“Don’t be so prissy,” he advised her sourly, “I’m no mealymouthed parson.”

She allowed herself a moment’s comparison of Mr. Campbell and the man before her and was surprised to find that Mr. Campbell came off second best. “I’m sure he’s a very good man and kind.”

“Meaning that I’m not? As though I care a damn what you think, my pious Miss. Darling—going to church in your best hat and probably making the reverend’s heart flutter to boot. You sound just his sort.”

“I’m not anyone’s sort, Mr. van Manfeld.” She picked up her empty basket and went to the door, her voice coming loud and rather wobbly. “It’s a good thing you can’t see me, because I’m extremely angry.”

His voice followed her, still sour. “But I can see you after a fashion. It’s true you’re dark blue and very fuzzy round the edges, but since you assure me that you’re a plain girl, I don’t really see that it matters, do you?”

Cassandra ground her teeth without answering this piece of rudeness and banged the door regrettably hard as she went out.

About the Author

Romance readers around the world were sad to note the passing of BETTY NEELS in June 2001. Her career spanned thirty years, and she continued to write into her ninetieth year. To her millions of fans, Betty epitomized the romance writer, and yet she began writing almost by accident. She had retired from nursing, but her inquiring mind still sought stimulation. Her new career was born when she heard a lady in her local library bemoaning the lack of good romance novels. Betty’s first book, Sister Peters in Amsterdam, was published in 1969, and she eventually completed 134 books. Her novels offer a reassuring warmth that was very much a part of her own personality. She was a wonderful writer, and she will be greatly missed. Her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.

Cassandra by Chance

Betty Neels

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER ONE

THE steamer from Oban drew into the island’s small jetty, deserted and unwelcoming, shrouded as it was in the chilly October rain and buffeted by an even chillier wind from the north. The few passengers it had brought over from the mainland disembarked smartly, bidding each other good-day as they went in cheerful voices which paid no heed to the weather. But the last passenger left the boat slowly, as though reluctant to exchange its shelter for the rain-swept quay. She was a young woman, obviously a stranger, sensibly dressed in a thick tweed coat and high leather boots. She carried a hold-all over one arm and clutched the head scarf tied over her rain-drenched hair with a gloved hand. One of the passengers had carried her case for her; he put it down now beside her with a smile and she smiled her thanks in return, a smile which transformed her ordinary face, so that the man looked at her a second time with rather more interest than he had shown.

‘Being met?’ he asked.

She nodded, ‘Yes, thank you,’ and she didn’t add anything, so that after a moment or so he said: ‘Well, so long,’ and walked away towards the huddle of houses around the end of the quay. Cassandra Darling watched him go and then turned her attention to her surroundings. She was quite a tall girl with a face which her mother had once hopefully described as jolielaide, for her hazel eyes, while of a good size and colour, were fringed with unspectacular, mousey lashes, her nose was too sharp and too thin, which gave her rather an inquiring look, and her mouth, although nicely curved, was far too large. She was almost twenty-three, but seemed older than this, partly because she had formed the habit of screwing her pale brown hair into a severe bun, and partly because she was a quiet girl who enjoyed tranquil pursuits—not that this trait in her character had prevented her from having a great number of friends at the hospital where she had just completed her training, for although quiet, she had a sense of humour and a ready but not unkind wit.

She surveyed the scene around her now with calm eyes. Before her, straight ahead, there loomed a tree-covered hill, presumably quite inaccessible. At its foot, on either side of the village, there were roads, narrow and lonely, each disappearing around the base of the hill. She knew that her sister lived on the south-west side of the island, so it would be the road on the left—she stared at it patiently and was presently rewarded by the sight of a Land Rover belting along towards the quay. It was her brother-in-law; he drew up exactly beside her, got out, embraced her with affection, flung her luggage into the Land Rover, besought her to get in beside him, and almost before she had time to settle herself, had turned the car and was racing back the way he had come.

‘Rotten day,’ her companion volunteered. ‘Good journey?’

‘Yes, thanks, Tom. It seemed to go on for ever and ever, though. Are you and Rachel ready to leave?’

‘Just about. It’s nice of you to come, Cassandra— I hope the kids won’t be too much of a handful.’

‘But it’s just what I wanted to do—it’ll be lovely to have a month or two’s break before I take my midder, and I need a change from London.’

He gave her a shrewd glance. ‘Did they offer you a job?’

‘As a matter of fact, they did.’

‘Ward Sister?’

She went a little pink. ‘Yes—Men’s Medical, but if I’d taken it, I should have had to start straight away and stayed a year at least, and I might have got into a rut and not wanted to do midwifery. I think it’s best to leave, don’t you?’

Her companion swung the Land Rover off the road on to a narrow winding lane with mountains towering to the right of them, and presently, the sight of a loch on their left. ‘Yes, I think you’re wise, and it’s wonderful for us. You won’t be lonely? The children love it, but after London…’

‘I shall love it too.’ Cassandra looked around her. ‘It must be beautiful in the summer.’ She added mildly, ‘But I daresay it’s pretty super at this time of year too—when it’s not raining.’

‘It can be gorgeous. Anyway, the house is pretty comfortable, and I suppose you’ve brought your knitting with you.’

‘Not knitting,’ she assured him gravely. ‘I’m doing a firescreen in gros-point and I’ve brought plenty of books with me too. Besides, there won’t be all that time to spare, will there, not with Penny and Andrew for company. How’s their school?’

‘Excellent. Small, but the teaching is first class.’

‘And the book?’

‘Finished. Here we are.’

The road was running beside the loch now, pushed there by the mountains, and then the loch ended abruptly, leaving only a wild, narrow river in its place, which in its turn opened suddenly into a much larger loch and gave Cassandra her first glimpse of her future home for the next few weeks. The village was very small and scattered, with an austere church in its centre and a few fishing boats drawn up beside the jetty. Its one street contained a single shop, but Cassandra had no chance to do more than glance at it as Tom drove on, out of the village and along a track running up the hillside. He stopped after a half mile, however, turned in through a wide gate and pulled up before a well-built house with a grey slate roof and whitewashed walls. The door was flung open as Cassandra prepared to get out and the two children and their mother came out to meet her.

Rachel was ten years older than her sister and had more than her fair share of good looks, although it was easy to see that they were sisters. She hugged Cassandra with real delight and then held her away to have a good look at her.

‘Lovely to see you,’ she said. ‘You look as though you could do with a holiday, darling. I’m so glad you decided to leave hospital, even if it is only for a month or two—besides, it’s wonderful for us to be able to get away on our own for a few weeks—these brats can’t wait to see us go.’ She smiled at the two children with her and they laughed back at her little joke. They didn’t mind in the least being left with their Aunt Cassandra—she was clever at making things and talked to them as though they were intelligent people and not half-witted kids. Andrew, her nephew, offered a rather grubby hand and grinned at her, but Penny, who was only five, threw herself at her favourite aunt and hugged her.

Indoors there was a roaring fire in the sitting-room. Cassandra had her wet coat taken from her, was invited to take off her boots and her head-scarf, and sat before the blaze while her sister went to the kitchen to fetch the coffee.

‘Anyone interesting on the boat?’ Rachel inquired when she returned.

Cassandra wriggled her toes in the pleasant warmth. ‘No, I don’t think so—there weren’t many people on board and they all melted away. You’re a long way away from everywhere, aren’t you?’

Rachel passed her a brimming mug. ‘Miles,’ she agreed comfortably. ‘But the village is nice; you’ll be absorbed into it in no time at all. You’ve got the Landrover. You’re not nervous of being alone at night, are you? You’ve no need to be.’

‘I’m not—you can’t think how marvellous it’s going to be, going to sleep in peace and quiet without traffic tearing past the windows all night.’

‘She was offered a Sister’s post,’ Tom told his wife as he sat down, and Rachel exclaimed: ‘Cassy, how marvellous for you—you didn’t refuse it because of us, did you?’ She sounded concerned.

Cassandra shook her head. ‘Of course not. I was telling Tom, if I had taken it, I should have got into a rut and stayed for ever and ever. Now I’m free to take my midder when I want. I’ve enough money to tide me over for a bit—besides, you’ve given me much more than I shall ever need.’ She broke off. ‘What do you do when you want to shop—I mean really shop?’

Rachel laughed. ‘You park the kids with Mrs MacDonnell, the schoolteacher. She’ll take them home for their dinner and you collect them when you get back from Oban. You can take the Landrover to the ferry and leave it near the quay and collect it on your way back—I’ve been doing that every few weeks.’

‘Well,’ said Cassandra, ‘I don’t suppose I shall want to go at all—I just wanted to know.’

Andrew, sitting beside her, said suddenly, ‘There’s a village shop—it’s super, you can buy anything there.’

His aunt gave him an understanding look. ‘Toffee?’ she suggested. ‘Crayons, pen-knives, balls of string and those awful things that change colour when you suck them? I’ve no doubt we shall do very well. What time do you leave?’ She turned to her brother-in-law.

‘Tomorrow afternoon. We’ll all go to the ferry and you can drive the kids back afterwards, Cassy. Our plane leaves Glasgow in the evening—we’ll spend the night in London and go on to Greece in the morning.’ He stretched luxuriously. ‘Six weeks’ holiday!’ he purred. ‘I can hardly believe it!’

‘You deserve it,’ remarked his wife. ‘This book’s been a bit of a grind, hasn’t it?’

He nodded. ‘But at least I’ve got the Roman Empire out of my system for ever. I always wanted to write about it, but never again—too much research. The next one will be a modern novel. I daresay I’ll get some ideas for it while we’re away.’

Rachel groaned. ‘Which means you’ll write all day and I’ll have to sit and knit.’

‘I didn’t know you could,’ observed Cassandra.

‘I can’t, that’s what makes it so difficult.’

Tom laughed. ‘My poor darling, I promise you I’ll only take notes—very brief ones.’ He got up from his chair. ‘How about taking Cassandra up to her room?’

They all trooped upstairs, Tom ahead with the luggage, the girls arm in arm and the children darting from side to side and getting in everyone’s way. Her bedroom was in the front of the house with a view of the sea, and if she craned her neck out of the window, the mountains as well. It was most comfortably furnished and pleasantly warm, with cheerful carpeting to match the cherry red curtains and bedspread. She began to unpack with everyone sitting around watching her as she handed out the small presents she had brought with her. They had been difficult to choose because she hadn’t a great deal of money and Tom was able to give Rachel and the children almost everything they could want. All the same, everyone exclaimed delightedly over their gifts and finally Rachel produced one for Cassandra—a thick hand-knitted Arran sweater. ‘To wear around,’ she explained. ‘I expect you’ve got some thick skirts and slacks with you—the children are great walkers and so are you, aren’t you? And there’s nothing much else you can wear here. Have you got some stout shoes?’

For answer Cassandra unearthed a sturdy pair from her case. ‘And my boots, and I suppose I can borrow someone’s Wellies.’

They all trooped downstairs then and had lunch, then did the last-minute packing while Mrs Todd, who came in to help, did the washing up.

The rain had ceased by the time they had finished and Cassandra changed into her new sweater and a pair of slacks, tied a scarf over her hair, and joined her relations for a walk. They went first to the village, where she made the acquaintance of Mrs MacGill, who owned the shop, and on the way out of it, the pastor, an almost middle-aged man, very thin and stooping, with hair combed tidily over the bald patch on the top of his head, and thick glasses. He shook hands with Cassandra, expressed himself delighted to make her acquaintance and hoped that she would go to the Manse one day and take tea with himself and his sister. He added, a little sternly, that he would see her in church on the following Sunday, and walked away rather abruptly.

They were well clear of the village, going along a rough track winding up the wooded hillside, when Tom observed, ‘You’ve made a hit, Cassy—I’ve never known old John Campbell issue an invitation to anyone until at least a month after he’s met them.’

‘Will you marry him?’ inquired Penny. ‘I don’t think I should like that, Aunt Cassandra.’

‘No, well—I don’t think I should myself, poppet, and as I don’t suppose there’s the slightest possibility of that happening, I think I’ll forget about it and concentrate on a prince in shining armour.’

‘So awkward,’ murmured Rachel, ‘the armour, I mean. However did they manage to give a girl a good hug, do you suppose?’

This interesting point held everybody’s attention for some time, it certainly lasted until they had reached the brow of the hill where they were met by a splendid wind and a vast expanse of grey sea and sky.

‘No view at all,’ said Tom in disgust, ‘and it looks like bad weather. We’d better get back, I think. We can go down the other path.’

They got home before the rain, glowing from walking fast, and the sitting-room looked very inviting as they crowded in. They made toast and ate a great deal of cake as well, and drank quantities of tea from an enormous teapot. It was nice, Cassandra reflected, that Rachel had never allowed Tom’s success and money to interfere with the happy home life she had achieved for them all. The house was roomy, well furnished and there was every comfort one could reasonably wish for, but the children weren’t spoilt; there was no obvious luxury, although she knew that Rachel could have anything she wanted and more besides.

She looked with affection at her sister, sitting curled up in one of the armchairs. She didn’t look her age; her pretty face was smooth and happy and contented—she was a dear; since their parents had died, she had, in the nicest possible way, looked after Cassandra, inviting her for holidays when they went abroad, giving her the pretty things she couldn’t quite afford to buy for herself, but only at birthdays and Christmas, so that Cassandra had never felt patronized. She had even contrived several meetings with young men when she and Tom had been living in London, so that Cassandra should have the opportunity of making their acquaintance. But this hadn’t been entirely successful; there were too many pretty girls around for the young men in question to waste more than a polite few minutes with her. Perhaps if she could have been a sparkling talker she might have achieved something, but she wasn’t, and she had never felt quite at ease with them.

She bit into another slice of cake, thinking how fortunate it was that she could repay Rachel and Tom a little for their kindness by minding the children while they took a holiday. They had wanted to go away together for some time, she knew, but neither of them would consider it unless the children could be looked after by someone they trusted. There were no grandparents now, and Tom’s sister, who lived in London, was heartily disliked by his children—that only left herself, and she had been able to say yes when Rachel had written and asked tentatively if there was any chance of her having a holiday and if so, could she bear to spend it looking after her nephew and niece. She had written back at once and offered to stay as long as they wanted her to, glad of the opportunity to get away from hospital life for a little while.

She loved her work, but a change was good for everyone and for the last six months, while she had been working in theatre, she had fancied herself in love with the young Surgical Registrar, who unfortunately, had barely noticed her—an unrewarding experience which she had the sense to know would get her nowhere. Up here, on this remote island, leading a totally different life, she would forget him quickly enough. She sighed, and Rachel asked anxiously, ‘You won’t miss London, darling?’

‘Me? No. Just think of it, six weeks of this— I shall read and sew and cook and discipline the kids…’

A remark which was greeted with delighted giggles from the children, because the idea of their beloved Aunt Cassandra disciplining anyone or, for that matter, being even faintly stern, was just too funny for words. They were still giggling as they led her away upstairs, where presently a furious uproar signified the fact that they were having their bedtime baths.

The weather had changed when Cassandra got up the next morning; the sun shone from a chilly blue sky, turning the sea to a turbulent green and the hills to yellow and red and brown, and in the distance the snowcapped mountains looked as though they had been painted against the horizon. The village was bright and cosy in the sunshine, its roofs and white walls sparkling, its windows gleaming. The sun was still shining as she drove back from the ferry in the afternoon with the two quiet and rather tearful children. The sky was paler now and already dim around its edges where the dusk was creeping in. Cassandra kept up a flow of cheerful conversation all the way home and as she swung the Landrover up the short track to the house, she asked:

‘How about a walk before tea? Just a short one— Bob needs some exercise and so do I. I’d love to go a little way up the hill behind the house.’

They set off presently, climbing steadily up the path which wound through the trees. It was sheltered from the wind and surprisingly quiet.

‘There’ll be mice here,’ said Cassandra, ‘and rabbits and an owl or two, I daresay, and any number of birds—I wish I knew their names. There’s a squirrel.’

They stood still and watched the creature dart up a tree and Bob, the elderly Labrador, who had grown portly with his advancing years, sat down.

‘Draw him when we get home,’ Penny begged her.

‘Certainly, my dear, if you would like that.’ Her aunt smiled fondly at her and added briskly, ‘Shall we go to that bend in the path and then go back for tea?’

There was a gap in the trees at the path’s turn; it afforded an excellent view of the hill above them, and the sun, gleaming faintly now, shone on something near its summit, in amongst the trees. Cassandra, staring hard, saw that it was a window and what was more, there was a chimney besides, with smoke wreathing above it.

‘A house!’ she exclaimed. ‘Whoever lives there? Why, it’s miles away from the village.’

For the first time since they had parted from their parents, the children perked up.

‘That’s Ogre’s Relish,’ Andrew informed her importantly, and waited confidently for her reply, for unlike other, sillier aunts, she could be depended upon to give the right answers.

‘What an extremely clever name,’ said Cassandra. ‘Do tell.’

She watched his little chest swell with pride. ‘I thought of it—Penny helped,’ he added. ‘There’s a man lives there, and one day I heard Mrs Todd telling Mrs MacGill that he relished his peace and quiet, and of course he’s an ogre because no one’s ever seen him.’

His aunt nodded her complete understanding. ‘Of course. Does he live alone?’

Penny answered her. ‘There’s another man there too—he’s old, and he comes to the shop sometimes and buys things, but he hardly ever speaks and Mrs MacGill says he only buys enough to keep body and soul together. Are ogres poor, Aunt Cassandra?’

‘This one sounds as though he might be.’

‘He can’t see.’

Cassandra stopped to look at her small niece. ‘My darling, are you sure? I mean, not see at all?’

Andrew chipped in: ‘We don’t know, but I heard Daddy tell Mummy, he said. “He can’t see, poor beggar.” That means,’ he explained, just in case his aunt hadn’t quite grasped the point, ‘that he’s not got any money—not if he’s a beggar.’

Cassandra nodded; it seemed hardly the time to start a dull explanation about figures of speech, and even if the poor ogre had enough to live on, it seemed a dreary enough existence. She turned her back on the gap, shivering a little. ‘Let’s go home,’ she said.

She took the children down to the village school the next morning and then went back to give Mrs Todd a hand in the house; but Mrs Todd assured her that she needed no help, so she retired to the kitchen and set about preparing their midday dinner. There was more than enough to choose from; she delved into the deep-freeze and settled on lamb chops and by way of afters she made a queen of puddings, adding homemade strawberry jam with a lavish hand and wondering as she did so if the poor ogre really had enough to eat. She found herself thinking about him as she worked; one day soon, while the children were at school, she would climb the path behind the house and call on him—he might be glad of a visitor, but perhaps he didn’t like callers, so it might be a good idea to walk up the hill and spy out the land first. Still busy with her thoughts, she started on a cake for tea, for the chocolate one had been demolished for all but two slices. She made the coffee, called to Mrs Todd to join her and they sat together in the kitchen, consuming the rest of the cake between them. Mrs Todd, Cassandra discovered, was a perfect fount of knowledge; she was told all about the pastor and the pastor’s sister, who according to her companion, was a proper old termagant. ‘No wonder the puir man has never taken a wife,’ she observed. ‘Who’d want to with him, knowing she’s landed with his sister too?’

Cassandra, her mouth full of cake, agreed fervently, ‘And the man who lives in the cottage behind us on the hill?’ she wanted to know casually.

‘Och, him. Now, there’s a tale I could tell ye…’

And never to be told, for the doorbell rang at just that moment. It was the lad from a neighbouring farm who brought the eggs each week; he had to be paid and given a cup of coffee, too, and by the time he had gone again Mrs Todd had no time left to talk. She still had to do the kitchen, she told Cassandra rather severely, and perhaps Miss Cassandra would like to go to the sitting-room or take a walk?

It was almost time to fetch the children from school; she chose to go for a walk, going the long way round to the school and calling in at the shop to buy stamps—Rachel would expect letters.

During their dinner Rachel telephoned; they were on the point of catching their flight to Athens, she told them, talking to each of them in turn and then making way for Tom, who promised that they would telephone that evening. Cassandra, who had expected the children to be tearful, was agreeably surprised to find that although they were excited to hear from their parents, they showed no signs of being unhappy. Just in case they were, she promised, rather rashly that they would play cards that evening.

The first few days went quickly and she enjoyed them; she missed the busy hospital life and the urgent work in theatre, on the other hand it was delightful to have time to read and sew and knit. Besides, she enjoyed cooking; she found a cook book and between the three of them, they chose something different each day, very much influenced by the colourful illustrations of dishes with exotic names and an enormous number of ingredients. They made toffee too and went for long rambles, so that it was almost a week before Cassandra had the opportunity of going to the cottage on the hill. The children had been invited to a birthday party in the village, a protracted affair which would last well into the evening. She had walked down with them just after two o’clock on the Saturday afternoon and seen them safely into the cottage where the party was to be held and then, her mind made up, went back through the village. She had almost reached the track leading to her sister’s house, when John Campbell came out of the Manse front door.

She stopped because he had called a greeting as she went past and it would have been rude not to have stopped, and he quite obviously wanted to talk. They stood together, chatting about nothing in particular for five minutes or more until she said: ‘Well, I’ll be getting along…’

‘I wondered if you would care to come to tea—today, perhaps?’ he smiled at her. ‘My sister would like to meet you.’

Cassandra, normally a truthful girl, lied briskly, ‘I’m so sorry, I promised Rachel that I would do some telephoning for her this afternoon—family, you know—she hadn’t time before she went. Besides, I’ve a simply enormous wash waiting in the machine.’ She smiled at him kindly, quite unrepentant about the fibbing, because she was determined that she would climb the hill and take a nearer look at Ogre’s Relish—and nothing was going to stop her.

It was further away than she had thought and the path became steeper as she went. It petered out at length in a small clearing from which several smaller paths wound themselves away into the trees all around her. She could see no sign of the cottage now and it took her a few moments to decide which path to take. The wrong one, as it turned out, for it led to a small enclosed patch of wild grass and thistles and heather, so she went back again and this time chose the path opposite, pausing to look about her as she went. All the same, she was taken completely by surprise when it turned a corner and opened directly into a quite large garden, very tidy and nicely sheltered by the trees. A path led to the cottage front door, set sturdily between two small windows with another two beneath its slate roof. She looked around her; the place seemed to be deserted, so perhaps it wasn’t the right one. She crossed the grass with the idea of peering in through one of its windows and then let out a small gasp when a voice from behind her said:

‘You’re trespassing, my good woman.’

The ogre! She forced herself to turn round slowly, filled with a ridiculous, childish fear which was instantly dispelled when she saw the dark glasses and the stick. For an ogre, she thought idiotically, he was remarkably handsome; tall and broad-shouldered, with dark hair greying at the temples, the dark glasses bridging a long straight nose beneath thick brows. His mouth was well shaped and firm too, although at the moment it was drawn down in a faint sneer. Probably, she told herself with her usual good sense, she would sneer too if she had to wear dark glasses and carry a stick… She found her tongue: ‘Good afternoon. I’m sorry if I’m trespassing—I didn’t mean to come into your garden, it was unexpected…’

The dark glasses glared at her. ‘Only to spy out the land, perhaps?’

Cassandra flushed. ‘Well, yes—at least, you see, I knew you lived here—the children told me about you.’

‘Indeed?’ The dark glasses bored a hole through her, the voice was icy. ‘And should I be flattered?’

‘Why?’ she asked matter-of-factly, and went on: ‘The children—my nephew and niece, were telling me.’

‘I’m all agog,’ he said nastily.

‘Well, they’re only small children and imaginative—they call this cottage Ogre’s Relish.’

His lips twitched. ‘So I am an ogre?’

‘No, not really. They’ve heard about you and they made up stories.’

‘Really?’ His voice was cold and she gave him an apprehensive look and said uneasily: ‘You’re not offended?’

‘What does it matter to you?’ he wanted to know coolly. ‘Don’t let me keep you.’

He might not be an ogre, but certainly he had the disposition of one! Cassandra retreated down the path and paused to ask: ‘Can you see at all?’ knowing that it was unpardonable of her to ask, but wanting very much to know. He didn’t bother to answer her and she took another step away from him, then stopped again because another man, elderly this time and as dark as the ogre, had come round the corner of the cottage. He had his sweater sleeves rolled up and the first thing Cassandra’s sharp eyes saw were the numbers tattooed on his arm, between his wrist and his elbow. She knew what they meant—he had been in a concentration camp. He had the face of an old hawk and looked decidedly surly, but all the same she wished him a good afternoon and he gave a surprised, reluctant reply. Still more surprising, however, was the fact that the man in the dark glasses spoke. ‘This is Jan, my good friend—he can do everything except make cakes.’ He smiled a little. ‘He speaks excellent English and Polish, if you should have a knowledge of that language, but don’t on any account address him in German; he dislikes that, for his own very good reasons.’

Cassandra said briefly: ‘I can’t speak anything but English and school French.’ She put out her hand. ‘How do you do, Jan?’ and shook his hand, careful not to look at the tattooed numbers. ‘I daresay I shall see you some time in the shop, shan’t I?’ She smiled and saw the faint reflection in his own face. She wished the ogre would smile too—he would look very nice then—if he ever did, but he seemed a bitter man, which was natural enough. She wondered how he had come to lose his sight in the first place and longed to ask him, although she knew that to be impossible. She wished him a pleasant goodbye which he answered with the briefest of nods in her direction, and started back down the path. She was almost home when she remembered that he had never answered her question as to whether he could see at all.

The next day being Sunday, she took the children to church, a bare whitewashed building, filled to capacity, and after the service, when she paused at the door to wish Mr Campbell a good morning, she was bidden to wait a few moments so that she might meet Miss Campbell, a treat she wasn’t particularly anxious to experience. The lady, when she came, was exactly as Cassandra had pictured her, only more so; she was younger than her brother, with a determined chin and cold blue eyes which examined Cassandra’s London-bought hat with suspicion and then raked her face, looking for signs of the frivolity the owner of such a hat would be sure to possess. But there was nothing frivolous about Cassandra’s face; Miss Campbell sighed with vexation—she had already heard far too much about this young woman from London from her brother, who, at his age, should know better, and now she had seen for herself that there were none of the more regrettable aspects of the modern world visible in the girl—only the hat. She would have her to tea, she decided, and show her up, with her usual skill, before her brother, and Cassandra, while unaware of these thoughts, sensed that she wasn’t liked—well, she didn’t like Miss Campbell either. She murmured noncommittally over the invitation to tea and made a polite escape with the murmured excuse that she had the Sunday dinner to see to.

Out of hearing, she was immediately attacked by her two small companions.

‘But you got the dinner ready before we came out, Aunt Cassandra,’ Andrew pointed out.

‘You said…’ began Penny.

‘Yes, my dears, I know. I told a fib, didn’t I? I’m very sorry, but you see I couldn’t think of anything else to say, and I didn’t want to go back to the Manse, and I believe Mr Campbell was on the point of asking us.’

This sensible way out of an awkward situation was immediately sanctioned, although Andrew asked doubtfully, ‘But you don’t usually fib, Aunt Cassandra, do you?’

And she, in some ways as young as her companions, crossed her fingers as she assured him that no, she did her best not to.

She thought about the ogre quite a lot during the next few days, and when she met Jan in the village shop and saw the meagre groceries he was buying, she went home, baked a large fruit cake and that same afternoon, after the children had gone back to school, climbed the path behind the house once more.

Probably she would get the cake thrown at her, but at least she had to try; the thought of the two men living in a kind of exile without enough to eat and with no hope of a home-made cake for their teas touched her heart—and perhaps this time the ogre would be more friendly. She had no wish to pry, she knew how difficult it was for anyone to reconcile themselves to blindness, especially when they were young—and he was still young, she guessed about thirty-five.

This time she walked boldly up the path and knocked on the door, and was rewarded by the ogre’s voice bidding her to go in and shut the door behind her. It led directly into the sitting-room, small and cosy and extremely untidy, but none the less clean. Cassandra paused just inside the door and before she could speak, the man in the dark glasses said: ‘It’s you again.’

‘Oh, you can see—I’m so glad!’ said Cassandra, her plain face illuminated by delight.

‘We don’t have so many visitors that I can’t make a shrewd guess as to who it is. Besides, Dioressence isn’t so difficult to recognize—I don’t imagine that there are many women in the village who wear it.’ The dark glasses were turned in her direction. ‘Why have you come? Did I invite you?’

A bad beginning, she had to admit. ‘No—but I was in the shop this morning and Jan was there and—and…’ She paused, not knowing how to say it without hurting his pride, of which she had no doubt he had far too much. ‘Well, I thought you might like a cake, as you said Jan couldn’t make cakes—it’s only a fruit one, but if you put it into a tin it will keep for days.’

She was still standing by the door and she couldn’t see his face very well, for he was sitting by the fire in a large armchair, half turned from her. He said quietly: ‘Will you sit down? I’m afraid we aren’t very tidy, but move anything you have to,’ and when she had done so, still clutching the cake, he went on: ‘You’re kind. We don’t encourage visitors, you know—there’s no point. I’m only here for a few weeks and they are almost over.’

‘You’ll go home?’

‘Yes.’

‘I don’t think you’re English—or Scottish—and you can’t be German because if you were Jan wouldn’t be with you.’

His smile mocked her. ‘Intelligent as well as beautiful,’ he remarked silkily.

‘If you didn’t have to wear those glasses you would see that I am rather a plain girl.’

‘Indeed? In which case we must allow my dark glasses to have some advantage after all.’

She went a painful scarlet. In a voice throbbing with self-restraint, she said: ‘That was really rather rude.’

The mouth beneath the dark glasses sneered. ‘Yes, but you asked for it, young woman.’

She got to her feet, laid the cake carefully down on the table and said in a sensible voice: ‘Yes, I did, didn’t I? I shall know better next time, if ever there is a next time. I came because I thought you might be lonely, but I see now that I’ve been officious and I expect you find me a prig as well. I’m sorry.’ She was at the door, she opened it, said goodbye and was through it and away down the path with such speed that she didn’t hear his sharp exclamation.

She had put the children to bed and was sitting with her gros-point in her lap, thinking about her afternoon visit and its awful failure, when there was a knock on the door. It was Jan, and when she invited him in, he shook his head and said: ‘I’m not to stop, miss. Mr van Manfeld sent me to ask if you would go and see him again—tomorrow, perhaps? He wishes to talk to you.’

Cassandra felt an instant pleasure, which in the face of her recent reception at the cottage, was ridiculous. She said cautiously, ‘Oh, I can’t possibly come tomorrow, or the day after that—let me see…’ she frowned over mythical engagements, ‘perhaps Friday afternoon.’

‘Not tomorrow?’ inquired Jan, disappointed.

She shook her head. ‘No, I’m afraid it’s quite impossible. I’ll come on Friday. Would you like a cup of coffee before you go?’

He gave her a suspicious look. ‘No—no, thank you, miss. I was to say that the cake was very good. I’ll be going.’

They wished each other good-night and she shut the door upon him and stood leaning against it, wondering why the ogre should want to see her again. He hadn’t liked her, had he? he had said so, not in so many words, perhaps—all the same…perhaps it was the cake. She went back to her embroidery, her mind already busy with the making of another cake, and possibly an apple pie. Her pastry was excellent, and men liked pies.

CHAPTER TWO

CASSANDRA climbed the hill path on Friday afternoon, carrying a basket this time and wrapped against the fine rain and boisterous wind in an elderly anorak of Rachel’s, and this time when she knocked on the door, Jan opened it for her and ushered her inside as Mr van Manfeld rose from his seat by the fire to greet her. She hadn’t quite expected that, and although he didn’t smile at least his face wore a look of polite welcome. She stared at the dark glasses and wondered what colour the eyes they concealed would be, then, rather belatedly, wished him a good after noon. ‘I’ve brought another cake, a chocolate one, and an apple pie—I was making one for us and it seemed silly not to…’

She stopped because it was a stupid sort of speech anyway, but someone had to say something. Jan had nodded at her and disappeared through a door leading presumably to the kitchen, and Mr van Manfeld took so long to say anything that she had to quell a desire to put her basket on the table and go away again.

‘I didn’t think that you would come,’ said her host at length. ‘Why did you?’

‘Well, you asked me, and I said I would—and besides, I thought you might be glad of another cake.’

He smiled then and his whole face changed. ‘I have a vile temper,’ he informed her, ‘and I have allowed it to get out of hand—I hope you will forgive me for my rudeness.’

Cassandra, ever practical, was taking off her anorak and went to hang it behind the door. ‘Yes, of course, and you’re not as rude as all that. The village…’

‘Discuss me? Naturally. But I came here to get away from people. Will you sit down?’

She took the chair opposite his and tried not to stare at the glasses; instead she picked up a small ginger kitten sitting before the fire, and put it on her lap. ‘You said you were going home soon—so I suppose you came here to convalesce or wait for results.’

The eyebrows rose. ‘Is that a guess?’ and when she said yes, he went on:

‘I’m awaiting results. There is a good chance that my blindness isn’t permanent, what sight I have has already much improved, but I depend on my eyes for my work—I’m a surgeon.’ He added impatiently, ‘But I can’t expect you to understand.’

‘Yes, you can. I’m a nurse, you see, and I’ve just done six months in theatre and I’ve watched the surgeons at work. Is it an optic nerve injury?’

‘Yes. A paralysis which is slowly righting itself, I hope.’ He spoke curtly and without any wish to continue the subject, something which became apparent when he went on: ‘I asked you to come so that I might apologize to you. I was abominably rude and you were most forbearing. I should warn you that I frequently lose my temper.’

The silence after this frank statement became rather long. Cassandra sat, wondering if she was supposed to go, or was she to stay a little while, even have tea? She was on the point of making some remark about getting back when Jan came in from the kitchen. To her disappointment he was empty-handed; she had, after all, come quite a long way and at Mr van Manfeld’s request. Whatever better feeling had caused him to invite her had cooled. She got up and offered Jan the basket. ‘If you wouldn’t mind putting these in the kitchen,’ she asked, and he nodded without looking at her and put out a stringy arm upon which the hideous tattoo stood out sharply.

She was normally a composed girl, not given to impulsive actions, but now she put out her hand and touched his arm gently and said: ‘Jan, I’m so sorry about this—I wanted to tell you.’

Jan looked at her then; his eyes were black and she thought for a moment that he was very angry, but he wasn’t. He smiled and patted her hand and said: ‘Thank you, miss.’ He might have said more, but Mr van Manfeld gave a short mocking laugh.

‘Spare me a mawkish scene!’ he begged nastily. ‘And should you not be going back to your charges, Miss…?’

‘Darling,’ Cassandra told him crisply, ‘and don’t dare to be funny about it!’

‘I’m never funny,’ he assured her, ‘and if it is your inappropriate name to which you refer, I can think of nothing more unsuitable. There is nothing darling about you—you invade my privacy without so much as a by-your-leave, you subject me to your quite unnecessary sentiment, and you assure me that you are not pretty. I really think you should go.’ His voice was cool, faintly amused, and mocking.

Cassandra stared at the dark glasses. The mouth below them was pulled down into a half smile which was fast becoming a sneer—and he had smiled so nicely. She sighed. ‘I’m not surprised that the children call you an ogre,’ she informed him tartly, ‘because you are a most ill-mannered man, which is a pity, because I expect you’re quite nice really.’

The glasses glared. ‘Oh, go away!’ he snapped, and got up from his chair. He looked very large and almost menacing. ‘God’s teeth,’ he ground out savagely, ‘what have…’

Cassandra’s firm chin went up in the air. ‘What a shocking remark to make!’ but he didn’t allow her to finish.

‘Don’t be so prissy,’ he advised her sourly, ‘I’m no mealy-mouthed parson.’

She allowed herself a moment’s comparison of Mr Campbell and the man before her and was surprised to find that Mr Campbell came off second best. ‘I’m sure he’s a very good man and kind.’

‘Meaning that I’m not? As though I care a damn what you think, my pious Miss Darling—going to church in your best hat and probably making the reverend’s heart flutter to boot. You sound just his sort.’

‘I’m not anyone’s sort, Mr van Manfeld.’ She picked up her empty basket and went to the door, her voice coming loud and rather wobbly. ‘It’s a good thing you can’t see me, because I’m extremely angry.’

His voice followed her, still sour. ‘But I can see you after a fashion. It’s true you’re dark blue and very fuzzy round the edges, but since you assure me that you’re a plain girl, I don’t really see that it matters, do you?’

Cassandra ground her teeth without answering this piece of rudeness and banged the door regrettably hard as she went out.

There was a note the next day, presumably delivered by hand while she had been out. It was typed and signed rather crookedly with the initials B. van M. It begged her pardon and asked her to go to the cottage and stay for tea. She read it several times, then tore it up. There was another note the following day; it was waiting for her when she got back from church with the children, and she tore that one up too and hurried to get their dinner because, having run out of excuses, she had accepted Miss Campbell’s invitation to tea that afternoon, and she was to take Andrew and Penny with her. She had, she told herself firmly, no intention of going anywhere near the ogre ever again. She found the idea distressing.

Tea at the Manse was run on strictly conventional lines. Everyone sat round the drawing-room eating slippery sandwiches and crumbling cake from plates which weren’t quite big enough. The children, coaxed into exemplary behaviour, sat like two small statues, making despairing efforts to catch the crumbs before they reached the floor, and Cassandra, seated with her hostess on a remarkably hard sofa, watched them with sympathy. It was a relief when the clock struck five and she was able to say that they should be going home before the dusk descended. ‘And anyway,’ she went on politely, ‘you will want to get ready for church, I expect.’

She had no ready reply when her host, despite the speaking look his sister gave him, professed himself ready to accompany them to their door.

‘There’s no need,’ cried Cassandra, who even if he hadn’t, had seen the look and didn’t want his company anyway. ‘It’s only ten minutes’ walk, and it’s not dark yet.’

Which made it worse, because the pastor pointed out that he couldn’t possibly allow a young and pretty woman to go that distance, especially with the children, he added. It made it sound as though the village were some vice-ridden haunt full of desperate characters with flick-knives waiting at every corner. Cassandra suppressed a giggle and they set off sedately, each with a child holding a hand. At the door she felt bound to ask him in, and was quite downcast when he accepted.

He didn’t stay long, although she had the impression that he would have done so if time hadn’t been pressing. She saw him to the door, murmuring politely about the tea-party, and suggesting vaguely that he and his sister might care to take tea with them at some future date. When he had gone, Andrew rounded on her. ‘Aunt Cassandra, how could you? Ask him to tea, I mean. He’s all right, I suppose, but Miss Campbell’s always so cross. Did you hear her telling Penny off because she made crumbs, and she couldn’t help it.’

Cassandra led the way to the kitchen. ‘Darlings, I know. I made crumbs too, but you see it would be so rude not to invite them back. But if they come on a Sunday they have to be back by six o’clock—earlier—so it wouldn’t be too bad.’

She opened the fridge and took out some milk, and Andrew, standing beside her, said: ‘He fancies you, Aunt Cassandra.’

She gave him a look of horror. ‘Andrew, you’re making it up! He couldn’t—you mustn’t make remarks like that,’ she rebuked him. ‘You’re only repeating something you’ve heard.’

He mistook her meaning. ‘That’s right. I heard someone in the shop yesterday—that’s what they said.’ He was speaking the truth; Cassandra said lightly: ‘Oh, gossip, darling, you shouldn’t listen to that, no one ever means it. Now, supper—I planned a rather nice one.’

The pastor wasn’t mentioned again, for after supper they played Monopoly until bedtime, which left no time to talk. It was later, when she was sitting in the quiet house, writing to Rachel, that Cassandra paused to worry about Andrew’s remark. Mr Campbell was a very nice man, she had no doubt, but definitely not her cup of tea. Besides, she didn’t like his sister. She would do her best to avoid him as much as possible, though how to do that in a village of such a small size was going to be a problem. She brightened at the thought that it was only just over a month until she would be gone and the problem would solve itself, but her relief was tempered by a very real regret that she would never see Mr van Manfeld again; even in a rage he was interesting company, and surely, sometimes he was good-tempered. It would be nice to know, but she doubted if she ever would.

She had the opportunity of doing so the very next day. She had taken the children back to school after their dinner and was sitting on the floor before the fire with the animals, doing nothing, when the front doorbell rang.

Mr van Manfeld stood outside with Jan beside him. He wore a sheepskin jacket which made him truly vast, so that Jan, similarly clad, looked like his very thin shadow. The ogre said politely: ‘Good afternoon, Miss Darling. I sent you two notes; you didn’t reply to them. We came to visit you yesterday afternoon, but you were not home. Taking tea with the reverend, so the village tells Jan.’

‘Come inside,’ said Cassandra in a no-nonsense voice. ‘Coming all this way—you must be mad! You can’t possibly see where you’re going…’ She stopped and bit her lip because her choice of words hadn’t been too happy.

‘Jan is my sight.’ He had followed her into the hall with Jan close behind. ‘I must own, my dear girl, that you are the only person I have met since my accident who hasn’t cried crocodile’s tears over me or wanted to lead me around like a dumb animal. I find it refreshing.’ He towered over her, standing in the centre of the spacious hall. ‘Can you imagine what it is like to be without sight?’

She returned the blank stare of the dark glasses steadily. ‘I think so—a kind of little hell. But you’re going to see again; you know far better than I do that if there’s any sight left after an optic nerve injury, it’s more likely to improve than worsen. Come into the sitting-room.’

She didn’t attempt to show him where the chairs were; Jan had taken his jacket, now he guided him unobtrusively to one of the armchairs by the fire and at Cassandra’s smiling invitation, took one close by.

‘Why have you come?’ she wanted to know, and sat down on the floor again with Bob and the cats.

Mr van Manfeld crossed one long leg over the other. ‘Another thing I like about you, dear Miss Darling, is your direct approach. I came because I wanted to see you again—er—figuratively speaking, of course. I am selfish, full of self-pity and evil-tempered, but I enjoy your company, therefore I force myself—and Jan—upon you, since you aren’t civil enough to answer my notes.’

‘Civil!’ Cassandra’s voice was shrill with annoyance. ‘Whatever next—when I took the trouble to walk up to your cottage on Friday and you didn’t so much as offer me a cup of tea…’

‘Tea?’ interrupted Mr van Manfeld. ‘That would be delightful. I was only saying to Jan that perhaps a little female society might do us both good.’

‘How right you are!’ exploded Cassandra. ‘But don’t count on me being the female.’

He had stretched out in his chair and one of the cats had got on to his knee. He was stroking her with a large square hand—a surgeon’s hand. ‘But you are very female, Miss Darling. You are as bold as a lion and just as rude as I am when occasion demands. Besides, Jan and I find your cakes delicious. Do you suppose we might enter into an uneasy friendship?’

She had to laugh. She had never met anyone like him before; she wondered what he was really like behind that façade he had built up—a façade to protect him from pity. She wondered for the hundredth time what kind of accident he had had. She got up and went and stood in front of him and held out her hand. ‘All right,’ she said, ‘an uneasy friendship, but don’t expect me to be a doormat for you to wipe your rages on, because I won’t.’

He shook her hand gravely, ‘I think you are hoaxing me,’ he remarked. ‘Only a pretty girl would speak with so much confidence. I find it an incentive to regain my sight as quickly as possible.’

‘No,’ she declared positively, ‘you mustn’t think that, because I’m plain—I told you so.’ She appealed to Jan: ‘I am, aren’t I?’

The black eyes were amused. ‘I have described you to Mijnheer, miss, so there is no need for me to do so again.’

‘There, you see?’ she inquired of the ogre, who said instantly and with gentle blandness: ‘No, I don’t see, but I have great faith in Jan.’

‘Oh, I am sorry,’ said Cassandra contritely. ‘I keep forgetting, you must think me a hard-hearted, uncaring person.’

‘No, I don’t think that at all.’ He smiled, which delighted her so much that she said at once: ‘You’ll stay for tea, won’t you? The children will be out of school in half an hour, if you don’t mind sitting here while I fetch them? I don’t like them to be out alone, I know it’s not far, but I feel I should be extra careful of them. Rachel—my sister—would never forgive me.’

‘We should very much like to stay, and Jan will fetch the children, won’t you, Jan? They know him, I believe—they meet in the shop.’

Which remark put her in mind of the inadequate purchases Jan made. Mr van Manfeld didn’t look poor, but then there were some people who never did, preferring to starve than tell anyone. She wondered what they had eaten for their dinner, and decided to add a plate of sandwiches to the hot buttered toast and the cake. Her thoughts were interrupted by her guest inquiring the name of her training school in London, and when she had told him, he went on to ask where her home was, and when she explained that she hadn’t got one, looked taken aback. ‘And where do you go for your holidays?’ he wanted to know.

‘To Rachel and Tom, only they came up here to live a year ago so that Tom could get his book finished—it was a bit far away, but now I’m here for six weeks while they are in Greece. Besides, it’s wonderful for me, because I’d planned to leave Duke’s and take my midwifery.’

‘When?’

‘When Rachel and Tom come home.’

‘Have you already applied?’

She was surprised at his interest, but perhaps he welcomed the chance to talk about something different. She answered readily enough: ‘No—at least, I applied months ago and I have to let them know by the end of the month.’

‘Three weeks’ time.’

‘Yes. You ask a lot of questions.’

‘Meaning it’s your turn? Well?’

‘Where do you come from? You’re not English, although you speak it perfectly. I think you’re Dutch.’

He inclined his head. ‘You are correct, my dear Miss Darling. I come from Utrecht, or rather, that is where I do most of my work. My home is in a small town called Rhenen, on the north bank of the Rhine.’

‘A pretty name—is it a pretty place?’

‘I think so.’

It was apparent that she had been allowed her quota of questions. She got up, saying: ‘Will Jan really not mind fetching the children? If not, I can go.’ She smiled at the older man as she spoke and he got to his feet.

‘I should like to go. Mijnheer?’

Mr van Manfeld nodded. ‘Yes, go by all means, Jan.’

When they were alone together Cassandra made up the fire, said matter-of-factly. ‘I’m going to switch on a lamp, a small one on this side of the room. Do you want to close your eyes when I do it?’ and then, ‘I’m going to make the tea.’

‘Must you? Or is it an excuse to get away from me?’

‘Why should I want to get away from you?’ She sounded reasonable. ‘I asked you to stay for tea. I didn’t have to, you know.’

‘You’re heaping coals of fire, Miss Darling.’

‘Well, I don’t mean to,’ she declared. ‘Why were you so bad-tempered on Friday?’ She saw the look on his face and added hastily: ‘All right, you don’t have to answer, and I’m not being nosey, I just wondered.’

He stirred in his chair. ‘I had a visit from the man who is looking after my eyes—he’s pretty good in his own line. I had hoped that he would say that I might wear different glasses—that there had been some dramatic improvement. I was disappointed, and I haven’t yet acquired the patience of the blind.’

She said with quick sympathy: ‘Being a surgeon makes it much harder for you, and not knowing if you will be able to go on with your work makes it even harder, doesn’t it?’

He winced. ‘You have a knack of touching a raw wound, dear girl, even if it is with a gentle finger.’

‘I don’t mean to hurt you, truly I don’t. But cast your mind back, Mr van Manfeld. You were totally blind at first, weren’t you? And now you can see just a little, out of focus and blurred, but you can see, so you are getting better. Can’t you remember that?’

He didn’t answer her and when he spoke he sounded thoughtful. ‘I wish I could see your face.’ He smiled, and although he couldn’t see, she smiled back.

The children came tumbling into the house, excited because Jan had fetched them from school and had told them that he would be staying for tea. They came into the sitting-room, still in their outdoor clothes, and stood staring silently.

‘Come and meet the ogre, my dears,’ invited Cassandra cheerfully. ‘His name is Mr van Manfeld and he and Jan have come to call. His dark glasses make it difficult for him to see, so go and stand in front of him and shake hands.’ Her practical voice made everything normal to their childish ears. They offered hands, said how do you do in small polite voices, and Andrew asked, disappointment colouring his voice: ‘You’re not an ogre?’

‘Well, no, not a storybook ogre, I’m afraid, but I have got some very ogreish habits, and as you can see, I am a little on the large side, though small for an ogre—but I have got enormous feet.’

The children examined his heavy brogues with interest, demanding to know what size. Cassandra left them to it and went to get the tea.

Jan came to help her carry in the tea things. ‘We always have it round the fire,’ she explained. ‘I hope you won’t mind—and we’re always famished, so I hope you’ll both eat a lot.’

Which they did. She watched the plates empty and the cake diminish, while she listened to Mr van Manfeld talking nicely to the children.

She talked to Jan at the same time, polite nothings, although she would have liked to ask him about his native Poland, but perhaps he didn’t care to talk about it, so to be on the safe side she talked about the village and the country around them and listened, after a time, with real interest to his replies, because he knew a great deal about the island. She was telling him about the squirrel when Penny interrupted to say:

‘Aunt Cassandra drew him when we got home. She drew lots of mice too—she draws beautifully.’

She trotted off and came back presently with Cassandra’s sketch book and opened it for Jan to see.

‘You are talented, miss,’ he said quietly, and pushed the book towards Penny. ‘Take the book, if you please, to Mijnheer and tell him what is in it.’

She watched the two children, one each side of their visitor, telling him in a muddled chorus about the mice and when they had finished, he asked:

‘Will you keep this book for me, and when I can see again, I should like to see it with my own eyes, although I must say yours were a very good substitute.’ He closed it and got up. ‘Jan, I think we must go or the animals will wonder where we are.’

‘Animals?’ cried Cassandra and the children.

‘The kitten—you may have seen him? He came looking for a home—a fox with a broken leg, a tawny owl, a robin with a broken wing—that’s all we have at the moment. They come and go.’

It was Penny who asked: ‘Please may we come and see them? We won’t disturb you…’

‘I should be delighted if you would all come. On Saturday afternoon perhaps, when there is no school, and we will have tea, though not such a splendid one as we have had today. I will send a message.’

They all went to the door and Cassandra said: ‘You will take care? It’s not a very easy path—you’ve a torch?’ and Jan nodded a little impatiently as he said goodbye and turned to go, but Mr van Manfeld paused on the step. ‘Your name is beautiful. May I call you Cassandra? I think it must suit you very well.’

The two men disappeared into the thickening dusk and Cassandra drew the children indoors and shut the winter evening out. The three of them washed up to the accompaniment of an animated discussion on their visitors. ‘I like the ogre,’ said Penny. ‘And so do I,’ added Andrew. ‘Do you like him, Aunt Cassandra?’

She was forced to admit that she did, and for the first time since she had fancied herself in love with the Surgical Registrar, she regretted not having a face as charming as her name.

They were drinking their mid-morning cocoa next day when Jan rang the bell and they rushed to the door to let him in.

‘Mijnheer wishes you to come this afternoon, if that is possible. He is sorry that he sent no message, but there were things…’

Presumably she was supposed to accept the ‘things’ as an excuse, and of course the children had no hesitation in saying that they would go immediately after their dinner. Cassandra, not wishing Mr van Manfeld to have everything all his own way, modified this statement with the promise of their arrival during the afternoon. ‘And do tell Mr van Manfeld that we are pleased to come; it will mean changing our plans for the afternoon, but luckily you came before we had made final arrangements.’

Jan fixed her with an expressionless black eye, assured her that he would deliver her message, and with the promise of seeing them all again within a few hours, took himself off.

Cassandra had privately decided to arrive just before tea time, but the children had other ideas. She found herself, much against her will, climbing the path soon after two o’clock; nothing she could say would dislodge their fixed idea that the ogre could hardly wait to see them again, and the quicker they got there the better.

They had tea sitting round the big table in the comfortable kitchen, because, as Mr van Manfeld explained, it was easier than trying to squash into the sitting-room. The talk was cheerful because the children were happy. They talked about school, their friends in the village, Bob’s rheumatism, and the dead mouse Penny had found on the lawn that morning. It was she who asked suddenly: ‘How long do you have to wear your blinkers, Mr van Manfeld?’

Cassandra was on the point of saying something—anything—but her host forestalled her. ‘I don’t know,’ he said with surprising mildness. ‘Not very much longer, perhaps. We shall have to wait and see, shan’t we? When I throw them away shall we celebrate with a party?’

The suggestion was instantly accepted by the two children, although Penny asked: ‘Can’t I give a party for you? I’d love to give a party—Mummy wouldn’t mind, and you can be my guest and we’ll have red jelly and ice cream, and Jan can come, and the kitten. Will you?’

The ogre’s face was lighted by a smile which was all kindness. ‘I think that’s a lovely idea. I accept your kind invitation, Penny, and we’ll all come, won’t we, Jan?’

At last it was time to go and, on the point of going out of the house Cassandra paused to remark: ‘We’ve spent the whole afternoon without a single cross word.’

Mr van Manfeld took her hand and held it. ‘That’s the effect you have upon me, Cassandra Darling.’ A remark one could take whichever way one wanted; her common sense told her that he was merely addressing her by her own name and not using a term of endearment. She followed Jan and the children down the hill, wondering when she would see him again, and hoping that it would be soon.

It was sooner than she had expected and in circumstances she could not have foreseen—it was, in fact, the very next morning. They had set off for a walk before church quite early, long before the church bell began to ring. They skirted the side of the hill and Cassandra, steadfastly refusing the children’s suggestion that they should go first to Ogre’s Relish and see if the ogre would like to accompany them, pursued her way along a little path winding itself around the foot of the hills above it. Cassandra noticed the grey clouds piling up on the horizon, and the wind, away from the shelter of the trees, blew cold. She had intended to follow the path along the loch and back the same way, but now she decided to turn off and strike inland, along the narrow rocky path over the rough turf. It followed a small wild stream which presently became a waterfall and they stopped to admire it. The ground was open now, the trees retreating on either side of them to come together again ahead of them, so that they could see nothing but pines around them.

‘We have to go left at the fork,’ said Cassandra, but at the fork Penny stopped. ‘There’s water down there, Aunt Cassandra,’ she cried, ‘down this other path—it’s another loch, a teeny-weeny one. Please may we go a little way and look at it?’

There was no reason why they shouldn’t. The path ended abruptly on a small turf platform poised above the water, still slippery from the night’s rain because there was no sun there. Penny, behind Cassandra, lost her footing, knocked her off her feet and slithered with a splash into the water. It wasn’t far, ten feet or so, and the water was as smooth as glass; she went in with a loud plop and Cassandra, scrambling to her feet, thought that her small niece would never come up again. She had pulled her anorak off by the time Penny’s small head appeared above the water, and dived in. She wasn’t a good swimmer, but Penny was very close to the edge.

The water was horribly cold. She gasped with the surprise of it as she surfaced, clutching the struggling Penny as she turned for the sloping turf at the water’s edge. Bob was sitting above them, watching intently and whining softly, but of Andrew there was no sign. Probably he had gone for help; for all his seven years, he was a surprisingly sensible little boy and sturdy, and would make short work of getting back to the village.

Cassandra clutched her small niece tighter and turned her head from side to side, studying the banks. There must be a spot where it would be possible to scramble up, or at least push Penny to safety without the danger of her rolling off again. Bob, who had been whining steadily, startled her out of her thoughts by barking suddenly and she heard voices— Andrew’s and…

‘The ogre!’ squeaked Penny, and Cassandra drowned the small voice with a shout of her own. ‘Don’t come any nearer!’ her voice was urgent. ‘There’s no foothold—you mustn’t…’ she spluttered, swallowing water, ‘you mustn’t,’ she repeated.

‘Don’t fuss, my dear young woman,’ the ogre besought her, his voice clear and unhurried from the bank. There was a gentle splash as he slid into the water, feet first. Beside her in no time at all, he said: ‘Penny, put your arms round my neck—you’re quite safe, only wet and cold.’ His voice was quiet and calm and quite unhurried and Penny did as he had bidden her without question. When she had anchored herself firmly he went on, still without any sound of urgency in his voice, ‘Now tell me where the bank stands out in the water like a finger.’

Cassandra looked too and saw it first. ‘It’s on our right, on the other side.’

‘Then that is where we must go, Cassandra. I take it you can swim? Keep beside me.’

She had no wish to do otherwise; even though he couldn’t see, or not very much, his bulk was reassuring and some of his massive calm had spilled on to her. She ploughed along beside him. It was no great distance, but she was already tired from holding Penny and her arms felt like lead. It was nice to hear her companion advise her to put her feet down as he stood up himself. Incredibly the water was scarcely waist deep.

‘A narrow shelf underwater,’ he explained as he slid Penny carefully on to the turf. ‘It’s the only place, the rest of it is bottomless.’

A remark calculated to hasten her own efforts to get on to dry land, which she achieved rather clumsily, helped by an undignified push from behind. He climbed out beside her, scooped up Penny and remarked:

‘You’ll have to lead the way—there should be some sort of path right the way round, but keep well away from the bank.’

Cassandra found the path quickly enough and with a hand on his arm guided him up to it, Penny quiet in his arms. It was cold and still under the trees. She shivered violently and asked: ‘Where’s Andrew?’

‘I told him to go back to the cottage and warn Jan. Everything will be ready for us there.’

Jan had worked hard in the ten minutes or so he had had before their arrival. Penny was soon undressed and wrapped in a blanket, and sitting in front of the fire. Cassandra could hear the bath water running too—Andrew was in the kitchen getting tea, and Jan, without wasting more words, handed her a blanket and threw open a door.

‘If you would undress, miss? I will dry your clothes as far as possible—you could have a bath after Penny, perhaps? And here is Mijnheer’s dressing-gown.’

She did as she was told and fifteen minutes later went back into the kitchen where Jan told her to sit by the fire and handed her a mug of tea which he laced liberally with whisky.

‘Jan—how kind you are. We’re putting you to a lot of trouble and I must thank you.’

‘I have done little,’ he shrugged his shoulders. ‘It is Mijnheer who did much.’

‘I know.’ She took a sip of fortified tea and found it surprisingly good. ‘I haven’t had a chance to see him yet, but I shall.’

The subject of their conversation appeared a few minutes later, clad in slacks and a sweater, to sit down in his chair again and demand to know if Jan had given her tea and put the whisky in it as he had ordered.

‘Yes, thank you,’ Cassandra answered him meekly, ‘it makes me feel nice and warm.’ Which remark he answered with a crack of laughter.

‘You will all stay for lunch,’ he told her, ‘and Jan shall go home with you when your clothes are dry.’

‘Oh, it’s very kind of you,’ she said, ‘and Penny and I are very grateful to you for rescuing us. We should like to thank you.’

He smiled faintly. ‘It’s always a pleasure to rescue damsels in distress, but do thank me.’

Cassandra hadn’t understood him, but Penny had; she got up from her place before the fire and went and flung her small arms round his neck and kissed him soundly. He put an arm round her and drew her to stand by his chair. ‘More than thanked,’ he remarked. ‘The other cheek’s waiting!’

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