Damsel In Green

‘Good. There is a car you may care to use while you are with us.’

Aunt Polly spoke. ‘Splendid! Georgina, you’ll be able to come home each week; it’s only a few miles. How very pleasant that will be!’ She caught Georgina’s eye. ‘Perhaps you would ask Mrs Mogg to bring in the tea, dear? You’ll stay for a cup, I hope, Professor?’

Georgina went to the kitchen, feeling somehow that she had been got at without exactly knowing how it had happened. She helped Mrs Mogg carry in the tea things and arranged them on the small table by her aunt’s chair, and would have taken a cup and saucer over to the Professor, but he forestalled her, and she found herself sitting in the crinoline chair again being waited upon by the Professor, who most certainly would not have been expected to lift a finger in hospital. She took a sandwich and caught his eye, and he smiled and said, ‘The boot is on the other foot, is it not, Miss Rodman—it makes a nice change.’ He spoke with a lazy good nature and his smile was so kind that she laughed.

He proved to be an excellent companion. Georgina watched her aunt sparkle, exchanging a gentle repartee with her guest and enjoying every minute of it. He got up to go presently, and as he shook hands he said:

‘I do hope that we shall meet again, Miss Rodman,’ at which Aunt Polly smiled.

She said without a trace of bitterness, ‘I’m always here,’ she gestured towards her sticks. ‘Come when you like, if you care to.’ She inclined her head. ‘Georgina will see you to the door, Professor.’

So Georgina found herself at the front door, standing beside him, contemplating with some awe the Silver Shadow drophead coupé in the lane outside. However, she had little time to do more than recognize it for what it was before he said briskly:

‘Well, goodbye, Miss Rodman.’ He shook hands in a no-nonsense fashion and added as an afterthought, ‘Just one thing. I shall require you to wear your uniform at the times while you are with us. Not of course when you go out in your free time.’

Georgina, who had forgotten about the slacks and sweater, was suddenly and uncomfortably aware of them again. With the fine impulsiveness for which she had received many a reprimand in hospital, she blurted out:

‘But I don’t always look as scruffy as this!’

He eyed her coolly. ‘Did I say that you looked scruffy?’ he wanted to know. ‘I can assure you that my wishes on the matter have no bearing on your present—er—most sensible garments.’ He allowed his gaze to travel from top to toe of her person. ‘Charming, too,’ he murmured.

She gaped at him. This from a man wearing tweeds, which, although not new, bore the hallmark of Savile Row! He was joking, of course. She said so.

‘Did I not say a short time ago, my dear girl, that I seldom say anything which I do not mean?’

Georgina blushed. ‘Oh,’ she said faintly. ‘May I know why—I mean about the uniform?’ She looked up at him, looming beside her in the early dusk; it was difficult to read the expression on his face, but his voice was decisive.

‘No, you may not,’ he said blandly. ‘Goodbye for the present.’

He went so quickly down the path that he would never have heard her reply, which was a good thing, for her voice had been an astonished squeak. At the gate he turned. ‘Beatrix and Cor send their love.’ The next minute he had got into the car and driven away.

Back in the sitting-room, Aunt Polly put down her book. ‘A delightful young man,’ she said in positive tones. ‘While you were getting tea he told me something about himself.’ Georgina smiled. Aunt Polly had her own methods of extracting information—she could, when it pleased her, be a remorseless and relentless interrogator. ‘He’s not married.’

Georgina rattled a tea cup in its saucer, and said ‘Oh,’ in what she hoped was a non-committal voice.

‘But he intends to marry in the near future. I wonder who she is? He spends quite a lot of time in Holland—he has a home there too; perhaps she is a Dutch girl—after all, he is a Dutchman himself.’

She settled her elegantly rimmed glasses on her small nose. ‘Will you pass me my knitting, please, dear?’ She started on one of the complicated patterns she favoured—not because she liked them overly, but because they forced her to concentrate and saved her from other, sometimes unhappy thoughts. ‘Shall you like nursing the little boy?’ she asked.

Georgina had picked up the tray and was on her way to the door. ‘Oh, yes, Aunt. Of course I shall.’ She spoke quietly, aware that she was going to like being in the Professor’s house very much indeed, although perhaps not for the right reasons.

Georgina had been back on duty for several nights before she met Professor Eyffert again. She knew that he had been to the hospital each day because Cor told her when she paid her morning and evening visits, but the little boy said nothing about going home and she forbore from mentioning it. When they did meet, it wasn’t quite half past seven in the morning. She had had a busy night and was clearing the last of the trolleys ready for the day nurses. She was tired, and because she was tired, she was cold. Her hair hung wispily where it had escaped the pins she had had no time to deal with; her nose shone with chill and lack of powder. As she saw him come into Casualty, she thought peevishly that they always met when she was looking at her worst. She scowled and said, ‘Good morning, sir’ without warmth, and felt, unreasonably, even more peevish when he smiled sympathetically and said, ‘Good morning, Staff Nurse. You’ve had a busy night. Do you never have help?’

She was scrubbing instruments at the sink. ‘Yes, but we had an overdose in at midnight and another at five. They make a lot of extra work on the wards—the runner hasn’t had a minute.’ She rinsed the tube and funnel of the wash-out apparatus and cast him a look full of curiosity, and he said to disconcert her, ‘Yes, I’m very early, am I not? But the first overdose isn’t responding as she ought—Dr Woodrow telephoned me an hour or so ago—I think she is out of the wood now.’

The door opened and the day nurses trooped in, with Gregg in the rear, urging them on. They looked curiously at the Professor, said good morning politely and plunged at once into the early morning ritual of cleaning and sterilizing and making ready. Only Gregg lingered. She ignored Georgina and smiled bewitchingly at the Dutchman, conscious that her make-up was perfection and her hairstyle immaculate. She said, at her most charming, ‘Night Nurse is off duty—perhaps I can help you, sir?’

Georgina swallowed rage. Night Nurse indeed! She was just as trained as Gregg was herself, but in the circumstances, powerless to do anything about it. The Professor wasn’t, however. He flashed her a look, and if she hadn’t known that her tired eyes were playing her false, she could have sworn that he winked. His voice, when he spoke, was silken. ‘Good for you—er—Nurse. You allude to Staff Nurse Rodman, I believe. Yes, indeed you may help, if you please. Be kind enough to take over from her at once—I have something I wish to discuss with her.’

His smile dismissed her. Georgina found herself walking to the door rolling down her sleeves as she went, and putting on hastily snatched up cuffs. Outside in the corridor he said pleasantly, ‘I thought that we might as well divulge our plans to Cornelis; that is, if you can spare the time?’ She nodded merely, being far too busy keeping up with his long legs. Halfway up the stairs to Children’s he stopped and said apologetically, ‘I forget that I cover the ground somewhat faster than most people—and you must be tired.’

She admitted that she was, tried to imagine him being tired himself and failed utterly. They heard Cornelis long before they saw him—apparently there was something he didn’t fancy for breakfast. He was, in fact, on the point of hurling a bowl of porridge at the attendant nurse when he saw them coming down the ward. His small, intelligent face brightened and he thrust the offending food at the nurse as he shouted a greeting at them. ‘Cousin Julius—George! How super to have you both at once. I say, George, do tell Nurse to take this beastly stuff away—I won’t eat it.’ He was peeping at his guardian as he spoke.

The Professor said nothing at all, indeed, there was a faint smile on his face, although his brows were raised in mild enquiry. Georgina put the bowl down on the bedtable in front of Cor, and said with the cunning of one versed in the treatment of childish tantrums:

‘You’ll grow into a very small man, you know.’ She put the spoon in his hand.

‘Why?’

‘Because if you don’t eat, you don’t grow, and some things make you grow more than others. Porridge, for example. You said the other day that you intended to be as big as your guardian.’

‘You mean Cousin Julius?’ He was watching her under lowering brows.

‘Yes, I do.’

‘Why don’t you call him Julius?’

‘Well …’ she cast a look at the Professor, who was standing, hands in pockets, watching with what she considered to be unnecessary enjoyment. He said now, without looking at her, ‘You’re not being polite, Cor. In fact, you are being particularly unpleasant. You will apologise, please.’ His blue eyes surveyed his small cousin, and Georgina, watching, could see the affection in them. ‘Look old chap, we know your legs are uncomfortable and you’re hating every minute of lying strung up like this, but that’s no excuse for being rude.’ He smiled, a wide kind smile that made her heart bounce against her ribs.

Cor smiled too. ‘Sorry, Cousin Julius,’ he said, all at once cheerful. ‘I was a rude pig, wasn’t I?’ He repeated himself, delighted with the words. ‘George, darling George, I’m truly sorry, I was a rude …’

She interrupted him. ‘All right, Cor. We know you didn’t really mean it. Now eat up your porridge so that we can talk.’

He started to spoon the cooling nourishment. ‘All of us?’ he enquired, his mouth full. ‘Why are you so early, Cousin Julius?’

‘I had some work to do here—it seemed a good idea to kill two birds with one stone.’ He caught Georgina’s expressive eye and said on a chuckle, ‘What a singularly inept remark!’

She replaced the empty bowl with a boiled egg and some bread and butter, and sat down thankfully on the stool the Professor had fetched for her. She turned her attention to Cor and kept her eyes on him while the Professor talked.

‘I’ve news for you, Cor. It’s the seventeenth today—the day after tomorrow you are coming home.’ He put a large, well-kept hand, just too late to prevent the bellow of delight from Cor. ‘Let me finish—I’ve work to do, even if you haven’t, and unlike you, I’ve not yet had my breakfast; nor has Nurse. You’ll have all this rigging until after the New Year. You know that, don’t you? And there will be X-rays at intervals and Uncle Sawbones to see you from time to time. Staff Nurse Rodman will look after you.’

Cor put down his bread and butter and stared at his guardian as though he couldn’t believe his own small ears. ‘George? Coming home with us all? Julius, you’re absolutely super. I’ll be home for Christmas … I’ll be so good … Julius, dear Cousin Julius, I love you!’

The big man’s eyes were very kind. ‘Yes, I know, old man. We all miss you, you know—you’ll have to stay in your room; but we can all come in and out, and Miss Rodman will be with you for a great deal of the time.’

Cor turned a starry gaze on Georgina. ‘You’ll like coming, won’t you, George?’ he asked anxiously.

‘I’m thrilled. I can’t think of anything I’d rather do.’ She found to her astonishment that she meant it—indeed, her delight at the prospect left her startled at its intensity. She went off into a brown study, watched by the Professor with no expression on his face at all, and by Cor with considerable bewilderment. She looked up and smiled at him, so that her tired face was touched with beauty. ‘I was just thinking of the fun we’ll have getting you on your feet again,’ she said cheerfully, and was rewarded by his grin.

She stayed a little longer while the Professor told her his arrangements. She was to be at the ambulance bay at four o’clock on the nineteenth, with whatever luggage she would require. He politely deplored the fact that she would be unable to have a full day’s sleep, but assured her that she should go to bed as early as she wished on reaching Dalmers Place. He himself would be unable to accompany them, but Mr Sawbridge would make sure that everything was in order before they left the hospital and had agreed to be at the house by the time they arrived in order to supervise the re-erection of the Balkan frame with its attendant weights and pulleys.

‘Why don’t you do it, Cousin Julius?’ Cor demanded.

‘My dear fellow, I haven’t a clue; I daresay Staff Nurse Rodman knows more about it than I do.’ He smiled at her, and she gave an answering chuckle, well aware that he was perfectly capable of putting up twenty Balkan frames if he so had the mind. He got to his feet.

‘Go to bed. How thoughtless of me to keep you like this!’ His eyes searched her face. ‘We are all happy to have you with us. Beatrix is longing to see you again.’

Georgina said quickly, ‘Oh, is she? I am glad. I wanted to write to her, but it didn’t seem—that is, I didn’t care to …’ she came to a halt awkwardly.