The Right Kind of Girl

His firm hand covered hers. ‘Your mother is doing splendidly; she’s an excellent patient. I’m sorry, I should have realised…You were asleep.’

She curled her cold toes on the hall carpet and nodded. ‘I didn’t mean to sleep for so long; it’s getting dark.’ She looked up at him. ‘Why are you here, then?’

‘I’m on my way home, but it has occurred to me that I shall be taking morning surgery here for the next week or two. I’ll drive you up to Exeter after my morning visits and bring you back in time for evening surgery here.’

‘Oh, would you? Would you really do that? How very kind of you, but won’t it be putting you out? Sister said that you were taking a sabbatical, and that means you’re on holiday, doesn’t it?’

‘Hardly a holiday, and I’m free to go in and out as I wish.’

‘But you live in Exeter?’

‘No, but not far from it; I shall not be in the least inconvenienced.’

She looked at him uncertainly, for he sounded casual and a little annoyed, but before she could speak he went on briskly, ‘You’d better go and put some clothes on. Have you food in the house?’

‘Yes, thank you. Cook gave me a pasty.’ She was suddenly hungry at the thought of it. ‘It was kind of you to come. I expect you want to go home—your days are long…’

He smiled. ‘I’ll make a pot of tea while you dress, and while we are drinking it I can explain exactly what I’ve done for your mother.’

She flew upstairs and flung on her clothes, washed her face and tied back her hair. Never mind how she looked—he wouldn’t notice and he must be wanting to go home, wherever that was.

She perceived that he was a handy man in the kitchen—the tea was made, Queenie had been fed, and he had found a tin of biscuits.

‘No milk, I’m afraid,’ he said, not looking up from pouring the tea into two mugs. And then, very much to her surprise he asked, ‘Have you sufficient money?’

‘Yes—yes, thank you, and Mrs Smith-Darcy owes me a week’s wages.’ Probably in the circumstances she wouldn’t get them, but he didn’t need to know that.

He nodded, handed her a mug and said, ‘Now, as to your mother…’

He explained simply in dry-as-dust words which were neither threatening nor casual. ‘Your mother will stay in hospital for a week—ten days, perhaps—then I propose to send her to a convalescent home—there is a good one at Moretonhampstead, not too far from here—just for a few weeks. When she returns home she should be more or less able to resume her normal way of living, although she will have to keep to some kind of a diet. Time enough for that, however. Will you stay here alone?’ He glanced at her. ‘Perhaps you have family or a friend who would come…?’

‘No family—at least, father had some cousins somewhere in London but they don’t—that is, since he died we haven’t heard from them. I’ve friends all over Buckfastleigh, though. If I asked one of them I know they’d come and stay but there’s no need. I’m not nervous; besides, I’ll try and find some temporary work until Mother comes home.’

‘Mrs Smith-Darcy has given you the sack?’

‘I’m sure of it. I was very rude to her this morning.’ Anxious not to invite his pity, she added, ‘There’s always part-time work here—the abbey shop or the otter sanctuary.’ True enough during the season—some months away!

He put down his mug. ‘Good. I’ll call for you some time after twelve o’clock tomorrow morning.’ His goodbye was brief.

Left alone, she put the pasty to warm in the oven, washed the mugs and laid out a tray. The house was cold—there had never been enough money for central heating, and it was too late to make a fire in the sitting-room. She ate her supper, had a shower and went to bed, reassured by her visitor’s calm manner and his certainty that her mother was going to be all right. He was nice, she thought sleepily, and not a bit pompous. She slept on the thought.

It was raining hard when she woke and there was a vicious wind driving off the moor. She had breakfast and hurried round to Dobbs’s garage to use his phone. Her mother had had a good night, she was told, and was looking forward to seeing her later—reassuring news, which sent her back to give the good news to Queenie and then do the housework while she planned all the things she would do before her mother came home.

She had a sandwich and a cup of coffee well before twelve o’clock, anxious not to keep the professor waiting, so that when he arrived a few minutes before that hour she was in her coat, the house secure, Queenie settled in her basket and the bag she had packed for her mother ready in the hall.

He wished her a friendly good morning, remarked upon the bad weather and swept her into the car and drove away without wasting a moment. Conversation, she soon discovered, wasn’t going to flourish in the face of his monosyllabic replies to her attempts to make small talk. She decided that he was tired or mulling over his patients and contented herself with watching the bleak landscape around them.

At the hospital he said, ‘Will half-past four suit you? Be at the main entrance, will you?’ He added kindly, ‘I’m sure you’ll be pleased with your mother’s progress.’ He got out of the car and opened her door, waited while she went in and then, contrary to her surmise, drove out of the forecourt and out of the city. Emma, unaware of this, expecting him to be about his own business in the hospital, made her way to her mother’s room and forgot him at once.

Her mother was indeed better—pale still, and hung around with various tubes, but her hair had been nicely brushed and when Emma had helped her into her pink bed-jacket she looked very nearly her old self.

‘It’s a miracle, isn’t it?’ said Emma, gently embracing her parent. ‘I mean, it’s only forty-eight or so hours and here you are sitting up in bed.’

Mrs Trent, nicely sedated still, agreed drowsily. ‘You brought my knitting? Thank you, dear. Is Queenie all right? And how are you managing to come? It can’t be easy—don’t come every day; it’s such a long way…’

‘Professor Wyatt is standing in for Dr Treble, so he brings me here after morning surgery and takes me back in time for his evening surgery.’

‘That’s nice.’ Mrs Trent gave Emma’s hand a little squeeze. ‘So I’ll see you each day; I’m so glad.’ She closed her eyes and dropped off and Emma sat holding her hand, making plans.

A job—that was the most important thing to consider; a job she would be able to give up when her mother returned home. She might not be trained for anything much but she could type well enough and she could do simple accounts and housekeep adequately enough; there was sure to be something…

Her mother woke presently and she talked cheerfully about everyday things, not mentioning Mrs Smith-Darcy and, indeed, she didn’t intend to do so unless her mother asked.

A nurse came and Emma, watching her skilful handling of tubes and the saline drip, so wished that she could be cool and calm and efficient and—an added bonus—pretty. Probably she worked for the professor— saw him every day, was able to understand him when he gave his orders in strange surgical terms, and received his thanks. He seemed to Emma to be a man of effortless good manners.

Her mother dozed again and didn’t rouse as the teatrolley was wheeled in, which was a good thing since a cup of tea was out of the question, but Emma was given one, with two Petit Beurre biscuits, and since her hurried lunch seemed a long time ago she was grateful.

Her mother was soon awake again, content to lie quietly, not talking much and finally with an eye on the clock, Emma kissed her goodbye. ‘I’ll be here tomorrow,’ she promised, and went down to the main entrance.

She had just reached it when the Rolls came soundlessly to a halt beside her. The professor got out and opened her door, got back in and drove away with nothing more than a murmured greeting, but presently he said, ‘Your mother looks better, does she not?’

‘Oh, yes. She slept for most of the afternoon but she looks much better than I expected.’

‘Of course, she’s being sedated, and will be for the next forty-eight hours. After that she will be free of pain and taking an interest in life again. She’s had a tiring time…’

It was still raining—a cold rain driven by an icy wind—and the moor looked bleak and forbidding in the early dusk. Emma, who had lived close to it all her life, was untroubled by that; she wondered if the professor felt the same. He had said that he lived near Exeter. She wondered exactly where; perhaps, after a few days of going to and fro, he would be more forthcoming. Certainly he was a very silent man.

The thought struck her that he might find her boring, but on the following day, when she ventured a few remarks of a commonplace nature, he had little to say in reply, although he sounded friendly enough. She decided that silence, unless he began a conversation, was the best policy, so that by the end of a week she was no nearer knowing anything about him than when they had first met. She liked him—she liked him very much—but she had the good sense to know that they inhabited different worlds. He had no wish to get to know her—merely to offer a helping hand, just as he would have done with anyone else in similar circumstances.

Her mother was making good progress and Emma scanned the local paper over the weekend, and checked the advertisements outside the newsagents in the hope of finding a job.

Mrs Smith-Darcy had, surprisingly, sent Alice with her wages, and Emma had made a pot of coffee and listened to Alice’s outpourings on life with that lady. ‘Mad as fire, she was,’ Alice had said, with relish. ‘You should ‘ave ‘eard ‘er, Miss Trent. And that lunch party— that was a lark and no mistake—’er whingeing away about servants and such like. I didn’t ‘ear no kind words about you and your poor ma, though. Mean old cat.’ She had grinned. ‘Can’t get another companion for love nor money, either.’

She had drunk most of the coffee and eaten all the biscuits Emma had and then got up to go. ‘Almost forgot,’ she’d said, suddenly awkward, ‘me and Cook thought your ma might like a few chocs now she’s better. And there’s one of Cook’s steak and kidney pies— just wants a warm-up—do for your dinner.’

‘How lucky I am to have two such good friends,’ Emma had said and meant it.

Going to the hospital on Monday, sitting quietly beside Sir Paul, she noticed him glance down at her lap where the box of chocolates sat.

‘I hope that those are not for your mother?’ ‘Well, yes and no. Cook and Alice—from Mrs Smith-Darcy’s house, you know—gave them to me to give her. I don’t expect that she can have them, but she’ll like to see them and she can give them to her nurses.’

He nodded. ‘I examined your mother yesterday evening. I intend to have her transferred to Moretonhampstead within the next day or so. She will remain there for two weeks at least, three if possible, so that when she returns home she will be quite fit.’

‘That is good news. Thank you for arranging it,’ said Emma gratefully, and wondered how she was going to visit her mother. With a car it would have been easy enough.

She would have to find out how the buses ran—probably along the highway to Exeter and then down the turn-off to Moretonhampstead halfway along it—but the buses might not connect. She had saved as much money as she could and she had her last week’s wages; perhaps she could get the car from Mr Dobbs again and visit her mother once a week; it was thirty miles or so, an hour’s drive…

She explained this to her mother and was relieved to see that the prospect of going to a convalescent home and starting on a normal life once more had put her in such good spirits that she made no demur when Emma suggested that she might come only once a week to see her.