douglas will be with us very shortly and it is to be hoped that you can be taken to hospital in Oban as soon as you are fit enough to move.’

  The man in the bed closed his eyes again, and presently the doctor said quietly to Rosie, ‘Go and get some clothes on.’

  ‘You’ll be all right?’ She went pink the moment she had spoken. It had been a silly remark; she didn’t need his slow smile to let her know that.

  When she got back there was another man there. Dr Douglas—a youngish man who had taken over old Dr MacTavish’s practice during the last year. It surprised her that he deferred to Dr Cameron’s opinion; she supposed that it was because he was a good deal younger.

  Her uncle was recovering slowly. The two men examined him together, and Dr Douglas went away to telephone.

  While he was gone Dr Cameron said, ‘We shall send your uncle to hospital. He needs urgent treatment. As soon as the ambulance is here and he is gone I’ll take you back.’

  Which, after an hour or so, he did. Mrs MacFee had insisted on hot soup for them both, and ten minutes by the blazing fire, and had taken the opportunity of discovering just why Rosie was there before they were allowed to get into the Land Rover and drive away. The ambulance had come and gone, and Dr Douglas had driven away behind it with the promise that he would be sure and let them know how the patient did.

  It was after ten o’clock when they left at last; the rain had settled down to a soft drizzle with patches of mist. Here and there the road was awash, and it was hard to see more than a few yards ahead, but the doctor remained unperturbed, and Rosie was too tired to bother. He drew up before the hotel entrance, got out, and opened her door.