twins didn’t like to be separated, Peter had his bath and got ready for bed, too. With Bas’s help she carried up their light supper.
But Paul didn’t want his; his throat was sore and his head ached and when she took his temperature it was alarmingly high. She sat him on her lap, persuaded him to drink the cold drinks Bas brought and, while Peter finished his supper, embarked on a story. She made it up as she went along, and it was about nothing in particular, but the boys listened and presently Paul went to sleep, his hot little head pressed against her shoulder.
Peter had come to sit beside her, and she put an arm around him, carrying on a cheerful whispered conversation until he, reassured about his brother, slept too.
It was some time later when Bas came in quietly to remind her that dinner was waiting for her.
‘I’m sorry, Bas, but I can’t come. They’re both sound asleep and Paul isn’t well. They’re bound to wake presently, then I can put them in their beds… Will you apologize to Jet for me? I’m not hungry; I can have some soup later.’
Bas went reluctantly and she was left, her insides rumbling, while she tried not to think of food. Just like the doctor, she thought testily, to be away just when he was wanted. She wouldn’t allow herself to panic. She had coped with childish ailments at the children’s convalescent home and knew how resilient they were and how quickly they got well once whatever it was which had afflicted them had been diagnosed and dealt with. All the same, she wished that the doctor would come home soon.
Minutes ticked themselves slowly into an hour, but she managed a cheerful smile when Bas put a concerned head round the door.
‘They’ll wake soon,’ she assured him in a whisper. But they slept on: Peter sleeping the deep sleep of a healthy child, Paul deeply asleep too but with a mounting fever, his tousled head still against her shoulder. She longed to changed her position; she longed even more for a cup of tea. It did no good to dwell on that, so she allowed her thoughts free rein and wondered what the doctor was doing and who he was with. She hoped that whoever it was wasn’t distracting him from returning home at a reasonable hour.
It was a good thing that she didn’t know that on the point of his leaving the hospital in the Hague he had been urgently recalled…
When he did get home it was ten o’clock. Bas came hurrying into the hall to meet him, his nice elderly face worried.
‘What’s wrong?’ asked the doctor.
‘Little Paul. He’s not well, mijnheer. He’s asleep, but Miss Pomfrey has him on her lap; he’s been there for hours. Peter’s there too. Miss Pomfrey asked me to phone the hospital, but you were not available…’
The doctor put a hand on Bas’s shoulder. ‘I’ll go up. Don’t worry, Bas.’
Araminta had heard him come home, and the voices in the hall, and relief flooded through her. She peered down into Paul’s sleeping face and then looked up as the doctor came quietly into the room.
‘Have you had the mumps?’ she asked him.
He stopped short. ‘Good Lord, yes, decades ago.’
He looked at his nephew’s face, showing distinct signs of puffiness, then stopped and lifted him gently off her lap.
‘How long have you been sitting there?’
‘Since six o’clock. He’s got a temperature and a headache and his throat’s sore. Peter’s all right so far.’
The doctor laid the still sleeping boy in his bed and bent to examine him gently. ‘We will let him sleep, poor scrap.’ He came and took Peter in his arms and tucked him up in his bed, talking softly to the half-awake child. Only then did he turn to Araminta, sitting, perforce, exactly as she had been doing for the past few hours, so stiff that she didn’t dare to move.
The doctor hauled her gently to her feet, put an arm around her and walked her up and down.
‘Now, go downstairs, tell Bas to ask Jet to get us something to eat and send Nel up here to sit with the boys for a while.’
And when she hesitated, he added, ‘Go along, Miss Pomfrey. I want my supper.’
She gave him a speaking look; she wanted her supper, too, and the unfeeling man hadn’t even bothered to ask her if she needed hers.
‘So do I,’ she snapped, and then added, ‘Is Paul all right? It is only mumps?’
He said coolly, ‘Yes, Miss Pomfrey. Hopefully only mumps.’
She went downstairs and gave Bas his messages, then went and sat in the small sitting room. She was tired and rather untidy and she could see ahead of her several trying days while the mumps kept their hold on Paul—and possibly Peter.
‘Twelve days incubation,’ she said, talking to herself, ‘and we could wait longer than that until we’re sure Peter doesn’t get them, too.’
‘Inevitable, Miss Pomfrey. Do you often talk to yourself?’
The doctor had come silently into the room. He poured a glass of sherry and gave it to her and didn’t wait for her answer. ‘It will mean bed for a few days for Paul, and of course Peter can’t go to school. Will you be able to manage? Nel can take over in the afternoons while you take Peter for a walk?’
He watched her toss back the sherry and refilled her glass. Perhaps he was expecting too much of her. ‘See how you go on,’ he told her kindly. ‘If necessary, I’ll get some more help.’
‘If Peter were to get the mumps within the next few days I shall be able to manage very nicely,’ she said matter-of-factly.
‘It is to be hoped that he will. Let us get them over with, by all means.’
Bas came then, so she finished her second sherry far too quickly and went to the dining room with the doctor.
Jet had conjured up an excellent meal: mushroom soup, a cheese soufflé, salad and a lemon mousse. Araminta, slightly light-headed from the sherry, ate everything put before her, making somewhat muddled conversation as she did so. The doctor watched with faint amusement as she polished off the last of the mousse.
‘Now go to bed, Miss Pomfrey. You will be called as usual in the morning.’
‘Oh, that won’t do at all,’ she told him, emboldened by the sherry. ‘I’ll have a bath and get ready for bed, then I’ll go and sit with the boys for a bit. Once I’m sure they are all right, I’ll go to bed. I shall hear them if they wake.’
‘You will do as I say. I have a good deal of reading to do; I will do it in their room.’
‘Aren’t you going to the hospital in the morning?’
‘Certainly I am.’
‘Then you can’t do that; you’ll be like a wet rag in the morning. You need your sleep.’
‘I’m quite capable of knowing how much sleep I need, Miss Pomfrey. Kindly do as I ask. Goodnight.’
She wanted to cry, although she didn’t know why, but she held back the tears, wished him a bleak goodnight and went upstairs.
