She turned round indignantly at that and he went on smoothly, ‘A pot of tea would help, wouldn’t it? And most of the stuff on your desk can wait until the morning.’
He leaned across her and picked up the phone. ‘The canteen number?’ he asked her, and when she gave it ordered with pleasant courtesy, and with a certainty that no one would object, a tray of tea for two and a plate of buttered toast.
She was very conscious of the vast size of him. She wondered, idiotically, if he had played rugger in his youth. Well, she conceded, he wasn’t all that old—thirty-five, at the most forty... He had straightened up, towering over her, his gaze intent, almost as though he had read her thoughts and was amused by them. She looked at the clock and said in a brisk voice, ‘I can get a good deal of this done this afternoon, sir. I’m quite willing to stay on for a while.’
‘I said that tomorrow morning would do.’ His voice was mild but dared her to argue. ‘We will have our tea and you will leave at your usual time.’
She said ‘Very well, sir’ in a meek voice, although she didn’t feel meek. Who did he think he was? Professor or no professor, she had no wish to be ordered about.
‘You’ll get used to me in time,’ he observed, just as though she had voiced the thought out loud. ‘Here is the tea.’
The canteen server put the tray down on his desk; none of the canteen staff was particularly friendly with those who took their meals there; indeed, at times one wondered if they grudged handing over the plates of food, and the girl who had come in was not one of Julie’s favourites—handing out, as she did, ill nature with meat and two veg. Now, miraculously, she was actually smiling. Not at Julie, of course, and when he thanked her politely she muttered, ‘No trouble, sir; any time. I can always pop along with something.’
The professor sat down behind his desk. ‘Come and pour out,’ he suggested, ‘and let us mull over tomorrow’s schedule.’ He handed her the toast and bit hugely into his. ‘What an obliging girl.’
‘Huh,’ said Julie. ‘She practically throws our dinners at us. But then, of course, you’re a man.’
‘Er—yes; presumably you think that makes a difference?’
‘Of course it does.’ Perhaps she wasn’t being quite polite; she added ‘sir’.
They had little to say to each other; indeed, he made a couple of phone calls while he polished off the toast, and when they had had second cups he said, ‘Off you go, Miss Beckworth; I’ll see you in the morning.’
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN Julie got home they were all waiting to hear how she had got on.
‘At least he didn’t keep you late,’ observed her mother. ‘Is he nice?’ By which she meant was he good-looking, young and liable to fall in love with Julie?
‘Abrupt, immersed in his work, likes things done at once, very nice with his patients—’
‘Old?’ Mrs Beckworth tried hard to sound casual.
‘Getting on for forty, perhaps thirty-five; it’s hard to tell.’ Julie took pity on her mother. ‘He’s very good-looking, very large, and I imagine the nurses are all agog.’
‘Not married?’ asked her mother hopefully.
‘I don’t know, Mother, and I doubt if I ever shall; he’s not chatty.’
‘Sounds OK to me,’ said Luscombe, ‘even if he’s foreign.’
Esme had joined the inquisition. ‘He’s Dutch; does he talk with a funny accent?’
‘No accent at all—well, yes, perhaps you can hear that he’s not English, but only because he speaks it so well, if you see what I mean.’
‘A gent?’ said Luscombe.
‘Well, yes, and frightfully clever, I believe. I dare say that once we’ve got used to each other we shall get on very well.’
‘What do you call him?’ asked Esme.
‘Professor or sir...’
‘What does he call you?’
‘Miss Beckworth.’
Esme hooted with laughter. ‘Julie, that makes you sound like an elderly spinster. I bet he wears glasses...’
‘As a matter of fact he does—for reading.’
‘He sounds pretty stuffy,’ said Esme. ‘Can we have tea now that Julie’s home?’
‘On the table in two ticks,’ said Luscombe, and went back to the kitchen to fetch the macaroni cheese—for tea for the Beckworths was that unfashionable meal, high tea—a mixture of supper and tea taken at the hour of half past six, starting with a cooked dish, going on to bread and butter and cheese or sandwiches, jam and scones, and accompanied by a large pot of tea.
Only on Sundays did they have afternoon tea, and supper at a later hour. And if there were guests—friends or members of the family—then a splendid dinner was conjured up by Luscombe; the silver was polished, the glasses sparkled and a splendid damask cloth that Mrs Beckworth cherished was brought out. They might be poor but no one needed to know that.
Now they sat around the table, enjoying Luscombe’s good food, gossiping cheerfully, and if they still missed the scholarly man who had died so suddenly they kept that hidden. Sometimes, Julie reflected, three years seemed a long time, but her father was as clear in her mind as if he were living, and she knew that her mother and Esme felt the same. She had no doubt that the faithful Luscombe felt the same way, too.
She had hoped that after the professor’s offer of tea and toast he would show a more friendly face, but she was to be disappointed. His ‘Good morning, Miss Beckworth’ returned her, figuratively speaking, to arm’s length once more. Of course, after Professor Smythe’s avuncular ‘Hello, Julie’ it was strange to be addressed as Miss Beckworth. Almost everyone in the hospital called her Julie; she hoped that he might realise that and follow suit.
He worked her hard, but since he worked just as hard, if not harder, himself she had no cause for complaint. Several days passed in uneasy politeness—cold on his part, puzzled on hers. She would get used to him, she told herself one afternoon, taking his rapid dictation, and glanced up to find him staring at her. ‘Rather as though I was something dangerous and ready to explode,’ she explained to her mother later.
‘Probably deep in thought and miles away,’ said Mrs Beckworth, and Julie had to agree.
There was no more tea and toast; he sent her home punctiliously at half past five each day and she supposed that he worked late at his desk clearing up the paperwork, for much of his day was spent on the wards or in consultation. He had a private practice too, and since he was absent during the early afternoons she supposed that he saw those patients then. A busy day, but hers was busy too.
Of course, she was cross-examined about him each time she went to the canteen, but she had nothing to tell—and even if she had had she was discreet and loyal and would not have told. Let the man keep his private life to himself, she thought.
Professor van der Driesma, half-aware of the interest in him at St Bravo’s, ignored it. He was a haematologist first and last, and other interests paled beside his deep interest in his work and his patients. He did have other interests, of course: a charming little mews cottage behind a quiet, tree-lined street and another cottage near Henley, its little back garden running down to the river, and, in Holland, other homes and his family home.
He had friends too, any number of them, as well as his own family. His life was full and he had pushed the idea of marriage aside for the time being. No one—no