successfully. She didn't think that anyone else there had noticed it, but
over the past weeks she had come to recognise the blank look on his face when
he was annoyed.
It took no time at all to get the children to bed. She left Cor till last
because there were several things she had to do for him. It was while she
was tucking him up that he said, "She meant it, you know, dear George."
"Meant what--and who?"
He muttered grumpily, "Madame LeFabre, of course. She was being beastly."
She said comfortably, "You're too tired to know what you're saying. Go to
sleep, my dear." She kissed him and went to find Dimphena, to tell her that
she wouldn't go back to the salon with her.
"I've a headache," she invented, 'and there'll be plenty to do tomorrow, I
expect. no one will notice. "
Dimphena went, looking doubtful, and presently she went back to Cor's
room--there was a strap on one of his calipers which needed adjusting.
She sat down on the floor before the fire, not caring about the brown organza
getting creased--it hadn't worked a miracle anyway. She might just as well
be in uniform. It had served her right for trying to attract his interest
when he was practically engaged to someone else.
She gave the cord which fastened the caliper's leather support a vicious tug
and it broke. She sat and looked at it, and would have gone on looking at it
for some time if the door had not opened behind her. Julius came across the
thick-piled carpet and said quietly.
"What are you doing?"
She had to look up a long way to see his face, and even then it was
indistinct in the darkened room.
"This needed adjusting," she said a voice which held only the ghost of a
wobble. She held up the cord.
"I broke it." She got up.
"I've some spare ones in my room."
She fetched one and found him still there when she returned. He took it from
her and threaded it quickly and laid it by its fellow.
"Phena tells me you aren't coming down again." His voice was gentle.
"Will you change your mind?--we're going to dance."
She was about to say no, when it flashed through her mind that perhaps
Therese had sent him, anxious to make sure that she hadn't really been
offended. She smoothed her brown skirts.
"Very well," she said, "I'll come."
It wasn't so bad--she danced a great deal, and twice revolved gently round
the room with Great- Uncle Ivo. A number of people she hadn't met seemed to
have drifted in--she supposed that they were local friends. She danced with
everyone who asked her until just after midnight, when she slipped quietly
away, confident that no one had seen her go. She was half way up the
staircase when the Professor said from the hall below, "I haven't danced with
you, Georgina."
She paused with her hand on the rail, and looked down at him.
"No," she said.
"Goodnight." She turned away and was barely a step higher before he was
beside her.
"You don't ask why," he said mildly.
She didn't look at him.
"I don't have to."
He caught her hand, so that she was forced to stand still.
"If you ask me--now--I promise I'll give you the answer."
But she only shook her head.
"Goodnight," she said again, and went on up the stairs alone.
She scarcely saw him the next day, and when she did, they hardly spoke
because Therese LeFabre was always with him.
The weather changed imperceptibly during the night; the cold north wind died
away, although the sky remained a uniform grey and the snow looked as thick
as ever. Georgina gave Cor his exercises, strapped on his calipers and took
him for a sober walk, with the other children tearing round them like playful
puppies. When they got back the first of the lunch guests had arrived. She
got the children organised with her usual calm good sense, and went upstairs
to change, returning presently wearing the apricot jersey. There was no sign
of the children; she stood in the doorway of the salon, watching its laughing
and chattering occupants, and took a step backwards into the hall, intent on
discovering where they had got to. Cor still needed to be careful, but he
wouldn't allow the fact to stop him if he was bent on mischief with the other
five.
"Don't worry about the children, I've wished them on Hans for half an hour,"
said the Professor from the hall.
"Come and meet some friends of mine."
He led her across the room to where Dimphena was talking to a very tall and
generously built girl, and an even taller man. The Professor hailed them.
"Maggy--Paul, this is Georgina, this is Maggy Doelsma, and her husband,
Paul--a doctor, of course. Maggy was Ward Sister at St. Ethelburga's."
He stayed for a few minutes and then went away, taking Paul and Dimphena with
him, leaving the two young women to talk. Maggy turned a pair of magnificent
brown eyes on to Georgina and asked:
"Do you like it here--Holland, I mean?"
"I don't really know," Georgina answered.
"I haven't been anywhere yet. I love Bergenstijn thought--it's so different
from the Professor's home in Essex, but just as nice."
Her companion eyed her with interest, said "Um," in a noncommittal way and
then, "Do you like Julius? Is he nice to work for?"
"Very." This at least was a question she could answer easily.
"He's most considerate, and the children are darlings."
Maggy nodded.
"Aye; it's time he married and had some of his own, though." She looked
around her.
"I see Therese LeFabre is here--as elegant as ever and looking every day of
her thirty years. Do you like her?"
Georgina answered guardedly.
"She's very charming--she wears lovely clothes too. It must be awful to be
left a widow..."
Maggy made a funny little sound between a snort and a laugh.
"Not for her it isn't. She married a Belgian industrialist who left her a
great deal of money, and I doubt she grieved overmuch. I don't like her."
"No," said Georgina simply, 'nor do I. "
They smiled at each other and after a pause Maggy asked, "When are you going
back to St. Athel's? Julius said something about you getting Cas."
"Yes, from March the first. I think we go back to England at the end of next
week. I suppose I'll go back to St. Athel's then."
"You must have a day with us before you go. I'll ask Julius to bring you
over."
"No," said Georgina quickly.
"I mean, I'd love to come, but the Professor has guests."
"All gone by Monday. We're not far away-Leiden."
"I--I don't know. Perhaps I could come by train?"
"Nonsense, I'll fetch you. Shall I give you a ring in a day or two?"
They went to lunch then, and she didn't see her new friends again except to
bid them a brief goodbye. As they walked to their car, she saw Paul catch at
his wife's hand, and the look he gave her, and suffered a pang of pure envy.
Karel and Franz arrived on Saturday in the forenoon, cheerful, noisy and
hungry, Georgina was in the hall when they arrived and Karel dropped his bag
and came
across the hall and caught her up and swung her in the air.
"Georgina, more beautiful than ever! I shall expect the first dance with you
this evening."
He put her down and gave her a smacking kiss and she giggled.
"Karel, do grow up! And I'm sitting out the first dance with Cor I promised.
The children are to stay up for an hour, you know."
"In that case, the second," he cried, and caught hold of her and waltzed her
round the hall. It was at that moment that she saw Julius watching them from
the study door. Karel saw him too, for he stopped with a flourish in front
of him, and said gaily, "Hullo, Julius. Here we are, you see. Bergenstijn
seems to agree with Georgina, if her dancing is anything to go by."
She smoothed herself down so that she wouldn't have to look at the Professor,
who said smoothly, "Hullo there. You must ask Georgina what she thinks of
Bergenstijn presently, but come in now and tell me all the news of Dalmers
Place."
He smiled at her briefly and closed the door gently.
She put the green dress on again that evening. The dance was to be a cosy
affair, just family, with friends dropping in after dinner. But Dimphena was
adamant that everyone should dress up for it. They dined early, so that the
children should have their share of the evening's fun, and Georgina was
delighted to find herself between Karel and Great-Uncle Ivo. They talked a
great deal of nonsense and laughed a great deal; and she tried not to look
too often at Therese, who was wearing a pale chiffon caftan and what Georgina
didn't doubt were real pearls. She looked gorgeous. Georgina stole a look
at Julius, to encounter his bright stare upon herself, and turned away
hastily with a flushed face, aware that he was secretly amused about
something--probably her.
The salon was comfortably crowded when she collected the children and took
them upstairs to bed. With Pankie's help she had them tucked up and was back
in the salon within the hour, to dance with a gratifying number of partners.
It was almost eleven when she slipped away and started up the big staircase
again. She had almost reached the top, when the Professor called, "Georgina,
where are you going?" And this time he followed her up and walked beside her
along the corridor.
"It's all right," she said matter-of-factly, "I'm going down again. I
promised Cor I'd come and peep at him, to make sure that he's asleep-Beatrix
too."
She swept ahead of him and bent over each child in turn, then went along the
little passage at the end and started up the small staircase at its end
leading to the next floor. He kept pace with her, merely saying:
"You're going somewhere else."
She looked back at him and said serenely, "Why, yes. I told the children's
mothers that I would look in on them while I was up here.
There's no point in us all coming up. "
She went in turn to the two bedrooms, where she found one small girl awake
and went through the ritual of a drink of water, and the turning of the
pillow and the re-tucking up. Finally she dropped a kiss on the round cheek
and rustled softly past him, leaving him to shut the door.
They were almost at the head of the stairs again when he said "Georgina," and
she stopped and looked round, to be instantly clasped and kissed and kissed
again, until, almost unknowingly, she returned his kisses. But presently she
put a firm hand against the fine stuff of his dinner jacket, remembering
Therese, and said in a steady, cold voice:
"You've been wanting to do that, haven't you? Perhaps you'll feel better
now."
Through her own pain she heard the shock in his voice, as he repeated:
"Better? What the devil do you mean by that?"
She said tiredly, "Just what I say. When you can't have something it gets
out of all proportion, doesn't it? You want it all the more even though you
don't really want it..." She stopped, for she was getting muddled; all the
same, she felt that she had made herself clear.
Apparently she had, for he let her go.
"You think that?" He spoke in a calm almost casual voice that told her
nothing.
She repeated, "Yes, I mean that. Goodnight."
She made herself go calmly down under his eye,
longing, most illogically, for him to say something--anything. He said
nothing at all, and although she stayed stubbornly until the last guest had
gone, he didn't speak to her again.
Only Karel and Franz were at breakfast when she went down with the children;
and they were off somewhere for the day. She listened to their talk and
replied suitably, and when they had gone realised that she hadn't heard a
word they had been saying. Everyone was leaving that morning--it was
Great-Uncle Ivo, bidding her a courtly goodbye, who let drop the news that
Julius had gone out very early that morning to some urgent call from a
hospital in Amsterdam. She stood with Dimphena and the two children, waving
goodbye, and asked as she turned away, "Is Madame LeFabre staying on?"
Dimphena replied rather shortly, "Yes. She's afraid it will be too dull for
Julius over the weekend. She says she will cheer us all up, I heard her
arranging to meet Julius for lunch today, so I expect we shall have to do our
own cheering up."
She looked resigned and Georgina said bracingly, "Why don't you look up that
friend who couldn't come yesterday--surely Karel would give you a lift?"
Dimphena brightened, and thus petitioned, her brother willingly agreed, and
half an hour later, having seen them on their way, Georgina stood in the hall
in slacks and jacket and a bright scarf on her head, while the two children
debated their morning's amusement. It was overcast outside, with no wind at
all, and Beatrix, always persistent, reiterated her demand to skate.
"What about Cor?" asked Georgina.
"It won't be much fun for him."
"Yes, it will, if we stop and talk to him every time we go round," persisted
her small companion.
"Half an hour," she wheedled, 'please, dear George. "
"Your guardian said we weren't to skate unless he gave permission, and you
know he went far too early this morning for me to see him."
"Ah, but I have seen him," said Therese from the stairs. She hurried towards
them, saying diffidently, "I overheard you as I came down--you do not mind, I
hope? But you see Julius gave me a message for you, that you might skate it
you wish. He thought that perhaps you feel lonely now that everyone is gone.
It was, you understand, far too early for him to tell you himself." She
glanced at Georgina and gave a half smile.
"It is good for skating; no wind. If I have the time before I meet Julius, I
may join you."
She drifted away, leaving an aura of something delicious behind her.
When she had quite gone, Cor said, "Let's go, George. I don't mind standing,
and I can walk along that little path Hans cleared for me;
only let's go indoors again if she comes too. "
They started for the door. Georgina smiled at him.
"Don't worry. Cor, I don't think Madame LeFabre will have time to skate with
us if she's goin
g out to lunch."
The ice was a grey reflection of the sky above them, the trees which
sheltered the lake were wind- still. It was ideal for skating.
Georgina, kneeling to fasten their skates, glanced around her. It was much
warmer--the ice looked the same and Julius had said that they could skate.
All the same, she circled slowly round the lake before going back for Beatrix.
It was on their second time round, when they were exactly opposite Cor,
watching them from the further bank, that the ice cracked suddenly beneath
their feet, and Georgina, making a frantic effort to save Beatrix, pitched
forward into the ever-widening gap in the ice.
Mercifully, she had Beatrix by the hand; she clutched it still as she fought
her way to the surface. As soon as they came above water, she gasped:
"Don't scream, darling. Keep your mouth shut, and stay still. When I tell
you, get an arm around my neck."
She began to tread water, a difficult, almost impossible feet because of her
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