Dr Blake's Angel

by Marion Lennox

  ‘It’s Christmas,’ Nell said simply. ‘They’re my next-door neighbours and they didn’t want to disturb you.’

  Right. It was a major hazard of being a country GP. Patients thought it was somehow easier for all concerned to land on the doctor’s front doorstep rather than come to the surgery. It wasn’t and, by the look of Nell’s face, she’d been feeling the strain.

  ‘Not up to taking on my full workload?’ he asked, and she flushed. Damn. Why had he said that? She was distressed, he thought, and it was he who’d distressed her.

  ‘I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.’

  ‘It’s true. I’m useless. I’m not usually—’

  ‘Usually you’re a really fine doctor,’ he told her, meeting her eyes and smiling—trying to make her smile back. ‘But kneeling on the floor when you have ten-ton Tess aboard is hardly sensible.’

  That made her indignant—which was just the reaction he’d been angling for. ‘Hey, my baby’s hardly ten-ton Tess.’

  ‘He looks like it—doesn’t he, Jason?’ Blake had swiftly washed his hands and was already stooping over the injured knee. ‘Holy cow, how much gravel did you get in here, Jason Gunner? You must have been travelling at a hundred miles an hour. It must be some bike that Santa left.’

  ‘It’s red,’ Jason told him proudly. ‘And it’s got little wheels so I can do heaps of tricks.’

  ‘Well, you write a letter to Santa and tell him he forgot knee and elbow pads,’ Blake said sternly. ‘What was Santa thinking of?’ Then he relented. ‘You didn’t hurt your bike?’

  ‘No.’ Jason managed a gap-toothed grin. ‘I checked it before I had a look at my knee.’

  ‘You’re born to be a Formula One driver.’ Then Blake glanced up at Nell and his smile faded. She was almost as white-faced as Jason. ‘Go and make yourself a cup of tea, Dr McKenzie,’ he suggested. ‘I can finish here.’

  ‘I don’t need a cup of tea.’

  ‘Well, ten-ton Tess might.’

  ‘Is your baby really ten tons?’ Jason asked, interested, and Nell managed a smile.

  ‘I hope not, but he sure feels that way at the moment.’

  ‘When exactly is your due date?’ Blake asked, focussing in sudden concern. The baby had dropped, he thought. Nell looked different. The baby was no longer a neat bundle around her midriff. Had it dropped in preparation for delivery? Surely not.

  ‘February eight. There’s a good six weeks to go.’

  ‘You’re sure of your dates?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure. I’m a doctor, aren’t I?’

  ‘You’ve had an ultrasound?’

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘But nothing. Hell, Nell…’

  ‘Do you mind?’ she snapped, motioning to the boy. ‘Concentrate on Jason.’

  ‘Sorry, Jase.’ Blake turned back to what he was doing. ‘You didn’t hear what I just said.’

  ‘Hell?’ Jason enquired, and Blake smiled.

  ‘It’s not a word to say in front of ladies. I only said it because I was provoked.’

  ‘What’s provoked?’

  ‘Something Dr McKenzie is very good at. She’s a very provoking lady.’

  Jason thought that through. ‘Does provoking mean pretty?’

  ‘That’s part of it.’ He’d determined to keep his mind on the job. There was only a tiny area of the wound left uncleaned. He scrubbed the top layer, scrubbed harder and then used tweezers to remove the last of it. Finally he looked around to find a dressing and Nell placed it into his hand, unasked.

  Her presence was strangely disconcerting. ‘I thought I told you to go and have a cup of tea,’ he growled.

  ‘I told you I didn’t want one.’

  ‘See?’ Blake demanded of his patient. ‘Provoking. Provoking, provoking and even more provoking.’

  ‘She is pretty,’ Jason agreed, and Blake grinned.

  ‘She’s pretty fat.’ Ignoring Nell’s indignant gasp, he came to the point he needed to focus on next. ‘You saw Emily last week?’ he demanded of Nell.

  ‘Yes. Why do you ask? You know I drove across to visit her.’

  ‘And she examined you?’

  ‘She says everything’s fine.’

  ‘But she examined you?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘And she agrees with your dates?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t she? I know I’m right.’

  ‘Have you got a bassinet yet?’ Jason asked, interested. ‘Cos there’s one at my place.’

  ‘I won’t need a bassinet for ages,’ Nell said, a trace of desperation in her tone. ‘I’ll worry about that when I stop working—in two weeks!’

  ‘You’re exhausted now,’ Blake told her.

  ‘No. Yes! Maybe I am, but only because I danced until the small hours last night, and then I had to stuff the turkey and lay the table.’

  And Jason was on her doorstep to stop her sleeping in, Blake thought—but she must already have been up and dressed. She was looking great, in a gorgeous crimson maternity dress. It was a simple sundress with shoestring shoulder straps, cut low across her breast and then flaring in soft folds to mid-calf.

  She was pretty, Jason had decreed, and Blake agreed entirely.

  ‘What else have you got left to do?’ he asked, fitting white gauze across Jason’s knee and lower leg.

  ‘Not much.’

  ‘You have a dozen people coming for Christmas dinner. That’s hardly not much.’

  ‘They’re all bringing something. My job’s the turkey and the roast potatoes. Everything else is done—oh, except the brandy sauce.’

  ‘So after the brandy sauce you can have a rest before everyone gets here.’

  ‘I guess.’ She sounded doubtful as she glanced at her watch.

  ‘Right.’ Blake lifted Jason and set him on his feet. ‘That’s you fixed—which gives me time to help Dr McKenzie with the brandy sauce before morning surgery.’

  ‘Are you having Christmas dinner with Dr McKenzie?’ Jason asked, and Nell butted in before he could answer.

  ‘Of course he is.’

  ‘Maybe…’

  ‘We’re having Christmas dinner in Dad’s room at the hospital,’ Jason said proudly, oblivious to the tension that was suddenly filling the bathroom. ‘But afterwards… If I promise not to fall off, can I ride my bike over to show it to you?’

  ‘We’d love to see it.’ Nell smiled at Blake. ‘Wouldn’t we?’

  Blake glowered. ‘I don’t know whether I’ll be here. I don’t know how busy I’ll be.’

  ‘You can’t be too busy for Christmas dinner,’ Jason said, shocked.

  ‘We’ll see.’

  They took Jason out to the hall to discover Wendy had pulled herself together and was in control again. Just. ‘I’m really grateful,’ she told them. ‘And, Nell, I’m so sorry for disturbing you on Christmas morning.’

  ‘Think nothing of it.’ Nell was watching Wendy’s face, taking in the strain around her eyes. ‘It’s been a crazy Christmas for you.’

  ‘Yes.’ Wendy faltered, but tried to keep her voice bright. ‘It’s an odd one. Just me and the kids. We were supposed to go to my sister’s in Blairglen. All the family are going.’

  ‘Instead of which, you’re pandering to the invalid.’

  ‘It feels funny.’ Wendy blinked, determined to hold back the tears which were just behind her eyes. ‘When Aaron was hurt, the family offered to come here, but my sister’s eight months pregnant and I thought it wasn’t fair. I mean…’ Her eyes flew to Nell’s tummy. ‘Well, eight months or not, she could have it any minute.’

  ‘Hey, I’m not due for six weeks,’ Nell said decisively. ‘And first babies are always late.’

  ‘Yeah.’ But both Blake and Wendy were looking at Nell’s tummy like a coiled snake.

  ‘Oh, cut it out, the pair of you.’ Nell managed a laugh. ‘Wendy, are you saying that after you leave hospital you’re going home alone?’

  ‘With the kids. Yes.’

  ‘You’d better come here, the
n,’ Nell told her. ‘It’s open house for anyone who can sing Christmas carols. We don’t mind if you come late and have eaten heaps already. You can help finish the brandy sauce.’

  ‘I couldn’t.’ But it was obviously enticing. ‘Oh, Nell…’

  ‘I’d love you to. We both would. Wouldn’t we, Blake?’ Nell grinned and tucked her arm into Blake’s, whether he liked it or not, making them an instant couple. ‘The average age of my guests is about a hundred and six. I suspect one tablespoon of my brandy sauce and they’ll be out for the count, so I depend on you and Blake to keep me company.’ She twinkled at Wendy and then she turned her smile on Blake. ‘And to help me wash up.’

  Wendy smiled back. ‘If you put it like that.’ She looked a question at Blake. ‘And if you’re coming, too…’

  He was stuck. They were all watching him, two women and three children, their faces bright with expectation. And Nell was by his side, holding his arm in hers and smiling up at him. Her body was warm and close and… And it was suddenly all too much.

  ‘I’ll come if I can,’ he said, goaded, and Nell grinned.

  ‘What a very polite way of accepting.’

  ‘It’s the best I can do.’

  It was only a meal, for heaven’s sake. Why did it feel like he was signing his life away? I’ll come if I can… Heaven knew that he couldn’t.

  Wendy took her children home, the four of them skipping down the track with Jason barely limping.

  ‘Kids are amazing,’ Blake said, watching them go. ‘You and me’d be in bed after falling like that.’

  ‘You think Jason would go to bed when there’s a new bike to be ridden?’ Nell laughed. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s back, having the other knee bandaged, before nightfall.’

  ‘He’ll be back anyway—for your party.’

  ‘He will, too.’

  ‘It’s too much for you,’ Blake said savagely, watching her face. Despite the gorgeousness of her crimson dress, she still looked pale. ‘Hell, Nell, why do you—?’

  ‘Do you mind not swearing at Christmas?’

  ‘I’ll swear if I want to.’

  ‘Ernest is shocked.’

  ‘Ernest is concentrating entirely on turkey, and stop changing the subject. Nell…’

  ‘Are you going to help me with the brandy sauce?’ she demanded. ‘Or are you just planning to stand around, getting in the way? Because if you are, I promise I’ll hang mistletoe on your nose. And there’s six widows coming to my dinner, and they all know what mistletoe’s for.’

  Blake smiled but he was still worried. ‘Nell…’

  ‘Just shut up and work,’ she told him, pushing him into the kitchen. ‘Do you know how to separate eggs?’

  ‘Separate eggs. You mean one from the other?’

  ‘And you a surgeon,’ she told him, exasperated. She plonked a carton of eggs in front of him. ‘I’ll show you one, and you do the other eleven.’

  ‘A full dozen! How much brandy sauce do we need?’ he demanded, startled, and she chuckled.

  ‘How long’s a piece of string? Goodness knows.’

  ‘So what’s it got in it?’ He picked up the recipe book, and saw it written in a child’s handwriting. ‘Where did you get this?’

  And for a moment she hesitated. ‘Um…’

  His attention was caught. ‘Don’t tell me it’s a secret.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘It was written on a slip of paper tucked into one of my mother’s books. I found it stowed in the garage with everything else of my mother’s. Heaven knows where she got it, because my grandmother certainly never made it, but now it’s one of the few things left to me.’ She put a cream container on the table and reached for an apron. ‘So I guess you could say it’s a family recipe. My family.’

  Blake felt his gut wrench at that, a feeling he was starting to recognise. She’d had so little, and she could have so much more—but, then, for Nell to have more, he’d have to give. So what was he thinking of?

  He knew what he was thinking of. He knew what he wanted. He wanted Nell to have a family, and he wanted that family to be him! But for him to be Nell’s family he’d have to break down barriers that had taken him years to build, and he didn’t want that. Did he?

  No. No and no and no. Definitely not.

  ‘If you don’t hurry and break those eggs, you’ll miss morning surgery,’ she was saying. ‘Mind, I’ve done half your work for you.’

  With a start he jerked himself back to the job at hand. Brandy sauce. The important things in life. Right.

  She was supposed to be sleeping. After Blake left, Nell tried to settle. Instead, she wandered around the house like someone lost, Ernest trailing behind her. Her back still ached, she was weary and she was downright miserable.

  Would he come back? Even though he’d promised, she didn’t think so. He’d find some urgent medical need and he’d phone with an excuse that she couldn’t fault.

  ‘You’re a fool, Nell McKenzie,’ she told herself for the fortieth time. ‘You have a house. A dog. Friends. People coming to Christmas dinner who you care about. What else do you want?’

  Blake.

  The answer was written across her heart as if it had been branded by fire. She wanted him so much, and she was stupid, stupid, stupid. Because Blake didn’t want her. He didn’t want anyone, and she simply had to accept that and get on with her life—as best she could.

  But she certainly couldn’t sleep.

  ‘Merry Christmas!’

  Ethel Norris was the first to arrive, carrying a boiler almost wider than she was. The pudding lay on the back seat of her car as Nell came out to greet her, and it was bigger than a basketball. ‘I know I’m early but if the pudding doesn’t go on soon it won’t be ready.’

  ‘What a pudding!’ Nell lifted it and groaned with the weight. Her back stabbed again with the pain she was starting to expect. She hid her grimace as best she could. ‘Heck, Ethel, what did you put in this?’ Drat, what was wrong with her? Her legs felt like jelly.

  But Ethel was too busy to notice. ‘Everything but the kitchen sink.’ The big woman beamed. ‘I’ve never made such a pudding. It should have been made a couple of months ago, but with this party planned just this week I had to put more brandy in to compensate.’ Her beam widened, and Nell thought back to the miserable Ethel she’d met when she’d first come back to town, and she could only wonder.

  ‘Hey, and I’ve lost two more pounds,’ Ethel told her, guessing where Nell’s thoughts were headed. ‘How good’s that?’

  ‘You’re not dieting today!’

  ‘No fear. No, Dr McKenzie, I’m following your advice and very good advice it is, too. Now, let’s get this pudding on the stove and see what else needs to be done.’

  Soon after Ethel came Grace, bearing trays of Moreton Bay bugs, gleaming in their crimson glory, with bowls of home-made tartare sauce and slices of fresh lime.

  Then old Norman Harper arrived with oysters, Harriet Walsingham with salads made from her own garden—a Harriet complete with pacemaker on board and details of her Very Interesting Heart Surgery—Bert with baby potatoes dug that morning, Marg with fresh peas, the ancient Toby with a whole bucket of fresh cream he’d scooped off his magnificent Jerseys’ milk, Elsie with strawberries, Clare with home-made chocolates…

  By the time they sat down to dinner the table was groaning, and Nell looked around at the sea of smiling faces and thought, Why wouldn’t you do something like this? If not for this, all these people would have sat down to Christmas dinner alone, and they’d have been collectively miserable.

  The only dampener to her spirits was that Blake still wasn’t here, and she couldn’t stop thinking of him. Drat the man. He hadn’t even phoned. Somewhere he was eating his Christmas dinner alone. He’d be in the hospital kitchen, she thought, or in his apartment with his boneless ham and his one punnet of strawberries. She wished suddenly that she’d sent some of this food over to him. She couldn’t bear that
here there was so much and he had so little.

  But he had to make the first move himself, she told herself fiercely, and he wouldn’t. He wanted to be solitary!

  ‘Pull my cracker,’ Tom told her, and then Grace and Ethel carried in the turkey between them. The bird was golden brown and so succulent Nell could almost taste it before she raised it to her mouth.

  ‘Happy Christmas,’ Grace said, and raised her champagne flute across the table to Nell. ‘Welcome home, Dr McKenzie. Welcome to your first proper Christmas at Sandy Ridge, and may there be many more.’

  There were cheers all around, and Grace was watching her with a look that was almost tender. Nell found her eyes filling with tears. This was what she’d wanted so desperately, for herself and her baby. She had a home.

  But where was Blake?

  Blake was trying hard not to be there. Really hard. But there wasn’t enough work.

  Jason Gunner must be the only casualty in the whole of Sandy Ridge, he thought desperately as he stood at the nurses’ station and wondered what to do next. The hospital was three-quarters empty. Every patient who possibly could had gone home. For those who remained there were the sounds of individual festivities as each family made a party around their special patient’s bed.

  These were private parties and he wasn’t wanted.

  Maybe he could go for a run now, he thought. After all, the beach would be deserted. But he knew he’d be seen—which meant Nell would be offended. To run in solitary state while the rest of the town ate their Christmas dinners would have everyone feeling sorry for him. People would be calling out for him to come and share their dinners, and the last thing he wanted was sympathy.

  Why should he want it? His solitude was self-imposed. That was what he wanted. Wasn’t it?

  Nell would be carving the turkey by now.

  What Nell was doing had nothing to do with him, he told himself fiercely. Nothing at all. He’d ring her to tell her he was busy, and then he’d go back to his own kitchen and eat.

  His hand wouldn’t quite lift the receiver.

  OK. He’d eat and then ring, he decided. Then she’d think the medical need had been really urgent—something had happened that meant he hadn’t even been able to phone.