Nurse Lang (7 page)

TWO DAYS LATER Sir Archibald Rathbone came to see Philip, driving himself down from London in a decrepit old car which rattled its way up the drive to pull up with a jerk before the front door.

Moira, in trim white coat and starched headsquare, met him outside Philip’s door. Serena had shown him up and was standing at the head of the stairs, reluctant to relinquish her authority.

“My cousin had to go across to the hospital,” she explained to Sir Archibald. “There was an emergency, but he will be back before lunch. We hope you will stay and take it with us, of course.”

“Delighted, my dear lady! Delighted!” the genial old man beamed, turning back to Moira. “We have a very competent-looking nurse here, I see, so I can be getting on with my job.”

The warm friendliness of his smile put Moira immediately at her ease, in spite of Serena’s disapproving frown, and she turned with him into the room.

Sir Archibald chatted pleasantly to Philip and gradually he began to relax. The stubborn lines about his mouth were ironed out by a half-reluctant smile, and the surgeon made his examinations afterwards in an atmosphere of slightly reduced tension.

Moira stood by the window, waiting, and after it was over Philip reached for her hand. She surrendered it instantly, trying to suggest confidence in the pressure of her fingers and the brief smile she gave him. There was nothing to be learned from the surgeon’s expression.

“How soon do you want to be on your feet again?” he asked.

Philip’s shocked glance flew to Moira.

“A great deal will depend on you,” Sir Archibald told him. “Nothing is so retarding as lack of faith.”

Grant came in then, and Moira marvelled at the control which let him speak to Philip and Sir Archibald about trivialities while all his mind must be centred on the verdict he had yet to hear.

The two men took their lunch in Philip’s room, as if to give him added confidence, and Moira left them, knowing that she would not hear that verdict until Sir Archibald had returned to London. She might not hear the whole truth even then, she realized, and it was perhaps in that moment that she understood how much it had come to mean to her. Her days had become bounded by the hope of Philip’s ultimate recovery, hedged in by alternating confidence and doubt, and in that way she had become part of Philip’s life.

Sir Archibald and Grant came downstairs shortly before two o’clock.

“I’m taking Sir Archibald over to the hospital,” Grant intimated. “He would like to look round and make a few suggestions about Philip’s operation.”

When Sir Archibald had shaken her by the hand and said that they would be meeting again quite soon, she made her way slowly up to Philip’s room, where the maid was clearing away the remains of the luncheon party. Philip did not speak until the girl had gone, closing the door behind her.

“Well,” he said, “that’s that! I suppose they’ve gone into a professional huddle about me now?”

“They’ve gone over to the hospital,” she said. “That’s all I know.”

He lay for several minutes staring up at the ceiling.

“Supposing Grant is right,” he said at last. “Supposing some miracle is still possible? If I were well again, Moira—?” His eyes held hers for an instant and then they fell away again. “But what’s the use of supposing?” he demanded angrily. “Nothing can ever come of building—castles in the air. I’d never be able to fly again.”

“Is that the main issue?” she asked, coming to stand beside the bed. “There are—other things, you know.”

“Such as settling down—or getting married?” he suggested derisively. “Is that what you mean, or would it be just another airy castle?”

“No!” she exclaimed passionately, because it seemed that his cynicism might undermine much of what Grant was trying to do for him. “No, Phil, it needn’t mean that. We are all entitled to some measure of happiness in our lives.”

He turned awkwardly groping for her hand.

“Moira!” he said. “Moira, you’re different!” His fingers fastened about her wrist, pulling her towards him. “If all this comes right, if I can hope to live even something of a life, would you share it? I’m not asking you to take pity on me in my present state,” he added swiftly. “I’d do anything rather than ask that, because pity was never a thing I wanted, but if there is a hope in this operation of Grant’s then it might mean hope for the future, too. We could start again together, you and I.”

His voice died in the silence and he lay waiting with his fingers still compelling on her wrist, and Moira felt as if every heartbeat must be audible to him as she cast about in her mind for some way—some unhurtful way—to answer.

“What’s the matter?” he asked suspiciously at last. “Are you going to marry someone else?”

“No.” The word all but choked her. “No, I’m not going to marry anyone else.”

“And you won’t take a chance on this? You won’t give me the hope I need?”

She strove to free herself, but he held her the more closely.

“Moira! Moira, don’t fail me!” he begged, all the tension gone out of his face, leaving him young and vulnerable and infinitely pathetic for a moment. “I need you! I need your faith and your courage to see me through all this!”

“I don’t know how to answer you, Phil. You can’t possibly be in love with me—”

“Can’t I?” he demanded. “I’ve told you you’re different. You’re kind and generous and—safe, and you’re very lovely!” He tried to draw her closer. “Promise me that you won’t walk out on me.”

“I won’t walk out, Phil,” she said.

Surprisingly, he did not attempt to kiss her.

“Well, that’s settled,” he said in an almost matter-of-fact tone. “The next step is to get on with getting well. The sooner all this is over the better I shall like it,” he added with a distasteful glance round the sick-room. “You can tell Grant I’m ready to go over to the hospital right away.”

“Grant won’t be hurried,” she said.

“The devil he won’t!” Philip grinned. “You can tell him that I have an incentive now!”

“That—wouldn’t make any difference,” she returned hollowly. “Grant will do things in his own way. I should imagine he always has done.”

“And there you would be right!” There was a sort of forced gaiety about Philip now. “He knows his own mind so well, but then so do I! I’ve no intention of waiting for weeks while things develop to Grant’s satisfaction.”

It was useless to argue with him in this mood, and Moira let the matter rest there. She tidied the room and remade the bed so that her patient could settle to sleep, but relaxation seemed far enough away from Philip now. He was more than eager to meet the future, and he seemed impatient until he knew that Grant had returned.

Moira heard Grant’s voice in the hall, but she knew that Philip would be instantly suspicious of some hitch if she went down to meet his brother. She found herself collecting magazines into a neat pile with a sudden trembling inside her, an inner excitement for which there could be no accounting, and then Grant strode into the room, looking as if he had forced himself to relax just outside the door.

“Well,” he asked, crossing to the bed, “what did you think of Sir Archibald?”

“He didn't look so very much like a doctor to me,” Philip said lightly, “but if he can do the job I’m all for him!”

“So am I. He’s the greatest living authority on the subject and a man of infinite skill. He should give you complete confidence.”

Philip allowed his assurance to slide into a lengthy silence and Grant passed Moira and went to stand beside the window, looking down on the wind-swept park.

“Grant,” Philip said almost aggressively, “Moira has promised to marry me.”

His brother swung round from the window, his eyes flaming in a face that had gone the color of chalk.

“Are you mad?” he demanded, and he was looking at Moira and not Philip. “Are you both quite mad?”

“Not as we see it,” Philip said casually. “I think we are doing the only sane thing. We’re making sure of the future.”

“When did this happen?” he asked in a voice which Moira would never have recognized as his.

“As soon as your back was turned!” Philip laughed. “These things happen quickly, you know.”

Grant did not answer him. He strode from the room without looking at Moira again and she was left staring at Philip as if she could not quite believe the events of the past few minutes.

“I’ll go to sleep if you make it worth my while.” The grey eyes met hers demandingly. “I want you to kiss me, of your own accord.”

She bent and put her lips to his forehead.

“Will that do?” she asked.

“For just now,” he agreed, and let her go.

She found Grant out in the stables, saddling a horse.

“Grant, I—may I speak to you?”

He did not turn.

“Go ahead,” he said.

“I—you’re making it very difficult. It’s—about Philip.”

He moved then, turning towards her, and when she saw his face she drew back. It was ravaged with anger, as dark and impassioned as Philip’s had been when he had first declared that life had passed him by.

“You and Philip can’t do this to me!” he said between clenched teeth. “If you’ve agreed to marry him out of sympathy, you’re a fool!”

“No, that wasn’t the reason!” The calmness of despair was in Moira’s voice now. “It was only because—because—”

He reached her in one swift, determined stride.

“Because you are in love with him? Tell me that!” He caught her by the arms, as if he were about to shake her. “Why don’t you say it? Why are you so suddenly stricken dumb?”

“Because, whatever I say, you will not believe me just now.”

He released her, standing back and running his hand through his hair in a bewildered gesture which tore at her heart.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve no right to—try to run other people’s lives for them.”

Moira stood aside as he leapt into the saddle, pulling the horse’s head round towards the drive, but she could not think of anything more to say. He had taken her promise to Philip for granted, and even if it had not been in his plans for the future, he would accept it now. That first, impassioned moment of denial had passed. He was himself again.

When he had galloped away she went slowly back towards the house. She stood before Philip’s window, waiting subconsciously for Grant’s return, her ears attuned to distant hoofbeats which were nothing more than the wild drumming of her own heart.

“When I go over to the hospital,” Philip said out of the shadows behind her, “I want Grant to arrange for you to come with me. It should be easy for him. He has the controlling say in most things over there, and Elizabeth Hillier will back him up. She always does.”

“How long has Doctor Hillier been at Mellyn?” Moira asked without turning.

“Five or six years, I should think. She’s been there as long as Grant has.”

Working with him Moira thought, day by day! Had that proved compensation enough for Elizabeth, even when Kerry had come upon the scene?

“You haven’t said you’ll come,” Philip reminded her.

“I made you a promise,” she said, as she had once said to Grant.

He sighed with relief.

“So you did! And I should imagine you are the sort of person who would never go back on her word.”

Suddenly Moira felt that she had to get away, even if it were only for a minute or two to compose her scattered thoughts.

She went swiftly out of the room and down the staircase to the hall, aware that Serena was moving about in the dining-room with a purposeful air, arranging the flowers and casting an expert eye down the long, beautifully-appointed table which was always set out with meticulous care, even when the family dined alone.

She turned in between the double doors of the library where a fire had been lit for Grant earlier in the day. She knew that he had not come in and could not think when that wild ride of his would end, but probably he would go straight up to his own room when he came in from the stables and would appear at dinner perfectly composed.

She stood shivering before the fire, unable to find comfort, unable to see any clear way in the future, and then the window behind her opened and Grant came in.

She had not heard his step on the terrace, but .she saw him before he became aware of her and she thought that he looked haggard and old. In the next instant, however, his face was wiped clear of emotion and he crossed to the door and switched on the central lights.

The room leapt into bold relief and his eyes met hers fully.

“I’m sorry I spoke to you in the way I did,” he said without preliminary. “I ought to have realized how much Philip needed—something like this to help him to face the future.”

She could not tell him then that she had given her promise to his brother under pressure, and all she could hope was that it might have eased some of the burden from his own shoulders. She knew that he had thrust aside all personal desire in order to help Philip face the future, because there would be no hope of his studying for the extra degree in surgery which he had set his heart on while his brother’s demands upon him were so many.

“Philip talks about going over to the hospital quite freely now,” she said, hoping that he would not see the tortured love mirrored in her eyes. “He seems reconciled to the idea, at last.”

“You have made a difference to Philip in a very short time. I’m glad of that.” He seemed to be speaking with difficulty, as if he had never been accustomed to reveal his innermost thoughts to anyone and found it strange and almost painful to talk to her. “He had an unfortunate experience of love not so long ago, but, thank heaven, that appears to be over now. I felt myself responsible, in part, for what happened at that time,” he went on briefly, “but now that he is recovered the least I can do is to feel grateful.”

It was strangely and rather arrogantly put, Moira felt, and certainly not the sentiment which she would have expected from a guilty person. Grant seemed to be utterly without compunction in that respect, without regret for the part he had played in that “unfortunate experience” of love which had involved Mellyn so disastrously, and his eyes met hers unwaveringly across the expanse of the hearth rug.

She knew then that she could not demand the truth from him unless he was ready to offer it, and all he was doing now was thanking her for wiping out the past for his brother, at least. The anguish of Kerry’s memory was to be left to him alone.

“If you think that—someone else would be better for Philip,”, she suggested, “I can look out for another job once he is settled at the hospital.”

“Because of your engagement?” he asked at length. “I don’t see that it can matter a great deal, and I’m quite sure Philip won’t agree to a substitute.”

“Philip wants me to go to the hospital with him,” she explained half reluctantly. "He—thought that you might be able to find me some sort of job there so that I could be with him. It—seems that it would give him added confidence and—perhaps it would be best not to announce our engagement in that case—”

“Has Philip agreed to a secret engagement?” he asked coldly.

“No! No, we haven't discussed it at all.” Her cheeks were scarlet although her heart felt encased in ice. "Philip—rather precipitated things by announcing it like that this afternoon. I—hadn’t had time to think very clearly...”

“Surely you don’t need time to think about a thing like that once you have given your promise?” he demanded. “I see no reason why you shouldn’t work at the hospital even when you are engaged to Philip. Doctor Hillier will be only too pleased to have your help. They’re always short-staffed over on her side of the building.”

“Everyone is being terribly kind,” she said, feeling as if the words were choking back in her throat. “You’ve no reason to feel like this about me.”

“Why not?” His voice sounded cool and deliberate. “After all, you are doing for Philip what both Elizabeth and I have failed to do. You appear to have given him back his trust in the future and that will be half-way to making this operation of his a success.”

Was that all that mattered? Frantically Moira sought for an answer, but her mind would not register anything but his apparent indifference to everything but his brother’s welfare. This was for Philip, and he would be ruthless in his determination to see it through.

“Sir Archibald will operate in a fortnight’s time,” he said. “There’s no need for Philip to be rushed across to the hospital right away.”

Her eyes searched his.

“You feel now that the operation might be successful?” she asked eagerly.

“Who am I to say?” he answered. “Love has been known to work miracles before now.”

She could not tell him that this wasn’t love, that pity and the thought of his own overburdened shoulders had kept her silent when his brother had taken so much for granted, impulsively precipitating her into an engagement for which she had no heart. She could not tell him that the thought of having served him even indirectly lay like bitter-sweet balm on her bruised spirit, helping her in small measure to face what lay ahead.