The Quiet Professor. Betty Neels

her, blocking a good deal of the passage. ‘I’m waiting to see if I have to go to Matron’s office.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Well, if you have complained about me she won’t waste much time before having me in for an interview.’ She eyed him wrathfully. ‘I shall probably be given the sack or lose my sister’s cap or something.’

      ‘My dear young lady, I have no intention of complaining about you. Indeed in your shoes I would have said and done exactly what you did. So you may forget the melodrama and come to work with an easy conscience in the morning.’

      He smiled suddenly and just for a moment he didn’t look like the austere man she imagined he was. ‘It would give me pleasure to take you out to dinner as a token of good faith, but I hesitate to trespass on young Fielding’s preserves.’

      She was surprised at the flash of regret which she felt. ‘It is kind of you to—to think that,’ she said carefully. ‘I’m sorry I was rude and thank you for being so nice about it.’

      ‘Nice, nice—an English word which means everything or nothing. I am not nice, as you very well know.’ He stood aside. ‘Goodnight, Sister Rodner.’

      She went on her way faintly disturbed and not quite sure why.

      Oscar was coming for supper that evening and she made haste home so that she could be ready for him. ‘Nine o’clock,’ he had said, which gave her time enough. She showered and changed into a grey jersey dress with a bright scarf at the throat, fed the cat, put on a pinny and got to work. A cheese soufflé, a winter salad, crusty french bread and a variety of cheeses. She had some sherry in the house now but she hadn’t bought any wine, although there was beer in the cupboard. The room looked cosy enough with the new lampshades casting a kindly pink glow over the cheap furniture and the table with its checked cloth and painted china. Oscar looked a little surprised as he came in. ‘I say, this place looks more like it although the furniture’s pretty grim. I’m famished…’

      The soufflé was a dream of lightness and he ate most of it before starting on the bread and cheese and the bowl of apples. She made coffee and he sat back presently and began to tell her about his day. It wasn’t until he got up to go that he observed, ‘That was a good meal—I had no idea you could cook, Megan. Did Melanie teach you? I often think of those scones…’

      She said evenly, ‘Yes, she makes marvellous scones. She’s a very good cook.’

      He kissed her then, but not how she wanted to be kissed. She wanted to be held close and told that she was a splendid cook too and that he loved her more than anything in the world. Something was not right, she thought, but she didn’t know what it was and she made the mistake of asking him.

      ‘Something wrong? Whatever makes you say that? Of course there isn’t. I dare say you’re tired. Never mind—I’ve fixed up a weekend; did you change yours?’

      ‘As far as I know.’ She watched him walk away and closed the door, then washed her supper things and tidied the room before turning the divan into a bed, feeding Meredith and going to bed, to lie awake listening to his hoarse purr and worrying about her wretched day. Nothing had gone right and she would have enjoyed a good cry, only, as she told herself, she had nothing to cry about.

      Take-in started again on Wednesday and since she had changed her weekend with Jenny, she was without that trusty right arm over this weekend, but, as she reminded herself at the end of each busy day, she and Oscar would be going home at the end of the following week. She saw little of him but, as she told the cat Meredith as she got ready to go to work on the last day of take-in, tomorrow they would be back to normal.

      Only they weren’t. During the afternoon she was told by a sympathetic office sister that there was an outbreak of flu at St Patrick’s, who alternated with Regent’s, and her ward would have to take in for another week.

      There was nothing to be done about it. When she got off duty she went to the porter’s lodge and asked if Oscar could see her for a moment and when he came into the entrance hall she told him the bad news at once.

      ‘What bad luck.’ He frowned. ‘I can’t do anything about my weekend; it would mean re-arranging the rota.’ His brow cleared. ‘I could go to your home on my own, if they’d have me?’

      She stifled a feeling of disappointment, feeling mean that she should grudge him the weekend she should have shared with him. ‘Of course they will. They’ll love to have you. I’ll phone Mother.’

      ‘Splendid. I must go, darling. A pity about our weekend.’ He sounded cheerful. She watched him go, feeling unreasonably cross.