‘Uncle Ben, is it yours? It’s super!’
‘Don’t be a fool, my dear, it’s Raf’s.’
She glanced at the Dutchman and found him watching her, his sleepy eyes alert beneath their lids. She said rather lamely: ‘Oh, how nice,’ and watched his smile as he opened the door and ushered her into the front seat. Probably he drove abominably, she told herself as Uncle Ben made himself comfortable in the back and the Professor got behind the wheel. But he didn’t, he drove superbly, placidly unconcerned with the traffic around them, taking advantage of every foot of space, using the big car’s power to slide past everything else. Katrina allowed herself to relax thankfully and just for a moment closed her eyes.
‘Never tell me you’re tired,’ murmured the Professor in a hatefully soft voice, ‘a great strapping girl like you.’
‘I am not…’ began Katrina in a strangled voice, and stopped; he was trying to make her lose her temper, and she wasn’t going to. ‘You’re not exactly a lightweight yourself,’ she observed sweetly.
‘For which I am profoundly thankful,’ he assured her. ‘I like to look down on my women.’
‘I am not,’ said Katrina in a furious rush, ‘one of your women!’
‘Oh, no, you don’t resemble any of the girls I know—they’re slim and small and mostly plaintive.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ she snapped, ‘if they know you.’
He had a nice laugh. ‘I think we’re going to enjoy getting to know each other, Kate.’
They were in Highgate Village now, close to Uncle Ben’s house, and as he slowed and stopped before its gate she had what she hoped was the last word. ‘Think what you like, Professor van Tellerinck, but I have no wish to get to know you.’
He only laughed again.
CHAPTER TWO
UNCLE BEN’S HOUSE was a Regency villa standing in its own immaculately kept garden, well back from the road. Aunt Lucy flung the door wide as they got out of the car and began to speak almost before they had got within earshot.
‘Katrina, how lovely—your supper’s waiting for you. Ben dear, how fortunate that it was something I was able to keep hot. Raf, you must be famished!’
She bustled them through the hall and into the sitting-room, furnished with easy chairs and sofas and a number of small tables, loaded down with knitting, books and newspapers. ‘Mary’s just dishing up—you’ll have time for a drink.’
Katrina had her coat whisked from her and was sat in a chair and a drink put into her hand. ‘Ben said on the phone that you’ve had a busy evening,’ went on Aunt Lucy, happily unaware of what the business entailed. ‘I was a bit put out when the men were called away just as we were about to sit down to table, but this makes up for it. How is your dear mother?’
The men had taken their drinks to the wide french window at the end of the room after responding suitably to Aunt Lucy’s greeting, and now she cast them an indulgent glance. ‘I suppose they’ll mull over whatever it was for the rest of the evening, which means that we can have a nice gossip.’
Aunt Lucy’s voice was soothing and the sherry gave Katrina an uplift she badly needed, and by some domestic magic conjured up by the cook, the meal which they sat down to presently was delicious. Katrina, thoroughly famished, fell to with a good appetite, avoiding the Professor’s eye and only addressing him directly when he spoke to her.
Which wasn’t often, and then with a casual politeness which she found annoying, despite the fact that she had decided that she really didn’t like him at all. She was taken completely off guard presently, when, dinner over and coffee drunk in the sitting room, she murmured to her aunt that she would have to go. The two men were standing together, discussing some case or other, but the Professor interrupted what he was saying to observe;
‘I’ll run you back, Katrina.’
‘There’s no need, thank you—I’ll get a taxi.’
‘I have to go back anyway to pick up some instruments.’ He spoke blandly, ignoring her reply, and Aunt Lucy at once backed him up.
‘Well, of course, if you’re really going that way—so much nicer than a taxi at this time of night, Kate—someone to talk to, as well,’ she added happily.
Katrina thought of that remark ten minutes later, sitting beside the Professor in the Bentley, trying hard to think of some topic of conversation. She scowled horribly when he observed placidly: ‘Considering that it will be April in a few days’ time, the evenings are surprisingly chilly.’
‘Why are you in England?’ asked Katrina, not bothering with the weather.
‘Interested? I’m flattered. Your uncle and I are old friends—he knew my father well. When I come to England I like to see him.’
Which hadn’t answered her question. ‘You’re a surgeon, too?’
‘Yes.’ He turned the car into the hospital yard and parked it. ‘No, stay there,’ he told her, and got out and opened the door for her. ‘Such a pleasant evening,’ he murmured. ‘Goodnight, Kate.’
She suspected that he was amused about something again. Her goodnight was civil but nothing more. Going slowly up the stairs of the nurses’ home to her room, she reflected that she wouldn’t see him again and was surprised at her glum feelings about that. She had hoped, with conventional politeness, that he would enjoy the rest of his stay in England, and all he had said was that he was quite sure that he would.
‘Oh, well,’ she said crossly as she opened her door, ‘who cares? I shan’t be seeing him again, anyway.’
She saw him the very next afternoon. It had been a simply beastly morning, with Mr Knowles doing a round of his six beds and spinning it out to a quite unnecessary length of time, so that dinners were late, nurses didn’t get off duty on time, and Katrina herself had had to be content with cheese sandwiches and a pot of tea in the office. And if that wasn’t enough, she had been waylaid by Jack Bentall, one of the house surgeons, and badgered into a reluctant promise to go out to dinner with him in a couple of days’ time. Despite the fact that she had never encouraged him, he waylaid her on every possible occasion, making no secret of his feelings, even allowing it to be bruited around that she was quite bowled over by him. Katrina had never lacked for invitations; she was a delightful companion and sufficiently lovely for men to like to be seen out with her, but she had never taken any of them seriously. For one thing, as she had pointed out so many times to her mother and sisters, she was so large…
But Jack Bentall didn’t seem to mind that; he was a rather short, thickset young mam, and conceited, and nothing Katrina could say would convince him that she didn’t care two straws for him. Usually she fobbed him off, but today she had been tired and put out and had lost some of her fire, and even though she regretted it bitterly already, she was far too honest to invent an excuse at the last minute. But it would be the last time, she promised herself, as she gobbled up the sandwiches and went back to the ward.
The nurses were tidying beds before the visitors were admitted and had prudently left Mr Crewe until the last. They had just reached him as Katrina opened the doors and her ears were assailed at once
