The Fortunes of Springfield (2 page)

No one had to be sensible. One must never panic. If there were times, in the middle of the ni
ghty
when one woke to despair, wondering how one girl, alone in the world, could succeed in life, these times were known only to herself.

David Springfield called upon Duncan Wescott to make his acquaintance, thank
him
for his trouble in writing, and ask his advice about a person to act as housekeeper, and to take on the thankless task of managing the children. For he recognized that the children could be
unman
ageable.
He found that Duncan was a man of about forty-five, very much in the prime of life, tall, stalwart, still brown-haired with only a trace of grey. Immediately, he took a liking to him. Here was integrity and genuineness.

Duncan promised to try and think of somebody suitable. He took the problem to Patricia
Close
, a neighbour, a young woman of twenty-eight, well known in the neighbourhood and knowing almost everybody. She said she would also think about it and took the problem, in her turn, to her mother.

“
Mama
darling,” she said, coming into a warm and cosy drawing-room at tea-time, “I’ve been talking to Duncan Wescott and he tells
me that Gerald’s brother has arrived at Springfield, and taken over.”

“I’
m very pleased to hear it. Come and sit by the fire, Patricia. You must be cold: I’m sure it’s freezing again already
.”

Patricia seated herself and took a cup of tea.

“That would be David, of course,” said Mrs. Close. “I remember
him
well—as a boy of eighteen, of course. He was always my favourite—I liked him much better than Gerald. Do you remember him?”

“Of course I do, Mama. If he was eighteen, I was thirteen. I know I thought him terribly handsome, and was already entertaining romantic thoughts about him.”

“Really, Patricia, how precocious you must have been. I’m afraid the poor boy has come back to a lot of trouble.”

“The poor boy is now thirty-three, dear; and, from what Duncan tells me, he has become a man of action. He has already sent the Church woman packing, got somebody in to help temporarily, and let his men know that, if they want to keep their jobs, they’ve got to
work. And that brings me to the point. He asks Duncan, and Duncan asks me, and now I ask you—who would be suitable to take over that house and those children in the state they are in?”

“I wonder,” said her mother, pausing in drinking her tea to consider the problem. She was lost in thought for a, few minutes. Then she said, gently and matter-of-factly:

“I w
o
nder if Caroline would do?”

Her daughter looked at her in a
dmiratio
n,

“Mama, you’re wonderful. Why didn’t I think of Caroline? Why didn’t Duncan? I should
thin
k
she would be ideal.”

“I don’t know, though, if we ought to push her into such a difficult job.”

“We haven’t got to push her, darling, we just have to mention the possibility to her, and she will make up her own mind. Why, the more I think of it, the more I think she is the very person. Do you know where she is?”

“No, but Annie will know, and
Anni
e is in Brier Cottage with Hilda. We can easily find her.”

Patricia telephoned Duncan, who telephoned David at Springfield, and in a few days a meeting was arranged between David and Caroline. David thought it should be at the house, so that Caroline would know the worst, and Caroline arrived on a lowering February afternoon, a cold and wind-swept afternoon, when everything took on a more-dismal-than-usual atmosphere. Mrs. Davis showed her into a fireless sitting-room, and went to find Mr. Springfield.

Caroline looked about her. She thought at once how cheerless it was. It had the penetrating cold of a shut
-
up room, and an air of neglect. The windows were tightly shut, there were no flowers, no fire, no signs that people lived or enjoyed themselves here. Some of the furniture was very good, but the wood had the dry, starved look that showed Caroline it had not been polished for years, and the tops were considerably scratched. The upholstered furniture all looked as if the
spr
ing
s
needed attention, and certainly the covers and cushions needed washing, and the carpets cleaning. There would be a lot to do here—that was obvious.

The door opened, and a very big man came into the room. He stopped when he saw Caroline, and for a few timeless seconds both of them adjusted themselves to their considerable surprise. David thought for a moment that Mrs. Davis must be mistaken—this could not be Miss Caroline Hearst, this slim, trim girl in a camelhair coat and a little brown hat, with wonderfully neat shoes and stockings, altogether so immaculate that she was a pleasure to look at. He had been told that she was one of the two members of Mrs. Webster’s staff: that old Annie was retiring, bu
t
that Caroline was available. He had thought of them all as old, and one of his doubts had been that she might be too old to manage the children. This was very different, indeed.

Caroline, too, was surprised. She had known Mr. Gerald Springfield slightly, and, hearing that his brother had returned to England from New Zealand to look after Gerald’s affairs, she had at once thought of David as an older brother. This vigorous young man in a suit of thick grey tweed, who carried about with him an air of impatience, and who seemed to take her in completely with penetrating glances from his dark eyes, was a surprise indeed.

“Please sit down, Miss Hearst,” said David. “I’m sorry it is so cold in here—the kitchen is the only room in the house with a fire.”

“That’s all right,” Caroline assured him.

“I expect Mr. Wescott explained to you what the position is here?”

“Mrs. Close did. I only know Mr. Wescott by sight—he came occasionally to Mrs. Webster’s house.”

“They tell me you are free to take on a job, but I feel that you should know first what that job entails. Then you can decide and let me know. Just what did Mrs. Close tell you?”

This is a very direct man, thought Caroline.

“That you had come to take over your brother’s house and family, and needed a housekeeper.”

“Did she say that both the house and family had been neglected?”

Caroline smiled.

“Yes, I think she made the position fairly plain.”

“And you still came along to consider it?
T
hat
is a hopeful sign.”

“But I think I should tell you, said Caroline, “that, although Mrs. Close prevailed upon me to come and see you, I have almost made up my mind to get a job abroad. But she was so persuasive: she asked me at least to talk it over with you.”

“I hardly see any point in it,” said David brusquely, “if you aren’t going to take the job.”

“If wasn’t as definite as that,” replied Caroline. “In fact, she was so eloquent about the poor, neglected children that I thought that, if you considered me suitable and if there really was an awkward predicament, I might help out temporarily, and get my job abroad later on.”

“That, of course, is entirely up to you. There is certainly something of a predicament, and I have to find somebody to help get us out of it; but I
think
I must tell you that there is plenty of work here. For myself, there is so much to do outside that I can’t be of much use to you inside. I have a full-time job on my hands for a long period; though I shall see to it that the essential repairs to the house are carried out. You would have to run the house and the three children. Do you think you could do it?”

“It is a big house,” said Caroline. “Would there be
any help at all?”

“We mi
ght
get Mrs. Davis to come in and help with the rough work. I will get her to show you over the place. Two of the children are at a small private school and have their midday meal there. They get back at about four in the afternoon. If you are to know the worst, I should tell you that they are not very well-behaved.”

“How old are they?”

“Terence is eight, Wendy six and Barbara four.”

“Perhaps I could stay and see them? It is nearly four o’clock now. And perhaps Mrs. Davis could show me over the house first?”

“Certainly.”

“If
you decided to take me on—and I decided to come—when would you want me?”

“I have decided,” said David firmly. “I do want to
ta
ke
you on. And I’d like you to come as soon as possible—right away, in fact.”

“Monday would be the earliest. I have no experience with children, Mr. Springfield.” Then she remembered the home that she had been brought up in. “At least, only a little, a long time ago.”

“I’m
sure you have common sense, and that is a good deal more than has gone into looking after them for a long while.”

He went to the door and called Mrs. Davis and handed Caroline over to her. “I will see you before you go,” he said, and watched her walk towards the kitchen. He hoped she would not be too discouraged by the state of the house, and he hoped, doubtfully, that the children would not be too badly behaved. For she looked a girl of sense and he wanted her to come. But a girl as immaculately groomed as she was, a girl who obviously laid great stress on cleanliness, was
going to find a lot in this house to put her off.

Caroline, however, going round the big house with Mrs. Davis, was already deciding to came. She had been for so long among people who were old, and here, in this house, was youth. Mr. Springfield was a young man, thirty-five perhaps, she hazarded. Thirty-five, even to her twenty-three, seemed young after Mrs. Webster and Annie and their diverse friends. The children would be a great contrast to all
that
, if they were not complete little horrors, she would stay. Mrs. Davis was saying:

“I’ve done what I could, but of course the whole place needs a proper doing. You should have seen it! What that Miss Church did all day long I don’t know, but she certainly never did a thing in the house. And letting those children run wild, too...”

There was a deal more in the same strain as she conducted Caroline round, but Caroline thought she was, in spite of her chatter, a good, kindly soul; and asked her, with her frank and charming smile, if she would come and help, if Caroline took the job.

“
Well, I
might
manage that. The money does come in useful. I must see what my old man
thin
k
s
about it.” Having seen the house, they returned to the kitchen to find the children there. Barbara had been to the end of the drive to meet the other two, and now all three stared at Caroline suspiciously. She smiled at them in a friendly fashion, and when they all gathered about the kitchen table for their tea, she studied them as unobtrusively as possible.

They were good-looking children, but they had no friendliness, no openness of manner, except for Wendy at times. She thought that Terence would be a difficult child. His demeanour was truculent, his expression sullen, and he refused stubbornly to meet her eyes or to speak to her. Wendy was a somewhat different proposition, for her reserved watchfulness was sometimes broken by a sunny smile, and a lilting voice which was a joy to hear. She could make conversation with a certain amount of self-possession. Babs was certainly tiresome, with appalling table manners, up and down from her chair half a dozen times, dropping things, spilling things, rudely refusing to do as she was told. Caroline took it all in. “There are no problem children,” she remembered reading. “Only problem parents.”
Or problem guardians, she added.

When tea was finished, and Caroline said she must go, Wendy said:

“Will you come and see us again, please?”

“Yes, I will,” Caroline promised, and went out to find Mr. Springfield. David was just coming into the house from outside and stopped at once, facing Caroline in the hall.

“Well?” he asked her.

Caroline smiled. How brusque he was, she thought, and, as if her thought had reached him, he added: “Now that you have seen the worst, what do you feel?”

“I will come,” she said. “Until you can find somebody to replace me.”

“Good. That is excellent.”

They discussed the terms of her employment, and then David asked her how she had come, and hearing
t
hat
the bus journey was slow and at most inconvenient times, insisted upon taking her back to the town in his car. As it sped along the lane and then the country road, she said:

“If you want references, Mr. Springfield, the Vicar or Dr. Barding or Mr. Welford at the Bank will provide them.”

“Thank you. I
think
that is good enough.”

They came to The Hollies. They stood together on the pavement to say good-bye. He was much taller than she. She had to look up, tilting her head a little to see
him
when he spoke.

“Good-bye, Miss Hearst. I shall expect you on Monday, and knowing the job you’ve taken on, I wish you luck.”

He held out his hand to her and she put hers into
it
.

“Thank you, Mr. Springfield. May I wish you the same?”

He smiled down at her.

“I think we shall both need it
,
” he said, getting back into his car. He sketched a brief salute with his hand, and then was gone, back along the road to Springfield.

Caroline stood on the pavement where he had left her, breathing in the cold, pure night air, lost in thought. It would be a change from Mrs. Webster’s, that much was certain. There was a tremendous amount to be done, in the house, but it was not the house that had first place in her thoughts. There was even more to be done for the children; and more for their mental well-being perhaps, than their physical.
“
They are all over the place, poor dears,” she thought, “especially Terence. Drifting about without guidance. No security, that’s the trouble. No guidance and no security; or perhaps it’s even deeper than
that
.
No loving.”

Yes, she thought, turning to go into The Hollies, I have certainly taken
on
a job there. And a feeling of excitement mounted in her. There was a challenge here which she was pleased to take up.