by Betty Neels
He looked surprised and then laughed. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be so ill-humoured. I suppose I’m not used to being married again.’
‘I know exactly what you mean,’ she told him kindly. ‘I feel a bit the same myself. But don’t imagine that I shall interfere with your life or your habits—I told you that I wouldn’t and I won’t, only you must tell me when I get in the way or do something to vex you, otherwise I shan’t know.’
He put down his glass and came to stand before her. ‘Laura, you’re a nice girl and an understanding one. Give me a little time, will you? And I promise you that I’ll tell you when you vex me, and you must do the same. Shall we go in to dinner?’
He pulled her to her feet and tucked an arm into hers so that her heart bounced against her ribs. ‘Tell me, what did you think of the house?’
Getting ready for bed later that evening, she decided that the evening had been a success; they had enjoyed their meal together and Reilof had told her something of his work at the hospital and a little, but not much, about his private practice. And later he had telephoned his father and arranged for them to drive over to see him the following evening, so that she was able to see him go to his study and wish him a placid goodnight without too much disappointment. After all, he had warned her that he worked each evening, and she had their visit to his father to look forward to. ‘Count your blessings, my girl,’ she admonished her reflection, and jumped into her enormous bed, to sleep at once and dream of Reilof.
CHAPTER SEVEN
REILOF was already at the breakfast table when Laura got down the following morning, deep in his letters and with a newspaper spread out before him as well. Evidently not a chatty meal—she wished him a quiet good morning and sat down opposite him, accepting the English newspapers laid neatly beside her plate as a strong hint to maintain silence. She poured herself some coffee; Reilof, who got to his feet as she went in, had returned to his mail once more, sparing a few seconds to hope that she had slept well and inviting her to help herself to anything she wanted and ring for anything she wished. She rather fancied that he didn’t hear her polite ‘Thank you,’ and he didn’t speak again until he had finished his letters, when he swallowed his coffee and rose to his feet once more.
‘I expect to be home about six,’ he told her, and halfway to the door remembered to wish her a pleasant day.
‘Doing what?’ asked Laura silently to his disappearing back, and then remembered that he had asked her to have patience. As it turned out there was plenty to occupy her time; the kitchens to inspect—a roomy complex with a separate scullery and laundry, and what she supposed was the Dutch equivalent of a butler’s pantry. She met the two maids, too, Annie and Els, strapping young girls who smiled widely as they greeted her and then the gardener, an old man with a weatherbeaten face and a fringe of white hair, and when she had had her coffee in the sunroom she was borne away to inspect linen cupboards, kitchen equipment and the housekeeping books. The latter made almost no sense at all, but she felt it was incumbent on her to make a start. The amount of money spent on food rather staggered her, but presumably Reilof could afford it, although when she changed the guldens into pounds the total made her open her eyes.
And after her solitary lunch she went to the swimming pool and spent a lazy hour. She swam well and the pool was a good size and the water warm, then she dressed and had tea in the garden, then went up to her room to change her dress, ready for Reilof’s return.
They were to dine with his father, he had told her, and she put on one of her new dresses, a silk print in shades of green, sleeveless and nicely cut, adding the Charles Jourdan sandals which she hadn’t really been able to afford because she wanted to make a good impression. But they made no impression on Reilof when he came home; he put his head round the sitting room door, said, ‘Hullo—shan’t keep you long,’ and went straight upstairs to reappear presently in a pale grey checked suit and a rather splendid tie. She doubted very much if he had any idea at all of what she was wearing, and he barely glanced at her as he suggested briskly that they should leave immediately.
Laura got to her feet at once, wished the dogs goodbye and accompanied Reilof out to the car—the Aston Martin this time—and he didn’t speak at all until they were through Hilversum and almost at Loenen. ‘You don’t have much to say for yourself,’ he observed a little impatiently.
‘I have plenty to say for myself,’ declared Laura with asperity, ‘but only when people want to listen to me. If you wish me to greet you,’ she went on with some heat, ‘with a flow of small talk of an evening, you have only to say so. I didn’t get that impression when you came home just now.’
‘My dear good girl, you don’t have to fly at me like a wildcat! You are free to say what you want and when you want to say it, you know.’
‘That isn’t what you said, you told me that you didn’t want your present way of living changed.’ She stared out of the window at the pretty country they were passing through and added without looking at him, ‘I haven’t taken umbrage, only made myself clear.’
His voice was silky. ‘Very clear, Laura. You sound exactly like a wife.’
She nipped back the answer to that just in time and held her tongue with an effort, until in a silence grown too long she observed sweetly:
‘How pretty it is here.’
‘Delightful.’
They were on a narrow road running alongside a lake of some size. There were boats of all shapes and sizes moored at its edge, and on the other side of the road were handsome villas, each standing in its own spacious grounds, screened from the road by shrubs and trees and well-clipped hedges.
It was through the gate of one of these houses that Reilof drove the car, to stop before the already open door of a fair-sized house with a thatched roof with a patio, screened by climbing roses, at one side.
‘Oh, very pretty,’ exclaimed Laura, refusing to be damped by Reilof’s silence, and jumped out before he could get round to open her door, but he caught her by the arm as they went up the path so that at a distance at least they must have looked like a devoted pair. And so it must have seemed to the man waiting for them at the door—Piet’s son, looking just like a younger version of his father—for he smiled in a pleased way as Reilof introduced him to her and said in rather quaint English: ‘It is a great delight that you enter the van Meerum family, mevrouw,’ before leading them across the dim, cool hall to a room at the back of the house which overlooked a formal garden, its doors wide to the summer evening.
Its only occupant got to his feet as they went in and came to meet them; an elderly man with iron-grey hair and dark eyes, as tall as his son and as broad too, but unlike his son he was smiling. He said: ‘Reilof…and your Laura,’ and then turned to put his hands on her shoulders and kiss her cheek. ‘My dear girl, I am so happy to welcome you into the family.’ He held her away a little and studied her face while she stayed quiet under his look. ‘I have always wanted another daughter,’ he told her kindly, ‘and now I have a charming one. I am glad that Reilof brought you here to meet me before he shows you off to the rest of the family.’
He took her arm and led her to an enormous sofa. ‘Come and sit down and tell me about yourself. Reilof, will you get us all a drink? Dinner will be in about half an hour.’
The evening was a huge success; Laura, completely at ease with the elder of her two companions, wondered why it was that Reilof didn’t allow himself to show the charm which his father demonstrated so easily. That he had charm she was well aware, and on one or two occasions during the evening he did relax, so that they were all talking and laughing like old friends with no hint of restraint, but the barrier he had put between them was there again once they were on their way home again. He refused to be drawn into more than polite, brief comments on their evening, despite her efforts, so that by the time they had arrived home once more she could find nothing more to do than wish him goodnight.
They were to go again to his father’s house later in th
e week, and the rest of the family would be there too—a celebration dinner, old Doctor van Meerum had told Laura. She was to wear her prettiest dress and perhaps they would clear the drawing room of its furniture and dance afterwards. It had all sounded fun, but thinking about it the next morning she wasn’t so sure; supposing none of them liked her?
She went down to her breakfast feeling subdued, and was made more so by Reilof’s announcement that he would be going to Maastricht for a seminar and would be away for two days. ‘I believe that I did mention that I go away frequently for a day or two at a time,’ he observed, ‘but I’m sure that you’ll find plenty to do—get Piet to drive you if you want to do any shopping in den Haag or Amsterdam. You have enough money?’
‘Yes, thank you, Reilof.’ She tried to make her voice cheerful. Of course she had plenty of money, he had been more than generous with her allowance; she had never had so much money to spend on herself in her life before—only she would have forgone the lot in exchange for just one gift from him, something he had bought himself. Not even a wedding present, she told herself forlornly, and remembered the gold cufflinks she had bought for him and had hidden away in a drawer when she realised that he had no thought of giving her anything.
‘I don’t think I shall need to bother Piet; there’s heaps for me to see in Hilversum and Baarn, and the bus service is awfully good.’
He looked surprised. ‘Oh, is it? I don’t have occasion to use it.’ He got up and came round the table to her chair and surprisingly bent to kiss her cheek. ‘Piet will look after you,’ he told her. ‘Tot ziens.’
He left her sitting there while the two dogs bustled along at his heels to see him off. Given the slightest encouragement Laura would have seen him off too, but she wasn’t given any.
She filled the two days somehow, writing letters, exploring Baarn and Hilversum, shopping a little, spending long hours in the garden with her head bent over the embroidery she had bought to keep her occupied. There were the dogs to take for walks too, and Truus to consult about meals, but all the same she thought about Reilof almost all the time, wondering what he was doing and who he was with. It was strange to love a man so much and know so little about him.
He came back very late on the evening of the second day; she had been in bed for an hour or more and it had struck midnight before she heard the car turn into the drive and stop. Laura skipped out of bed at once and peeped from her window to see Reilof enter the house, and presently she heard him come upstairs and go to his room. She shivered a little by the open window and got back into bed; it would have been nice to have gone downstairs and made him a drink or sandwiches, but he might not have liked that. All the same, it was lovely to have him home again—she would ask him about Dutch lessons in the morning. She had half expected him to mention them, but perhaps he had been too busy… She drifted off into a daydream in which she learned to speak Dutch with a faultless accent and surprised and delighted him with her brilliance, and presently she went to sleep.
She brought the matter up at breakfast and was agreeably surprised when he said instantly: ‘Yes, of course you shall have lessons—I know just the man to teach you, too. I’ll telephone him this morning and arrange it. At what time of the day would you like him to come?’
Laura considered: she spent an agreeably pleasant hour in the kitchen with Truus after breakfast and then another hour walking the dogs. ‘Eleven o’clock?’ she wondered out loud. ‘I should like to learn Dutch as quickly as possible. I did ask Jan about lessons, but he said you would be bound to arrange something…’
‘You asked Jan…?’ There was no mistaking the annoyance in his voice, although he looked placid enough.
‘Well, yes—you see, I don’t see you very often, really, do I? And you’re busy.’
He let that pass and gathered up his letters. ‘I’ll arrange for eleven o’clock each day except Saturday and Sunday. Mijnheer de Wal can come here.’
‘Does he have far to come? If he lives in Baarn or Hilversum I could easily catch a bus…’
Reilof was ready to go. ‘I prefer him to come to the house,’ he said briefly. ‘I shall be home just before tea.’
So she began lessons with Mijnheer de Wal, a nice old gentleman with a luxurious moustache and beard, a benign expression and a firm determination to teach her to speak correct Dutch if it was the last thing he should do. After the first lesson she rather enjoyed herself, took his stern corrections meekly and made peculiar mistakes which she longed to laugh about with Reilof. But he, beyond asking her if she had started her lessons, made no further inquiries as to her progress, so that at the end of the week, when they were bidden to his father’s house, she was able to surprise him by uttering a handful of painstakingly correct phrases, learned especially for the occasion.
And it had been an occasion, a red-letter day to be looked back on with pleasure. Reilof had asked her to wear her wedding dress, and, rather mystified, she had done so, and when she had gone downstairs he had been waiting for her in the drawing room, very elegant in his dinner jacket. He had stared at her rather as though he had never seen her before, before opening a leather case on the table beside him.
‘I asked you to wear that dress because it would provide a suitable background for these,’ he said. ‘Stand still a moment.’
He had hung a necklace round her neck, a magnificent affair of rubies set around with diamonds, and then turned her round to see her reflection in the big Chippendale mirror on one wall. She was gasping with surprise when he lifted her hand and clasped a matching bracelet round her wrist.
She looked at that too, her eyes round with excitement and delight.
‘They’re gorgeous!’ she managed. ‘I suppose…’
‘These too, but you’ll have to put them on for yourself.’
The earrings were pear-shaped drops of rubies and diamonds in a heavy gold setting, and she poked the hooks into her ears and swung her head from side to side, admiring them. Her eyes met his in the mirror and she smiled widely and then turned towards him. ‘Thank you, Reilof—I’ve never had…’
His matter-of-fact, ‘The eldest son’s wife inherits them. I can hardly take the credit for giving them to you,’ damped her delight as effectively as a bucket of water would have done. She said bleakly, ‘Oh, I see—and of course I have to wear them this evening…’
‘Just so. Are we ready?’
But despite that unhappy little episode, the evening had been a success. Her father-in-law liked her and Margriet, Reilof’s sister, had been charming and kind and friendly too. She was a pretty girl in her thirties, with his dark eyes, and her husband, a tall, bony man, good-looking in a rangy way, treated her with a casual warmth which she had found very reassuring. As for Laurent, the youngest of the family, he made no bones about liking her on sight; they had got on famously and were instant friends, so that the evening which she had been dreading had proved to be the greatest fun.
There had been uncles and aunts too, and half a dozen cousins, all making much of her, and after the family dinner party, friends had come in for drinks and to offer congratulations. Laura stood beside Reilof, shaking dozens of friendly hands, very conscious of him and the hand he had tucked under her arm from time to time. She had done her best; presumably his family, though perhaps not his father, thought that Reilof had married her for love and not just on an impulse, and she had behaved, she hoped, just as she ought, unaware that each time she had looked at him her love showed so clearly that all the members of the van Meerum family had gone home delighted that Reilof had fallen in love with a girl who so obviously adored him.
And Reilof—his behaviour couldn’t be faulted. He had said and done exactly the right things, smiling pleasantly as they had talked with first one and then the other of the family, and he had smiled at her too, his eyes dark and expressionless, so that she had felt cold inside. But when they were home again he observed pleasantly enough that everyone had liked her and she had been a great success with the family. She ha
d thanked him quietly, wishing that he could like her and more than that, and then went upstairs in her magnificent jewels, sparkling in the light from the chandelier, and cried herself to sleep.
But there was no point in wishing for the moon; she was Reilof’s wife and sooner or later she was determined to win his regard and even his love. She was beginning to fit nicely into his life now; she got on well with Truus, and Piet was her devoted slave; she had taken over a number of small chores about the house, gone shopping, and armed with the necessary basic Dutch Mijnheer de Wal dinned into her, coped with the telephone, callers, and the wives of Reilof’s colleagues, who came to see what she was like. Because she was friendly and unassuming and a little shy they liked her, a fact which Reilof remarked upon one evening at dinner.
‘Quite a success,’ he told her blandly. ‘You have slipped into your new role very easily, Laura.’
She wasn’t sure if he was being deliberately nasty. ‘Your family have been more than kind to me. I have a lot to thank them for—your friends too. And Mijnheer de Wal is a wonderful teacher, and Jan gives me lots of tips…’
‘Jan?’ Reilof was on his way to his study.
She had got up from the table with him. ‘Well, yes—I see him from time to time, you know.’
His eyebrows lifted. ‘Indeed? You like him?’
‘Oh, very much…’ She noticed then that his dark eyes were studying her closely. She added lamely, ‘He makes me laugh.’
He crossed the hall without a word and went into his study, closing the door very quietly behind him.
It was a couple of days later that he came home in the afternoon. Laura had been sitting in the garden, lounging on the grass with the two dogs and learning Dutch verbs, and was quite unprepared for his unexpected appearance, strolling across the grass with his hands in his pockets. She got to her feet at once, exclaiming happily, ‘How lovely, you’re early!’