Surgical was on the second floor and nurses were supposed to use the stairs; in any case both lifts were in use. Eloise started off running down the stone steps, late and tired and a little cross. She had reached the ground floor and had begun to traverse the back lobby in order to reach the last, narrow flight of stairs, when she saw Sir Arthur Newman, the senior consultant on the surgical side, standing directly below the staircase she was tearing down, looking the other way, talking to a tall man with very broad shoulders, facing her. The man was good-looking—very, noted her tired eye, with fair hair and commanding features—and he was staring at her.
And no wonder, she thought peevishly; her hair was coming loose from its bun and her cape was hanging from one shoulder; all the same, he didn’t have to look at her as though she were surrounded by winking lights or something. She frowned and lifted her chin because he had begun to smile a little, and that was a great pity, because she took a step which wasn’t there and fell flat on her face. The knitting cushioned her fall, but the pineapple bounded ahead and landed with a squashy thump on the man’s shoe, denting itself nastily.
The shoe’s wearer kicked it gently to one side, surveyed his large, well-shod foot and bent to pick her up. The pair of them hauled her to her feet rather as though she had been a sack of coals, dusted her down with kindly hands and while Sir Arthur handed her her knitting, his companion bent to pick up the crushed fruit.
‘So sorry,’ said Eloise breathlessly, ‘very clumsy of me…’ Her eye fell on the pineapple and her face dropped. ‘Oh, it’s spoilt!’ She lifted a worried face to his. ‘And I did so want to…’ She paused; this stranger wouldn’t be in the least interested in her intentions regarding her gift. ‘I hope it didn’t hurt your foot,’ she said politely.
‘I have large feet,’ he had a slow, pleasantly deep voice, ‘and there’s no harm done—only to this.’ He handed over the battered thing. ‘A present?’ he inquired gently.
‘Well, yes—you know, someone going home…so kind…thank you both very much…breakfast…I’m late…’ She smiled at them both, happily forgetful of her deplorable appearance, and nipped across the lobby and down the stairs, to be greeted by her friends wanting to know why she was so late and had someone dragged her through a hedge backwards.
She sat down with her plate of porridge and showered it with sugar. ‘Well, I got off late, and then I fell down in the back lobby and Sir Arthur was there and picked me up.’ For some reason she didn’t want to tell them about the man who had been with him. ‘I’ve ruined my pineapple, though.’
‘Put it in the fridge,’ someone suggested. ‘Perhaps it’ll harden up—you’ve got nights off after tonight, haven’t you?’
Eloise fetched scrambled eggs on toast and began to devour them. ‘And three weeks’ holiday only two weeks away.’
‘What will you do?’
‘Stay at home—I expect we’ll go out, exhibitions and things,’ she observed vaguely; London at the beginning of October wasn’t really the place for a holiday. Now, Eddlescombe would be lovely; bonfires in the gardens and falling leaves and long walks under an autumn sky… She pushed aside the rest of her breakfast, no longer hungry, and got herself another cup of tea. ‘Does anyone want any stamps?’ she asked. ‘I’ve got to go to the post office on the way home.’
She went home by bike, on an ancient machine which creaked and groaned through the morning traffic and brought her finally to the block of flats where she and her mother lived. The building looked bleaker than usual as she wheeled it to the basement shelter and chained it up for the day before walking up two flights of stairs to the second floor, the pineapple, very much the worse for wear, secure on top of the knitting in her bag. It looked a bit second-hand by now, but at least most of it would be edible.
Second-hand or not, Mrs Bennett was delighted with it, making light of the damage. ‘What a lovely surprise,’ she declared happily. ‘We’ll have it at supper.’ Her still pretty face creased into a ready smile, while her eyes, hazel like her daughter’s, noted the tired white face.
‘A bad night, love? Well, only two more nights before you get nights off—what shall we do with them? There’s that exhibition of pottery—oh, and your aunt wants to come and see us…’
Eloise had cast off her outdoor uniform and was putting on the kettle. ‘Oh, Mother, must she? She only comes when she wants something.’
‘Yes, I know, darling, but this time she’s bringing Deborah Pringle with her—remember I knew her years ago and we were always great friends—still are in a way, for we write regularly even though she doesn’t live in England. I should like to see her again.’
She went back into the kitchen and made the tea and they went into the sitting room, small and rather crowded with the furniture they had brought with them from Somerset; all the same, it was a pretty room with a few flowers and some small pieces of silver on the sideboard. The pair of them sat down by the window and drank their tea and presently Eloise went off to have her bath and go to bed. Really, night duty was no life at all, she thought sleepily as she brushed her hair; here it was almost eleven o’clock and she would have to be up soon after five so that she could eat her supper in peace before going back on duty—there was no time to read or talk. ‘Poor Mother,’ she muttered, ‘it’s even worse for her.’
She went to say goodnight to her parent, busy in the kitchen, and then retired to take her night’s rest in her topsy-turvy world. It had been a horrid night, she reflected gloomily as she curled up in bed. At least, not quite horrid, for there had been that nice man… She fell asleep thinking about him.
Her mother called her, as she always did, with a cup of tea and sat on the end of the bed while she drank it. ‘You’ve not slept very much, have you?’ she wanted to know.
‘Well, once the children get out of school…’ Eloise tried to sound cheerful because she knew that her mother worried about her wakefulness, and her mother nodded and went on:
‘That pineapple, dear—was there something special about it?’
‘Just a pineapple, Mother.’
‘Yes, I know that—but a special delivery man called after lunch with a Fortnum and Mason basket, I opened it because all the man said was “name of Bennett”, the way they always do—and it’s crammed with fruit: three pineapples and grapes and those enormous pears and apples…there’s a note.’
She handed an envelope to her daughter and didn’t say a word while Eloise opened it and read the brief note inside: ‘Allow me to offer compensation for the damage done by my foot this morning.’ The signature was unintelligible and it was addressed to the Pineapple Girl.
‘Well!’ said Eloise, and then: ‘He must be nuts.’
‘Who, dear?’ Mrs Bennett’s voice was casual, masking her seething curiosity.
‘Well, there was this man…’ Eloise related the morning’s happening without trimmings. ‘And my hair was coming down—I looked a perfect fright—you know…’ She paused. ‘Mother, have I ever reminded you of a pineapple?’
Her mother took the question seriously. ‘No, dear. You’re not a beauty, but you’re not knobbly—your hair grows very prettily too, not out of the top of your head.’
‘How did he know where I lived?’
‘He only had to ask, presumably. Porters,
