He didn’t sit himself, but began to wander about the room. Presently he said: ‘You’re not at all the kind of nurse I intended to take with me. Have you travelled?’
‘No, but I’ve nursed in a variety of situations, some of them rather out of the ordinary way of things.’
‘You’re too young.’ He stopped marching around the room and looked at her.
‘I’m twenty-five—a sensible age, I should have thought.’
‘Women at any age are not always sensible,’ he observed bitterly.
Isobel studied him carefully. An ill-tempered man, she judged, but probably just and fair-minded with it, in all probability he was a kind husband and father. She said calmly: ‘Then it really doesn’t matter what age I am, does it?’
He smiled, and his face was transformed so that she could see that he could be quite charming if he wished. ‘All the same—’ he began and then stopped as the door opened and the manservant came in, murmured quietly and went away again.
‘You must excuse me for a moment, Miss—er—Barrington. I shan’t be more than a few minutes.’
She was left to contemplate the portraits of his ancestors on the walls, although she didn’t pay much attention to them; she had too much to think about. It was a severe blow if he didn’t give her the job…she needed it badly enough. When she had left hospital to take up agency nursing, she hadn’t had her heart in it: she had loved her work as Male Surgical Ward Sister and her bedsitting room in the nurses’ home and going home for her weekends off. However, when her only, younger brother Bobby had been given the chance of going to a public school and her mother had confided to her that there wasn’t enough money to send him, she had given up her post, put her name down at a nursing agency and by dint of working without breaks between cases had earned enough to get Bobby started.
She didn’t really enjoy it. It was a lonely life and she had far less free time; on the other hand, she could earn almost twice as much money and she had no need to pay for her food and room. And she wouldn’t have to do it for ever. Bobby was a bright boy, he was almost certain to get a place in one of the universities in four or five years’ time and then she would go back to hospital life once more. She should have liked to marry, of course, but she had no illusions about her looks, and although she could sew and cook and keep house she had never got to know a man well enough for him to appreciate these qualities. It was a regret that she kept well hidden, and it had helped to have a sense of humour and a placid nature as well as a strong determination to make the best of things.
She braced herself now for Dr Winter’s refusal of her services, and when he came back into the room looking like a thundercloud, she gave an inward resigned sigh and turned a calm face to him.
‘That was the nursing agency,’ he said shortly. ‘They wanted to know if I was satisfied with you for the job I had in mind, and when I said I’d expected someone older and more experienced they regretted that there was positively no one else on their books.’ He cast her an exasperated look. ‘I intend to leave England in two days’ time, and there’s no opportunity of finding someone else in forty-eight hours…I shall have to take you.’
‘You won’t regret it,’ she assured him briskly. ‘Perhaps you would tell me exactly what kind of case I’m to nurse.’
‘An old lady crippled with arthritis. My old nurse, in fact.’
The idea of this self-assured giant of a man having a nanny, even being a small boy, struck Isobel as being faintly ludicrous, but the look that he bent upon her precluded even the faintest of smiles. He sat down at last in one of the Chippendale chairs, which creaked under his weight. ‘She married a Pole and has lived in Gdansk since then. Her husband died last year and I’ve been trying since then to get a permit for her to return to England. I’ve now succeeded and intend to bring her back with me. You will understand that I shall require a nurse to accompany me; she’s unable to do much for herself.’
‘And when do we get back to England?’ Isobel asked.
‘I shall want your services only until such time as a suitable companion for her can be found.’ He crossed one long leg over the other and the chair creaked again. ‘We fly to Stockholm where we stay the night at a friend’s flat and take the boat the following day to Gdansk, we shall probably be a couple of days there and return to Stockholm and from there fly back to England. A week should suffice.’
‘Why are we not to fly straight to Gdansk? And straight back here again?’
‘Mrs Olbinski is a sick woman; it’s absolutely necessary that she should travel as easily as possible; we shall return by boat to Stockholm and spend at least a day there so that she can rest before we fly back here. And we spend a day in Stockholm so that the final arrangements for her can be made.’
He got up and wandered to the window and stood staring out. ‘You have a passport?’
‘No, but I can get one at the Post Office.’
He nodded. ‘Well, this seems the best arrangement in the circumstances; not exactly as I would have wished, but I have no alternative, it seems.’
‘You put it very clearly, Dr Winter,’ said Isobel. Her pleasant voice was a little tart. ‘Do you want to make the arrangements for the journey now, or notify the agency?’
‘I’ll contact the agency tomorrow.’ He glanced at the watch on his wrist. ‘I have an appointment shortly and can spare no more time. You will get your instructions, Miss—er—Barrington.’
She got to her feet. ‘Very well, Dr Winter—and the name is Barrington, there’s no er in front of it.’ She gave him a vague smile and met his cold stare and walked to the door. ‘You would like me to wear uniform, I expect?’ And when he didn’t answer, she said in patient explanation: ‘It might help if you had any kind of difficulties with the authorities…’
‘You’re more astute than I’d thought, Miss Barrington.’ He smiled thinly. ‘That’s exactly what I would wish you to do.’
He reached the door slightly ahead of her and opened it. ‘Perhaps you would confine your luggage to one case? I’ll fill in details during the flight.’
The manservant was hovering in the splendid hall. ‘Oh, good,’ said Isobel cheerfully. ‘One wants to know something about a case before taking it on. Goodbye, Dr Winter.’ She smiled kindly at him and made an exit as neat and unremarkable as herself.
She took a bus, a slow-moving journey of half an hour or more, back to her home—a small terraced house on the better side of Clapham Common. It looked exactly like the houses on either side of it, but in the narrow hall there was a difference. In place of the usual hallstand and telephone table there was a delicate wall table with rather a nice gilded mirror above it, and the small sitting room into which she hurried was furnished with what their neighbours referred to disparagingly as old bits and pieces, but which were, in fact, the remnants of furniture saved from the sale of her old home some ten years earlier. She never went into the little house without nostalgia for the comfortable village house she had been born and brought up in, but she never mentioned this; her mother, she felt sure, felt even worse about it than she did.
Her mother was sitting at the table, sewing, a small woman with brown hair a good deal darker than her daughter’s, the same blue eyes and a pretty face. She looked up as Isobel went in and asked: ‘Well, darling, did you get the job?’
