Victory for Victoria

‘I never—’ she began, and then remembered that she had asked him quite a lot and closed her pretty mouth firmly, thinking better of it.

‘Have you had tea?’ His voice was pleasantly friendly.

‘No—that is, I had some in a mug while I was changing.’

He nodded with the air of a man who was in the habit of drinking his own tea in such a manner. ‘I’ve brought a picnic basket with me, I thought we might run a little way out of town and have tea in the car and then go on somewhere for dinner.’ He glanced sideways at her and smiled. ‘Unless there’s something else you would rather do?’

There was nothing else that she would rather do; she said so.

‘Good—let’s go, then.’

It was the evening rush hour; she was relieved to find that not only did he drive very well indeed; he displayed none of the irritation or impatience she had come to expect from anyone negotiating London at such times; moreover he talked as he drove, an unhurried flow of smalltalk which put her at her ease. St Judd’s was in the East End, or almost so. He had left that part of the city far behind and was across the river, travelling in a south-western direction when she remarked: ‘You know London very well.’

‘You sound surprised.’ He didn’t give her any reason, though, but went on: ‘There’s a quiet pub at Abinger, we’ll go down through Leatherhead and turn off as soon as we can find a reasonably quiet spot for tea, and then go on to Abinger Hammer. I presume you don’t have to be in at ten o’clock or whenever you have your curfew.’

Victoria chuckled. ‘I’m exempt. Once we’re trained we’re allowed to stay out until a reasonable hour.’

He said ‘Good’ as he edged the car past a loaded van and then a string of slow-moving cars, and after a minute or two when it became apparent that he wasn’t going to say anything else for the time being, Victoria ventured: ‘Was it just…I mean, were you surprised to see me?’

‘I’m surprised each time I set eyes on you—you’re very lovely. You must get a little bored with being told that by all the men you meet.’

She remembered the last man to say that to her, Doctor Blake, and how she had hated it, yet now she was glowing with delight. She said with admirable calm: ‘It’s according to who says it, and if I were with my sisters no one would think of saying any such thing—they’re beautiful.’

He glanced at her. ‘Yes, they are.’ He turned the car off into a side road whose signpost said Walton-on-the-Hill, but after half a mile he turned it again, this time into a mere lane, saying: ‘Somewhere here, I should think, wouldn’t you? I’m not quite sure where we are, but we can look at the map presently.’

It was quiet and the late afternoon had brought a wintry nip with it. The doctor stretched behind him and produced a tea basket from the back of the car. ‘Do you want to stay in the car or shall we try outside?’ he enquired.

‘Outside,’ said Victoria promptly. ‘We can always get back in if it gets too cold, can’t we?’ She looked around her. ‘Look, there’s a little hollow there under the hedge, it shouldn’t be too bad.’ She looked up at him, laughing. ‘It’s fun, isn’t it, having a picnic tea at half past six in a dropping temperature?’

He laughed too as he got out to open her door and help her out and picked up the basket. ‘Yes,’ he said slowly, ‘but I fancy anything with you would be fun, Victoria.’

They had reached the little hollow and she stood looking down at her shoes, conscious of her quickened heartbeats. She said rather shyly:

‘It was strange that we should meet again,’ and looked at him startled when he gave a great rumble of laughter.

‘No,’ he said, still laughing, ‘not strange at all. I had this meeting arranged with Sir Keith Plummer; I had seen you board the boat for Weymouth and I heard your mother telling you to be sure and have breakfast on the train. I gambled on it being the London train and I already knew that you were a nurse.’

‘Oh? How?’

‘My friends knew someone who knows your father. It was only a question of enquiring at the London hospitals.’

She gaped at him. ‘You mean you didn’t know I was at St Judd’s? But you asked Kitty if there was a copper-headed nurse…’

He stared back at her, his eyes glinting with amusement. ‘I had resigned myself to visiting each hospital in turn, but luck was on my side, wasn’t it? You were in the very first one, and one, moreover, in which I have every right to be.’ He spread a rug on the bank and put the basket beside it and observed placidly: ‘You must be dying for your tea. Sit down and we’ll have it now or we shan’t have an appetite for dinner.’

Victoria sat down with the speechless obedience of a little girl while she sorted out the muddled thoughts surging around her head.

‘Why did you do it?’ she enquired at length.

He opened the hamper and took out the flask of tea and two cups as well as a variety of tidily wrapped sandwiches. He undid them, poured the tea, added milk and sugar, handed her a cup and proffered one of the packets, with the remark that the sandwiches were cucumber. She took one mechanically, feeling a little breathless and at a complete loss, an experience she had until then not had. She took a bite and drank some tea. ‘I still don’t see why…’ she began.

‘No? Never mind, let’s enjoy ourselves and be glad that we have been fortunate enough to meet again. Tell me about your work.’

He sounded like a big brother or a kindly uncle; she tidied away her disturbing, exciting thoughts and told him while he plied her with delicate sandwiches and little cakes and tea, which even from a thermos tasted delicious. He didn’t eat much himself, but Victoria hardly noticed that, for she was telling him all about the hospital and why she had trained as a nurse and how much she loved her home, but presently she came to a stop, peered at him through the gloom and asked: ‘And you? What part of Holland do you come from, and are you going to be in England long?’

‘The Hague. I have a practice there, though my home is just outside—in Wassenaar. My parents live in Leiden, my father is a doctor but more or less retired—he does consulting work and sits on various committees, and when I am away, as I am from time to time, he helps out with my practice. I have two brothers and two sisters, all younger than I, and all married.’ He paused and she knew that he was smiling at her through the dusk. ‘There, have I not answered all your questions before you could ask them?’

‘No—well, that is, almost. Are you here to lecture or were you on holiday in Guernsey?’

‘I’m here for a few days before I go up to Birmingham and Edinburgh and then back home. I was on holiday in Guernsey—I have friends there.’

Victoria started to re-pack the hamper. ‘You must be very clever,’ she began, ‘to lecture, you know. Are you older than you look?’

She heard his rumble of laughter. ‘That’s a difficult question, for I have no idea how I look, have I?’ He leaned over and fastened the tea basket and put out a hand to help her to her feet. ‘I’m thirty-five, give or take a month or two—almost eleven years older than you.’

She stopped in her tracks. ‘How did you know that?’

‘Oh, a friend of a friend, you know.’ His voice sounded casual as he opened the car door for her and then went to put the tea things in the boot. In the car beside her again he looked at his watch. ‘I booked a table for eight o’clock—supposing we cut down behind Hindhead and circle back?’

‘That would be nice, Doctor…’

‘My name’s Alexander,’ he prompted her mildly. ‘You may have noticed that I call you Victoria, for I find myself quite unable to address you as Miss Parsons. What are your sisters’ names?’

Victoria told him; she told him how old they were too and what they did with their days and how clever Amabel was with her sketching and what a formidable couple Stephanie and Louise were on the tennis court. One thing led to another; by the time they arrived at the Abinger Hammer, she had told him a great deal without being aware of it; it was only afterwards she realised that he had told her only the barest facts about himself.

They had leisurely drinks in the bar of the peaceful old pub and dined off Chicken Savoyarde, followed by chocolate roulade washed down with white burgundy. They went back into the bar for their coffee, sitting at a little table in the now crowded room with so much to talk about that they hardly noticed the cheerful noise around them. It was only when the landlord called, ‘Time, gentlemen, please,’ that Victoria broke off in mid-sentence. ‘It can’t be as late as that already,’ she exclaimed. ‘We’ve never been here as long as that?’

Doctor van Schuylen laughed. ‘Indeed we have. Are you in a hurry to get back?’

‘No—’ She paused. ‘That is, I mustn’t be too late because I’m on in the morning and I must make up a clean cap…’

He laughed again and she flashed at him: ‘That sounds like a silly excuse, but it isn’t.’

He stared at her across the table. The gleam in his eyes could have been amusement, she didn’t know, but perhaps it wasn’t after all, for he said gravely: ‘I know it isn’t, Victoria, I know you well enough for that.’ He smiled gently at her and her heart rocked against her ribs.

‘I shall take you straight back and you shall make up your cap and have your beauty sleep—not,’ he added softly, ‘that you need it.’

‘Oh, I do,’ she contradicted him, ‘it’s been quite a day on the ward.’

Just as though she hadn’t spoken, he added: ‘You’re beautiful enough as it is.’

She got into the car wordlessly. That was the second time he had called her beautiful and she was astonished at the delight she felt—just as though he were the first man ever to have said so. She considered the idea for a moment; he was the first man—none of the other men counted any more.

She was rather quiet on the trip back because she had a good deal to think about, but he didn’t seem to notice, rambling on in a placid fashion about topics which must have been of so little importance that she was unable to remember anything about them later, only the pleasant sound of his voice—a quiet, calm voice, and deep. She liked listening to it.

They arrived back at St Judd’s just before midnight and although she hastened to say: ‘Don’t get out—I’m going through the hospital to the Home,’ he ignored her and got out too and walked with her to the big front doors. When she thanked him for her evening he said:

‘It was delightful—I shall remember it while I’m away.’