by Betty Neels
‘Yes,’ said Emma, not looking at him. Her hands shook a little as she picked up the curved stitch scissors. There were a lot of sharps and a great many needles; she wondered what Justin would do when she had finished them.
‘I should have known,’ he began. ‘It wasn’t until I got home from the afternoon list at the hospital that my brain began to work—you numbed it, my sweet darling, going off like that; I couldn’t think and I didn’t dare until I’d finished my work, then on the way home I began to see a glimmer of sense in it all, for you said, if you remember, that you had come to a decision to leave while I was away and after Will and Kitty had gone, so I knew that it must have been when you were alone with Tante Wilhelmina. I didn’t know what she had said to you, I could only guess that it was something she didn’t want me to know about, otherwise why was she so careful to prevent us from talking to each other? I had almost made sense of it by the time I reached home, and when I asked her, she told me.’
He paused and in the silence Emma sniffed, because the hard lump of unhappiness she had been carrying around with her for days was melting fast and she was going to cry at any moment. ‘Did you believe her, dear love?’ His voice was very loving, and Emma, busy with her sharps, sniffed again and said in a damp voice, ‘Well, yes—you see, it all made sense to me too and I thought your aunt liked me, and Saskia’s so pretty…’
‘And I have never told you that I love you, have I?’
Emma was arranging her variety of scissors in the thick glass container which housed them. ‘No,’ she said soberly while her heart sang, ‘you never have.’ She snapped the lid of the container on securely and turned her attention to the needles.
The professor crossed one leg over the other and thrust his hands into his pockets. He could have been discussing the weather, so calm was his face, only his eyes glinted greenly.
‘I had some ridiculous old-fashioned notion about not rushing you, my darling. Kindly remember that I am middle-aged and therefore a little out-of-date in such matters.’
‘How could you be—all those girls!’ declared Emma quite viciously. ‘Your aunt told me,’ she went on, stabbing some cutting needles into their square of lint with extraordinary violence.
‘None of it is true,’ said Justin, watching her—reading her thoughts. ‘It is simple when you know; Tante Wilhelmina would have liked to live in my house for the rest of her life—all that nonsense about Saskia marrying me was pure fiction so that you would go away. You see she guessed how I felt about you, Emma. As for Saskia, I’ve never thought of the girl other than as a young cousin, and she looks upon me in the light of an older brother.’
‘Indeed?’ Emma’s voice was cool, ‘and the—the girls—Mevrouw Teylingen told me that you have had a great many girl-friends.’
‘Naturally,’ he agreed genially, and she took her eyes off her work just long enough to see the amusement on his face. ‘I’m forty, Emma—surely a bachelor of that age is allowed girl-friends?’ He saw the look on her face. ‘Only girl-friends, my dearest Emma, never one special one, not until I met you, sitting in that ridiculous car of yours, spitting with rage because the door wouldn’t open. I should have kissed you then and there and married you out of hand. As it is, you have been my constant distraction ever since. The only cure is to marry you and never let you out of my sight again.’
Emma had finished the needles. She folded the lint carefully, aware that Justin had come across the tiled floor, to stand, tall and large and solid, beside her. She turned her back on him and heard him say,
‘If you will turn round, my dearest girl, I will ask you to marry me.’ She felt his fingers at the back of her neck, untying the strings of her mask. He pulled her cap off too, so that her hair, already untidy, was worse than ever, but he didn’t touch her and she stayed as she was.
‘Before I do I want to know what will happen to Mevrouw Teylingen and Saskia—will they go on living at Huize den Linden?’
‘Saskia is going to live in Utrecht. She is going to marry someone who lives there—that was why I went there, to meet him. Her mother knew nothing of it—it was a little shock for her, I’m afraid, but I have bought a house for her in The Hague. She will be happy there, I think, and in time we shall become friends again and she will come to visit us, I daresay, but I want no one in my home but you, my darling, and me and the children you will doubtless see fit to present me with.’
She hadn’t quite finished. ‘You’ve been ten days—I never thought I’d see you again.’
She felt his hands on her shoulders as he turned her round at last.
‘I have a job like any other man—I couldn’t get away sooner, and I wasn’t going to write and risk any more misunderstandings. And now have you finished asking questions, because I have one to ask you, my love.’ Emma smiled at him then. ‘Will you marry me, Emma darling?’ he asked.
He gave her no chance to answer him, but bent and kissed her mouth with slow gentleness and then again, very hard so that she was left without breath.
‘You haven’t answered,’ said the professor, and kissed her again, this time with ruthlessness.
‘Well,’ said Emma, still very much out of breath, ‘you give me no chance.’ She smiled at him and her mouth had never curved so sweetly. ‘Of course I will, my dearest.’
She reached up to put her arms around his neck. ‘What did you wish when we blew out the candles?’ she wanted to know.
Justin smiled. ‘That is my secret, my love, although it is only fair to tell you that my wish came true.’
‘So did mine,’ said Emma, and reached up to kiss him.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-3931-9
WISH WITH THE CANDLES
Copyright © 1972 by Betty Neels.
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