She peeped at him. He was smiling, but not nicely. “Oh, dear, what have I said to make you smile that way?”

“Like what?”

“Well, you smile like that when you lecture the nurses and one of them makes a silly reply to a question.” She paused. “Ready to pounce.”

He roared with laughter. “Am I such an ogre? Do you think I am an ogre, Venetia?”

It would be best not to tell him what she thought of him. “No,” she told him sedately. “I’ve never thought that. You’ve always been kind to me.” She added, suddenly bold, “When you’ve remembered that I’m here.”

He said blandly, “Oh, but I’ve never forgotten that.” A remark that left her puzzled, and hunting for a suitable reply.

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, and her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.

The Convenient Wife
Betty Neels

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER ONE

VENETIA FORBES, sitting at the end of the back row of Casualty’s crowded benches, allowed her gaze to roam; it was a nice change from watching the clock on the wall facing her, something she had been doing for over an hour. She was a smallish girl, pleasantly plump, with an ordinary face redeemed from plainness by a pair of magnificent grey eyes, thickly lashed. She had pretty hair of a soft mouse shade which curled on to her shoulders, although at the moment she was so covered in dust and dirt that it was difficult to see that. Her clothes were torn and filthy, and one sleeve had been roughly torn apart so that a first-aid pad could be tied around her forearm, which she held carefully cradled in her other hand. She was a nasty greenish white, but she was apparently composed, unlike her neighbour, a stout woman who was threatening hysterics at any moment and with an eye rapidly turning from an angry red to a rich plum colour. By morning, Venetia thought, it would be an even richer purple.

She glanced at the clock again, and then studied her surroundings. Casualty was bulging at the seams, for not only had those seriously injured in the bomb blast at a nearby Woolworth’s been rushed to St Jude’s, but the majority of those less seriously hurt as well, St Jude’s being the nearest Casualty—a large department, always comfortably occupied, but now crowded to the doors. Most of the people round her had minor wounds—deep scratches and grazes, sprained ankles, perhaps a broken bone or two, and until the really ill victims had been dealt with and warded they would have to possess themselves in patience. There were fifty or sixty people ahead of her, and already a number of them were demanding attention which the hard-pressed nurses and housemen were unable to give.

The woman next to her nudged her bandaged arm, and Venetia went a shade greener and closed her eyes for a moment.

‘Sorry, ducks. ’Urt yer arm, ’ave yer? What abart me eye, eh? I’ve lorst me shoes. ’Ow am I going ter get ’ome, that’s what I want ter know?’ She surveyed her feet in their remnants of stockings. ‘Can’t walk like this, can I?’

‘I expect they’ll send you back in an ambulance.’

‘An’ when’ll that be, I’d like ter know?’

‘Not just yet, I’m afraid. They have to attend to the ill people first.’

‘Course they do, ducks, but we’ve been ’ere for getting on for two hours…’

There was a good deal of shuffling from the front bench, and the first of the slightly injured was wheeled away to a cubicle. Venetia, to keep her mind occupied, began doing complicated sums in her head to discover how long it would be before her turn, and looked at the clock once more. Not too long, she hoped. She was feeling sick.

Various persons had been hurrying to and fro past her for ages now, and she had kept her mind occupied by watching them. Quite a few of them she knew, at least by sight—Mr Inglis, the orthopaedic surgeon, his registrar, two consultant surgeons, the senior physician, and any number of house doctors and house surgeons—and she had more than a passing acquaintance with several of the nurses hurrying to and fro, but none of them noticed her. In any case, she reflected, she was probably unrecognisable.

She turned her attention back to the clock and watched the second hand jerking from minute to minute, and she went on staring at it as a very tall man went past and was met by one of the registrars, who ushered him into a cubicle at the far end of the department. She had never spoken to him, only attended his lectures, and she thought it unlikely that she would ever speak to him. Perhaps that was a good thing—from all accounts he was an impatient man, not suffering fools gladly, and with a coldly biting tongue when annoyed. Probably crossed in love, she decided, watching his large back disappear behind the curtains.

It was all of half an hour before she saw him again, and by then the occupants of the benches around her were being dealt with with efficient rapidity. He walked back the way he had come, talking to his registrar, and Venetia’s neighbour said, ‘Cor—look at ’im. There’s an ’andsome bloke.’ She put a large hand on Venetia’s injured arm; Venetia gave a small, gasping sigh and little beads of sweat shone on her dirty face.

This time, she thought hopelessly, there was nothing for it—she was either going to be sick or faint. She closed her eyes, so she didn’t see Professor ter Laan-Luitinga pause by her.

‘This girl was here as I came in,’ he observed. ‘She’s all in. I wonder…?’ He lifted the pad off her arm and stood studying the splinter of glass which had gone in one side of her forearm and out the other.

Venetia opened her eyes and looked up into his dark face. Very handsome, she thought hazily, and indeed he was, with a high-bridged nose above a rather thin mouth, dark eyes under alarming eyebrows, and a head of dark hair sprinkled with silver. She said clearly, ‘I’m so sorry, but I think I’m going to faint.’

And she did. The professor picked her up off the bench. ‘An empty cubicle?’ he demanded. ‘I’ll get this thing out— I’ll need a local in case she comes round.’

Venetia had never fainted in her life; now she did the thing properly and stayed unconscious for all of three minutes, by which time the professor had made a neat incision, removed the glass shard and given a local injection. Just in time, for she opened her eyes and frowned.

‘Lie still,’ he told her. ‘The glass is out. I’ll put in a few stitches as soon as the local acts.’ He stared down at her. ‘Have you had ATS injections?’

She nodded. ‘The last one about three months ago.’ She added urgently, ‘I’m going to be sick.’

Someone tucked a bowl under her chin and the professor, taking no notice, began his stitching. Presently he cast down his needle. ‘That should take care of it,’ he observed. ‘Go home and go to bed, you’ll feel more the thing in the morning. See your own doctor.’ He smiled suddenly at her. ‘You were in a lot of pain, were you not?’ He said to someone she couldn’t see, ‘Get this young lady back home in an ambulance, will you?’ Then he nodded at Venetia, patted her shoulder with a surprisingly gentle hand, and went away, dismissing her from his powerful mind, already battling with the quite different problems of the operation he intended to do on the boy with the damaged brain.

Venetia watched him go, head and huge shoulders above everyone else, his registrar beside him. It must be nice, she reflected, to give orders to people knowing that they would be carried out without any trouble to himself, although, she conceded, it was only fair that anyone with as brilliant a brain as his should be spared the mundane tasks of everyday life.

Her rather hazy thoughts were interrupted by a brisk staff nurse.

‘You are to go home and go to bed for the rest of the day. Will you tell me where you live, and I’ll see if I can get an ambulance to take you?’

Venetia opened her eyes. ‘The nurses’ home. Here.’

‘For heaven’s sake! Why on earth didn’t you say so hours ago? Whatever will Sister Bolt say? You should have told someone.’

‘Who?’ asked Venetia politely. ‘When you were all up to your eyes with the badly injured. And I’m perfectly able to go over to the home by myself.’

‘Don’t you dare. Professor ter Laan-Luitinga will raise the roof in his nasty cold way if he hears that he hasn’t been obeyed to the letter. I’ll fetch Sister Bolt.’

Venetia closed her eyes again, trying to shut out a threatening headache. Sister Bolt was a veteran of St Jude’s and, although Venetia had never worked in Casualty, she knew that its senior sister had a Tartar’s reputation. It was therefore surprising when that lady’s amazingly sympathetic voice made her open her eyes once more.

‘Nurse? What is your name, and which ward are you on?’

‘Forbes, Sister and I’m on Watts Ward.’

‘You will stay here until the home warden comes for you. I will have a word with her. You fainted.’

‘Only because someone accidentally leaned on the splinter, Sister.’

Sister Bolt said kindly, ‘You poor child. Very painful. You had better have the rest of the day off. Eight stitches inserted by Professor ter Laan-Luitinga…’ She uttered the words as though conferring an honour upon Venetia, and went on, ‘Did you become unconscious when the bomb exploded, Nurse?’

Venetia drew her mousy brows together, thinking hard. ‘No, Sister. It surprised me, and I was blown off my feet, but there was a stand of winter woollies by me and they fell on top of me, so, except for the glass, I’m perfectly all right.’ She added apologetically, ‘I do have a headache.’

‘I’m not surprised. The professor has left instructions as to your medication. When you have been bathed clean and are in bed you will be given what he has ordered.’

Sister Bolt sailed away, and very shortly the warden arrived. She was a nice, cosy, middle-aged lady who clucked sympathetically over Venetia and hovered round in a motherly fashion while she was transferred to a wheelchair, wheeled briskly into a lift, and then over the bridge which separated the hospital from the nurses’ home. Her arm began to hurt, and she was grateful to Miss Vale for the speed with which she got her into a bath, where she was soaped and sponged and then sat with her eyes obediently shut while her hair was washed. She felt much better when she was clean once more, and as Miss Vale turned back her bed she said, ‘I do hope all the other people in Cas have someone to help them.’

‘You may depend upon it,’ said Miss Vale cheerfully. ‘In you get, and I’m going to get you a nice cup of tea and some toast and give you those pills. You’ll feel as right as rain when you’ve had a good sleep.’

So Venetia had her tea, nibbled at the toast and took her pills, and presently she slept. The October afternoon was sliding into dusk when she woke to find Sister Giles from her ward standing at the end of her bed.

‘Feeling better?’

She was another nice person, thought Venetia, still half asleep. A bit brisk, but perhaps one got like that when one had been running a busy surgical ward for years.

‘How’s that arm?’

Venetia levered herself up in bed. ‘Quite comfy, thank you, Sister.’

‘You’re on duty at seven-thirty tomorrow. I can’t spare you for two days off, but take tomorrow and come on duty the day after, Nurse. The ward’s bulging, and I’m having to cut off-duty for a few days.’

‘I’m sure I could come on duty tomorrow, Sister—’

‘If anything were to go wrong with your arm Professor ter Laan-Luitinga would be most annoyed. The day after will do; there’s quite a lot you can do with one arm.’ She added with kindly briskness, ‘Bad luck, Nurse Forbes. Luckily it’s no worse.’ She breezed to the door. ‘They’re bringing you something to eat. Have a quiet day tomorrow.’

The prospect of a day in bed was inviting, the prospect of a meal even more so. When Miss Vale came presently with chicken and creamed potatoes, and a delicious cold pudding which Venetia felt sure she must have pinched from the doctors’ supper table, she ate the lot. When the day staff came off duty various of her friends came to see her and, over cups of tea, discussed the day’s excitement, sympathised with her and expressed envy that she had been stitched by the professor, who, as one of her friends pointed out, concerned himself with complicated operations on brains and left the easy stuff to lesser men. ‘Gosh,’ she added, ‘it must have been worth it. Did he say anything?’

‘He told me to lie still.’

Her friends smiled at her in an indulgent fashion. Venetia was well liked both by her second-year set and by those junior and senior to her. She was good-natured and hard-working, and not in the least interested in catching the eye of any one of the house doctors, and when someone pointed this out to her she merely said that she hadn’t time. ‘I simply must get trained and get on the register,’ she had pointed out. ‘Besides, I’m not very exciting to look at, am I?’

A truth which her friends kindly denied while privately agreeing with her.

‘I cannot think,’ she observed to her companions over a last very strong cup of tea, ‘why everyone is so scared of Professor ter Laan-Luitinga. He’s only a man, after all, and he doesn’t even live here. I mean, he’s kind of international, isn’t he? Here today and gone tomorrow.’

Caroline Webster, the acknowledged beauty of their set, spoke kindly because she liked Venetia. ‘If only he’d stay for a month or two instead of the odd week here and there, Venetia darling. He isn’t only a man, he’s every girl’s dream.’ She peered at her pretty face in Venetia’s dressing-table looking-glass. ‘I wonder if he’s married, or has a girl? Such a pity that no one knows a thing about him.’

Someone asked, ‘Are you sure that’s all he said to you, Venetia?’

‘Oh, he asked if I’d had ATS injections.’

‘What a waste,’ moaned Caroline. ‘Couldn’t you think of something to say?’

‘No, and I was being sick…’

Horrified laughter greeted her, so loud that the night sister, coming to see that Venetia was all right, bade them all go to their rooms and stay there. She offered Venetia a pill, watched her swallow it and went away again, and Venetia went thankfully to sleep once more.

She felt fine in the morning; her arm was sore and stiff, but her headache had gone. She ate the breakfast brought to her and then got up and trailed around in her dressing-gown, sharing elevenses with those of her firm friends who were off duty, watching TV, and doing her nails. Her hands were scratched and grazed, and she was surprised to find that there were bruises on her person, most of them, luckily, out of sight. Her face was scratched as well, and she spent some time rubbing in a cream guaranteed to give instant beauty, offered to her by the generous Caroline. It made very little difference to her ordinary features, and since she had a lovely complexion already it did little good, although it did a lot for her ego.

She went on duty the next morning, and since the ward was still extremely busy there was plenty for her to do, even with one hand: TPRs, adjusting drips, feeding patients, helping the hard-pressed staff nurses with dressings. The day passed very quickly, and although she was late off duty it was still not quite six o’clock when she left the ward.

Her arm was aching now, and she thought thankfully of her bed. She would go to first supper and then get between the sheets. The thought sent her hurrying down the stone staircase and into the main corridor which ran from end to end of the hospital. She was almost at its end when Professor ter Laan-Luitinga turned the corner, walking slowly, a sheaf of papers under one arm, and deep in thought. So deep, she just hoped that he wouldn’t see her.

It wasn’t until he had passed her that she was brought to a halt by his voice.

‘Nurse—wait.’

She turned reluctantly, but stayed where she was.

‘Where have I seen you before?’ His eyes lighted on the wide strapping on her arm. ‘Good lord, who would have thought it?’

A remark which she took in good part; she must have been unrecognisable in Casualty. ‘Well, I’m clean now,’ she pointed out matter-of-factly, and added a hasty, ‘sir’.

His alarming eyebrows drew together. ‘Why are you on duty?’

‘Well, the ward’s awfully busy, and there aren’t enough of us to go round.’ She smiled at him re-assuringly. ‘But we can manage. I’m sure you have plenty to worry you, too. I hope that boy is going to do—’

‘Yes, eventually.’

‘Oh, good. I expect you are very tired,’ she added kindly, ‘operating and all that. I dare say you could do with a good sleep.’

He stared down at her over his commanding nose. ‘When I need advice, Nurse, I will ask you for it.’

His astounded stare at her ‘Oh, good,’ reminded her to add ‘sir’ again.

He turned on his heel, and then paused. ‘Your name, Nurse?’

‘Forbes, Venetia Forbes.’ She added, ‘I’m not supposed to speak to consultants—I’m only just second year, you see.’

‘Pray accept my apologies for making it necessary for you to address me, Nurse Forbes.’

She gave him another smile. ‘Well, of course, I will. I think it’s very handsome of you to say that. I mean, you don’t even need to notice me…’

‘I am relieved to hear that.’ He gave her a frowning nod and walked away.

She watched his vast person disappearing down the corridor until he turned a corner. ‘Very testy,’ she declared to the emptiness around her. ‘I dare say he’d rather be in Holland—perhaps he’s got a wife and children there. Poor fellow.’

The poor fellow, discussing with his registrar the finer points of the craniotomy he was to perform on the following morning, paused suddenly to ask, ‘Do you know of a Nurse Forbes, Arthur?’

If Arthur Miles was surprised, he concealed it nicely. ‘Venetia Forbes? First or second year nurse on the men’s surgical. You stitched her arm in Cas; a glass splinter, if you remember, sir.’

‘I remember.’

‘Nice little thing, by all accounts. On the plain side, but you must have seen that. Liked by everyone; no wiles, and a bit shy, though she can be remarkably plain-spoken.’

‘Indeed?’ The professor lost all interest. ‘Now, I thought I’d try that new drill…’

Venetia had gone on her way to the nurses’ home, to gossip with her friends until it was time for supper, and then retire to her room to drink tea with those of them who weren’t going out for the evening. Almost all her friends had some kind of love-affair in progress and, since she made a good listener, she knew the ins and outs of them all, but if she felt that she was missing romance she never said so. To anyone who asked her she replied that she was quite happy to visit her granny on her days off, and in her off-duty to visit the art galleries and museums easily reached by bus. They made a nice change from the dull streets encircling the hospital in the east end of London; they didn’t cost much, either.

She always went to her grandmother’s house on her days off. A small, red brick cottage in a row of similar ones, tucked away behind the opulent avenues of Hampstead, it had been home for her for the last five or six years, ever since her mother and father had been killed in a car accident. She had no brothers or sisters, and, for that matter, no uncles or aunts, either. Save for a cousin of her father’s whom she had never met, and who lived somewhere in Yorkshire, she and her grandmother were without kith and kin. Her grandmother hadn’t always lived there; when Venetia was very small she had gone with her mother and father to visit her grandparents at a nice old house on the edge of a Sussex village, but when her grandfather had died a good deal of his income had died with him, and her grandmother had moved to the little house she now lived in to be near Venetia’s parents, who lived in a pleasant house on the other side of the Heath. It wasn’t until after their deaths that she discovered that the house had been rented, and what money there was was barely enough to feed and clothe her. All the same, her grandmother had insisted that she should continue at school until she had her A levels. She was eighteen by then, and, although she had been offered a place at one of the lesser universities, she had got a paid job instead as a receptionist to a team of doctors and then, almost two years ago, she had persuaded her grandmother to let her train as a nurse.

She had had no regrets; she enjoyed her work and, being a friendly soul, had no trouble in making friends. The patients liked her, too, for she was patient and good-tempered and most sympathetic without being sentimental. The pay wasn’t very much, for she had to pay board and lodging to the hospital, but there was enough over to buy clothes and help out her grandmother’s small income. And it would get better—in a little over a year she would be trained, with more freedom, more money and a chance to work where she fancied.

It was three days later that she met the professor again. She had raced off duty at five o’clock, changed into a sweater and skirt, brushed her hair and tied it back, packed what she would need for a couple of days into a big shoulder-bag, dragged on her jacket and sped down to the entrance. The rush hour was on and she would have to get into a queue for a bus, but she would still be home in time for supper.

She was half-way across the vast expanse of the entrance hall when she saw the professor making for the door from the other side—the side sacred to consultants, the hospital secretary’s office and the boardroom. He was going fast, and if she slowed her steps there would be no need to encounter him—on the other hand, if she just hurried more she might slip through the door ahead of him. The quicker she got to the bus stop the better the chance of getting on a bus at this hour of day.

As it turned out they arrived at the door together, and to her annoyance he opened it for her and then stood so that she couldn’t get past him.

‘Ah, Nurse Forbes. You have had the stitches out?’

‘Thank you, yes, sir. You stitched it beautifully; there’ll be almost no scar.’

His firm mouth twitched. ‘I do my best. Why are you dancing around like that? Are you in a hurry?’

She had indeed been edging round him. ‘I’m going to catch a bus.’

‘Where to?’

It was none of his business, but she said politely, ‘Hampstead.’

‘Ah—Hampstead. I’m just about to drive myself there; may I offer you a lift?’

‘Well,’ said Venetia, ‘it’s very kind of you, sir, but I’m not sure…’

He hadn’t listened to a word. She was swept outside into the courtyard, and walked across to where a dark blue Bentley was parked. ‘Get in,’ he said, and, since it was obvious to her that he meant exactly what he said, she got in.

‘Where do you live?’

He had inched the car into the rush-hour traffic and had turned the nose to the west.

‘If you would drop me off in any part of Hampstead…’ began Venetia.

‘Don’t be ridiculous. Where do you live?’

‘Do you talk to everyone in such a manner?’ asked Venetia, quite forgetting who he was. ‘Or perhaps,’ she went on thoughtfully, ‘you’re tired after a long day’s work.’

‘Think whatever you wish, Nurse. Where do you live?’

‘Percy Lane. It’s behind—’

‘I know where it is. Are you married or—er—having a lasting relationship with some young man?’

They were driving through Holborn, and then on towards Primrose Hill; they would be in Hampstead very soon now. ‘No,’ she said quietly, ‘I’m not married, and I haven’t a boyfriend or anything like that. I live with my granny, at least for my days off and my holidays.’

‘No parents or brothers or sisters?’

‘No.’

He had nothing more to say, and she sat quietly, enjoying the comfort of the big, smooth car until he slowed and turned into Percy Lane. ‘Which house?’

‘Number fourteen, on the left half-way down.’

He slid to a halt, leaned across her and opened the door and undid her seat-belt, then got out himself and hauled her bag from the back of the car. ‘Enjoy your days off.’ He sounded as though he didn’t much care whether she did or not. ‘Goodnight, Nurse.’

‘Goodnight, and thank you, sir.’ She looked up into his face and smiled a little. He looked tired; perhaps that was why he looked austere and impatient whenever she had encountered him. She said kindly, ‘You must be glad to be going home; you look tired, sir.’

His mouth twisted into a sneer. ‘I am touched by your solicitude, Nurse. Quite wasted upon me, I’m afraid.’

He got back into the car and drove away, and she watched the car until it had turned back into the wide avenue at the end of the lane, and then beat a tattoo on the door of the little house behind her.

It was opened immediately. ‘Come in, child. How nice to see you. Who was that? A Bentley, too!’

Venetia kissed her grandmother, a small, elderly lady with the same nondescript features as her granddaughter, and with the same beautiful eyes. ‘Nice to be home, Granny. That was Professor ter Laan-Luitinga. He’s an honorary brain surgeon who comes to operate here from time to time. He met me at the door and offered me a lift.’

Her grandmother ushered her into the little sitting-room. ‘Nice of him, darling. Supper won’t be long. Leave everything in the hall, you can go to your room later.’

She cast a quick look at her granddaughter’s face. She was way behind with modern ways and habits, but in her elderly view it seemed strange that a member of the consultant staff should offer a lift to a student nurse he would probably know nothing of. Unless, of course, they had met already.

She took her usual high-backed chair in the pleasant room, remembering that she hadn’t heard from Venetia for some days, and there had been that bomb…

‘Did you see anything of that bomb outrage?’ she asked. ‘There must have been any number of casualties, and it was close to St Jude’s.’

‘Well, actually, I was in Woolworth’s when it went off, Granny. I was one of the lucky ones, though—just cut my arm a little. Professor ter Laan-Luitinga stitched it for me, and it’s perfectly all right.’

Her grandmother gave a small sigh of satisfaction. So that was why…

‘Let me see it, Venetia.’

The scar was examined, and pronounced a very neat piece of needlework. ‘Couldn’t have done it better myself,’ said her grandmother. ‘I thought you said he was a brain surgeon.’

‘Well, yes, he is. He just happened to go past while I was waiting in Casualty.’

‘How very fortunate, child.’ Her grandmother, a great knitter, began to turn the heel of a sock she was making. ‘Now tell me what you’ve been doing since I saw you last.’

Venetia’s two days off passed quickly. There was nothing exciting to do, but she didn’t mind—it was nice just to potter round the little house, go shopping with her grandmother, and sit round the fire in the evening listening to her reminiscing about Venetia’s mother and father. She had been very happy in those days, and remembering them made her sad, but, as her grandmother had said, life had to go on, and the sooner she was trained with the certainty of a secure job, the better. ‘I shan’t live forever,’ said her grandmother, ‘and there won’t be much for you, child. I’ve borrowed on this house, so there will be only a fraction of its worth to come to you. It’s not what I would have wished.’

Venetia had assured her that she had no need to worry; she already paid some of her salary towards household expenses, and in another year or two she would earn sufficient to look after the pair of them.

St Jude’s loomed inhospitably out of the evening mist when she went back the following day. The bus had been packed, and when she got out of it the sight of the narrow, shabby streets around her sent her usually cheerful heart plummeting down into her sensible shoes. Perhaps when she had trained she would be able to find a job away from London, somewhere from where she could still get to Hampstead to visit Granny, but where there were trees and fields and one could hear the birds singing.

The alternative, of course, was to find a millionaire and marry him. She laughed at the very idea, and Sedgwick, the head porter, looked up from his scrutiny of the evening paper.

‘Feeling ’appy, Nurse? On men’s surgical, aren’t you? ‘Ad three nasty cases in today—motorbikes—and there’s another just in, not ’alf an hour ago.’

Venetia poked her head through his little window. ‘What a welcome!’ she observed cheerfully. ‘For two pins I’d turn round and go home again.’

She went unhurriedly across the entrance hall and down the passage to the nurses’ home, where she spent a pleasant hour before bed drinking tea and catching up on the hospital gossip with various of her friends.

There was precious little time to gossip on the following day; the ward was full and, just as Sedgwick had said, the three cases which had been admitted were nasty ones, for not only were they badly injured, they were uncouth youths who raved and shouted and used language which Venetia, for one, didn’t always understand—which was perhaps a good thing. And the fourth case was developing symptoms of a hidden head injury as well as internal injuries. Sister Giles sent for Arthur Miles, who spent a long time examining the man and then disappeared into her office to telephone, and fifteen minutes later Professor ter Laan-Luitinga arrived.

Venetia, trotting briskly out of a dressing-room with a tray of dressings, managed to halt within a few inches of him, and even then she trod on the toe of his large, beautifully polished shoe.

‘Oops, so sorry, sir!’ She smiled widely at him, quite forgetting that when they had last met he had snubbed her quite nastily. He snubbed her now, not by saying anything—his nod was glacial, his dark eyes cold, dismissing her with a glance.

She went on her way, reflecting reasonably that there was no earthly reason why he should so much as smile at her. All the same, he had no need to look as though she weren’t there. She handed over the dressings to Staff Nurse Thomas, who was tall and thin, wore a perpetually cross expression and, although very competent, intimidated the patients. The elderly man having his dressing changed grinned at Venetia as she stood by the trolley ready to pass anything needed; a nice little thing, he reflected, never too busy to turn a pillow or fetch more water. He was on the point of exchanging a joke with her when Sister Giles poked her head round the curtains. ‘Nurse Forbes, Professor ter Laan-Luitinga wants that patient transferred to his unit now. He intends to operate this afternoon. Pack up everything, will you, and go with the patient and hand him over.’

There wasn’t much to pack up, and since the patient was becoming more and more drowsy there was no use in checking his few possessions with him. Venetia made a tidy packet, helped the porters get him on to the trolley, accompanied them to the lift and was whisked to the fifth floor which was the professor’s domain when he was at the hospital. He came out of IC as they proceeded down the wide corridor to the end cubicle and stood watching them. Venetia took care not to look at him and, once the patient was in his bed, busied herself arranging this and that in his locker. Then she stood waiting until a nurse came to relieve her.

The professor came instead. ‘You will be good enough to stay with this patient, Nurse. You will be relieved shortly. Ring the panic bell if you find it necessary. Sister will be here presently.’

‘Sister Giles is expecting me back, sir.’

‘She shall be informed.’

He went away and she glanced uneasily at the patient. It was a relief when the junior sister came in, made sure that he was lying correctly, checked that Venetia knew what to do if he showed signs of distress, and assured her that someone would come the moment she pressed the bell. ‘We’re rushed off our feet,’ she explained. ‘Just as soon as there’s a nurse free, she’ll take over.’

But the professor came first, and one of the anaesthetists was with him. He paused when he saw Venetia, his dark face frowning. ‘You’re still here, Nurse?’

‘Well, there is no one else, sir,’ she pointed out matter-of-factly, and listened to his irritable rumblings. He must be worn to the bone, she reflected. A professor of surgery he might be, but he was also at everyone’s beck and call. She hoped that he had a nice home life to make up for it…

He pressed the panic bell; there was a flurry of feet along the corridor, and Sister and a nurse came in smartly.

‘There is no panic, Sister, but be good enough to find an experienced nurse to remain with this patient.’ His voice was chillingly polite, and Sister shot a look at Venetia as though she were to blame. ‘I thought,’ went on the professor smoothly, ‘that I had made it clear that he needs a trained eye.’ His own eye lighted on Venetia. ‘Go back to your ward, if you please, Nurse.’

She was only too glad to do so. Worn to the bone he might be, she muttered savagely, racing down several flights of stairs, but civil he was not. Downright rude, in fact. It was with regret that she conceded that she wasn’t in a position to tell him so.

CHAPTER TWO

OCTOBER ebbed slowly into November, bringing with it chilly rain and wind and darkening mornings. Watts Ward was busy and Venetia trotted to and fro, and when her days off came round went thankfully to the cottage in Percy Lane. It was pleasant to get up in her own room in the morning and make tea for her grandmother and do the shopping, and all without having to keep an anxious eye on the clock. In the evenings they sat by the fire and talked, which was pleasant, and her grandmother knitted and Venetia wound wool or did nothing at all.

She had seen nothing of the professor. He came very seldom to Watts Ward, but he was to be glimpsed from time to time going in or out of the hospital. It was Caroline who told her that he had gone back to Holland. ‘What a lovely life,’ she added. ‘Think of all the people he meets. He must be rolling in cash—I bet he’s got a marvellous house somewhere.’

‘It’s to be hoped that he has,’ said Venetia sedately. ‘If he’s married his wife and children will need a roof over their heads.’

Caroline giggled. ‘Venetia darling, there’s not a scrap of romance in you. I’ve got a date with one of the housemen in his team—I’m going to find out something more about our professor.’

Venetia raised her eyebrows and then smiled. ‘I dare say if I were as pretty as you, Caro, I’d do that, too.’

But Caroline discovered nothing of the professor’s private life. Tim Dobson either didn’t know or wasn’t going to tell, and Venetia, caught up in a week even busier than usual, forgot to ask.

She felt that days off made a more than welcome break, even when it meant queueing in the cold rain for a bus after a long day. Venetia, struggling off the bus, made for Percy Lane as fast as her tired feet would allow, thinking of her supper and her grandmother’s welcome. It surprised her to see that the cottage was in darkness, and when no one answered the door she had a moment’s apprehension, which she explained away with her usual common sense. Her grandmother had a number of friends living in Hampstead, and it was barely seven o’clock—she could have lingered after having tea with one of them. She got out her key, opened the door and let herself into the narrow hall.

As she switched on the light she called, ‘Granny,’ but the little house was silent. She put down her bag and went into the sitting-room, turning on the light as she did so. The fire had burned low and her grandmother was sitting in her chair, her knitting in her lap, and Venetia knew before she reached her and felt for her pulse that she wouldn’t be able to find it. She said, ‘Granny?’ again in a frightened voice, and put her young arms around the elderly shoulders. She stayed like that for a few minutes, thrusting back grief. That could come later…

There was no telephone in the cottage. She crossed the road to one of the neighbours and phoned her grandmother’s doctor, and then went back and waited quietly for him to come, sitting very still, her granny’s hand in hers.

It was the end of the month before the professor returned to St Jude’s, and, after discussing the operation he intended doing on the following day, he got into his car and drove himself to his house. He was going through Hampstead when he saw Percy Lane’s narrow opening, and on an impulse he turned the car into it. He wasn’t sure why he was going—Venetia probably wouldn’t be there. He was being foolish, and he was annoyed at that.

There was a light shining between the drawn curtains and the front door was open. He got out of the car and pushed the door wider, and noticed then that there was a house agent’s board fastened on to the wall beside it. He said, ‘Venetia, I’m coming in,’ and pushed the sitting-room door open. She was sitting at the little round table by the window, her hands in her lap, and the face she turned to him was so white and weary that he said quickly, ‘What’s the matter? Are you ill?’ His dark eyes swept round the little room; it was scrupulously tidy, and also very cold. ‘Your grandmother?’ he asked.

Venetia supposed that she should have felt surprise at seeing him, but she didn’t. She said in her quiet way, ‘She died rather suddenly, two weeks ago.’

‘My poor girl.’ He undid his coat, tossed his gloves on to the table and sat down opposite her. ‘The house is up for sale. Why are you sitting here in the cold alone?’

She said steadily, ‘Well, you see, this house doesn’t belong to Granny now—there was some arrangement she made a long time ago—she sold it to some kind of company, and they let her have the money for it then so that she had an income.’ She added seriously, ‘The rates are rather high, you know, and there wasn’t any other money, only her pension. That’s why I’m here—someone’s coming with some papers for me to sign…’

‘Have you no solicitor?’

‘Oh, yes, but you see it wasn’t convenient for him to come here in the evening, and he said it was all right for me to sign them.’ She went on in her sensible way, ‘The furniture is mine.’

‘You have family?’

‘No. At least, only a cousin of my father, whom I’ve never met. He and my father didn’t like each other, and I don’t suppose he would want to hear from me.’

He got up and shut the door. ‘When is this man coming?’

She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘Now, if he’s punctual. Can I get you a cup of tea? I’m so sorry I didn’t ask you…’

Someone knocked on the door and he got up. ‘I’ll answer that. Are you having days off?’ And when she nodded he added, ‘And sleeping here?’

‘They said I could stay until the end of the month. There are things to pack up.’

He nodded and went to the front door, and presently he ushered in a businesslike-looking man with a briefcase. ‘Go ahead,’ he invited him. ‘I’m merely here in an advisory capacity.’

A remark which made Venetia blink with surprise. She still wasn’t thinking straight, but she was conscious of relief that the professor should have appeared on her doorstep just when she knew she needed someone. She wished the man good evening, and set herself to read the papers he offered her. Then she passed them over to the professor, who read them, too. They were quite in order, and it was no good pointing out that if the house had been Venetia’s on her grandmother’s death she would have been able to sell it for three times the amount her grandmother had received for it.

Venetia sighed, offered tea and was refused, and watched the professor see the man to the door. When he came back into the room she got up.

‘Thank you very much, Professor,’ she said politely. ‘It was very kind of you to stay. Now I have only to pack up and get somewhere to store the furniture.’ She added, unconsciously wistful, ‘Would you like a cup of tea before you go?’

‘No. Get whatever you need for the night. You’re coming back with me.’

Her white face flushed faintly. ‘Indeed, I am not, Professor. It is very kind of you to suggest it—’

‘I’m not being kind, I’m being sensible. You can’t stay alone. My housekeeper will look after you, and you can return in the morning and do whatever you have to do.’

He sounded reassuringly disinterested.

‘But won’t it interfere with your evening?’

‘Why should it? I’m going out to dinner, and shall not be back until late, and I’m operating in the morning. I suggest that you spend your two nights at my house and come and go as you please.’ He turned a frowning look upon her. ‘I’m already a little late.’

Put like that, there wasn’t much that she could do about it and, indeed, she hadn’t quite regained her usual independent spirit. She pushed a few things into her overnight bag, locked up and put on her coat, to be bustled out and into the Bentley, greatly to the interest of the neighbours.

It was a dark, misty evening and later there would be a frost. Venetia was grateful for the warmth of the big car, and at the same time realised that she was hungry. She hadn’t waited for tea at the hospital, and her midday dinner had been gobbled because she had been delayed on the ward by old Mr Thirsk, who was recovering from a stomach operation and had mislaid his glasses. It had taken her a few minutes to find them among the bedclothes, and by then his neighbour was demanding that his water jug be filled. Somehow her hunger was the last straw; she had just parted with what had been her home for some years, and she had very little idea what to do next. Go on nursing, of course, but there was the question of the furniture, and the solicitor had mentioned several outstanding bills. To her horrified shame her eyes filled with tears. They dripped down her cheeks, getting worse every moment. She put out her tongue and did her best to catch them, and sniffed discreetly, but she was quite unable to stop. It was a good thing that her companion was looking ahead of him. She turned her head away and gazed unseeingly out of the window.

The professor had turned into a wide road skirting the Heath, with houses standing well back, surrounded by large gardens, overlooking the fields and trees. He turned into an open gateway and stopped before the lighted porch of the house at the very end of the road, switched off the engine and asked quietly, ‘Why are you crying, Venetia?’ At the same time he offered her a handkerchief.

She mopped her eyes, blew her small nose defiantly, and said in a sodden voice, ‘You’re so kind.’ She looked at him over the hanky. ‘I’m very sorry—Mother always said that nothing annoyed a man more than women weeping.’ She gave a gulp and scrubbed at her face. ‘It’s just that it’s one thing on top of another,’ she mumbled.

He put out an arm and drew her close so that her head was on his shoulder. He didn’t say anything, but the comfort of it started her weeping once more. He let her cry for several minutes and then said, ‘We’ll sort things out tomorrow. I’ll be home after lunch for a couple of hours. I think it will be best if you stay here until I get back, then we can talk about it. It will be easier with two.’

She sniffed into his coat. ‘I’m not usually so silly, but it was all a bit sudden.’

‘And you had no one to turn to,’ he said softly. He disentangled her from his shoulder and undid her seat-belt, then got out to open her door. ‘Mrs Todd will look after you and give you supper.’ He had opened the door with his key, and ushered her inside. The hall was large and square, lit by a crystal chandelier hanging from a plastered ceiling, and a curved staircase rose from one side. There were a number of doors leading from it, and from one of these came a small, round woman with grey hair piled high in elaborate rolls, wearing a neat dark dress.

‘There you are, sir.’ She trotted to meet them. ‘Todd’s laid out your things. And can I get you anything…?’ Her small twinkling eyes studied Venetia.

‘Mrs Todd, I’ve brought Miss Venetia Forbes back here for a couple of nights. Will you see that she has supper? And give her the room overlooking the back garden, will you? Perhaps you would take her there now, and then come back to me.’

Mrs Todd smiled and nodded. ‘Right, sir. If Miss Forbes would like to come upstairs…’

It was a lovely house, thought Venetia, following Mrs Todd obediently. Not only lovely to look at, but it felt…she sought for a word…like home, warm and welcoming and softly lit. She had no doubt, either, that it was run on oiled wheels. She sighed and Mrs Todd turned round to say kindly, ‘You’re tired, miss. I can see that. A nice supper and then bed—there’s nothing like a night’s sleep to get you on your feet again.’

She opened a door on the balcony above the staircase and ushered Venetia inside. The room was quite large, with a large window draped in old rose chintz; the counterpane on the bed matched exactly, and the rose colour was repeated on the small armchair and the bedside lights. The carpet was thick, a rich cream colour which, reflected Venetia, her housewifely instincts aroused, would be quite a problem to keep pristine. She glanced guiltily at her own shoes and then apologetically at Mrs Todd, who only smiled in a cosy way and led her into the adjoining bathroom.

‘You just tidy yourself, miss, and then come downstairs. Todd’ll be there to show you where to go. And just you ask me if there’s anything you need.’

Examining the dressing-table, a dainty affair of maple wood, and then the bathroom, Venetia decided that someone had provided everything a girl could want cosmetic-wise. It would be lovely to use them, but she decided against that; she was only there for a couple of nights, and she supposed that anything used, however sparingly, would have to be replaced. She washed her face and hands, powdered her prosaic features, tidied her hair and went down the stairs.

Todd was waiting for her, a small round man, exactly right for Mrs Todd, but with a great deal of dignity. He bade her good evening, opened a door and silently ushered her into what she supposed was the drawing-room. It extended from the front of the house to the back, its parquet floor strewn with silky rugs, and a number of comfortable armchairs and sofas disposed about it. The professor rose from an outsize chair by the open fire and came to meet her. ‘Ah—just time for us to have a drink before I go out. I made it clear that you are to spend your nights off duty here? You will have a good deal to do during the next few days. It would be satisfactory if you could settle everything before you go back to St Jude’s.’

He handed her a glass of sherry and sat down opposite her chair. ‘I shall be here shortly after two o’clock tomorrow. It would be helpful if you had decided by then exactly what you intend to do with your possessions, so that arrangements can be made.’

She took a sip of sherry and said thoughtfully, ‘You are awfully kind, Professor, but please don’t bother. I’m very grateful for your hospitality, but I’ll manage quite well—’

‘Are you telling me not to interfere?’ His voice was chilly.

‘My goodness me, no. Only I think I’ve been enough bother to you already.’

‘Which is no reason for us to leave things half done.’

A remark which struck her as decidedly indifferent to her feelings, to say the least.

He went away presently with a polite wish that she should enjoy her evening and go to bed at a reasonably early hour, and she in her turn was invited by Todd to accompany him to a pleasant room at the back of the house, where she dined deliciously and in solitary state, and then, not wishing to disrupt the household more than necessary, elected to go to bed.

To her surprise the professor was in the hall, magnificent in a dinner-jacket and looking ill-tempered. He was listening to someone on the telephone, and said curtly, ‘I have been delayed, unavoidably so.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘I should with luck be with you in twenty minutes.’ He put down the phone, frowned at her, rumbled something which might have been goodnight, and let himself out of the house.

Venetia stood on the bottom stair and listened to the car being driven away. A staid tabby cat had arranged itself comfortably on one of the high-backed chairs in the hall, and she addressed it for lack of any other audience. ‘Poor man. I am being a nuisance, but he didn’t have to make it quite so obvious, did he? I dare say that was his girlfriend telling him off.’

The cat settled herself just so and began on a meticulous toilet, and Venetia turned and went upstairs. ‘I am lapped in luxury,’ she told herself as she went, ‘so I have no reason to feel lonely.’ But she was.

She spent all of ten minutes wondering about the professor, guessing wildly at his life, wondering, too, whereabouts he lived in Holland. No wife, she decided. Somehow he didn’t strike her as the kind of man to leave his wife at home while he took up residence somewhere else for weeks on end. She was inventing a beautiful blonde sitting opposite him in some exclusive restaurant at the very moment when she fell asleep.

A cheerful girl brought her early-morning tea, wished her a good morning and begged her to stay in bed, since Mrs Todd was even then cooking her breakfast and would bring it up herself.

Which that good lady did, not ten minutes later: scrambled eggs, crisp toast, orange juice and a pot of coffee. ‘And mind you eat every crumb, miss,’ she urged. ‘You could do with a bit more flesh on your bones. A nasty time you’ve been having, by all accounts, and a good lie-in will do you the world of good. There’ll be coffee if you want it when you come downstairs, and I’ll dish up a nice little lunch at half-past twelve sharp, since the professor expects to be home earlier than he thought. Phoned he did, ten minutes ago. He’ll have a sandwich and a glass of beer at the hospital and then come right home.’

Venetia longed to ask questions, there was so much she wanted to know about the professor, but she held her tongue. Mrs Todd was a kind little chatterbox, but she suspected that to chatter about her employer would be the last thing the housekeeper would do.

She ate her breakfast, had a bath—much too hot and lengthy—dressed and went downstairs. Todd, with the cat trailing him, came to meet her in the hall. ‘Good morning, miss. The professor asked me to suggest to you that you should decide which firm you wish to employ to dispose of your furniture. It will save time this afternoon, and allow arrangements to be made.’

He opened the door to the room where she had had dinner. There was a fire burning brightly, and coffee on a tray placed invitingly on a drum table, by a small armchair. ‘I have put the local telephone directory on the table in the window, miss. Also today’s newspaper.’

After the bleak weeks she had struggled through it seemed like a dream world. She sipped coffee and studied the lists of firms who might be suitable. There were one or two things she would like to keep: a papier-mâché work-table which had belonged to her mother, a small collection of her grandmother’s books, one or two pieces of silver left from more affluent days… She made a tidy list of these, picked out the more modest firms who might dispose of the furniture, and opened the Daily Telegraph, suppressing a feeling of guilt because she wasn’t going to do anything useful.

She lunched deliciously: watercress soup, cream sitting on its smooth green; a cheese soufflé; baked apple dumplings with a rich custard; and more coffee afterwards. She was just finishing her second cup when the professor walked in. He was followed by Todd, bringing fresh coffee, and sat down at the table. Venetia wished him good afternoon and received a beetle-browed stare. Evidently he was in no need of the niceties of speech; she finished her coffee and waited silently.

‘If you have decided what you wish to do with your furniture and who is to deal with it, there is no reason why the business shouldn’t be settled at once. Presumably you don’t have any more days off for another week?’

‘No, I don’t. And I should like to get everything settled today and tomorrow. I have chosen a firm I think will do. A local business—perhaps they could collect the furniture before I go back to the hospital.’

He put down his cup. ‘Then let us go without delay.’

‘Give me two minutes,’ begged Venetia, and belted upstairs to fetch her coat and handbag. He was obviously impatient to get the whole business settled; indeed, she suspected that he probably regretted even offering to help her in the first place. Well, two could be businesslike; she nipped down to the hall, intent on getting through the afternoon’s business as quickly as possible.

Things went smoothly. At the professor’s instigation, someone from the house furnishers she had elected to go to accompanied them to her grandmother’s house and, since it was a small place and there wasn’t a great deal of furniture, within the hour he had assessed its contents and named a price, with the undertaking that it would be removed on the following day and a cheque for the amount paid to her if she cared to call in the afternoon. Moreover, he offered to store the one or two pieces she wished to keep. The matter nicely settled, they all drove back to his place of business where Venetia arranged to call on the following day.

The professor had had little to say, but what he had said had been very much to the point and with no words wasted. She got back into the car and they drove back to his house and went indoors. In the hall he said, ‘I suggest that you telephone your solicitor and anyone else concerned with your affairs. There’s a phone in the small sitting-room.’ He turned away. ‘You will excuse me if I leave you? I have some letters to dictate before I go back to St Jude’s.’

‘Thank you very much for your help, Professor. I’m very grateful.’

He paused at his study door. ‘You have no relations other than your father’s cousin who has no interest in you?’

‘No.’ He was frowning so heavily that she added kindly, ‘But it doesn’t matter at all, I’ve lots of friends.’

He nodded. ‘I shall be out this evening. Feel free to come and go as you please. You return to your duties tomorrow?’

She made haste to assure him that she would return to the hospital when she had been to receive the cheque from the furniture company. ‘I—I’ve promised to go out in the evening,’ she fibbed, in case he might think that she would want to stay for dinner.

He regarded her thoughtfully, aware of her small lie, even guessing why she had told it. ‘Just as you wish.’ He smiled faintly. ‘I dare say that we shall see each other occasionally in St Jude’s.’

‘Oh, yes, but not to talk to, of course. I’m not supposed to talk to consultants, only to answer them if they ask me something.’

She gave a brisk nod and went upstairs to take off her coat. When she went down again the house was quiet as she went to the small sitting-room and did her telephoning. That done, she sat quietly until Todd came in with the tea-tray and the news that the professor had returned to the hospital and would only come back for a brief visit in order to change for the evening.

She was saved from loneliness by the presence of the cat, who curled up on the chair on the other side of the hearth and went to sleep while she sat with paper and pen, making plans. The money from the furniture sale wasn’t a great deal, but she felt emboldened to spend a little of it; she needed new boots for the winter as well as a topcoat. The remainder she would put in the bank to swell her tiny capital against a rainy day.

And tomorrow, she reflected, she would leave during the morning, for she felt that she had tried the professor’s hospitable instincts to their limit. She could look at the shops, have a snack lunch, collect her cheque and go back to St Jude’s. Having decided things to her satisfaction, she drank the sherry Todd handed to her and sat down to her dinner. It was a pity that her grandmother wasn’t there to share the delicious food. For a moment her firmly suppressed grief threatened to engulf her, but Granny had had no time for self-pity. She was young, and once she had trained she would have a safe, interesting job for as long as she wanted, or until she retired, she supposed. She dreamed of marrying, as any girl of her age would, but she had no looks to speak of and, according to her friends at the hospital, looks were of paramount importance when it came to getting a husband.

She was a sensible girl, and she didn’t dwell on the lack of romance in her future, but made civil conversation with Todd, who was presiding over her dinner. He excused himself when he had served her pudding, and she heard him talking in the hall, and then the professor’s deep voice. Todd came back presently, and after a little while she heard the professor’s step in the hall and the sound of the heavy front door being shut.

She explained to Todd when she went down to breakfast that she would be leaving that morning, refusing his offer of a nice lunch, although she agreed that she wouldn’t go until he had brought her coffee later on in the morning. And, when it came to the point of leaving, she felt real regret as she thanked the Todds for their kindness; the professor’s home had spelt security and calm just when she had needed it. She refused the taxi Todd offered her, and walked to the High Street, where she idled away an hour before having lunch in a small café and then going to collect her cheque. That done, there was nothing to keep her there any longer. She made her way to Percy Lane and found the little house already empty, and, mindful of the solicitor’s instructions, left the keys on the sitting-room mantelshelf and then went quickly away, closing the door behind her and not looking back.

In a way it was a relief to be back at work, even though Staff Nurse Thomas was sharper tongued than usual and there were several testy patients who wanted attention all the time, never mind how busy the nurses were.

Of the professor there was no sign. It wasn’t for a day or two after her return that Caroline, sharing a pot of tea with her before bed, observed that he had gone back to Holland.

‘How do you know?’ asked Venetia. ‘I mean, you knew last time, too…’

‘Tim told me. But he’ll be back. I heard Theatre Sister telling Sister Bolt that there was a brain tumour being sent over from Jersey—he’s bound to be back to deal with it. It’s a teaser, she said, and they always have him over for the nasty ones.’

Two days later she met him in one of the long downstairs corridors. She was on her way to collect a drug which had to be given immediately, and was racing along much too fast. His long arm, shooting out to try to stop her, brought her to a halt.

He had his registrar with him, which probably accounted for his bland, ‘Ah, Nurse Forbes. Your domestic difficulties are at an end, I trust?’

‘Yes, thank you, sir.’ She had gone a little pink with the unexpectedness of the meeting, and when he nodded in a dismissive manner she smiled a little uncertainly at him and hurried off on her errand. Seeing him brought back the memories she had been trying so hard to stifle. All at once she longed for her grandmother and the little house in Hampstead—more than that, she longed for an anchor, somewhere to call home, somewhere to go when she was free. She hadn’t moped, she had done her best, spending her free days visiting museums and art galleries, eating economical meals in busy cafés so that she had people around her, assuring her friends when they asked her that she simply loved exploring London, anxious not to infringe upon their kind concern for her. And now the professor was back to upset her. She had some holiday due, she would use some of her little capital and go away. Right away, although just for the moment she had no idea where.

The answer came from an unexpected source the very next day. The professor’s registrar stopped her as she was crossing the entrance hall, intent on giving a message to whoever was in the porter’s lodge.

‘Spare a minute?’ he asked pleasantly, and, since he had always been friendly and she liked him, she stopped willingly enough. ‘I say, you may find this awful cheek, but I’m in a spot. I have to go over to Holland with Professor ter Laan-Luitinga, and it means leaving my wife for a week or ten days. She’s expecting a baby and hates to be on her own, and none of her family or mine is free to go and stay with her. Sister Giles was complaining about being short of a nurse while you were on leave, and I wondered—if you hadn’t anything better to do, if you would stay with Lottie?’

She had met his wife once, at Christmas when Mr Miles had brought her round the wards. They had liked each other, but they hadn’t met since. Venetia said slowly, ‘Well, I wasn’t going anywhere—but how does your wife feel about it?’

‘When I suggested it she was pleased. You have met, haven’t you? I remember she liked you. Would you think about it? The professor will be going back to Holland in two or three days’time—he’s got this tricky case to see to, and a backlog of patients to deal with. When do you start your holiday?’

Nothing in his manner suggested to her that he might already know.

‘Well, I’ve days off on Monday and Tuesday, and then my holiday starts.’

‘Couldn’t be better, I believe we’re to go on the Tuesday evening.’

He smiled in his friendly fashion. ‘Leave a message at the lodge if you would like to come; we’d be eternally grateful.’

‘If you’re sure—?’ began Venetia.

‘Quite sure, and you’ve no idea what a load it would be off my mind.’

She thought about it for the rest of the day. It was a heaven-sent opportunity to get away from hospital life, and, when she came to think about it, hadn’t someone told her that Mr Miles had bought a small cottage—somewhere near Beaconsfield? Penn, that was the name, and, although he and his wife had a small flat in one of the new blocks built by the Thames where the docks once were, they spent his free weekends and holidays there. She was a little surprised that he had asked her, but there probably wasn’t anyone suitable free. By the end of the day she had made up her mind to accept his offer.

On the Friday evening he came on to the ward, very properly asked Sister Giles if he might have a word with Venetia, and drew her to one side.

‘Lottie and I are so glad that you will come. She’s at the flat, but if you could be ready to go with us on Tuesday afternoon, we’ll collect you on the way down to the cottage at Penn; she would rather be there.’

He smiled kindly at her and went away, leaving her feeling pleasantly excited at the prospect of a change of scene.

She felt a little anxious as she waited for Mr Miles to fetch her; supposing his wife didn’t like her after all? And what would they do all day? And would she be expected to help in the house? She wasn’t really a guest, but, on the other hand, she wasn’t employed by the Mileses, either.

She need not have worried; she was popped into the car, her luggage was stowed in the boot, and it was evident from the first moment that she and Mr Miles’s wife were going to like each other.

‘Call me Lottie,’ begged the pretty girl sitting beside him, ‘and I shall call you Venetia. You don’t mind?’

It took a little while to leave London behind them, but once on the motorway they were going through Beaconsfield and turning off for Penn in no time at all. It was a charming village, just as Venetia had hoped it would be, with a green and a duck pond, surrounded by seventeenth-century cottages overlooked by the church and the Crown Inn. The Mileses’ cottage was down a narrow lane, standing sideways on to the road; a small, neat house, its garden bare now, although very tidy. Inside there was a welcoming fire in the sitting room, and an appetising smell coming from the kitchen.

‘Mrs Trent,’ explained Lottie. ‘She comes in every day when we’re here, just for an hour or two. Come and see your bedroom—we’ve only got two—Arthur will bring up your case.’

It was a dear little room, pink and blue and white, sparsely furnished, but there was everything one could need. ‘We share the bathroom.’ Lottie beamed at Venetia. ‘I don’t know what we’ll do when baby gets here.’

Venetia peered out of the small window. ‘Couldn’t you build on? There’s lots of room, isn’t there? The garden’s beautiful, and fairly big.’

‘We don’t want to leave here—we love it. Would you like to unpack? Arthur will have to go back almost at once…’

‘Will you wish him a good trip from me? I’d like to unpack, if I may.’

It was obvious from her companion’s face that she had said the right thing. She opened her case and started putting things away, and found that her thoughts, without any prompting from her, had turned to the professor. He would be going home—and to whom?

CHAPTER THREE

THE two of them settled down happily. They had a lot in common, for they were of a similar age and they both liked clothes, books and the theatre. Although Venetia had a small wardrobe, her clothes were as good as she could afford, even if not in the forefront of fashion. As for Lottie, a slavish follower of all fashion, but for the moment wearing voluminous garments which none the less contrived to look smart, she studied the latest Harper’s, her pretty head full of the clothes she would buy when the baby was born.

Mrs Trent came daily to tidy the house and give what she called a good clean through, so Venetia and Lottie had a minimum of chores. They did the shopping, went for a walk each day, and spent the evenings round the fire, roasting chestnuts and knitting garments for the forthcoming infant. Each evening the phone rang, the signal for Venetia to go into the kitchen to start the supper while Lottie spent the next fifteen minutes or so talking to Arthur. It was on their fourth evening there that she remarked, putting down the phone at last, ‘He doesn’t know when he’ll be back, he thinks at least another four days.’

Venetia came to the open door between the kitchen and the sitting-room. ‘What exactly are they doing?’ she wanted to know.

‘Oh, some VIP needed brain surgery. Arthur doesn’t always go with the professor, but now he’s getting much more experienced—the professor’s very generous with his teaching.’ She looked up, smiling. ‘He’s a nice man. Do you see much of him at St Jude’s?’

‘Almost nothing, but he was very kind to me when my grandmother died.’ Venetia began to beat the eggs for an omelette. ‘He stitched up my arm, too.’

Lottie chuckled. ‘I can just imagine the fuss and bother when they discovered that you were on the staff.’

Venetia spooned in water and did a bit more beating. ‘Yes, it was funny, though I couldn’t have cared less at the time.’

‘A nasty experience. I’d have been terrified.’

‘Well, I was, and I felt such a fool—I was sick while my arm was being stitched…’

‘Not very glamorous, but then medical men expect that kind of thing,’ observed Lottie comfortably.

But not very senior consultant surgeons who had descended from Olympian heights to do a bit of sewing on a student nurse’s arm. But Venetia didn’t say that out loud.

It was cold and wet the next day, and they spent it happily enough writing Christmas cards—not that Venetia had many to write, a lack more than made up for by the list Lottie worked her way through.

‘Will you be in hospital over Christmas?’ she wanted to know.

‘Me? Oh, yes. It’s quite fun, you know. We visit the other wards and sing carols, and each ward has a tree.’

‘Could you have leave if you wanted it?’

Venetia said a little too quickly, ‘Not really. We all get some time off, of course, but it’s split up… Will you be here for Christmas?’

‘Yes, Arthur’s got the three days off. We’ll go to his parents’ on Christmas Eve, and mine on Boxing Day, but we’ll have Christmas Day here together.’

‘That’s nice. That shop in the village has got some lovely tree decorations in. Do you want to buy some tomorrow?’

Christmas as a topic of conversation kept them busy until bedtime.

It was still cold the next morning, and the grey sky held a yellowish tinge. ‘It’s going to snow,’ said Venetia as they walked briskly into the village and returned presently with a basket full of tinsel, baubles and the ingredients for a beef casserole.

‘You ought to sort out the decorations,’ suggested Venetia, ‘while I get this casserole into a pot. I’ll just nip into the garden and pull a couple of leeks.’

Easier said than done—there had been a hard frost for several nights and she had to prise them out with a gardening fork. The first few flakes of snow were falling as she went back indoors. A lovely wave of warm air met her as she opened the kitchen door, to stop short on the threshold and gape at the professor, who was leaning against the kitchen table, eating the carrots she had laid out neatly for the casserole.

‘Come in and shut the door, Venetia. You’re letting all the cold air in.’

She pushed the door shut with one foot and put the leeks beside the carrots. ‘You’re in Holland,’ she said.

‘An unnecessary remark, and untrue,’ he pointed out. ‘Arthur and I arrived here not ten minutes ago.’

‘Oh, well, I’ll go and—’

‘No, you won’t. They haven’t seen each other for a week. Why do you think I am mewed up here with nothing but carrots to eat?’

She took off her coat and kicked off her boots. She looked small without them. She said tartly, ‘You could get into that car of yours and drive home, and Mrs Todd would give you a super meal.’

‘What an unkind girl you are, and what a way to talk to someone of my age! Besides, I’ve been invited to stay for lunch and tea. Will there be muffins?’

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