it’s usually just Ted, and he generally doesn’t have all that much to do. He stays in the guest house at the back.’
Nell walked over to the window, looking out. Beyond the garden, and shielded by trees, was a small cottage, nestling against the perimeter wall.
‘It all sounds reassuringly normal.’
‘Not quite. But we try to make it so.’ Hugo was watching her speculatively. ‘There is one thing I want to ask you.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Nadine, the little girl in the brochure, wearing a pink dress. I told you she’d had an operation recently...’
‘Yes, I remember.’
‘Dr Bertrand, the head of department, is the only one there who knows that I’ve been ill—everyone else thinks I’m taking a leave of absence for fundraising. He told me that he’d have me removed by security if I went in to see Nadine earlier than seven days after my own operation.’
Nell grinned. ‘He sounds like a good man...’
‘He’s a very good man. You’d like him.’
‘And since this is the seventh day, you’d like to go and see Nadine.’
‘It would be best to go today. After the news of our engagement breaks, my turning up on the ward might cause a bit of a stir.’
‘Where is the hospital?’
‘On this side of the city, so it’ll only take twenty minutes to get there. I’m feeling better every day, and I’d really like to see Nadine.’
If this was normal, then it was a new normal that Nell hadn’t experienced before. Hugo asking her whether or not he could do something. ‘It sounds like a lovely idea. May I come along? I’d like to see the hospital.’
Hugo smiled. As time went on that smile was surfacing more and more, and it convinced Nell that everything was going to be all right. ‘I was hoping you might. You’ll have to drive.’
NO ONE SEEMED to notice Hugo’s presence as they walked through the reception area at the hospital. He exchanged smiles with the receptionist at the main desk, who waved him through in much the same way as she probably would have done with anyone else she knew. Here, Hugo appeared to shed the mantle of royalty.
He led her through a maze of corridors, mysterious box in hand, and a high-speed lift took them to the seventh floor. Hugo punched a code into a keypad at the entrance to one of the wards and the doors opened automatically, allowing them through.
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