The Other Linding Girl

by Mary Burchell

  “Did you tell him so—in so many words?” Rachel sounded shocked.

  “It’s possible. I wasn’t a model of tact in my younger days,” he conceded amusedly. “Perhaps I didn’t choose my words well. Anyway, I went my own way, and without his blessing.”

  “And have you—justified your decision?”

  “He wouldn’t think so, Rachel.”

  “But do you think so?” she pressed him.

  “I don’t know, my dear. If one chooses a lone road, one never does know until the end is reached. If it proves to have led nowhere—then everyone can say, with great satisfaction, that it was a wild goose chase anyway. But if it leads to some entirely new discovery—” he paused and laughed softly—“ah, well, that’s a very different matter.”

  “And meanwhile,” Rachel said slowly, “Uncle Everard thinks you’re wasting your time?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  There were a few moments of silence, while Rachel digested what he had said and rearranged her views somewhat. Then she asked, almost diffidently,

  “What is your line of research?”

  “I don’t think you’d understand very well, even if I tried to explain,” he said, though not at all patronisingly. “It’s the kind of thing that most popular newspapers would probably lump together under the term ‘atomic treatment’, but that wouldn’t be a very accurate description. It is, however, something quite out of line with orthodox surgery—winch makes it even more improbable and unacceptable to your uncle.”

  “And is it—dangerous, your work?”

  “It can be, if you do the wrong thing.” He smiled.

  She would have liked to ask more. But at that moment there was an interruption, which switched them back so completely to the crisis of the evening that Rachel was surprised to find that she could have been so completely absorbed in something else, even for so short a time. The door opened, and Sir Everaid himself came into the room.

  “Uncle!” Rachel jumped up and ran to him, everything else forgotten at the sight of his pale, drawn, but admirably calm face.

  “Rachel, my dear—” He seemed surprised to her there. “You should be at home, in bed. I’m afraid I had forgotten all about you.”

  “Oh, that doesn’t matter! And I’m all right,” Rachel assured him, touched by his concern for her in the midst of his own troubles. “Come and sit down.” She took him affectionately by the arm and urged him towards the chair by the fire which she had just vacated.

  It was a measure of his distress, however well controlled, that he let her put him into it

  “Please tell me—” fearful though she was, Rachel had to put the question—“how is Hester?”

  “Shell be all right, I think” Sir Everard passed his hand over his face and, for the first time, it occurred to Rachel that he was, like her father, an elderly man.

  “Oliver had the sense to get hold of Ventris immediately, and he operated right away. Thank heaven someone was there to act with responsibility.” He did not look at Nigel as he said that, but Rachel heard the slight tremor of anger in his voice and knew who must be the object of that barely controlled indignation. It distressed her more than she would have believed possible, and only by biting her lip hard could she restrain her eager defence. Instead, she said gently,

  “Uncle, can’t you come home now and rest?”

  ‘No, no, my dear. I am staying here for what’s left of the night.”

  “Oh—? Then you won’t be operating tomorrow?”

  “Of course I shall be operating tomorrow—or rather, later this morning,” he retorted irritably. “Matron is giving me a room here, so that I can rest and be fit. But I couldn’t be anywhere else while Hester is still so ill.”

  He made the statement so simply that there was no arguing with it, and Rachel felt her heart go out to him for his devotion. Her sympathies were sorely tried the next moment, however, when he turned to Nigel and said curtly,

  “Can I trust you to take Rachel home safely?”

  “Yes, certainly,” replied Nigel, with exemplary self-control. “It will have to be by taxi in any case, you know.”

  Even this oblique reference to his damaged car seemed to make Nigel still farther an object of wrath. Sir Everard looked at him with positive dislike.

  “Well, take care of her,” he growled, “I’m sorry your first evening ended so badly, my dear.”

  “Oh, Uncle, as though that mattered!” Rachel leaned, forward and kissed his worn handsome cheek with real affection. “Don’t worry about me. I’m the least of your cares at the moment.”

  He smiled faintly at that, returned her kiss and said, “You are a great comfort, child.”

  Then, as though aware that this was a good exit line, he took his departure, without glancing at his brother-in-law.

  “Shall we go?”asked Nigel. “I expect there’ll be a taxi on the all-night rank.”

  “Is it near enough to walk?”

  “Oh, yes. Only five or six minutes, if you prefer that” Rachel said she did prefer that, and they went out of the Nursing Home, into the silent, moonlit street, where the tall houses threw long shadows, and a cat, slipping silently between area railings, was the only sign of life. She must have been more

  tired than she knew, for she stumbled slightly once, and he took her arm in a firm, warm clasp and said, ‘You should have let me call a cab.”

  Rachel shook her head, started to say something, and then found that the reaction from her evening had suddenly become so overwhelming that she was humiliatingly near tears.

  “What’s the matter, Rachel?” He was quick to sense her distress. But she merely shook her head again, without attempting to reply.

  He did not press her, and very soon they came to her uncle’s house, where he opened the front door with his key, and stood aside for her to go in. ‘You’ll find you can put out the hall light from the upper landing,” he told her. “Good-night, Rachel.”

  “B-but aren’t you coming in?” She turned to him quickly, in inexplicable dismay.

  “No.”

  “Where are you going, then? Back to the Nursing Home?”

  “No. I’m going to my own place.”

  “But I thought you were staying here for the night?”

  “Yes, I was. But your uncle has decided that he doesn’t want me to come into his house any more.”

  “He—’’ She put the back ofher hand against her mouth and stared at him in horror. “Did he say—that?”

  ‘Yes.” His tone suggested that they should keep the conversation on an unemotional level, but it had the opposite affect on Rachel.

  “Oh, how unfair! How—Oh, I can’t have things happen like that. This is too much!” And suddenly all the distress and strain of the evening combined to defeat her last shred of self-control, and she began to cry, standing there on the doorstep.

  “My dear girl!”

  “It’s a shame,” sobbed Rachel, divided between horror at her own absurd behaviour and indescribable dismay at the injustice of everything. “You hadn't a thing to do with it, really. It was that stupid little rotter, Keith Elman, and—and—”

  “Rachel—’ He took hold of the hands she had put against him in her distress and drew her quite close— “you simply mustn’t upset yourself like this. You’re tired and over-strained, It must have been a whale of a day for you, and its nearly three o’clock in the morning. Go to bed now—you’ll feel quite different in the morning. And as for me, I don’t care where I sleep—”

  “No, but its the idea of it!” she protested. “Fancy being forbidden anyone's house for s-something one hasn’t done.”

  “My dear, tender-hearted little niece—or whatever you are to me—”

  ‘Tm not your niece!” She had to put that straight, even in the midst of her woe.

  “Well, you're my sister’s niece, which makes you something that I can't possibly work out at this hour of the morning,” he retorted amusedly. “Anyway, you simply must not shed tears over
me. I can take a lot more than your uncle's disapprobation, you know, and—”

  “But don’t you hate being misjudged like this?” she interrupted, with such force that he was silent for a second.

  Then he said, unexpectedly, “All right—I loathe it But there’s no other way out of things, Rachel. And now I don't mind half so much—since you’ve shed a few tears for me.”

  He laughed softly and kissed her wet cheek. And, before she knew what she was doing, she returned his kiss. It was only long afterwards that this seemed an extraordinary thing to have done. At the time, it seemed natural.

  “You're sweet,” he said. “Now go to bed and sleep well, and remember that your indignant support made a lot of difference to me. Only you mustn’t indulge in it openly, any more than I can tell Keith Elman openly what I really think of him We must each keep our own secret. Agreed?”

  “A-agreed,” she whispered, on a rather childish aftersob.

  “Then good-night,” he said, and gently put her inside the doorway.

  “Good-night,” Rachel replied, but already the door had been quietly closed.

  For a few seconds longer she stood there, listening to the crisp sound of his footsteps dying away along the street. Then slowly she climbed the stairs to her room, conscientiously putting off the lights as she went.

  It was too late—and she was too tired—even to think about all that had happened since she had left Loriville that morning. She could achieve no more than an immense astonishment that so many experiences could have occurred in less than twenty-four hours. But even that was unimportant beside the overwhelming fatigue which now took hold of her. And, undressing in a fog of weariness, she dropped into bed and fell into a sleep so deep that it was like tumbling over a cliff

  Except for Paula, there was no saying when she might have woken the next morning. As it was, she struggled to the surface, at some unidentified hour, to find her little cousin beside her bed, and enquiring,

  “Where on earth is everyone? Mummy’s not in her room Uncle Nigel isn’t in his room And although I know Daddy was going off early, he doesn’t seem to have had any breakfast first.”

  “Oh—” Rachel sat up, slightly dazed. Then she remembered everything— and, with it, the necessity of not frightening the little girl. “There was something of a car accident last night,” she said, as casually as she could, “Your mother was a bit injured, arid they thought it better for her to go to the Nursing Home, where they could look after her.”

  “Was she much hurt?” Paula seemed interested, rather than violently upset.

  “I think they thought so at first, but later your father said she would be quite all right,” Rachel explained, not wishing to depart too far from the truth, while at the same time determined to sound unalarming.

  “And Uncle Nigel?” A deeper shade of anxiety was discernible on Paula’s small face at that.

  “Oh, he’s all right!” Rachel was able to declare that quite cheerfully. “For some reason of his.own, he went back to his own flat. And your father stayed on at the Nursing Home, so as to be near your mother, and available for his work this morning. What time is it, Paula?”

  “Half-past eight.”

  “I must get up! I’m supposed to be at the Nursing Home to take letters for Mr. Mayforth this morning. I imagine he’ll expect me about nine-thirty.”

  “Was he up half the night too?” enquired Paula practically.

  ‘Well—yes, he was.”

  ‘Then he won’t be dictating at nine-thirty. Why don’t you have breakfast in bed?”

  “No, darling! Run along, and I’ll be down in twenty minutes,” Rachel promised.

  “I shall have gone to school then,” Paula explained. “I’m just off now, as a matter of fact. Only I thought I’d come and ask you first where everyone was. I’ll see you this evening.”

  “All right, pet.” Rachel smiled at her. “Have a good day.”

  “At school?” Paula seemed to find that improbable. But she grinned at Rachel and started off towards the door. Then suddenly she turned and came back to the bed. “You’re sure Uncle Nigel’s all right?”

  “Absolutely sure.” “And Mummy’s not—not too badly hurt?”

  “I don’t think so, dear. Your father assured me she would be all right,” Rachel repeated. “And he would know.”

  “Oh, yes, he’d know,” Paula agreed. “He knows everything. Of that sort, I mean,” she added somewhat enigmatically. And off she went to school,

  Rachel got up, bathed and dressed rapidly, and was downstairs before nine. Here one of the maids served her with breakfast, and asked, with respectful curiosity, after Lady Linding. It seemed Nigel had been right and that one or two of the newspapers had at least a mention of the accident.

  Unable to add much to the bare news, Rachel repeated that Sir Everard seemed hopeful. Then, having had her breakfast, she walked over to the Nursing Home, to find that Paula was right and that Oliver Mayforth had not yet arrived.

  However, Matron—with a certain degree of graciousness, attributable, Rachel felt suie, to the name of Linding—informed her that Lady Linding was as well as could be expected.

  Finding this phrase as comforting and informative as most of us do, Rachel ventured to enquire what kind of injuries Hester had suffered.

  “Why, head injuries, of course. They called in Sir Michael Ventris, you know,” Matron said, as though Rachel would naturally have drawn her own conclusions from that.

  “Oh—I see,” Rachel replied meekly. And then she went into the office which had been indicated to her as the place where Mr. Mayforth would expect to find her.

  In spite of the fact that he must have had an even shorter night than she, he was not really many minutes after her.

  “Hello!” He seemed pleased and surprised to see her. “Very punctual, I see. How are you feeling this morning?”

  “A little better than you, I expect,” Rachel replied, at which he laughed “Oh, I can get by on quite a little sleep—and I hear the morning report on Hester is satisfactory. So, provided we all keep our heads—” he gave her a level glance—“we may come out of this business not too badly.”

  “I’ve had my briefing,” Rachel informed him drily, “from Nigel Seton. It’s all right.”

  “Good. Well then, what about some correspondence?” Rachel indicated that she was at his service, and for an hour he dictated—letters and a conference report— clearly and fairly rapidly.

  “Have you got all that?” he enquired at last.

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Don’t say ‘yes’ if you haven’t,” he warned her, rather irritably. ‘Your predecessor was always cheerful about taking down, but singularly at sea when it came to typing back.” “She doesn’t seem to have been very hot on filing either,” Rachel observed mildly, as she inspected a muddled pile of letters and papers. “If it’s all right with you, I’ll do the letters first, so that they’re ready for signature, and then I’ll clear up the filing before I do your report.”

  “Whatever you like,” he said, having apparently decided finally that she was efficient. And he went away, leaving her to her own devices.

  Rachel was indeed efficient, and a steady worker, so that when he came back, just before lunch, all his letters were waiting for signature, and his new secretary was standing in the alcove by the filing cabinets, with an air of considerable absorption.

  He said nothing, but shot her an approving glance, as he sat down at his desk, and for a while there was silence. Then Rachel, who had her back to the room, heard the door open, and a cheerful masculine voice said, “May I come in?”

  “Oh, Denbey, come in. Have you got the lunch-time papers?” There was a barely controlled note of eagerness in the assistant surgeon's voice.

  “Yes. Sister told me you wanted to see what they had to say about the accident, you old ghoul, you!”

  “I just wanted to make, sure there was no—vulgar romancing about it You never know with the papers,” muttered Oliver
Mayforth, rather unfairly. “Have you met Miss Linding?” He made a vague gesture in the direction of Rachel’s corner. ‘Miss Linding—Dr. Denbey, our resident physician.”

  Rachel turned and smiled briefly at the resident physician, before returning to her filing.

  “Nothing at all sensational, ” Oliver Mayforth stated, after a minute or two, with some satisfaction. “Just the bare facts.”

  “But you haven’t noticed the star attraction,” countered Dr. Denbey, in the jocular tone which appeared to be characteristic of him “Have a look at the social page ofthe Echo. Splendid picture of you, enjoying yourselflike mad, you dark horse.”

  “Of me?” Oliver Mayforth sounded astonished—and distastefully astonished at that. While Rachel—she hardly knew why—suddenly lost interest in her filing.

  “Well, it’s not intentionally of you,” the resident physician conceded. “‘Miss Floo-Flah, top debutante of the Season, dancing at the Spastics Ball’—or something like that. But there you are too, just left of centre, on the point of kissing your very lovely partner, if I’m not much mistaken. Who is she, for heaven’s sake? Prettiest girl I’ve seen in a long while, and evidently thinks you’re the answer to her prayer. If I hadn’t been coming in with the paper anyway, I’d still have been coming to enquire when the banns are

  being put up. As it is—Oh!”

  The resident physician came to a dead stop, as Rachel advanced slowly from her obscure corner and impinged completely on his notice at last.

  “I say—I’m sorry! That’s the gaffe of the year, isn’t it? You must forgive my nonsense—I often talk that way. Silly habit—only—”

  But Rachel was not really listening to him She was looking down at the newspaper spread out on Oliver Mayforth’s desk. And there they were, both of them, caught ruthlessly by a roving camera, and registered for all time in a moment she would already most willingly have forgotten.

  “How—how idiotic I look!” she exclaimed, angry and embarrassed beyond belief.

  ‘You don’t, you know. You look perfectly charming,” countered Oliver Mayforth unexpectedly. And, leaning back in his chair, he smiled up at her as though, in some odd way, he saw her for the first time.