The Most Marvellous Summer

‘A fractured pelvis, cracked ribs, starved and very, very dirty. He’ll live.’

‘May he stay here? What will happen to him? Will it take long? If no one wants him I’m sure Father will let me have him…’

‘He’ll stay here until he’s fit and he’ll be well looked after. I should suppose he’ll be fit, more or less, in a month or six weeks.’ Mr Scott-Thurlow paused and then went on in a resigned voice, ‘I have a Labrador who will be delighted to have a companion.’

He was rewarded by an emerald blaze of gratitude. ‘Oh, how good of you; I’m not sure what kind of a dog he is but I’m certain that when he’s well again you’ll be proud of him.’

Mr Scott-Thurlow doubted this but forbore to mention it. ‘Were you on your way back to Kensington? I’ll run you there; Mrs Venables may be getting anxious.’

‘Oh, I don’t suppose so,’ said Matilda airily. ‘We may do as we please during the day, you know, unless there is some suitable young man coming to lunch. Do you know Mrs Venables?’

They had reached the door but he made no move to open it. ‘I have a slight acquaintance. Rhoda knows her quite well, I believe.’

‘Oh, then I expect you will be at the dinner party next week—a kind of farewell before we go back to Abner Magna.’

He had categorically refused to accompany Rhoda when she had told him of the invitation. Now, on second thoughts, he decided that he would go with her after all.

He opened the door. ‘Then we shall meet again,’ he said as they reached the car. Before he drove off he reached for the phone and said into it, ‘I shall be half an hour late—warn everyone, will you?’

He drove off without a word, leaving Matilda guessing. Was he a barrister, defending some important client, she wondered, or someone in the banking world, making decisions about another person’s money? It would be a clerk at the other end, middle-aged, rather shabby probably with a large family of growing children and a mortgage. Her imagination ran riot until he stopped outside the Kensington house, bade them a polite goodbye and drove off.

‘He doesn’t talk much, does he?’ Roseanne wanted to know. ‘I think I’m a bit—well—scared of him.’

Matilda looked at her in astonishment. ‘Scared? Of him? Whatever for? I dare say he was wrapped up in some business transaction; of course he didn’t want to talk. Anyway you’ll change your mind next week—he’s coming to your godmother’s dinner party, so we shall see him then.’

She saw him before then.

The days had passed rapidly, too fast for Roseanne, not fast enough for Matilda; she wanted to go home—London, she felt, wasn’t for her. True, while she was there there was always the chance that she would see Mr Scott-Thurlow, but what was the use of that when he was going to marry Rhoda? A girl who was undoubtedly beautiful, clever and wore all the right clothes regardless of expense. She and Roseanne had gone shopping, gone to more exhibitions than she could count, seen the latest films and plays and accompanied Mrs Venables on several occasions when that lady, an enthusiastic member of several committees, introduced them to their various other members, mostly middle-aged and not in the least interested in the two girls. Roseanne found them a waste of time when she might have spent it in the company of her Bernard.

There were only a few days left now and preparations for the dinner party that night were well ahead. They were finishing their breakfast, which they took alone since Mrs Venables had hers in bed, when the dining-room door was thrust open and the kitchen maid—who should have known better, as Roseanne was quick to point out—rushed up to the table.

‘It’s Cook—cut herself something awful and the others down at the market getting the food for tonight. Whatever shall I do?’

‘My dear good girl,’ began Roseanne, looking alarmingly like her mother, but she was not allowed to finish.

‘I’ll come and look, shall I?’ suggested Matilda calmly. ‘If it’s very bad we can get her to the hospital, but perhaps it looks worse than it is.’

Cook was sitting at the table, her hand wrapped in a teatowel. She was a nasty green colour and moaning faintly. Matilda opened the towel gently, making soothing noises the while. There was a lot of blood, but if it was a deep cut she could tie the hand up tightly and get a taxi to the nearest hospital. Since both of her companions were on the edge of hysteria she told them bracingly to close their eyes and turned back the last of the towel. She would have liked to have closed her eyes too; Cook’s first and second fingers had been neatly severed just above the second joints. Matilda gulped and hoped her breakfast would stay down.

‘Milly—it is Milly?—please go and ring for a taxi. Be quick and say that it’s very urgent. Then come back here.’

‘Is it a bad cut?’ asked Roseanne from the door. ‘Should I tell Aunt Maud?’

‘Presently. I’ll go with Cook to the nearest hospital and perhaps you’ll tell her then.’ She glanced at the girl. ‘Would you get a shawl or something to put round Cook?’

‘There’s blood everywhere,’ said Roseanne, and handed over a cape hanging behind the door, carefully looking the other way.

Matilda hung on to her patience. ‘Thanks. Now find a table napkin or a scarf and look sharp about it…’

‘No one speaks to me like that,’ declared Roseanne.

‘Don’t be silly! I dare say you’ll find a cloth of some sort in that cupboard.’

Roseanne opened drawers in an aggrieved manner and came back with a small teacloth. It was fine linen and beautifully embroidered and Matilda fashioned it into some kind of a sling, draped the cloak round Cook’s shaking shoulders and propelled her gently out of the kitchen across the hall and out to the waiting taxi. They left a trail of red spots across the floor and Matilda heard Milly’s gasp of horror.

‘The nearest hospital,’ urged Matilda, supporting a half-fainting and sturdily built Cook, ‘as quick as you can.’

The cabby drove well, taking short cuts, cutting corners, beating the lights by a hair’s breadth. At the Casualty entrance they got out and he got out too and between them they got poor Cook in to Casualty.

There was a young man standing talking to a nurse near the door. Matilda paused by him. ‘Would you please pay the cabby? I’ll let you have the money as soon as I can leave Cook.’

He looked astonished, paid the man while Matilda offered hasty thanks, then took his place on the other side of Cook.

‘She’s cut off her fingers—two of them—they’re there, inside the towel. Could someone get a doctor?’

‘That’s me. Casualty officer on duty. Let’s have her in here.’

The place was half full, patients on chairs waiting to be seen, nurses going to and fro, several people on trolleys and a fierce-looking sister coming towards them.

‘Well, what’s this?’ she wanted to know and with a surprising gentleness turned back the towel. She lifted Cook’s arm and pressed the bell beside the couch and, when a nurse came, gave her quick instructions and then glanced at the young man.

‘Shall I get her ready for Theatre? Nurse is taking a message—the quicker the better.’

Matilda was holding the other hand and Cook was clinging to it as though she would never let it go. Her skirt and blouse were ruined and her hair was coming down but she didn’t give them a thought. She felt sick.

The shock of seeing Mr Scott-Thurlow in a long white coat over an excellently tailored grey suit dispelled the sickness. He was coming towards them with calm speed and fetched up beside the couch. He gave her a cool nod and she said in a wondering voice, ‘Oh, I’ve been wondering just what you did…’ and blushed scarlet as he gave a faint smile as he bent over Cook. The casualty officer was doing things—a tourniquet?—some kind of pressure so that the bleeding wasn’t so bad any more and Sister was handing swabs and instruments to Mr Scott-Thurlow. Matilda, feeling sick again, looked at the curtains around the couch.

She heard him say, ‘Right, we’ll have her up right away, please, before I start my list. Warn Theatre, will you?’ He bent over Cook. ‘Don’t worry too much, my dear, I’m going to stitch your fingers on again and you can stay here for a few days while they heal. Nurse is going to give you a little injection now to help the pain.’ He patted her shoulder. ‘You’re very brave.’

He spoke to Matilda then. ‘What did she have for breakfast?’ he wanted to know.

‘I don’t know, but she would have had it quite early—about seven o’clock. She was slicing bacon with one of those machines…’

Matilda felt cold and looked green; the thought of the bacon had been too much. ‘I’m going to be…’

Mr Scott-Thurlow handed her a bowl with the manner of someone offering her a hanky she might have dropped or a glass of water she had asked for. He was just in time.

There was someone beside her, a young nurse being sympathetic and helpful, and when Matilda lifted a shamed face everyone had gone.

‘Don’t worry,’ said the nurse, ‘there’s somewhere where you can wait and I’ll get someone to bring you a cup of tea. Mr Scott-Thurlow is going to operate at once so you’ll know what’s happening quite soon. Do you want to phone anybody?’

‘Yes, please, only I haven’t any money.’

She was led away to a rather bare room lined with benches with a kind of canteen at one end and two telephones on the wall. The nurse gave her twenty pence, patted her on the shoulder in a motherly fashion and hurried away.

She phoned Mrs Venables. ‘How could she?’ cried that lady in an outraged voice. ‘When we have the dinner party this evening and absolutely no chance of getting a cook at such short notice. What am I to do? She must have been careless—’

‘She’s cut off two fingers,’ said Matilda. ‘I’ll stay here until I know what is happening to her. She’s been very brave.’