The Vicar's Daughter. Бетти Нилс

his or her doctor to be a married man? It’s an interesting point.’

      So started an interesting discussion in which Margo took no part. She passed the cake, handed cups of tea round and wished herself elsewhere. Which was silly—after all, she hadn’t been very rude. She should have laughed it off for the trivial remark it had been, instead of feeling as though she had been nosey. Perhaps, horror of horrors; now he would think that she was intent on attracting him. He wouldn’t want any more to do with her. He would go away and she would never see him again. If she had been witty and pretty and charming, it might have been a different matter...

      Professor van Kessel was either a man with the kindest heart imaginable or was prone to deafness; he apparently hadn’t heard her muttered apology. The conversation flowed smoothly, and presently, when he got up to go, he bade her goodbye with his usual pleasant detachment. He didn’t say he hoped to see her again, however.

      Watching the Rolls-Royce gliding away towards the village, Margo told herself that he’d gone for good and she could forget him. Whether she wanted to forget him was an entirely different matter, and one she was reluctant to consider.

      To her mother’s observation that it was a pity that they were unlikely to see him again, she replied airily that it had been pleasant meeting him once more and that she supposed he would be returning to Holland. ‘After all, it is his home,’ she said.

      She collected the tea things and carried them out to the kitchen. ‘I thought I’d go over to see Mrs Merridew tomorrow afternoon. George said she might like some help with the jam. They’ve a huge plum harvest this year.’

      Her mother gave her a thoughtful look. Despite the fact that George’s mother had made no secret of the fact that she considered Margo to be a suitable wife for him, the woman had no affection for her. She was, thought Mrs Pearson shrewdly, under the impression that once Margo married she would be able to mould her into the kind of wife she felt her George should have. That Margo wasn’t a girl to be moulded had never entered her head. She had too good an opinion of herself to realise that Margo didn’t like her overmuch, but bore with her overbearing ways for George’s sake.

      Mrs Pearson, knowing in her bones that Margo didn’t love George, told herself to have patience. Somewhere in the world there was a man for her Margo—preferably the counterpart of Gijs van Kessel...

      So Margo took herself off the next day to Merridew’s Farm, intent on being nice to everyone, doing her best to keep her thoughts on a future when she would marry George and live there, and failing lamentably because she thought about the professor instead.

      However, once she was at the farm, he was banished from her head by Mrs Merridew’s loud, hectoring voice bidding her to join her in the kitchen.

      ‘I can do with some help,’ she greeted Margo.

      ‘There’s an apron behind the door; you can stone the plums... You should have worn a sensible sweater; if you get stains on that blouse they’ll never come out.’

      I have never known anybody, reflected Margo, rolling up her sleeves, who could put a damper on any occasion, however trivial. She began to stone the plums—a messy business—and paused in her work as the thought that she couldn’t possibly marry George suddenly entered her head.

      ‘Why have you stopped?’ Mrs Merridew wanted to know. ‘There’s another bucketful in the pantry. I’m sure I don’t know why I should have to do everything myself; you’ll have to change your ways when you marry George.’

      Margo said nothing—there was no point at the moment. Besides, she was busy composing a suitable speech for George’s benefit.

      He wouldn’t mind, she reflected. He was fond of her, just as she was fond of him, but being fond wasn’t the same as being in love. She wasn’t sure why she was so certain about that. A future with George had loomed before her for several years now—everyone had taken it for granted that when the time came they would marry, and she had got used to the idea and accepted it; she wanted to marry, she wanted children and a husband to care for her, and at twenty-eight she was sure that romance—the kind of romance she read about in novels—had passed her by.

      But romance had touched her with feather-light fingers in the shape of Gijs van Kessel, and life would never be the same again.

      She glanced across the table at Mrs Merridew, who was a formidable woman, tall and stout, with her iron-grey hair permanently waved into rock-like formations and a mouth which seldom smiled. She was respected in the village but not liked as her long-dead husband had been liked, and she was always ready to find fault. Only with George was she softer in her manner...

      ‘Fetch me the other preserving pan, Margo.’ Mrs Merridew’s voice cut into her thoughts. ‘I’ll get this first batch on the stove. By the time you’ve finished stoning that lot I can fill a second pan.’

      Margo went to the far wall and got down the copper preserving pan and put it on the table.

      ‘Cat got your tongue?’ asked Mrs Merridew. ‘Never known you so quiet. What’s all this nonsense I heard about you and a pack of tramps?’

      ‘Not tramps—travellers. And it wasn’t nonsense. One of them had a baby by the side of the road.’

      ‘More fool her,’ declared Mrs Merridew. ‘These people bring shame to the countryside.’

      ‘Why?’ asked Margo, and ate a plum.

      ‘Why? They’re dirty and dishonest and live from hand to mouth.’

      ‘Well, they looked clean enough to me,’ said Margo. ‘And I don’t know that they’re dishonest—no more so than people who live in houses...’

      Her companion snorted. ‘Rubbish! If any of them came onto the farm George would soon send them packing.’

      ‘Would he? Would he really? Or would he do it to please you?’

      Mrs Merridew went red. ‘You don’t seem yourself today, Margo. I hope you’re not ill—picked up something nasty from those tramps.’

      She set the pan of fruit on the old-fashioned stove. ‘While that’s coming to the boil we’ll have a cup of tea, then you’d better go home. I dare say you’ve a cold coming.’

      Margo never wanted to see another plum; she agreed meekly, drank her tea, washed the cups and saucers in the sink, bade Mrs Merridew goodbye and got on her bike. She had wanted to talk to George but she wasn’t to be given the chance. She would come up early in the morning; he would be in the cow parlour and there would be time to talk.

      ‘Early back, dear,’ commented her mother as she came in through the kitchen door. ‘Weren’t you asked to stay for tea?’

      Margo sat down at the table and watched her mother rolling dough for scones. ‘No. Mrs Merridew thinks I may have caught a cold.’ Margo popped a piece of dough into her mouth. ‘Mother, I don’t want to marry George...’

      Mrs Pearson was cutting rounds of dough and arranging them on a baking tray. ‘Your father and I have always hoped that you wouldn’t, although we would never have said anything if you had. You don’t love him.’

      ‘No. I like him—I’m fond of him—but that’s not the same, is it?’

      ‘No, love, it isn’t. When you do fall in love you’ll know that. Have you told George?’

      ‘I’ll go and see him tomorrow early. Do you think he’ll be upset?’

      Her mother put the scones in the oven. ‘No, dear, I don’t. George is a nice young man but I think he wants a wife, not a woman to love. She’ll need to be fond of him, of course, and he of her, but that will be sufficient. And that wouldn’t be sufficient for you, would it?’

      ‘No. I would like,’ said Margo thoughtfully, ‘to be cosseted and spoilt and loved very much, and I’d want to be allowed to be me, if you see what I mean. I would be a good wife and have lots of children because we would have enough money to