Betty Neels: Not Once But Twice

He drove a rather showy Mercedes Benz 450SL, and he drove fast, but Christina didn’t mind. She was blissfully happy; Adam had turned up again, quite miraculously, and for the moment the future didn’t matter a row of pins.

But in the little Greek restaurant, over kebab and a bottle of wine, she found herself telling him everything, something which astonished her, for she hadn’t confided in anyone, not even her closest friends, for years. She ended abruptly saying in a shamed voice: ‘I’m sorry, Adam, I’ve been boring on, why on earth didn’t you stop me?’

‘I didn’t want to. Besides, I’ve just had a perfectly splendid idea. How about coming to Holland and working for six months or a year?’

‘Me? But I can’t speak a word of Dutch!’

‘That won’t matter—you will be given a crash course. Do you speak any languages at all?’

‘Not fluently. I did French and German for A levels…’

He switched to French. ‘Do you have a liking for languages? Are you a quick student?’

She answered him in rather hesitant but correct French. ‘Yes, I think so, but how would I manage while I was learning?’

‘Everyone speaks English, especially in the hospitals, and almost all the medical terms are the same, only pronounced differently. You would get help.’

‘I think I might like it very much.’

He was speaking German now. ‘And I think you would do very well, Chrissy. Will you do it? I would like you to come very much.’ His blue eyes sparkled and she smiled back at him.

‘I’ll think about it,’ she told him in German.

‘And not too long.’ They were speaking English now. ‘It will be necessary for my partner—he’s my brother, and the senior and Directeur of the hospital—to agree.’

‘Oh, is he likely to object?’

Adam laughed. ‘Not at all likely. He objects almost never—he is a calm man, so calm that sometimes one does not know what he is really thinking about, but I have no doubt that he will be glad to have you on the hospital staff. I shall be going to den Haag this weekend, I’ll talk to him about it and let you know when I get back.’

She felt breathless. ‘Yes, well—it does sound rather super.’

‘Then that’s settled. I shall be back in Holland in a few weeks now, but we’ll see plenty of each other then, darling.’

Christina’s cheeks pinkened, but she said with composure: ‘Will you tell me something about Holland?’ And while he talked she watched him, unable to take her eyes from his face. She was behaving like a teenage idiot, she admonished herself as they drove back, and she was enjoying it. And when Adam kissed her goodnight at her brother’s door, she enjoyed that too.

THERE WERE three days until the weekend and Adam had said that he would return on the Monday, but Christina didn’t allow herself to get excited. She went steadily about her work, and if in the solitude of her room she spent rather longer than usual doing things to her face and trying out different hair-styles that was her business and no one else’s.

She remained calm, outwardly at least, when Monday came and went and there was no sign of Adam. She reminded herself of all the very good reasons why he hadn’t come and went home on the Tuesday evening, telling herself that he would be there when she arrived, or telephone or even write…

He had done none of these things. Moreover, Hilary was there, making it plain that Christina was making a quite unnecessary third, hinting plainly that there was a splendid film on at the Odeon and wouldn’t she like to see it.

‘Funny you should have said that,’ said Christina in a bright voice. ‘I’m meeting some of the others in an hour, we’re going to eat first, there’s just time before the second house.’

So she went to her room and changed, wished them a pleasant evening and left the house. The last thing she wanted to do; she was tired and depressed and hungry, and worst of all, supposing Adam came while she was out? She took a bus to Tottenham Court Road and sat through a film she wasn’t in the least interested in, eating a packet of sandwiches in the dark, because she hated going into cafés by herself.

She could hear voices from the sitting room as she let herself in later, so she shut the door loudly enough for them to hear her and then went in. George Henry and Hilary were sitting side by side looking at patterns of curtain material; obviously there had been no visitors. Christina said she’d had a lovely evening, wished them goodnight and whisked herself out of the room to make herself a pot of tea and carry it up to her room, together with the remains of a macaroni cheese from the fridge. It was quite late by now and it seemed rather a waste to fuss over her face and hair, because Adam wasn’t coming. Probably the senior partner had overruled him, probably too he himself had thought better of it. Life, she reflected, was full of small disappointments, but it didn’t do to grieve over them. She got into bed and went to sleep almost at once.

She wasn’t on until ten o’clock the next morning, which gave her time to rush out and do some household shopping before she went on duty. She had two days off, starting on the next day, and she occupied herself in deciding what to do. Usually she had spent a good part of them at home, keeping George Henry company at meals and quite often going out in the evening if he was free, but now he had Hilary… A day’s shopping, she thought; something new would be good for her and she could lunch at one of the big stores. She hadn’t been to Harrods for a long time; she could spend the afternoon there and have tea, and since Beryl’s steady had gone to Scotland for a week, she might spend the evening with her. There was another day to plan, of course, but that would do for the present.

The day seemed endless. The ward was full and several patients were very ill, so it was long after eight o’clock when she got off duty. She had to wait for a bus too and it had begun to rain a little as she walked the last stage of her journey. As she put her key in the door she thanked heaven that Hilary had gone to see her parents in Highgate. George Henry would have had his supper long since; she would boil herself an egg and would spend half an hour with him. She closed the door behind her and crossed the hall to the study; the vague murmur of voices would be the television—George Henry had the habit of switching it on and then walking away and forgetting all about it. She opened the door and went in.

Adam was there; she didn’t see anyone or anything else for a few moments. Her face lighted up with her delight and she cried ‘Adam, I thought you weren’t coming…’ before she realised that besides him and George Henry there was someone else in the room.

He had risen to his feet as she paused at the door, a tall man, taller than Adam and, unlike him, heavily built. He had the same handsome face, but his mouth was firm and his nose high-bridged; moreover, although his eyes were blue, they were pale and very clear. Christina wasn’t sure about his hair; it was so fair that it could have been grey or just flaxen. He wasn’t all that young either, in his thirties, and dressed with a conservative good taste very much in contrast to Adam’s rather flamboyant clothes. She had the instant impression of quietness before George Henry spoke.

‘Chrissy, how late you are. Adam has brought his brother to visit us to see you, actually.’ He frowned a little. ‘You didn’t tell me you were considering taking a post in Holland.’

She smiled at him. ‘Well, love, it seemed a bit silly to say anything before I knew more about it.’

She shook hands with Adam and turned to the other man. ‘This is Duert—I told him about you, and he decided he might as well come back with me and see you.’ Adam was still holding her hand and she pulled it away gently, to be engulfed in a very large firm one.