She said in her quiet way, ‘Well, thank you. I’ll—I’ll go and change.’
She went past him and then stopped. ‘Nowhere too grand,’ she begged him. ‘I haven’t the right clothes.’
He assured her in a placid manner that the restaurant he had in mind required no dressing up.
She showered and changed into a soft grey jersey dress which, while well cut and in the best of taste, did nothing for her, topped it with her winter coat, dug her feet into her best shoes—quite unsuitable for the Dutch winter weather—found gloves and handbag, and went down to the entrance, telling herself as she went that she must have lost her good sense. Mr van der Brons could have found out all he wanted to know about her reactions to working at the hospital without the bother of taking her out for the evening. She made her way to the entrance, worrying as to whether she was wearing the right clothes. Cor had never happened to take her anywhere where clothes mattered, but she had the strong feeling that the professor was an entirely different kettle of fish.
She had worried unnecessarily; she was stuffed neatly into the Rolls and driven through the city to the Bodega Keijzer, opposite the Concertgebow, for the professor had a very shrewd idea of what she was thinking about behind her quiet face. The food there was excellent and the atmosphere was pleasantly warm and friendly, just the thing to put her at her ease, and the grey dress was exactly right… Charity relaxed, which was what he had intended, drank the sherry he ordered for her and conned the menu.
‘I’m famished,’ observed Mr van der Brons. ‘The groentensoup is delicious; shall we have that to start with? And the fish here is good—I can recommend the zeetong—sole…’
Charity, disarmed by the friendly informal atmosphere, agreed happily and applied herself to her soup and the easygoing conversation of her companion. They had eaten their soup and sole and she was halfway through a towering ice-cream swathed in whipped cream before Mr van der Brons asked her if she was happy.
She paused in conveying a spoonful of ice to her mouth. ‘Me? Yes, thank you. I do like the burns unit; it’s—it’s worthwhile, if you see what I mean.’
The professor, whose life work it was, saw what she meant. ‘Not working you too hard?’ he wanted to know pleasantly.
‘No. It’s nice to be so busy that there’s no time to think about anything else.’
She blushed a little, for she hadn’t meant to say that; it was a relief when he took no notice. He would have forgotten about Cor by now.
She swallowed the next spoonful of ice-cream very suddenly when he asked. ‘And young van Kamp?’
He expected an answer, she could see that. ‘I never see him,’ she told him, but she couldn’t quite keep the regret out of her voice.
He said kindly, ‘You have only to ask me if you should at any time wish to be transferred back to a medical ward.’
She said hastily, ‘No, that would be a mistake—he might think that I was… He’s taking out that very pretty nurse from the general theatre.’
‘Ah, yes. She is a charmer, isn’t she? Will you have another ice? No? Coffee, then… Do you hear from your stepsister?’
‘I had a card from Portugal, she’s modelling there for Harper’s and Queen magazine.’
‘It is to be hoped that she will get an assignment to Amsterdam, then you would be able to spend some time with her.’
‘It would be nice to see her.’ She looked down at her plate. ‘But I bore her and I can quite see why. She is really beautiful.’ She sighed unconsciously. ‘And she wears the loveliest clothes.’
She didn’t enlarge upon that; somehow she felt that her companion didn’t mind about clothes, though without saying a word he had given her the impression that he had found the grey dress quite acceptable.
She gave another little sigh, this time of pure pleasure; Mr van der Brons was an undemanding and restful companion. With Cor she had had to exert herself to be lively and appreciative of his remarks; with her companion there was no need to be either. Indeed, their small talk was easy and their silences were comfortable and there was no need to break them; she was quite at ease with him.
They sat over their meal for a long time until she glanced at her watch and exclaimed at the lateness of the hour.
‘You have a day off tomorrow,’ he pointed out. When she nodded without speaking, he asked, ‘What do you intend to do with it? A week tomorrow I’m going to Leiden…’
He was sitting back in his chair, a cup of coffee before him. ‘I am lecturing there. I’ll give you a lift there, only you will have to be outside by half-past eight.’ He smiled suddenly so that she found herself smiling back, when in actual fact she had intended refusing coldly, for he had sounded arbitrary.
She said hesitantly, ‘Well…’ Of course he would be used to his sisters; she imagined that an elder brother might adopt a tone of voice like that when addressing them; perhaps he thought of her in the same category. ‘Thank you very much,’ she said in a little rush.
He took her back to the hospital presently, bade her a pleasant goodnight at the entrance and waited until she had disappeared down the corridor on her way to the nurses’ residence before getting back into his car and driving himself home.
He was letting himself into one of the beautiful seventeenth-century red brick town houses overlooking the Herengracht when he was met in his hall by a small neat man of middle years who addressed him with the civil familiarity of an old servant and a decided cockney accent.
‘Evening, Jolly,’ said the professor.
‘Good evening to you, sir—me and Mrs J. were getting that worried. As nice a dinner as I ever seen all ready to serve and you not ’ome.’
He took his master’s coat and laid it carefully over an arm. ‘Rang the ’ospital, I did, and they said as you ’ad gone hours earlier.’
‘On a friendly impulse I took someone out to dinner, Jolly. I had no intention of doing so, but she looked very lonely. English, Jolly.’
‘Ah, a tourist, sir?’
‘No, a nurse at the hospital. So I will come to the kitchen and apologise to Mrs Jolly and beg you to eat the dinner she had so kindly cooked for me.’
‘Well, as to that, sir…’ Jolly bustled ahead and opened the narrow door at the back of the hall and they descended a few steps to the kitchen, an extremely cosy place even if semi-basement; warm and well lit with a vast Aga along one wall and an open dresser filled with china along another. There were Windsor chairs on either side of the Aga, each occupied by a cat, and sprawled before the fire was a large shaggy dog who heaved himself up and pranced to meet the professor. He stayed quietly by him while he made his excuses to his housekeeper, speaking Dutch this time to the plump little woman before going back to the hall and into his study, the dog close on his heels. Here he sat down at his desk and, despite the papers waiting for his attention, did nothing at all for quite a while but sat deep in thought.
Presently he stirred. ‘I am almost forty years old,’ he addressed the dog, who looked intelligent and wagged his tail. ‘Would you consider, Samson, that I am middle-aged? Past the first flush of youth?
