These Delights (18 page)

“Luke! Watch me! See how high I can go!”

They all stood watching her, her young body curving first in, then out, her fair hair flying as she leaned far out on the downward swing.

It was Lou who shouted, “Vicky!
Prenez garde
!”
too late as one of the ropes snapped and she was thrown out of the swing in a wide, graceful curve.

“Vicky
!”
Luke cried as she did not move, and the note in his voice made Hester look at him sharply, before she hurried forward with the others.

Vicky lay on the lawn, her arms flung wide, and Hester hoped that only she had seen Luke’s face as he ran to kneel beside her.

“Vicky
...”
He gathered her into his arms and tried to rouse her, and presently he picked her up and carried her into the house.

“Knocked out, I expect. Damn shame!” said Tregenna. He was used to spills in the hunting field and felt only a cursory interest.

“I’ll get some brandy,” Diana said, cool and efficient as ever. “She probably bumped her head.”

She went out of the room just as Pauline and Lou, who had been stunned to momentary silence, burst in through the window.

“She’s dead, she’s dead!” shrieked Lou, and Pauline burst into tears.

“It is your fault!” sobbed Lou, pointing at Diana who was coming back with the brandy. “First your dog kills Bibi, and now your spring
kills
Vicky! Your fault, your fault, your fault
—”

He would have gone on indefinitely had not Hester slapped him sharply and told him to be quiet.

“Better get them out of here,” said Luke, and Hester went back to the terrace with Lou and Pauline clinging to her.

“Good heavens!” exclaimed Lady Sale, appearing on the scene, “What a mercy it wasn’t one of the village children—we should never have heard the end of it.”

Luke slipped an arm under Vicky’s head as she lay on the sofa, and took the glass from Diana. His face was a little white and she looked at him curiously.

“I’ve often fallen o
ff
of the swing when I was little,” she said. “She isn’t really hurt.”

“She fell on her
back
,” said Luke briefly.

“Personally, I think she fell on her head,” said Tregenna.

“Well, she’s coming round nicely,” observed Diana, watching the color begin to flow back under the tanned skin.

“Better?” asked Luke.

Vicky blinked up at him.

“What happened?” she asked weakly.

“A rope broke and you fell out of the swing,” he told her. “Serve you right for showing off.”

Her long eyes narrowed and she wrinkled her nose. “Yes, I was showing off—to you,” she said. “I think I have a pain somewhere.”

“Where? Your back?”

“I don’t know.” She sat up and swung her feet carefully to the ground.

“See if you can stand,” said Luke, “but easy, now.”

She stood up a little shakily, clinging to his arm, and walked a few steps.

“That’s enough, now. Does it hurt you to walk?”

“I’
m not sure. My spine feels funny.”

“Well,
I think we’ll get you into the hospital and have an X-ray. Come along. I’ll carry you to the car.”

“Oh, really, Luke, that’s hardly necessary, is it?” Diana protested. “I’ve had far worse falls than that, hunting, and haven’t bothered about X-rays.”

“She fell on her
back
,” Luke repeated, picking Vi
ck
y up. “There’s no sense in taking dunces. Diana, do you think Noakes could possibly run Hester and the children home, then I can get straight into Plymouth.”

She gave a little shrug.

“Oh, very well, but I think you’re making a great deal of fuss about nothing.”

He carried Vi
ck
y out and her head rested contentedly against his shoulder. Tregenna went with them to help Luke settle her in the
back
of the car, and Diana was left for a moment with her mother.

“She could walk perfectly well if she liked,” she said
.

Lady Sale inspected her ringed hands.

“I dare say,” she said, “but Luke’s very fond of her, you know.”

“He makes her ten times worse,” snapped Diana. “I can’t help it, Mother, I don’t like that child, and never will.”

Her mother gave her shoulder a little tap.
“But don’t
show
it so much, dear girl,” she said with exasperation. “All the world can tell you don’t like her, including Luke.”

Hester had sent Pauline and Lou to bed by the time Luke brought Vicky home. Corky was waiting anxiously with hot soup and the remains of the blackberry pudding, unsure whether to hot up the liver and onions again or boil an egg lightly. He was most distressed by Vicky’s accident and was relieved to see her walk into the house beside Luke.

“She’s all right,” Luke told Hester. “Bad bruising which is bound to be painful for a bit, but no serious damage. They say she must rest, so no gallivanting over the moor, or carting pigswill with Tom, young woman.”

“No, Luke,” said Vicky, and put her arms round Hester’s neck, kissing her fondly. “Dear Cousin Hester, I’m sorry to have been such a nuisance and spoilt the party.”

Hester gave her a small hug.

“Well, I’m glad it’s no worse,” she said. “You gave us all a fright, Vicky. Do you feel hungry?”

“Ravenous but sick,” said Vicky, and Hester laughed. “Very likely after that shake-up—sick, I mean. I think soup and an egg, Corky, and perhaps a cup of your excellent cocoa when she’s in bed. You’d better put, your feet up on the sofa, Vicky, while Corky’s getting your supper, and afterwards we’ll get you upstairs quickly. I’ll go and see if I can give him a hand.”

Hester had lighted a small wood fire in the living-room, and Vicky lay on the sofa beside it and stretched herself gingerly. Luke regarded her with tenderness. She looked tired and it was plainly hurting her to move, but he felt
a
vast relief that the damage was no worse.

She wrinkled her nose at
him.

“Were you really worried, Luke?” she asked.

“I was frankly frightened,” he retorted. “One never knows what a spine injury may involve, and you’re very precious to me, Vicky.”

“Precious—me?” Her eyes opened widely. “Oh, Luke, that is lovely. You are precious to me, too.”

“Am I, Vicky? It’s funny, isn’t it? But I feel I’ve always known you. I might have almost watched you grow up, so well can I imagine what you were like—at fourteen, say—long legs like a little colt, and very untidy; at ten, rather a shrimp and full of questions. You’ve always been full of questions, and answers, too, haven’t you?”

She stretched out a hand t
o
him, and made room for him on the sofa.

“I too have known you,” she said a little shyly. “I think I know you better than you know yourself, for you do not think you are exceptional, do you?”

“Not very,” he laughed. “I’m ordinary enough, I’m afraid, Vicky, and rather dull.”

“No, you are not ordinary. You have tenderness and understanding, and—and simplicity, I think. Not all men have these gifts.”

“
You have simplicity yourself,” he said softly. “A lovely shining simplicity that warms. Don’t ever lose it
.
”

“I
—”
she began. “No, there are some things I must
not say.”

“Even to me?”

“Even to you—most of all to you.” She winced suddenly, and he pulled a cushion lower for her.

“Roll over on your face, and I’ll rub your back,” he said.

She turned carefully, and he began to rub her back with careful, sensitive fingers. The firelight flickered across her relaxed body and she gave a deep sigh.

“The gentle apostle—Luke, the physician,” she said, as she had told
him
once before. “It suits you, the name, Luke.”

He stooped and kissed the tender nape of her neck where the thick hair had parted and fallen aside, and there was silence between them until Hester came in with the lamp, followed by Corky carrying a laden tray.

“
Now, you two, nursery supper in front of the fire, and then bed,” Hester said, and she set the lamp on a table and turned up the wick.

Vicky was very sleepy by the time the meal was over and reluctant to make the effort to go upstairs.
Smiling,
Luke picked her up and carried her to her room.

“Hester will bring you some cocoa and aspirin when you’re in bed,” he said.

She raised drowsy eyes to his.

“You bring it. Then you can say good night to me in bed.”

“All right, you wheedler.”

“And some for Pauline, too?”

“And some for Pauline, too. Now hurry up and get undressed.”

They were both sitting up in bed when he brought the tray up, looking very alike with their wide, high cheekbones and expectant eyes, their hair neat and shining for the night. He sat on Pauline’s bed while they drank their cocoa, then he tucked them both up, kissed them each good night, and snuffed out the candle.

Hester was coming up the stairs as he closed the door, and they said good night on the landing.

“Have a good night’s rest,” she said and gave him a long, uncertain look. Then she smiled, a fond, rather shy smile, and, touching his hand for a moment, went into her own room.

The next morning Diana and her father drove over to enquire. Vicky was lying on a chaise-longue in the garden, Huxley’s
Point Counter Point
open on her lap, but her attention was on the drowsy-sounding bees that were pillaging Hester’s flowers.

Sir Harry put a bunch of his choicest
Madame Butterfly’s
into Vicky’s arms, and glanced at the title of her book.

“Huxley—h’m,” he remarked. “Last time I was here you were going straight through Jane Austen.
”

“Yes, I like the old ones best,” she confessed. “But Luke says I must read
modern
literature as well. I don’t like this very much—the characters are so depressing and horrid to each other.”

“Very good for you,” said Luke, coming out with chairs for the visitors. “When you’ve finished that I’ll find you something else along the same lines.”

She put her tongue out at him, and Sir Harry said:

“Ha! I don’t
think
there’s much wrong with you.”

“
I dare say,” said Diana, “Vicky quite enjoys playing invalid. It’s nice to be waited on, isn’t it, Vicky?”

“Sometimes,” she said, “but I’m not really an invalid, Diana.”

“I’m sure you’re not,” said Diana sweetly.

“Well,” said Sir Harry, “a bruised spine can be very painful. I remember when I fell down the stairs that time, because the damn maid had left her dustpan lying about, I couldn’t sit down for days.”

Vicky giggled.

“It isn’t that part of me, Sir Harry, so I
can
sit down,” she said. “I have to rest, you see, and it’s really better the other way round, because then Luke rubs my back.”

“I
think
I’ll go and find Hester,” said Diana, getting up. “Is she in the house?”

“In the dairy, I think,” said Vicky vaguely, and Diana walked away.

“I wouldn’t say things like that in front of Diana just now, if I were you,” Sir Harry said.

“Things like what, Sir Harry?”

“Oh—like Luke rubbing your
back
.”

Vicky’s green eyes opened widely.

“But what is wrong with Luke rubbing my back?”

“Nothing, of course, but
—”

“I have my
cl
othes on, quite proper. If I were to rub your
back
, Sir Harry, would your wife think it strange?”

“Well, she might” He grinned. “Yes, she undoubtedly would.”

“But I cannot see,” pursued Vicky, who was really interested, “that there can be anything wrong in someone rubbing someone else’s back. You go to a
masseur
and he
rubs your back, only you pay him for it, which perhaps
makes it respectable, yes? You go to
—”

“All right, all right,” said Sir Harry, defeated.
“
You win. Let’s talk of something else.”

“Never start any argument with Vicky that you aren’t prepared to follow to a logical conclusion,” laughed Luke, coming out of the house with a tray and glasses. “She has a devastating way of insisting on the exact truth of your meaning. Sherry or beer, Sir Harry?”

“So I’ve just discovered,” Sir Harry replied. “Beer, I think. It’s very hot still.”

“Luke will tell me,” Vicky said. “Luke, Sir Harry has just said that I should not say in front of Diana that you rub my back. What is wrong with that?”

“Oh, dear, oh, lord! Now it’ll be a worse muddle!” groaned Sir Harry. “Can’
t
you forget it, child? Of course there’s nothing wrong with I was an idiot to say anything at all.”

“Luke?”

“No, Vicky, nothing wrong at all,” he said quie
tl
y. “I dare say Sir Harry only meant that Diana might be annoyed.”

Vicky sniffed her roses and said: “Oh!” in a meek voice. She was about to ask if Luke would be annoyed if Frank Tregenna rubbed Diana’s back, but thought better of it, and presently Hester and Diana came out of the house and joined the party.

The talk was desultory. Diana was showing at Taunton the following week and would be away for a couple of nights; Lady Sale wondered if Hester would start a sewing-party at the Manor in the autumn and provide extra milk for the teas; Sir Harry was going to Scotland for the tail-end of the grouse shooting. Vicky listened inattentively, her mind still running on Sir Harry’s remarks, and present
l
y she could hear Lou and Pauline squabbling mildly on the other side of the hedge, and she called reprovingly to Lou that he should be practising.

“You really ought to go and have a look at Frank Tregenna’s farm, Luke,” Diana was saying. “His methods are very
modern
and he’s breeding wonderful stock.”