Three for a Wedding

‘Oh, I don’t—I love it. Only she’s so splendid and she took my breath I didn’t expect … And I’m sure it’s the simplest way, only I don’t know which way that is.’

He put down her case and bag the better to give her his full attention. ‘Did I not tell you how we should be travelling?’

She shook her head.

‘Dear me —you must forgive me. By car, of course. We shall load it on to the Harwich boat and drive to Delft from the Hoek when we land in the morning. You are a good sailor?’

‘Yes—though I’ve only crossed to Calais twice. We nearly always went by plane, and I loathed it.’

‘We?’ he prompted her gently.

‘My mother and father and s …’ she stopped just in time, ‘me,’ she added lamely, and felt her cheeks warm, but he didn’t seem to notice and she drew a relieved breath. How fortunate it was that he wasn’t an observant man, only with his patients. He picked up her case and put it in the boot, already packed with books and cases and boxes—no wonder he had hoped that she wouldn’t bring too much luggage with her.

It was extraordinary how many times during their journey to Harwich that she had to stop to think before she replied to his casual questions. She hadn’t realised before how often one mentioned one’s family during the course of even the most ordinary conversation; she seemed to be continually fobbing him off with questions of her own about his work, their journey, details of the hospital where she would be working—anything, in fact, but her own home life. It was a relief when he slid the car to a halt in the Customs shed, a relief tempered with regret, though, because he was a most agreeable companion and she had found herself wishing that she could have told him all about Sybil and Nick, and her own part in the deception they were playing upon him. When she had consented to take Sybil’s place she hadn’t thought much about the other people involved; now she found that it mattered quite a lot to her.

They had a meal on board and Phoebe talked feverishly about a dozen subjects, taking care not to mention her home or her family, and the doctor made polite comments upon her sometimes rather wild statements, and didn’t appear to be aware of the fact that she repeated herself upon occasion, but as soon as they had had their coffee, he observed pleasantly: ‘I expect you would like to go to your cabin, Miss Brook,’ and stood up as he said it, so that there was nothing else for her to do. Besides, he had a briefcase with him; he was already opening it when she looked back on her way out of the restaurant.

Possibly, she thought crossly, he had been dying for her to go for hours past. She undressed slowly and hung her oatmeal-coloured dress and jacket carefully away so that they would be creaseless and fresh in the morning. ‘Not that it would matter,’ she told herself, getting crosser. ‘If I wore hot pants and a see-through blouse he wouldn’t notice!’

She lay down on her bunk, determined not to go to sleep so that she would be able to tell him that she had spent an uncomfortable night—no, not uncomfortable, she corrected herself—it was a delightful cabin, far more luxurious than she had expected, certainly first class and on the promenade deck. It surprised her that the hospital authorities were willing to spend so much money on a nurse. She would have been just as comfortable sharing a cabin with another girl, although she doubted if she would have had the cheerful services of the stewardess who promised tea at six o’clock and begged her to ring her bell should she require anything further. With difficulty Phoebe brought her sleepy mind back to Doctor van Someren; it would be nice if she were to see a great deal of him in hospital—presumably she would be working on one of his wards, but perhaps he would leave the actual instruction to one of the more junior members of his team. She frowned at the idea and went to sleep.

She slept all night and, much refreshed by her tea, dressed, did her face and hair with care and went along to join the doctor for breakfast, looking as though she had slept the clock round and spent several leisurely hours over her toilette. His eyes, very bright beneath the arched colourless brows, swept over her and then blinked lazily. He wished her a good morning, hoped she had slept well and begged her to sit down to breakfast, something she was only too glad to do. Coffee and toast would be delightful, but the ship seemed to be a hive of activity and they had already docked; perhaps he hadn’t noticed. She mentioned it diffidently, to be instantly reassured by his easy: ‘I have a theory that it is quicker to be last off the ship.’ A remark which, it turned out, was perfectly true, for by the time they had finished, the last of the passengers were leaving the ship and the Jaguar was swinging in mid-air, on its way to dry land.

There was no delay in the Customs shed but a good deal of talk in Dutch, which sounded like so much nonsense in her ears, so that she didn’t pay attention but stood looking about her. She was recalled from this absorbing pastime by Doctor van Someren’s voice and she turned at once to answer him and in the same split second was aware that he had called her Phoebe and she had responded. She felt the colour leave her face and then flood back, washing her from neck to forehead with a delicate pink. She would have liked to have said something—anything, but her brain, like her tongue, was frozen. It was the doctor who spoke.

‘Very interesting. I have been wanting to do that since we met.’ His voice was thoughtful, but she could have sworn that he was secretly amused. He turned away to speak to a porter and she followed him to where the car stood waiting in the cobbled yard beyond the station. It was only after she had got into it and he had taken the seat beside her that she asked in a small voice: ‘How did you know my name?’ and then: ‘Are you going to send me back?’

He didn’t look at her. ‘Your sister mentioned you, and no why should I? You are an admirable nurse, obviously far more experienced than you wished me to believe. I don’t know the reason for the deception, but I imagine it was a sufficiently good one.’

‘When did you find out?’

He sounded surprised. ‘When we met, naturally.’

She faltered a little. ‘But Sybil and I are so alike, people can never tell us apart, only when we’re together, or—or they look at us properly.’

‘And your sister decided that I hadn’t studied her for a sufficient length of time to make your substitution risky. You are not in the least like her.’

They were already out of the town, tearing along the highway, but she really hadn’t noticed that. She opened her mouth to refute this opinion, but he went on smoothly: ‘No, don’t argue, Miss Phoebe Brook. I’m not prepared to enlarge upon that at the moment, you will have to take my word for it.’

Phoebe stared out at the flat countryside without seeing any of it.

‘I’m very sorry,’ she told him stiffly, and thought how inadequate it was to say that. She was sorry and ashamed and furious with herself for playing a trick on him. ‘It was a rotten thing to do. At the time, when Sybil—when I arranged to do it, it seemed OK I hadn’t met you then,’ she added naively, and failed to see his slow smile and the gleam in his eyes.

He gave the Jag her head. ‘Do you care to tell me about it? But only if you wish …’

She felt quite sick. ‘It’s the least I can do.’ She stared miserably at a group of black and white cows bunched round a man in the middle of a field as green and flat as a billiard table. ‘I’m the one to blame,’ she began, faintly aggressive in case he should argue the point, and when he didn’t: ‘You see, Sybil wants to get married—quite soon …’ She was reminded of something. ‘I should like to save up my days off and go home for the wedding, though I don’t suppose you have anything to do with the nurses’ off duty.’

They were in the heavy early morning traffic now and approaching a town. ‘Is that Delft?’ she wanted to know.

‘Yes, it is. I have nothing to do with the nurses’ off duty,’ he was laughing silently again and she frowned, ‘but I imagine I might be able to bring my influence to bear.’

To her surprise he edged the car into the slow lane and then into the lay-by ahead of them, switched off the engine and turned to look at her intently. ‘Perhaps if I were to ask you a few questions it would be easier for both of us.’ He didn’t wait for her to answer him. ‘Supposing you tell me where you were working to begin with. You are older than your sister,’ he shot her a hooded glance, ‘and I think that you have held a more responsible post …’

She choked on pricked vanity —did she look such an old hag, then? Very much on her dignity, she said stiffly: ‘I was Night Sister at St Gideon’s—the medical block. I’m twenty-seven, since you make such a point of it …’ She paused because he had made a sound suspiciously like a chuckle. ‘I will explain exactly what happened …’

She did so, concisely and with a brevity which did justice to her years of giving accurate reports without loss of time. When she had finished she stole a look at him, but he was staring ahead, his profile, with its forceful nose and solid chin, looked stern. Perhaps he was going to send her back after all. She conceded that she deserved it. But all he said in a mild voice was: ‘Good, that’s cleared the air, then,’ started the car again and allowed it to purr back into the stream of fast-moving traffic. ‘The hospital is in the heart of the city. It’s not new—there is a very splendid one, you must go over it while you are here—but the one in which you will work is very old indeed and although we have everything we require, it is dark and awkward. But the children are happy and that is the main thing. You will be on a sixteen-bedded ward of fibrocystics, but all the research work is done at the new hospital—St Jacobus.’

She found her voice. ‘What’s the hospital called—the one where I shall be?’

‘St Bonifacius. You’ll find that most of the staff speak English, and as for the children, I have discovered long ago that they will respond to any language provided it is spoken in the right tone of voice. Besides, there are a number of words which are so similar in both languages that I have no doubt you will get by.’

She hoped it would be as easy as it sounded. They were going slowly now through the compact little city, its winding streets lined with old houses, some of them so narrow that there was only room for a front door and a window, some so broad and solid that they should have been surrounded by parklands of their own. The streets were intersected by canals linked by narrow white bridges. She had the impression that she would be lost immediately she set foot outside the hospital door.

The silence had lasted a long time. Phoebe asked in a polite voice: