A Case of Heart Trouble (2 page)

. and the slow smile of gratitude that curved her lips.

“Thank you, Doctor,” she said, a trifle inaudibly, “for choosing me.”

He put out his hand to her, and she put hers into it. He squeezed and retained her fingers.

“Didn’t I say you’re the only pretty nurse they’ve got here?” he reminded her teasingly. “And what man would choose a plain nurse, when he could have a pretty one?”

CHAPTER TWO

Two weeks later he was discharged from Ardrath House with the two sticks he had predicted, and Nurse Drew accompanied him on the long journey to Yorkshire. As he elected to go by car they broke their journey half-way, and stayed at a little inn where Dallas had her first real opportunity to get to know him away from the somewhat restricting atmosphere of the nursing home.

In the car he had seemed somewhat somnolent, lulled by the motion of the chauffeur-driven vehicle that was superbly comfortable; but no sooner did they stop for tea at the inn than he wakened up. He became alert and smiling, assuring Dallas that the effects of the drive so far had been entirely beneficial, and that his injured left leg was not in the least cramped, or causing him any discomfort. He also, stated, rather boyishly, that he loved having tea on a September afternoon in a centuries-old inn.

But, although he called for toast and scones, and everything they could provide, he ate very little. He watched Dallas presiding behind the teapot in her uniform, and suddenly started to frown.

“Can’t you wear something else?” he asked. “I want to forget Ardrath House for a time.”

Dallas looked surprised.

“But it’s customary to wear uniform when looking after a patient,” she protested. “And I don’t think Matron would approve if I suddenly discarded it in favor of ordinary clothes. In any case, I haven’t brought very many with me.”

“What have you brought with you?” he asked.

“Oh, a tweed skirt and jumpers ... a pair of slacks for when I’m really off duty. That sort of thing.”

“Then you’ll wear the tweed skirt, the jumpers and the slacks when you get to Loring Court,” he informed her dictatorially. “I’ll be responsible to Matron if any trouble arises.”

For an instant Dallas was so amused by the thought of Matron’s face if she ever caught her tucking up a patient for his afternoon’s rest wearing slacks and a casual sweater that she uttered a soft, attractive giggle. Martin Loring, whose face had been contorting slightly as if he was enduring twinges of pain—and she was pretty sure he was, despite his assertions—appeared to relax again, and he said approvingly:

“You have a funny little laugh, Nurse Drew. I like the sound of it. It reminds me of the days when I used to laugh a lot myself.”

She regarded him thoughtfully. It was true that, when he did laugh—which was, actually, rather rarely—it was a short, sardonic sound. Just as his smile always seemed edged with something that was either malice or a too keen amusement.

“You’re in pain, aren’t you?” she said suddenly, quietly. “Would you like a couple of your tablets? You can have them now, you know. It’s several hours since you had the last.”

“Don’t tell me what I can and can’t have,” he replied. His eyes had a bleak, hollow kind of smile in them. “I know exactly the kind of effect the muck I swallow is likely to have on me. If you want to deceive your patient, Nurse, you must pick on one who isn’t a doctor.”

“And you will have the tablets?”

“No. In about an hour I can have a drink—and you, too!—and in the meantime I’ll tell you something about Loring Court. I was born there, you know. It’s belonged to my family for generations. Three hundred years, in fact.”

“How wonderful! ” she exclaimed.

“Why is it wonderful?” He looked skeptical. “A house is a place that draws one back to it again and again. ... A home is something more. However, Loring Court is very old and very beautiful. Its situation is isolated, as I warned you, but the country is magnificent. I hope you like walking on moors, and that sort of thing? At this time of year we get a lot of mist, but there will be wonderful days.

Days when it’s good to be alive, full of a wet heathery smell, and with the afternoon sunshine building up into a magnificent sunset. And if you like to get up early you’ll see wonderful dawns, too.” Dallas, whose green eyes reflected every passing emotion as if they were bits of clear green glass, was plain attracted by the thought of getting up early to receive such a reward. She clasped her slim hands round her knees and leaned towards him eagerly.

“That sounds marvellous,” she declared. “I’ve never lived very much in the country myself, but I’ve always craved to do so. My people are Londoners, I’m afraid . . . what you’d call ‘Cits’.”

“You don’t look like a Cit,” he told her. “You look like a spring morning in the flower garden at Loring ... or you would if you weren’t wearing that uniform.” She colored, and he apologized dryly. “I shouldn’t pay compliments like that to my nurse, should I? Particularly when she’s unchaperoned. However, my aunt is a proper old dragon, so don’t worry.”

“I’m not,” she confessed, the color fading, although she found it a little difficult to meet a certain dry twinkle in his eyes. “And what about your daughter?” she asked. “Does she spend a lot of time at Loring?”

“Only during school holidays,” he replied curtly. “She’s at school on the south coast, as I expect you know.”

“Yes. The school matron brought her to see you when you were

“On the danger list?” He grinned. “Poor child, I hope they didn’t tell her I was likely to depart this life at any moment!”

“Of course not. But she realized you were very ill. She’s very pretty,” she added, as if she hoped to draw him still further. “And not very old, to be at boarding school, is she?”

He looked away from her. His face looked suddenly shut in and cold.

“She’s nearly eight,” he replied. “And she gets her looks from her mother.”

“I see,” she said.

Barely half an hour later he was demanding the drink he had been looking forward to from the moment they stopped at the inn, and she agreed to allow him a very small one. She declined to have anything herself, however, and insisted that he went upstairs to his room and to bed immediately after it. He protested, grumblingly.

“But I thought we were going to have dinner downstairs together tonight. They’ve a wonderful oak-panelled dining room here, and I thought we might run to a bottle of champagne. . . .”

He was teasing her, she knew, hoping to see her trained hackles rise, but she disappointed him by merely saying firmly:

“Oh, no. Nothing of that sort yet.”

“I’ve a nasty feeling you’re going to turn out to be a dragon, like my aunt,” he said peevishly.

She thrust a thermometer into his mouth, in order to be on the safe side.

“I may be only a first-year nurse, but I know my job,” she said quietly.

“So it seems,” he returned, speaking with difficulty because of the thermometer. “Thank heavens I didn’t pick on a second- or third-year one.” The next day they arrived at Loring Court, and the

doctor’s aunt came out to welcome them. The little village of Loring was so tiny, and huddled so picturesquely in a pocket of the moors, that Dallas thought she was immensely fortunate to have travelled north to see it. It had all the ageless charm of moorland villages, and the church was pure Norman, with a squat tower that looked out across the moor. Loring Court was mellow as a gem in an old-fashioned setting in the clear, pale light of noon. One wall was entirely covered in a creeper that glowered like blood against the light, there were some magnificent

trees in the drive, and the gardens were full of autumnal beauty.

Mrs. Letitia Loring—Aunt Letty—failed to strike Dallas as having very much in common with a dragon. She was plump and white-headed, placid and, to judge by her expression, benevolent, and she welcomed her nephew with affection and a kind of amiable concern for his welfare.

A special lunch had been prepared for them, and the cook was upset when the returning master seemed to have little appetite for it. He was too exhausted to take his customary place in the dining room—one of the most beautiful, mellow rooms Dallas had ever seen—and instead he had it on a tray in the library. Even so, the tray was scarcely touched when it was removed, and Aunt Letty looked at Dallas meaningfully. The look said plainly, he has a long way to go yet before he’s fit! This is going to be rather a trying convalescence for everyone!

Dallas was afraid it was . . . but she was thinking of the patient, and not of herself. Martin Loring was naturally, she had decided, rather a moody man, and his accident had done something to deprive him of a certain zest for life which he had previously known. Or she imagined it had! he couldn’t always have been as irritable and impatient, as alternately sunk in fits of deep despondency and harsh cynicism as he was now. For the last few miles of -the journey from London he had been almost literally consumed with impatience to be home . . . and then, when the car turned in at the gates, and he saw it for the first time for months, he had turned his face to the wall, as it were, and declined to be thrilled because they had arrived.

Aunt Letty drew Dallas out into the hall when she had settled her patient on a long, comfortable couch in front of a brightly burning log fire in the library, once his tray had been removed, and she looked her up and down a little curiously before she spoke.

“I’ve made arrangements, Nurse, for my nephew to have his old suite in the west wing . . . the one he had, that is, before he was married. It’s convenient, and there’s a pleasant room which I thought you would occupy, and which connects with his bedroom.” She coughed slightly. “I must confess I expected to see someone older than you are. One always thinks of nurses as being sort of seasoned and practical.”

„ I hope you’ll find I’m completely practical,” Dallas replied, understanding perfectly what she meant. “And although I’m not precisely seasoned, I’ve done a year’s full training.”

Mrs. Loring coughed again.

“I’m a little surprised that Matron didn’t pick on someone—or

advise someone—older.”

Dallas smiled very slightly.

“I’m afraid your nephew picked on me himself, Mrs. Loring. Since you are his aunt you must be well aware that he isn’t easily influenced once his mind is made up.”

“How right you are,” Mrs. Loring agreed, in a dry tone. “For want of a better word I’d say he’s downright pigheaded when-he’s well and possibly ten times more pigheaded when he’s ill.”

She showed Dallas the suite she was to share with her patient, and it was certainly very attractive, with large windows overlooking the lawns and the shrubberies, and furnished in a manner that would ensure them the very maximum amount of comfort. In Dallas’s own bedroom there was so much wardrobe space that her few frocks looked lost when she had hung them up in it, and her drawers were intended to hold piles of filmy underwear, and not the easily laundered nylon essentials she had brought with her.

Even her dressing gown looked slightly apologetic hanging on the gleaming, white-painted door, and she thought of other dressing gowns that must have hung there from time to time, and was sure they were far more elegant.

Having emptied her cases and stowed away her things, she went out into the garden. She could see the rooms she had just left, in the wing of the house that was more Queen Anne than Tudor— and the house itself was largely Tudor—and she wondered why Mrs. Loring had decided her nephew would raise no objections to being deprived of the benefits of his rightful quarters in the house, and in any case, why there was never any mention of his wife. Surely, if he was on good terms with his wife, she would have been to visit him long before this? But it was fairly obvious she no longer resided in Loring Court. Or she was not a resident at the moment.

When she went in for tea Dallas had acquired a delightful color in her face, and her hair was slightly blown about by the warm September breeze. She had wandered in a centuries-old rose-garden, where the air was full of perfume, walked beside a reed- fringed lake that had a small island and a summerhouse in the middle of it, lingered in the sunshine on the terrace, and now she was ready for the typical afternoon tea that she was certain would be served in this house, complete with silver teapot, cream jug, etc., and the usual assortment of little cakes and gateaux.

But first she had to make certain that her patient was ready for his tea, too. He was lying regarding the fire with a slightly lowering expression when she entered the room, but it lifted at once, and he smiled when he recognized her.

“So there you are, Nurse!” he said. His eyes took in the slight confusion of the hair under her cap, the rosy glow in her cheeks. “Country air suits you, Nurse,” he remarked, quietly. “But didn’t I tell you to get out of that uniform?”

She made a little gesture with her hands.

“Please don’t ask me to do the impossible, Doctor,” she begged. “Your aunt is already having serious misgivings because I look so young, and if, in addition to looking young, I look casual and incompetent, I think she’ll be quite likely to ring up the nursing home and ask for a replacement.”

He scowled darkly.

“I told you my aunt was a nuisance,” he said. “She doesn’t mean to interfere . . . but she constantly does. She’s the most amiable person in the world, if you’re on the right side of her, but once you offend her good taste, or her sense of correctness, she jibs. However, there’ll be no question of anyone replacing you. You can take my word for that.”

“And you won’t mind if I stick to my uniform? I’d feel entirely wrong without it, honestly I would.” “Then you shall wear it during the peak hours of the day, and in the evening you can put on a

frock. How’s that?” “In the evening I shall still be on duty,” she reminded him.

He sighed.

“Humor me a little. If you don’t wish to retard my progress, humor me sometimes ... at least. I know I’m a difficult man, but I usually have a reason for being difficult.”

“Then I’ll put on a frock the first night you stay up for dinner. “I’m staying up tonight.”