LITMIR.BIZ

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there’s no hurry, you haven’t got a job to go to now.’

      Gemma turned to look at him. ‘Nor have I.’ She waited while he opened the door and followed him inside; she knew the house as well as her own home; they had been friends for years now. She told him to go and sit down and went through to the kitchen to put the kettle on.

      They had finished their tea and were sitting discussing the fire and its consequences when the professor got back. Gemma heard the car turn into the drive and went away to make more tea; probably he would be hungry too. She spooned tea into the largest pot she could find and sliced bread for toast. She didn’t hear him when he came into the kitchen, but she turned round at his quiet ‘hullo’.

      ‘Tea and toast?’ she invited, unaware how deplorable she looked; her slacks and sweater were filthy with smoke and stains, her face was dirty too and her hair, most of it loose from the plait by now, was sadly in need of attention.

      The professor joined her at the stove, made the tea, turned the toast and then spread it lavishly with butter. He said to surprise her: ‘How nice you look.’

      Gemma stared at him over the tray she was loading, her mouth a little open. ‘Me—?’ She frowned. ‘If that’s a joke, I just don’t feel equal to it.’

      He took the tray from her and put it down on the table again. ‘It’s not a joke, I meant it.’ He bent and kissed the top of her tousled head and smiled at her; he didn’t look in the least tired. ‘You’re a jewel of a girl, Gemma—just like your name.’

      He took the tray and led the way back to the sitting room and they drank the pot dry, saying very little. It was when they had finished and she was stacking the cups on the tray again that he said in a matter-of-fact voice: ‘And now there is no reason why you shouldn’t come back with me, is there?’ He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Unless you object on personal grounds?’

      Gemma cast a glance at Doctor Gibbons, who had gone to sleep and would be of no help at all. She suddenly felt very sleepy herself so that her mumbled ‘No, of course I don’t’ was barely audible, but the professor heard all right and although his face remained placid there was a satisfied gleam in his eyes. His casual: ‘Oh, good,’ was uttered in tones as placid as the expression on his face, but he didn’t say more than that, merely offered to escort her to her own front door, and when they reached it, advised her to go to bed at once.

      A superfluous piece of advice; Gemma tore off her clothes, washed her face in a most perfunctory manner and was asleep the moment her uncombed head touched the pillow.

      CHAPTER THREE

      GEMMA slept all through the sounds of a household getting up and preparing itself for the day, perhaps because everyone was so much quieter than usual, for the professor, keeping watch from his window until Cousin Maud opened the back door so that Giddy might go out, presented himself at it without loss of time, and over a cup of tea with her, recounted the night’s events. It was hard to believe, looking at him, that he had himself taken part in them, for he appeared the very epitome of casual elegance, freshly shaved and bathed, his blue eyes alert under their heavy lids. Only when she looked closely Maud could see the lines of fatigue in his face. A tough man, she decided as she went round the house cautioning her young relations to behave like mice so that Gemma might sleep on.

      And sleep she did, until almost midday, to go downstairs much refreshed and eat an enormous meal while Cousin Maud plied her with hot coffee and questions. She ate the last of the wholesome cheese pudding before her, washed up, invited her cousin to come upstairs with her while she dressed, and signified her intention of cycling over to the ruins of Millbury House to see exactly what was to happen. ‘Perhaps it will close down for good,’ she wondered worriedly. ‘What do you think, Maud?’

      The older woman sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘Well, dear, I should think it very likely, wouldn’t you? There must have been an awful lot of damage done and it would cost a fortune to rebuild the place. Doctor Gibbons is coming in to tea if he can spare the time—perhaps he’ll know something. He telephoned this morning—he said you were marvellous. Ross said so too.’

      Gemma piled her hair neatly on top of her head and started to pin it there. ‘Oh—did you see him, then?’

      ‘He was at the back door this morning when I went down, to tell me that you’d only just got to bed.’ She got up and strolled over to the window. ‘You know, Gemma, it might not be such a bad idea, to take that job Ross suggested. No, don’t look like that, dear—he didn’t talk about it; Doctor Gibbons told me—I imagine that he thought I already knew about it.’ There was faint reproach in her voice.

      Gemma was making haste with her face. ‘I should have told you—I did mean to, but I wasn’t sure—I mean it was only to be for a week or two and although he said he could make it all right with Matron, I was a bit doubtful about her wanting me back. But now I suppose there’s nothing for me to go back to.’ She went and put an arm through her cousin’s. ‘I’ll go and find out now. Would you mind if I did go? There’s an awful lot to do here, you know.’

      Cousin Maud, who had been doing it for years, agreed a little drily, ‘But it’s time Mandy and Phil helped out a little more, and you haven’t had a holiday for years—not that this job sounds much like a holiday, but at least it will be a change of scene.’

      Gemma mulled over her cousin’s words as she cycled along the lanes and forgot them when she saw the charred ruins of the hospital. It really had been badly damaged; true, the Victorian extension at the back had escaped more or less intact, but it had never been used as wards for the patients; the rooms were poky and dark and there were any number of small staircases which the old ladies would never have managed. Gemma propped her bike against a tree and went round to the back and through a door which looked as though it belonged to a church but led instead to a narrow, damp passage leading to the back hall. It was here that Matron had her flat. Gemma knocked on the door and was relieved to hear Matron’s voice bidding her go in, for she remembered then, a little late in the day, that she had gone to the Rectory. But Matron was there, all right, in uniform too, looking calm and collected, just as though the hospital hadn’t been burned around her ears only a few hours earlier.

      She looked up as Gemma went in and smiled at her. ‘Sister Prentice, I’m glad you’ve come. I’ve been hearing about this job you’ve been offered—at least one of my staff won’t be out of work.’

      Gemma took the chair she had been waved to. ‘You mean the hospital can’t be rebuilt?’

      Matron nodded. ‘I’m almost sure of it. There’s only been a preliminary survey, of course, but any idiot can see that it would need rebuilding completely—what a splendid chance for the Hospital Board, who have been wanting to close us down for months, but of course something will have to be done, the other hospitals can’t absorb our old ladies permanently. At the moment they’re distributed around the area, but a handful of them will be able to come to Vicar’s Place—a large empty house some miles away. I don’t know yet, for no one has said anything, but I hope that I shall be asked to go there as Matron until such time as larger premises can be found—probably years. I shall only need two nurses there, for it won’t take more than ten patients.’ She smiled at Gemma. ‘It will take a very long time to settle, Sister Prentice, and I doubt if I can offer you even the prospect of a job.’ She added bracingly: ‘You could get a post in London very easily, you know—your references are excellent.’

      Gemma shook her head. ‘That wouldn’t do at all, Matron. This job was marvellous, it meant that I could live at home, you see—there are so many of us and it’s not fair that Cousin Maud should have to manage alone.’

      Matron agreed: ‘Yes, of course. Well, shall we leave things as they are and you could come and see me when you get back.’

      It was a little vague, but Gemma could see that there wasn’t much to be done at the moment. She agreed without demur and asked after her patients.

      ‘Scattered round half a dozen hospitals, but unharmed, I’m glad to say. Their resilience

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