Tangled Autumn. Betty Neels

hadn’t spoken. ‘I’ve arranged for Tonia to come over with me. It’s most inconvenient, but I don’t dare face you without her. That will be a week on Thursday. Goodbye.’

      He rang off before she had time to open her mouth. She put down the receiver slowly and went back to the MacFees and repeated what he had said, but with a good deal of it expurgated, so that her mild version didn’t tally in the least with the heated retorts she had given. This quite escaped her, and the MacFees, beyond a mild comment on the pleasure of seeing Rolf and Antonia again, didn’t mention it.

      Later on, in bed, Sappha went over all that he had said. She hadn’t understood his remarks about her not starving for love and having good prospects and she thought about it for a long time, getting more and more frustrated because it didn’t make sense, finally she said out loud: ‘Oh, he’s crazy,’ then turned over and went determinedly to sleep. The following days passed quietly enough and the boredom which she had half expected to settle upon her after a week or so, didn’t materialise. Instead, she began to find the days not quite long enough. The Baroness had taken heart again; Rolf had telephoned her several times and she was full of excitement at seeing Antonia so soon. She had never asked Sappha if she had spoken to Rolf about her daughter’s visit, nor did she do so now beyond making a comment upon his kindness and understanding. Sappha, asked to agree with her patient upon her son’s excellent qualities, agreed woodenly, remembering what he had said—she wondered if she would ever forget his words even though she had forgiven them. She pummelled the pillow she was shaking up with unnecessary vigour—he was one of the most unpleasant men she had ever met.

      She had her day off on Wednesday and took the Mini in the other direction down to Balmarca, so that she might see the hills of Skye across the Kyle of Lochalsh. She had lunch at the hotel there and then went on to look at Eilean Donan Castle on the edge of Loch Duich. She followed on down the steep road to get a good view of the Kintail Mountains, but they were fast disappearing in heavy clouds, so she found a place to turn the car and started back home. She had promised to have tea with Gloria anyway, and it was already getting on for four o’clock.

      Gloria wasn’t home, but Sappha let herself in, poked up the fire, put on the kettle and then went to fetch the cake she had brought from the baker’s. The cottage had a small rather cluttered kitchen, gay with gingham curtains and a collection of copper pans which Sappha coveted. She pottered around, rather enjoying herself so that she found herself reflecting, while cutting bread for the toast, that life in Dialach was so pleasant that the idea of going back to London seemed quite laughable. A fortunate thing, in the circumstances, because that was the last place she wanted to be in—probably by now Andrew had married that beastly little blonde…

      She frowned and sighed at the thought, so that Gloria, coming in at that moment, exclaimed: ‘Good lord, Sappha, what’s eating you? You look ferocious—sadly ferocious—or do I mean ferociously sad? What’s the matter?’

      Sappha speared bread on to a toasting fork. ‘Hullo—nothing, really.’

      Gloria cast her hat on one chair, her coat on another and her case on the table. ‘Not bored, are you?’

      ‘No, on the contrary—I was just thinking how bored I should be in London.’

      ‘Well, even if you were,’ said Gloria, making the tea, ‘you won’t be after tomorrow. Rolf and Antonia will be here, you can’t be bored when they’re around. What do you think of Rolf?’

      Sappha buttered toast. ‘Well, I don’t really know him—I mean we only talked a little.’

      Gloria laughed. ‘But he’s not the kind of man you need to talk to—don’t tell me he didn’t make an impression on you, or you’ll be the first woman under ninety who hasn’t been bowled over.’

      The two of them sat down by the fire in the little sitting room and bit into their toast. ‘If you want to know,’ said Sappha, her mouth full, ‘I found him rude, bossy—and he laughs behind his face.’

      Gloria stared at her over her tea cup. ‘I haven’t asked you yet, but it’s obvious to anyone with eyes in their heads that you came up here to get away from something or someone—a man, I suspect. It’s hardly fair to colour your impression of Rolf by your own experience.’ She put down her cup and held out a friendly hand. ‘That was a beastly thing to say—I’m sorry. I know how I’d feel if Hamish…’

      ‘I daresay you’re right,’ conceded Sappha, privately thinking her all wrong. ‘Now tell me, what are you going to do with your day off?’

      ‘Inverness—with Hamish. He’s coming for me about nine and we won’t be back until the late evening. There’s nothing to worry about in the village; old Mrs MacGower is off her penicillin injections and Mrs MacTadd is OK. She should go another three weeks—the babe’s a transverse lie, but there’s time enough for it to right itself—Hamish has turned it twice already. Are you a midwife? You are?—good, just in case I’m not about when Mrs MacTadd starts, I shall warn them to come for you.’ She had spoken jokingly and Sappha replied in kind, and Rolf’s name wasn’t mentioned again for the rest of Sappha’s visit. Before she went home though, Gloria said with a laugh: ‘I’m going to show you where everything is kept in the surgery, Sappha, so that if ever there is an emergency you could cope.’

      So Sappha was invited to see where the key was hidden and where the midwifery bag was housed, and the gas and air apparatus, even the blood taking and giving sets—’For,’ said Gloria, ‘we just have to be prepared for everything—and by the way, there’s a litre of O blood, Rhesus positive, in the fridge—Hamish brought it with him today in case Mrs MacTadd does the dirty on us.’ She went with her guest to the door. ‘Do you want anything from Inverness?’

      Sappha considered. ‘No, I don’t think so, thanks. I thought I’d drive over on my next day off and do some shopping, but there’s nothing urgent.’

      She said goodbye and drove the short distance to the Manse, where she put the car in the little lean-to at the back of the house which the minister had put at her disposal, and ran indoors. The house was warm and quiet; the faint murmur of voices from the drawing room told her that Mr and Mrs MacFee were enjoying their usual evening chat together; she forbore from joining them, for she suspected that it was probably the only hour in the day when they could be reasonably sure of being uninterrupted, but went on upstairs, to pause at the Baroness’s door undecided whether to go and see her first or wait until she had taken off her outdoor things. She decided to go in; probably the Baroness was feeling lonely. She opened the door and poked her pretty head round it.

      The Baroness was not lonely at all; she had company—a very pretty blonde girl curled up beside her on the bed, and the Baron, crouching on the floor, tinkering with a portable TV set. He came to his feet in a surprisingly agile manner for so large a man and said: ‘Hullo—had a nice day?’

      Sappha said yes, thank you, a trifle breathless with surprise and some other sensation which, if she hadn’t disliked him so much, she would have admitted was pleasure. The Baroness beamed at her. ‘Sappha, isn’t this a lovely surprise? Rolf brought Tonia a day sooner and he’s brought a TV for me too…come and meet my daughter.’

      Antonia had left the bed and had pranced over to Sappha. She really was extraordinarily pretty with great blue eyes and dimples, her hair was straight and thick and corn-coloured, cut in a fringe across her forehead. She put out a hand, remarking disarmingly: ‘You’re far too pretty to be a nurse. I don’t believe you’re much older than I am—I’m sixteen.’

      Rolf said lazily from the floor: ‘Antonia, you mustn’t ask Nurse how old she is—she might not want me to know.’

      ‘Stuff,’ said his sister inelegantly. ‘You make her sound like some old bag in her thirties—just because you’re thirty-two yourself…’ She turned her lively little face to Sappha. ‘Tell me later,’ she invited, and bounced back to make herself comfortable by her mother once more as that lady said indulgently: ‘Tonia, you’re not to talk to Sappha like that—you hardly know her.’

      ‘Oh, yes, Mama, I do, you