The Secret Pool
Betty Neels
Mills & Boon presents the complete Betty Neels collection. Timeless tales of heart-warming romance by one of the world’s best-loved romance authors.Her quiet life was thrown into turmoil. Calm and capable – those were the words used to sum up Francesca. Certainly, she had plenty to cope with, looking after the home she shared with three elderly aunts and working at the local hospital. Yet she dealt with it all with her usual quiet efficiency and believed her life was complete…until the arrival of Dr Litrik van Rijgen!Having taken the trouble to track her down while she was enjoying an occasional holiday in Holland, he seemed to have other plans for her. But was she really willing to let him take over her life and possibly her heart?
Dr. van Rijgen stirred. “Magnificent. Do you like our Grote Kirk?”
“It’s breathtaking. I didn’t know it was so old…. All those years building it. I must get a book about it.”
“I have several at home. You must borrow one.”
Fran stood up and he stood up with her, which put her at an instant disadvantage, for she had to look up to his face. “You want something, don’t you?” she asked. “I mean…” She hesitated and blushed. “You don’t—you aren’t interested in me as—as a person, are you?”
“That, Francesca, is where you are mistaken. I should add that I have not fallen in love with you or any such foolishness, but as a person, yes, I am interested in you.”
“Why?” She spoke softly because there were people milling all round them now.
“At the proper time, I will tell you….”
Romance readers around the world were sad to note the passing of Betty Neels in June 2001. Her career spanned thirty years, and she continued to write into her ninetieth year. To her millions of fans, Betty epitomized the romance writer, and yet she began writing almost by accident. She had retired from nursing, but her inquiring mind still sought stimulation. Her new career was born when she heard a lady in her local library bemoaning the lack of good romance novels. Betty’s first book, Sister Peters in Amsterdam, was published in 1969, and she eventually completed 134 books. Her novels offer a reassuring warmth that was very much a part of her own personality, and her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.
The Secret Pool
Betty Neels
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER ONE
THE early morning sun of a midsummer’s day morning shone with warm cheerfulness on to the quiet countryside, the market town tucked neatly into the Cotswold hills and its numerous windows. These included those of the Cottage Hospital, a symbol of former days, fought for and triumphantly reprieved from the remorseless hand of authority, and proving its worth tenfold by never having an empty bed.
Inside the grey stone walls of this Victorian edifice, the day’s work was already well advanced. Its thirty beds were divided between surgical and medical patients, with two beds for maternity cases who couldn’t make it in time to Bristol or Bath, and one private ward used for any child too ill to move or anyone too ill to nurse in the wards. There was a small outpatients’ department, too, and a casualty room where the local GPs could be called to attend any accident. Small it might be, but it did yeoman service, easing the burden of patients on the big Bristol hospitals.
It was staffed by the local doctors, ably supported by Miss Hawkins, who still insisted on being called Matron, two ward sisters and their staff nurses, and four pupil nurses, sent from Bristol and Bath to gain experience. There was a night sister, too, and a handful of nursing aides, local ladies, whose kindness of heart and willingness to work hard when everyone else was fast asleep more than made up for their lack of nursing skills. Miss Hawkins was nearing retirement age, an old-fashioned martinet who had no intention of changing her ways. Until six months ago she had had the willing co-operation of Sister Coffin on the medical ward but that lady had retired and her place had been taken by a young staff nurse from the Bristol Royal Infirmary, who had accepted the post of sister in preference to a more prestigious one at her own hospital. It was agreed by everyone, even the grudging Miss Hawkins, that she had proved her ability and was worth her weight in gold. She had a happy knack of getting her patients better, coping with emergencies without fuss, carrying out the various doctors’ orders faithfully, and lending a sympathetic ear to the young nurses’ requests for a particular day off duty.
She sat at the desk in her office now, the sun gilding the mousy hair pinned neatly under her frilled cap, warming her ordinary face, escaping plainness only by virtue of a pair of fine hazel eyes, thickly lashed, and a gentle mouth. The desk was more or less covered by charts and a variety of forms and she had a pen in her hand, although just for the moment she was doing no work at all, her thoughts far away, if rather vague. She was normally a sensible girl, prepared to accept what life had to offer her and not expecting anything very exciting to happen. Indeed, the three elderly aunts with whom she lived had imbued her with this idea from an early age. They prided themselves on their honesty and plain spokenness and had pointed out on a number of occasions her lack of good looks and amusing conversation. They had done their best to dissuade her from training as a nurse, too, but she had been surprisingly stubborn; despite their certainty that she was too quiet, too shy with strangers, and lacking in self-assurance, she had gone to Bristol, done her training, and emerged at the end of it with flying colours: Gold Medallist of her year, the prospect of a ward sister’s post in the not too distant future, and a circle of firm friends. The girls liked her because she listened to the details of their complicated love lives with sympathy. The young housemen liked her because she listened to them, too, about their fleeting love affairs and their dreams of being brilliant consultants. She sympathised with them when they failed their exams and rejoiced with them when they passed and, when on night duty, she was always a willing maker of hot cocoa when one or other of them had been hauled out of bed in the small hours.
But she had declined the ward offered her and had instead applied for and been appointed to the medical ward of the Cottage Hospital in her home town. All because her youngest aunt, Janet, had had a slight—very slight—heart attack and it had been impressed upon her by Aunt Kate and Aunt Polly that it was her duty to return home.
So she had come back to the small town and lived out, going to and fro from her aunts’ rambling old house not ten minutes’ walk from the hospital. And because she was a good nurse and loved her work, she had taken pride in changing the medical ward, with patience and a good deal of tact, into the more modern methods Sister Coffin had ignored. It had been uphill work but she had managed it so well that Matron considered that she had been the instigator of change in the first place. If she regretted leaving her training school and the splendid opportunities it had offered her, she had never said so, but just now and again she wondered if life would have been different if she had taken the post at Bristol. She would have kept her friends for a start and used her nursing talents to their utmost; and who knew, perhaps one day she might have met someone who would want to marry her.
She stifled a sigh and looked up with a smile as her staff nurse came in. Jenny Topps was a big girl, always cheerful and amiable and with no wish to be anything but a staff nurse. She was getting married in a year’s time to a rather silent and adoring young farmer and her ambitions lay in being a good wife. She said now,
‘We’re ready, Sister. There’s time for a quick cup of tea before Dr Beecham gets here. I’ve sent the little nurses to coffee; Mrs Wills—the nursing auxilary—is in the ward.’
‘Good. Yes, let’s have tea, then I’ll go over to the Women’s Medical. It’s quiet there and Staff can cope, but I’ll just take another look at Miss Prosser. Mr Owen’s not responding to his antibiotic, is he? I’ll see if Dr Beecham will change it. He might be better off at the Infirmary.’ She took the mug of tea Jenny had fetched from the ward kitchen and sipped it.
‘You must miss the Infirmary,’ observed Jenny. ‘It’s pretty quiet here—bad chests and diabetics and the odd heart case…’
She studied Sister Manning’s quiet face on the other side of the desk; she liked her and admired her and although she wasn’t pretty she had a pretty name—Francesca.
‘Well, yes, I do, but I do need to be nearby my aunts…’ She finished her tea, got to her feet and said, ‘I’ll be back in five minutes. Get the nurses to start making up that empty bed, will you? There is a diabetic coming in at two o’clock.’
The ward was quiet, the men waiting for the bi-weekly round from the consultant. Most of them were on the mend. Mr Owen worried her a little, and the new patient who had come in during the night, a suspected coronary, might spring something on them. She went slowly down the old-fashioned but cheerful ward, stopping for a word here and there and casting an eye on these two, and then went through the door into the women’s side.
Here she was met by her second staff nurse, a small dark girl who like herself lived out.
‘All ready for Dr Beecham?’ asked Francesca. ‘How’s Miss Prosser? She was a bit cyanosed when I did the round this morning.’
‘Still a bit blue. She’s had some oxygen and she’s quite bright and cheerful.’
They stood together and looked along the facing row of beds. It was a small ward with pretty curtains at the windows and round each bed, and plenty of flowers. Half the patients were up, sitting by their beds, knitting or reading or gossiping. Francesca walked slowly to Miss Prosser’s bed and made small talk while she studied that lady. They had had her in before and she was by no means an easy patient; she would have to talk to Dr Beecham about her. She smiled and nodded at the other patients and went back to her office, tidied the top of her desk, and with a glance at the clock went back to the men’s ward. Dr Beecham would be there at any moment now.
He came through the door within moments, a short stout man with a fringe of hair on a bald head and twinkling blue eyes. She had known him ever since she had begun her training; he had been one of the first lecturers she had had and as she became more senior he had occasionally explained some unusual case to her. She liked him and the smile which lighted up her face made it almost pretty.
He had someone with him. Not just Dr Stokes, who was the RMO; a tall man with massive shoulders, fair hair with a heavy sprinkling of grey and the good looks to turn any woman’s head. Francesca sighed at the sight of him. She knew him, too: Dr van Rijgen, a specialist in tropical diseases who had come to the Infirmary at regular intervals to lecture the students. He lived in Holland and worked there as far as she knew, although he seemed equally at home in England. Years ago when she had begun her training she had had the misfortune to drop off during one of his lectures; even after all these years, she remembered his cold voice, laced with sarcasm, very quietly reducing her to a state bordering on hysteria. They had encountered each other since then, of course, and she had taken care never to allow her feelings to show, and he for his part had never betrayed any recollection of that first unfortunate meeting. He eyed her now with a kind of thoughtful amusement which made her fume inwardly. But she replied suitably to Dr Stokes and Dr Beecham and then bade him a frosty good morning.
He had a deep slow voice. ‘Good morning, Sister Manning. I see that I must congratulate you since we last met at the Infirmary.’ He glanced round the ward, half the size of those in a Bristol hospital. ‘Hiding your light under a bushel?’
She said in a voice which made his fine mouth twitch, ‘If I remember aright, sir, my light was a very small one—a mere glimmer.’
He gave a crack of laughter. ‘Oh, dear, you have a long memory, Sister.’
‘A useful thing in a nurse,’ interpolated Dr Beecham cheerfully. ‘What have you got for us today, Fran?’
Dr Beecham prided himself on the good terms he enjoyed with the ward sisters and none of them minded that he addressed them by their Christian names when they were away from the patients.
‘Nothing much, sir. There’s Miss Prosser…’ She didn’t need to say more, they both knew that lady well enough. ‘And Mr Owen who isn’t so well. All the rest are making good progress.’
‘Right, shall we see the ladies first? I want Dr van Rijgen to look at Mr Owen.’
The round wound its usual way, first through the women’s ward and then the men’s, to spend some time with Mr Owen; this time Dr van Rijgen did the examining. At length he straightened up. ‘I agree with you, John,’ he told Dr Beecham, ‘he should be transferred to the Infirmary as soon as possible.’
He sat down on the side of the bed and addressed himself to Mr Owen. He explained very nicely, even Fran had to admit that, with a mixture of frankness and confidence which cheered the patient. ‘And if Sister can arrange it, perhaps your wife would like to travel with you in the ambulance?’
He glanced at Dr Beecham who nodded and then turned his cold blue eyes upon Fran. ‘Sister?’
‘Mrs Owen lives close by, I am sure something can be arranged.’
They had coffee next, squashed in her office, discussing the round, pausing from time to time to alter drugs and give her instructions.
They had finished their coffee when Dr Beecham reached for the phone. ‘I’ll warn the medical side, Litrik. What about his wife?’
Dr van Rijgen turned to Fran and found her eyes fixed on his face.
‘Mrs Owen? Can you get her here so that we can have a word with her, Sister?’
He frowned impatiently when she didn’t answer at once. She had never thought of him as having any name other than van Rijgen; the strange name Dr Beecham had said made him seem different, although she didn’t know why. A strange name indeed, but quite nice sounding. She realised that he had spoken to her and flushed a little and the flush deepened when he repeated his question with impatience.
‘Certainly, sir. I can telephone her, she lives less than five minutes’ walk away.’ She spoke crisply and thought how ill-tempered he was.
Dr Beecham had finished with the phone, and as she dialled a number he said, ‘Right, Fran. We’ll go along to X-Ray and look at those films. Litrik, will you talk to Mrs Owen?’
He patted her on the shoulder, said, ‘See you later, Litrik,’ and went away, taking Dr Stokes with him.
Mrs Owen was a sensible woman; she asked no unnecessary questions but said that she would be at the hospital in ten minutes. ‘I’ll not ask you any questions, Sister,’ she finished, ‘for I’m sure the Doctor will tell me all I want to know.’
Fran put down the receiver and glanced at Dr van Rijgen, sitting on the window ledge, contemplating the view. She had no intention of staying there under his unfriendly eye; she picked up the charts on the desk and got up.
‘Don’t go,’ said Dr van Rijgen without turning round. ‘However sensible Mrs Owen may be, she’ll probably need a shoulder to cry on.’
He spoke coldly and she, normally a mild-tempered girl, allowed her tongue to voice her thoughts. She snapped, ‘Yes, and that’s something you wouldn’t be prepared to offer.’
The look he gave her was like cold steel; she added, ‘sir’ and waited for his cold calm voice to utter something biting.
‘It is a good thing that my self-esteem does not depend upon your good opinion of me,’ said Dr van Rijgen softly. ‘Would it be a good idea if we were to have a tray of tea? I have found that tea, to the English, soothes even the most unhappy breast. Come to that, the most savage one, too.’
Fran didn’t look at him but went in a dignified way to the kitchen and asked Eddie, the ward maid, to lay up a tea tray.
‘’As ’is nibs taken a liking for it?’ asked that elderly lady. ‘Not like ’im, with ’is foreign ways.’
Fran explained, knowing that if she didn’t Eddie was quite capable of finding out for herself.
‘Give me ’arf a mo’, Sister, and I’ll bring in the tray. Three cups?’
‘Well, yes, I suppose so. Mrs Owen won’t want to sit and drink it by herself.’
She would rather not have gone back to the office but there was no reason why she shouldn’t. Dr van Rijgen was still admiring the view and he didn’t look at her when she sat down at her desk. Indeed, he didn’t move until one of the nurses tapped on the door, put her head round it in response to Fran’s voice and said that Mrs Owen was there.
Fran sat her down: a small plump woman, her round face so anxious. ‘It’s Jack, isn’t it, Sister? He’s not so well. I’m that worried…’
Fran poured the tea and said in a quiet way, ‘Mr Owen has been seen by Dr Beecham and Dr van Rijgen this morning, Mrs Owen.’ She handed the doctor a cup. ‘Dr van Rijgen will explain how things are…’
He had got to his feet when Mrs Owen had been ushered in; now he sat on the edge of the desk, half turned away from Fran. He looked relaxed and unworried and Mrs Owen’s troubled face cleared. His explanations were concise and offered with matter-of-fact sympathy; he neither pretended that there was much chance of Mr Owen recovering, nor did he paint too dark a picture of his future. ‘We shall do what we can, Mrs Owen, that I can promise you,’ he told her finally and Fran, listening, was aware that if she were in Mrs Owen’s shoes she would believe him; what was more, she would trust him. Which, considering she didn’t like the man, was something to be wondered at.
Dr van Rijgen went away presently, leaving Fran to give what comfort she could, and Mrs Owen, who had kept a stern hold on her feelings while he had been talking, broke down then and had a good cry, her grey head tucked comfortingly into Fran’s shoulder. Presently she mopped her eyes and sat up. ‘So sorry,’ she said awkwardly, ‘but it’s a bit of a shock…’
Fran poured more tea and murmured in sympathy, and Mrs Owen went on, ‘He’s nice, isn’t he? I’d trust him with my last breath. Funny, how you can feel he means what he says. Though I suppose he has to talk to lots of people like that.’
‘Oh, yes, I’m sure he must. He’s a very eminent doctor even though he’s not English, but that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t understand your husband’s case, Mrs Owen, and have every sympathy with you both.’
‘And you, you’re a kind girl too, Sister. My Jack thinks a lot of you.’
Fran made a comforting murmur and, since Mrs Owen was calm again, embarked on the business of ways and means. ‘I still have to arrange things with the ambulance; it’ll be some time tomorrow morning, quite early, if you could manage that? If you could come here? The ambulance will have to come back here, but I expect you’d like to stay for a bit and see Mr Owen settled in? Do you have friends in Bristol where you could stay?’
Mrs Owen shook her head.
‘Then I’ll phone the Infirmary and ask them to fix you up—they have a room where you can be comfortable and they’ll see that you get a meal. There is a morning bus from Bristol, isn’t there? And another one in the late afternoon. I should take an overnight bag.’ She added in a gentle matter-of-fact voice, ‘Are you all right for ready money, Mrs Owen?’
‘Yes thank you, Sister. You don’t know how long I might have to stay?’
‘Well, no, but I’m sure the ward sister will tell you and you can ask to see Dr Beecham and Dr van Rijgen.’
Mrs Owen went away presently and Fran went into the ward to cast an eye on things and to reassure Mr Owen that his wife would be with him when he was transferred. Other than that there wasn’t a great deal to do; she sent the nurses to their dinner and Jenny with them and, leaving the aides in the ward, filling water jugs, went back to her office, where she sat down at her desk and started on the laundry list. She felt restless; perhaps it was the sight of the quiet country she could see from her window, or perhaps it was the knowledge that, after her busy days at the Infirmary, she wasn’t working here up to her full capacity. Anyway, she felt unsettled and a little impatient with her life. Was she to go on for ever, living and working in this little country town? Her aunts were dears but they still treated her as though she were a child and she would be twenty-six on her next birthday. Another five years and she would be thirty… She shook her head at her own gloom; nothing ever happened. She turned back to the laundry list and Willy, the porter, came in with the second post. A handful of letters for the patients and one for herself. She got up and went into the wards and handed them all out. Jenny had done the dinners while she had been busy with Mrs Owen and the patients were resting on their beds for an hour. She made her quiet way round the two wards, stopping here and there to have a whispered word, and then went back to the office.
The letter on her desk had a Dutch stamp. It would be from a cousin she hardly knew; the aunts had had a brother who had died and his daughter had married a Dutchman and lived in Holland. Fran remembered her vaguely as a child when her own mother had taken her to visit the family. She had gone to her wedding, too, but although they liked each other their paths didn’t cross very frequently.
She opened it now—it would make a nice change from the laundry—and began to read. When she had finished it, she went back to the beginning and read it again. Here was the answer to her restlessness. And one the aunts could not but agree to. Clare wanted her to go and stay. ‘You must have some holidays,’ she had written, ‘two weeks at least. I’m going to have a baby—I was beginning to think that I never would—and I’m so thrilled, I must have someone to talk to about it. I know the aunts make a fuss if you go off on your own, but they can’t possibly mind if you stay with us. Do say you’ll come—phone me and give me a date. Karel sends his love and says you must come.’
Fran put the letter down. She had two weeks leave due to her and the wards were slack enough to take them; moreover it was a good time of year to ask before autumn brought its quota of bronchitis and asthma and nasty chests. A holiday might also dispel this feeling of restlessness.
She went to the office after her dinner and asked for leave and Miss Hawkins, aware of Fran’s worth, graciously allowed it: starting on the following Sunday, and Sister Manning might add her weekly days off to her fortnight.
All very easy. There were the aunts to deal with, though. Fran, off duty that evening, tackled that the moment she got home. The ladies were sitting, as they always did of an evening, in the old-fashioned drawing room, knitting or embroidering, waiting for Winnie, the housekeeper, to set supper on the table. Fran, poking her head round the door to wish them a good evening before going up to her room to tidy herself, wondered anew at the three of them. They were after all not very old—Aunt Kate was the eldest, sixty-seven, Aunt Polly next, a year or two younger, and Aunt Janet a mere fifty-eight. And yet they had no place in modern times; they lived now as they remembered how they had lived in their childhood years between the two wars. It was only Fran’s mother, five years younger than Aunt Janet, who had broken away and married, and had died with Fran’s father in a plane crash when Fran had been twelve. She had missed them sorely and her aunts had given her a home and loved her according to their lights, only their love was tempered with selfishness and a determination to keep her with them at all costs. She remembered the various occasions when she had expressed a wish to holiday abroad; they had never raised any objections but one or other of them had fallen ill with something they had referred to as nerves, and each time she had given up her travels and stayed at home to keep the invalid company, fetch and carry and generally pander to that lady’s whims. She had been aware that she was being conned, but her kind heart and her sense of obligation wouldn’t allow her to say so.
She greeted them now, and whisked herself away and presently went downstairs armed with Clare’s letter. Her aunts read it in turn and agreed that, of course, she must go. Looking after a cousin wasn’t the same as gallivanting around foreign parts and, as none of them had ever lost their old-fashioned ideas about childbirth—a conglomeration of baby clothes, feeling faint, putting one’s feet up and not mentioning the subject because it wasn’t quite nice, eating for two and needing the companionship of another woman—they saw that Fran’s duty lay in joining her cousin at once. She was, after all, their dear brother’s daughter and Fran, they felt sure, was aware where her duty lay.
Fran agreed, careful not to be too eager, and in answer to Aunt Janet’s question said that she thought that Matron would allow her to have two weeks, starting on the following Sunday. ‘I’d better phone Clare, hadn’t I?’ she suggested and went to do that, to come back presently to say that Karel would meet her on Sunday evening at Schiphol.
‘Sunday?’ asked Aunt Kate sharply.
‘Well, dear, he’s free then, otherwise I’d have to find my own way…’
The conversation at supper was wholly given up to her journey. She said very little, allowing the aunts to discuss and plan and tell her what clothes to take; she had no intention of taking any of their advice but to disagree would be of no use. She helped Winnie clear the supper things presently, laid her breakfast tray ready on the kitchen table, wished her aunts good night and went up to bed. It was too soon to pack, but she went through her wardrobe carefully, deciding what she would take with her. Clare was only a few years older than she was and, contrary to her aunts’ supposition, the last person on earth to lie with her feet up; a few pretty dresses would be essential.
There was no time to think about her holiday the next day. Getting Mr Owen away to Bristol was a careful undertaking and necessitated sending Jenny with him. Mrs Owen had arrived, breathless with anxiety and haste, and had had to be given tea and a gentle talk, so that the morning’s routine started a good hour late, and that without Jenny to share the chores. Then, of course, there was a new patient coming into Mr Owen’s bed and Miss Prosser was making difficulties, something she always did when they were busier than usual. It wasn’t until Fran got home at last that she allowed her thoughts to dwell on the delights ahead. She was listening to Aunt Janet’s advice about her journey and thinking her own thoughts when the image of Dr van Rijgen popped into her head, and with it a vague but surprising thought that she might not see him again for a long time. Not that I want to, she admonished herself hastily, horrid man that he is, with his nasty sarcastic tongue, and then thought, I wonder where he lives?
Surprisingly he came again at the end of the week, on his way back to Holland, to examine with Dr Beecham one of her patients who, recently returned from the tropics, was showing the first likely symptoms of kala-azar, or so Dr Stokes thought. To be on the safe side, Fran had put her in the single ward and had nursed her in strict isolation, so that they were all gowned and masked before they went to see the patient. Dr van Rijgen, being tied into a gown a good deal too small for his vast person, stared at Fran over his mask. ‘Let us hope your praiseworthy precautions will prove unnecessary, Sister,’ he said. She caught the faint sneer in his voice and blushed behind her own mask. She had, after all, only done what Dr Stokes had ordered; he had spoken as though she had panicked into doing something unnecessary.
Which, after a lengthy examination, proved to be just that. Acute malarial infection, pronounced Dr van Rijgen. ‘Which I think can be dealt with quite satisfactorily here. It is merely a question of taking a blood sample to discover which drug is the most suitable. I think we might safely give a dose of chloroquinine phosphate and sulphate…’ He held out a hand for the chart Fran was holding and began to write, talking to Dr Stokes at the same time. ‘You were right to take precautions, Peter, one can never be too careful.’ A remark which Fran considered to be just the kind of thing he would delight in; buttering up Dr Stokes after sneering at her for doing exactly the same thing.
He had the effrontery to look at her and smile, too, as he said it. She gave him a stony stare and led the way to the office where she dispensed coffee to the three of them and ignored him. It was as they were about to leave that Dr van Rijgen asked, ‘Who takes over from you when you go on holiday, Sister?’
‘My staff nurse, Jenny Topps.’
‘I believe you start your leave on Sunday?’
‘Yes,’ and, after a pause, ‘sir’.
He looked at her from under his lids. ‘A pleasant time to go on holiday. Somewhere nice I hope?’
‘Yes.’
It was vexing when Dr Beecham chimed in with, ‘Well, the girl can’t say anything else, can she, seeing that she is going to your country, Litrik?’
‘Indeed! Let us hope the weather remains fine for you, Sister. Good morning.’
When they had gone she sat and fumed at her desk for a few minutes. He had been nastier than usual and she hoped that she would never see him again. She got up and when she’d done her desk went in search of Jenny; it was almost time for the patients’ dinners and the two diabetic ladies would need their insulin. There were several patients whom Dr Beecham wanted put on four-hourly charts, too. She became absorbed in the ward’s routine and, for the time at least, forgot Dr van Rijgen.
There was a day left before she was to go on holiday; it was fully taken up with handing over to Jenny and, when she went off duty that evening, packing.
Her head stuffed with sound advice from her aunts, just as though she were on her way to darkest Africa, she took the early morning bus to Bristol where she caught a train to London, got on the underground to Heathrow and presented herself at the weighing-in counter with half an hour to spare. There was time for a cup of coffee before her flight was called and she sat drinking it and looking around her. A small, neat girl, wearing a short-sleeved cotton dress, sparkling fresh, high-heeled sandals, and carrying a sensible shoulder bag. She attracted quite a few appreciative glances from passers-by, together with their opinion that she was the kind of traveller who arrived looking as band-box fresh as when she had set out.
They were right; she arrived at Schiphol without a hair out of place, to be met by Karel and driven to Bloemendaal, a charming suburb of Haarlem where he and Clare had a flat. It wasn’t a lengthy trip but they had plenty to talk about: the baby, of course, his job—he was an accountant in one of the big bulb growers’ offices—Clare’s cleverness in learning Dutch, the pleasant life they led…
The flat was in a leafy road, quiet and pleasant, within walking distance of the dunes and woods. They lived on the third floor and Clare was waiting at their door as the lift stopped. She was a pretty girl, a little older than Fran, and she flung her arms round her now, delighted to see her. The pair of them led her into the flat, both talking at once, sitting her down between them in the comfortable living room, plying her with questions. After the aunts’ staid and sober conversation, they were a delight to Fran.
Presently Clare bore her off to her room where she unpacked and tidied herself and then joined them for tea and a lively discussion as to how she might best enjoy herself.
‘Swimming of course,’ declared Clare, ‘if the weather holds.’ She poured more tea. ‘I rest in the afternoons, so you can poke around Haarlem if you want to. There is heaps to see if you like churches and museums. Then there is Linnaeushof Gardens and the open air theatre here and the aviary… Two weeks won’t be enough.’
‘You are dears to have me,’ said Fran. ‘It’s lovely to—to…’
‘Escape?’ suggested Clare.
Fran, feeling guilty, said yes.
It was a delightful change after life in the hospital; Karel went early to work and she and Clare breakfasted at their leisure, tidied the flat and then took a bus into Haarlem or did a little shopping at the local shops; and after lunch, Clare curled up with a book and Fran took herself off, walking in the dunes, going into Haarlem, exploring its streets, poking her nose into its many churches, visiting its museums, and window shopping.
It was on the fourth day of her visit when she went back to St Bavo’s Cathedral. She had already paid it a brief visit with Clare on one of their morning outings but Clare hadn’t much use for old churches. It was a brilliant afternoon so that the vast interior seemed bathed in twilight and she pottered happily, straining to see the model ships hanging from its lofty rafters, trying to understand the ornate memorial stones on its walls and finally standing before the organ, a vast affair with its three keyboards and its five thousand pipes. Her mind boggled at anyone attempting to play it and, as if in answer to that, music suddenly flooded from it so that she sat down to listen, enthralled. It was something grand and stirring and yet sad and solemn; she had heard it before but the composer eluded her. She closed her eyes the better to hear and became aware that someone had come to sit beside her.
‘Fauré,’ said Dr van Rijgen. ‘Magnificent, isn’t it? He is practising for the International Organists’ Contest.’
Fran’s eyes had flown open. ‘However did you get here?’ And then, absurdly, ‘Good afternoon, Dr van Rijgen. I was trying to remember the composer—the organist is playing like a man inspired.’
She studied his face for a moment; somehow he seemed quite friendly. ‘Do you live here?’
‘Utrecht.’
‘But that’s the other side of Amsterdam…’
‘Thirty-eight miles from here. Less than that; I don’t need to go to Amsterdam, there is a road south…’
She was aware that the music had become quiet and sad. ‘You have patients here?’
‘What a girl you are for asking questions. I came to see if you were enjoying your holiday.’
She goggled at him. ‘Whatever for? And how did you know where I was staying, anyway?’
He smiled slowly. ‘Oh, ways and means. Your cousin told me you would most probably be here. She most kindly invited me back for tea. I’ll drive you, but there’s time enough. Shall we wait till the end? The best part, I always think.’
Fran opened her mouth and then closed it again. What was there to say in the face of such arrogance, short of telling him to go away, not easily done in church, somehow? But why had he deliberately come looking for her? She sat and pondered the question while the organ thundered and swelled into a crescendo of sound and faded away to a kind of sad triumph.
Dr van Rijgen stirred. ‘Magnificent. Do you like our Grote Kirk?’
‘It’s breathtaking; I didn’t know it was so old…all those years building it. I must get a book about it.’
‘I have several at home; you must borrow one.’
Fran stood up and he stood up with her, which put her at an instant disadvantage for she had to look up to his face. ‘You want something, don’t you?’ she asked. ‘I mean,’ she hesitated and blushed. ‘You don’t—you aren’t interested in me as—as a person, are you?’
‘That, Francesca, is where you are mistaken. I should add that I have not fallen in love with you or any such foolishness, but as a person, yes, I am interested in you.’
‘Why?’
She spoke softly because there were people milling all round them now.
‘At the proper time I will tell you. Now, if you are ready, shall we go back to your cousin?’
She went ahead of him, down the length of the vast church, her mind in a fine muddle. But I don’t even like him, she reminded herself, and then frowned quite fiercely. Once or twice during their strange talk, she had liked him very much.
CHAPTER TWO
SHE paused outside the great entrance to the church and he touched her arm. ‘Over here, Francesca,’ he said and led her to a silver grey Daimler parked at the side. On the short drive to Clare’s flat he made casual conversation which gave Fran no chance to ask questions and once there she saw that she was going to have even less opportunity. Apparently whatever it was he wanted of her would be made clear in his own good time and not before. And since she had no intention of seeing him again while she was in Holland, he would presently get the surprise he deserved.
Her satisfaction was short-lived. She was astounded to hear him calmly telling Clare that he felt sure that she would like to see something of Holland while she was there, and would Clare mind if he came on the following day and took her guest for a run through the more rural parts of the country?
She was still struggling for words when she heard Clare’s enthusiastic, ‘What a marvellous idea! She’ll love it, won’t she, Karel?’
Just as though I’m not here, fumed Fran silently, and got as far as, ‘But I don’t…’
‘Oh, don’t mind leaving Clare for a day,’ said Karel. ‘I shall be taking her to the clinic tomorrow anyway—you go off and have fun.’ He gave her a kindly smile and Fran almost choked on the idea of having fun with Dr van Rijgen. Whatever it was he wanted of her would have nothing to do with fun. She amended the thought; perhaps not fun, but interesting? All the same, such high-handed behaviour wouldn’t do at all. She waited until there was a pause in the conversation. ‘I had planned to visit one or two places,’ she said clearly and was stopped by Dr van Rijgen.
‘Perhaps another day for those?’ he suggested pleasantly. ‘It would give me great pleasure to show you some small part of my country, Francesca.’
There was nothing to say in the face of that bland politeness. She agreed to go, the good manners the aunts had instilled into her from an early age standing her in good stead.
He left shortly after with the suggestion that he might call for her soon after nine o’clock the next morning.
‘Don’t you like him?’ asked Clare the moment the sound of his car had died away.
‘Well,’ observed Fran matter-of-factly, ‘I don’t really know him, do I? He gave us lectures when I was training and he’s given me instructions about patients on the wards… He was absolutely beastly to me when I was a student and I dozed off during one of his lectures. I think he laughs at me.’
Clare shot her a quick look, exchanged a lightning glance with Karel and said comfortably, ‘Oh, well, I should think he’s forgotten about that by now—or perhaps he is making amends.’
A fair girl, Fran said, ‘I shouldn’t have fallen asleep, you know—I expect it injured his ego.’
Clare gave a little chortle of laughter. ‘You know, love, once you’ve got to know each other, I think you and Dr van Rijgen might have quite a lot in common. He’s very well known over here; did you know that?’
‘No. He comes to Bristol to lecture on tropical diseases, that’s all I know about him.’
‘Well, he goes to London and Edinburgh and Birmingham and Vienna and Brussels—you name it and he has been there. A very clever laddie.’
Fran had turned her head to look out of the window; Fran was a dear and Clare studied her… She was a thought old-fashioned but that was the aunts’ fault, and save for her lovely eyes she had no looks to speak of. But, her hair was fine and long, and her figure was good, if a trifle plump. Clare, with all the enthusiasm of the newly wed, scented romance.
There was no romance apparent the following morning. Dr van Rijgen arrived exactly when he said he would, spent five minutes or so charming Clare—there was no other word for it, thought Fran indignantly—and then led the way to his car.
‘Where are we going?’ asked Fran and, when he didn’t answer at once, ‘where are you taking me?’
He was driving south, through the country roads criss-crossing the duinen so that he might avoid Haarlem, and there was very little traffic about. He pulled in to the side of the road and turned to look at her. ‘Shall we clear the air, Francesca? You sound like the heroine in a romantic thriller. I’m not taking you anywhere, not in the sense that you imply. We shall drive across country, avoiding the motorways so that you may be able to see some of the more rural parts of Holland, and then we shall go to my home because I should like you to meet someone there.’
‘Your wife,’ said Fran instantly.
‘My wife is dead.’ He started up the car once more. ‘On our right you can just get a glimpse of Heemstede, a suburb of Haarlem and very pleasant. And down the road is Vogelenzang, a quite charming stretch of wooded dunes; we must go there one day to hear the birds…’
Fran turned her head away and pretended to take an interest in the scenery; she had been snubbed, there were no two ways about that. If these terms were to continue all day then she began to wish most heartily that she had never come; she hadn’t wanted to in the first place. She voiced her thoughts out loud.
‘No, that was only too obvious, but it was rather difficult for you to refuse, wasn’t it?’
‘I cannot think,’ said Fran crossly, ‘why you are bothering to waste your time with me.’
‘I dare say not, but now is not the time to explain. And now, if you could forget your dislike of me for an hour or two, I will tell you where we are going. This road takes us the long way round to Aalsmeer. We shall go through Hillegom very shortly and take a secondary road to the shores of Aalsmeer which will take us to the town itself; there we shall drive down its other shore and take country roads, some of them narrow and brick, to Nieuwkoop. We have to drive right round the northern end of the lake and pick up the road which eventually brings us to the motorway into Utrecht. My home is on the far side of the city in the woods outside Zeist. We will stop for coffee at one of the cafés along the Aalsmeer.’
‘It sounds a long way,’ observed Fran.
‘No distance as the crow flies, and not much further by car. We shall lunch at my home.’
She gave him a sideways glance. His profile looked stern; he couldn’t possibly be enjoying himself so why had he asked her out? He turned his head before she could look away. His smile took years off his face. ‘I haven’t had a day out for a long time—shall we forget hospital wards and night duty and lectures by disagreeable doctors and enjoy ourselves?’
His smile was so warm and friendly that she smiled back. ‘Oh, I’d like that—and it’s such a lovely day.’
His hand came down briefly on hers clasped in her lap. ‘It’s a pact. Here we are at Aalsmeer. I’ll explain about the flowers…’
They stopped for coffee presently, sitting down by the water’s edge while he drew a map of the surrounding countryside on the tablecloth. ‘There are motorways coming into Utrecht from each point of the compass. We shall join one to the south, going round the city, and then turn off towards Leusderheide—that’s heathland…’
‘You live there?’
‘No, but very near. It’s only a short run from here.’
They got back into the car and drove on through the quiet countryside with only the farms and small villages studded around the flat green fields. But not for long. They joined the motorway very soon and presently the outskirts of Utrecht loomed ahead and then to one side of them as they swept past the outskirts. Dr van Rijgen drove fast with an ease which was almost nonchalance, slipping past the traffic with nothing more than a gentle swish of sound, and once past Utrecht and with Zeist receding in the distance he left the motorway and slowed his speed. They were on a country road now, with Zeist still visible to one side, and on the other pleasantly wooded country, peaceful after the rush of the motorway.
‘We could be miles from anywhere,’ marvelled Fran.
‘Yes, and I need only drive a couple of miles to join the road into Zeist and Utrecht.’
‘And the other way?’
‘Ede, Appeldoorn, the Veluwe; all beautiful.’
‘You go there often, to the—the Veluwe?’
He didn’t allow himself to smile at her pronunciation of the word.
‘Most weekends when I am free.’
It was like wringing blood from a stone, she reflected, wringing bits and pieces of information from him, word by word. She gave a small soundless sigh and looked out of the window.
They were passing through a small scattered village: tiny cottages, a very large church and a number of charming villas.
‘This looks nice,’ she observed.
‘I think so, too,’ said Dr van Rijgen and swept the car with an unexpected rush through brick pillars and along a leafy drive. Fran, suddenly uneasy, sat up, the better to see around her, just in time to glimpse the house as they went round a curve.
It was flat-faced and solid with a gabled roof and large windows arranged in rows across its front; they got smaller and higher as they went up and they all had shutters. The front door was atop semi-circular steps, a solid wooden affair with ornate carving around its fanlight and a tremendous knocker.
Fran didn’t look at the doctor. ‘You live here?’
‘Yes.’ He leaned over her and undid her door and her safety belt and then got out himself and went round the bonnet so that he was standing waiting for her as she got out, too. She said quite sharply, ‘I wish you would tell me why you’ve brought me here.’
‘Why, to meet my small daughter. She’s looking forward to seeing you.’
‘Your daughter? I had no idea…’
He said coolly, ‘Why should you have? Shall we go in?’
The door had been opened; a very thin, stooping, elderly man was standing by it. ‘Tuggs,’ said the doctor, ‘this is Miss Manning, come to have lunch with us. Francesca, Tuggs has been with us for very many years; he runs the place with his wife, Nel. He is English, by the way.’
Fran paused at the top of the steps and offered a hand. ‘How do you do, Tuggs,’ and smiled her gentle smile before she was ushered indoors.
It was a square entrance hall with splendid pillars supporting a gallery above it and with a fine staircase at its end. Fran had the impression of marble underfoot, fine silky carpets, a great many portraits, and sunlight streaming through a circular window above the staircase, before she was urged to enter a room at the back of the hall. She paused in the doorway and looked up at her host. ‘I’m a bit overwhelmed—it’s so very grand.’
He considered this remark quite seriously. ‘One’s own home is never grand, and it is home. Don’t be scared of it, Francesca.’ He shut the door behind them. ‘Nel will bring coffee in a few moments and you can go and tidy yourself—she’ll show you where. But first come and see Lisa.’
They were in a quite small cosy room with chintz curtains at the windows and a wide view out to a garden filled with flowers. The furniture was old, polished and comfortable, and sitting by the open window was a buxom young woman with a rosy face, reading to a little girl perched in a wheelchair.
The young woman, looking up, saw them, put down her book and said something to the child who turned her head and shrilled, ‘Papa!’ and then burst into a torrent of Dutch.
She was a beautiful child, with golden curls, enormous blue eyes and a glorious smile. Dr van Rijgen bent to kiss her and then lifted her carefully into his arms. He said something to the nurse and she smiled and went out of the room and he said,
‘This is Lisa, six years old and as I frequently tell her the most beautiful girl in the world.’
Fran took a small thin hand in hers. ‘Oh, she is, the darling.’ She beamed at the little girl, careful not to look at the fragile little body in the doctor’s arms. ‘Hullo, Lisa.’
The child put up her face to be kissed and broke into a long excited speech until the doctor hushed her gently. ‘Let’s sit down for a moment,’ he suggested and glanced up as a stout woman came in with a tray. ‘Here’s Nel with the coffee.’ He said something to her and turned to Fran.
‘This is my housekeeper; no English worth mentioning, I’m afraid, but a most sensible and kind woman; we’d be lost without her.’ He spoke to her again—she was being introduced in her turn, Fran guessed—and then got up as he said, ‘Nel will show you where you can tidy yourself.’
The cloakroom into which Fran was ushered, tucked away down a short passage leading from the hall, was so unlike the utilitarian cubbyhole in her aunts’ house that she paused to take a good look. Powder blue tiles, silver grey carpet, an enormous mirror and a shelf containing just about everything a woman might need to repair the ravages upon her make-up. Fran sniffed appreciatively at the bottles of eau-de-toilette, washed her hands with pale blue soap and felt apologetic about using one of the stack of towels. She dabbed powder on her nose in a perfunctory manner, combed her hair and went back across the hall.
Father and daughter looked at her as she went in and she had the strong impression that they had been talking about her—naturally enough, she supposed; and when asked to pour out she did so in her usual unflurried manner.
Lisa had milk in her own special mug and sugar biscuits on a matching plate but they were largely ignored. She was a happy child, chuckling a great deal at her father’s soft remarks, meticulously translated for Fran’s benefit.
A very sick child, too, the charming little face far too pale, the small body thin above the sticks of useless legs. But there was no hint of despair or sadness; the doctor drew her into the talk, making a great thing of translating for her and urging her to try out a few Dutch words for herself, something which sent Lisa into paroxysms of mirth. Presently she demanded to sit on Fran’s lap, where she sat, Fran’s firm arm holding her gently, examining her face and hair, chattering non-stop.
They were giggling comfortably together when the young woman came back and Dr van Rijgen said, ‘This is Nanny. She has been with us for almost six years and is quite irreplaceable. She speaks little English. Lisa goes for a short rest now before lunch.’
Fran said, ‘How do you do, Nanny,’ feeling doubtful that such an old and tried member of the family might look upon her with jealousy. It was a relief to see nothing but friendliness in the other girl’s face and, what was more puzzling, a kind of excited expectancy.
Alone with her host, Fran sat back and asked composedly, ‘Will you tell me about Lisa? It’s not spina bifida—she’s paralysed isn’t she, the poor darling? Is it a meningocele?’
He sounded as though he was delivering a lecture on the ward. ‘Worse than that—a myelomeningocele, paralysis, club feet and a slight hydrocephalus.’ His voice was expressionless as he added, ‘Everything that could be done, has been done; she has at the most six more months.’
The words sounded cold; she studied his face and saw what an effort it was for him to speak calmly. She said quietly, ‘She is such a happy child and you love her. She would be easy to love…’
‘I would do anything in the world to keep her happy.’ He got up and walked over to the French window at the end of the room and opened it and two dogs came in: a mastiff and a roly-poly of a dog, very low on the ground with a long curly coat and bushy eyebrows almost hiding liquid brown eyes.
‘Meet Thor and Muff—Thor’s very mild unless he’s been put on guard, but Muff seems to think that he must protect everyone living here.’
He wasn’t going to say any more about Lisa. Fran asked, ‘Why Muff?’
‘He looks like one, don’t you think?’ He bent to tweak the dog’s ears. ‘Would you like to see the gardens? Lisa spends a good deal of time out here when the weather’s fine.’
There was a wide lawn beyond the house bordered by flower beds and trees. They wandered on for a few minutes in silence, with the doctor, the perfect host, pointing out this and that and the other thing which might interest her. But presently he began to ask her casual questions about her work, her home and her plans.
‘I haven’t any,’ said Fran cheerfully. ‘I would have liked to have stayed on at the Infirmary; at least I’d have had the chance to carve myself a career, but the aunts needed me at home.’
‘They are invalids?’
‘Heavens no, nothing like that. They—they just feel that—that…’
‘You should be at their beck and call,’ he finished for her smoothly.
‘Oh, you mustn’t say that. They gave me a home and I’m very grateful.’
‘To the extent of turning your back on your own future? Have you no plans to marry?’
‘None at all,’ she told him steadily.
He didn’t ask any more questions after that, but turned back towards the house, offering a glass of sherry while they waited for Lisa to join them for lunch.
She sat between them, eating with the appetite of a bird, talking non-stop, and Fran, because it amused the child, tried out a few Dutch words again. Presently they went into the garden once more, pushing the wheelchair, Fran naming everything in sight in English at Lisa’s insistence.
They had tea under an old mulberry tree in the corner of the garden and when Nanny came to take her away, Lisa demanded with a charm not to be gainsaid, ‘Fran is to come again, Papa—tomorrow?’
He was lying propped up against the tree, watching her. ‘Are you doing anything tomorrow?’ he asked. ‘We might take Lisa to the sea—the sand’s firm enough for the chair.’
‘If she would like me to come, then I will—I’d like to very much.’
She was quite unprepared for the joy on the child’s face as her father told her. Two thin arms were wrapped round her neck and she was kissed heartily. In between kisses she said something to her father and squealed with delight at his reply. Fran looked from one to the other of them, sensing a secret, probably about herself. She certainly wasn’t going to ask, she told herself, and wished Nanny goodbye, encountering that same look of pleased anticipation. It was time she went home, she decided and was instantly and blandly talked out of it.
They dined in a leisurely fashion in a room furnished with an elegant Regency-style oval table and ribbon-backed chairs and a vast side table laden with heavy silver. Fran was surprised to find her companion easy to talk to and the conversation was light and touched only upon general topics. Lisa wasn’t mentioned and although she longed to ask more about the child, she was given no opportunity to pose any questions.
She was driven back to Clare’s flat, her companion maintaining a pleasant flow of small talk which gave away nothing of himself. And at the flat, although he accepted her invitation to go in with her, he stayed only a short time before bidding them all good night and reiterating that he would call for her at ten o’clock in the morning.
Clare pounced on her the moment he had gone. ‘Fran—you dark horse—did you know he’d be here? Did he follow you over to Holland?’
Fran started to collect the coffee cups. ‘Nothing like that, love, we don’t even like each other. He has a small daughter who is very ill; I think he has decided that it might amuse her to have a visitor. We got on rather well together, so I suppose that’s why he’s asked me to go out with them tomorrow.’
‘His wife?’ breathed Clare, all agog.
‘He is a widower.’
‘And you don’t like each other?’
‘Not really. He’s devoted to Lisa, though, and she liked me. I like her, too. You won’t mind if I’m away tomorrow?’
Her cousin grinned. ‘You have fun while you’ve got the chance.’
The weather was being kind; Fran awakened to a blue sky and warm sunshine. She was ready and waiting when Dr van Rijgen and Lisa arrived. She got in beside Lisa’s specially padded seat in the back of the car and listened, only half understanding, to the child’s happy chatter.
It was a successful day, she had to admit to herself as she got ready for bed that evening. They had gone to Noordwijk aan Zee, parked the car and carried Lisa and her folded chair down to the water’s edge where the sand was smooth and firm. They had walked miles, with the shore stretching ahead of them for more miles, and then stopped off for crusty rolls and hard-boiled eggs. They had talked and laughed a lot and little Lisa had been happy, her pale face quite rosy; and as for the doctor, Fran found herself almost liking him. It was a pity, she reflected, jumping into bed, that he would be at the hospital at Utrecht for all of the following day; it was even more of a pity that he hadn’t so much as hinted at seeing her again. ‘Not that I care in the least,’ she told herself. ‘When Lisa isn’t there he is a very unpleasant man.’ Upon which somewhat arbitrary thought she went to sleep.
She spent the next morning quietly with Clare and Karel, and took herself for a walk in the afternoon. Another week, and her holiday would be over. She hadn’t mentioned Dr van Rijgen in her letters to the aunts and upon reflection she decided not to say anything about him. She thought a great deal about little Lisa, too; a darling child and happy; she had quite believed the doctor when he had said that he would do anything to keep her so. She went back to the flat, volunteered to cook the supper while Clare worried away at some knitting and went to bed early, declaring that she was tired.
Karel had gone to work and she was giving Clare the treat of breakfast in bed when the doctor telephoned. He would be at the hospital all the morning, he informed her in a cool voice, but he hoped that she would be kind enough to spend the afternoon with Lisa. ‘I’ll call for you about half past one,’ he told her and rang off before she could say a word.
‘Such arrogance,’ said Fran crossly. ‘Anyone would think I was here just for his convenience.’
All the same, she was ready, composed and a little cool in her manner when he arrived. A waste of effort on her part for he didn’t seem to notice her stand-offish manner. To her polite enquiries as to his morning, he had little to say, but launched into casual questions. When was she returning home? What did she think of Holland? Did she find the language difficult to understand? And then, harshly, did she feel at her ease with Lisa?
Fran turned to look at him in astonishment. ‘At ease? Why ever shouldn’t I? She’s a darling child and the greatest fun to be with. I like children.’ She sounded so indignant that he said instantly, ‘I’m sorry, I put that badly.’ He turned the car into the drive. ‘A picnic tea, don’t you think? It’s such a lovely day.’ And, as she got out of the car, ‘It would be nice, if you are free tomorrow, if you will come with us to the Veluwe—it’s charming, rather like your New Forest, and Lisa sees fairies behind every tree. We’ll fetch you about half past ten?’
‘I haven’t said I’ll come,’ observed Fran frostily, half in and half out of the car.
‘Lisa wants you.’
And that’s the kind of left-handed compliment a girl likes having, thought Fran, marching ahead of him up the steps, her ordinary nose in the air.
But she forgot all that when Lisa joined them; in no time at all, she was laughing as happily as the little girl, struggling with the Dutch Lisa insisted upon her trying out. They had tea on the lawn again and when Nanny came to fetch Lisa to bed, Fran went, too, invited by both Nanny and the child.
Being got ready for bed was a protracted business dealt with by Nanny with enviable competence. But it was fun, too. Fran fetched and carried and had a satisfactory conversation with Nanny even though they both spoke their own language for the most part. They sat on each side of Lisa while she ate her supper and then at last was carried to her small bed in the charming nursery. Here Fran kissed her good night and went back to the day nursery, because it was Nanny’s right to tuck her little charge up in bed and give her a final hug. She had just joined Fran when the doctor came in, said something to Nanny and went through to the night nursery where there was presently a good deal of giggling and murmuring before he came back.
He talked to Nanny briefly, wished her good night and swept Fran downstairs.
They had drinks by the open windows in the drawing room and presently dined. Fran, who was hungry, ate with a good appetite, thinking how splendid it must be to have a super cook to serve such food and someone like Tuggs to appear at your elbow whenever you wanted something. They didn’t talk much, but their silences were restful; the doctor wasn’t a man you needed to chat to, thank heaven.
They had their coffee outside in the still warm garden, with the sky darkening and the faint scent of the roses which crowded around the lawn mingling with the coffee. She sighed and the doctor asked, ‘What are you thinking, Francesca?’
‘That it’s very romantic and what a pity it’s quite wasted on us.’
She couldn’t see his face, but his voice was casual. ‘We are perhaps beyond the age of romance.’
She snapped back before she could stop herself, ‘I’m twenty-five!’
‘On October the third you will be twenty-six. I shall be thirty-seven in December.’
‘However did you know?’ began Fran.
‘I made it my business to find out.’ His voice was so mild that she choked back several tart remarks fighting for utterance.
‘More coffee?’ she asked finally.
Their day in the Veluwe was a success: the doctor might be a tiresome man but he was a splendid father and, when he chose to be, a good host. They drove through the narrow lanes criss-crossing the Veluwe and picnicked in a charming clearing with the sunshine filtering through the trees and numerous birds. The food was delicious: tiny sausage rolls, bite-size sandwiches, chicken vol-au-vents, hard-boiled eggs, crisp rolls and orange squash to wash them down. Fran, watching Lisa, saw that she ate very little and presently, tucked in her chair, she fell asleep.
When she woke up, they drove on, circling round to avoid the main roads and getting back in time for a rather late tea. This time the doctor was called away to the telephone and returned to say that he would have to go to Utrecht that evening. Fran said at once, ‘Then if you’ll give me a lift to the city I’ll get a bus.’
‘Certainly not.’ He sat down beside Lisa and explained at some length and then said, ‘Lisa quite understands—this often happens. We’ll get Nanny and say good night and leave at once; there will be plenty of time to drive you to your cousin’s flat.’
And nothing she could say would alter his plans.
It was two days before she saw him again. Pleasant enough, pottering around with Clare, going out for a quiet drive in the evenings when Karel got home, all the same she felt a tingle of pleasure when the doctor telephoned. She had only two days left and she was beginning to think that she wouldn’t see him or Lisa again.
‘A farewell tea party,’ he explained. ‘I’ll pick you up on my way back from Zeist—about two o’clock.’
He hung up and her pleasure turned to peevishness. ‘Arrogant man!’
All the same she greeted him pleasantly when he arrived, listened to his small talk as they drove towards his home and took care not to mention the fact that in two days’ time she would be gone. He knew, anyway, she reminded herself; it was to be a farewell tea party.
Lisa was waiting for them, sitting in her chair under the mulberry tree. She wound her arms round Fran’s neck, chattering away excitedly. ‘Is it a birthday or something?’ asked Fran. ‘There’s such an air of excitement.’
Father and daughter exchanged glances. ‘You shall know in good time,’ said the doctor blandly.
They took their time over tea, talking in a muddled but satisfactory way with Fran struggling with her handful of Dutch words and the doctor patiently translating for them both. But presently Nanny arrived and Lisa went with her without a word of protest.
‘I’ll see her to say goodbye?’ she asked, turning to wave.
Dr van Rijgen didn’t answer that. He said instead, in a perfectly ordinary voice, ‘I should like you to marry me, Francesca.’
She sat up with a startled yelp and he said at once, ‘No, be good enough to hear me out. May I say at once that it is not for the usual reasons that I wish to marry you; since Lisa was able to talk she has begged me for a mama of her own. Needless to say I began a search for such a person but none of my women friends were suitable. Oh, they were kind and pleasant to Lisa but they shrank from contact with her. Besides, she didn’t like any of them. You see, she had formed her own ideas of an ideal mama—someone small and gentle and mouselike, who would laugh with her and never call her a poor little girl. When I saw you at the prize giving at the Infirmary I realised that you were exactly her ideal. I arranged these days together so that you might get to know her—needless to say, you are perfect in her eyes…’
‘The nerve, the sheer nerve!’ said Fran in a strong voice. ‘How can you dare…?’
‘I think I told you that I would do anything for Lisa to keep her happy until she dies. I meant it. She has six months at the outside and you have fifty—sixty years ahead of you. Do you grudge a few months of happiness to her? Of course, it will be a marriage in name only and when the time comes,’ his voice was suddenly harsh, ‘the marriage can be annulled without fuss and you will be free to resume your career. I shall see that it doesn’t suffer on our account.’
Fran gazed at him, speechless. She was more than surprised; she was flabbergasted. Presently, since the silence had become lengthy, she said, ‘It’s ridiculous, and even if I were to consider it, I’d need time to decide.’
‘There is nothing ridiculous about it if you ignore your own feelings on the matter, and there is no time. Lisa is waiting for us to go to the nursery.’
‘And supposing I refuse?’
He didn’t answer that. ‘You intend to refuse?’ There was no reproach in his calm voice, but she knew that, in six months’ time, when Lisa’s short life had ended, she would never cease to reproach herself.
‘No strings?’ she asked.
‘None. I give you my word.’
‘Very well,’ said Fran, ‘but I’m doing it for Lisa.’
‘I hardly imagined that you would do it for me. Shall we go and tell her?’
Lisa was in her dressing-gown, ready for bed, eating something nourishing from a bowl. The face she turned towards them as they went over to her was so full of eager hope that Fran reflected that even if she had refused she would have changed her mind at the sight of it. She felt her hand taken in a firm, reassuring grasp. ‘Well, lieveling, here is your mama.’
She was aware of Nanny’s delighted face as Lisa flung her arms round her neck and hugged her, talking non-stop.
When she paused for breath the doctor said, ‘Lisa wants to know when and where. I think the best thing is for me to drive you back and you can discuss it with your aunts. And for reasons which I have already mentioned the wedding will have to be here.’ He smiled a little. ‘And you must wear a bride’s dress and a veil.’
Fran looked at him over Lisa’s small head. ‘Anything to make her happy.’
He said gravely, ‘At least we can agree upon that.’
CHAPTER THREE
THEY stayed with Lisa for some time; she was excited and happy, talking nineteen to the dozen, full of plans for a future which would never be hers, but presently she became drowsy and the doctor carried her to bed where she fell instantly asleep.
Downstairs in the drawing room, over drinks and with the dogs at their feet, Dr van Rijgen observed, ‘Thank you, Francesca, you have made Lisa happy. Now as to plans for the future… For a start, you must call me Litrik and, with Lisa, we must present at the least a friendly front. I suggest that I drive you home and we can tell your aunts together. You realise why the wedding must be here, of course? Lisa expects a full-blown affair, I’m afraid, and you are free to invite anyone you wish to attend. Are your aunts likely to disapprove?’
‘Disapprove. Well, I don’t know. You see they have made up their minds that I shan’t marry, but I think that if we just told them at once they wouldn’t be able to do much about it. I don’t want them to know the real reason…’
‘God forbid. How soon can you be free to marry me? It will take about three weeks for the formalities here.’
‘I can be ready by then. It might help if you wrote to Miss Hawkins…’
‘I’ll go and see her. Do you want Dr Beecham to give you away? The service isn’t the same as your Church of England, but I dare say you’ll feel better if it’s on familiar lines.’
It was rather like discussing the future treatment for a patient and just as impersonal and efficient.
‘That would be nice.’ She swallowed the rest of her sherry and wished that it would warm her cold insides.
‘I will arrange your return here and for any family or friends whom you would like at our wedding.’ He got up and refilled her glass.
‘I must reassure you that you will be free to return to England after Lisa’s death.’ His voice was bleak. ‘The annulment may take a little time but it can be dealt with here; you will have no need to be bothered with it.’
Fran tossed off her sherry. ‘You had it all worked out, didn’t you? Were you so sure of me?’
He smiled faintly. ‘Certainly not. But Lisa was.’ He got up and took her glass as Tuggs came in to say that dinner was served. ‘And may I, on behalf of Mrs Tuggs and myself, wish you both happiness, Miss Manning and you, sir.’
‘Why thank you, Tuggs. I shall be driving Miss Manning back the day after tomorrow; when I return we must make all the necessary arrangements. We hope to marry within the month.’
Nothing more was said about the wedding over dinner and when Fran said that she would like to go back to Clare’s, Litrik made no objection. It was a warm quiet night and they had little to say to each other. Only when he drew up before Clare’s flat did Litrik say, ‘I’ll come in with you, if I may—it may be easier for you.’
Karel and Clare were delighted at the news. Beyond remarking that it must have been love at first sight, and the hope that they would wait until she had had the baby before they married, Clare showed little surprise. She plied them with coffee and then tactfully retired to her kitchen with Karel so that Fran could bid her new fiancé good night—something she did in her normal calm manner, thanking him for her pleasant afternoon and asking if he would be good enough to let her know when he wished her to be ready for the journey back to England.
‘Well, I’ll let you know tomorrow. You will have to come and say goodbye to Lisa. Can you manage the morning? I’ve patients to see after lunch.’
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