Nurse Saxon's Patient

by Marjorie Norrell

  ‘And Garth?’ Roger persisted. ‘How does he feel about all this?’

  ‘He loves me.’ Julie made the statement simply and sincerely, without a trace of coquetry in her voice. ‘He told me so ... this afternoon, just as soon as his memory returned. They haven’t a thing in common, neither work nor play. He was flattered when she set out deliberately to make him look at a girl instead of bricks and mortar, he says. I don’t know about Tansy. I only know that from the very beginning she was more worried about whether or not he would remember their quarrel than she was about anything else connected with the accident.’

  ‘Then it’s simple.’ Roger struck a match and applied it to his pipe which he had allowed to go out as he listened. ‘He has only to tell her that he remembers all the story, their quarrel, her offer to return his ring and what happened when he rejected the offer...’

  ‘Would you?’ Julie queried softly. ‘Could you, Roger, when at the hospital and all the time he’s been here she’s visited, written, phoned, acted the devoted fiancée all the time? I don’t think you would. I don’t think you could. You’d be like Garth, unable to make a break without another quarrel, and Tansy isn’t going to risk that a second time.’

  There was silence between them for a little while until at last Julie spoke again.

  ‘I like her,’ she said sincerely. ‘I like her a lot, but she isn’t right for Garth. That’s the awful part. I was thinking of asking Matron to take me off the case, give them a chance, let Garth make up his own mind, and if they ... went ahead, I should pray for their happiness. But I know it wouldn’t work out. They’re like oil and water. They’ll never mix.’

  ‘Hmmmm.’ Roger knocked out his pipe as Mrs. Andy came in, followed by Edna with a supper-tray. ‘Let’s sleep on it,’ he suggested as he usually did when she faced him with any problem. ‘We’ll see how things look in the morning, shall we? Don’t do or write anything hastily.’

  ‘I’d like you to look at Garth’s hand, Julie, please,’ Mrs. Andy suggested gently. ‘I’m not sure, but it looked a little swollen to me after we’d finished. I hope I haven’t set him back at all.’

  ‘I don’t think you’ll have done that, Mrs. Crossman,’ Julie smiled at her hostess, ‘but I’ll take a look just the same and then you won’t worry. Excuse me a moment, Roger.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with Garth’s hand,’ Mrs. Andy remarked as the door closed behind the girl. ‘I just wanted to see you alone for a moment. Garth has been telling me what happened this afternoon.’ She spoke to Roger as though she had known him for years and could trust his judgement, as indeed she felt she could. ‘I don’t know how much Julie has told you, but I expect she has confided in you somewhat. What I do know is that those two young people are made for each other—Julie and Garth, I mean—and that Garth has some quixotic notion of waiting until Tansy breaks off their engagement all over again before doing anything about it. Have you any theories?’ she demanded suddenly. ‘Anything in either fact or imagination which may help?’

  ‘If I knew why—what’s-her-name?—Tansy, wanted to go on pretending everything is all right between herself and Garth I might have a clue,’ Roger said slowly. ‘Julie says she’s a lovely girl, attractive and so forth, it can’t be that she thinks if she doesn’t marry Garth she won’t find anyone else.’

  ‘I don’t imagine that would be difficult for her,’ Mrs. Andy said slowly. ‘She’s a strange personality,’ she went on reflectively. ‘She thinks I don’t like her. I do, as a person, but not for Garth. They would never be right together, couldn’t even ever grow together as some people do. She is not Garth’s sort of person, and I think in her heart she knows that, but she’s by no means as hard or as modern as she would have people believe her to be. She’s lonely, I think,’ she mused. ‘And she’s searching for someone, something, but I’m not certain that she knows who or what she’s searching for. If ... if she marries Garth and finds whoever or whatever it is afterwards there’ll be no happiness for any of them.’

  ‘She sounds an interesting person, anyhow,’ Roger commented mildly. ‘What is it exactly that she does? Julie said something about her being with a band, orchestra or something.’

  ‘She sings,’ Mrs. Andy told him. ‘She has rather an attractive voice—if she would sing something worth while. I’m afraid I’m not a very modern person,’ she said apologetically, ‘although I do like a few of the modern songs, but not many. Tansy’s been all over the country, singing. She’s been abroad too, and made a number of records. She’s been to the Far East, the Middle East, France ... all over, and if she thinks she can combine that sort of thing with being Mrs. Garth Holroyd she’s very much mistaken, and Garth can’t change his life to suit hers.’

  ‘Has she ever acted in a film?’ Roger asked, as though it were just a passing question, but already his mind was turning over various possibilities.

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Mrs. Andy spoke reflectively. ‘No, I’m certain she said that was one ambition so far unfulfilled. Why?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Roger gave a little smile as Julie returned to the room. ‘It’s just that I’m making a flying trip to town tomorrow—it won’t take me long—and I thought I’d make a few enquiries while I was there.’

  ‘Do that.’ Mrs. Andy nodded as though concluding some part of a discussion. ‘And try to see me before you leave if you have time,’ she added, and with a few general remarks she bade them both goodnight and retired.

  ‘It’s time I was turning in too, Julie.’ Roger put an affectionate arm about his sister’s shoulders. ‘I promise I’ll think over what you’ve told me and tell you what I think tomorrow ... maybe when I come back from town. Right now I’m tired; I’ve had a long day. But not to worry.’ He gave her a little hug. ‘You’ll see,’ he said with more assurance than he felt, ‘everything’s going to turn out all right after all.’ And as she went to sleep that night Julie was certain that it would ... now that Roger was home, Garth had recovered his memory—and, most important of all, had discovered that he loved her as she knew now that she loved him and would do so to the end of her days.

  CHAPTER XI

  Roger was not in the least surprised to find himself summoned to Mrs. Andy’s private sitting-room shortly after breakfast the following morning. He had already guessed that the old lady had a shrewd idea of what had been going on in his mind when he was asking the questions about Tansy Maitland, but as yet he had formed no definite plan of action.

  She may have some ideas of how best to begin, he smiled to himself as he tapped on her door. She seems a very resourceful old darling.

  Mrs. Andy was seated at her huge rosewood desk, scanning her morning mail. The letter she had just been reading had brought yet another case of hardship to her notice, and before she turned to greet Roger she carefully placed this on the appropriate pile for her attention later in the day.

  ‘Well,’ she began brightly, motioning him to a chair, ‘make yourself comfortable. Smoke if you wish, and I won’t keep you as I know you are anxious to be off, but first,’ she twinkled at him, ‘you must tell me if I’m wrong, or are you going to town principally to see Tansy Maitland?’

  ‘Specifically to see her,’ Roger corrected, smiling back at her, ‘but what I’m going to say, what reason I’m going to invent to explain why I’m there I can’t tell you, for I simply don’t know. I shall have to rely on my brain getting some sort of wave on the doorstep.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt it will’—Mrs. Andy’s smile deepened—‘but if it’s any help to you, Tansy is wild with excitement about your visit. She’s dying to meet you, why I don’t know ... I don’t mean that the way it sounded,’ she laughed. ‘I mean, I don’t know whether it’s because of the book or the film or because you’re Julie’s brother or someone different ... she may have any one of a hundred reasons, but I do know she almost drove Julie mad during last weekend, asking questions about you.’

  ‘Then there’s my excuse, all ready-made.’ Roger lit his pipe, puffing ref
lectively. ‘I haven’t so many fans as yet that I can ignore one on my very doorstep, so to speak.’ He was thinking aloud. ‘That will be my line. I’ll tell her I had to go into town and Julie told me how much she wanted to meet me...’

  ‘How disappointed that you were delayed this weekend,’ put in Mrs. Andy with the air of a conspirator, and Roger nodded.

  ‘I think that should get by,’ he concluded. ‘If it doesn’t I’ll have to think of something else, but I must find out,’ he was suddenly serious, ‘why a girl such as you say Tansy is should want to hang on to a man who no longer wants her. There must be a reason, and when we know what it is we’ll know how best to stop her wrecking three lives.’

  ‘And that’s just what will happen,’ Mrs. Andy nodded her head in agreement, ‘if Tansy and Garth persist in this pretending engagement, for that’s all it amounts to.’ She rose briskly, terminating the interview if such it could be called. ‘Tansy will be here for the weekend,’ she said. ‘I’m only telling you this to spare you any unnecessary embarrassment. If you quarrel with her...’

  ‘I hardly think that’s likely.’ Roger rose too, ready to leave. ‘She sounds too interesting a person for that, and I like interesting people. There aren’t enough of them in the world.’

  ‘I think you and Tansy will get on remarkably well together,’ Mrs. Andy told him. ‘I certainly hope so, for Julie’s sake as well as Garth’s.’

  ‘I’ll certainly do my best,’ Roger promised. ‘I only hope she is at home. By the way,’ he turned at the door, ‘can you possibly give me her address? It would save a great deal of time if I don’t have to look for her, and I can’t ask either Garth or Julie to give it to me.’

  ‘It’s a flat,’ Mrs. Andy said. ‘Where she lives, I mean. Twenty-five A, St Martin’s Avenue, Highfield. That’s right at the top of the town.’

  ‘I know that part fairly well.’ Roger had once reported a spectacular burglary from that area. ‘I’ll find it all right,’ he added. ‘Thanks a lot.’

  Julie and Garth were in the garden as Roger went out to his hired, gleaming Mark Ten Jaguar, his for the duration of his stay. He grinned at them from behind the wheel.

  ‘Bit of a change from my old jalopy, isn’t it, Julie?’ he jested. ‘I’ll buy one of these, when I’m home to stay. Like a turn in her?’

  ‘Not just now,’ Julie answered for them both, ‘and I’d feel a great deal safer in it with you at the wheel! Much as I’d like the thrill of a try myself.’

  ‘We’ll do both,’ Roger promised. ‘If Mrs. Crossman can spare you both we’ll have a run to the coast, all being well. Right now I must be off.’ And with the air of a man with a pressing appointment he let in the clutch and set off on his self-imposed task of trying to put matters right for the sister who was so dear to him and the man she obviously loved and whom Roger liked instinctively, from the little he had seen of him.

  That might be what makes Tansy, or whatever her name is, cling to him, he mused, driving carefully through the narrow village streets. He’s such a likeable bloke.

  He had no difficulty in finding St Martin’s Avenue. Number Twenty-five was at the top end of the avenue and was evidently divided into three flats. Roger pressed the bell marked Miss T. Maitland, and walked up the wide, carpeted stairs. Tansy met him at the door. She had just finished making up her face and looked, as she always did, lovely and appealing. She looked up at him from her own diminutive height, and the colour rushed into her cheeks as she held the door wide open.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ she gasped rather than said. ‘I know. You’re Julie’s brother, aren’t you? Roger ... Roger Saxon. Do come in.’ She was ahead of him, whirling round the flat like a small tornado. ‘Do excuse this mess.’ She waved a vague aim at the scattering of feminine clothes which littered the place. ‘I was taking this opportunity of going through my wardrobe. I didn’t expect visitors at this hour of the morning. Do sit down,’ she added as an afterthought, sweeping a pile of fripperies from a chair. ‘Would you like a drink?’

  Roger was amused. He shook his head and accepted the chair she pushed forward, glancing at his watch.

  ‘On second thoughts,’ he said, watching her, ‘I’ve changed my mind on the condition that you’ll let me take you for luncheon somewhere? The Royale used to do a pretty good lunch...’

  ‘They still do.’ Tansy suddenly smiled, a brilliant, flashing smile with which she was wont to capture her listeners at a performance. ‘I usually manage on just a sandwich,’ she confessed. ‘Unless I have a business engagement.’

  ‘Then pretend you have one today,’ Roger suggested, ‘with me.’

  ‘I’ll do that.’ She had poured the drinks and brought them to him, proffering a box of cigarettes and lighting one herself when he said he preferred his pipe. ‘Just give me a moment to change, then you can tell me why you came, how you found me and all about it. There’s nothing wrong, is there?’ She suddenly whirled about and faced him as she was about to enter the other room.

  ‘Nothing that I know about,’ Roger said carefully. ‘In what way do you mean—’

  ‘With ... Garth.’ There was the slightest hesitation before she said his name. ‘He’s ... progressing all right, isn’t he?’

  Unexpectedly Roger admired her at that moment. She was obviously wondering if the blank patch in Garth’s memory had been filled and yet she gave nothing of her anxiety away.

  ‘He appears to be doing all right so far as I could see,’ he said soberly. ‘But I don’t know him very well. In fact I don’t know him at all. I only met him this weekend, so I can’t really say, but Julie says he’s doing fine, and I guess she should know.’

  ‘She’s wonderful, isn’t she?’ Tansy said, coming back to perch rather than sit on a pouffe close to his chair. Roger was astonished. The admiration in her voice was real and unmistakable. Obviously it had never entered her head that Julie felt anything for Garth than what any good nurse feels for her special patient.

  Either Julie’s a dashed good actress herself or Tansy’s so interested in her own affairs she has eyes for no one and nothing else, Roger told himself. Aloud he said: ‘I agree. She is wonderful. As a person, as well as a nurse.’

  ‘I know.’ Tansy flushed again, then in a little rush of confidence she added: ‘She was the only one who seemed to understand how I felt the night we—the night the accident happened. She’s been very kind.’

  ‘She’s a kind person,’ Roger commented.

  He was worried, suddenly! As Mrs. Crossman had said, Tansy was by no means as modern or as hard as she would have people believe. She had taken him completely by surprise, and none of the things he had intended to say to her could be said now. Instead he spoke what he felt to be the truth:

  ‘You must have had a severe shock yourself that night, Tansy. I may use your name, mayn’t I?’ continuing as she nodded: ‘It couldn’t have been very pleasant for you ... a party, and then to find yourself in hospital, with Garth unable to help in any way.’

  ‘He was the one needing help,’ Tansy said slowly. ‘But for his quick action I would have been the one to be hurt. But,’ her tone changed suddenly, ‘you haven’t told me why you came or how you found me; have you?’

  ‘There’s nothing mysterious about it.’ Roger gave a slight chuckle. ‘I haven’t so many fans that I can afford to ignore one just yet! Julie told me you were interested in the film and the book...’

  ‘I am,’ Tansy breathed. ‘How kind of you to call! I was so looking forward to the weekend, and then you couldn’t come until I’d left...’

  ‘Well, I had an appointment in Hyncaster.’ Roger told himself it was the truth. The ‘appointment’ was of his own making ... and with Tansy. ‘I thought I’d look you up and take you to lunch, if you were free.’

  ‘I’ll be ready in two minutes flat,’ Tansy told him, adding as she sped from the room, ‘If there’s one thing my job teaches a person it’s how to change in double-quick time. I won’t keep you waiting.’

  She
was as good as her word, and in a few minutes reappeared in a leaf-green two-piece with gold-coloured accessories which did strange things to her hair, which gleamed from the quick, vigorous brushing she had just given to it. She looked vital and alive, she was smiling and interested, proud to be with him, and Roger found himself liking her more and more with every passing moment.

  It was a sensation which increased over lunch. They talked of his first book and the film he was helping to direct and of the book he was working on at the present time, and suddenly Roger saw her as Wanda, the white girl with the glowing chestnut hair, singing in the camp of the Mexican gypsies. As they talked the story fell into place, step by step. Roger could feel his fingers itching for the typewriter.

  Tansy talked too, almost as much as he did. When he was talking she was ready with her questions, intelligent ones, about the picture, about his work, about anything and everything connected with what he was doing.

  ‘Have you ever done any film work, Tansy?’ Roger asked as they finished their meal, lingering over coffee.

  ‘No.’ Tansy shook her head. ‘I’d like to,’ she confessed. ‘Is there ... do you think there might be a chance in your next one?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Roger confessed. ‘Casting isn’t my department, but I’ll see what I can do,’ he added, then, obeying an impulse, he went on: ‘But if you’re going to marry Garth you’ll be too busy.’

  ‘Let’s talk about it again, shall we?’ Tansy suggested, gathering up her bag and gloves, ‘over the weekend.’

  Roger drove her back to her flat, but refused to go in for another drink. He had, he said, other business to which he must attend. In reality he drove back slowly to Woodlands, thinking furiously. Tansy Maitland was not at all the kind of girl he had expected her to be. She was lovely, as Julie had said, she was lively and interesting, as Julie and Mrs. Andy had told him, but she was something else too. Roger pulled into a side road and , sat there thinking. Never a believer in the ‘love at first sight’ theory, he was inclined to scoff at himself, but the longer he sat there the more convinced he was that Tansy Maitland was the one girl he had met so far who could hold his interest, his imagination and his love as a life partner.