When May Follows

‘Well, the Professor did say something about it…’

There was another howl of laughter. ‘Kate, you don’t call him Professor, do you? What’s his name—what do you talk about?’

‘The weather,’ said Katrina guilelessly.

The afternoon went quickly. She handed over to Julie at five o’clock, did a final round to wish the patients goodnight, and went off duty. She had plenty of time, time to lie for ages in the bath, make up her lovely face at her leisure and wind her hair into its intricate chignon before putting on the organza dress. It was a lovely thing, patterned in shades of amber and brown with a square yoke and a waist tied by long satin ribbons, its balloon sleeves ending in tight bands at her elbows. Her slippers were exactly right with it, as was the brown marabou stole she dug out from the back of the wardrobe.

He had said half past seven, and she took care to be on time this evening, even though she was held up for a few minutes by some of her friends who had come to inspect her outfit. Their cheerful teasing voices followed her down the stairs and then were abruptly shut off by the nurses’ home door. It was quiet as she went through the hospital corridors: it was visiting time again and nurses would be at first supper while the rest finished the tidying up for the day. The sudden lack of voices worried her. Supposing he wasn’t there? Supposing she had made a mistake in the evening—supposing he hadn’t meant it? All silly ideas, but all the same they loomed large. Just until she came in sight of the entrance, to see him standing there, enormous, reassuringly calm and very elegant indeed.

His hullo was friendly, as was his: ‘How charming you look, Katrina, and punctual too.’

She wondered fleetingly if he said that to all the girls he took out, for undoubtedly there must be girls… She said, ‘Thank you,’ in a guarded tone, and he laughed and said ruefully: ‘It doesn’t matter what I say, does it? You see a hidden meaning in every word I utter.’

They were walking to the car, but now she stopped. ‘Look, we can’t possibly start the evening like this— I—didn’t mean…that is, I was only wondering if you said that to all the girls you take out.’

‘Would you mind if I said yes?’

She said haughtily: ‘Of course not,’ and spoilt it by asking: ‘Do you go out a great deal?’

They were in the car now, but he hadn’t started the engine. ‘Yes, quite a bit, but work comes first. What about you, Katrina?’

‘Well, I go out—I like my work too,’ she added with a bit of a rush.

‘We share a common interest, then.’ He started the car. ‘We have time for a drink if you would like one.’

He took her to the Savoy and gave her a glass of Madeira, and when she confessed that she had had no tea, a dish of salted nuts and another of potato crisps.

She crushed her way very nearly through the lot and then said apologetically: ‘I’m making a pig of myself. It was stew for lunch and I got there late.’

His winged nostrils flared. ‘Tepid and greasy, no doubt.’ He lifted a finger and when the waiter came, asked for sandwiches. She consumed them with the unselfconscious pleasure of a child—smoked salmon and pâté de foie gras and cucumber. But she refused a second glass of Madeira because, as she explained to her companion, she wanted to enjoy every moment of the play.

Which she did, sitting up straight in her seat, her eyes glued to the stage, and the Professor, sitting a little sideways so that he could watch her as well as the stage, allowed himself a faint smile at her obvious pleasure. They went back to the Savoy when it was over and had supper—caviar, poularde Impératrice, and for Katrina a bûche glacée, while the Professor contented himself with Welsh rarebit. And because, as he had gravely pointed out to her at the beginning of the meal, they had both had a tiring day, a bottle of champagne seemed the best thing to drink.

Katrina, her head still full of romantic music, would have happily drunk tap water; as it was, she drank two glasses of champagne and enjoyed them very much. There was a faint worry at the back of her head that she was liking her companion much more than she had intended. Perhaps it was the combination of romance and champagne which had dimmed her good sense, but certainly he seemed really rather nice. When he suggested that they might dance she got up at once. She might be a big girl, but she danced well and was as light as a feather, and the Professor was pretty neat on his feet too. They danced for a long time, going back to drink their coffee and then taking to the floor again. It was past one o’clock when Katrina asked him the time, and gave a small screech when he told her.

‘I’m on in the morning, and it’s Mr Knowles’ round and take-in.’

He didn’t try to persuade her to stay but drove her back to the hospital without fuss and saw her to the door, and when she thanked him for her lovely evening, observed placidly that he had enjoyed it too, then he wished her goodnight and opened the door for her.

Katrina went through feeling let down; not so much as a hint that he wanted to see her again, let alone the kiss which she had come to expect at the close of an evening out. The horrid thought that he had asked her out because Uncle Ben had suggested it crossed her mind; Uncle Ben knew how shy she was about going out with men who weren’t her size, and here was one who positively towered over her. He hadn’t said goodbye, she mused as she tumbled into bed; a clever girl would have known how to find out when and where he was going…and anyway, she asked herself pettishly, why was she worried? She didn’t like him, did she? Or did she? She was too sleepy to decide.

The morning began badly with two road accidents being admitted just after eight o’clock, and it got worse as the day wore on, so that when Jack Bentall rather fussily examined Mr Knowles’ patients during the afternoon, demanding unnecessary attention and calling for things he didn’t really need, she found her patience wearing thin. The urge to cry off the evening’s entertainment was very strong, but she was a kind-hearted girl and she had refused to go out with him on so many occasions she couldn’t avoid this one without hurting his feelings. Not that she minded about that over-much; he was a young man of unbounded conceit and she doubted if even the severest snub would affect him for more than a few minutes.

She dressed unwillingly and went just as unwillingly to the car park where Jack had asked her to meet him. He drove a souped-up Mini, very battered and uncomfortable and he tended to regard the road as his. She felt a pang of relief as he stopped with a teeth-jarring suddenness in front of a Chinese restaurant in the Tottenham Court Road. It was unfortunate that Katrina didn’t like Chinese food and that Jack hadn’t thought to ask her. Now if it had been the Professor, with all his faults, she added mentally, he would have made it his business to find out. And even if he hadn’t, she mused with surprise, she would have felt quite at liberty to have told him that she loathed sweet and sour pork and could have asked him if they could go somewhere else. But Jack would either laugh at her and tell her that she didn’t know good food when she saw it, or worse, sulk.

She ate her way through a great many dishes without once betraying her dislike of them, listening to Jack, carrying on about the other housemen and their inefficiencies, what Mr Knowles had said to him and he had said to Mr Knowles; he droned on and on and Katrina’s thoughts turned more and more to the previous evening. Professor van Tellerinck might annoy her, although she wasn’t sure why any more—but he didn’t bore her. She came out of a flurry of half-formed thoughts to hear Jack say:

‘Well, what about it? Everyone else does it these days and getting married seems a bit silly until I’ve reached the top, and you’re not all that keen on it, are you? You can’t be—you must have had plenty of chances, but after all, you are twenty-seven.’

She gave him a look of such astonishment that he added querulously: ‘Well, you don’t have to look like that—I thought we understood each other.’

As well as being astonished she was furiously angry, but she discovered at the same time that she simply couldn’t be bothered to explain to him just how wrong he was. She could of course have said: ‘I am a clergyman’s daughter and old-fashioned in my views about matrimony’; instead she heard herself saying in a reasonable voice: ‘I really should have told you sooner, Jack, but I didn’t realise…’ She left the sentence hanging delicately in mid-air. ‘I’ve resigned—I’m going abroad in a few weeks’ time.’ She paused, trying to think of a country as far away as possible: ‘The Gulf—a lovely job.’ Her imagination was working well by now. ‘One of those new hospitals, a fabulous salary and a flat of my own…’

He looked at her gobbling with rage. ‘Well, you could have told me before we came out to dinner!’ he said furiously. He put a hand up for the bill. ‘I don’t suppose you want coffee.’

They tore back to Benedict’s through the almost empty streets and as he came to a squealing halt in the forecourt: ‘I hope you get what you deserve!’ he hissed at her.

Just as though I’d led him on, thought Katrina as she went into the nurses’ home, and giggled. She stopped giggling almost at once, though. She would have to resign in the morning; she had done herself out of a job and banished herself to the Gulf to boot. Jack would tell everyone, he was a noted gossip, and really there was nothing she could do about it but leave; even if she explained to him why she had done it, he wouldn’t understand but would merely think that she had been playing hard to get and would pester her more than ever. She lay awake for a long time getting more and more worried, and fell asleep at last with her mind in a dither.

CHAPTER THREE

SHE WAS STILL dithering when she got reluctantly out of bed a few hours later, but by the time she had dressed she knew for a certainty that she would go to the office directly after breakfast and tender her resignation to Miss Bowles. She stopped doing her hair and sat down on the edge of the bed to write out her resignation, then finished dressing in a rush so as to be in time for breakfast. As it was, she was late, which was a blessing for no one had time to ask her any questions.

Miss Bowles asked questions, though. She was a small peppery lady well into her fifties, who ruled the hospital with a rod of iron whatever the National Health Service said. There wasn’t much that she approved of, and certainly not Katrina going off to the Gulf. She demanded all the details of the mythical post, too, and Katrina was forced to say firmly that she was still waiting for all the details.

‘Well, Sister,’ said Miss Bowles, in an ill humour now because one of the best ward Sisters was leaving, ‘I hope you know what you’re about. You have a good post here and prospects of promotion in the future. I only hope you’re not throwing security away for some pipe dream in the desert.’

Katrina longed to tell her that it was a pipe dream, but the repercussions if she did weren’t to be contemplated. She would go home for a holiday and then set about getting another job, well away from London. Abroad, perhaps? There was surely no reason why she should think of Holland?

She didn’t tell any of her friends straight away; for one thing, she had no opportunity, it was that evening when she went off duty that she told them as they sat around in their sitting-room, mulling over the day among themselves.

‘But you can’t!’ they chorused. ‘Kate, why? There must be some reason…’

‘I need a change,’ she told them, ‘I’m going to have a holiday at home and then go abroad. The Gulf,’ she added vaguely, mindful of the hospital grapevine and Jack, not to mention Miss Bowles, who in her own dignified manner would allow the news to seep through the upper strata of admin staff.

She had a few days’ holiday due to her, which meant that she could leave in just about three weeks’ time. She would go home on her next days off and explain to her mother, and until then she would go on with her work in a normal manner. Easier said than done; she worried a good deal about her future, trying to make up her mind just where she wanted to go and she still had to tell Uncle Ben, not a real uncle at all, but he had been her father’s closest friend and had kept an eye on them ever since her father’s death.

But not just yet, it seemed. Uncle Ben had a severe cold and couldn’t operate or do his rounds; his registrar coped in his absence until a nasty traffic accident, full of complications, made it needful for him to call in a consultant.

Katrina supposed she wasn’t surprised to see Professor van Tellerinck with the registrar at his heels, come down the ward. She had imagined him back home in his own country, but she had no means of knowing where he was; probably he’d been close at hand all the time. She greeted him civilly, led him to the patient and waited quietly while he went over the man’s severe injuries. The leg could be saved, he thought, given a few hours’ repair work in theatre, but he wasn’t sure about the arm. He arranged for the man to go to theatre that afternoon, and made his way to the door, the registrar beside him, Katrina, one pace behind, ready to bid him good-day at the ward door.