The Watersplash

CHAPTER V

Susan went down to Mrs. Alexander’s general shop next morning to pass the time of day and to get a picture postcard of the church with the six-hundred-year-old tunnel of yew which led up to it. The Professor would like to have one. She was turning over the postcards and waiting for Mrs. Alexander to serve Dr. Croft’s housekeeper, who could take as long to buy a tin of shoe-polish as a girl who is choosing a dance-frock, when Clarice Dean came into the shop and fell upon her with effusion.

“I’ve been longing to see you! Miss Blake came home from Mrs. Random’s and said you had come! You are going to catalogue the books at the Hall, aren’t you? I wish I had a nice easy job like that, but”-with an exaggerated sigh-“we poor nurses have to work!” She lowered her voice, but not much. “Now do tell me, is Edward Random here? Someone told me he was, but Miss Blake says he wasn’t at tea. Did he come by the later train?” She dropped her voice just a little further. “Or did he shirk the tea-party?”

She might sigh, and she might complain about being hard-worked, but she appeared to be in very good spirits. She had a bright, dark prettiness made up of vivid colouring, brown wavy hair, and dancing hazel eyes. She had run out in her cap and a highly becoming blue uniform with short puffed-over sleeves of white muslin.

The voice in which she asked about Edward was not really quite low enough. It had a sweet carrying quality. Mrs. Alexander and Dr. Croft’s housekeeper both looked round.

Susan said,

“You had better ask him. I am buying postcards.”

Clarice laughed.

“How discreet you are! But he is here now?”

“Oh, yes.”

“We were quite friends, you know. Oh, years ago-I had only just finished training. I nursed Mr. James Random when he had influenza, and of course I saw quite a lot of Edward. That’s how I came to be here last year when Mr. Random died-he wouldn’t have anyone else. And we all thought Edward was dead! Dreadful-wasn’t it? I’m longing to see him again and hear all about everything! Miss Blake says he won’t utter, but I think he’ll tell me!”

Susan said, “I don’t think-” and then stopped. Edward would have to deal with Clarice himself.

Dr. Croft’s housekeeper said in her slow, heavy way,

“Well, it’s no fault of yours, Mrs. Alexander, and I’m not saying it is, but I do say and I won’t go from it, that things aren’t the equal of what they were before the war. Nobody won’t get me from it that they’re not-not the boot-polish, nor yet the leather you have to shine with it. Nothing’s the same as what it used to be, nor won’t be again, but I’ll take a tin of the black and a tin of the brown and just make the best of them like we’ve all got to nowadays.”

Mrs. Alexander had a fat, comfortable laugh. She said,

“That’s right, Miss Sims, and better put a good face on it. Not but what you won’t find the polish is all right, for I use it myself.”

She moved over to the other end of the counter. The warmth in her voice was for Susan.

“Well, my dear, you’re back again and welcome. What can I do for you?”

Susan bought postcards, and Clarice matches.

“I don’t know where they go to. And Miss Blake said to ask if you had ripe tomatoes-and oh, two pounds of the cooking apples Miss Ora likes. She said you would know.”

Mrs. Alexander looked gratified.

“Why, yes, of course-off our own tree, and I don’t know the name, but it’s a good one. My father always give it a hogshead of water first week in July to swell the apples, and we’ve kept right on doing it. But you’d better have the dozen pounds like Miss Blake always do. Two pounds won’t go no way with Miss Ora-no way at all.”

Edward Random walked down the village street without looking to left or right. As he passed Mrs. Alexander’s shop, Clarice Dean ran out and stopped him. She had a basket full of apples in one hand and a paper bag of ripe tomatoes in the other. Her colour was bright, and so were her eyes. She held out both hands-basket, bag, fruit and all-and cried,

“How wonderful to meet you like this! But I don’t suppose you even remember me-Clarice Dean! I nursed your uncle- do you remember?”

Edward remembered without sentiment. A boy and girl in a garden a long time ago. The girl had been pretty and flirtatious. He said,

“Oh, yes, I remember. How do you do?”

“I’m nursing Miss Blake-Miss Ora Blake. Do you remember what you used to call Miss Mildred?” Her pretty, high laugh floated down the street. She leaned towards him to whisper,

“Miss Mildew! Shocking of you, wasn’t it?”

“Schoolboy manners, I’m afraid.”

She laughed again.

“You were a very nice schoolboy-and you were nearly eighteen! We used to play tennis in the afternoons when your uncle was resting, and you did so improve my game! But I never get time for it now-at least hardly ever, and I expect I’ve gone back a lot. I have to take my time off in the evenings now. We could do a flick if you’d like to. The Royal gets quite good films. Nursing’s a pretty dull job. Do say you will!”

“Well, I’m going to be rather busy taking over from Mr. Barr. Look out-you’re going to spill that fruit!”

She laughed and sparkled at him.

“I’m stupid, aren’t I? It’s being so glad to see you again! You’re going to be Lord Burlingham’s agent, aren’t you? Well, you can’t be taking over all day and all night. Look here, let’s leave it a day or two, and then I can ring you up and we can fix something!”

She ran back into the shop, flushed and smiling.

“That was Edward Random! So he did come after all!”

Susan said, “Yes.”

Clarice laughed.

“Tactful of you not to come out and spoil our little reunion, my dear! You know, I really did know him quite well, and I’m so pleased to see him again. We are going to fix up an evening to go to the pictures! Goodness-I must fly, or Miss Blake will be ringing her bell out of the window! Do you know, she did actually do that once when she thought Nurse Brown had stayed here too long gossiping with Mrs. Alexander!”

Edward walked on down the street. Clarice had changed very little indeed. She was still pretty, and still flirtatious. She seemed very pleased to see him. The warmth of her greeting had actually induced a slight surface glow. He supposed that life with Mildred and Ora would make you pleased to see practically anyone. Clarice dropped out of his mind as suddenly as she had invaded it.

The Miss Blakes lived in one of the late eighteenth-century houses. A bow window on the upper floor was supported by stone pillars set flush with the street and commanded an extensive view. From her couch Miss Ora Blake could see everything that went on from eight o’clock in the morning, when she left her bedroom at the back of the house and was transferred to the sitting-room in front, until after the evening meal, when she went back to her bed again. The move had to be made betimes in the morning, or she would have missed the arrival of the post, which wouldn’t have done at all. She had excellent sight and was able to follow the postman’s progress from one end of the village street to the other. She knew just when Maggie Ledbetter’s young man stopped writing to her, and when young Mrs. Harris had all those letters from abroad. They made quite a lot of talk, until it came out that she had an aunt in Vancouver. Or at least so she said. Her husband came home from the Malay States soon afterwards, and she left Greenings, so of course it was quite impossible to know whether there really was an aunt or not, but the Miss Blakes continued to have their doubts.

Clarice Dean ran lightly up the stairs, leaving the apples and the tomatoes with Mrs. Deacon, who was Miss Blake’s daily and a very good cook. She found Miss Ora very much pleased and interested.

“Now don’t tell me that was Edward Random! Or perhaps I should say don’t tell me it wasn’t, because I could see that it was, and when you ran out of the shop like that I thought-I really thought-you were going to drop all those apples!”

“So did I!”

“Did Mrs. Alexander lend you the basket? It wasn’t one of ours. And what did you have in the paper bag?… Tomatoes? Well, I hope they were ripe. That was one of the things Nurse Brown used to be so tiresome about-just took whatever they gave her and never thought of looking to see if they were ripe. Well, well, why do you go on talking to me about tomatoes, when I want to hear about Edward Random? You seemed very pleased to see him.”

“Oh, I was!”

Miss Ora Blake had a large round pink face, large round blue eyes, and a lot of white fluffy curls surmounted by two bows of blue satin ribbon and a little frill of lace. She gazed solemnly at Clarice and said,

“When I was young a girl wouldn’t have said that.”

“Why not? We saw a great deal of each other when I was here before.”

“Seven years ago.”

Clarice laughed.

“We were very friendly, you know-and I don’t forget my friends.”

Seven years ago! Miss Ora began to make calculations. Edward couldn’t have been much more than a schoolboy-eighteen at the outside. Because he wasn’t more than twenty-five now. She remembered him in his pram. Yes, he would have been eighteen when Miss Dean came down to nurse James Random through that attack of influenza. And she was already trained then. She might look young, but she must be several years older than Edward. That bright colour of hers was deceptive. Miss Ora decided to her own satisfaction that Clarice Dean might quite easily be as much as thirty.

She said tartly,

“That was a very large basket of apples.”

“Mrs. Alexander said-”

“Mrs. Alexander wants to sell her fruit. But my sister Mildred won’t be pleased-she won’t be pleased at all. She will think we have been extravagant. She does not care for fruit herself, and we shall have to be tactful. You had better tell Mrs. Deacon to put the apples away out of sight and return the basket when she goes to her dinner.”