of surgery.’
Her mother smiled. ‘Yes, love, and I’m fine. I really am. You’re to go home now and not worry.’
‘Yes, Mother. I’ll phone this evening and I’ll be back tomorrow. Do you want me to bring anything? I’ll pack nighties and slippers and so on and bring them with me.’
Her mother closed her eyes. ‘Yes, you know what to bring…’
Emma bent to kiss her again. ‘I’m going now; you’re tired. Have a nap, darling.’
It was still early; patients were being washed and tended before the breakfast trolley arrived. Emma was too early for the ward sister but the night staff nurse assured her that she would be told if anything unforeseen occurred. ‘But your mother is most satisfactory, Miss Trent. The professor’s been to see her already; he came in the night too. He’s away for most of the day but his registrar is a splendid man. Ring this evening, if you like. You’ll be coming tomorrow?’
Emma nodded. ‘Can I come any time?’
‘Afternoon or evening is best.’
Emma went down to the car and drove herself back to Buckfastleigh. As she went she planned her day. She would have to go and see Mrs Smith-Darcy and explain that she wouldn’t be able to work for her any more. That lady was going to be angry and she supposed that she would have to apologise…She was owed a week’s wages too, and she would need it.
Perhaps Mr Dobbs would let her hire the car each day just for the drive to and from the hospital; it would cost more than bus fares but it would be much quicker. She would have to go to the bank too; there wasn’t much money there but she was prepared to spend the lot if necessary. It was too early to think about anything but the immediate future.
She took the car back to the garage and was warmed by Mr Dobbs’s sympathy and his assurance that if she needed it urgently she had only to say so. ‘And no hurry to pay the bill,’ he promised her.
She went home then, and fed an anxious Queenie before making coffee. She was hungry, but it was past nine o’clock by now and Mrs Smith-Darcy would have to be faced before anything else. She had a shower, changed into her usual blouse, skirt and cardigan, did her face, brushed her hair into its usual smoothness and got on to her bike.
Alice opened the door to her. ‘Oh, miss, whatever’s happened? The mistress is in a fine state. Cook says come and have a cup of tea before you go up to her room; you’ll need all your strength.’
‘How kind of Cook,’ said Emma. ‘I think I’d rather have it afterwards, if I may.’ She ran upstairs and tapped on Mrs Smith-Darcy’s door and went in.
Mrs Smith-Darcy wasted no time in expressing her opinion of Emma; she repeated it several times before she ran out of breath, which enabled Emma to say, ‘I’m sorry if I was rude to you on the phone, Mrs Smith-Darcy, but you didn’t seem to understand that my mother was seriously ill—still is. I shall have to go to the hospital each day until she is well enough to come home, when I shall have to look after her until she is quite recovered—and that will take a considerable time.’
‘My luncheon party,’ gabbled Mrs Smith-Darcy. ‘You wicked girl, leaving me like this. I’m incapable…’
Emma’s efforts to behave well melted away. ‘Yes, you are incapable,’ she agreed. ‘You’re incapable of sympathy or human kindness. I suggest that you get up, Mrs Smith-Darcy, and see to your luncheon party yourself. I apologised to you just now—that was a mistake. You’re everything I said and a lot more beside.’
She went out of the room and closed the door gently behind here. Then she opened it again. ‘Will you be good enough to send my wages to my home?’ She closed the door again on Mrs Smith-Darcy’s enraged gasp.
She was shaking so much that her teeth rattled against the mug of tea Cook offered her.
‘Now, don’t you mind what she says,’ said Cook. ‘Nasty old lady she is, too. You go on home and have a good sleep, for you’re fair worn out. I’ve put up a pasty and one or two snacks, like; you take them home and if you’ve no time to cook you just slip round here to the back door—there’s always a morsel of something in the fridge.’
The dear soul’s kindness was enough to make Emma weep; she sniffed instead, gave Cook a hug and then got on her bike and cycled home, where she did exactly what that lady had told her to do—undressed like lightning and got into bed. She was asleep within minutes.
She woke suddenly to the sound of the door-knocker being thumped.
‘Mother,’ said Emma, and scrambled out of bed, her heart thumping as loudly as the knocker. Not bothering with slippers, she tugged her dressing-gown on as she flew downstairs. It was already dusk; she had slept for hours—too long—she should have phoned the hospital. She turned the key in the lock and flung the door open.
Professor Sir Paul Wyatt was on the doorstep. He took the door from her and came in and shut it behind him. ‘It is most unwise to open your door without putting up the chain or making sure that you know who it is.’
She eyed him through a tangle of hair. ‘How can I know if I don’t look first, and there isn’t a chain?’ Her half-awake brain remembered then.
‘Mother—what’s happened? Why are you here?’ She caught at his sleeve. ‘She’s worse…’
His firm hand covered hers. ‘Your mother is doing splendidly; she’s an excellent patient. I’m sorry, I should have realised…You were asleep.’
She curled her cold toes on the hall carpet and nodded. ‘I didn’t mean to sleep for so long; it’s getting dark.’ She looked up at him. ‘Why are you here, then?’
‘I’m on my way home, but it has occurred to me that I shall be taking morning surgery here for the next week or two. I’ll drive you up to Exeter after my morning visits and bring you back in time for evening surgery here.’
‘Oh, would you? Would you really do that? How very kind of you, but won’t it be putting you out? Sister said that you were taking a sabbatical, and that means you’re on holiday, doesn’t it?’
‘Hardly a holiday, and I’m free to go in and out as I wish.’
‘But you live in Exeter?’
‘No, but not far from it; I shall not be in the least inconvenienced.’
She looked at him uncertainly, for he sounded casual and a little annoyed, but before she could speak he went on briskly, ‘You’d better go and put some clothes on. Have you food in the house?’
‘Yes, thank you. Cook gave me a pasty.’ She was suddenly hungry at the thought of it. ‘It was kind of you to come. I expect you want to go home—your days are long…’
He smiled. ‘I’ll make a pot of tea while you dress, and while we are drinking it I can explain exactly what I’ve done for your mother.’
She flew upstairs and flung on her clothes, washed her face and tied back her hair. Never mind how she looked—he wouldn’t notice and he must be wanting to go home, wherever that was.
She perceived that he was a handy man in the kitchen—the tea was made, Queenie had been fed, and
