Love for the Matron (5 page)

She looked at him steadily. “That was never the reason, and you know it.” She glanced back at William Gregory. “How long have you been at St. Genevieve
’
s?” she asked him.

He seemed startled by her question. “How long? Good heavens, it must be nineteen years. Mary was expecting Robin and this was the only hospital that offered a house with the job. That was rather essential when you consider what they paid us in those days. It
was still the phony war, so I hadn
’
t been called up yet
.
When I was, Dear Emily moved in and Mary took over my job at the hospital and carried on until I was demobbed.” He smiled absently in the direction of the
corner
where Susan and Robin were poring over some book. “Susan was our post-war child and Mary for some reason never seemed to pick up afterwards ... too much overwork during the war years, I suppose, and she just faded away.” He sighed. “If I hadn
’
t been so busy catching up on all I
’
d missed perhaps I would have noticed something was wrong, but when I did
...
it was too late.”

There was a silence, and yet it wasn
’
t a painful one; as if time had already healed the hurt of the man who had spoken. Raised voices roused him from his reverie.

“If you
’
ve finished your prep, Susan, you
’
d better think about saying good night.”

“I haven
’
t quite done it, Daddy. Robin thinks he
’
s got a better way. Five minutes
?
”

“All right, but not a minute longer. You know what you
’
re like when you don
’
t get enough sleep,” her father said warningly.

There was a subdued murmur of disagreement not loud enough to rate as disrespect.

Elizabeth seized the opportunity. “I think I
’
d better be making a move, Doctor Gregory. This has been very pleasant indeed, but I haven
’
t had time to unpack yet, and last night was a very late one as well.”

“I
’
ll see you back to the hospital, Miss Graham. It can be rather unnerving at this hour.”

“There
’
s no need for you to turn out, William.
I can escort Miss Graham to her doorstep before
I go over the wall to my own abode.” Then, as William
Gregory
was still hesitating, he went on: “After all Elizabeth and I are old friends.”

“I was forgetting that,” William Gregory said rather heavily.
“
Susan, perhaps you would take Miss Graham up to get her coat.”

Susan came flying to her feet in a shower of scattered schoolbooks. “Oh, you are going already? I know I should have finished this ages ago.” She led Elizabeth upstairs. “I did want to ask you about London and so on, but there were always grown-ups talking and Daddy gets annoyed with me if I chatter too much. He belonged to the children-are-seen-and-not-heard era and no one has bothered to tell him times have changed.”

Elizabeth chuckled. “Just wait until you have a family of your own, young lady, and you
’
ll find they haven
’
t at all.”

Susan made a face. “But you can
’
t know either, can you, or have you some children hidden away
?
I
’
m not going to get married for ages and ages ... not until I find someone as nice as Daddy, only lots younger, of course. You haven
’
t married, or is that the wrong kind of question, as Stuart would say? He
’
s nice, isn
’
t he? Sort of fun and grownup and yet young all at the same time and doesn
’
t talk down to us unless he gets narked—and then he snaps at us like an old sergeant-major and we scuttle away until he
’
s smoothed down again.”

Elizabeth was beginning to get used to Susan
’
s flow of conversation that never slowed down long enough for the questions in it to be answered or perhaps she didn
’
t expect replies. She slipped on her coat and tucked her gloves in her pockets: “We can talk next time you come,” Susan said comfortably.

“If I
’
m asked,” Elizabeth reminded her gently.

“You will be—Miss Brown always was,” Susan reassured her blithely.

“But she and your father were great friends.”

“What difference does that make, or don
’
t you like Daddy?” Susan demanded heatedly.

“Of course I like him, but you must remember we
’
ve only just met.”

Susan sighed. “Why do grown-ups always make things so complicated
?
Either you like a person or you don
’
t, and if you don
’
t no matter how long you try it isn
’
t going to change it. So if you like a person when you meet them you
’
ll go on liking them, won
’
t you
?
”

“Usually you do, but sometimes people change,” Elizabeth pointed out.

“Like you and Stuart? Or didn
’
t you like him much when you knew him before? You
’
re both all claws and ready to pounce like Whiskers, our cat, and you
’
re still sort of purring at the same time as if to try to pretend you
’
re really friends. I was noticing when you were talking and you
’
d forgotten I was there,” Susan told her with engaging frankness.

Feeling that her defences wouldn
’
t survive these guerilla tactics for long, Elizabeth hastily led the way downstairs. Susan followed, dancing from step to step on tiptoe, holding on to the banister like a ballet dancer at the barre and humming
Love is Like a Violin
very softly.

Stuart was waiting for her. “William makes his apologies. Another of his elderly patients decided that
he
wasn
’
t going to last until morning. Robin
’
s gone with him because the car is misbehaving and he
’
s the only one who can talk it back into action.”

“What about Dear Emily?” Elizabeth asked hastily.

“She
’
s muttering about a hot drink for Susan, so I wouldn
’
t disturb her if I were y
o
u,” Stuart said smoothly. “Good night, Susan. Don
’
t keep the dragon waiting or you
’
ll lose your beauty sleep.”

Susan gazed at him, her hazel eyes wide and innocent. “Am I beautiful, then, Stuart?”

He looked at her with a smile and then abruptly the smile faded. “Dangerously near it. Stay a child as long as you can, Susan.”

Her lips curved impishly. “Oh, am I disturbing you? I
’
m not a child any more, you know. I
’
m fifteen next birthday.”

He smacked her lightly. “Old enough to know better. Run along, sweetie.”

Susan tossed her head, gave them both a warm smile, and went off with: “I know when I
’
m not wanted!”

“Whew! This younger generation is getting too hot to handle. Were you like that at fourteen and a bit Elizabeth?” He
shook
his head at the thought. “I suppose you were young once before you got caught up with suffering humanity and your laughter was tucked away with your girlish dreams. Come on, Elizabeth. Time I took you home and shut the door between us.”

The night was cool and held a breath of retreating winter and the stars were distant and remote and uncaring and the slip of a mo
o
n had tired of showing herse
l
f to unnoticing humans. Their footsteps rang crisply on the gravel path and there was no speech between them until they had turned the corner and left Castleford behind them.

Then Stuart stopped abruptly and took her roughly by the arm and shook her a little. “Why did you have to come back into my life, Elizabeth, just when I was beginning to get you out of my
blood?”
he demanded between set teeth.

Elizabeth made no attempt to resist him, but her face was wistful under the glow of the lamps on the castle wall. “I might say that I would never have come to Shenston if I
’
d known you were living here,” she said softly.

He shook her again less gently. “But why? Do you hate me that much?”

She sighed at that and shook her head. “I never hated you, Stuart. It didn
’
t go deep enough for that.
We
didn
’
t feel the same way about things then and I doubt if we ever will. I care about people and you don
’
t. You think they are puppets for your amusement.”

“You
’
re wrong, Elizabeth. I did care about you. I didn
’
t know quite how much until that last time I saw you and you only laughed and sent me away, and I was fool enough to take your ultimatum.”

“It wouldn
’
t have made any difference, Stuart. We
’
re two people with widely divergent views
...
oh, about everything, and we only would have ended by hurting one another.
”

“But isn
’
t hurting and making up part of loving?” the man demanded.

“Not my kind of loving,” Elizabeth said steadily
.

“I suppose you
’
re referring to that wide-eyed love you had for Irving, and you
’
ve never been able to see past it ever since,” he told her brutally.

Elizabeth put her hand up in a little gesture of defe
n
s
iven
es
s. “Who told you about Irving? I never did!” she
whispe
red.

He laughed then without mirth and released her. “I to
o
k the trouble to f
i
nd out aft
e
r you sent me away. Somehow my pride wouldn
’
t let me accept that you had rejected me because of what I was. There had to be a reason not attached to myself, or
my
person
...
something
th
at stood between us and could be swept away. But when I discovered that I was competing with the ghost of a dead lover ... a man who had been dead for all of fifteen years
...
I suppose I gave up hope then
...
especially when some well-meaning soul told me that Irving had blue eyes like mine! I suppose that was why you tolerated my presence at all,” he ended bitterly.

Elizabeth stood there as if he had struck her across the face. “If that was the reason I certainly wasn
’
t conscious of it,” she said scornfully. “It
’
s just like you to make a mock of anything a person holds sacred and drag it in the mud!”

It was he who winced this time. “Don
’
t, Elizabeth! It
’
s not funny this time. It never has been where you were concerned. Perhaps that
’
s where I went wrong. Once you care too much, it isn
’
t amusing any more, either for the lover or the loved one. It either hurts like hell or becomes so deadly dull that one lashes out just to make a change.”

“Can we just leave it at that, Stuart? We
’
re both living in Shenston now and this isn
’
t getting us anywhere. Can
’
t we agree to differ?” Elizabeth suggested wearily.

He shrugged his shoulders. “I suppose we can try
...
make polite conversation when we meet.
I
expect one of these fine days you
’
ll marry William Gregory, and ask me to the wedding, and I
’
ll send an expensive present and arrange to be out of town on that date and
...
Ouch!”

Elizabeth looked down at her tingling fingers and then at the darkening mark on Stuart
’
s cheek. “That was a beastly, horrid thing to say! I
hate
you!”

And the new Matron of St. Genevieve
’
s turned on her heel and left him, as flushed with anger as she would have been twenty years ago. How dare he say a thing like that about her
...
about William Gregory!