to meet the people who work there?’
‘Yes, of course,’ she said with assumed heartiness, deciding that she may as well get it over with. At least it was only a place for local people with their ailments. There would be no rows of beds or doctors with sombre expressions looking down at her, and nurses treating one of their own with sympathy and efficiency.
She’d been introduced to the two receptionists, both of them middle-aged, pleasant and organised, met the two practice nurses and discovered that it was a delicatessen that Beth Jackson and her husband were going to open very soon at the other end of the main street.
At that moment the door of the nearest consulting room opened and an attractive, dark-haired woman was framed there, holding a baby in her arms. The doctor she’d been consulting was close behind and as she was about to leave he bent and kissed her tenderly.
Laurel’s eyes widened and as Elaine steered her in the opposite direction she explained, ‘That is baby Arran Allardyce come to see his daddy. Ben is helping out while Georgina, his wife, who is one of our regular doctors, is on maternity leave.’
‘I see,’ Laurel said, and wished that she had a man in her life to kiss her like that and a beautiful baby to go with it. Day would turn into night before that ever happened in the light of recent events.
James Bartlett, the senior partner, was all that Elaine had described him to be, pleasant, handsome, a very likeable man with two lovely children if the photograph on his desk was anything to go by, and when they’d been introduced her aunt left them to get acquainted.
She’d removed the hat by then, deciding that if she was going to be employed there it was only fair that the man sitting opposite should see what she really looked like, yet she needn’t have worried. James didn’t seem to see anything too odd about the young woman that Elaine had brought to the surgery. ‘When could you come for an interview, Laurel?’
‘Whenever,’ she replied. ‘My time is my own at present.’
‘Then how about on the afternoon of the day that Elaine returns from the leave that she arranged in honour of your arrival? Say two o’clock?’ As she got up to go he shook her hand and said, ‘We’ll look forward to seeing you then.’
She was missing nursing, but until Elaine had suggested she work at the practice had felt it would be too painful to go back to it. But there was something about this pleasant village health care centre that was reaching out to her…and of course there was David Trelawney. Where was he today?
Yesterday she’d been too frazzled to really register the man who’d come to her rescue when she’d been getting off the train, but now she was curious to see if he was as presentable as she’d thought. It would be nice to see him again now that she was in residence, so to speak, and it would give her the opportunity to express further gratitude for his assistance, but it seemed that it was not to be on this bright summer day, and it did rather take the edge off it.
If she and Elaine had walked a little further she would have had the answer to her question. David’s car was parked outside the village hall. He’d been about to start his home visits when a call had come through and he’d gone straight there to find the chairlady of the Women’s Institute, who were holding their usual monthly meeting on the premises, looking far from well.
She was experiencing severe chest pains, perspiring heavily, and her lips were blue. Before he’d even sounded her heart David was phoning for an ambulance and telling her gently, ‘I’m sending you to hospital, Mrs Tate.’
She nodded. Maisie Tate was no fool. She wouldn’t be chairlady of Willowmere’s branch of the Women’s Institute if she was. She could tell that the new doctor at the practice had her down for a heart attack and she didn’t think he was wrong.
But if that was the case, who was going to look after her husband? Barry always had kippers for tea on a Thursday and she wasn’t going to be able to call at the fishmonger’s on her way home today.
David had finished examining her and as another stab of pain ripped across her chest he said reassuringly, ‘The ambulance will be here any moment, Mrs Tate, and they’ll take you straight to hospital when I’ve had a word with the paramedics.’
The rest of the Women’s Institute was hovering around her anxiously and one of them, who must have known her routine, said, ‘Don’t worry, Maisie. I’ll get your Barry his kippers.’
She nodded and David thought incredulously that this was the age group who’d been brought up to have a meal ready for the man of the house when he came in from work. But surely when he knew what was happening to his wife the absent Barry wouldn’t have any appetite.
As he drove along the main street of the village on his way to the delayed calls he was surprised to see Elaine and Laurel walking slowly along the pavement ahead of him, and as he pulled up alongside them he saw that the short skirt, high heels and sheer tights had been replaced by jeans and sandals.
But the rest of her attire was still strange and he didn’t think it was what the fashion-conscious were wearing for the summer in London. A soft felt hat was completely covering the short red-gold hair and she was still wearing the white cotton gloves.
‘Hello, there, and what are you folks up to on this glorious day?’ he asked with a smile that embraced them both.
‘I’m showing Laurel around the village,’ Elaine replied. ‘We’ve just been to the surgery and she’s been introduced to everyone there. Where were you, though? You were the only one missing, David, although you’ve already met my niece, haven’t you?’
I have indeed, he thought, three times to be exact.
‘Yes,’ he replied with the smile still in place, and went on to explain with his glance on her so-far silent companion, ‘I was out on an emergency call.
‘And how are you this morning, Laurel?’ he said easily, wondering if she was anaemic or something of the kind to be wearing that sort of jumper in the heat of summer.
‘Much better, thank you,’ she said flatly, and he sighed inwardly.
He turned to Elaine. ‘I was called to the village hall where the Women’s Institute are having a meeting and found their chairlady with a suspected heart attack.’
‘Oh! No!’ Elaine exclaimed. ‘That would be Maisie Tate. Poor Maisie!’
‘Yes, it was,’ he replied, and thought he couldn’t imagine her companion having much interest in the ills and ailments of the Willowmere villagers. There was an aloofness about her today and he was curious to know what lay beneath it as he never could resist a challenge.
‘And so what do you think of our beautiful village?’ he asked Laurel.
‘I thought that you were a newcomer too,’ she commented dryly, while comparing his clear-cut attractiveness to the wavy dark hair and fashionable stubble of Darius, who’d not wanted her any more because he’d seen the scarring and been revolted…
It wasn’t a situation that would ever occur with this man, she thought with a rush of blood. There would never be an occasion when he saw her minus clothing and…where had such an idea come from anyway?
He was smiling at the comment and she thought how likeable he was as he said, ‘I am a newcomer in one way, yet I feel
