Rachel Lindsay - Heart of a Rose

by Rachel Lindsay

  She yawned and stood up.

  "I'm not as strong as I thought I was," she apologized. "The journey's knocked me for six and I think I'll go to bed."

  "A good idea, poppet. I'll bring you up some supper later on."

  Rose climbed 'the narrow stairs to her room and, too weary to do more than cursorily wash her face and hands, climbed into bed. She was almost asleep when her father came in with a tray and she ate the cold meat and salad and drank the large cup of steaming hot chocolate. As soon as she had finished she flopped back on the pillows and the next instant was sound asleep.

  She did not awaken till morning and the air coming in through the window was so warm that she pushed the bedclothes off and padded over the floor to look at the view. It was as beautiful as ever, the rolling green fields, the steep drop of the cliffs and the restless, tumbling sea.

  From downstairs came the sound of crockery and she knew her father was making breakfast. Although he was cared for by a daily woman, Desmond Tiverton was extremely domesticated and had little need of anyone to take care of him. He was too self-sufficient in fact, and had he not been so might have married again instead of living alone. At forty-eight her father was still young enough to look forward to more happiness, Rose thought, yet after his wife's death he had given up his job of history master at a public school in order to retire to his beloved Devon and devote himself to writing historical books. True, they had brought him a great deal of prestige, but they had brought him very little else.

  "Not that I've any need for money," he had told her on one occasion. "I've an insurance policy that will go to you and I've enough for my own needs."

  Hearing the object of her thoughts clattering heavily up the stars, Rose hurriedly slid back into bed and made herself ready to receive the breakfast tray.

  The pattern of that day, lazy, enervating, set the pattern for the two weeks that followed. As though reproaching her for going elsewhere to seek warmth and sunshine, the sky was cloudless and the spring sun instead of being watery pale had an unusual summer intensity that tanned her fair skin.

  "If you don't come back from Cannes with a millionaire in tow," her father said as he drove her to the station to catch the train, "I'll feel that fate is looking on you most unkindly."

  "She'd probably be looking on me unkindly if she gave me a millionaire," Rose laughed. "From the few rich young men I've seen coming into our florist's I'd just as soon be a working man's darling!"

  It was on a note of laughter that she waved her father goodbye and after she had watched his tall figure recede on the platform she settled back in her seat and gave herself up to thoughts of the future.

  As soon as Rose reached her small flat in London she telephoned Mrs. Rogers, who immediately invited her over to dinner.

  "In fact," the woman said, "if you get all your things packed my chauffeur will call for you and then you can spend the night here and go straight to the airport in the morning."

  Realizing it would be churlish to refuse Rose accepted the invitation, and as the street lamps came winking on in the dusk of evening, she drove across London in a purring Rolls Royce to the Mayfair flat where Mrs. Rogers lived.

  The first welcome she received as she entered the hall was of a small black body launching itself into her arms and a hot tongue licking eagerly at her chin.

  "There you are," Mrs. Rogers cried as she came out of the drawing room. "Benjy knows it was you who saved his life. Look how pleased he is to see you!"

  Rose hugged the poodle and then turned to her hostess. "It was kind of you to ask me to come."

  "Nonsense! I'm enjoying your excitement. It's almost as if I were going instead of you."

  "But surely there's nothing to stop you going away?" Rose asked in surprise, and could not help glancing at the elegantly furnished drawing room in which she found herself.

  "That's the trouble," Mrs. Rogers answered. "It's knowing that you can do everything you want that takes away all the excitement. If I'd had to work for what I wanted I might get a thrill out of it," Mrs. Rogers sighed. "It seems wrong not to be grateful for what I have, doesn't it?"

  Beginning to understand something of the boredom that could come from having too much time on one's hands as well as too much money, Rose did what she could during the evening to entertain her hostess with an account of her own working life, and told in great detail of her occasional visits to Covent Garden and the way Mr. Marks used to hunt for flower bargains.

  "Your job sounds as if it's been a lot of fun," Mrs. Rogers said as she led Rose to her bedroom. "But you'll soon meet a nice young man and give up all thoughts of a career."

  "That's what my father said," Rose answered. "But I wouldn't want to give up my career for any man. I love working with flowers and I'd hate to be cooped up in a kitchen."

  "Maybe you'll be another Constance Spry," Mrs. Rogers laughed.

  "I'm not talented enough for that," Rose said seriously, and as she undressed and climbed into bed she couldn't help wishing she were more clever. There was something monotonous in being an average sort of person, particularly if one was sufficiently unaverage to resent being so!

  'If I were really brilliant no one would think it strange that I preferred a career rather than a marriage. Yet even

  Dad, who's emancipated enough goodness knows, still clucks over me like a mother hen when he envisages me remaining a spinster for ever.'

  She closed her eyes and rubbed her toes over the hot water bottle. Excitement would not let her relax and she began to analyse herself, probing deep in a way she had rarely done before. What exactly was she looking for in a marriage? Real love, deep love, love in the tradition of the great romantics? There was that dread word romantic again. What was it she had been called at school — Romantic Rosie! Even now she blushed at the thought, for in this era of rock 'n' roll, of beatniks and weirdies, romance as she envisaged it was outdated. "But I'd never marry a man unless I came first in his life,' she vowed. 'And if I find them in the future to be as cynical and philandering as I've found them in the past, then I'll remain a Miss for ever!'

  It was on this threat that she finally fell asleep.

  Rose left London Airport the next morning. It was her first flight and she could not help a tremor of nervousness as she climbed the aluminum steps and boarded the Nice- bound Viscount aircraft. There was such an unhurried calm about the stewardess who welcomed her aboard that her fears diminished and she watched fascinated as the signal for takeoff was given. Safety belts were fastened and they taxied across the tarmac to the runway. The noise of the engines was deafening and as they raced over the ground it seemed as if her eardrums would burst. There was a gentle swaying movement and suddenly they were airborne, rising so swiftly that almost before she realized it the trees and the houses looked like toys and the cars became black dots crawling across ribbon roads.

  Even though she had not been conscious of being afraid, Rose found that her hands were damp and she rubbed them surreptitiously on her skirt before undoing her safety belt. She glanced round at the other passengers. Some were talking, some were writing and others were already asleep, completely oblivious of the wonderful panorama through which they were flying. Never before had Rose realized that clouds could take on so many different shapes and colors, for it seemed as though she were passing through a veritable fairyland. Here was a castle of palest pink, there a clump of dark grey trees, here again a grotesque figure tinged with yellow, ahead an illumined mountain of shimmering white.

  But after half an hour Rose too grew tired of watching the never-ending, ever-changing cloud shapes and she was glad when the stewardess brought round hot drinks and sandwiches and handed her some magazines. Quicker than she had thought it possible they were droning over France, going ever farther south until far below she caught her first glimpse of the Mediterranean, a wondrous vista of lapis-lazuli. Once again she fastened her seat belt and once more was caught up on a wave of fear as the plane jokingly descended. There was the whin
e of wheel flaps going down, the change in the tempo of the engines, a high pitched scream of brakes and then they were rolling across the tarmac at Nice Airport.

  The moment she stepped out of the plane Rose felt the sun beating on her with brazen fingers and she immediately took off her coat and unbuttoned as much of her sweater as decency allowed. Then she followed the rest of the passengers to the Customs Hall where the babble of voices became one unintelligible blare.

  Any knowledge she had possessed of French completely disappeared and when the Customs official spoke to her she stared at him blankly. He smiled and addressed her in English, and the moment he did so her fear evaporated. Indeed, as she took stock of her surroundings she realized there were more English people around her than French, and it was not until she was in an old-fashioned taxi bowling along the road towards Cannes that she got the feeling she was actually outside her native shores. It was not so much the landscape, which bore a striking similarity to Devon and Cornwall, but a certain atmosphere in the quality of the air and above all in the scents that wafted to her nostrils: perfume of strange looking flowers mixed with suntan oil, garlic and coffee.

  Any feeling that she might still be in England was finally abandoned when they were clear of Nice itself and tearing at a furious pace along the winding cliff road.

  "No driver could get away with this in England," she thought indignantly, and clutching the edge of the seat vowed she would never go in a French taxi again.

  "Lentement!" she said loudly to the driver. "Lentement,'s'il vous plait!"

  "Oui, oui," said the man and turned to grin at her, showing a row of tobacco-stained teeth. Then to show that he understood her clearly, he pressed his foot even harder on the accelerator.

  Only when they reached Cannes and the Promenade des Anglais did they slow down, this due in the main to the preponderance of other cars. Rose glanced eagerly around her. Although it was still early in the season the narrow strip of sand was crowded with gaily colored umbrellas and deck- chairs, while scores of people strolled leisurely by or sipped a drink at one of the many cafes lining the right-hand side of the road. On the right-hand side too lay the hotels, each one more resplendent than the last. There was the gleaming bulk of the Martinez, the turrets of the Carlton and then, set back in a carpet of mossy green grass, the most glittering hotel of them all — the Plage.

  They drove gently into the drive and Rose could not help a pang of fear at the sight of the vast terrace running the entire front length of the building and dotted with tables at which sat groups of holiday-makers sipping drinks served to them by scarlet jacketed waiters.

  The car drew to a stop and two page-boys stepped smartly forward. One deposited her cases on a trolley while the other took hold of the travelling case she was carrying.

  "I'm not a guest here," she told him in French. "I've come to work in the florist's shop. Perhaps you could take me to Monsieur Ferrier?"

  "O.K.," he said in broken English with a strong American accent. "I show you to Monsieur Ferrier tout de suite."

  Nervously she followed him through the swing doors to the lobby. The hotel was even more vast than it appeared from outside, the ceiling high and vaulted, the walls of gleaming marble with here and there elegant pedestals on which reposed displays of flowers.

  'If I'm supposed to do the flower arrangements here as well,' Rose thought, 'I won't get much chance to serve in the shop!'

  She had no more than time to glance curiously around her before the page-boy led her past the reception desk, past the three gilt cages that served as lifts and down a narrow red-carpeted corridor to a room at the far end. He knocked at the door and with a flourish opened it.

  A middle-aged man seated at a desk stood up and came round it instantly, both arms held out in greeting.

  "Miss Tiverton? I'm very happy to see you. You had a good journey, I trust?"

  Without waiting for her reply he turned to the pageboy. "See that Miss Tiverton's luggage is sent to her room. I'll take her up there myself in a moment." He waited until the door had closed and he and Rose were alone. Then he beckoned her to sit down and resumed his own seat.

  He was not the sort of manager Rose had expected to find at the Hotel Plage, for he looked more like an Agatha Christie detective, being short and portly with florid cheeks and a pointed, waxed moustache.

  "Mrs. Rogers has spoken to me at great length about you," he said. "I'm sure you will fit very well into our regime here."

  "I hope so," Rose said. "But I really haven't much idea of what I'm supposed to do. Mrs. Rogers was very vague."

  The tips of Monsieur Ferrier's moustache lifted in what Rose was to realize was his only intimation of a smile.

  "Mrs. Rogers is only vague when it suits her. If she wants to she can be most terribly precise. And she was very precise about you!"

  "I had a proper training," Rose said quickly, "and then I worked at —"

  "I know all your background," Monsieur Ferrier said hastily. "Besides, Mrs. Rogers' recommendation is enough. Indeed, we only take people to whom we are recommended. In a hotel like this it can be dangerous to employ the wrong sort"

  Seeing Rose's mystified expression he elaborated. "The people who stay here are among the richest and most exclusive in the world, and people of that type are not always careful of their possessions or how they spend their money. Many girls would like to work here for they see it as the Open Sesame to a glittering future. For my part, I only see a job here as a job. We are not a marriage bureau but a hotel!"

  Rose burst out laughing. "I know exactly what you mean. But you needn't worry about me."

  "Please, Mademoiselle. I was not suggesting anything of the sort. I was merely explaining that if it had not been for Mrs. Rogers we would not have taken you. But since you are her protegee it is more than good enough for me."

  "Do you know her very well?"

  "But of course. Her husband was a founder member of this hotel and she is still a large shareholder."

  Rose digested this news in silence. It explained how the job had become available so fortuitously!

  Monsieur Ferrier stood up. "First I will show you the florist's and then I will show you your room. You can have a couple of days rest and if you would be ready to start work by Friday — the weekend is always our busiest time — it will be in accordance with me."

  "I'd rather start tomorrow," Rose said firmly. "Mrs. Rogers might have been good enough to get me the job, but I wouldn't want you to keep me here for any reason other than that I was good enough."

  A gleam of admiration lightened his eyes, but without any comment he led her back to the foyer.

  On the other side of the lifts was a wide arcade that Rose had not noticed before. Here were the shops of the Hotel de la Plage; the hairdresser's, the chemist's, the gift shop, the perfumery and in the middle a double window with a magnificent display of blooms.

  "This is the florist's," said Monsieur Ferrier unneccessarily, and pushed open the door.

  A thin girl of about her own age came forward as they entered and Rose was introduced to her assistant, Mademoiselle Jacqueline Roussel. "But please call me Jacky," the girl said.

  Rose liked her immediately, but they had no time to exchange more than a few words, for the manager was already leading her down the arcade again to the lifts. They went up to the top floor and along the innumerable corridors until they reached a corner room at the back.

  "It has no view of the sea."

  "but it has an excellent view of the mountains."

  "It's beautiful," she said sincerely. "I never expected anything as magnificent as this."

  "Most of our staff rooms are much smaller," came the dry reply. "But Mrs. Rogers especially asked me to give you this one."

  Rose knew better than to comment on this and she thanked him and watched him go.

  Alone in the bedroom she relaxed for the first time that day. What a strain it was to come to a new job in a strange land! And even more of a strain to know th
at it was influence that had got her the job in the first place. 'Not that it's going to be an easy one,' Rose thought as she remembered die lavish window display and the vast bouquets that she had seen dotted around the hotel itself. 'It looks as if I'll have to work harder here than I did with dear old Mr. Marks!'

  She walked over to the window and pushed back the shutters, staring in delight at the vista ahead. The sun was already beginning to set and long shadows cast their purple fingers over the mountains. Never had she seen so many different shades of green, from muted leaf to dark cypress. Although the sunlight was mellow the rays were still hot, and she drew the shutters again and stepped back into the bedroom.

  The furniture was sycamore, the pale wood lending an illusion of space and light, while the bathroom was larger than any Rose had ever seen. Quickly she unpacked, changed into another dress and went downstairs. She had forgotten to ask Monsieur Ferrier where the staff dining room was, but one of the clerks at the reception desk was going off duty and he led her down to the basement floor and a large, plainly furnished room with scrubbed wooden tables and hard chairs.

  "Not good to look at," he said with a smile, "but the food is excellent and you will get here the left-overs of what the dining room had yesterday. If you like to join me I would be delighted."

  She accepted his offer and found him a pleasant if slightly boring companion. He had been working at the hotel for four years and was leaving at the end of the season to accept a job as chief receptionist at a hotel in Switzerland. But he served to introduce her to some of the other staff as they came in, although Rose still remained the only woman among them.

  "The linen keepers and the various housekeepers from each floor go off duty at eight in the evening and will have their supper at home, but you will meet them all here at lunch time tomorrow. The other people who work in the shops go to their own homes too and the only staff to use the dining room at night are us receptionists and the head waiters. If you wish you could probably arrange to have your meals served in your room. It would just mean giving a few francs to one of the boys."