Marrying Mary

Marrying Mary
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. A Perfect Wife?Everyone in her family had agreed that Mary Pagett would one day make some man a perfect wife. The problem was that the only man Mary had ever even thought about marrying was eminent heart specialist Roel van Rakesma.But it had been clear from the start that his only interest was in curing frail hearts, not broken ones!

“I cannot think why you persist in annoying me, Professor van Rakesma.” (#u348ad889-0932-5278-a85d-45070d7f3ff8)About the Author (#uc893a1f0-198a-5ea9-8835-247352baf5a1)Title Page (#u2d419dea-3601-54f5-ba8c-dba1527c1e8e)CHAPTER ONE (#u070faa61-50fa-555c-8388-be4624a51167)CHAPTER TWO (#u9761010b-99cd-5b90-bdac-1265a4b71a14)CHAPTER THREE (#u3fd81cf0-d8a5-5b5b-b13c-18d5268390e5)CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

“I cannot think why you persist in annoying me, Professor van Rakesma.”

“I am not sure myself,” he told Mary mildly. “You are a perpetual thorn in my otherwise disciplined life.” He turned to look at her. “To mix my metaphors, you are like a sore tooth that I’m unable to leave alone.”

Her brown eyes flashed with temper “Well, a thorn, indeed, a sore tooth—whatever next. I should like to know?”

“I’ve been wondering that myself. Do you suppose we might cry quits and become friends?”

Friends, thought Mary wildly Who wants to be friends? And he’s almost a married man.

“Certainly not.”

“You don’t like me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Good, in that case let us at least assume an armed neutrality.”

About the Author

BETTY NEELS spent her childhood and youth in Devonshire, England before training as a nurse and midwife. She was an army nursing sister during the war, married a Dutchman and subsequently lived in Holland for fourteen years. She lives with her husband in Dorset, and has a daughter and grandson. Her hobbies are reading, animals, old buildings and writing. Betty started to write on retirement from nursing, incited by a lady in a library bemoaning the lack of romantic novels.

Marrying Mary

Betty Neels

CHAPTER ONE

MARY PAGETT, stripping a bed with energy, was singing at the top of her voice. Not because she was happy, but to quell the frustration within. For her father—that charming but absent-minded man—to invite Great Aunt Thirza to spend her convalescence at his home had been a misplaced kindness, bringing with it a string of inconveniences which would have to be overcome.

For a start Mrs Blackett, who came daily to oblige and suffered from a persistent ill temper, was going to object to peeling more potatoes and scraping more carrots, not to mention the extra work vacuuming the guest bedroom. And Mr Archer, the village butcher, was going to express hurt feelings at the lack of orders for sausages and braising steak, since Great Aunt Thirza was a vegetarian, and for reasons of economy the rest of the household would have to be vegetarian too.

There was her mother too—Mary’s voice rose a few decibels—a lovable, whimsical lady, whose talent for designing Christmas cards had earned her a hut in the garden to which she retired after breakfast each day, only appearing at meals. Lastly there was Polly, her young sister, who was a keen and not very accurate player of the recorder; her loving family bore with the noise but Great Aunt Thirza was going to object ...

Mary finished making the bed, cast an eye over the rather heavy furniture in the high-ceilinged room, with its old-fashioned wallpaper and wooden floor, sparsely covered by elderly rugs, and hoped that the draughts from the big sash windows opposite wouldn’t be too much for her elderly relation.

The house—a mid-Victorian rectory built for an incumbent with a large family—wasn’t all that old. After standing empty for some years it had been bought by her father, since it had been a bargain at its low price. But he, an unworldly man, had not taken notice of the size of its rooms, which made heating the place almost hopeless, or the lack of maids, or the fact that coal for the enormous grates was a constant drain on the household purse—nor had he considered the amount of gas and electricity which was needed.

He had his study, where he worked on his book, and Mary’s pleas for someone to clear the drains, paint the doors and put tiles back on the elaborate roof fell on deaf ears.

Her father was a dear man, she reflected, but unworldly. He was devoted to his wife and children, but that had never prevented him from delegating the mundane responsibilities of a married man to someone else and, since Mary was so conveniently there, they had fallen to her.

It had happened very gradually; she had left school with hopes of going on to university, but her mother had been ill and her two brothers had been home, and someone had had to feed and look after them—besides which Polly had still been a little girl. Her mother had got better, the boys had gone to Cambridge, but no one had suggested that Mary might like to do anything but stay home and look after them all. She had stayed quite willingly since, despite its drawbacks, she loved the shabby old house, she liked cooking, and she even liked a certain amount of housework.

So the years had slipped quietly by, and here she was, twenty-four years old, a tall, splendidly built girl with a lovely face, enormous brown eyes and an abundance of chestnut hair, her face rendered even more interesting by reason of her nose, which was short and tip-tilted. It went without saying that the men of her acquaintance liked her, admired her and in two cases had wished to marry her. She had refused them kindly and remained firm friends, acting as bridesmaid at their weddings and godmother to their children.

There was Arthur, of course, whom she had known for years—a worthy young man who rather took it for granted that one day she would marry him, and indeed from time to time she had considered that possibility. He would be a splendid husband—faithful and kind even if a bit bossy. He was also a shade pompous and she had doubts as to what he would be like in ten years’ time.

Besides, she had no intention of marrying anyone at the moment; the boys were away from home but Polly was thirteen—too young to be left to the care of a fond but unworldly mother and a forgetful father. Right at the back of her head was the half-formed wish that something exciting would happen—something so exciting and urgent that her prosaic plans would be dashed to pieces...

The only thing that was going to happen was Great Aunt Thirza, who was neither of these things, but a cantankerous old lady who liked her own way.

Mary went down to the kitchen and broke the news to Mrs Blackett, who paused long enough in her. cleaning of the kitchen floor with far too wet a mop to scowl at her and grumble with such venom that her dentures got dislodged.

‘As though we ’aven’t got enough on our ‘ands. And it’s no good you expecting me to do more for you than what I do now.’ She gave a snort of ill humour and sloshed more water over the floor.

Mary, side-stepping the puddles, made soothing noises. ‘When you’ve finished the floor,’ she said cheerfully, ‘we’ll have a cup of tea. I wouldn’t expect you to do more than you do already, Mrs Blackett, and I dare say that Great Aunt Thirza will spend a good deal of time resting.’

Knowing that lady, she thought it unlikely, but Mrs Blackett wasn’t to know that, and the latter, calmed with a strong cup of tea and a large slice of cake, relating the latest misdemeanour of Horace, her youngest, became sufficiently mollified to suggest doing a bit extra around the house. ‘I’d stay for me dinner and do a couple of hours in an afternoon—it’d ’ave to be a Tuesday or a Wednesday, mind.’

Mary accepted her offer gratefully. ‘It will only be for a week or two, Mrs Blackett.’

‘Where’s she coming from, then?’

‘She’s in St Justin’s. Her housekeeper will take whatever clothes she needs to the hospital and an ambulance will bring her here.’ Mary gave a very small sigh. ‘Tomorrow.’

‘You’ll want more spuds,’ said Mrs Blackett. ‘Going ter get a nice bit of ’am?’

‘Well, I’m afraid that Mrs Winton is a vegetarian...’

‘I don’t ’old with them,’ said Mrs Blackett darkly.

Nor did Mary, although she sympathised with their views.

She took a basket from the hook behind the kitchen door and went down the garden to pick beans, pull new carrots and cut spinach. Thank heaven it was early summer and her small kitchen garden was flourishing, although she would have to go to the greengrocer presently and get more vegetables, as well as beans and lentils and spaghetti. She hoped that Great Aunt Thirza would like that, though she was doubtful if anyone else would.

Before going back into the house she stopped to look around her. The house was on the edge of Hampstead Heath, with Golders Green not far away, and the garden offered a pleasant view and she stood admiring it. It would be nice to spend a day in the country, she reflected, and thought of her childhood, spent in a rambling cottage in Gloucestershire.

They might still be there but for the fact that her father had needed to be nearer the British Museum so that he could do his research and her mother had wanted a closer contact with the agent who sold her cards. Polly hadn’t been born then, and although it hadn’t mattered much to the boys, who had been at boarding-school anyway, Mary had taken some time to settle down at her new school and make new friends.

She went back indoors and presently out to the butcher, where, since it was likely to be the last meat they would have for a while, she bought steak and kidney in a generous amount and bore it home. It was a warm day for steak and kidney pudding but she was rewarded that evening by the pleasure with which it was received.

‘Everything all right, dear?’ asked her mother, and before she could reply added, ‘I’ve had a letter from Mr Thorne—the agent—he’s got me a splendid commission. I shall have to work at it, though—you’ll be quite happy with Great Aunt Thirza?’

Mary assured her that she would. She wasn’t surprised to hear from her father that he would be away all day at the British Museum. ‘But I’ll be home in time to welcome Thirza,’ he said. ‘Make her comfortable, won’t you, my dear?’

‘I’ll play her “Greensleeves”,’ offered Polly.

‘That’ll be lovely, darling,’ said Mrs Pagett. ‘It’s so nice that you’re musical.’

Mrs Winton arrived the next day in nice time for tea. She was tall and thin with a high-bridged nose, upon which rested her pince-nez, and she wore a beautifully cut coat and skirt of the style fashionable in the early decades of the century, and crowned this with a wide-brimmed straw hat. She had the same kind of hat, only in felt, during the winter months.

Mary had gone to the door to meet her and watched while the ambulancemen settled her into a chair and trundled her over.