Sunflower Summer

by Sue Peters

  'Bridge End farm—is that the place you pointed Out, at the other end of the valley?' Keir asked Nan, glancing down the list of calls. 'Which road do I take to that one? I don't remember,' he said doubtfully.

  'Take Nan with you as a guide,' her uncle forestalled her crisp directions, and Nan's heart sank. It did not seem to occur to her large-hearted relative that she might not want to go with Keir.

  'I'd like to, until I get to know the district a bit better,' lie greeted the offer with such enthusiasm that Nan's lips curled. He was a good actor as well, she thought cynically, he sounded as if he really wanted her with him. She did not believe he doubted his own capability to find his way about; Keir seemed nothing if not supremely self-confident.

  'There's the bedrooms to turn out,' she began hopefully, but Mary Gray interrupted her firmly.

  'Rose and I can manage beautifully. I'm quite well now, and you must try and' get some fresh air before you have to go back to Bartholomews,' she told Nan. 'You've only, got a few weeks left, and you must use it as a holiday,' she drove her niece into a position from which she could not extricate herself without appearing churlish.

  'I'll get my jacket.' Nan escaped to her bedroom, and after a moment's hesitation slipped into a maize-coloured trouser suit and a white sweater that would be comfortable for driving. That Keir expected her to drive he made plain by being in the passenger seat waiting for her when she went out.

  'That colour suits you,' he commented, watching her approach, and she frowned impatiently.

  'It's serviceable, and it washes,' she resorted to practicalities. She did not feel 'in the mood for compliments, particularly from Keir. 'Where to first?'

  'The farthest call out, and we'll work our way back,' Keir decided. 'You know,' he said conversationally when he returned to his transport after calling on the patient at Bridge End, 'you don't expect breathing troubles in air as pure as this.' He inhaled a deep lungful, and settled back into his seat as Nan keyed the engine into life again. 'Rheumatism I can understand, being out so much in all winds and weathers.'

  'It's the dust,' Nan remarked absently.

  'You associate dust with factories, not farms.'

  'You do now,' Nan agreed. 'The modern machinery has taken the dust out of the work, particularly with jobs like harvesting and poultry plucking. Christmas used to be a busy time for bottles of cough mixture,' she remembered. 'Old Joe was a thresher,' she referred to the patient he had just visited. 'Even I can remember the threshing sheds so thick with dust when the men were working that you could hardly see across them. Then the combines came, and it stopped all that,' she spanned a minor industrial revolution with quiet satisfaction. 'The next are the Jones twins. They've got mumps,' she said maliciously. She did not wish Keir any harm—heaven forbid —but an impish picture of his dignity spoiled by a swollen face made her eyes dance.

  'I've had them,' he read her thoughts with deflating accuracy, and left her to compose herself until his return, 'They're getting along nicely,' he announce!! a short while later. 'Hardly any sign of bumps under their chins now.'

  'There'll be a bump of a bigger sort if that driver isn't more careful.' Nan watched the progress of a vivid red sports car on the main road running along the side of the hill above them. The way he took that bend ...' She shuddered. 'Oh well, maybe the skid scared some sense into him.'

  'I hope so.' It was more a breathed prayer than an answer to her remark, and she looked round at Keir questioningly. He was watching the progress of the small red dot, rapidly disappearing over the brow of the hill, and in his eyes was the same horror that had been there before, when he spoke of his own car. 'It was a write-off ... I wasn't in it at the time.' What had happened to his own car? she wondered curiously. If it was of the same calibre as the new one he contemplated buying, it would have been powerful, and capable of being driven at high speed. She thrust the thought from her mind. Doubtless if he wanted to, he would tell her uncle about it one day, when they got to know one another better. Nan herself was an unlikely recipient for his confidence, she would not be at Minster House long enough to get to know Keir well, even if she wanted to. Which she didn't, she told herself irritably. Perhaps it was as well she had only a little time left; she reflected; she did not care for Keir's difficult nature, and if they were together for long it would almost certainly lead to a clash of wills. With only a few weeks to go she felt she could keep the peace between them fairly easily provided they kept away from the subject of the Planning Committee and their designs on the hospital and Ma's cottage.

  'Hi, Steve!' She slowed to a crawl at the cross roads to allow a motor-cyclist the right of 'way, and waved her arm to a girl in denims and gumboots who was crossing the paddock at the back of a nearby red brick cottage, leading two enormous horses behind her.

  'Hello!' the girl called back cheerfully, her diminutive figure completely dwarfed by the great animals that followed her as meekly as two puppies. 'How're you fixed for a game of tennis at the weekend?'

  'Love to,' Nan called back. 'I'll ring you.'

  'Fine. 'Bye !' The girl led her charges away towards a long row of stables, and Nan accelerated across the now clear road.

  'That's Steve Whitworth,' she identified the stranger for Keir's benefit. 'She and her husband David breed horses. Their other love is tennis,' she added as an afterthought.

  'Carthorses? Surely their use is practically extinct in this day and age?' Keir said incredulously.

  'Does everything have to have a use?' Nan asked him quietly.

  'If you do it for a living—yes.'

  'They get their living by breeding racehorses and hunters. Pedigree stock. They've also got a riding school,' Nan enlarged, knowing the reasonableness of his argument but unwilling to admit it. 'They've only got the two Shires, and they're in constant demand for shows. They more than earn their keep,' she could not resist pointing out.

  'I'm surprised they still find time for tennis.' Keir's tone was faintly condescending, and Nan frowned.

  'They still enjoy the game, though they don't play pro ... goodness, what's happened here?' She slowed down and stared at the mutilated grass verge that narrowed into high banks at the approaching bend.

  'It looks as if someone's run out of road,' Keir predicted drily.'

  'And not long ago, either,' Nan realised with a shiver, sniffing the air. 'The wild garlic still smells where the stems have been crushed by whatever made these wheel marks.' An odoriferous reek of onions and scorched rubber pervaded the atmosphere, lying heavy despite the faint breeze that blew gently across the fields.

  'Stop the car! Run it onto the bank for safety,' Keir commanded her sharply, and when she obeyed, 'Stay here, I'm going to see ...'

  'I'm coming with you.' Nan did not wait for him to argue.

  She would not have listened if he had. She pulled the Land-Rover to a halt in a nearby field gateway and slid to the ground beside him, starting to run.

  'Hang on a minute.' Keir retraced his steps hurriedly and fished his medical case from out of the back of their vehicle. 'You never know,' he commented grimly. 'Listen!' He paused, his head on one side. 'I thought I heard something.'

  'So did I. Come on!' Nan started off ahead of him, and slipped on a stone.

  'Here, hold on to me, we can make faster speed.' He grasped her hand, his longer legs crossing the ground faster than she could hope to do on her own, but she did not try to pull him back. The sound, unmistakably a groan, lent wings of fear to their heels.

  'That car,' she panted, visions of the red sports car that had skidded wildly, on the main road flashing through her mind, and making her feel slightly sick.

  'It's a Land-Rover, like ours.' Keir halted abruptly, his way partly blocked by an upturned vehicle, whose wheels still spun slowly, mocking its lack of momentum.

  'It looks familiar,' Nan said slowly, and looked up at Keir. 'Are you all right?' Momentarily she forgot the crashed vehicle in startled wonder at his face. It had gone chalk white, and stark fear sh
one undisguised in his eyes. 'My car was a write-off ...'

  'Of course I'm all right. Come on,' he said abruptly. 'We've got to find out...' Another groan, fainter than the first, galvanised Nan into action, and after the first hesitant step, which she thought wildly Keir would never take, he was by her side, and kneeling with her to look inside the crashed Land-Rover. It lay on its side, and the two occupants were just beginning to stir.

  'It's Helen and Bob Marriott—the local vet and his wife.' She realised why the Land-Rover had looked familiar.

  'Nan?' At the sound of her voice the fair-haired man slumped behind the wheel opened his eyes.

  'Don't try to move, Bob. I've got Doctor Raven with me, Uncle Oliver's new assistant. We'll get you both out of there.' How, she had no idea; they would have to try and find out first how badly the two were injured.

  'I can't move, my legs are pinned.' Returning consciousness brought sharp pain, and the man screwed up his face for a moment before he went on. 'Look after Helen,' he begged, and fainted.

  'I'm all right.' The woman beside him spoke up unexpectedly, her voice faint but lucid. 'It's my one leg, too. I think it's broken.'

  'Do you hurt anywhere else?' Keir wrenched at the door with desperate strength, and it flew open. In seconds he was with the woman, his expert hands seeking signs of further injury. 'I'll give you an injection, it'll kill the pain for a bit, then we'll lift you down.' Quickly he rolled her sleeve away from her arm and inserted the needle. 'Help me, Nan.' Together they managed to ease her so that Keir could reach her injured leg, then slowly, agonisingly slowly, they lifted her down and laid her on Keir's jacket on the soft grass at the side of the lane. 'Now for your husband. It's this bar thing that's holding him. I think I can manage to move it far enough away . ..'

  'Gor ! What's 'appened?' A broad voice spoke from behind the Land-Rover, and Nan spun round.

  'Postie! Thank goodness it's you.' She could have hugged the blue-uniformed figure perched on the top of his ancient bike, his cap in his hand, and his fingers scratching his thinning hair with bewilderment. 'There's been an accident,' she stated unnecessarily. 'It's the vet and his wife. Ride over to Steve Whitworth's place and phone for an ambulance, do,' she begged.

  'We'll need more than one ambulance.' The woman lying on the verge spoke up again, urging her voice above the whisper that was all her failing strength allowed. 'Look further round the bend.' She lapsed into exhausted silence, and Keir reappeared through the door of the Land-Rover.

  'I've moved the bar that's holding him, but I'll leave him where he is until the ambulance comes. What's this about something else round the bend?' he asked tautly.

  'I'll go and look.' Nan hurried a few yards further along the lane. Somehow, she knew what she was going to find. Knew that it had to be the red sports car.

  'It's completely upside down.'

  She felt Keir's hand rest steadyingly on her shoulders.

  'We'll need a breakdown wagon.'

  'The garage is closed. That was the foreman we saw on the motor-bike at the crossroads. He was going home to his lunch, and he lives in town.' It would take at least three-quarters of an hour to find him and fetch him back. 'Postie?' She spun round and ran back to where the man remained with their first patient beside the Land-Rover.

  'I'll go and phone, now you're back.' He mounted his cycle.

  'Get Steve Whitworth to hitch up the two Shires, and bring them here as quickly as she can. There's another car upside down in the ditch, just round the corner.'

  'Foreman'll be at home to his dinner by now. Garridge'll be closed.' The postman paused, dismayed.

  'That's why Steve's got to bring the Shires. It's our only chance.' She gulped. 'Their only chance . . .'

  'I'll see she brings un.' The postman turned his bicycle round and made off at a speed that in other circumstances Nan would not have believed him capable of.

  'Have you found—what have you found?' An urgent whisper came from the woman prone on the grass verge.

  'It's a red sports car.'

  'Tell me,' the vet's wife insisted, and Nan complied, knowing that nothing but the truth would satisfy her. 'It's completely upside down, we can't reach the two people inside, and without help we can't lift it off them,' she said quietly.

  'Thank God the weather's been dry.'

  Nan nodded wordlessly. If the dyke had been flooded, as she knew it did at that particular spot after a lot of rain, Keir's services would not have been needed.

  'I can see them, but I can't get at them.' Keir rejoined her, his face drawn and strained, and a jagged tear along his shirt sleeve. 'I tried to wrench the door open,' he indicated his ill-used garment, 'but the car's sunk too far down in the ditch.' He spoke with his head half inside the Land-Rover, his attention once more concentrated on the driver, who was now coming round again and demanding to know where they had taken his wife.

  'Helen's outside on the verge,' Nan told him. 'She's fine, and so will you be soon—there's an ambulance on its way.'

  'The sports car—it hit us,' the vet's voice trailed away weakly.

  'We're attending to that as well,' Keir answered crisply. 'Now, tell me if you hurt anywhere else besides your legs.' He drew the injured man's attention back to his own flight.

  'They must have run out of road round the bend,' Helen Marriott took up the tale, and Nan let her talk, sensing that it eased the strain of her anxiety for her husband. 'We heard them hit the verge before they got to us. They must have been doing a terrific speed. They careened off the bank straight into us,' she shut her eyes momentarily. 'Bob swung the wheel over, but the lane's too narrow. They caught us sideways on.'

  'We'll soon have you both in hospital.' Keir's voice was crisply reassuring. 'You've both got leg injuries, but nothing that won't mend. You'll be on your feet again in no time. That sounds like the ambulance now.' A distant siren proclaimed help was on its way.

  'What about Timmy?' Helen Marriott reached out and grasped Nan's hand. 'What's going to happen to him? He'll be home from school this afternoon.' Her whisper was distraught.

  'I'll go and collect him,' Nan responded immediately. 'He can come and stay with us at Minster House until you're better.' She had forgotten the vet's small son. 'He stayed with us when you and Bob were away on that course, so he'll be happy enough,' she reminded the boy's mother, and. was thankful to see her face clear.

  'Doctor Gray's at. the hospital, miss, he's already been alerted,' the ambulance man shot the information over his shoulder to Nan as he loaded his charges on to their stretchers.

  'Tell him I'll join him as soon as we've pulled the occupants out from under that sports car,' Keir said curtly.

  'There's another ambulance on its way, sir, he was just behind us.'

  'Good.' Keir straightened up from helping load the two stretchers into the first vehicle, just as the second one drew up beside them. 'Carry on round the bend,' he gesticulated to the driver, then slammed the door of the first ambulance and sent it on its way.

  'Blimey!' The second ambulance man stopped abruptly as he caught sight of the sports car. 'Looks more like a battlefield than a road accident,' he muttered.

  'The garage is closed,' Keir told him, 'and we can't get at the crash wagon for nearly an hour. Maybe we could try winching it off them with our Land-Rover?'

  'No chance, sir, beggin' your pardon,' the driver shook his head. 'The lane's too narrow to shunt.' The man was a local, with years of experience, and knew what he was talking about.

  'I've sent for Steve Whitworth and her two Shires,' Nan joined them and explained.

  'The horses will find a footing where the machine can't,' the driver nodded his approval. 'If we tried the Land-Rover, and it slipped on that,' he jerked his thumb at the high, tangled bank with a deep ditch cut at the bottom, 'it might roll the car back on—those two.' His glance at the red car was bleak and unhopeful. 'We could do more damage, if that's possible. Better to wait for the horses, if one of them slips the other will hold firm. They're
coming now, I reckon.' His quick ears had caught the familiar clip-clop from the other side of the bend.

  'I've brought some grapples.' Steve led her two gentle giants on to the scene at a brisk trot. 'Goodness, what a mess!' She held out four ropes to which blunt-ended metal hooks were attached, giving two each to Keir and the ambulance driver. 'Show him where to hook on, Bill,' she allowed for Keir's possible lack of experience.

  'I know,' Keir said quietly, and moved swiftly towards the car, working in unison with the other man.

  'I'll hitch up this one while you do the other.' Nan swung into action with Steve, and the two great horses stood patiently, as if they knew what would be required of them.

  'Fan out.' Steve assessed the situation with a quick glance. 'Stop when the rope tightens, then start walking slowly when I signal. You two, steady the car as it rolls back.' She took charge of the situation, and despite their macabre task Nan felt a quirk of amusement at Keir's meek acceptance of her instructions. 'O.K., stop now. Let her take the strain. Pull!' Slowly the two Shires stepped forward, leaning on their harness, and the ropes strained tight until Nan feared they might give way under the strain.

  'It's coming!' A grinding, churning sound made Nan glance round. Slowly the strength of the animals gained ascendancy over the weight of the red car, until it rolled out of the ditch and lay on its side on the bank.

  'Hold it!'

  'Whoa!'

  'Keep it there for a bit,' Keir called. Despite the risk of it rolling back and trapping him he jumped into the ditch and reached inside the car to the two crumpled figures of a man and a girl, who rolled with rag doll-like limpness over the seats. 'They're alive,' he announced, in a tone that added for itself 'only just'. 'Take it a bit further, can you, Steve?' He used her Christian name as naturally as he had used Nan's a moment before. 'Fetch a couple of stretchers.' But the driver had already gone, and was back in seconds with his load. While the two girls held the horses steady, the man attended to the grisly task of transferring the injured occupants on to the blankets. They took the girl first.