by Betty Neels
The snow stopped after midday, and she fought her way out of the door once more, only to find the snow had drifted in all directions so that she had no way of reaching the coal shed. It had frozen solid here and there, but it would be easy to step into a drift and be unable to pull herself out. She went back indoors and turned on the radio just long enough to hear the news. A voice recited an endless list of difficulties and the snow was expected to continue for the next twenty-four hours. She switched it off, more worried about Lady Manderly than the weather forecast. The old lady looked feverish and despite the fact that she was sitting bolt upright in her chair, working away at her tapestry, she looked as though she ought to have been tucked up in her bed. Jemima made the tea and went round checking her water containers. They were getting low.
‘I must say,’ declared Lady Manderly as they ate their supper, ‘that I had no idea that a roasted potato could be so delicious, and is that a treacle tart I see on the table?’
Jemima’s heart warmed to her. She had been by no means an easy employer, and no doubt once they were out of this pickle she would be as testy and selfish as she normally was, but just now she was doing her best. Poor old thing, thought Jemima, she’s got a fearful cold. If only I had the water to spare I’d put her feet in a hot mustard bath.
She doled out the brandy instead; she had an idea that she had read somewhere that one shouldn’t drink spirits when bitterly cold, something to do with blood pressure, but perhaps the writer had never experienced the kind of chill they were putting up with. It was worth risking anyway, because it made them all feel much better.
No one had a good night. Lady Manderly coughed and sniffed and when she did fall asleep, snored most dreadfully, Pooley was in pain and unable to sleep because of Lady Manderly, and Jemima, nipping in and out of her covers for first one and then the other, had no chance to close her eyes for more than a few minutes at a time. In the end they all dropped off as the dark night turned to a grey morning and woke late, stiff and still tired.
Porridge and tea restored them a little. Jemima helped the two ladies to make a toilet of some sort, spent a fruitless ten minutes trying to bring order to chaos in the kitchen and since it wasn’t snowing, decided to have another try for the coal. There wasn’t much left now and at all costs the Aga must be kept alight.
It was almost mid-morning but not really light, and the snow had hardened. Using the shovel as an awkward stick, she struggled towards where the shed would have been if she could have seen it. If the drifts around it weren’t too frozen she might be able to get at the door. How she was going to get the coal back to the house was a problem she had quite overlooked.
She stood, halfway to the shed, trying to make out where it was exactly, dizzy with tiredness and the glare from the snow, wanting more than anything else to put the shovel down and curl up and go to sleep. The snow began again as she stood there, blinding her and touching off the panic she was trying to ignore. Above the wind then she thought she heard the faint beat of an engine, but it was impossible to see anything and ridiculous that she should have thought it in the first place. She turned her head away from the driving snow and tried to get her bearings; it was impossible to get lost only fifty yards or so from the house, but she wasn’t sure of her direction any more. She turned again uncertainly and just for a moment the wind dropped and she saw someone coming towards her—on skis of all things!
The Professor fetched up neatly before her. ‘Hullo,’ he said cheerfully. Jemima stared at him as though he had been something not real at all. Feelings, strong and quite uncontrollable, surged up into her throat.
‘So there you are!’ she cried in a voice which would have done credit to a virago. ‘Where have you been?’ and burst into tears.
CHAPTER NINE
IF THE Professor was surprised at this tempestuous greeting, he gave no sign, but if Jemima had been able to see clearly through her tears, she would have seen the sudden bleakness in his face. He took off his skis and the next moment she felt his arms around her. He only held her for a few seconds, while she struggled to stop crying, already regretting her words—words she had never meant to utter anyway. She had never been so glad to see anyone in her life before, but it hadn’t sounded like it. She mumbled into his shoulder that she had been longing for him to come, but the wind carried away every word.
After a moment he let her go and shouted, ‘We’d better go indoors before we turn into snowmen!’ and turned her round. Together they made their way back to the kitchen door and he opened it and thrust her inside and followed her.
The kitchen was heavenly warm, although it looked frightfully untidy. Lady Manderly, who had been dozing, sat up straight in her chair. ‘Ah, Alexander, I rather expected you would find a way of getting to us. How nice to see you!’
He bent to kiss her cheek, smiling from a tired face. When he saw Pooley sleeping off yet more Panadol, he asked: ‘What happened?’
Jemima had taken off her outdoor things and padded across the kitchen floor in slippers. ‘Give me those things,’ she said urgently. ‘I’m going to make tea in a few minutes.’
He did as she had asked and Lady Manderly asked: ‘Where did you find Jemima?’
He turned and looked at her. ‘Brown mouse in the snow,’ he said softly, ‘not quite what I expected either.’ He raised his voice to answer his aunt. ‘I came by helicopter and landed a few hundred yards away from the lodge. I stumbled on Jemima in the middle of nowhere.’ He turned again and looked at her. ‘Surely not escaping?’
‘Looking for coal.’ She felt shy now. Perhaps he hadn’t heard her when they had met, even though he had seen her burst into shameful tears. Nothing in his manner indicated it, and she took heart from that. ‘Lady Manderly’s got a very bad cold and Pooley’s broken her arm,’ she volunteered, and blushed because she was telling him something he could quite well see for himself. But he only nodded at her gently. He hadn’t missed the blush, but he didn’t comment on it. ‘We’d better splint that arm,’ was his only comment, and when Jemima gave him a questioning look: ‘I’m a doctor as well as an endocrinologist, you know. Now let’s see; what can we use for splints?’
He stood in the middle of the room dominating it, and Jemima at least was sure that all their worries were at an end. He looked surprisingly elegant; she admired him silently as she laid his things by the Aga to dry.
‘Still going to Huntsman for your suits, I see,’ commented Lady Manderly in a sodden voice, and sneezed.
‘Of course, Aunt.’ He was rolling up his shirt sleeves, having taken off his jacket.
‘And your shirts?’ She sneezed again.
‘I prefer Turnbull and Asser.’
How can they talk about shirts when we’re in need of a good meal and a wash? thought Jemima, and made the tea.
By the time she had poured it, the Professor had rooted round the mess in the kitchen and come up with an empty drawer which he proceeded to take apart and fashion into two splints with the potato knife. Pooley had woken up by now and he was talking to her in a reassuring way while he cut one of the kitchen curtains into strips. Jemima, watching him, felt ashamed that she hadn’t thought of doing that herself.
‘Tea?’ he asked, looking up suddenly and catching her gazing at him. He smiled to melt her very bones. ‘I’m hungry, or are we out of food?’
She produced the last of the bread and sliced it and used up the remains of the butter—a reckless thing to do, but she felt that it was an occasion.
She sipped her tea, only half listening to his quiet talk with Lady Manderly. Coco had climbed on to his knee and he was stroking the woolly grey head. Jemima longed to ask just how he had got to them, but he might fob her off with one of his nasty smiles. She held her tongue, happily unaware of her appearance, which was regrettably tatty and grimy, but even if she had given it a thought she wouldn’t have cared, though, she was tired and suddenly dispirited. None of this was real, and when they got back to London, he would look at her in that mocki
ng way he had. They lived in two different worlds, he and she, and it would be as well if she remembered that.
His voice disturbed her thoughts. ‘Come over here, Jemima, and steady this arm, will you?’
He was very gentle, but Pooley fainted from fright before he had touched her.
‘Good. Hold her arm above the elbow and when I say pull, pull.’
It took only a moment to straighten the bones; by the time he was binding on the splints, Pooley was recovering.
‘All done, my dear,’ he assured her calmly. ‘Jemima will give you some brandy.’
‘This is all there is,’ Jemima said apologetically. ‘We’ve all been drinking it.’
He smiled slowly. ‘A very good idea too. Jemima, go and pack Pooley’s things, and I’ll take her to Fort William; they’re cut off there, but there’s enough of everything to keep them going for days and the hospital’s got emergency generators.’ And when Pooley murmured protestingly. ‘Don’t worry, as soon as this weather clears, we’ll have you back in London. And you won’t be alone. Lady Manderly and Jemima will be there too.’
‘What do you plan for us?’ asked his aunt.
‘Why, a day or two there, Aunt and then Belling can come up by train and see you all safely back home. I’ll have to go back as soon as possible, otherwise I’d stay with you.’
Jemima had wrapped herself in one of the shawls and started for the door. She had reached it when the Professor caught up with her. ‘I’ll help you,’ he offered. ‘You’ll have to pack for everyone.’
It was too cold to talk in the hall or on the stairs, and Pooley’s room was no better.
‘The cases are in the boxroom at the end of the passage,’ she told him, and when he returned with the first of them: ‘Are we all going together?’
‘Lord no! Pooley first, I’ll drop her off at the hospital; there’s bound to be a taxi at the airfield. I’ll come back for aunt and her luggage and settle her in at a hotel, and then come back for you. You won’t mind being alone here for a little while?’
Jemima wondered what he would do if she said yes. ‘Not in the least,’ she told him coolly.
He went back for the rest of the luggage, and she started to pack Pooley’s things. Thank heaven they had none of them brought much with them. She was shivering by the time she had finished. The Professor took the case downstairs and she went along to Lady Manderly’s room. He came back again before she had done more than open the first drawer.
She looked at him over her shoulder. ‘There’s no need for you to stay here,’ she pointed out. ‘I’ll call you when I’m ready. It’s far too cold.’
He took no notice of this but came into the room and sat down on the end of the bed. ‘Why were you so furious when you saw me?’ he wanted to know.
Jemima paused in her packing. ‘I—I was surprised.’
‘And yet I had the strong impression that you were expecting me…’ His voice was silky.
Jemima, folding tentlike nighties, didn’t look at him. ‘What rubbish!’ she said crossly. ‘Why on earth should I expect you of all people?’
‘Why indeed? I was hoping you could—or would—tell me.’
‘Well, I can’t. How are you going to get Pooley to the helicopter?’
‘Now that’s a question I’m still pondering. But whatever we decide it must be soon. It’s roughly fifty miles—no, less by air, say half an hour, taking into account loading and offloading and so forth—I’ll return for my aunt and then come back for you. By then it will be growing dark. You’re not afraid? It may be a little awkward.’
‘Not in the least,’ declared Jemima robustly, her insides quite jellied at the idea. ‘It will be nice to have a hot bath and a proper meal.’ She started on a pile of woollies. ‘I do hope Lady Manderly will be all right, she’s got a shocking cold. She’s been wonderful, you know.’
The Professor said thoughtfully: ‘No one has ever called her that before!’ He got off the bed. ‘May I have one of those scarves?’ and when she handed it to him: ‘I’m going to take the first of the luggage to the helicopter; I’ll be back for Pooley in a short time.’ He lounged over to the window. ‘It’s not snowing at the moment, I’d best be on my way.’
He wandered back to her, bent and kissed her hard and swiftly and went away.
Jemima finished packing Lady Manderly’s things, not allowing herself to think about him at all, and went back downstairs to the kitchen presently.
Lady Manderly was sitting exactly as she had left her, but Pooley had got to her feet and was peering fearfully out of the window. She looked round as Jemima went in. ‘I’ll never be able to get there,’ she moaned unhappily. ‘All that snow, I’m sure to fall over…I don’t want to go…’
‘You’ll do as the Professor tells you,’ observed Lady Manderly hoarsely.
‘You’ll be perfectly safe,’ Jemima told her bracingly. ‘The Professor wouldn’t attempt it if he wasn’t quite sure he’d succeed.’ She had joined Pooley at the window. ‘Look, here he is coming back; it can’t be far, and the snow’s very hard.’ She started wrapping Pooley’s coat round her and buttoning it. ‘You’ve got one good arm,’ she pointed out, ‘and think how lovely it will be to sleep in a bed tonight and have someone to look after you.’
‘You’ve been doing that,’ said Pooley. ‘I don’t know what we’d have done without you, miss.’
Professor Cator’s cheerful voice interrupted her. ‘Ready?’ he enquired, and waited patiently while Jemima wound a scarf round Pooley’s head and tied it firmly. There was only one pair of wellingtons, and, she had thrust Pooley’s reluctant feet into them. ‘And for heaven’s sake bring them back with you,’ she begged the Professor, ‘so we can use them later.’
She watched them go, the Professor once more on his skis, an arm round Pooley’s waist, hauling her along beside him. When they had gone round a great drift by the garage, she turned away from the window.
‘What about lunch?’ asked Lady Manderly.
Jemima stopped dead in her tracks. ‘Lunch—oh, my goodness, the poor man’s had nothing to eat—only that tea and bread and butter, and he looked so tired.’
‘He’ll snatch a sandwich before he comes back for me,’ said her companion comfortably. ‘He’s always been able to look after himself. What is there left to eat, Jemima?’
Jemima went to the cupboard and surveyed its contents. ‘Caviare, a tin of pâté and the oatmeal. Shall it be porridge?’
‘Since there’s nothing else, but you may open the caviare, Jemima, I’ll have that first. You don’t suppose there are any biscuits?’
‘No, Lady Manderly, but we can have a cup of tea.’
She set about cooking the porridge and boiling the kettle, and presently they ate their meal while Lady Manderly discoursed in a gruff voice on the delights of caviare, when and where she had eaten it and in whose company. Jemima listened with half an ear and an eye on the clock, her thoughts almost entirely of Alexander.
‘You’re not listening,’ declared Lady Manderly. ‘You needn’t worry about Alexander. He is, as I’ve already said, perfectly capable of looking after himself.’ Jemima didn’t answer and her companion went on: ‘You’re not a pretty girl, but given the right clothes and a good hairdresser you would do well enough; you have a certain air about you. It’s time that Alexander settled down.’
Her cold was making her feverish, thought Jemima. The quicker she was got into a warm bed and properly fed, the better. She cleared away the dishes and left the kettle singing on the Aga. Alexander would want tea when he got back. And I must stop thinking of him as Alexander, she told herself sharply.
He arrived almost silently, his coming muffled by the sound of the wind. Jemima caught sight of him coming round the garage and opened the door.
‘My God, it’s cold,’ he said. ‘Any tea?’ He smiled at her. ‘Will you help my aunt to get into her things? I’ll have that tea and then get the rest of her cases on board and come back for her. Pooley’s safe and sound
in hospital; they’re going to set that arm and put it into plaster, and she’ll be able to join you at the hotel some time tomorrow.’
He swallowed the tea and went upstairs for the cases and Jemima urged Lady Manderly into a variety of woollies, her mink coat, and the boots, tied a scarf securely round her head and sat her down to drink some of the tea while the Professor, the cases tied on to his back and Coco under one arm, set off once more.
He was back very shortly. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can,’ he told Jemima. ‘Pack the rest of your things and then come down here and stay by the stove.’ He glanced at the clock. ‘Don’t put any more coal on to it, and rake it out as well as you can when it gets low.’ His eyes searched her quiet face. ‘What a splendid girl you are!’ This time he didn’t kiss her. She watched him toiling through the snow, his aunt, her not inconsiderable weight supported by his arm, contriving to look regal even in wellington boots.
She went upstairs presently and finished packing her own things, then brought the case down to the kitchen. The house was quiet so that the wind sounded more eerily than before. Lady Manderly had taken her radio with her and there was nothing to break the silence. Jemima poked up the Aga and made more tea and watched the clock’s hands creep at a snail’s pace round its face. She lighted the lamp soon; it wasn’t dark, but it seemed more cheerful, and presently she lighted the candles too, rather recklessly. Suppose Alexander couldn’t get back? He had told her to let the stove out and the kitchen was already getting chilly. She got up and walked around, stopping to look out of the window—a silly thing to do, because she knew quite well that there was no chance of his return for another hour at least. Lady Manderly would demand his full attention until she was settled in at the hotel, and that might be miles away from the airstrip.
