Dear Tiberius; (aka Nurse Nolan) (18 page)

“
You mean Miss Harling—
”
Lucy wished he had not introduced her name just then
“
—Miss Lynette Harling?
”

“
Ah, yes—that is the lady
’
s name! Miss Lynette Harling!
”

Lucy crumbled bread on her plate, and stared at the tips of her fingers while she did so.

“
Miss Harling
is
very charming.
”

“
Can it be that Sir John thinks so, also?
”
he inquired, in his soft, Austrian voice, with the faintest suggestion of an accent.
“
Or did I perhaps form a wrong impression when
I
decided that the little Miranda might one day acquire a stepmother?
”

“
I think it is highly likely that she will one day acquire a stepmother,
”
Lucy answered, a little flatly.

“
So!
”
he exclaimed. He lit another cigarette, watching the smoke curl upward.
“
And all the indications are that that stepmother will be Miss Lynette Harling?
”

“
I
...
think so,
”
Lucy answered, still crumbling bread. And then she added quickly, looking up at him almost defensively,
“
She is a very celebrated ballerina, and of course Sir John is still quite young. It is only natural that he should wish to marry again. And then there is Miranda to think of
....”

“
In your opinion it is a good thing that he should marry again?
”

“
Good for Miranda, you mean?
”

“
Yes.
”

The shrewd eyes were partly screened by the thick, dark eyelashes.

“
I
don
’
t know. It could be a good thing
....”

“
But, on the other hand, it would all depend upon the type of stepmother?
”
Dr. Wern suggested.
“
A stepmother for whom she could feel affection would almost certainly be the best thing that could happen for that lonely child. But one for whom she could not feel affection—even supposing she was quite well again—might prove a disaster in her life. You are inclined to agree with me there,
I
believe?
”

Lucy barely nodded her head, for it was a subject on which she felt very strongly, and in any case, she was a little uneasy under his watchful eyes and she wished she knew precisely what was passing in his mind. He smiled at her suddenly.

“
But for the time being the best we can do for Miranda is to get her to walk again, and when she can walk and take her place among her fellows, as she once did, then, no doubt, other things of perhaps lesser importance will work out right for her as well.
”

He stood up and helped her on with her warm tweed
traveling coat—a purchase she had made before leaving England—and then they left the restaurant and went out to his car. Just after he deposited her on the steps of the Wern Clinic he gave her one of his quick, bright smiles, told her that he hoped to see her the following day, and then let in his clutch and proceeded back down the driveway.

That night his aunt invited Lucy to dine with her in her own apartment at the clinic, and afterward the girl went early to bed as she had done the night before, for there seemed little point in doing anything else once Miranda was settled for the night.

But before she undressed and took her bath she wrote a brief note to Sir John—she had promised to write him daily while Miranda was in the clinic—and then sat reading it through and trying to picture his face when he received it. He would probably cast it aside quite quickly once he had absorbed its contents, she thought. Or would he—would he, perhaps, spare a few minutes to try to picture
her
in her strange new surroundings—her and his only real kith and kin, Miranda—and wonder how they were really feeling cut off from everything that was familiar?

Before she climbed into her supremely comfortable bed, with its deliciously fat eiderdown to keep her warm, she remembered how he had held her hands closely in Kathleen
’
s flat, and how he had said to her,
“
If you want me
I
will come at once!
”

Would he have said that if he had had the least idea that her need of him was ever present, and that it was difficult to control? It was like something that consumed her, and if it consumed her altogether she could do nothing about it.

The next few days p
assed so quickly that Lucy herself was surprised, for it seemed to her that she did nothing to justify her existence save spend a great deal of time sitting with Miranda, either reading to her or listening to her talking enthusiastically about the kindness and attentiveness of her new nurses.

Miranda responded so quickly to kindness, and to anyone who took a genuine interest in her, that it was amazing to see how she almost glowed under these new conditions, and how little her journey from England had affected her. If anything, her spirits were higher than they had been for months.

Lucy was firmly prevented from taking any active part in the life around her, although to have been permitted to do so would have been much more to her taste than being forced to enact the role of an onlooker. And she had lunch once more with Rupprecht Wern. He was a very busy man, who had arrived at the pinnacle of his profession as a result of sheer skill and devotion to the task he had set himself, but he managed to convey to her nevertheless the impression that if he had had the time to spare it would have given him a certain amount of personal pleasure to introduce her to all the sights of Vienna.

He was musical, she gathered, and apparently Vienna still had more than any other capital in Europe to offer in the way of musical entertainment to those who were enthralled
by it, as Lucy herself was. The beautiful State Opera House was burned out in 1945, but its spirit and tradition are carried on in the Volksoper and the Theater-an-der-Wein, and numerous smaller theaters and concert halls. Then, too, there were the museums and the public galleries devoted to various cultural collections, and the palaces and churches, all so very worthy of a visit.

“
Perhaps someday I will have time to show them to you,
”
Dr. Wern said to Lucy when they had lunch together that second time. She felt a little embarrassed sometimes by the way in which he looked at her, and that he appeared to find some satisfaction in doing so. His eyes had a warm, nearly golden light in them, and sometimes their expression was
almost caressing.
“
When Miranda is better
....”
She
noticed that on the occasions when he referred directly to Miranda he did not say
“
if
Miranda gets better,
”
and
she told herself that that might be a hopeful sign.
“
When Miranda is recovered sufficiently, and the spring is here, it might be a good plan for her to convalesce at a little place
I
know of up in the mountains. And then you will see something of the grandeur of this country.
”

Lucy said nothing. She was afraid to look so far ahead, and she also wondered sometimes—if Miranda made that wonderful recovery they all hoped for—how long the two of them would have to remain away from Ketterings and their own country. And when she thought of Ketterings she always automatically thought of Sir John.

It was actually closer to a fortnight than a week before Dr. Wern decided to perform his operation on Miranda. He and Miranda had become great friends by that time. It was a part of his policy to establish a link with a patient of her years that overcame any sensations of awe and nervousness she might otherwise have felt when he paid her his professional visits, and the nurse in Lucy marveled at and admired
the humanity he brought to his chosen profession, and the quality of the psychology behind it.

The night before the day
s
elected for Miranda
’
s operation Lucy had dinner with the matron in her pleasingly furnished little sitting room, and afterward, while Fraulein Wern attended to some correspondence, she sat beside the stove and looked at a pile of magazines. The stove was surrounded by gleaming tiles the color of blue delft china; the carpet was blue, and on an occasional table there was a large blue bowl filled
w
ith some exotic hothouse flowers that gave off a delicate aroma. Fraulein Wern, still clad in her immaculate uniform with her severe starched cap on her pale hair, sat at her writing desk. Outside, snow was falling in earnest tonight, and a tremendous hush lay over the garden that surrounded the clinic. If there were any footfalls they were completely muffled by the snow, and inside the sitting room the hush was just as noticeable. Lucy, a little drowsy from the heat of the stove, was yet mentally alert—how could she be otherwise with Miranda on the eve of something so momentous—and although she turned the pages of the magazines, her mind was a queer jumble of disconnected thoughts, and her eyes saw nothing of what was in the printed columns.

Tomorrow at this time...! How would she be feeling tomorrow at this time? How would Miranda...?

She gave herself a little shake, and realized vaguely that she was staring at an advertisement. But another thought intruded at once—what was Sir John doing at this moment? Surely he was not spending the evening with Lynette Harling...
?
Although, if he really was going to marry her it was only natural that he would want her company. But with his only daughter about to undergo such a serious operation...?

He
must
have some feeling for Miranda—he had, she felt

sure. But most fathers in his position, with his wealth and nothing to prevent them, would be here at this moment in the clinic—not waiting to receive news when it was sent.

And what would his reaction be if the news was not good news?

The telephone purred softly in the little room and Fraulein Wern picked up the receiver. It was the house telephone. She spoke softly into the mouthpiece.

“
Very well,
”
she said,
“
I will be down in one moment.
”

She looked across at Lucy and smiled. Lucy, gazed back at her somewhat vaguely.

“
I am wanted in my office,
”
Fraulein Wern told her.
“
If there is anything you require, just ring the bell.
”

“
I will,
”
Lucy answered, but she knew there was nothing she was likely to require. She was treated rather like a hotel guest in this superbly run clinic, and her every need was anticipated. But it was a lonely position being a guest in such a place when she longed to be doing something active. And tonight she was not even allowed to sit with Miranda. Miranda had been given over into the charge of these new and extremely competent nurses, and Lucy felt like an outsider—save that she knew Miranda was happy to know that she was near.

Lucy, once the door closed behind the matron, and the silence of the room was intensified with the snow falling soundlessly outside, felt an urgent longing to be back among faces she knew—the familiar faces of Abbott, and Fiske, and even Purvis, if she could choose—and the knowledge that Sir John, even if he was not at Ketterings, was not really far away from her.

Restlessly she got up and started to pace around the room. Sir John
should
be here—she felt almost angry with him because he was not here. It was a disappointment now that he had not even insisted on accompanying them to the airport that last morning in London. At the time she had not really wanted him to do so, but now—now she felt aggrieved because he had let them go away alone, with no one to wave them farewell.

It hadn
’
t been fair to Miranda—Miranda who might never see him again!

Lucy put her hands over her eyes and felt as if she was being engulfed by waves of homesickness and panic and dread. And then the door opened silently and F
r
aulein Wern stood there.

“
Nurse Nolan,
”
she said, in her soft, precise and quite beautiful English,
“
there is someone who would like to speak to you in my office at this moment. Will you go down?
”

Lucy couldn’t even think w
ho it could be when she pushed open the door of the office. It might be Dr. Wern, she decided—but then it was odd that his aunt hadn
’
t mentioned him by name. She had simply said,
“
Someone who would like to speak to you
....”

The office, like the sitting room upstairs, had one or two bowls and vases of exotic flowers in it, and the perfume caught at Lucy
’
s nostrils. It was a perfume she remembered long afterward, and she also remembered the sight of the room—the quick impression she had of it as she entered, with its light walls and filing cabinets and unstained oak chairs and desk. Normally, it was a room in which a brisk, businesslike atmosphere prevailed, but tonight the atmosphere was charged with tension, for the man who was waiting there had his eyes firmly fixed on the door. And when the door opened and Lucy stood staring at him unbelievingly he moved forward at once.

“
Lucy!
”
he exclaimed.

Afterward she recalled with a breathless sensation of excitement that it had not been
“
Nurse Nolan,
”
or even
“
Miss Nolan.
”
He had called her Lucy, and before she had recovered from her astonishment at seeing him there at all he had taken both her hands.

“
I
felt that I had to come
“
he told her simply.

Lucy could not find her voice for several moments, and when she did it was a trifle shaky. She smiled at him, and it was rather a shaky smile, too.

“
Oh, Sir John,
”
she told him,
“
I am so very glad you decided to be here!
”