There Were Three Princes

by Joyce Dingwell

  "Yes. I know that nothing can be done, nothing except to

  keep him as contented and happy as possible." She was silent a while; she was wondering how long the money that went a long way if not the entire way to Robin's contentment and happiness could last. "Matthew . . ."

  "Yes, my dear?" The dear was said kindly, with understanding.

  "How — how long?"

  "Can a doctor ever say that? He can estimate, but finally it's another authority. Also, the man's will enters into it, his capacity to hold on."

  "Then — an estimate?"

  A pause. "Not long," Matthew said.

  Matthew also talked about himself.

  "The moment I saw Cassandra, Verity, I knew . . . at least I think now I knew."

  She looked quickly at him at that "think."

  "What are you saying, Matthew?"

  "I don't know. For the life of me I don't know. Except" he hesitated . . . "except why, oh, why can't she understand? Understand how important my work is to me, how I must find my roots in my work first." He looked at Verity. "You understand."

  "Yes, but I may be differently constructed from Cassandra. I may not have another capacity that she has."

  "Capacity for what ?" he asked a little harshly, and in his harshness he reminded her more of Bart Prince than Peter, whom she had judged he most resembled before.

  "Capacity for love?" she suggested . . . then she found herself meeting Matthew's eyes, and flushing vividly.

  For a long time he said nothing, he just sat looking back at her, looking deeply. Then he rose and sighed. "Tomorrow is another day, little one." There was an infinite gentleness in that "little one."

  There had been no more letters from Peter, and Verity had expected none. Unlike Priscilla, who had said of the third Prince's talent for collecting, and discarding, lovely girls a bleak "But Cassandra —" Verity had at no time anticipated anything else than the same as had been meted out to her.

  She was wrong.

  "Verity, be the first to know —" said the letter from Peter that came the following morning. Verity read it to the end, then put it down. Poor Matthew, she thought.

  She would never have told the doctor had he not probed it out of her.

  "Matthew, do you delve professionally as you're delving now ?" she complained at length.

  "Of course. I must." He paused. "You have had something from Peter, haven't you ?"

  "Yes."

  "What does he say ?"

  "Oh, Matthew ! " she sighed.

  "All right then, just tell me one thing : Is it going the same way as it went with you, with the rest? Here today, gone tomorrow?"

  She sat silent.

  "Answer me, Verity."

  "No, it's not going the same way."

  "Then Peter and Cassandra —"

  "Yes. I'm sorry, Matthew."

  There was a dead silence. For quite a long time Verity could not bring herself to look up at Matthew. But when she did his first words to her completely surprised her. For Matthew said quite calmly, without any heroics, without any anger against anyone . . . with only emotion for her :

  "Come away with me, Verity."

  CHAPTER VII

  "You'RE not serious, Matthew!" Verity looked back at him in disbelief. This could not be Doctor Prince, the first Prince. The "gracious prince."

  "I think," Matthew said slowly, deliberately, "I've never been more serious in all my life."

  "It's rebound. It has to be. You're hurt. You're lost. You're turning to someone, anyone at all, and it just happens to be me."

  "Perhaps it could be rebound, Verity, but I can truthfully tell you that in this moment it doesn't seem like that at all. Instead . . . well, instead it seems the most wonderful moment in my life. It seems —" He took her hand in his strong surgeon hand. "It seems —" He paused. "Also," he went on presently, unable to finish what he had begun, "I don't feel hurt at all —indeed, I don't think I feel anything at all, except —"

  "Except a numbness," she hazarded.

  "Except a gratefulness to you," he corrected stubbornly. "Gratefulness isn't enough."

  "It's a start, everything has to have a start."

  "And with anyone?"

  "With you." Now he said it intentionally.

  "Matthew —" she began.

  "Oh, I know how this sounds to you, Verity, and I know it should sound like that, too, to me. But it still doesn't. This last week has been the happiest week of my life."

  "Happiness," said Verity with a wisdom she did not know she possessed, "has to include more than we happen to have. Real happiness, the kind I believe you're talking about" she flushed . . . "can't be built on just companionable happiness as we have known it, it has to go much deeper than that, it has to — well, it has to —" But her wisdom left her, and, as they had with him, the words ran out.

  "I don't know about all that," said Matthew a little wearily. "I only know I've been able to talk with you as I've never talked to Cassie."

  "Has Cassandra been able to talk to you?" probed Verity fairly.

  "Two people should meet halfway," he said doggedly. "I talked to you, you listened to me, you talked to me, I listened to you."

  "Did you ever listen to Cassandra?"

  He grew silent.

  "Did you, Matthew?" Verity persisted.

  He answered, "Cassie never listened to me."

  They were getting nowhere, nowhere on the subject of Cassandra, too deep on the subject of Matthew Prince and Verity Tyler.

  "Matthew, go home now," Verity said. For a moment she thought he was going to refuse, then he smiled ruefully at her, kissed her cheek, then left.

  Verity tidied up, then left, too. As she went down the street she wondered . . . but was afraid to wonder too deeply . . . what tomorrow would bring.

  It brought Bart.

  He was dragging his leg a little as he did when he was tired, but he wore that satisfied look of a job going well.

  "Everything's falling into place," he told Verity, "a few hitches here and there, but nothing really for an assignment of this size."

  "I'm glad."

  "You mightn't be," he shrugged. "Although we're progressing favourably Cilla now believes it will take even longer than the extra time I warned you. In other words, Miss Tyler, you'll be asked to cope another week."

  "That's all right," she said.

  He looked at her shrewdly. "Very confident, aren't you?" "What do you want ?" she came back, irritated. "A defeated attitude? A doubt if I can keep on?"

  "No, I like assurance as much as the rest. Only . ." He was looking at her curiously now.

  "Yes, Mr. Prince?"

  "You seem different somehow."

  "You said that last time."

  "I say it again. You are different."

  "Then that should please you."

  "Also," he said, ignoring her comment, "you seem very eager to continue here by yourself." As she did not speak, he asked sharply, "Which you are, Miss Tyler?"

  He was silent for a while. Then : "Has my brother been around?"

  She caught her breath, but in that breath he continued, "Because if Peter has chucked this Melbourne tour he'll have to answer for it."

  "No," she came in smoothly, "he hasn't been around."

  As he went through the records of her sales, the copies of any correspondence she had thought should be answered, he said casually, "If Matthew comes in, see to it that he gets Cassandra's address. I'll leave it with you. He doesn't deserve it, playing hard to get with a girl like that, but I like to be Cupid. Besides, with Peter in the same city, one never knows." — So he hadn't learned yet, Verity thought. The thought was pushed aside as Bart, glancing up at her, asked : "Has Matthew been in by any chance?"

  "Yes. He's very like you. I mean you're like him, except—"

  "All the Princes are alike," Bart drawled. "Except." He gave that old bitter derogatory laugh, but he did not add the usual bitter comment. As Verity did not speak, he went on: "My dear mamma evid
ently knew only the one pattern. To give her her due, she had variations, or should it be a standard? Mediocre, better, best. You can allot the grades." As she still did not speak, he got up and moved towards the door. "Don't forget about Matthew."

  "I won't."

  How could she? Verity thought.

  Sitting in her favourite position at the flat window last night, she had analysed, or tried to analyse, herself. It hadn't been easy. She had never been the sort of person that she was uncomfortably aware she must seem now. For instance one week Peter. Then soon after, much too soon: Matthew. She had wondered at the difference in herself, for she always had been a very stable girl. As a child, her mother had said that once Verity had a friend she had her forever.

  She could not understand it ... nor could she understand the undercurrents and the crosscurrents and the too swift currents that seemed to be upsetting the previously quiet flow of her life. Almost, she thought, as if a major change had taken place in her.

  Matthew did not contact her for several days, and in her uncertainty she was glad of that.

  Then he rang ... and she felt her concern going out to him as he said sensitively : "Verity? Verity, my dear, I'm sorry."

  "That's all right, Matthew." She did not ask "Sorry for what?" because she felt she knew already, she knew that he never really had meant that "Verity, come away with me." Never Matthew. She said so now, hoping it would help him.

  "But I did mean it," he said at once, "that is I meant —"

  "Matthew" . . . gently . . . "what did you mean?"

  A silence at the other end, then, wretchedly : "I just don't know."

  He told her he was working hard. He would not see her for several more days.

  "I think that would be a good thing," she agreed. She related his brother's instruction to pass Cassandra's address on to him. When this was met with silence, and the silence grew, she called, "Did you hear me, Matthew?"

  "Yes, I heard. But don't bother about the address."

  "What do you mean, Matthew?"

  "I'll ring on Thursday, V."

  There was still no letter from Mr. Carstairs telling Verity how Robin now stood, and it was with trepidation that Verity visited Robin and Adele again; she would not know what to answer to Adele if she questioned her as to what held up the cheque.

  As it happened Adele was in such a good mood that Verity knew some moments of doubt. Robin was a spender; she knew Adele would be the same; and the amount she had given Adele, though large by her own standards, would not have satisfied that pair for this long. Instantly her mind jumped to Bart, and she felt herself withdrawing in distaste at the thought of what Adele could have tried, and, from the look of her, could have succeeded in.

  She could not ask, but she learned, anyway, without asking.

  As she was leaving she made a complimentary remark on Adele's new dress. She had left Robin in the lounge. The two girls stood at the flat door.

  "Not bad," acknowledged Adele.

  "A Sydney make?"

  "You could say" . . . a little laugh . . . "that it was locally inspired in every way." There was no mistaking Adele's emphasis, but in case Verity did mistake it, Adele said, "Bart is a dear."

  "Bart!" It was out before Verity could stop it, dismay with

  it.

  Adele pounced triumphantly on the dismay. "Why not? I knew Bart Prince a long time before you did. Yes" . . . another little laugh . . . "we knew each other very well."

  Sickened, Verity turned and went down the apartment stairs.

  But the next day what Adele had said was lost in a worry she had known she must face soon, but had not anticipated as soon as this. The answer came from Mr. Carstairs, and the news could not have been worse. There was nothing remaining, nothing at all, of the Ramsay estate.

  "I have delayed my reply to you, Verity" . . . Mr. Carstairs was an old family friend . . . "for the reason that I have been exhausting every possible channel. I know how important it is"

  . Verity had told him of Robin's prognosis . . . "and I only wish my news could be more favourable."

  There followed a detailed account, of which Verity took small notice. She had implicit trust in the solicitor . . . she even suspected that final debt written down did not include the fee that his services should entail.

  She was shocked. She had not expected anything as bad as this. She did not know what she would do. It had been all right to make a vow that Robin would never be told, but when she had made it there had been something, very little admittedly, but something. Now there was only a debt. Debts had to be paid. But how? How?

  She yearned to talk to someone, to confide in them, to be advised. If only Adele had been the right kind of wife, a wife she could have gone to and told the whole unfortunate story. But the right kind of wife would not have been interested in the story, only concerned with Robin, and Robin's health.

  There must be someone, Verity despaired.

  Almost as if in answer, the telephone pealed. As she picked it up mechanically, still wrapped in her abject thoughts, Matthew's voice came over the wire ... and at once she felt cut loose from her forebodings. They were still there, of course, but Matthew's contact seemed to help her. She remembered reading once where a change of pain is almost as miraculous as a cessation of pain. Now Matthew with his own troubles seemed to help her with hers.

  "Verity."

  "Matthew."

  "I said I'd ring."

  "Yes."

  "To say" ... but a little smile somewhere now ... "will you come away with me?"

  'Matthew, not that again?"

  "No, my dear, not that again. V, I'm sorry to the ends of the world. Of course I didn't mean it. You knew, didn't you, you sensed all the time that it was still Cassie with me, always was, always has been, is, always will be."

  "Yes, Matthew, I sensed that."

  "And for that reason I want you to come away with me." "Matthew, are you mad ?" she gasped.

  "Hear me out, V. I'm not playing tit for tat, anything like that. I'm just flying down to Melbourne to put my cards on the table, to tell Cassie that she was right, that I was wrong, that building a career is very good, but that love comes first."

  "Oh, Matthew, that's wonderful !"

  "But only if you come, too. To lend me courage, to prod me. I'm a dull stick, I told you that. Most of all, if it is called for, I need you to take Peter out of the picture."

  "Oh, Matthew, none of that is necessary. You should be able to handle it all yourself."

  "Should, yes, but don't forget what I am."

  "A good doctor."

  "And a rotten executive. Verity, please come. I need your help."

  "But, Matthew, it wouldn't be ... well, right." She had been thinking of Bart as she answered this, Bart who had said something of the sort, tongue in cheek probably, but still he had said it.

  "Melbourne is all of an hour's flying time," said Matthew drily. "We would be back the same day." For a few moments Verity was silent.

  "It's still impossible," she reminded him. "The store has to open."

  "But it will be closed all of next week-end — it's a public holiday, even women's castles close up. Only hard worked doctors remain on deck, but I've snared myself the services of a good locum."

  Again she was silent. It would be a break, she thought eagerly, and with Robin's troubles heavy on her shoulders she felt she needed a break. Besides, in her backing of Matthew, or so he had said, she certainly would be talking to him, he would be talking back to her. Talk, she yearned. Someone to spill things to.

  "Verity?" came Matthew's voice, anxious, pleading. Poor Matthew, he really did need someone to nudge him on, she half-smiled.

  But still something stopped her from answering ... yet not

  something, she knew intrinsically, but someone. Bart. How would Bart take to this?

  But need Bart know? Matthew saw very little of his brother. They were on excellent terms, but not the terms that would entail Matthew ringing Bart to say : "I t
ook your assistant down with me to Melbourne."

  It came down finally to a matter of conscience, everything came down eventually to that, and her conscience, Verity told herself, was clear. — It also came down to human contact, which in her present state she knew she must have . . . and to the contributing fact that when it came to human contact, Matthew offered all the sympathy and comfort she could need. He was a sympathetic and comforting person, not like —

  "Verity?"

  "Yes, Matthew," she said, "I'll come."

  The doctor called round just after closing time. He did not bring the carrier bags of goodies, that phase was over. But it had benefited both of them, Verity thought.

  He waited long enough, though, for a coffee, telling her his arrangements as they drank together.

  "I'm hurrying back now, V. Bryan, my locum, is calling round, and I want to go through some things with him. I've decided against flying after all, the times of departure don't suit me. I thought we'd drive instead. Would that be all right with you?"

  "Yes, Matthew, but it is a long way." She was thinking it could entail an overnight stop.

  He smiled, reading her thoughts. "I love driving; this restricted house-to-house process has been stifling me, I've been yearning to put my foot down on the accelerator for a long time. Besides, I believe you could take over now and then." He made a question of it, and she nodded. It would be easier, too,

  she thought, just to step into a car.

  "It will be cosier coming home," he went on almost boyishly, "that is if Cassie — if she'll —"

  "She will, and I'll fly back. No, Matthew, two's company." "It could be for you as well. Peter might come."

  "That," smiled Verity, "is finished."

  The telephone rang and she picked it up. It was Bart. "Still there ?" he asked.

  "Yes, Mr. Prince."

  "Still coping?"

  "Yes, Mr. Prince."

  "Anything to tell me ?"

  "No — no, nothing out of the usual."

  "It's a holiday week-end. I suppose you knew that ?" "I didn't, but I do know now."