“If I were James, I should come after you and marry you out of hand, Miss Pennyfeather.”

“Why? And why do you call me Miss Pennyfeather?” Julia said, still absorbing what Ivo had just said.

“You don’t like it? But I always think of you as the magnificent Miss Pennyfeather. You are, you know, and you’re not only quite beautiful you’re—alive.”

He stopped the car in front of the house, turned toward her, slipped an arm around her shoulders and kissed her hard.

When she had her breath again, she said with a kind of stunned politeness, “Thank you for a very nice evening, Ivo.”

His face was only an inch or two from her own and he was smiling a little. “I haven’t enjoyed myself so much for a long time,” he said softly.

He got out, walked around the car and opened the door for her. She went inside the house without saying anything more, only a quiet good-night as she went up the stairs.

About the Author

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. She was a wonderful writer, and she will be greatly missed. Her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.

The Fifth Day of Christmas
Betty Neels

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER ONE

VIEWED FROM the comparative comfort of the ambulance’s interior, the M1 looked uninviting. Miss Julia Pennyfeather, too occupied with her patient to have bothered overmuch with the passing scenery, now realised that the motorway was becoming more and more shrouded in fog, which, coupled with the fast darkening sky of a December afternoon, boded ill for their chances of reaching their destination as early as they had hoped. She pulled her cloak closely around her, cast a quick look at her dozing patient and peered out once more. There seemed to be a lot of traffic surging past, at great speed and in a confusion of lights, a sight which made her thankful that she wasn’t called upon to drive the ambulance. She frowned in thought, then, moving cautiously, opened the little glass window behind the driving seat and said softly to the man sitting beside the driver, ‘Willy—the fog, it’s getting worse, isn’t it?’

The man the back of whose neck she had addressed turned a cheerful face to answer her. ‘Proper thick, Nurse, but it’s not all that far. We’re coming up to Newcastle now; it’s about sixty miles to the Border and another twelve to the crossroads where we turn off—and the house is another ten miles or so.’

‘It’s nearly four o’clock,’ said Julia. ‘We shan’t get there much before nine…’

‘Just in nice time for a bit o’ supper, Nurse, before we ‘ands over the patient and goes to our warm beds.’

They were off the motorway now and almost clear of Newcastle; two hours’ steady driving would bring them to the Border, and once they were in Scotland… She broke off her speculations as the girl on the stretcher asked, ‘Where are we, Nurse?’

Julia told her, adding in a determinedly cheerful voice, ‘We shan’t be long now—three hours at the most, perhaps less. I expect you’d like a drink, wouldn’t you?’ She unscrewed a vacuum flask and poured the milkless tea into a mug. ‘As soon as we arrive, you shall have your insulin and your supper—I’m sure they’ll have it ready for you, for your nurse will have arrived some time this afternoon.’

‘I hope I like her.’

Julia glanced at her patient. ‘I’m sure you will,’ she replied in a soothing voice, and privately hoped that she was right. Miss Mary MacGall hadn’t been the easiest of patients—eighteen years old, pretty and spoilt and a diabetic who somehow never managed to achieve stabilisation, she had been a handful the Private Wing of St Clare’s Hospital had been glad to see go. In the two short weeks she had been there, having an acute appendix removed, and then, unfortunately, peritonitis, which naturally played havoc with the diabetes, she had been rude to the Matron, flirted outrageously with the young housemen, and exasperated the consultant staff; only with Julia was she amenable, and that was something neither Julia nor her fellow workers could fathom, unless it was that Julia’s dark and striking beauty was such a magnificent foil to her own blonde prettiness. And Julia didn’t fuss, but treated her with the pleasant calm that a well-trained nanny might have shown to a recalcitrant child. Not that Julia looked in the least like a nanny—indeed, just the opposite, with her almost black hair and great brown eyes with their preposterously long lashes. Her mouth was a little large perhaps, but beautifully shaped and her nose was straight, with the merest hint of a tilt at its tip. She was well above average height, nicely rounded and refreshingly and completely natural. She was just twenty-two and had achieved State Registration only a few months previously. And only the day before she had left the hospital where she had spent several happy, busy years, not because she had particularly wanted to, but to look after her sister-in-law who had just had a second child and was suffering from depression. It had been, therefore, a happy chance that Mary MacGall should have demanded to be sent home by ambulance, and also demanded, at the same time, that Julia should go with her on the journey. Julia was due to leave anyway, and it would give her a couple of days’ respite before she went home.

When next Julia looked out of the window it was snowing hard and the fog had become dense. The ambulance was travelling slowly now, with its blue light flashing, and Julia was uneasily aware that they were skidding from time to time. She opened the little window once more and said softly into Willy’s ear, ‘Is it freezing as well?’

He nodded without looking round.

‘Are we lost?’

She heard his chuckle and took comfort from the sound. ‘Not a bit of it, Nurse. We’re over the Border—we’ll be at the crossroads soon.’

‘Is Bert all right? Does he want to stop?’

She peered ahead, the visibility was down to about ten yards and that was obscured by driving snow.

Bert answered for himself. ‘I’m OK, Nurse. It’s not far now and I think we’d do better to keep going. It might clear.’

She agreed softly, knowing that he had said that to reassure her, and closed the window, observing for the benefit of her patient,

‘We’ve a dozen miles or so to go. Are you very hungry? I’ve some cream crackers here and there’s plenty of tea.’

But Mary was disposed to be difficult. She said rather peevishly,

‘I want a huge steak with lots of duchesse potatoes and creamed cauliflower and lashings of gravy and sauce, then Charlotte Russe with masses of whipped cream and a plate of petits fours—the gooey ones, and a huge whisky and soda—oh, and Kummel with my coffee.’

Julia felt sympathy with her patient. After all, she was very young; she would be on a fixed diet for the rest of her life. It was a pity that she was so spoiled that she refused to accept the fact, and anyway, once she was stabilised, the diet wouldn’t be too awful, for her parents were wealthy enough to give it the variety those in more straitened circumstances couldn’t afford. She said kindly, ‘You make me feel quite hungry too, but you’d pay for it afterwards, you know.’

The girl beside her scowled. ‘Who cares? That’s what you’re for—to see that I don’t die in a coma.’

Julia looked at her reflectively. ‘There’s always the possibility that someone might not be there…’

‘Oh, yes, there will,’ declared Mary, and sat up suddenly. ‘I suppose you wouldn’t like to stay with me—for ever, I mean.’

Julia smiled, feeling a little touched. ‘How nice of you to ask me. But I have to go home and look after my sister-in-law for a bit, then I thought I’d get a job abroad for a year or two—and I’ve still got my midwifery to do.’

‘Marry a rich man instead.’

‘Why rich? As long as he’s the right one, the money doesn’t matter very much, does it? You need enough to live on and educate the children.’

‘And pretty clothes and the hairdresser and jewellery and going to the theatre and out to dine, and a decent holiday at least twice a year.’

Julia said soberly, ‘Perhaps I’m not ambitious,’ and turned away to look out of the window again—a pointless act, for it had been quite dark for some time now.

When the ambulance at last stopped, Julia couldn’t believe they had arrived, for the last hour had been a nightmare of skidding and crawling through the blanket of fog and snow and now there was a gale blowing as well. She stepped out of the ambulance into several inches of snow and then clutched at her cap as a gust of wind tossed her backwards as though she had been a leaf. It was pitch dark too, but in the ambulance lights she could just see the beginning of steps leading upwards. She stood aside to let Bert and Willy get into the ambulance and asked, ‘Shall I ring the bell?’ and thought how ridiculous it sounded in this black waste of snow and fog and howling wind. But Bert said cheerfully enough,

‘OK, Nurse—up them steps, and look out for the ice.’

She advanced cautiously with the beam of her powerful torch guiding her: it wasn’t so bad after all—the steps ended at a great door upon whose knocker she beat a brisk tattoo, and when she saw the brass bell in the wall, she rang that for good measure. But there were no lights—she peered around her, unable to see anything but the reassuring solidarity of the door before her, and that hadn’t opened. She was about to go down the steps again to relay her doubts to her companions when the door swung open, revealing a very old man holding a hurricane lantern. She was still getting her breath when he spoke testily.

‘Ye didna’ need to make all that noise. I heard ye the fust time.’

Julia, who had nice manners, apologised. ‘Is this Drumlochie House?’ she asked through teeth which were beginning to chatter with the cold.

‘Aye—ye’ll be the nurse with Miss Mary?’

‘That’s right—could you turn on the lights, please, so that the ambulance men can bring her indoors?’

‘No lights,’ said the old man without annoyance. ‘Wind’s taken the electric—can’t think how ye got here.’

Julia couldn’t either, but it hardly seemed the right moment to discuss it. She said instead, ‘Then would you leave the door open and we’ll bring Miss Mary in.’

She didn’t wait to hear his reply but went carefully down the steps again.

She followed the two men, with the carrying chair and Mary in it, between them, back up again, shuddering at the possibility of a broken ankle or two added to Mary’s diabetes. But they achieved the entrance without mishap and went inside where the old man was waiting for them, his lamp held high. ‘So ye’re back, Miss Mary,’ he was, it seemed, a man of few words, ‘your room’s ready.’

He turned and started to walk across the hall towards the staircase discernible in the gloom, and the ambulance men, still with Mary between them, followed him with Julia bringing up the rear, shivering a little partly because she had got cold waiting at the front door and partly because her surroundings were, inadequately lighted as they were, a trifle forbidding. They seemed to walk a great distance before the old man at length opened a door and they entered Mary’s bedroom—a large apartment with a fire burning in its open fireplace and most pleasantly furnished. Julia, looking round her, heaved a sigh of relief. If their rooms were half as comfortable they would have nothing to grumble about.

‘Where’s the nurse?’ she asked the old man.

He stood and thought, his head on one side, for an aggravating moment. ‘The nurse? Weel, she’s to come from Edinburgh, but it’s been snowing a blizzard since daybreak hereabouts. There’ll be no nurse.’

‘No nurse!’ Julia looked at him with something like horror. ‘But I’m going back to London with the ambulance in the morning—I can’t leave my patient. Where’s the telephone?’

‘The wind’s had it.’

The wind, thought Julia bitterly, was answerable for a lot.

‘There must be some way of getting a message—to the village or a doctor—or the police.’

He didn’t even bother to say no, just shook his head. ‘Snow’s deep,’ he observed without emotion. ‘There’s Jane the cook and Madge the maid gone to Hawick yesterday to shop for Miss Mary’s return. They’ll not be back for twa days, maybe.’

Julia’s dismay was smothered in a flood of practical thoughts.

‘Food?’ she asked. ‘Hot water, candles?’

‘Food’s enough—candles and lamps we’ve got—hot water, now, that’s another matter. I’ve no call for hot water, stove’s gone out.’

‘If you could possibly light it for us again? Miss Mary—all of us, we need to wash at least. Are there any rooms ready for us?’

He shook his head. ‘No. Madge was to have done that, and me thinking ye’d not get here in this weather—I didna’ light the fire…’

‘Never mind—could the ambulance men come and help you? They’re tired and hungry—they must have a meal and a good sleep. If you’d give them the bedlinen I’m sure they’ll make up the beds, and I’ll come down to the kitchen and cook something.’

He looked at her with a glimmer of respect. ‘Aye, do that if ye will. Miss Mary—she’s all right?’

‘Once she has had her supper she will be.’ Julia smiled at him and went to fetch Bert and Willy.

There was food enough once she could find it in the vast semi-basement kitchen. She pottered about, still wrapped in her cloak, while the men made up beds and lighted fires, making Mary’s supper as attractive as possible.

It was getting on for midnight when Julia removed the supper tray, and Mary, still grumbling, had consented to go to bed. Julia left an oil lamp the old man had produced in the room, wished her patient a good night and went in search of Willy and Bert. She found them, after a great deal of tramping up and down draughty corridors, very snug in a little room on the floor above.

‘Nothing but fourposters downstairs,’ Willy explained. ‘We’ve found you a nice room below, Nurse, got a fire going an’ all. First left at the bottom of the stairs.’

She thanked them, warned them that she was about to cook supper and went in search of her sleeping quarters. The room was reasonably near her patient’s, she was glad to find, and at the head of the stairs, and although there was a piercing draught whistling round the hall below, the room itself looked pleasant enough. She sighed with relief, went to look at Mary, who was already asleep, and made her way downstairs once more. The old man had disappeared; to bed probably, having considered that he had done enough for them. She set about frying eggs and bacon and boiling the kettle for tea, and presently the three of them sat down to a supper, which, while not being quite what they had expected, was ample and hot.

The three of them washed up, wished each other good night, and crept upstairs, bearing a variety of candlesticks and yawning their heads off. Julia, with a longing eye on the comfort of the bed, undressed with the speed of lightning, unpinned her hair, brushed it perfunctorily and went to find a bathroom. There were several, none supplying more than tepid water, so she cleaned her teeth, washed her face and hands with the same speed with which she had brushed her hair and, after a quick look at the sleeping Mary, retired to her room, where, without daring to take off her dressing gown, she jumped into bed. And as she closed her eyes the front door bell rang.

She waited a moment, pretending to herself that she hadn’t heard it, but when it pealed again she got out of bed, picked up her torch, thrust her feet into slippers and started downstairs. The wind was fiercer now and the draughts eddied around her, chilling her to the bone. Only the thought of the unfortunate person on the doorstep urged her on. It would be the nurse, arrived by some miracle Julia was far too tired to investigate, or perhaps the cook and the maid from Hawick, although she fancied that the town was a good many miles away. She undid the bolts of the front door, slid the chain back and opened its creaking weight on to the fog and wind and snow outside.

There was a man on the top step, a very large man, who stood wordless and patient while she allowed her torch to travel his considerable length. She knew that he was staring at her from the gloom and when she said impatiently, ‘Oh, do come in—we’ll both catch our deaths of cold…’ he stepped into the hall without uttering a word, only when he had locked the door behind her did he say without heat,

‘Of all the damn fool things to do—opening a door to a complete stranger in the dead of night!’

Julia’s beautiful eyes opened wide. ‘But you rang the bell.’

‘And have you never heard of opening a door on its chain? I might have been armed with a shotgun.’

Julia interrupted him in a matter-of-fact voice, ‘Don’t be absurd—who’d be out on a night like this with a shotgun?’

He laughed then. ‘Since you’re kind enough to trust me, could I beg shelter until the morning? I’m on my way down from Edinburgh and quite obviously I’ve taken the wrong road.’

He gave himself a shake and the snow tumbled off him, to lie unmelting on the floor. ‘You’re not alone in this place?’

‘No,’ said Julia with calm, ‘I’m not—there are two ambulance men asleep upstairs, so tired they won’t hear a sound—and my patient—oh, and there’s a kind of ancient family retainer, but I haven’t seen him for several hours.’

He took the torch from her hand and shone it deliberately on her.

‘You are a fool,’ he remarked mildly. ‘Here you are, a very beautiful girl unless my eyes deceive me, with two men sleeping like the dead upstairs, an old retainer who’s probably deaf and a patient chained to his bed…’

‘Look,’ said Julia patiently, ‘I’m very tired—you’re welcome to a bed,’ she waved a vague arm towards the staircase. ‘There are plenty of empty rooms if you like to choose one. Are you hungry?’

She had taken the torch once more from his grasp and shone it briefly on him. ‘Take off that coat,’ she advised. ‘I’ll go and put the kettle on—will bacon and eggs do?’

‘Not only beautiful but kind too,’ he murmured. ‘Thank you, I’m famished. Where’s the kitchen? Go back to bed and I’ll look after myself.’

She was already on her way kitchenwards. ‘It’s warmer there than anywhere else. Come along.’

Ten minutes later he was sitting at the kitchen table devouring the food she had cooked, while she made the tea. ‘Thank heaven there’s a gas stove,’ Julia commented as she fetched two cups. ‘The wind took the electric and the telephone.’

‘How very whimsical!’

Julia poured him another cup of tea and then filled her own cup. In the little silence which followed a clock wheezed dryly and struck twice, and the wind, taking on a new strength, howled like a banshee round the house. Julia looked up to see the stranger’s eyes fastened on her. He smiled and said, ‘If you trust me, go to bed—I’ll clear up and find myself a room.’

She got to her feet and picked up her torch, yawning as she did so. ‘There’s your candle,’ she indicted a brass candlestick with its snuffer which she had put ready for him. ‘Don’t come into my room, will you? It’s at the top of the stairs—nor the third one on the right—that’s my patient’s. Good night.’

She wondered why he looked amused as he wished her good night, getting politely to his feet as he did so, which small action somehow reassured her.

Not that she needed reassuring, she told herself, lying curled up in her chilly bed; the fire had died down and the warmth it had engendered had already been swallowed up by the icy air. She shivered and decided that she liked him, even though she knew nothing about him, neither his name nor his business, but she liked his face—a face she felt she could trust, with strong features and steady blue eyes and a mouth that was firm and kind. And even though he had called her a fool—which she was bound to admit was the truth—he had also called her beautiful. She fell uneasily asleep, smiling a little.

Something wakened her in the pitch darkness, a sound, not repeated. She switched on the torch to find that it was just after six o’clock, and sat up in bed, the better to listen. The sound came again—a hoarse croak. She was out of bed, thrusting her feet into her slippers as the list of post-operative complications liable to follow an appendicectomy on a diabetic patient unfolded itself in her still tired mind. Carbuncles, gangrene, broncho-pneumonia…the croak came again which effectively ruled out the first two, and when she reached her patient’s bedroom and saw Mary’s flushed face as she lay shivering in bed, she was almost sure that it was the third.

As she approached the bed Mary said irritably, ‘I feel so ill, and I can’t stop coughing—it hurts.’

‘I’ll sit you up a bit,’ said Julia with a calm she didn’t feel. Sudden illness on a hospital ward was one thing, but in an isolated house cut off from the outside world, it was quite a different matter. She fetched more pillows and propped the girl up, took her temperature which was as high as she had expected it to be, and gave her a drink, while all the time she was deciding what to do. Presently, when Mary was as comfortable as she could be made, Julia said,

‘I’m going to send someone for the doctor—once we’ve got you on an antibiotic you’ll feel better within hours. Will you stay quietly until I come back?’

She found the stranger in the third room she looked into, lying on his back on a vast fourposter bed, fast asleep. She put out an urgent hand and tapped a massive shoulder and he opened his eyes at once, staring at her with a calm which she found most comforting.

Before she could speak he said reflectively, ‘The hair’s a little wild, but I still think you’re a beautiful girl. What’s the matter?’

Julia swept her long black hair impatiently on one side the better to see him. ‘My patient—she’s ill. I’m afraid I must ask you to go and find a doctor or a telephone or—or something. I can’t ask the ambulance men to go; they’ve got to go back to London today and they must have a night’s sleep.’

He had sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. ‘And I, being a man of leisure, am the obvious one to sacrifice on the altar of frostbite and exposure.’

Julia just stopped herself in time from wringing her hands. ‘I’d go myself, but who’s to look after Mary if I do?’

‘A moot point,’ he conceded, and stood up, reassuringly large. ‘And before I detect the first rising note of hysteria in your very delightful voice, I must tell you that I am a doctor.’

Julia’s first reaction was one of rage. ‘You beast,’ she said roundly, ‘letting me get all worried!’

He smiled at her and lifted her neatly to sit on the bed and then sat down beside her. ‘I am of the opinion that if I were not a doctor I should even now be meekly dressing myself, preparatory to tramping miles in search of aid, while you coped with great competence with whatever crisis has arisen. Now, let’s have the bad news.’

She shivered, and was glad when he put an arm around her shoulders.

‘My patient’s a diabetic—an unstabilised one. She had appendicectomy followed by peritonitis two weeks ago. She made a good recovery although she isn’t very co-operative and has had several slight comas. She wanted—insisted on coming home and it was arranged that she should travel from St Clare’s in London by ambulance. We had a job getting here, but on the whole she had a comfortable journey and her usual diet and insulin. Her TPR was normal last night. She’s loaded with sugar and acetone now and her temp’s a hundred and three.’

He got off the bed, taking her with him. ‘Well, you pop back to the patient and make soothing sounds while I put on some clothes and fetch my case—it’s locked in the car just outside the door.’ He gave her a gentle push. ‘Go along now, there’s a good girl.’

Mary was restless when Julia got back to her. She said as soon as she caught sight of her, ‘I’m going to die, and there isn’t a doctor.’

Julia gave her another drink of water and then went to build up the fire. ‘Yes, there is.’ She explained about his arrival during the night in a few brief words because Mary was too feverish to concentrate on anything. ‘He’ll be here in a moment,’ went on Julia soothingly, ‘he’ll take a look at you and then prescribe something which will have you feeling better in no time.’

She went and got the case history notes and the charts and diets she had prepared so carefully for the nurse who was to have taken over from her, laid them neatly on a table and then hastily plaited her hair. She had just finished doing that when the doctor knocked on the door and came in.

Not only had he donned his clothes, but a faultless professional manner with them, which somehow made the whole situation seem normal and not in the least worrying. He knew what he was about, for he dealt with his patient gently and with a calm air of assurance which convinced her that she was already getting better, and then went to bend over Julia’s papers, lying ready for them. When he had finished reading them he looked up and asked,

‘Is there a doctor’s letter?’

‘Yes,’ said Julia, ‘it’s in my room.’ She didn’t offer to fetch it. ‘I think I should see it—I’ll take full responsibility for opening it, Nurse. Would you fetch it?’

She did so without a word, not sure as to the ethics of the case, and stood quietly by while he read it. Which he did, refolding it into its envelope when he had finished and adding some writing of his own before handing it back to her.

‘Penicillin, I think, Nurse. Shall we give her a shot now and repeat it six-hourly? And the insulin—she’s been on Semilente, I see. We’d better increase it this morning and test every two hours until this evening. Now, diet…’

He went away when he had given Mary her penicillin and told her cheerfully that she would be out of bed in a couple of days, leaving Julia to reiterate all he had said before she went to dress. Once more in uniform and intent on perching her cap on her neatly arranged hair, she turned in surprise when there was a tap on her door.

‘Tea,’ said the stranger, ‘and if you’ll tell me where the ambulance men are I’ll wake them for you.’

Julia took the proffered cup. ‘How kind,’ she said with surprise, and felt suddenly downcast when he answered carelessly,

‘Oh, I’m handy about the house,’ for it made him sound as though he were married. She said hastily because she wanted to change the trend of her thoughts, ‘Is the weather better?’

He sat down on the end of the bed and started to drink the ambulance men’s tea. ‘No—the snow’s in drifts—the car’s almost covered and so is the ambulance. There’s no snow at present, but there’s more to come as far as I can see in this light. The fog has lifted, but the ground’s like glass.’

She sipped her tea. It looked as though they would be there for another day at least and she was surprised to find that she didn’t mind in the least. When he asked, ‘What’s your name?’ she answered without hesitation. ‘Pennyfeather, Julia Pennyfeather.’

‘Miss Pennyfeather—it is Miss?’

She nodded. ‘You’re drinking Willy’s and Bert’s teas,’ she pointed out.

‘I’m thirsty. Don’t you want to know my name?’

She nodded again.

‘Van den Werff—Ivo. Very nearly thirty years old and until now, a confirmed bachelor.’

She ignored her sudden delight. ‘Dutch?’ she hazarded. ‘Do you work in England—no, Scotland?’

‘I’ve been on a course at the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh. I’m on my way back to Holland, but I intend to spend a day or so in London before I cross.’

Julia drank her tea, conscious of a sense of loss because presently he would be gone and she would never see him again. He got up off the bed and picked up the tray with the two empty cups and went off.

Julia went downstairs herself a few minutes later and found the old man sitting by the gas stove, drinking tea. She said good morning pleasantly and was told there was nothing good about it, so she busied herself getting her patient’s diet and went back upstairs with it. It was another ten minutes by the time she had given the insulin and arranged Mary more comfortably to have her tea and bread and butter, and when she got back to the kitchen the old man had gone. She set about laying the table and got out the frying pan once more; lucky that there were plenty of eggs and a quantity of bacon, she thought, peering into the old-fashioned, roomy larder. She was making the tea when the three men came in, Willy and Bert very apologetic at having slept through the night’s calamities. They looked well rested though, and volunteered cheerfully to do any chores she might choose to set them.

Bert looked at Julia an asked worriedly, ‘And what’s to be done about you, Nurse? We’ll ‘ave to go the minute we can—will you be able to come with us? You can’t stay here alone.’

‘She won’t be alone.’ The doctor’s quiet voice sounded quite certain about that. ‘I’ll stay until the patient’s own doctor can take over and the nurse can get here.’

‘That’s quite unnecessary,’ said Julia quickly, ‘I’m perfectly able to manage…’ she remembered how she had awakened him that morning and went faintly pink, and before she could finish what she was going to say, Bert observed with obvious relief, ‘Ah, well, if the doc’s going to be ‘ere, that’s OK, ain’t it, Willy? Can’t do better than that.’

‘Then that’s settled,’ said Dr van den Werff, ignoring the light of battle in Julia’s fine eyes. ‘In any case, we can do nothing today except get this mausoleum warm. If the snow holds off we might reconnoitre later on…in the meantime shall we share out the chores?’

Something which he did with a pleasant authority which neither Willy nor Bert disputed, and which Julia, even if she had wished to do so, was unable to argue against because she had to go back to her patient, leaving him to explain to the old retainer, who had appeared from nowhere to join them at breakfast, just why they were forced to remain at Drumlochie House for at least another day.

CHAPTER TWO

JULIA HAD PLENTY to do, for not only did she have to see Mary comfortably settled and work out her diet for the day; there were meals to cook for the five of them as well. Fortunately she was a good cook; at one o’clock she was able to call them into a solid meal of soup, followed by bacon omelettes with jacket potatoes done in the Aga, and a baked rice pudding to follow, and when she would have apologised for the plainness of the fare they looked at her with astonishment, declaring that it was one of the best meals they had eaten for a very long time.

It was after this warming meal that Julia found herself with the doctor while he went over Mary’s tests and wrote up the insulin. Mary had responded very well to the penicillin; her chest condition had already improved, although she was sorry enough for herself, but she was too listless to complain about her diet, and for once there seemed no danger of her going into another coma. Julia had given her another penicillin injection at noon and rather to her surprise, her patient had made very little fuss about it and had even laughed a little at the doctor’s jokes when he came to see her. Julia stood by him while he wrote up the insulin chart for the rest of the day and as he was putting his pen away, said,

‘I—we are very grateful to you, doctor. Mary’s better, isn’t she?’

‘Yes.’ He gave her a thoughtful glance. ‘Are you in a hurry to be gone?’

‘If you mean do I have a job to go to, no. I left St Clare’s three days ago—I came here with Mary to oblige her parents—they’re abroad, and Matron…’

‘You’re going on holiday?’ He put the question so gently that she answered him without hesitation.

‘No, I’m going home to my brother’s—his wife—that is, he thinks it would be nice if I stayed with them for a bit and…’ She stopped, for she really had no intention of telling him anything about herself. ‘Oh, well,’ she finished airily, ‘it’s all arranged,’ and if she had expected him to press for more of an answer than that she was disappointed, for all he said was, ‘We’ve dug out the car and ambulance. If it doesn’t snow any more today Bert and Willy might get away in the morning.’

Julia was examining what he had written with unnecessary interest.

‘Did you mean what you said?’ she asked, not looking at him, ‘I mean about staying? Don’t you have to get home?’

‘I can’t very well leave my patient, can I?’ he wanted to know with an air of reasonableness which she found infuriating. ‘I can’t deny it’s most inconvenient, but then we’re all being inconvenienced, aren’t we?’ He gave her a sideways look. ‘Would you like to go for a walk?’

Julia gave him a surprised look and then said sensibly, ‘Yes, but I can’t—I haven’t any boots and I can’t leave Mary.’

‘We’ll get the old retainer to fit you out, and Bert and Willy can mount guard over Mary for an hour. You’ve got to get some fresh air some time.’

She was given no more chance to protest but caught firmly by the arm and walked back to the kitchen, where Bert and Willy immediately agreed to look after their patient and the old man, winkled out of some cosy haunt of his own, produced rubber boots which more or less fitted and a great hooded cape which reached her ankles and had obviously been cut to fit someone of majestic proportions. The doctor fastened the hood under her chin with a large safety pin Bert obligingly produced, got into his own outdoor clothes and opened the back door.

They made their way through the snow and, presently, out of the gate at the back of the garden. It led on to moorland, which, in the right kind of weather, must have contained magnificent views. Now only the nearest of the foot-hills could be seen. The Cheviots, she knew, were close but shrouded in the still lingering mist into which the trees ahead of them marched, to disappear into its gloom. ‘Do we know where we’re going?’ Julia asked with interest.

‘Vaguely. We’re quite safe as long as it doesn’t snow, and I don’t think it will.’ He took her arm to help her along and at the touch of his hand she felt a little glow of warmth deep inside her.

‘It’s only three weeks to Christmas,’ she observed, trying to ignore the glow. She would be with her brother and his family and his friend James would come over for Christmas dinner. She frowned at the thought and the doctor said, ‘And you’re not looking forward to it.’ It was a statement, not a question.

‘Well, no, not very. I’ve spent my last few Christmases in hospital and it was rather fun…’

‘But that’s not the reason.’

He was far too perceptive. Julia stood still and looked around her. ‘How quiet it is,’ she almost whispered. She looked up at the lowering sky too and her hood fell back. The doctor undid the safety pin and pulled it back over her black hair, then fastened the pin again and before she could turn her head away, bent down and kissed her.

‘Only a seasonal greeting,’ he explained gravely, and Julia striving to behave as she felt a sophisticated young woman should, said a little breathlessly, ‘Yes—well, should we be going back?’

He took no notice of this remark but tucked her hand in his and continued walking through the snow, while she, hampered by the boots which were a little on the large side, plodded beside him.

‘Tell me about yourself,’ he invited, and for a moment she was tempted to do just that—to tell him how she disliked the idea of going back to Stoke-cum-Muchelney, because she was afraid that she would never get away again, only if she married James. She looked sideways at the man beside her, comparing him with James, who came off very second best. James was already getting thin on top, while her companion had plenty of hair on his handsome head, of a pleasing fairness and elegantly cut; James hadn’t a square chin and his mouth was small and a little thick in the lip. The doctor had a firm, well-shaped mouth and his voice was pleasant too, deep and unhurried, and he didn’t say H’m each time he spoke. The thought that Doctor van den Werff would make the splendid husband of her vague dreams crossed her mind, to be dismissed immediately. He was a complete stranger—well, almost complete; she knew nothing about him, and, she told herself firmly, she didn’t intend to. In a couple of days’ time, when the nurse arrived and he could contact the doctor, he would go, and so would she, both to their respective worlds.

‘There’s nothing to tell,’ she replied with a cool politeness which wasn’t lost on him, for he said instantly, ‘Ah, yes—not my business, eh?’

He let go of her arm and stopped to scoop some snow into his gloved hand, looking at her and laughing as he did so, and she, guessing that the snowball was meant for her, made haste to dodge it, a difficult task with the boots hampering her every step. It would have been silly not to have defended herself, which she did with some success, for he was a large target and although quick on his feet, not quick enough. She tossed the snow at him with all the pleasure of a small child, laughing and shouting and momentarily forgetful of her prosaic future. Presently, still laughing and panting from their exercise, they turned back to the house.

The rest of the day seemed a little dull after that. Julia, her hair tidied once more and crowned with its nurse’s cap, returned to her patient, her pink cheeks and sparkling eyes belying the extreme neatness of her person, a fact which Bert and Willy duly remarked upon when she saw them. They had been discussing her, she sensed, as she entered the room, and they made no attempt to hide the fact from her, for Bert said at once,

‘We were wondering, Willy and me, if we ought ter go—it don’t seem right, leaving you alone. Yer don’t mind staying—just with the doc, I mean?’

Julia smiled very nicely at him. ‘No,’ she said gently, ‘I don’t mind, Bert. In fact I shall feel quite safe.’

“E seems a nice sort of fellow,’ said Willy, ‘even though ‘e is a foreigner.’ He got up and went to the door. ‘If yer’re quite happy about it, Nurse?’

She answered him seriously. ‘If I weren’t, Willy, I should have asked you both to stay. What time do you expect to leave in the morning?’ She frowned. ‘I must write to Sister…’

‘Eight o’clock or thereabouts. We’ll go back the way we came, though the Carlisle road isn’t all that far, but it wouldn’t be easy to reach. The doc says he’ll come a bit of the way with us, just in case we get stuck. We’re going to ring Miss Mary’s doctor for him too, so’s ‘e can come over just as soon as the road’s clear. Doc’s written it all down for us. I’m to tell ‘im you’re ‘ere as well.’

Julia said uncertainly, ‘Oh, are you? I never thought of that.’ Nor had she. It seemed Doctor van den Werff had taken the welfare of his fellows very much to heart; she felt pretty certain that when the time came, he would arrange for her departure, buy her ticket and see that she had enough money for necessities on the journey back. Which reminded her, she had a little money with her, but not nearly enough to take her back to London. She would have to borrow, and from the doctor, for it was unthinkable to ask her patient for it and the old retainer was equally impossible. The family doctor might be of help, but she disliked asking for a loan from a stranger. That Doctor van den Werff was a stranger too had for the moment escaped her.

Mary woke up and Julia, who had been standing idly by the window, went to draw up the penicillin before getting her patient’s tea and then, when the doctor obligingly said the he would sit with Mary, went down to the vast kitchen to get supper for the rest of them.

She was up early the next morning making sandwiches for the two ambulance men and filling the thermos and then cooking as generous a breakfast as she dared for them. The food was getting a bit low by now, although she would be able to go on making bread for some time, and there were plenty of potatoes, but there was Mary to think of, for as soon as she had recovered from her broncho-pneumonia she would want to eat again. Julia had set aside as much as possible for her, which meant that she and the doctor and Hamish would have to make do with a restricted though ample enough diet.

The morning was a mere glimmer at the end of the long night when she went to the door to see the men off. They wrung her hand, took the letter she had written and trudged through the frozen snow towards the stable. The doctor followed them. He had hardly spoken during breakfast, but now he paused at the door. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can,’ he said cheerfully, ‘but don’t worry if I don’t turn up until later in the day—we might get held up with the drifts and have to dig ourselves out. If I can get as far as the main road I’ll try and find out what’s happening about the telephone, or get a message into Hawick. The men will telephone there from Newcastle anyway, but I don’t think we should leave any stones unturned, do you?’

Julia asked, ‘Will you be able to telephone your family in Holland? Won’t they be worrying?’ and went faintly pink when he said coolly, ‘Time enough for that, Miss Pennyfeather—we have to get you settled first, don’t we?’

He grinned suddenly, turned on his heel and set out into the icy morning.

The house was very quiet when they had gone. She had listened to them starting up the ambulance and then the car and, minutes later, their horns blaring a goodbye to her as the noise of the engines became fainter and fainter and then ceased altogether, leaving her lonely.

But there wasn’t much time for loneliness; there was Mary to see to and the rooms to tidy and the food cupboard to be frowned over once more. Hamish had brought in some more eggs, but everything else was getting on the low side, though there was plenty if someone arrived that evening and brought food with them, but Julia had looked out of the window as soon as it was light and had been disquieted by the grey sky with its ominous yellow tinges streaking the horizon, and the wind was getting up again as well. She went back to Mary’s room and built up a magnificent fire as though by so doing she could ward off the bad weather she guessed was coming.

The wind began to whine in real earnest about three o’clock and the first snowflakes whirled down, slowly and daintily at first and then in real earnest. It didn’t look as though the nurse would arrive that day, nor the cook and the maid, nor, for that matter, thought Julia gloomily, Doctor van den Werff. He was probably stuck in some drift miles from anywhere; she was thankful that she had made him take some sandwiches and a thermos too.

She took Mary’s tea up presently, to find her awake and more cheerful, and she was still with her when she heard the car return. It was dark outside and the fast falling snow almost obliterated its headlights as it went past the house in the direction of the stables. Julia left Mary to finish her tea and went downstairs, her cape held close against the draughts, and reached the kitchen as the doctor came in from outside, bringing a rush of cold air in with him.

Julia went to the stove and opened one of the plates so that the singing kettle could boil. ‘I thought you’d never get here,’ she said, trying to make her voice light.

The doctor took off his coat and shook a quantity of snow from it on to the floor, then hung it on the back of a chair where it began to steam. Only then did he speak, and the extreme placidity of his voice annoyed her.

‘My dear Miss Pennyfeather,’ he remarked, ‘I told you that I should come,’ which calm and brief speech caused her to burst out, ‘Well, I know you did, but sitting here waiting for you isn’t the same…’

‘Waiting for me, were you? I’m flattered—at least I should have been in any other circumstances. Unfortunately the telephone wires are still down—I wasted a great deal of time. Still, the snow ploughs have been out on the main road.’ He sat down at the table and she realised that this meagre information was all she was going to get about his day. She poured him some tea from the pot she had just made and offered him bread and jam.

‘Is the weather very bad?’ she wanted to know.

‘Quite nasty, but I don’t fancy it’s going to last. Has everything been all right here?’ He glanced at Hamish, who nodded before Julia could answer. ‘Aye, the fires are lit, and there’s plenty of wood. I’ll kill a chicken tomorrow.’

The doctor nodded. ‘Good idea—otherwise I’ll have to go out with a gun.’

‘What,’ said Julia indignantly, ‘and shoot any small creature, half-starved and frozen?’

He didn’t laugh at her. ‘I shouldn’t enjoy it,’ he said gently, ‘but we have to eat. But don’t worry, if Hamish here lets us have a chicken we’ll do very well for a couple of days—Mary can have it too.’

Julia agreed, wondering the while what Mary’s mother would say when she arrived home and found no food in the cupboards and several beds in use. But of course they would all be gone by then and she herself would never know, she would be in Somerset and this strange adventure would be a dream—so would the doctor. She sighed and got up to refill the teapot.

She had tucked Mary up for the night and had gone to her room to sit by the fire before beginning the chilly business of undressing when there was a knock on the door and the doctor came in.

‘Mary?’ asked Julia as she started to her feet.

‘No—she’s asleep, I’ve just been to look. I want to talk to you and your room is warmer than mine—do you mind if I come in?’

Julia felt surprise, pleasure and finally a faint excitement which she firmly suppressed. She sat down again. ‘There’s a chair in that corner, it’s larger than the others,’ she said sensibly.

His lips twitched, but he went obediently and fetched it, sat down opposite her and began without preamble.

‘The reason I was going to London before returning to Holland was in order that I might engage a nurse to take back with me. There is a young lady staying with my family—an English girl who contracted polio just before I came over to Edinburgh. She went to hospital, of course, but now she is back with us, but I hear that she is very bored with only my sister to talk to, for she doesn’t care to learn Dutch. She’s convalescent and has made a splendid recovery which I feel could be hastened even more by having someone with her to whom she could talk freely.’

He paused and looked across at Julia, his eyebrows lifted in an unspoken question.

‘Me?’ asked Julia, and felt a pleasant tingle of excitement.

‘Yes—it would save me hunting around in London, and I think that you may suit admirably. You are very much of an age and capable with it. If you could see your way to coming for a few weeks? I know it is sudden, but I fancy you wouldn’t mind overmuch if you didn’t go to your brother’s. Am I right?’

‘Yes—I don’t want to go in the least,’ she said bluntly, ‘but I really should.’

‘Forgive me, but is your brother not able to afford a nurse for his wife, or help of some sort?’

She flushed. ‘Yes, of course he can, only I expect he feels it’s a waste of money to pay someone when there’s me.’

‘So you would have no feeling of—er—guilt if you were not to go?’

Julia was a little surprised to find that she didn’t feel in the least guilty. She said briefly, ‘No.’

‘Then, Miss Pennyfeather, will you come? I know this is a most irregular way of offering a job, but in the rather peculiar circumstances in which we find ourselves…you trust me?’

Julia looked startled. ‘Trust you? Of course I trust you.’ Her voice sounded as startled as her face. ‘I hope I shall suit your patient.’

She hoped that he might give her a few more details, but it seemed that he didn’t intend doing so, not at that moment anyway, for he went on to ask her if she had a passport and would she mind being out of England for Christmas.

She said a little breathlessly, for she was still surprised at herself for her rash acceptance of a job she knew nothing about, ‘Yes—I’ve a passport, it’s with my things in London. I’ve never been out of England at Christmas time, but I don’t suppose I shall mind.’

‘No? I daresay you’ll find it much the same as in England. We have the same family gatherings, but I don’t think we put quite such emphasis on presents. We have St Nikolaas, you see, earlier in the month.’

She nodded, having only a slight inkling of what he was talking about. She had heard of St Nikolaas, naturally, and she knew all about his white horse and Black Peter, but that was already over and done with; it was almost Christmas. A Christmas she might enjoy much more than if she went to her brother’s.

His voice cut through her thoughts with a gentle persistence she couldn’t ignore. ‘If I might have your attention, Miss Pennyfeather? We shall have to stay here until such time as the nurse, the doctor and the servants arrive, then I propose to drive down to London where you can collect your clothes and whatever else you want. We can cross from Harwich when it suits us and drive home from there.’

Julia watched him put another log on the fire. ‘I don’t know where you live.’

‘Near Tilburg, a small town called Oisterwijk. I work at the hospital in Tilburg—I’m an anaesthetist. I also go once a week to Breda and s’Hertogenbosch and occasionally to Eindhoven. My father has a practice in which I am a partner and when he retires I shall take it over. My sister runs the household and I have two brothers younger than I—one is married, the youngest is still finishing his post-graduate course at a Utrecht hospital.’

‘And my patient?’

He gave her a sharp glance and took so long in replying that she thought that probably he was deciding what to tell her. ‘Miss Marcia Jason,’ he said at length, ‘who was staying with us when she was taken ill. We are all very fond of her, and to get her completely well again is our dearest wish.’

Julia ignored the pang she felt at his words, for she suspected that it had something to do with the doctor being fond of his patient… It was extremely foolish of her to get interested in him. She told herself that it was only because they had been thrown together in trying circumstances that she felt…she decided not to pursue her train of thought and looked up to see the doctor regarding her steadily. ‘And now,’ he invited, ‘tell me something of yourself.’

To her surprise she did, although she hadn’t really meant to. Out it all came, her brother and Maureen and her home and how lovely the garden was in the summer and how awful London was if you hadn’t anywhere to go—and James. He didn’t speak, just sat and listened as she enlarged upon James and his tedious perfections. ‘He’s s-so right always,’ she ended, ‘and so dreadfully patient and good when I lose my temper. He says I’ll be better when we settle down: But I don’t want to settle down—not with him.’

‘Have you anyone in mind?’ queried her companion mildly.

She said uncertainly, ‘No—oh, no,’ and knew in her heart that it wasn’t quite true. James and Maureen and her brother too had told her a great many times that there was no such thing as love at first sight; love came gradually, they had explained patiently, and Julia, an unwilling listener, had considered that it all sounded rather dull. She had said so, passionately, and they had smiled at her with pitying coolness. She said now, ‘I shouldn’t have said all that about James.’ She gave the doctor a direct look. ‘It was disloyal.’

He smiled nicely. ‘No. As far as I can judge, you owe this James nothing, and you can be sure that I’ll forget everything about the tiresome fellow, and I suggest that you do too, otherwise you’ll find yourself living in a semi-detached with a great deal to do and a string of babies.’

‘But I like babies!’

He closed his eyes. ‘So do I, Miss Pennyfeather. How delightful that we agree upon such an important aspect of life. If we persevere we shall undoubtedly find other things just as important.’

Julia stared at him, her lovely eyes wide. As though it mattered if they agreed about anything! The fewer things the better, she was inclined to think, bearing in mind Miss Marcia Jason…

‘Is she pretty?’ she asked suddenly. The doctor looked as though he was laughing silently, but he had that sort of face, anyway.

‘Very,’ he answered without hesitation, ‘small and fair, with large blue eyes. She has an extremely intelligent brain.’

‘Has the polio affected her badly?’

‘Luckily the damage is slight. It’s a question of constant encouragement, that’s why I thought a nurse, someone sensible and her own age, would give her the stimulus she needs for the last few weeks of convalescence.’

Julia nodded while she seethed. She had had her share of men friends, none of whom had ever called her sensible in that matter-of-fact voice. She gave him a cross look and went scarlet when he added, ‘Not that being sensible is your only attribute, my dear young lady, but it is the only one which applies in this case, I think.’ He got up, taking his time, and at the door he said, ‘Let us pray for good weather so that we may get away from here as soon as possible; I have never suffered so many draughts. Goodnight, Miss Pennyfeather.’

It snowed again the next day, but late in the afternoon the weathered cleared and at teatime Hamish offered the information that the worst was over, and neither Julia nor Doctor van den Werff thought to question his pronouncement, for after all, he had lived in the Border country all his life, and he should know. As if to bear him out the radio in the doctor’s car proclaimed exactly the same state of affairs, if in somewhat more elaborate language, adding a rider to the effect that telephone communications were being reinstated as quickly as possible. But the telephone at Drumlochie House remained silent and no one arrived, which wasn’t surprising, for the snow plough hadn’t got so far.

The snow plough, however, came the next morning and Doctor van den Werff went up to the road and brought the driver back for coffee. The road was clear, the man told them, at least a narrow lane of it, and once on the main road the going wasn’t too bad, although he warned them about skidding and went on to relate, to the delight of old Hamish, several unfortunate incidents which had occurred owing to the bad weather; he would have gone on for some time in like vein had not the doctor reminded him that he still had the stretch of road to Hawick to clear. When he had gone the doctor looked at his watch and remarked. ‘He should be there by midday or a little after. I should think we might expect someone by this evening. It is to be hoped that the telephone will be working again before then so that I can talk to Mary’s doctor—he should have had my message by now, that is, if Bert managed to get it to him.’

The doctor didn’t telephone, but came in his car with Jane and Madge sitting inside it. By the look on their faces, Julia thought that perhaps the journey hadn’t been all that smooth, a supposition the doctor bore out with forceful language when he got out of the car. ‘But I got your message,’ he said as he looked round the hall for Doctor van den Werff, who wasn’t there, ‘and I came as soon as I could—I had no idea…is Mary all right?’

Julia, easing him out of his duffle coat, said that yes, she believed so and that Doctor van den Werff would have heard the car and would be in to tell him all he wished to know. She then offered everyone tea, introduced herself to Jane and Madge, begged them to go and get warm in the kitchen and then inquired of the doctor if he had brought any food with him.

‘In the boot, I’ll bring it in presently, Nurse.’ He turned away as Doctor van den Werff walked in and Julia made her escape, leaving them to introduce themselves, for she had no idea of the doctor’s name.

They were drinking tea while Julia apologised for the amount of food they had eaten during their stay, when the two men came in with the air of people who were quite satisfied with each other. She poured them each a cup, offered a plate of scones and murmuring something about seeing to Mary, went upstairs, followed almost immediately by Jane and Madge, who made much of the invalid and listened with patience to her highly coloured version of her journey home. They rose to go at length, promising supper within a couple of hours, and went away, discussing the merits of a nice toad-in-the-hole as opposed to Quiche Lorraine. Scarcely had they gone when the two doctors presented themselves at the door and spent half an hour examining their patient and studying charts after which her own doctor pronounced himself well satisfied as to her condition and promised to be out the following morning. ‘And the nurse,’ he observed, ‘I fancy she’ll be here very shortly,’ he smiled at Julia. ‘You’ll be free to go, Nurse, with my grateful thanks.’

Julia murmured a reply, thankful that she had made up the bed in the room next to hers. She would get someone to light a fire there as soon as possible. The doctor shook her hand in a powerful grip, thanked her once more and went downstairs. Presently she heard his car making its careful way back to the road.

When she went downstairs presently the doctor was nowhere to be seen, but when she went into the hall she heard his voice in the sitting room, an icy apartment which housed the telephone which she was pleased to see he was using. He looked up as she went in and said cheerfully,

‘We’re on again, and the wind has brought back the electric too.’ He got up and came towards her. ‘What do you think of Doctor MacIntory?’

Julia looked at him, her head a little on one side. ‘He seemed very nice—so that’s his name. Do you plan to go tomorrow if the nurse comes tonight?’

He nodded. ‘If you have no objection, I’m anxious to get home.’ He smiled suddenly and because his smile gave her a faintly lightheaded sensation, she said the first thing which came into her head. ‘What sort of car have you got?’ she wanted to know.

‘Come and see,’ he invited, and went to fetch the cloak hanging behind the kitchen door and wrapped her in it and gave her his hand to hold because the steps were ice-covered again. The stable was gloomy and cold and could have housed half a dozen motor cars; there was only one there now—the doctor’s and well worth housing. It was a Jensen Interceptor, gleaming and sleek and powerful. She walked round it exclaiming, ‘What a lovely car—how fast does she go?’

He laughed. ‘Just over a hundred and thirty miles an hour, but we’ll be lucky if we manage fifty in this weather.’

Julia withdrew her head from the interior of the car and turned to look at him. She said politely, ‘Look, I’m sure you’re anxious to be gone. Would you like to go now? There’s nothing to keep you, you’ve seen the doctor and done more than you need…the nurse might not come…I can go back by train.’

She got no further, for the doctor had her by the shoulders and was shaking her gently. ‘I have no patience with you,’ he said a trifle testily. ‘Of course I’m anxious to get home, but you don’t really think that I would go just like that and leave you here? Besides, I like company on a long journey and I should have to wait for you in London.’ His hands tightened on her shoulders as he bent his head to kiss her. ‘Have you forgotten, Julia, that I’ve engaged you to look after Marcia?’

Being kissed like that had made her forget everything, but it didn’t seem very wise to say so. She withdrew a little from him and said in a commendably sensible voice, ‘No, of course I hadn’t.’ A very large image of the beautiful Miss Jason floated before her eyes. She said firmly, ‘I think I must go and see how Mary…’ then paused, frowning. ‘I can hear…there’s a cat here,’ she said quickly. ‘Oh, the poor thing!’

The doctor went past her to a corner of the stable. ‘Yes, there is,’ he said casually. ‘At least, there are five—mother and kittens—look!’

Julia peered down into the apple box filled with straw which he indicated, and the mother cat, with the kittens crawling around her, peered back. Julia said in a voice soft with pity, ‘Oh, please can’t we take them inside and feed them?’

‘She’s the stable cat and won’t stay in the house. I found the box for her before the kittens arrived and I’ve fed her regularly. She’s fine. I’ll tell Jane or Madge to keep an eye on them when we go.’

Julia stooped and put out a finger, and the cat licked it politely and then turned to the more urgent business of washing her kittens. Julia stood up and looked at her companion. ‘You’re very kind. A lot of men wouldn’t have bothered,’ she said. ‘Why didn’t you tell me? I could have fed her.’

‘You had enough to do. You’re a practical young woman, aren’t you, Julia?’

Part of her mind registered the pleasing fact that he had called her Julia twice within a few minutes while she replied, ‘I don’t know—I suppose being in hospital makes one practical.’ She started walking towards the door. ‘Do you think the nurse will come today? It’s already five o’clock and very dark.’

The doctor opened the stable door before he replied. The wind was slight but icy cold and Julia shivered and wrapped her voluminous cape more closely round her as they made their way back to the house.

‘I should think the trains are running,’ said the doctor. ‘She’s coming straight from Edinburgh to Hawick and if the doctor could get through so can a taxi.’

It seemed his words were to be ratified. Barely an hour later a car rolled to a halt at the front door. Julia heard it from Mary’s room where she was doing the evening chores, and hurried downstairs to welcome the arrival, but Doctor van den Werff had heard the taxi too and was already there, talking to a small woman, who could have been any age from forty to fifty, and whose pleasant face lighted up with a smile when she saw Julia. The doctor performed the introductions smoothly, giving them barely time to utter the most commonplace civilities before suggesting that the kitchen might be a warmer place than the draughty hall.

‘Oh, how thoughtless of me,’ cried Julia, ‘you and the driver must be frozen!’ She led the way to the kitchen. ‘I’m sure Jane won’t mind if I make you some tea.’ She arranged Miss MacBonar on one side of the stove and the driver on the other and went to where Jane was making pastry at the table.

‘You don’t mind,’ she begged that lady, ‘if they sit here get warm, and would you mind very much if I made them some tea? I’m afraid we’ve used the kitchen to live in while you’ve been away.’

Jane smiled. ‘Aye, it’s a cold house, Nurse—it’s been none too easy for you, I daresay. And don’t worry about the tea. Madge made it when she heard the taxi. Should I keep the driver here for his supper, do you think? It’ll be easier going on the way home if he’s got something hot inside him.’

‘What a good idea. I’m going back to Miss Mary now and then I’ll come back and take Miss MacBonar up to meet her. I expect you know that the doctor and I are leaving tomorrow?’

Madge gave her a quick glance. ‘Aye, he told me. A kind gentleman he is, ye’ll have a safe journey with him.’

Julia said a little shyly, ‘Yes, I’m sure I shall,’ and made her way through the icy hall and up the stairs to Mary, who was sitting up in her chair by the fire, demanding to know exactly what the new nurse was like.

‘Nice,’ said Julia promptly. ‘If I were ill I should like her to nurse me—I’m going to fetch her in a few minutes and then I’ll get your supper and take her down to have supper with us.’ She picked up the insulin syringe. ‘Now roll up your sleeve, Mary—it’s time for your injection.’

Nurse MacBonar and Mary took to each other on sight; Julia left them together while she went down for Mary’s tray and having settled that young lady to her satisfaction, took her colleague along to her own room to give her the details of her patient. ‘And your room’s next door,’ she explained, ‘and I’m sure if you don’t like it no one will mind if you change. I’m afraid we just took the first ones we saw when we arrived. There’s a fire going and I’ve put a hot water bottle in the bed. I wondered if you would like half an hour to yourself until supper? I’ll come and fetch you.’

They went downstairs together a little later to find that the table had been laid in the dining room, a forbidding apartment with a great many hunting trophies on its walls and a quantity of heavy mahogany furniture arranged very stiffly beneath them. But there was a fire in the hearth and the supper was ample and well cooked. The three of them sat at one end of the large oval table and Nurse MacBonar told them at some length and a good deal of dry humour of her difficulties in reaching them.

‘But I hear from Doctor MacIntory that you had your ups and downs too,’ she remarked cheerfully. ‘I can imagine how you felt when you arrived,’ she looked at them in turn. ‘Did you get here to together?’

It was the doctor who answered. ‘No, for I am on my way to London from Edinburgh—I got hopelessly lost, and how I got here I have no idea, but Miss Pennyfeather was kind enough to take me in…’

‘Weren’t you scared?’ inquired Miss MacBonar of Julia. ‘A strange man coming to the door like that?’

Julia avoided the doctor’s eyes. ‘I was so cold and tired I didn’t think about it,’ she confessed, ‘otherwise I daresay I should have been frightened.’

‘Oh well,’ said Miss MacBonar comfortably, ‘it was only the doctor here, so there was no need.’

This time Julia glanced up to find him watching her and although his face showed nothing of it, she knew that he was laughing silently. He said pleasantly, ‘You invest me with a character I fear I cannot lay claim to. Miss Pennyfeather, who has had to put up with me these last few days, could tell you how tiresome I can be at times.’

Nurse MacBonar chuckled. ‘Aren’t all men tiresome at some time or another?’ she wanted to know. ‘Not that the world would be much of a place without them, and I should know—I’ve buried two husbands. Are either of you married?’

Julia shook her head and the doctor murmured in a negative manner.

‘Ah, well, your turn will come. Do you plan to leave early?’

Doctor van den Werff picked up his fork preparatory to demolishing the portion of bread and butter pudding Julia had just handed to him.

‘Eight o’clock—that will allow for any small hold-ups on the way.’ He looked at Julia with lifted brows. ‘That is if our Miss Pennyfeather is agreeable?’

Julia, smouldering inwardly at being addressed as our Miss Pennyfeather, said coolly, ‘Yes, quite, thank you,’ and then addressed herself to Miss MacBonar. ‘I’ll call you before I go, shall I? Mary sleeps until eight or thereabouts, so you’ll have plenty of time to dress.’

They separated to go their various ways after supper. Julia to get Mary into bed and settled for the night.

She was a little silent as she went quiet-footed about the room putting everything to rights. Her patient lay watching her and then asked, ‘Aren’t you excited about tomorrow? Lucky you—all day with Ivo.’

‘Ivo?’ asked Julia.

‘Doctor van den Werff, silly. Isn’t it a nice name? I like him, don’t you?’

Julia, looking for a clean nightie for her patient, agreed. ‘Oh, yes, and you have cause to be grateful to him too.’

‘Well, I am. I told him so. I’m grateful to you too. Have I been a good patient?’

Julia looked across the room at her charge, a little wan still but pretty for all that. She said generously, ‘Yes, you have. It hasn’t been much fun for you, has it, but you’ve stuck to your diet like a brick and not fussed over your injections. Go on being good, won’t you? Nurse MacBonar is nice, don’t you think? We both like her very much and she’ll look after you splendidly, and if you keep to your diet and do as you’re told you’ll be able to lead the same life as any of your friends.’

‘Yes, Ivo told me that too. I’ll try. I like you, Nurse Pennyfeather—I like Ivo too. You’d make a handsome pair.’ She narrowed her blue eyes and stared at Julia, who stared back, mouth agape.

‘We’d what?’ Julia reiterated.

‘Make an awfully handsome pair. I can just see you coming down the aisle together, you with your eyes sparkling like they do when you’re pleased and happy and your cheeks all pink, and him, proud and smiling.’

Julia contrived a laugh, a very natural one considering her heart leapt into her throat and was choking her. She said with admirable calm, ‘Go on with you, Mary, it’s your own wedding you should be thinking about, not anyone else’s. Now go to sleep, because I shall wake you early to say goodbye in the morning.’

They wished each other goodnight and Julia, as it was still early, went along to Miss MacBonar’s room, trying to dismiss Mary’s words from her mind and failing utterly.

Her colleague had finished unpacking and had arranged her small possessions around her so that the room looked almost cosy. She looked up as Julia knocked and went in and said, ‘There you are, dear. Should we go down and have a last word with the doctor? I think he expects it.’

Julia ran a finger along the carved back of the rather uncomfortable chair she was leaning against. ‘He doesn’t expect me,’ she said positively, ‘but I’m sure he’d like to see you—last-minute things,’ she added vaguely. ‘Doctor MacIntory said he’d be along tomorrow if we’ve forgotten anything. The charts are in the table drawer in Mary’s room, and I’ve brought the insulin and syringe with me—I keep them in my room, here they are.’

She handed them over and Nurse MacBonar nodded understandingly and got to her feet. ‘Then I’ll pop along then and see that nice doctor of yours.’ She beamed at Julia as they went out of the room together. ‘You won’t come too?’

‘No, I don’t think so. I’m tired,’ said Julia mendaciously. They wished each other goodnight and she went along to her room and started to undress slowly, oblivious of the room’s chill. She wasn’t tired at all. There was no reason at all why she shouldn’t have gone downstairs with Nurse MacBonar, at least no reason she was prepared to admit, even to herself.

CHAPTER THREE

IT WAS COLD and dark when they left the next morning after the ample breakfast Madge had insisted upon them eating. And the road was like a skating rink. Julia clutched her hands tightly together under her cloak, sitting very stiff and upright beside the doctor, expecting every minute to go off the road or land upside down in a ditch.

‘Sit back,’ commanded her companion quietly, ‘nothing’s going to happen. You aren’t frightened?’

‘I’m terrified!’ declared Julia.

‘You must have realised that it would be like this?’

‘Yes, of course I did.’ She spoke crossly.

‘And yet you came with me?’

‘Well, I—I’m sure you’re a good driver,’ she answered lamely.

‘So you trust me as a driver as well. Good. Go on trusting me, Julia. Lean your head back and relax—I shan’t take any risks.’

She did as she was told and found to her surprise that after a little while she was actually enjoying the nightmare journey in an apprehensive sort of way, and when presently the doctor asked her if she was warm enough and then went on to talk about a hundred and one unimportant things, his quiet voice never altering its placid tones, flowing on through even the most hair-raising skids, she found herself answering him in a quite natural voice, and if her lovely face was a little paler than usual, there was no one to remark upon it.

Once on the main road the going was easier, although woefully slow in places so that when they reached Newcastle the doctor judged it wise to order sandwiches with their coffee in case it might prove difficult to stop later on.

The M1, when they got to it, was almost clear of snow, however, although lumps of it, frozen solid, added to the hazards of the already icy surface, but traffic was sparse at first and there was no fog so that they made good progress; so much so that south of Doncaster the doctor suggested that they should stop for lunch.

‘There’s a place I’ve been to before,’ he said, ‘a mile or two off the motorway. I think it’s called Bawtry.’

It was pleasant to get off the monotonous highway for just a little while, and the old coaching inn where he stopped looked inviting.

‘I’m sorry about my uniform,’ said Julia as they went inside. ‘I don’t look very glamorous.’

He gave her a sideways glance. ‘And what makes you think that I like a glamorous companion?’

She said in a prosaic voice, ‘I thought men did.’

He took her arm because the pavement was still slippery. ‘Not always,’ he said, half laughing, ‘in any case you’ve no need to worry; with your looks you could get away with anything you choose to put on.’

He said it so carelessly that she felt doubtful if he meant it as a compliment. She sighed and he said at once, ‘You’re tired, you need a meal.’

The food was good and the dining room pleasantly warm. They ate roast beef with all its traditional accompaniments washed down with burgundy, and while the doctor contented himself with the cheese board, Julia, who had a sweet tooth, applied herself to a chocolate soufflé. She ate with relish and as she put down her fork, remarked, ‘You know, food you haven’t cooked yourself always tastes different—besides, we had rather a monotonous diet at Drumlochie House, didn’t we?’

‘But excellently cooked. We were all glad there was no bread, yours was so delicious.’

‘I enjoyed baking it,’ said Julia simply. ‘What time shall we get to London?’

‘Almost a hundred and sixty miles—it’s hard to say. Three hours normally, but I should think we might double that allowing for slow going and hold-ups. Getting bored?’ he asked with a smile.

Julia shook her head, wishing very much to tell him that she was enjoying every minute of his company. Instead she remarked, ‘Not in the least. I like motoring, though I don’t do so much of it.’

‘Hasn’t James got a car?’

She pinkened. ‘Yes—a Morris, but he doesn’t believe that you should travel fast on the roads nor that you should use a car solely for pleasure.’

The doctor choked. ‘Good God—what kind of pleasure?’

‘Well, short trips to the sea, somewhere where we could do the shopping at the same time, and—and picnics…’

‘Sandwiches and a thermos flask?’ he wanted to know.

‘Yes. James considers eating out is a great waste of money.’ Her already pink cheeks went a little pinker. ‘Oh, I beg your pardon, that sounds rude and ungrateful just after you’ve given me such a gorgeous lunch. I—I didn’t mean that at all; I love eating out and driving miles. I’d forgotten what fun it was.’ She sounded wistful.

‘I can see that I shall have to rescue you from James.’

‘How?’

‘By a method which will prove quite infallible.’ The doctor’s voice was light. Julia decided that he was joking. She asked equally lightly,

‘Do tell me.’

He shook his head, ‘No—not yet, but I promise it will work.’

They got up to go and Julia, still persisting, asked, ‘You mean if I take a job away from home for a long time he might forget me?’

‘Something like that.’

The short winter’s day was already dimming although it was barely two o’clock. Julia looked anxiously at the sky as they got into the car. ‘It’s not going to snow again, is it?’ she asked worriedly.

‘I shouldn’t think so. If it does and it gets too bad we’ll just have to stay the night somewhere, but I don’t think that will he necessary.’

She settled down as he started the car, drawing her cloak around her, thankful for the warmth and comfort. Presently she closed her eyes; they were back on the M1 once more and there was nothing to see, only the road running ahead of them and the traffic weaving in and out of the lanes in a never-ending, tiring pattern. The doctor was doing a steady fifty, overtaking whenever he had the opportunity; he didn’t seem disposed to talk. She opened her eyes and peeped at him once; his good-looking profile looked stern and thoughtful. Immersed in dreams of Miss Marcia Jason, thought Julia pettishly, and closed her eyes again, sternly dismissing her own dreams. She opened them a few moments later, aware of something wrong, although the man beside her had made no sound. They were on the point of passing an articulated lorry and as she looked behind her the doctor accelerated to a sudden breathtaking speed, sliding ahead of it with seconds to spare as a car, roaring down the motorway, passed them within inches. Julia caught a glimpse of its occupants laughing and waving. ‘That was a bit near,’ she said in a voice which quavered just a little. ‘I’m glad you’re a good driver.’

The doctor sounded grim. ‘Yes, so am I—they’re the sort who cause a pile-up. He passed us at over a hundred and twenty.’

‘What were we doing when you overtook?’ Julia wanted to know.

He grinned. ‘Never you mind,’ he replied, ‘but it was either that or being pushed into the next world…’ He broke off and said something harsh and sudden in his own language, and Julia watched with silent horror as the car, careering madly half a mile ahead of them, tried to pass a huge transport which was on the point of crossing into the fast lane, and even as she watched she was aware that the doctor had slowed and was edging back on to the slow lane and on to the hard shoulder of the road, to stop close to the appalling chaos.

The transport driver, in a last-minute attempt to avert disaster, had slewed to his left, but the oncoming car had been too fast for him. It was wedged, no longer recognisable as a car, under the huge back wheels, its recent occupants lying untidily around it. Even as they were looking, two more cars crashed into it.

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