Hilltop Tryst. Betty Neels

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СКАЧАТЬ your mother would give me breakfast?’

      ‘I’m sure she will. There’s only Ella home, and unless Father’s been called out he hasn’t a surgery until half-past eight.’

      ‘You’re glad to be home?’

      She nodded. ‘Oh, yes. I don’t think I’m cut out to be a companion…’

      ‘You have no ambition to take up a career?’

      She shook her head. ‘I suppose that years ago, when I was eighteen and full of ideas, I would have liked to train as a vet, but Father taught me a great deal and I like helping him. Ella’s too young, and anyway she’s not made up her mind what she wants to do, and Carol—she’s the brainy one and works in an office, and Kathy will be getting married in a month.’ She was silent for a moment, then, ‘I’m almost twenty-seven, a bit old to start on a career.’

      ‘But not too old to marry?’ He paused. ‘I feel sure that you must have had several opportunities. Dr Forbes did mention that his son and you…’

      ‘People make things up to suit themselves,’ declared Beatrice crossly. ‘James and I have known each other forever, but I have no wish to marry him. I keep saying so, too.’

      ‘Very tiresome for you,’ agreed her companion, and gave her a kindly smile, so that her ill humour went as quickly as it had come. ‘We had better go if we want breakfast…’

      They went unhurriedly down the hill with Knotty cavorting around them, and so to the village and her home, carrying on a desultory conversation and on the best of terms with each other.

      Early though it was, the village was stirring; Beatrice called cheerful good mornings as they went, not noticing the smiling, knowing looks exchanged behind her back. She was liked in the village, and although no one had actually said so it was generally thought that she was far too good for Dr Forbes’s son. Her companion, aware of the glances, gave no hint of having seen them, although his eyes danced with amusement.

      Mrs Browning was breaking eggs into a large frying pan on the Aga, and bacon sizzled under the grill. She looked up as they went into the kitchen, added two more eggs and said happily, ‘Good morning. I do hope you’ve come to breakfast—such a satisfying meal. A lovely day again, isn’t it? Beatrice, make the toast, will you? Ella’s finishing her maths, and your father will be here directly.’ She dished the eggs expertly and put them to keep warm. ‘Are you on holiday, Dr Latimer?’

      ‘I only wish I were. I must be back in town by noon…’

      ‘Good heavens! All that way.’

      ‘I had a fancy to watch the sunrise.’

      He took the knife from Beatrice and began to slice the loaf, and Mrs Browning, bursting with curiosity, sliced mushrooms into the frying pan, reflecting that he couldn’t possibly have driven down from London in time to see the sunrise, in which case, he must have spent the night somewhere nearby. After breakfast, when everyone had gone, she would phone the Elliotts… Lorna would surely know something about him. But her curiosity wasn’t to be satisfied; when everyone was out of the way Mrs Browning phoned her friend, only to discover that she was on the point of going out and had to leave the house on the instant. Mrs Browning put down the receiver with something of a thump.

      Beatrice, helping her father with his morning surgery, was wondering about Dr Latimer too; it was two hours’ hard driving to get to London, and he had said that he had patients to see at noon. There had been no sign of a car; he must have had one, though, parked somewhere nearby—or did he live close by?

      She had to hold a large, very cross cat while her father gave it an injection, her thoughts far away so that her father asked mildly, ‘Will you take Shakespeare back, my dear? Mrs Thorpe will be waiting for him… I want to see him in two weeks, so make an appointment, will you?’

      She bore Shakespeare away to his doting mistress, made an appointment in her neat hand and went back to the surgery where a small boy was standing, clutching a pet rat. She didn’t care for rats or mice, but years of helping her father had inured her to them. All the same, she shuddered slightly as she took the animal from its anxious owner. There was nothing much wrong; advice as to diet and a few words of encouragement, and the small boy went away happy to be replaced by Major Digby with his Labrador. Since he and her father were old friends, a good deal of time was spent in talking about the good fishing locally, the chances against Farmer Bates planting sugar beet instead of winter greens and the vagaries of the weather. Beatrice, aware that she was no longer needed, left the two gentlemen, tidied the waiting-room and went along to the kitchen, where her mother was putting a batch of loaves to rise.

      ‘I wonder where he lives?’ she asked as Beatrice walked in. ‘I have no idea, Mother. London, I would suppose, since that was where Great-Aunt Sybil went to see him. Probably he likes driving long distances.’

      Beatrice spoke rather tartly, and Mrs Browning gave her a quick look.

      ‘Oh, well,’ she observed, ‘we aren’t likely to see him again.’

      She was wrong. It was exactly a week later that Mr Browning had a heart attack—very early in the morning, on his way back from checking Lady Lamborne’s pet donkey. Beatrice, coming down to make early morning tea, found him lying at the kitchen door. He was conscious, but cold and clammy and a dreadful grey colour, and when she felt for his pulse it was fast and faint. She wasn’t a girl to lose her head in an emergency; she put a cushion under his head, covered him with the old rug which was draped over one of the Windsor chairs, told him bracingly that he was going to be all right and went to phone Dr Forbes, fetched her mother and then went back to crouch beside her father.

      Dr Forbes was there within ten minutes, listened to Beatrice’s calm voice, examined his old friend and told her to ring for an ambulance. ‘We’ll have to go to Salisbury,’ he told Mrs Browning. ‘I’ll give him an injection and we’ll keep him on oxygen.’ He patted her arm. ‘I think he’ll do, but it’s hard to tell for the moment. Thank heaven that Beatrice found him when she did.’

      ‘You stay with him while I put some things in a bag for him,’ said Beatrice. Her voice was quite steady, but her hands shook. ‘You’ll go with him? I’ll stay and sort things out here.’

      She was back with the bag within minutes, and urged her mother to get what she needed, ready to go in the ambulance. Her father was quiet now, but he looked so ill that she felt sick with fright, although nothing showed of that upon her pale face. She held one limp hand in hers, and stared down at her father, oblivious of everything else, so that she didn’t see Dr Latimer get out of his car at the same time as the ambulance drew up.

      A large, gentle hand on her shoulder made her look up. ‘Tell me what has happened, Beatrice.’ His voice was calm and matter of fact, so that she answered him readily.

      ‘Father—I found him here—Dr Forbes says he’s had a coronary thrombosis.’ She saw the ambulance for the first time. ‘He’s to go to Salisbury. Mother’s going with him.’

      Her voice had been steady enough, only it didn’t sound like hers.

      Dr Forbes had been talking to the ambulancemen; now he came to his patient. He paused when he saw Dr Latimer. ‘We’ve met,’ he said at once. ‘You gave a talk at the seminar in Bristol last year… Latimer—Dr Latimer, isn’t it?’

      He launched into a brief description of Mr Browning’s collapse, and Dr Latimer said, ‘Do you mind if СКАЧАТЬ