Roses for Christmas

  “Well, aren’t you going to ask me if I had a pleasant weekend?”

  “I did want to,” she told him spiritedly, “but I didn’t feel like being snubbed.”

  He moved very fast; he was beside her almost before she had finished speaking. She hadn’t bargained for it and he was far too near for her peace of mind, and that peace was wholly shattered when he kissed her quite fiercely on her mouth, all without saying a word. He was back in the hall again while she was still blinking over it.

  “I’m going to have something to eat,” he then told her in a perfectly ordinary voice.

  Romance readers around the world were sad to note the passing of Betty Neels in June 2001. Her career spanned thirty years, and she continued to write into her ninetieth year. To her millions of fans, Betty epitomized the romance writer, and yet she began writing almost by accident. She had retired from nursing, but her inquiring mind still sought stimulation. Her new career was born when she heard a lady in her local library bemoaning the lack of good romance novels. Betty’s first book, Sister Peters in Amsterdam, was published in 1969, and she eventually completed 134 books. Her novels offer a reassuring warmth that was very much a part of her own personality. She was a wonderful writer, and she will be greatly missed. Her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.

  THE BEST OF BETTY NEELS

  Roses for Christmas

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE LOFT WAS warm, dusty and redolent of apples; the autumn sunshine peeping through its one dusty window tinted the odds and ends hanging on the walls with golden light, so that the strings of onions, cast-off skates, old raincoats, lengths of rope, worn-out leather straps and an old hat or two had acquired a gilded patina. Most of the bare floor was taken up with orderly rows of apples, arranged according to their kind, but there was still space enough left for the girl sitting in the centre, a half-eaten apple in one hand, the other buried in the old hat box beside her. She was a pretty girl, with light brown hair and large hazel eyes, extravagantly lashed and heavily browed, and with a straight nose above a generous, nicely curved mouth. She was wearing slacks and a thick, shabby sweater, and her hair, tied back none too tidily, hung down her back almost to her waist.

  She bit into her apple and then bent over the box, and its occupant, a cat of plebeian appearance, paused in her round-the-clock washing of four kittens to lick the hand instead. The girl smiled and took another bite of apple, then turned to look behind her, to where a ladder led down to the disused stable below. She knew the footsteps climbing it and sighed to herself; holidays were lovely after the bustle and orderly precision of the ward in the big Edinburgh hospital where she was a Sister; the cosy homeliness of the manse where her parents and five brothers and sisters lived in the tiny village on the northernmost coast of Scotland, was bliss, it was only a pity that on this particular week’s holiday, both her elder brothers, James and Donald, should be away from home, leaving Henry, the youngest and only eight years old, recovering from chickenpox, with no one to amuse him but herself. She doted on him, but they had been fishing all the morning, and after lunch had been cleared away she had gone to the loft for an hour’s peace before getting the tea, and now here he was again, no doubt with some boyish scheme or other which would probably entail climbing trees or walking miles looking for seashells.

  His untidy head appeared at the top of the ladder. ‘I knew you’d be here, Eleanor,’ he said in a satisfied voice. ‘There’s something I must tell you—it’s most exciting.’

  ‘Margaret’s home early from school?’

  He gave her a scornful look, still standing some way down the ladder so that only his head was visible. ‘That’s not exciting—she comes home from school every day—besides, she’s only my sister.’

  Eleanor trimmed the core of her apple with her nice white teeth. ‘I’m your sister, Henry.’

  ‘But you’re old…’

  She nodded cheerfully. ‘Indeed I am, getting on for twenty-five, my dear. Tell me the exciting news.’

  ‘Someone’s come—Mother’s invited him to tea.’

  Eleanor’s eyebrows rose protestingly. ‘Old Mr MacKenzie? Not again?’

  Her small brother drew a deep breath. ‘You’ll never guess.’

  She reached over for another apple. ‘Not in a thousand years—you’d better tell me before I die of curiosity.’

  ‘It’s Fulk van Hensum.’

  ‘Fulk? Him? What’s he here for? It’s twenty years…’ She turned her back on her brother, took a bite of apple and said with her mouth full: ‘Tell Mother that I can’t possibly come—I don’t want to waste time talking to him; he was a horrid boy and I daresay he’s grown into a horrid man. He pulled my hair…nasty arrogant type, I’ve never forgotten him.’

  ‘I’ve never forgotten you, either, Eleanor.’ The voice made her spin round. In place of Henry’s head was the top half of a very large man; the rest of him came into view as she stared, so tall and broad that he was forced to bend his elegantly clad person to avoid bumping his head. He was very dark, with almost black hair and brown eyes under splendid eyebrows; his nose was long and beaky with winged nostrils, and his mouth was very firm.

  Eleanor swallowed her apple. ‘Well, I never!’ she declared. ‘Haven’t you grown?’

  He sat down on a convenient sack of potatoes and surveyed her lazily. ‘One does, you know, and you, if I might say so, have become quite a big girl, Eleanor.’

  He somehow managed to convey the impression that she was outsized, and she flushed a little; her father always described her as a fine figure of a woman, an old-fashioned phrase which she had accepted as a compliment, but to be called quite a big girl in that nasty drawling voice was decidedly annoying. She frowned at him and he remarked lightly: ‘Otherwise you haven’t changed, dear girl—still the heavy frown, I see—and the biting comment. Should I be flattered that you still remember me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Could we let bygones be bygones after—let me see, twenty years?’

  She didn’t answer that, but: ‘You’ve been a great success, haven’t you? We hear about you, you know; Father holds you up as a shining example to Donald.’

  ‘Donald? Ah, the medical student. I’m flattered. What’s in the box?’

  ‘Mrs Trot and her four kittens.’

  He got up and came to sit beside her with the box between them, and when he offered a large, gentle hand, the little cat licked it too.

  ‘Nice little beast. Don’t you want to know why I’m here?’ He chose an apple with care and began to eat it. ‘How peaceful it is,’ he observed. ‘What are you doing now, Eleanor? Still a nurse?’

  She nodded. ‘In Edinburgh, but I’m on a week’s holiday.’

  ‘Not married yet?’ And when she shook her head: ‘Engaged?’

  ‘No—are you?’

  ‘Married? No. Engaged, yes.’

  For some reason she felt upset, which was ridiculous, because for all these years she had remembered him as someone she didn’t like—true, she had been barely five years old at their first meeting and tastes as well as people change; all the same, there was no need for her to feel so put out at his news. She asked the inevitable female question: ‘Is she pretty?’

  The dark eyes looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Yes, ethereal—very small, slim, fair hair, blue eyes—she dresses with exquisite taste.’

  Eleanor didn’t look at him. She tucked Mrs Trot up in her old blanket and got to her feet, fee
ling, for some reason, a much bigger girl than she actually was and most regrettably shabby and untidy. Not that it mattered, she told herself crossly; if people came calling without warning they could take her as they found her. She said haughtily: ‘Tea will be ready, I expect,’ and went down the ladder with the expertise of long practice. She waited politely for him at the bottom and then walked beside him out of the stable and across the cobbled yard towards the house. She walked well, her head well up and with a complete lack of self-consciousness, for she was a graceful girl despite her splendid proportions and tall, although now her head barely reached her companion’s shoulder.

  ‘It hasn’t changed,’ her companion observed, looking around him. ‘I’m glad my father came just once again before he died; he loved this place. It was a kind of annual pilgrimage with him, wasn’t it?’

  Eleanor glanced up briefly. ‘Yes—we were all sorry when he died, we all knew him so well, and coming every year as he did…’ She paused and then went on: ‘You never came, and now after all these years you have. Why?’

  They had stopped in the open back porch and he answered her casually: ‘Oh, one reason and another, you know.’ He was eyeing her in a leisurely fashion which she found annoying. ‘Do you always dress like this?’

  She tossed back her mane of hair. ‘You haven’t changed at all,’ she told him tartly. ‘You’re just as hateful as you were as a boy.’

  He smiled. ‘You have a long memory.’ His dark eyes snapped with amusement. ‘But then so have I, Eleanor.’

  She led the way down the flagstoned passage and opened a door, while vivid memory came flooding back—all those years ago, when he had picked her up and held her gently while she howled and sobbed into his shoulder and even while she had hated him then, just for those few minutes she had felt secure and content and very happy despite the fact that moments earlier she had been kicking his shins—she had lost her balance and fallen over and he had laughed, but gently, and picked her up…it was silly to remember such a trivial episode from her childhood.

  The sitting room they entered wasn’t large, but its heterogeneous mixture of unassuming antiques and comfortable, shabby armchairs, handmade rugs and bookshelves rendered it pleasant enough. It had two occupants: Eleanor’s mother, a small, pretty woman, very neatly dressed, and her father, a good deal older than his wife, with thick white hair and bright blue eyes in a rugged face. He was in elderly grey tweeds and only his dog collar proclaimed his profession.

  ‘There you are,’ exclaimed Mrs MacFarlane. ‘So you found each other.’ She beamed at them both. ‘Isn’t it nice to meet again after all these years? Fulk, come and sit here by me and tell me all your news,’ and when he had done so: ‘Did you recognise Eleanor? She was such a little girl when you last saw her.’

  Eleanor was handing plates and teacups and saucers. ‘Of course he didn’t recognise me, Mother,’ she explained in a brisk no-nonsense voice. ‘I was only five then, and that’s twenty years ago.’

  ‘A nice plump little thing you were, too,’ said her father fondly, and smiled at their guest, who remarked blandly: ‘Little girls so often are,’ and Eleanor, although she wasn’t looking at him, knew that he was secretly laughing. It was perhaps fortunate that at that moment Henry joined them, to sit himself down as close to him as possible.

  ‘Are you going to stay here?’ he enquired eagerly. ‘I mean, for a day or two? And must I call you Doctor van Hensum, and will you…?’

  ‘Call me Fulk, Henry, and yes, your mother has very kindly asked me to stay for a short visit.’

  ‘Oh, good—you can come fishing with us, Eleanor and me, you know, and there’s an apple tree she climbs, I daresay she’ll let you climb it too if you like.’

  ‘Eat your bread and butter, Henry,’ said Eleanor in the same brisk voice. ‘I’m sure Doctor van Hensum doesn’t climb trees at his age, and probably he’s not in the least interested in fishing.’ She cast the doctor a smouldering glance. ‘He may want to rest…’

  She caught the quick gleam in his eyes although his voice was meek enough. ‘As to that, I’m only thirty-six, you know, and reasonably active.’

  ‘Of course you are,’ declared Mrs MacFarlane comfortably, and passed him the cake. ‘I can remember you fishing, too—and climbing trees—Eleanor used to shriek at you because you wouldn’t let her climb trees too.’ She laughed at the memory and her daughter ground her splendid teeth. ‘So long ago,’ sighed her mother, ‘and I remember it all so vividly.’

  And that was the trouble, Eleanor told herself, although why the memory was so vivid was a mystery beyond her.

  ‘And now,’ interpolated her father, ‘you are a famous physician; of course your dear father was a brilliant man—you were bound to follow in his footsteps, and your mother was a clever woman too, and an uncommonly pretty one. I’m afraid that we none of us can hold a candle to your splendid career, although Eleanor has done very well for herself, you know; in her own small sphere she has specialized in medicine and is very highly thought of at her hospital, so I’m told.’ He added with a touch of pride: ‘She’s a Ward Sister—one of the youngest there.’

  ‘I can hardly believe it,’ observed Fulk, and only she realized that he was referring to her careless appearance; no one, seeing her at that moment would have believed that she was one and the same person as the immaculately uniformed, highly professional young woman who ruled her ward so precisely. A pity he can’t see me on duty, she thought peevishly, and said aloud: ‘Donald—he’s younger than I—is at Aberdeen and doing very well. He’s going in for surgery.’

  She encountered the doctor’s gaze again and fidgeted under it. ‘He was in his pram when you were here.’

  He said smoothly: ‘Ah, yes, I remember. Father always kept me up to date with any news about you; there’s Mary—she’s married, isn’t she?—and Margaret?’

  ‘Here she is now,’ said Mrs MacFarlane, ‘back from school—and don’t forget James, he’s still at boarding school.’ She cast a fond look at her last-born, gobbling cake. ‘Henry’s only home because he’s had chickenpox.’

  There was a small stir as Margaret came in. She was already pretty and at twelve years old bade fair to outshine Eleanor later on. She embraced her mother, declaring she was famished, assured Eleanor that she would need help with her homework and went to kiss her father. She saw the doctor then and said instantly: ‘Is that your car in the lane? It’s absolutely wizard!’

  Her father’s voice was mildly rebuking. ‘This is Fulk van Hensum, Margaret, he used to come and stay with us a long time ago—you remember his father? He is to stay with us for a day or so.’

  She shook hands, smiling widely. ‘Oh, yes—I remember your father and I know about you too.’ She eyed him with some curiosity. ‘You’re very large, aren’t you?’

  He smiled slowly. ‘I suppose I am. Yes, that’s my car outside—it’s a Panther de Ville.’

  It was Henry who answered him. ‘I say, is it really? May I look at it after tea? There are only a few built, aren’t there—it’s rather like an XJ12, isn’t it? With a Jag engine…’

  The big man gave him a kindly look. ‘A motorcar enthusiast?’ he wanted to know, and when Henry nodded, ‘We’ll go over it presently if you would like that—it has some rather nice points…’ He smiled at the little boy and then addressed Eleanor with unexpected suddenness. ‘When do you go back to Edinburgh?’

  She looked up from filling second cups. ‘In a few days, Friday.’

  ‘Good, I’ll drive you down, I’ve an appointment in that part of the world on Saturday.’

  She said stiffly: ‘That’s kind of you, but I can go very easily by train.’

  Her mother looked at her in some astonishment. ‘Darling, you’ve said a dozen times how tedious it is going to Edinburgh by train, and then there’s the bus to Lairg first…’

  ‘I drive tolerably well,’ murmured the doctor. ‘We could go to Lairg and on to Inverness. It would save you a good deal of time, but of course, if y
ou are nervous…’

  ‘I am not nervous,’ said Eleanor coldly. ‘I merely do not want to interfere with your holiday.’

  ‘Oh, but you’re not,’ he told her cheerfully. ‘I have to go to Edinburgh—I’ve just said so. I came here first because I had some books my father wanted your father to have.’

  Which led the conversation into quite different channels.

  It was a crisp, bright October morning when Eleanor woke the next day—too good to stay in bed, she decided. She got up, moving quietly round her pretty little bedroom, pulling on slacks and a sweater again, brushing and plaiting her hair. She went down to the kitchen without making a sound and put on the kettle; a cup of tea, she decided, then a quick peep at Mrs Trot and the kittens before taking tea up to her parents; and there would still be time to take Punch, the dog, for a short walk before helping to get breakfast.

  She was warming the pot when Fulk said from the door: ‘Good morning, Eleanor—coming out for a walk? It’s a marvellous morning.’

  She spooned tea carefully. ‘Hullo, have you been out already?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m more than willing to go again. Who’s the tea for?’

  ‘Me—and you, now you’re here.’

  He said softly: ‘I wonder why you don’t like me, Eleanor?’

  She poured tea into two mugs and handed him one, and said seriously: ‘I think it’s because you arrived unexpectedly—quite out of the blue—you see, I never thought I’d see you again and I didn’t like you when I was a little girl. It’s funny how one remembers…’

  He smiled. ‘You were such a little girl, but I daresay you were right, I was a horrid boy—most boys are from time to time and you were bad for me; you made me feel like the lord of creation, following me around on those fat legs of yours, staring at me with those eyes, listening to every word I said—your eyes haven’t changed at all, Eleanor.’