by Betty Neels
By the end of the week though she was striking out boldly on her own, still falling a good deal of course, amid peals of laughter from the children, but smugly pleased with herself.
She told Charity about it when she went to spend her free day with her. ‘I’m black and blue,’ she confided, ‘but it’s such fun and it keeps the children amused.’
‘You’re still happy? The ter Beemstras are kind to you?’
‘Oh, yes, and once the children go back to school I shall have more time... Everyone seems to be getting excited about New Year...’
‘Oh, yes, Olie Ballen and champagne. Great fun. Are the ter Beemstras having a house party? We’ve got Tyco’s family coming again. Usually we go there but he doesn’t want me to go too far from home...’
Cressida nodded. ‘Quite right too. Yes, there is to be a houseful again. Willum is to be allowed to stay up this year; Jacobus and Friso are furious about it. The other four children won’t be coming though so once I get them to bed the others should be manageable.’ She smiled widely. ‘They are sweet, you know, even when they’re naughty.’
Charity looked at her anxiously. ‘You don’t regret being there? You might have got a much cushier job in England.’
‘What as? I can’t do anything, you know—only housework and the flowers and fetching and carrying. Children are much more fun. Besides, they keep me very busy.’
The next day the guests arrived; aunts and uncles, cousins, old friends—Cressida had met most of them at Christmas. They greeted her kindly, observed in their excellent English how well she coped with the children, and looked forward to seeing her that evening at dinner.
Cressida, getting into the grey dress—which she never wished to see again—reflected that so far everything was going well. The children had gone to bed like lambs and she actually had time on her hands before going down to the drawing-room. She went along to the playroom and sat down in a window-seat, looking out into the dark night. It had stopped snowing and presently there would be a moon but now there was the merest glimmer of stars. She stared up at them and wondered where the doctor was. Back in his lovely home, no doubt, with Nicola and a houseful of guests.
His, ‘Hello, Cressy’, was so part and parcel of her thoughts that she took a moment to realise that he was actually there, in the room, leaning against the door, still in his heavy car coat, bringing a blast of icy air from the cold night into the room.
‘Well,’ said Cressida, ‘well, what a surprise.’ She was aware that this didn’t sound very welcoming or friendly and added hastily, ‘I mean, how nice to see you, Doctor.’
He came to stand before her, looming over her, blotting out the room with his vast size, and since he said nothing she plunged into speech.
‘You’re not staying here of course—you’re on your way to Janslum. I expect you have a houseful of guests; I had no idea that New Year was so important in Holland...’
‘Friesland,’ he corrected her smilingly. ‘Oh, but it is. We come miles in order to celebrate it and wish each other well. My sisters and their husbands and children will be at home waiting for me...’
‘And Mabel and Caesar and the horses, pony and donkey,’ said Cressida in a far-away voice, ‘and that nice Wester and his wife.’ She sat up—this would never do; on no account must he feel sorry for her. She went on briskly, ‘I expect you had a happy Christmas? I hope Lady Merrill is well?’
‘In excellent health. She sends you her love. Are you happy, Cressida?’
She hadn’t expected that so that she answered too quickly. ‘Oh, yes. The children are such fun and Mevrouw and Mijnheer ter Beemstra are so kind. We had a lovely time at Christmas.’ She went pink, for it had sounded as though she was reminding him that he had ignored her completely, although he had no reason to have done otherwise. She hurried on, anxious to let him see just how happy she was. ‘The children have taught me to skate, I’m not good at it yet, but I can stay on my feet for a little while. It’s been very cold here and there’s been a lot of snow.’
She looked up and caught his eyes. There was a gleam in them which she thought was amusement and indeed she was making a fine hash of a casual conversation.
He bent down and drew her to her feet and laid his hands on her shoulders. ‘I came to wish you a happy New Year, Cressy,’ he told her, ‘and it will be, you know.’ He kissed her gently on her cheek, looking down at her gravely. ‘I thought of you while I was in England.’
She was suddenly very cross. ‘Oh, did you?’ she asked, peeved. ‘Then why didn’t you send me a Christmas card? Lady Merrill sent me one and so did Moggy and her sister and Mr Tims.’ She drew in her breath like a child. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean any of that, truly I didn’t. You’ve been so kind to me and I shall always be grateful. Perhaps I’m tired.’ She smiled shakily. ‘I hope you have a marvellous New Year with lots of patients and everything you could possibly wish for.’
‘Well, not too many patients,’ he was laughing a little, ‘and I intend to have everything I wish for. Do you know what I wish for, Cressy?’
The door opened and Willum came in and the doctor took his hands from Cressida’s shoulders and said easily, ‘Hello, Willum, do you want Cressy?’
‘Yes, I can’t find the tie I had for Christmas—the green one—I want to wear it.’ He added importantly, ‘I’m staying up for dinner.’
‘Splendid.’ The doctor didn’t sound in the least put out at the interruption. It couldn’t have been anything important, thought Cressida; perhaps he had been going to tell her that he was going to marry Nicola, and that they had made up their differences. She was a clever enough young woman to convince him that she had been acting for the best when she had arranged for Cressida to go to her aunt and he would have forgiven her.
The doctor said softly, ‘No, Cressida, don’t try and guess. Wait until I tell you.’ He went to the door. ‘I must be off or it will be after midnight before I get home and that wouldn’t do at all. I’ll wish you both a happy New Year and leave you to find that tie.’
He went away and Cressida heard a good deal of laughter in the hall downstairs and then the solid sound of the front door shutting.
‘Let’s go and look for it,’ she told Willum.
Dinner was elaborate and festive and afterwards everyone went to the drawing-room and drank champagne and ate the Olie Ballen. They were nice, Cressida decided, like small doughnuts, each encased in a paper napkin to keep the grease and sugar off the guests’ clothes, and presently their glasses were filled once again and as the great stoelklok in the corner of the room chimed midnight, a toast was drunk to the New Year and everyone went around kissing each other and shaking hands. Someone turned on the record player and several people started to dance, the signal for Cressida to capture a reluctant Willum, bid everyone goodnight and see him safely into his bed. She didn’t go downstairs again; it had been a lovely evening and the very best bit of it had been Aldrik’s visit. Although, she thought sleepily, it had been a pity that Willum had had to come into the room when he had. Of course she knew that sooner or later the doctor would marry Nicola, she was so exactly right for a well-known doctor, but it would have clinched the matter, so to speak, if he had told her himself; she was finding it hard to plan her future but she thought in a muddled way that it might be easier once he was married.
After the excitement of the New Year the days were rather dull but very soon the boys went back to school so that the pattern of her days was changed again. She was still fully occupied but now she had an hour or two free during the day, which she occupied by exploring the village and the surrounding countryside. It was on the second day that she went for an expedition that she met the domine again and was invited to look round the church with him. She liked him and she was eager to learn all that she could about Friesland and the people who lived there, and he for his part seemed pleased to tell her all that
he knew. The church disappointed her; it was white-washed and rather bare although the pulpit with its sounding-board was very handsome, but it had a long and interesting history and she was a willing listener. Before she left him he invited her to go again so that she might look at the church registers. She accepted willingly; it was nice to have a friend and very soon now Charity would have her baby and there would be an end to their shopping expeditions at least for the time being. She told Mevrouw ter Beemstra about it when she got back and that lady nodded approvingly; Domine Stilstra was a serious man, no longer young but well liked by everybody. It crossed her mind that it wouldn’t be a bad thing if he were to marry; Cressida would make him a most suitable wife... She observed kindly, ‘Domine Stilstra is a most interesting man; he knows so much of our history and spends a great deal of his time studying old customs.’
It had stayed cold and the canals and ponds were frozen solid although the sun had shone from time to time, but two days after Cressida’s tour of the church the sky became overcast and the wind, always cold, became bitter. None the less Anna wrapped herself and Lucia warmly and declared her intention of going to see her sister who lived on the other side of the village. Mevrouw ter Beemstra had gone to Leeuwarden to the hairdressers and Cressida, struggling for the right words to persuade her not to go, found her vocabulary quite inadequate. To her anxious arm waving in the direction of the darkening cloudy sky, Anna merely smiled and patted her shoulder with a reassuring, ‘OK.’
Cressida dredged up what she hoped were the right words and asked if Anna would be back for playroom tea, whereupon Anna broke into a long reply, which, since she couldn’t make head or tail of it, did little to reassure Cressida. She watched the two of them go with the unhappy feeling that she should have stopped them; on the other hand probably she was being fussy. After all, Anna had lived in Friesland all her life and would know the weather like the back of her hand.
She didn’t go out herself. Both Sepke and Galske were at home, sharing, as they shared everything, a nasty cold. She settled them by the playroom stove, with a packet of tissues and their favourite toys, and then got out the mending basket and began on the task of repairing a rent in one of Friso’s shirts. The afternoon darkened rapidly and she drew the curtains and turned on the lights, listening worriedly to the wind howling across the empty fields. Presently she went downstairs to see if Anna and Lucia were back but there was no sign of them and although she was partly reassured by the cook’s unworried face she wished that Mevrouw ter Beemstra were at home.
They had their tea and there was still no sign of any one of them and when she heard the car stopping outside the house she ran downstairs intent on telling Mijnheer ter Beemstra. As she reached the front door she saw its tail lights disappearing again and Willum told her that his father had to return at once to his office. ‘What do you want him for?’ he asked.
‘Oh, well, I dare say it’s all right but Anna and Lucia are still out—I expected them back for tea. Your mother will be back presently and she’ll know what to do. Come along upstairs, you’re all three cold and wet...is the weather very bad outside?’
‘Very bad, and there is warning of a storm,’ said Willum. ‘I hope that our mother takes care.’
‘She’s a very good driver,’ said Cressida cheerfully, and tried to ignore a particularly violent gust of wind howling round the house.
She had the boys settled at the table eating their tea when Mevrouw ter Beemstra returned. She heard her voice in the hall and went down to meet her.
‘The weather is very bad,’ said Mevrouw ter Beemstra. ‘It is difficult to drive. The children are safe home?’
‘Anna and Lucia went out after lunch and they are not back. I came down to tell Mijnheer when he brought the boys back but he didn’t stop only drove away at once. Anna said she was going to her sister’s; perhaps she is still there?’
Mevrouw ter Beemstra looked worried. ‘She would never stay if she saw that the weather was worsening. I am so afraid that she has taken the short-cut across the fields—it is only a short distance that way and she may have thought she could get back here before the storm broke... We have had a warning of severe wind, I must go and see...’
‘I’ll go,’ said Cressida. ‘It’s the path leading from the end of the garden at the back of the house, isn’t it? Willum pointed out the cottage to me one day, I’m sure that I can find it. If I have a torch it won’t be difficult.’
Brave words. She was scared of going out into the dark evening but perhaps Anna and Lucia were sheltering somewhere along the path, not too far away, afraid to go on without a light.
‘I’ll get my boots—if I could have a powerful torch.’
She was ready to go within five minutes, seen out of the kitchen door by Mevrouw ter Beemstra. ‘Don’t worry if we don’t get back quickly; if Anna is near enough to her sister’s cottage, I’ll take them back there until the worst of the storm is over. Can it be reached from the village?’
‘By car, no. At least a Range Rover could get to within a short distance but there’s a canal...’
Mevrouw ter Beemstra looked as though she was going to cry and Cressida said quickly, ‘Don’t worry, they can’t be far away. They may still be with Anna’s sister. If they are, I’ll come back and tell you.’
She turned on the torch, reassured by its powerful beam, and started with haste down the path which led to the end of the grounds at the back of the house.
The wind was terrific, tearing at her clothes and the scarf she had tied round her head. The rain was ice-cold and the ground beneath her feet treacherous with ice too. She shone the torch before her until she reached the path and then went even more slowly, for she was walking into the teeth of the wind now and could hardly keep on her feet. Every few yards she stopped and shone the torch round her in the hope that she might see Anna and Lucia. It seemed unlikely, there was no shelter and no hedges, only frozen canals between the fields, narrow enough to jump over. There was a much wider canal further on, she knew, with a rickety bridge over it. The thought of having to cross it made her feel sick but the cottage was only a few hundred yards from it and there was no other way. Reaching it, she eyed it fearfully and actually had one hand on the flimsy wooden rail when she heard a sound, and when the wind paused in its bellowing she heard it again. She turned the torch in all directions, lighting up the fields around her and then shone it on to the canal. Anna was crouched on the bank, shielding Lucia with her body.
Cressida gave a wobbly shout and started towards her at the same time as the rain turned to blinding snow. It blotted out everything, whirling round her, driven by the wind and for a moment she stood still, making quite sure that she hadn’t moved since she spotted Anna, then she moved carefully forward, praying that she wasn’t going round in a circle, and to her relief saw them only a yard or two away.
Crouched down beside them, she could see that Anna’s face was very white. Her Dutch deserted her, all she could think of to say was, ‘OK?’ At least it was a start. Anna shook her head and pointed to one leg.
‘Gebroken’, she muttered, and then urgently, ‘Lucia?’
The child was almost asleep with the cold and the pulse in the small wrist was faint, as far as Cressida could tell, though, she wasn’t hurt. It was poor Anna who needed urgent help; she must be in pain, thought Cressida and she was lying awkwardly, shielding the little girl’s body with her own.
‘I’m going to get help,’ said Cressida, and added, ‘hulp’ and held up five fingers, hoping that Anna would understand that she would be gone for five minutes. That was nonsense, of course, she would never get back in five minutes, but it helped to look on the bright side.
She got to her feet, numb with the cold, patted Anna on the shoulder and started back the way she had come. Hopefully anyone watching from the house would see her torch and come to meet her. She didn’t know how long Anna and Lucia ha
d been lying there but Lucia had seemed half asleep despite her whimpers and Anna must surely be half frozen to death. The thought sent her scurrying along the slippery path and she fell down almost at once. The ground was iron-hard and she had to scramble painfully to her feet as best she could before going on more cautiously.
‘More haste, less speed,’ said Cressida, in a rage with herself, the wind and snow and the terrifying feeling that she was alone in a strange world. She had dropped the torch too, but luckily it was not broken. She picked it up and shone it ahead of her and was almost blinded by the beam from another torch. It was too much; she screamed and was instantly engulfed in the doctor’s great arms.
‘Silly girl, it is I!’ he bellowed into her ear.
Even in a trying situation such as this, she thought, he gets his grammar right, and she promptly burst into tears.
‘Where are they?’ he asked her, shouting into the wind.
She waved behind her. ‘Anna’s hurt her leg—I was coming to get help. I think Lucia is all right.’
‘Stop crying.’ He spoke close to her ear. ‘Just where?’
Unfeeling brute, she reflected and then pulled herself together. ‘By the canal on the left...’
‘Stay here, on no account move.’ He kissed her quite roughly and was gone, leaving her almost frozen solid but with a warm glow under her ribs on account of the kiss.
He was a great deal quicker than she had been—in no time at all he was back with Lucia in his arms. He dumped the child on to Cressida, stayed only long enough to warn her to stay where she was and disappeared into the snowy darkness once again.
