For Ever and Ever (17 page)
Authors: Mary Burchell
If, as she had dared to hope once or twice, Claire was beginning to have a few faint misgivings, any lack of direct opposition might make these grow. On the other hand, the appearance of her father—angrily accusing Kingsley Stour and insisting on removing her from his orbit—might well stiffen her resistance and force her into silly, impulsive action.
To compromise by communicating with the cousins was not a bad idea, and would be fully justified by the condition of Sir James’ health. On the other hand, to leave him in complete ignorance—”
Leonie looked down at the crumpled paper in her hand, and knew suddenly that at any rate she was not equal to starting to compose tactful cables again.
“I’ll think about it,” she told Kingsley Stour shortly. “I’m too tired to make any snap judgment now.” And she got up from the table.
“Very well.” He rose, too. “But there’s one other thing I want to say, Leonie, though why I’m not quite sure. However badly you think of me—and a lot of what you think is probably justified there is one thing absolutely true. I do, in my selfish way, love Claire.”
“But”—Leonie, who had been on the point of going, turned back now to look at him in astonishment—”how can you say such a thing to me? You were willing to cast her aside for what you thought to be a better proposition.”
“No. It wasn’t quite like that.”
“It was exactly like that,” retorted Leonie. “I know you’ve put up a magnificent pretence that nothing ever passed between you and me. But you said some pretty damaging things the other evening, for a man who now claims to love someone else.”
“All right. I behaved badly. I’m not claiming anything else. But what you didn’t know when I spoke to you about—well, that evening—was that Claire and I had quarrelled.”
“You concealed that very well.” Leonie sounded sceptical.
“You put on a rather devastating act yourself,” he retorted, and Leonie was silent. “It was all very unworthy and quite impossible to justify,” he went on impatiently, “and I’m not pretending I’m a very worthwhile person. But when Claire was suddenly in danger last night—” Unexpectedly his voice shook. “Anyway, it doesn’t really matter whether you believe me or not. Only—I just wanted to tell you, for some reason.”
Leonie was silent still, not knowing whether to believe a word of this or not, and yet slightly moved in spite of herself.
“I don’t know quite what you expect me to say in return.” She spoke at last, doubtfully and not ungently. “And, frankly, I simply don’t know what to believe.”
“All right. You don’t really have to say anything,” he told her, with a shrug and a slight laugh, as he accompanied her to the door of the dining-room. “But don’t do anything in a hurry, Leonie. You might be very sorry afterwards.”
The words were not said at all in a threatening tone, and obviously were meant to refer to possible regrets for someone else’s spoiled happiness. But something in the phrasing reminded Leonie unpleasantly of other times when she had found Kingsley Stour a completely unscrupulous person. So that although he caught her hand as he bade her goodnight, she drew it away hastily and replied curtly as she left him.
According to Mr. Pembridge’s orders, she should have gone straight to her cabin at this point. But, in spite of being weary, she now felt quite unsleepy. And so, instead of going to bed, she stepped out on deck, determined to have a breath of fresh air after her long hours on duty.
Although it was now fairly late, there were still several people on the promenade deck, but Leonie was neither in the mood nor the dress for joining in any festivities. So she mounted the steps to the upper deck and, seeking out a sheltered corner, she leaned her arms on the ship’s rail, and stared out across the moonlit waters.
In her weary, undecided state of mind, she found her thoughts drifting hither and thither, without falling into any connected line. And although she tried to tell herself that this was a good opportunity to decide what she was really going to do about telling or not Sir James of his daughter’s operation, she could not bring herself to consider the arguments in any clear manner.
Instead, she began to think back over the incredible weeks since she had come on board. The heights and depths, the joys and disasters, which had crowded upon her. All experiences which in some curious way made life at home or at the office seem like something which had happened to someone else in another world. “I don’t even feel like the same person,” Leonie thought. “And I can’t imagine how I’m ever going to settle down to ordinary life again. It will seem as though—as though all the people who matter most are miles away.”
Then she remorsefully realized that this was no way to dismiss her mother and her sister, both of whom were extremely dear to her. Back home with them who else would she want?
Well—Claire, of course. Claire had grown very close to her, in spite of the unhappy difference over Kingsley Stour. But Claire, though dear, was not a person to change life for one.
Few people could do that. It was silly of her even to have thought in those terms, she decided, and for a few moments she dropped her head on her arms, as they rested on the rail.
She was so tired. Mr. Pembridge was right—she ought to have gone straight to bed. Mr. Pembridge had a habit of being right. Perhaps that was why—
And then suddenly, although she could not see him, she knew he was standing beside her. Not that she had heard even his footstep above the sounds from the deck below. But she knew it by those incalculable little waves of emotion that announce the presence of someone very dear or very important. Someone who can indeed change life for one.
And as she remained with her face hidden, too unspeakably overcome by her own discovery even to raise her head and look at him, she felt his hand lightly on her shoulder, and his voice said gently,
“What are you doing up here all alone? I thought I told you to go to bed.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
For a
second longer Leonie kept her face hidden, savoring the delicious awareness of his hand on her shoulder. Then she looked up, and found the Senior Surgeon regarding her with a touch of concern.
“What is the matter?” he inquired, changing his question into more precise terms.
“N-nothing.” Her voice faltered unaccountably and she felt absurdly near tears. But they were tears of excitement, she thought, because of the immensity of her discovery about Mr. Pembridge’s importance to her. “I’m just tired,” she said hastily. “And a little worried.”
“About Claire? You need not be. She is going to be all right now.” He was reassuringly positive about that.
“Oh, thank you! I’m so glad!” Leonie’s face cleared. “But it wasn’t quite that. I guessed she was going to be pretty well when you made me go off duty. What I was troubled about was what I ought to do about her father. I felt I ought to cable to Sir James. But, on the other hand—”
She hesitated, toying with the almost overwhelming desire to tell Mr. Pembridge all her anxieties. But, even as she did so, he said,
“You don’t need to. I have already done so.”
“
You
have?” She was astonished—and enchanted— that Mr. Pembridge himself should have settled her problem for her. “But—why? I mean—I’m sure it was the right thing, but why did you do it yourself?”
He raised his eyebrows and looked faintly amused. “I did the operation,” he pointed out, “without the usual formality of obtaining the nearest relative’s consent. In addition, I was asked to look after her health while she was on board, if you remember.”
“Why, of course.” Leonie smiled in the sheer relief of finding that everything was now out of her own hands. “Oh, I’m so
glad
! I wonder what he’ll do,” she added musingly.
“He has already done it,” replied Mr. Pembridge. “The reply to my cable came ten minutes ago. He wants daily bulletins—which I suppose is reasonable—and intends to fly out to join the ship at Melbourne.”
“He does?” Leonie simply could not hide her joy. “Oh, how wonderful! Why, that will—will simplify everything.”
In her relief and happiness, she spoke her thoughts aloud, and Mr. Pembridge looked at her a trifle quizzically, but as though he understood.
“Makes things easier for you, eh?” he suggested a little drily.
“Oh, indeed it does!” Leonie agreed thankfully, thinking how gladly she would leave the decisions to Sir James, and what a wonderful relief it would be to have no responsibility any longer where Claire and Kingsley Stour were concerned. “It’s the best news I’ve heard since—since I came on board.”
Again Mr. Pembridge gave her that odd, quizzical glance.
“Well, I suppose that’s natural,” he said, and she was struck by the fact that his tone suddenly sounded cooler and more remote than it had early in the conversation. But perhaps he, too, was feeling tired by now. At any rate, he rubbed his hand across his eyes with a slightly impatient movement and added, “Now go along to bed, as I told you. We can both do with a good night tonight.”
She went then, curiously happy to be carrying out his orders, even in so slight a matter. And as she went, she thought how inconceivable it was that she had not realized until this evening what was happening to her.
Alone in her stateroom, she sat on the side of her bed and thought of Mr. Pembridge, for very much longer than he would have approved.
She would have liked to know just when it was that her feelings towards him had undergone this profound change. At which point had he ceased to be the arrogant surgeon from her youthful past, and become the all-important figure round which her present seemed to revolve?
When he chose her to help him in his work?—But the joy which she had felt on that occasion surely sprang from an earlier change of heart, even if she had not quite recognized it at the time.
Tired though she was, she tried to think back over the events of the voyage. But, strangely enough, the one scene which presented itself to her memory again and again was herself standing on the veranda of that hotel in Naples and an angry Mr. Pembridge saying, “Get into the car, you little idiot. You’ve been holding up the whole ship.”
Impossible to think that one’s heart went out to a man who addressed one thus. And yet—she saw him now, in her mind’s eye, tall, commanding and very good-looking—and once more she almost tasted the salt tears of relief which had come to her as he hustled her unceremoniously towards the waiting car.
“Maybe I loved him then,” thought Leonie. And it gave her a strange and delicious and frightening shock to use that word, even in her thoughts.
Her mind refused to reach out over practical considerations of the future. She scarcely even asked herself how he felt about her—or how he might be made to feel, even though his heart had once been given to a girl now dead. She only knew that she loved him, and that for tonight at any rate that realization spanned her world.
She hardly knew when she went to bed or when she fell asleep. Relief over the solution of the Claire problem merged in the warm joy of knowing her own heart at last, and both combined to make her sink into the most perfect and tranquil sleep she had ever known.
The next morning, more practical considerations began to force themselves upon her attention. She must be realistic, she told herself. Mr. Pembridge had never shown any special—certainly no romantic interest in her. He had chosen her to assist in the hospital, it was true, but only because he regarded her as a good nurse.
Leonie reminded herself that in less than two weeks they would be in Sydney and the voyage would be over. After that, for all she could foresee or arrange, she might hardly ever see Mr. Pembridge again.
She would have to realize that she was not the first, and would certainly not be the last, to lose her heart on a long voyage. People got over these things. Especially if they faced facts in good time and refused to delude themselves.
In fact, Leonie was rather pleased with the hardheaded wisdom which she managed to impart to herself while she was dressing. And then she went down to the hospital, and Mr. Pembridge was sitting at his desk in the surgery, the sun bright on his smooth fair hair. And, as she stood for a moment in the doorway, looking at him, her heart gave such a thump that she thought he must hear it, and she wondered how she had ever supposed she could do any thing but love him.
He glanced up then and said,
“You’re a bit late, aren’t you?”
“No! Am I?” She glanced at her watch, and realized that it still blandly registered the same time as when she had last looked at it in her cabin. “I’m sorry. I must have forgotten to wind my watch last night.”
“All right.” He gave a brief, half-indulgent smile. “The circumstances were rather special.”
She smiled, too, then and asked if there were time for her to run in and see Claire before surgery began.
“Oh, yes. But—wait a minute”—as Leonie turned to go—”there’s just one thing first. I haven’t mentioned to her that her father will be meeting her at Melbourne, and on the whole I think it’s better she should not know. It might make her—worry.” Mr. Pembridge rearranged one or two things on his desk with meticulous and unnecessary care.
Leonie was silent, wondering how much he had guessed of the real situation.
“I suppose you’re right,” she said at last.
“Which means, of course,” went on Mr. Pembridge, still studying the things on his desk, “that no one else must be told either.”
This time Leonie was silent for even a little longer, for, small reason though she had to study Kingsley Stour’s interests, she could not help feeling sorry for the shock he would receive when Sir James came on board.
“If you—if you really think that’s the way it should be done—” she said reluctantly.
“I do.” He was very much the Senior Surgeon at that moment.
“Very well, sir,” Leonie said, and went to see how Claire was.
Her charge was extremely cheerful, and looking so pretty and eager and friendly that Leonie’s heart misgave her about the arrangement which had been made behind her back. But she reminded herself again that the matter was out of her own hands now. And, though it was illogical of her, she felt she loved Mr. Pembridge all the more because of this.
“I’m so sorry I shan’t be able to go ashore tomorrow,” Claire said. “I’ve got cousins in Perth. Not the same family as the Sydney cousins. But one of them used to go to school in England and was rather a pet when he was about fourteen and I was nine. I quite meant to look him up, but now I can’t.”
“Do we really reach Perth tomorrow?” Leonie, who had forgotten the passage of time during the exciting events of the last few days, pushed back her hair and made rapid calculations about the number of days left until they reached Melbourne.
“Fremantle—yes. It’s the port, you know, and about twelve miles from Perth. Perhaps if you went ashore, Leonie—?”
“I don’t think I can, darling. I know Meech specially wants to go, and I did have time off at Colombo,” Leonie explained. “Why don’t we wireless your cousin? He might be able to come out to the ship.”
Claire found this an excellent arrangement, and took so much interest in the composition of the proposed cable that it was obvious she was feeling very much better.
“Funny how I’ve hardly ever thought of Maurice until now,” she said musingly. “And yet at this moment he’s as clear as anything in my mind. Must be because we’re approaching his part of the world, I suppose. He had red hair when he was a schoolboy, and a temper that went with it.”
“But you said he was rather a pet,” objected Leonie.
“Oh, he exercised it on my behalf,” Claire explained naively. “He fought a much bigger boy who’d pulled my hair one day. And did he make the other fellow’s nose bleed!—Yes, I liked Maurice. I hope he gets the cable in time to come.”
“Anyway, I’ll see it goes off right away,” Leonie promised, and she went off to see to the sending of the cable, somewhat amused by the circumstances on which Maurice’s good reputation rested.
It was a strangely peaceful day. She should, she supposed, have been agitated by the discovery that she loved Mr. Pembridge. Or, if not, she should be worrying about what would happen when Sir James came on board at Melbourne. But instead she went about her daily routine wrapped in a sort of golden tranquillity.
“You look so calm and happy and—relaxed,” Claire said once. “Were you very worried about me, Leonie?”
“A bit—one way and another.” Leonie smiled at her. “But everything is all right now.”
“That’s just how you look,” Claire remarked. “As though everything is all right now. Leonie, are you in love with someone?”
“Claire!” Leonie was astounded and a good deal put out by the other girl’s perspicacity. “Whatever makes you think that?”
“Oh, I don’t know. You look as though you’ve
arrived
somewhere good. Not literally, of course. But mentally and—spiritually, I suppose.”
Leonie was silent, struck by the strangely accurate description of her state of mind.
“It’s Mr. Pembridge, isn’t it?” Claire said after a minute.
“Oh, Claire—he doesn’t know a thing about it, and I don’t believe he has any special feeling for me. I hardly dare to say—I mean, it seems presumptuous to—to feel that way when he’s probably quite indifferent to me.”
“It’s never presumptuous to love anyone,” Claire said simply. “Only sometimes I know one has to keep it to oneself.”
“That’s what I meant.”
“Have you
any
idea how he feels?”
Leonie shook her head.
“Only that he was deeply in love with a girl who died.”
“I remember. You told me. But people have to get over these things, Leonie.”
“I know. But some take much longer than others. And I suppose a few never do at all. Anyway, I’ve no reason to think—” She stopped.
“Well, it’s difficult to tell, with anyone as reserved as he is,” Claire said frankly. “And there’s not so much time left.” She sounded reflective but severely practical. “Don’t break your heart, Leonie, if nothing happens.”
“Oh, I shan’t,” declared Leonie, for all the world as though one could break or mend a heart at will.
And then Kingsley Stour came in, with an air of smiling devotion, and Leonie slipped away to see after her other patients. But she was aware that he looked after her as she went, and she guessed that he was wondering what decision she had finally taken about Sir James.
Inevitably he cornered her later in the surgery and, without bothering with preliminaries, asked curtly,
“Did you cable to Claire’s father in the end?”
“No,” said Leonie composedly, glad that he had put the question in that form, since she could give a simple negative without outraging her conscience.
“You didn’t?” He looked relieved. “Are you going to?”
“No,” Leonie said again. “I don’t think it’s necessary.”
“But you’re going to let her cousins in Sydney know?”
“I hadn’t thought of doing so,” Leonie replied calmly. “As you may know, Claire has cousins in Perth, and she has cabled to one of them asking if he can visit her on board when we’re in port at Fremantle tomorrow.”
“I didn’t know that.” He frowned. “Why did she want to do that, I wonder?”
“Why not?” inquired Leonie drily in return. “Sometimes it’s pleasant to see one’s relations. Especially if one is thousands of miles from home.”
“Yes, but—we didn’t really want any of the family around before the end of the voyage.”
“Claire seemed to feel differently,” replied Leonie coldly.
He gave her a quick, suspicious glance.
“Was the idea yours?”
“No. At least—not the original idea that she should make some contact with this cousin. I didn’t even know he existed until Claire mentioned him this morning, and said she was sorry not to be going off the ship at Fremantle, as she would have liked to see him. She wanted me to go instead, but I knew I shouldn’t be able to get away. Then I did suggest he should come and see her instead.”
“It would have been better to have left well alone,” he exclaimed impatiently.
“That,” Leonie said drily, “is a matter of opinion. Claire wanted to see him, and I hope she manages to do so.”
He said no more, but she saw he was put out. And apparently he was unwise enough to voice his annoyance to Claire, because late that evening, when Leonie came to see that she was comfortable for the night, Claire said,
“I do wonder if Maurice will make it tomorrow. I should so like to see him—whatever Kingsley says.”
“What did Kingsley say?” inquired Leonie mildly.
“Oh, well”—Claire glanced at her and laughed with a touch of embarrassment—“he didn’t much like the idea of my digging up all the family roots here. I suppose it’s natural.”
“Not if he is really concerned with your good and happiness,” replied Leonie drily. “But if he’s only thinking of his own interests, of course it would be very natural.”