Ring in a Teacup

‘But what a nice man to get you another lot—he sounds a poppet.’

Lucy said that probably he was, although she didn’t believe that Mr der Linssen was quite the type one would describe as a poppet. Poppets were plump and cosy and good-natured, and he was none of these. She read his letter, sitting on the kitchen table eating the bits of pastry left over from the pie her mother was making, and had to admit that it was a very nice one, although she didn’t believe the bit where he wrote that he admired her for bravery. He hadn’t admired her in the least, on the contrary he had complained that she smelt of fish…but the flowers had been lovely even if he’d been doing the polite thing; probably his secretary had bought them. She folded the letter up carefully. ‘He sent me some flowers,’ she told her mother, ‘but I expect he only did it because he thought he should.’

Her mother put the pie in the oven. ‘I expect so, too, darling,’ she said carefully casual.

Lucy was still sitting there, swinging her rather nice legs, when her father came in to join them. ‘Never let it be said,’ he observed earnestly, ‘that virtue has no reward. You remember my friend Theodul de Groot? I’ve just received a telephone call from him; he’s in London attending some medical seminar or other, and asks particularly after you, Lucy. Indeed he wished to know if you have any holiday due and if so would you like to pay him a visit. Mies liked you when you met seven—eight? years ago and you’re of a similar age. I daresay she’s lonely now that her mother is dead. Do you have any holiday, my dear?’

‘Yes,’ said Lucy very fast, ‘two weeks due and I’m to take them at the end of next week—that’s when I come off night duty.’

‘Splendid—he’ll be in London for a few days yet, but he’s anxious to come and see us. I’m sure he will be willing to stay until you’re free and take you back with him.’

‘You would like to go, love?’ asked her mother.

‘Oh, rather—it’ll be super! I loved it when I went before, but that’s ages ago—I was at school. Does Doctor de Groot still practise?’

‘Oh, yes. He has a large practice in Amsterdam still, mostly poor patients, I believe, but he has a splendid reputation in the city and numbers a great many prominent men among his friends.’

‘And Mies? I haven’t heard from her for ages.’

‘She helps her father—receptionist and so on, I gather. But I’m sure she’ll have plenty of free time to spend with you.’

‘Wouldn’t it be strange if you met that lecturer while you were there?’ Mrs Prendergast’s tone was artless.

‘Well, I shan’t. I should think he lived in London, wouldn’t you?’ Lucy ran her finger round the remains of custard in a dish and licked it carefully. ‘I wonder what clothes I should take?’

The rest of her nights off were spent in pleasurable planning and she went back happily enough to finish her night duty, her bruises now an unpleasant yellow. The four nights went quickly enough now that she had something to look forward to, even though they were busier than ever, what with a clutch of very ill babies to be dealt with hourly and watched over with care, and two toddlers who kept the night hours as noisy as the day with their cries of rage because they wanted to go home.

Lucy had just finished the ten o’clock feeds on her last night, and was trying to soothe a very small, very angry baby, when Mr Henderson, the Surgical Registrar, came into the ward, and with him Mr der Linssen. At the sight of them the baby yelled even louder, as red in the face and as peppery as an ill-tempered colonel, so that Lucy, holding him with one hand over her shoulder while she straightened the cot with the other, looked round to see what was putting the infant into an even worse rage.

‘Mr der Linssen wants a word with you, Nurse Prendergast,’ said the Registrar importantly, and she frowned at him; he was a short, pompous man who always made the babies cry, not because he was unkind to them but because he disliked having them sick up on his coat and sometimes worse than that, and they must have known it. ‘Put him back in the cot, Nurse.’

She had no intention of doing anything of the sort, but Mr der Linssen stretched out a long arm and took the infant from her, settling him against one great shoulder, where, to her great annoyance, it stopped bawling at once, hiccoughed loudly and went to sleep, its head tucked against the superfine wool of his jacket. Lucy, annoyed that the baby should put her in a bad light, hoped fervently that it would dribble all over him.

‘Babies like me,’ observed Mr der Linssen smugly, and then: ‘I hear from Mr Trevett that you are going to your home tomorrow. I have to drive to Bristol—I’ll give you a lift.’

She eyed him frostily. ‘How kind, but I’m going by train.’ She added: ‘Beaminster’s rather out of your way.’

‘A part of England I have always wished to see,’ he assured her airily. ‘Will ten o’clock suit you?’ He smiled most engagingly. ‘You may sleep the whole way if you wish.’

In other words, she thought ungraciously, he couldn’t care less whether I’m there or not, and then went pink as he went on: ‘I should much prefer you to stay awake, but never let it be said that I’m an unreasonable man.’

He handed the baby back and it instantly started screaming its head off again. ‘Ten o’clock?’ he repeated. It wasn’t a question, just a statement of fact.

Lucy was already tired and to tell the truth the prospect of a long train journey on top of a busy night wasn’t all that enthralling. ‘Oh, very well,’ she said ungraciously, and had a moment’s amusement at the Registrar’s face.

Mr der Linssen’s handsome features didn’t alter. He nodded calmly and went away.

CHAPTER TWO

LUCY SAT stiffly in the comfort of the Panther as Mr der Linssen cut a swathe through the London traffic and drove due west. It seemed that he was as good at driving a car as he was at soothing a baby and just as patient; through the number of hold-ups they were caught up in he sat quietly, neither tapping an impatient tattoo with his long, well manicured fingers, nor muttering under his breath; in fact, beyond wishing her a cheerful good morning when she had presented herself, punctual but inimical, at the hospital entrance, he hadn’t spoken. She was wondering about that when he observed suddenly: ‘Still feeling cross? No need; I am at times ill-tempered, arrogant and inconsiderate, but I do not bear malice and nor—as I suspect you are thinking—am I heaping coals of fire upon your mousy head because you dropped off during one of my lectures…It was a good lecture too.’

And how did she answer that? thought Lucy, and need he have reminded her that her hair was mousy? She almost exploded when he added kindly: ‘Even if it is mousy it is always clean and shining. Don’t ever give it one of those rinses—my young sister did and ended up with bright red streaks in all the wrong places.’

‘Have you got a sister?’ she was surprised into asking.

‘Lord, yes, and years younger than I am. You sound surprised.’

He was working his way towards the M3 and she looked out at the river as they crossed Putney Bridge and swept on towards Richmond. She said slowly, not wishing to offend him even though she didn’t think she liked him at all: ‘Well, I am, a bit… I mean when one gets—gets older one talks about a wife and children…’

‘But I have neither, as I have already told you. You mean perhaps that I am middle-aged. Well, I suppose I am; nudging forty is hardly youth.’

‘The prime of life,’ said Lucy. ‘I’m twenty-three, but women get older much quicker than men do.’

He drove gently through the suburbs. ‘That I cannot believe, what with hairdressers and beauty parlours and an endless succession of new clothes.’

Probably he had girl-friends who enjoyed these aids to youth and beauty, reflected Lucy; it wasn’t much use telling him that student nurses did their own hair, sleeping in rollers which kept them awake half the night in the pursuit of beauty, and as for boutiques and up-to-the-minute clothes, they either made their own or shopped at Marks & Spencer or C.&A.

She said politely: ‘I expect you’re right’ and then made a banal remark about the weather and presently, when they reached the motorway and were doing a steady seventy, she closed her eyes and went to sleep.

She woke up just before midday to find that they were already on the outskirts of Sherborne and to her disjointed apologies he rejoined casually: ‘You needed a nap. We’ll have coffee—is there anywhere quiet and easy to park?’

She directed him to an old timbered building opposite the Abbey where they drank coffee and ate old-fashioned currant buns, and nicely refreshed with her sleep and the food, Lucy told him about the little town. ‘We don’t come here often,’ she observed. ‘Crewkerne is nearer, and anyway we can always go into Beaminster.’

‘And that is a country town?’ he asked idly.

‘Well, it’s a large village, I suppose.’

He smiled. ‘Then let us go and inspect this village, shall we? Unless you could eat another bun?’

She assured him that she had had enough and feeling quite friendly towards him, she climbed back into the car and as he turned back into the main street to take the road to Crewkerne she apologised again, only to have the little glow of friendliness doused by his casual: ‘You are making too much of a brief doze, Lucy. I did tell you that you could sleep all the way if you wished to.’ He made it worse by adding: ‘I’m only giving you a lift, you know, you don’t have to feel bound to entertain me.’

A remark which annoyed her so much that she had to bite her tongue to stop it from uttering the pert retort which instantly came to her mind. She wouldn’t speak to him, she decided, and then had to when he asked: ‘Just where do I turn off?’

They arrived at the Rectory shortly before two o’clock and she invited him, rather frostily, to meet her family, not for a moment supposing that he would wish to do so, so she was surprised when he said readily enough that he would be delighted.

She led the way up the short drive and opened the door wider; it was already ajar, for her father believed that he should always be available at any time. There was a delicious smell coming from the kitchen and when Lucy called: ‘Mother?’ her parent called: ‘Home already, darling? Come in here—I’m dishing up.’

‘Just a minute,’ said Lucy to her companion, and left him standing in the hall while she joined her mother. It was astonishing what a lot she could explain in a few seconds; she left Mrs Prendergast in no doubt as to what she was to say to her visitor. ‘And tell Father,’ whispered Lucy urgently, ‘he’s not to know that I’m going to Holland.’ She added in an artificially high voice: ‘Do come and meet Mr der Linssen, Mother, he’s been so kind…’

The subject of their conversation was standing where she had left him, looking amused, but he greeted Mrs Prendergast charmingly and then made small talk with Lucy in the sitting room while her mother went in search of the Rector. That gentleman, duly primed by his wife, kissed his youngest daughter with affection, looking faintly puzzled and then turned his attention to his guest. ‘A drink?’ he suggested hospitably, ‘and of course you will stay to lunch.’

Mr der Linssen shot a sidelong glance at Lucy’s face and his eyes gleamed with amusement at its expression. ‘There is nothing I should have liked better,’ he said pleasantly, ‘but I have an appointment and dare not stay.’ He shot a look under his lids at Lucy as he spoke and saw relief on her face.

Her mother saw it too: ‘Then another time, Mr der Linssen—we should be so glad to give you lunch and the other children would love to meet you.’

‘You have a large family, Mrs Prendergast?’

She beamed at him. ‘Five—Lucy’s the youngest.’