by Betty Neels
‘Too personal, dear girl? Don’t you know me well enough yet?’ He was staring ahead as he spoke and didn’t wait for her answer. ‘All right, we’ll have a harmless conversation about the countryside.’ She thought his voice was a little too silky—perhaps he was annoyed, but after all, he had never actually said anything and he came and went—and for all she knew he might one day go for good… She followed his lead and they talked, happily enough, about the country they were passing through. They were going through Chipping Norton when she asked if they were getting near Bibury.
‘Twenty miles or so—getting hungry?’
Victoria nodded and they drove in companionable silence until they drew up outside the Swan in Bibury. They ate their lunch without haste, discussing where they should go that afternoon and then, when they had finished, walked through the village to view the famous Arlington Row.
‘Very picturesque,’ pronounced Victoria, ‘but I wonder what they’re like in winter?’
‘Snug,’ said the doctor, and took her arm to walk her a little further along the road to see the ducks in the water before strolling back to look round the church, dim and cool and very peaceful, even in that peaceful little place.
They drove on presently, through Cirencester and on to Malmesbury where they stopped to examine the Market Cross and take a closer look at the Abbey Church. The big car made light of the miles to Chippenham; they went straight through the town and on to Marlborough, where, because it was still too early for tea, the doctor declared his intention of going on to Savernake, where they found an hotel on the edge of the forest. ‘A walk?’ he suggested, and when Victoria agreed, got out of the car and went to help her out. It was a warm afternoon and they didn’t hurry and when a patch of rough ground necessitated him taking her hand to help her, he didn’t let it go again. His hand was cool and firm and reassuring. Victoria wished with all her heart that he might never let it go again. A silly wish, her common sense told her, but at that moment her common sense seemed powerless against the delightful, nonsensical thoughts flitting in and out of her head.
‘You’re not listening.’ Alexander stopped and perforce she stopped too to say guiltily: ‘I’m sorry—I was really, only I thought of something…’
His hand tightened on hers and he half smiled. She went on earnestly:
‘Was it important? I really am sorry.’
‘Don’t be. Surely we are past the stage of apologising for being at ease with each other?’
Her mouth curved into a delighted smile. ‘How lovely that sounds, as though…it’s true too, I’m very at ease with you. I wonder why?’
He started to walk again. ‘That’s something I promise we’ll discuss in a very short time. Let’s walk as far as that oak ahead of us and then turn back. We can have tea at the hotel if you like.’
They had their tea, and Victoria, pausing in the middle of some engrossing topic, exclaimed: ‘What a lot there is to talk about! I feel as though I shall never stop. Do you find it tiring—Father often says that we’re more than enough to tire a saint.’
Alexander laughed. ‘Don’t worry, Vicky, you never tire me, nor will you ever do so,’ and something in his look sent her heart singing once more.
They took to the by-roads on the way back and didn’t reach Bray until after eight o’clock. The restaurant overlooked the river and was so delightful that Victoria regretted that she wasn’t a little more dressed for the occasion, but when she went away to tidy her hair and take a good look at herself in the mirror, she decided that she didn’t look too bad, despite her very simple dress, something of which her companion was already aware, for as she sat down he remarked, ‘Collecting admiring glances again, Victoria? I can see that if I want you all to myself I shall have to find a dark cellar or drag you off to the remoter Highlands!’
‘I like Scotland,’ said Victoria, demurely. ‘I wouldn’t mind that at all.’ She laughed at him across the table and he raised quizzical brows.
He said blandly: ‘I’m tempted to take you at your word, my darling!’ and gave her such a bright glance across the table that she went faintly pink under it, at which he smiled again and asked briefly: ‘Now, what shall we eat? I believe the lobster cutlets are well spoken of—with a salad, perhaps?’
They ate their meal at leisure, talking about a great many things, and it was after ten o’clock when Victoria exclaimed: ‘Should we be going, do you think? There’s bound to be some traffic and it’s almost thirty miles…’
Alexander agreed without demur, which rather annoyed her. Perhaps he had had enough of her company—breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner tête-à-tête might have been a little too much for him. She cast him an uncertain look and he said instantly: ‘No, my reasons for taking you home are not those you have in mind—and don’t ask me what I mean, because you know quite well. Where shall we go tomorrow?’ He had shut the car door upon her and was settling his length beside her. ‘I imagine it will be a fine day—shall we take a picnic? I have to get the Harwich ferry in the evening, I’m afraid, but I shan’t need to leave London until eight o’clock.’
‘Oh, you really want to spend the day with me again?’ Victoria turned her head to look at him and the look on his face answered her question far more forcibly than his quiet ‘Yes’, she went on rapidly: ‘What time shall I be ready? I’ll bring the picnic.’
He was travelling fast through the last spring evening. ‘Just before nine? How about exploring Essex?’
‘Yes, let’s. I’ll be ready.’
‘You go back on Monday, don’t you?’
She had forgotten all about hospital. It seemed another world, far away and nothing to do with her. She said with a kind of surprise: ‘So I do—I’d almost forgotten.’ She subsided into silence, thinking that in no time at all, St Judd’s would have swallowed her up again, just as though she had no life of her own. She sighed without knowing she had done so and he said sympathetically: ‘Do you hate the idea? But you’re not a girl to have a pointless life; you need to have something to do—am I not right?’
It was a little discouraging to find that he thought of her as a career girl when all she wanted was to be his wife and run his home and have several miniature Alexanders under her feet. She swept this beguiling daydream from her mind and said that yes, probably he was quite right.
He drew up before the house in Pimlico before midnight and although the light glowed through the transom over the front door, the rest of the house was in darkness. He got out of the car with her and walked across the pavement and opened the door for her.
Before she could change her mind Victoria said: ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
He had lived long enough in England to accept the habit the English had of making pots of tea round the clock. ‘Very much,’ he answered, and followed her in.
They had their tea in the kitchen, drinking it from the blue-and-white-china mugs which hung on the scrubbed dresser, and Victoria felt happy because there was still so much to talk about and Alexander showed no signs of tiring of her company. She sat in Martha’s comfortable, shabby armchair, watching the doctor washing the mugs and drying them and emptying the teapot before he returned them all to their proper places. He did it with unselfconscious ease as though he had done it many times before and thought nothing of it.
‘Do you wash up at home?’ asked Victoria.
He hung up the tea towel. ‘Sometimes, if my housekeeper is away or I’m very late in and want something to eat after she’s gone to bed.’ He gave her a smiling glance. ‘I’m quite domesticated.’
She saw that he was ready to leave; she got up off her chair and went with him to the door. ‘It’s been a lovely day, thank you, Alexander.’
He kissed her, far too briefly. ‘Goodnight, Vicky, I’ll be round in the morning.’
She watched him drive away, then went upstairs and got ready for bed, and still with her head full of him, went to sleep.
She was up early, but Martha was already in the kitchen. Victori
a regaled her with the highlights of the previous day’s outing and asked if she might have her breakfast early so that she could cut sandwiches.
‘You’ll have your breakfast at half past eight with Mrs Johnson,’ declared Martha firmly. ‘Here’s a cup of tea to keep body and soul together and leave me to get the picnic.’
Victoria accepted the tea. ‘I can’t let you do all that extra work,’ she protested.
‘Nonsense, I’ve nothing to do—now run along.’
Victoria got off the table. ‘Well, thank you, Martha dear, but let me take up Mrs Johnson’s tea for you and I can tell her about today.’
Mrs Johnson was awake, sitting up in bed, reading. She wished her guest good morning, took her tea and remarked: ‘You’ll be going out again today, I expect?’
‘Well, yes, Alexander did ask me—do you mind? I feel very ill-mannered, but I couldn’t tell you sooner because we didn’t get back until nearly twelve.’
Her hostess smiled. ‘My dear Victoria, I was so certain that your doctor would be here this weekend that I arranged to lunch with friends today.’
Victoria gaped at her. ‘But supposing he hadn’t turned up?’
‘You would have accompanied me to Brigadier Groves’ for luncheon, and a very dull time of it you would have had.’ She shot a keen look at Victoria. ‘I don’t suppose you have a dull time with the doctor.’
‘No,’ said Victoria, a little breathlessly, ‘I don’t—there’s such a lot to talk about.’
Mrs Johnson agreed gravely: ‘Of course. He goes back this evening?’
‘Yes.’ Victoria went to the door. ‘It’s going to be a lovely day.’ She found it impossible to keep the excitement out of her voice.
She went downstairs to hover restlessly about the little house and then into the garden. She had put on a sleeveless dress and discarded the scarf. The bruises were fading fast, but they still showed badly—still, if they were going to picnic there would be no one to see them, only Alexander. She examined her face in the sitting-room mirror, decided to take a cardigan to wear over her blue jersey dress and then went back into the kitchen to try Martha’s patience, and presently, in Mrs Johnson’s company, to eat a sketchy breakfast because she was afraid that Alexander might come early and she wouldn’t be ready for him. He came at ten minutes to nine, putting an end to all her doubts, which she instantly avenged by declaring that she wasn’t quite ready.
They spent the day, as he had promised, exploring Essex. Not the flat uninteresting part—the Mercedes carried them swiftly out of London and didn’t slacken speed until Alexander turned off on to one of the lesser roads to Dunmow. They went through Great Bardfield and Finchingfield and so on to Saffron Walden, where they had coffee at the Rose and Crown after strolling along to see the old timbered and plastered houses. They turned east then, driving along the Suffolk border and exploring any lane which took their fancy. It was at the end of one of these lanes that they came upon high open ground, with a view of the rolling country around them, and even though it was early for lunch they decided to stop there. The sun was warm on the grass; they lay full length, side by side, hardly speaking until presently Alexander asked: ‘Are you asleep?’
‘No—just lazy. This is a heavenly spot.’
‘Yes.’ He rolled over on to his side to look at her and after a moment put out a hand and picked up her arm to examine the bruises.
‘They’re better,’ she assured him. ‘They look awful, but they don’t hurt.’
He still held her lightly by the wrist. ‘I cannot bear to see you hurt, Vicky dear. There’s something I have to tell you. I shan’t be able to come to England for a while, and I’m very bad at writing letters.’
He couldn’t bear to see her hurt, her heart cried silently, and yet he could hurt her more than all the bruises. Was he trying to tell her that he wouldn’t be seeing her again? The sun was warm on her, but inside she was suddenly cold. ‘Me too,’ she said lightly. ‘They take up so much time, don’t they, when there are other things to do.’
She lay waiting, hoping that he would tell her why he wasn’t coming. All he said was: ‘Will you miss me?’
‘Yes.’
‘Will you forget me?’
‘No,’ she spoke quietly staring up at the sky. ‘I don’t forget my friends even if I never see them again.’ She sounded, despite the light tone, a little forlorn.
‘You talk as though I’m going away for ever, you silly girl.’ He spoke on a laugh and the temper which went with her hair stirred.
‘I’m speaking generally,’ she assured him coldly. ‘It will be very pleasant to see you again if you should ever come to London.’
He didn’t answer her but bent over and kissed her hard on the mouth. ‘You’re ridiculous,’ he stated calmly, ‘and you know it. You’re being melodramatic and you know it.’ He sat up. ‘Let’s have lunch.’
Victoria sat up too. Her voice, when she spoke, sounded cheerful, even in her own listening ears. ‘Let’s! I’m hungry and Martha’s excelled herself.’ They unpacked the picnic basket together and laughed and joked, and the little cloud of his departure hung between them so that although they talked as gaily as they had done earlier, it was, on Victoria’s part at least, a little forced.
They drove on later and crossed the boundary into Suffolk and had a late tea at Long Melford, where they sat among the old rafters and beams of the Bull Inn, keeping up a steady flow of conversation, and if Victoria’s was still a little too bright, the doctor’s placid, friendly manner gave no indication of any unease on his part.
They were back in Pimlico before seven and to Victoria’s surprise, when she asked him if he would like to come in he said: ‘Of course, I must say goodbye to Mrs Johnson and Martha.’
His goodbyes were of necessity brief, though. Within five minutes he remarked with real regret that he would have to be on his way, and Mrs Johnson said: ‘Of course— Victoria dear, see the doctor out.’
She stood at the street door with him, unable to believe that she wouldn’t be seeing him—for how long?—perhaps he would forget her entirely. She put out her hand and said:
‘Well, goodbye, Alexander. It was a gorgeous weekend, and thank you so much for the lovely times we’ve had. I— I expect we’ll see each other some time.’
He stood looking down at her and she could see that behind his grave face he was laughing. ‘What a very nice little speech,’ he observed, ‘like the end of a play.’ He kissed her gently and without haste. ‘Only do remember that it isn’t a play, my darling; this is life—our life.’
A thousand and one answers crowded her throat, but by the time she had sorted them out he had got into his car and driven away. She went upstairs to her quiet little room and flung herself on her bed and cried her eyes out, not sure if she was very happy or acutely miserable.
CHAPTER SIX
GOING back to St Judd’s wasn’t as bad as she had expected it to be, probably because her head was so full of Alexander that she hardly noticed what was going on around her. The ward was full—too full—with beds down the middle and Sister Crow beside herself, what with the shortage of nurses; days off; Sir Keith’s round imminent and some vital X-rays missing. She fell upon Victoria with a quite unusual welcome and spent ten minutes alternately grumbling and giving orders to put things right. Victoria, who knew exactly how she felt, and sympathised, soothed her as best she could and departed wardwards to get the nurses organised for the morning, which she did to such good effect that the round wasn’t the catastrophe Sister Crow had prophesied. Indeed, Sir Keith was in high good humour and wasted quite a few minutes before the round began enquiring about Victoria’s bruises and being so nice about it that she became a little pink under his kindly eye. Johnny she had already seen; he had clapped her on the back in a brotherly manner and told her that she didn’t look too bad on the whole, and Jeremy Blake, when he arrived just before Sir Keith, was surprisingly pleasant and not too fulsomely friendly, as though he sensed that that was the las
t thing she wanted.
On the whole the morning went smoothly, and the afternoon, with the Old Crow off for a half day, went even smoother. By the time the part-time nurse came on at five, Victoria felt as though she hadn’t been away at all, only, as she went off duty, she was conscious of feeling more tired than usual; too tired to go to the cinema with one of the housemen who met her on the way across the quadrangle. He was a nice young man—she quite liked him, but she was honest enough to admit to herself that if she went with him it would only be so that she might forget Alexander for an hour or two, and that was hardly fair on the boy. She thanked him with the friendly charm which had gained her so many friends in the hospital and went on her way to her room, where she stayed until supper time, writing a letter home. It took a very long time to write because she kept pausing to think about Alexander.
The days passed uneventfully; she spent her next days off with Mrs Johnson, who wanted to know how the doctor was, and Victoria was forced to explain as lightly as she could that she had no idea and didn’t expect to, anyway.
‘Easy come, easy go, these days, Mrs Johnson.’ She summoned a laugh to make it sound genuine and was a little disconcerted when her hostess said: ‘Rubbish. Oh, I’m sure you’re right generally speaking, in this modern society—but that man’s not modern society, nor will he ever be. Old-fashioned and full of tradition, I should imagine, with his own high standards to live up to.’
Victoria frowned. ‘Yes, I’m sure you’re right, but it isn’t as though…I mean, we just enjoyed each other’s company while he was in London.’
Mrs Johnson snorted with dignity. ‘I am not a betting woman,’ she informed Victoria, ‘otherwise I would be prepared to make a wager… And how is the ward? Not too busy, I hope?’