Cherry Ames 24 Companion Nurse (9 page)

Cherry remarked that it was silly of Ryder to be so impressed and intimidated by Martha Logan that he ran away, but all boldness with the eminent Philip Lawrence. “Unless he’s plain ignorant about Mr. Lawrence, or is scared of women. What sort of questions did he ask Mr. Lawrence?” Cherry asked again.

“Perfectly innocent questions,” Peter replied. “Which paintings of the Shakespearean characters are the most famous, which the rarest, or the oldest.” Peter grinned ruefully. “Poor Mr. Lawrence! I apologized to him all over the place. I’m going to give Ryder a good bawl-ing out if it will register with that featherbrain.” Peter looked at his wristwatch. “He’s twenty minutes late for our tennis date. Come on. Let’s go to his inn and see if we can fi nd him. I lent him my book of Shakespeare’s plays, and he promised to return it today.” Peter left word with an attendant at the tennis court, in case Ryder showed up. Then he and Cherry started out for Ryder’s inn, along cobblestoned High Street.

Ryder would come along High Street, Peter said, if he were heading for the tennis courts. But they did not see his tall, skinny, apparently boneless fi gure. They passed the exhibit hall, and Cherry said, “I’d like to see those paintings again.”

“You’ll have to wait and see them when you get to Edinburgh,” Peter said. “Mr. Lawrence and his staff

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packed them up all day yesterday, and this morning they were put on the train to Edinburgh.”

“Accompanied by a guard, I hope,” Cherry said.

“Yes, certainly. They’re all catalogued and insured.” Peter guffawed. “Ryder actually offered to help Mr.

Lawrence pack the paintings. In his enthusiasm for all things Shakespearean! He only means to be amiable and helpful, but can you imagine! He’d put his big feet through two or three of the canvases while he was

‘helping.’ ”

Cherry laughed. “He’ll probably forget all about Shakespeare the moment he’s left Stratford.” At the small inn where Rodney Ryder was staying, Peter and Cherry went to the desk. They asked the pleasant, pink-cheeked woman in charge whether Mr.

Ryder was in.

“I believe Mr. Ryder left last evening,” the woman said. She glanced at the inn’s account books. “Yes, he has gone.”

Peter stared. “I mean
Rodney
Ryder—a tall, thin young man—blinks his eyes rapidly—joking, light-hearted—”

“Yes, I mean the tall, thin Mr. Ryder who blinks,” the woman said, “although he impressed me as being quite serious and preoccupied.”

It was Cherry’s turn to stare. “I never saw Ryder serious about anything, the few times we met—not even about Shakespeare,” she said.

The woman asked, “Are we talking about the same person? Our Mr. Ryder was
most
silent and reserved.

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Oh, yes, he did have one discussion with my husband, about cricket, rugby, soccer, and tennis.”

“That’s our man,” said Peter, baffl ed. “Did Mr. Ryder leave any message?”

The woman glanced into a fi le. “Sorry, sir, there’s nothing. . . . Oh, yes. Are you Mr. Holt? He left this book for you.” Peter thanked the woman. She hesitated. “Mr.

Ryder left rather in haste last evening, after he made a long-distance telephone call. Possibly an emergency—?”

“Possibly,” said Peter. “Well—thank you very much.” He and Cherry went outdoors. “If that isn’t just like that unreliable character! I hope he wasn’t called home by some drastic emergency.”

“And so farewell to Rodney Ryder,” said Cherry. “But I don’t understand—how come he gave the people at the inn such a different impression than the one he gave us? Or did he naturally react like that to your lively young students?”

Peter shrugged. The question did not interest him.

What concerned him now was the fact that he and his students were leaving Stratford late tomorrow afternoon, on their bicycles, and between then and now he had people to see and arrangements to make.

“So this is my last hour with you,” Peter said.

“You sound like a condemned man,” Cherry said, laughing.

“I ought to answer something witty and touching,” Peter said, “but the best I can think of is that I want to see you again. When will you and Mrs. Logan be in Edinburgh?”

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“In about a week—” Cherry opened her handbag and consulted her itinerary, tucked in her passport, which she always carried. She told Peter the exact dates for their Edinburgh stay, and the name of their hotel.

“Fine!” he said, brightening. “We’ll be there around the same time, and we’re booked at the same hotel.

But”—his intelligent face changed expression—“after Edinburgh, what? You live in Illinois and I live in Ore-gon. Two thousand miles apart. From the Mississippi River to the Pacifi c Ocean. Well, there are jet planes.”

“We could always meet here in England, where the distances aren’t so great,” Cherry suggested teasingly.

“A perfect idea,” Peter said. “Let’s go for a walk,” and he started to sing a song about “the foggy, foggy dew.” Along the way, as they walked, he gathered wild-fl owers for Cherry. At one place she insisted he was helping himself to late roses off somebody’s garden wall, but he declared gallantly:

“You deserve roses. They match the roses in your cheeks. Now, isn’t that poetic, Miss Nurse?”

“My rosy cheeks indicate a preponderance of red corpuscles in my bloodstream, and a lack of any bio-chemical trace of anemia,” Cherry replied. “Shall I translate?”

He laughed and said,
“That
distance between us isn’t so great.” When they turned back and reached her inn, Peter presented her with the bouquet. “Tell Mrs. Logan this one”—he touched a pink-and-white fl ower—“is the York and Lancaster rose. And tell her goodbye for me. See you next week, Cherry.” 78
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Peter kissed her on the cheek. Cherry was so surprised that she went upstairs to the wrong fl oor.

She missed Peter that moonlit evening, an ideal evening for a country stroll. But she and Martha Logan were leaving tomorrow themselves; there were notes and packing to do, and Cherry made another routine, but careful, checkup of her patient. As eight thirty approached, Martha said, “Oh, why waste an evening on chores? We’re in Stratford, and they’re playing
Romeo and Juliet
tonight! Come on, Cherry, we’ll fi nish these little jobs later—”

“I can see you’re feeling much better!” Cherry snatched up a coat for Martha Logan and followed her, almost running.

They arrived puffi ng at the theater in time to see the curtain go up.

c h a p t e r v i

A Fantastic Visitor

the next few days were strenuous—and full of discovery for Cherry. She and Martha Logan again boarded a tour bus, leaving behind the sunny orchards and hay barns to travel northeast through the Midlands, into busy manufacturing and market towns of great age. The weather grew colder in this high north country. In Chester they walked briskly around the Roman wall, and shopped in the medieval Rows, for antique silver that Martha loved. She regretted that they had to travel so fast and were getting only glimpses of England.

They traveled farther north into hills and green forests and the calm blue waters of the Lake District.

The mid-September weather grew still colder, sometimes rainy. They wore coats, and Cherry tucked woolen lap robes around her patient and herself in the bus. They were grateful for hot baked apples with 79

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custard and steaming tea when they arrived at Windermere late Saturday afternoon.

They were to stay for three nights at this rambling old wooden country hotel beside a lake. The Carewe Museum was in this area, forty miles from the hotel.

The hotel manager said he would engage a local taxi-man to drive them there; after a day’s rest they would visit the private museum.

Cherry was concerned that Martha might have grown overtired. That Saturday evening the most Cherry would allow her patient to do, after dinner, was to watch television in one of the hotel’s public sitting rooms. After a newscast, white-bearded Shah Liddy came on the screen and gave another interview.

Martha Logan was diverted by his bristling white eyebrows, white beard, and extravagant mannerisms. She was so amused she scarcely noticed that it was only nine o’clock when her nurse shooed her to bed.

Their day of rest fell, appropriately, on Sunday. The sun shone, and it was a joy to be deep in the country this autumn day.

“Let’s walk to the village,” Martha said eagerly to Cherry. “The Lake District is a hiker’s paradise, you know.”

“Aren’t you being awfully ambitious?” Cherry asked. She knew that her patient’s bruised legs were nearly healed by now, and Mrs. Logan had recovered from the shock of the fall—but her general health still lagged. “We’ve already done quite a lot of traveling and sightseeing on the way up here,” Cherry
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cautioned her. “What about a drive today, or just a short walk?”

“Oh, I’m fi ne!” Martha Logan made an impatient, clumsy gesture with her right arm in its cast. “Besides, it’s a perfectly beautiful day!” Cherry reluctantly gave in. A walk in this bracing air might do her patient good. The village was not very far away, along a road that rose to cut through forests, and dipped beside meadows. One thing struck Cherry as they walked—on either side of them, tall, thick hedges enclosed the meadows, high stone walls guarded the privacy of gardens. At times she and Martha were walled in on the road, unable to see anything except treetops and the unwinding ribbon of road straight ahead.

“We don’t usually have walls, or walls of hedges, at home,” Cherry said uncomfortably. “I guess I’m used to

‘the great wide open spaces.’ ”

“Well, we have immense lands and a relatively small population per square mile, outside the cities,” Martha Logan said. “For a long time, while our wild new, young country was being settled, parts of it had no population, except for Indian tribes, and one or two lonely settlers. It was a rare event when a traveler or a new settler came by—people were glad to see him, and gave him food and lodging and helped him. That’s how it happens that Americans are generally very friendly. With Europeans, who have smaller countries and dense populations, living close together, they’re inclined to be more cautious and reserved.

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Also, they’re much older peoples than we are, more sophisticated—” Martha Logan smiled. “Our differ-ences can enrich one another. The main thing is for us to get better acquainted.”

They came to an open view. Martha’s serious expression turned joyful. “Oh, look at that lake with the sun on it!” She recited a snatch of a poem, then broke off.

“This is Wordsworth country, Cherry.” Cherry obliged by chanting, “ ‘I wandered lonely as a cloud, That fl oats on high o’er vales and hills . . .’ Anyway, I can’t help wondering what goes on behind these walls and high hedges.”

“Wait until tomorrow. We’ll go behind the walls of the Carewe estate. Ah—you know, Cherry—I do feel a little tired.”

They turned back without ever reaching the village.

Cherry insisted Mrs. Logan rest in bed for the greater part of the day “and eat all the nourishing food you can hold.”

Martha Logan grinned. “For once I won’t argue with you. Tomorrow is the big day.” A maid knocked on the door of Martha Logan’s room Monday morning. “The taxi you ordered is waiting for you, ma’am.”

Cherry, putting on her coat in the adjoining room, heard Martha call out, “Thank you. We’ll be right down.” Her voice sounded tired.

Cherry rapped, went in, and said, “If you aren’t feeling too well, do you have to go to the Carewe
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Museum this morning? Couldn’t you telephone and ask whether you could come tomorrow?”

“Of course I must go this morning! You’ve heard how fussy the Carewe Museum people are about appointments. I feel perfectly well, just not very energetic.” Well, they had crossed an ocean to keep this appointment, so diffi cult to get in the fi rst place.

Cherry decided she had no reason to worry, provided her patient did not overdo today. She escorted Martha Logan down the hotel’s wide staircase and out into the courtyard.

A chunky, fair-haired man in a rumpled suit and chauffeur’s cap—a local man—came up to Mrs. Logan and said, “Good morning, ma’am, at your service.” He looked pleasant and responsible. Mrs. Logan asked him his name. It was Edwin. He said he could give them as much of his time today as they might need.

He led them to an old, well-kept sedan and helped them in.

During the leisurely drive to the Carewe estate, Edwin was closemouthed. He did point out a few sights, and when Mrs. Logan ventured to ask him, said he had lived in this part of England all his life, and he and his wife had six children. Cherry thought, in amusement, how an American taxi driver, if he were driving foreigners through his own part of the country, would regale them with local history and anecdotes, and would ask the visitors questions about their country. But Martha Logan was silent, too—probably thinking about what she most wanted to see at the 84
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Carewe collection in relation to her book. Cherry kept quiet, enjoying the countryside and occasional villages they were driving through. The roads were nearly deserted. Only a public bus or two and a few farm wagons passed along these hilly roads.

Punctually at ten o’clock they arrived at the Carewe estate, which was enclosed by a high stone wall. At the gate a guard inspected their letters of admission. Edwin was permitted to drive his passengers up the short roadway to the stone mansion and to park there, with the understanding that he remain in or near his taxi, within sight of the gate guard. Cherry noticed another guard patrolling the grounds outside the mansion.