The Fifth Day of Christmas Page 5

  It was pleasant to get off the monotonous highway for just a little while, and the old coaching inn where he stopped looked inviting.

  ‘I’m sorry about my uniform,’ said Julia as they went inside. ‘I don’t look very glamorous.’

  He gave her a sideways glance. ‘And what makes you think that I like a glamorous companion?’

  She said in a prosaic voice, ‘I thought men did.’

  He took her arm because the pavement was still slippery. ‘Not always,’ he said, half laughing, ‘in any case you’ve no need to worry; with your looks you could get away with anything you choose to put on.’

  He said it so carelessly that she felt doubtful if he meant it as a compliment. She sighed and he said at once, ‘You’re tired, you need a meal.’

  The food was good and the dining room pleasantly warm. They ate roast beef with all its traditional accompaniments washed down with burgundy, and while the doctor contented himself with the cheese board, Julia, who had a sweet tooth, applied herself to a chocolate soufflé. She ate with relish and as she put down her fork, remarked, ‘You know, food you haven’t cooked yourself always tastes different—besides, we had rather a monotonous diet at Drumlochie House, didn’t we?’

  ‘But excellently cooked. We were all glad there was no bread, yours was so delicious.’

  ‘I enjoyed baking it,’ said Julia simply. ‘What time shall we get to London?’

  ‘Almost a hundred and sixty miles—it’s hard to say. Three hours normally, but I should think we might double that allowing for slow going and hold-ups. Getting bored?’ he asked with a smile.

  Julia shook her head, wishing very much to tell him that she was enjoying every minute of his company. Instead she remarked, ‘Not in the least. I like motoring, though I don’t do so much of it.’

  ‘Hasn’t James got a car?’

  She pinkened. ‘Yes—a Morris, but he doesn’t believe that you should travel fast on the roads nor that you should use a car solely for pleasure.’

  The doctor choked. ‘Good God—what kind of pleasure?’

  ‘Well, short trips to the sea, somewhere where we could do the shopping at the same time, and—and picnics…’

  ‘Sandwiches and a thermos flask?’ he wanted to know.

  ‘Yes. James considers eating out is a great waste of money.’ Her already pink cheeks went a little pinker. ‘Oh, I beg your pardon, that sounds rude and ungrateful just after you’ve given me such a gorgeous lunch. I—I didn’t mean that at all; I love eating out and driving miles. I’d forgotten what fun it was.’ She sounded wistful.

  ‘I can see that I shall have to rescue you from James.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘By a method which will prove quite infallible.’ The doctor’s voice was light. Julia decided that he was joking. She asked equally lightly,

  ‘Do tell me.’

  He shook his head, ‘No—not yet, but I promise it will work.’

  They got up to go and Julia, still persisting, asked, ‘You mean if I take a job away from home for a long time he might forget me?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  The short winter’s day was already dimming although it was barely two o’clock. Julia looked anxiously at the sky as they got into the car. ‘It’s not going to snow again, is it?’ she asked worriedly.

  ‘I shouldn’t think so. If it does and it gets too bad we’ll just have to stay the night somewhere, but I don’t think that will he necessary.’

  She settled down as he started the car, drawing her cloak around her, thankful for the warmth and comfort. Presently she closed her eyes; they were back on the M1 once more and there was nothing to see, only the road running ahead of them and the traffic weaving in and out of the lanes in a never-ending, tiring pattern. The doctor was doing a steady fifty, overtaking whenever he had the opportunity; he didn’t seem disposed to talk. She opened her eyes and peeped at him once; his good-looking profile looked stern and thoughtful. Immersed in dreams of Miss Marcia Jason, thought Julia pettishly, and closed her eyes again, sternly dismissing her own dreams. She opened them a few moments later, aware of something wrong, although the man beside her had made no sound. They were on the point of passing an articulated lorry and as she looked behind her the doctor accelerated to a sudden breathtaking speed, sliding ahead of it with seconds to spare as a car, roaring down the motorway, passed them within inches. Julia caught a glimpse of its occupants laughing and waving. ‘That was a bit near,’ she said in a voice which quavered just a little. ‘I’m glad you’re a good driver.’

  The doctor sounded grim. ‘Yes, so am I—they’re the sort who cause a pile-up. He passed us at over a hundred and twenty.’

  ‘What were we doing when you overtook?’ Julia wanted to know.

  He grinned. ‘Never you mind,’ he replied, ‘but it was either that or being pushed into the next world…’ He broke off and said something harsh and sudden in his own language, and Julia watched with silent horror as the car, careering madly half a mile ahead of them, tried to pass a huge transport which was on the point of crossing into the fast lane, and even as she watched she was aware that the doctor had slowed and was edging back on to the slow lane and on to the hard shoulder of the road, to stop close to the appalling chaos.

  The transport driver, in a last-minute attempt to avert disaster, had slewed to his left, but the oncoming car had been too fast for him. It was wedged, no longer recognisable as a car, under the huge back wheels, its recent occupants lying untidily around it. Even as they were looking, two more cars crashed into it.

  The doctor reached across Julia, locked the door and undid her safety belt. ‘When I get out,’ he commanded, ‘get into my seat and don’t put a foot outside the door until I say so.’

  He took his bag from the back seat and got out himself, and then after a quick look around, turned to help her. The traffic, for the most part, was still moving south down the slow lane, Julia could hear the urgent squeak of brakes behind them as they made their way to the wrecked cars. There was already a small crowd of people—the doctor tapped the nearest man on the shoulder and said with mild authority,

  ‘Would you go to the side of the motorway and find the telephone? One shouldn’t be too far away—tell the police and say we shall want several ambulances.’ He didn’t wait to see if the man would do as he asked but shouldered his way through the little group, propelling Julia along beside him. The first victim lay very quietly, which was only to be expected of someone with a compound fracture of skull and a badly torn leg. Doctor van den Werff examined her swiftly, grunted gently and said, ‘Get a tourniquet on that leg, Julia, and try and get a pad and some sort of bandage on her head, then come to me.’ He opened his case, gave her a handful of slings and a packet of gauze and went away.

  Once she had something to do, it wasn’t so bad. Julia forgot the horror of it all in the urgency of her work. She begged a tie off a man standing nearby, tightened her home-made torniquet with her pen and then turned her attention to the woman’s head. There wasn’t a great deal which could be done. She covered the wounds carefully with gauze and slid a cotton sling carefully around the woman’s head and fastened it loosely, then enlisted the tieless man’s help, explaining what he had to do about the tourniquet, and went to find the doctor.

  He was sprawled across the wreckage of the first car, his head and shoulders out of sight in the tangle of twisted steel; she worked her way to his side and looked inside too. Her almost soundless ‘Oh’ was full of horror and she closed her eyes, willing herself not to be sick. She opened them again as the doctor pulled her out to stand beside him. He said in a perfectly ordinary voice, ‘Very nasty, but I doubt if he knew anything about it. Who’s next?’

  Julia, her face very white, spoke with a mouth which shook a little.

  ‘That woman—I left a man with her, he seemed sensible. There’s someone screaming…’

  ‘Hysterics,’ said the doctor briefly. ‘Let’s have a look at this one.’ A man this ti
me, conscious and miraculously only slightly injured. The doctor sent him to the side of the road, accompanied by two willing helpers, who, now that they had got over the initial shock, had offered, as had several others, to help in any way they could. The next one was a man too, with a leg twisted at a strange angle and a pale, unconscious face. The doctor felt the man’s head with gentle fingers and said,

  ‘I think we’ll leave him as he is until the ambulances get here. But we’ll splint that leg.’

  Which he did, with the aid of two planks of wood torn from a packing case and two more ties. Two children came next, both sadly dead. Julia turned away from them with a heavy heart to join the doctor at the side of the last victim—a woman, and conscious. Her pale lips sketched a smile as they knelt down beside her. ‘It’s my back,’ she whispered, ‘it feels funny.’

  The doctor said with gentle decisiveness, ‘They’ll put that right in hospital. Stay exactly as you are, will you, my dear? You’ll not have to wait long, I can hear the ambulance now.’

  He stayed where he was, a gentle hand on her shoulder, and said to Julia, ‘Tell the ambulance men to come to this patient first and fast. Then find the driver of the transport—he’s not amongst this lot, probably he’s all right, just shocked, and if I’m not about see if anyone was hurt in the other two cars. I don’t think so, they’d all better be examined in hospital.’

  Julia sped away, glad to have something to do. The driver was still sitting in his cab, dazed with shock and but for a few bruises, unhurt. All the same, she persuaded him to go with her in search of the doctor, whom she found helping to load the woman with the broken back on to an ambulance. He gave her a hasty glance. ‘He’s all right? Leave him here, I’ll have a quick look before he goes for a check-up. See about the others?’

  She saw about them; bruises and a cut or two and some nasty grazes, nothing that half an hour in hospital casualty wouldn’t put right. She led them, unnaturally quiet with shock, over to the ambulances too and sat them on the blankets someone had spread on the grass at the side of the road, then looked for the doctor. He was with the group of police and ambulance men and a breakdown lorry gang, bending over the wreckage where the dead man lay. She looked away as they began to draw something covered in a blanket out of the tangled mess, her stomach turning over, and most fortunately had her attention immediately distracted by the arrival of another ambulance, complete with doctor and nurse. By the time she had answered their immediate questions, the little group had dispersed from around the wrecked car and Doctor van den Werff was wiping his hands on a towel produced by one of the ambulance men, and while he talked to the doctor Julia went with the nurse to see what help they might give the ambulance men in stowing the remainder of the slightly injured passengers into the last two ambulances, but she had only been with them a very few minutes when the doctor tapped her on the shoulder, picked up his car coat from the ground where he had tossed it earlier and instead of putting it on, draped it around her shoulders; it was only as he did so that she discovered that she was shivering violently. They had reached the car when she said in a surprised, tight little voice, ‘I think I’m going to faint,’ and did so.

  She came round in the car, with her cap off and her head against the doctor’s shoulder, as she opened her eyes he said mildly,

  ‘Stay as you are,’ and she was glad to do so; his shoulder felt comfortably solid under her swimming head and the weight of his arm round her shoulders was reassuring.

  ‘I’ve never done that before,’ she said in a surprised apologetic voice. ‘That man in the car…’

  His arm tightened. ‘Forget him,’ his voice was calm and matter-of-fact and very kind. ‘Think instead of the help you were able to give to the others.’

  ‘I didn’t do much,’ she said forlornly, almost on the verge of tears. ‘You did all the work…those two children…’

  He ignored her last muttered words and said briskly, ‘If you hadn’t helped me I should have wasted a great deal of time bandaging and tying splints and so forth, and while I was doing that someone else might have died.’

  ‘The man in the car, and the children…do you think they…?’

  If he felt impatience at her insistence he gave no sign but said in his calm way, ‘None of them knew anything about it, and that’s the truth, Julia; you’re too nice a person to lie to.’

  For some reason Julia couldn’t even guess at, she began to cry then. She cried and snivelled and sniffed while the doctor sat silent, and when at last she fumbled for her handkerchief, he offered her his own, still without speaking.

  Her face mopped, she sat up, feeling a great deal better, and made shift to repair the damage to her face and tidy her hair, still sniffing from time to time. When she had finished her eyes still looked red and so did the tip of her nose, but neither of these things could dim her vivid good looks. She said soberly, ‘If you want to change your mind about employing me to look after Miss Jason, I shall quite understand.’

  He looked completely taken aback. ‘But I don’t want to change my mind. Whatever put the idea into your head? I want only the best for Marcia, and I think you are exactly what I hoped to find.’ His voice was very decided and Julia heaved a sigh of relief.

  ‘Oh, thank you—I thought I’d better ask after making such a fool of myself. Have you a very deep regard for her?’

  She heard him sigh, but all he said was: ‘I haven’t seen her for six months.’ Which didn’t quite answer her question. He had sighed very deeply, though; Julia, who had a romantic nature, thought that it was probably with longing. She quelled a fresh desire to burst into tears once more, although for quite a different reason this time, and when he suggested that they should stop for tea at the earliest opportunity, she was able to agree in a calm little voice which was, nevertheless, quite unlike her usual tones.

  The accident had occurred a few miles north of Nottingham. The doctor started the car and drove past the chaos. He was going faster now despite the icy road, but there was no fault to find with his driving; Julia sat back relaxed in a friendly silence until a sudden thought struck her and she asked,

  ‘Have you somewhere to go tonight? Will it be a little late for you to go to a hotel?’

  She could not see his face, but she was sure that he was smiling.

  ‘I think I shall be all right—I usually go to the same hotel when I’m in London—they know me there. What about you? Your friend will be home?’

  ‘I’m sure she will, and even if she isn’t I know where the second key is hidden.’ She added shyly, ‘I’m sure she’ll be glad to give you a meal.’

  ‘That’s kind, but I believe I’ll go straight to the hotel when I’ve seen you safely there. I want to telephone to Holland.’

  Miss Jason, thought Julia sadly. How he must dote on her to telephone her all that way at that time of night! She wondered what it would feel like to be loved like that and was unable to pursue the thought further because he was speaking again. ‘I’ll come round and see you some time tomorrow if I may. Do you suppose you could be ready to catch the night boat from Harwich?’

  ‘Yes, of course, I’ve only to pack a few things.’ She stared ahead of her into the dark night, made darker by the car’s powerful lights, aware that if he had asked her to go with him to the other side of the world she would have given him the same reply because she loved him; she admitted the fact to herself without surprise and with the unhappy satisfaction of knowing that her brother and Maureen and James had all been wrong—love for her, at least, hadn’t come gradually. It had come when she had opened a door to a stranger on a bitter cold night.

  They reached Connie’s flat just after ten o’clock and as the doctor stopped the car outside the tall terraced house he put his head out of the car window and looked upwards. ‘There are lights on the top floor,’ he announced.

  ‘Good,’ said Julia, ‘that’s Connie’s.’ She started to open the door, but he put a large gloved hand over hers and said mildly, ‘Not so fast—I�
�ll get your case. Wait there until I open the door.’

  Julia did as she was told meekly, not that she was a meek girl by any means, but she had discovered in the last few days that sometimes it was nice to be told what to do. At the door she put her hand out for her case, but he shook his head. ‘Lead the way up, I’ll see you safely indoors.’

  Connie came to the door, in her dressing gown and with her head crowned with a complexity of rollers tied into a pink hair-net. She flung her arms round Julia and exclaimed, ‘Where have you been? Come in at once…’ She caught sight of the doctor and asked instantly, ‘Who’s that?’

  Julia performed the introduction with a certain amount of haste, not because she didn’t want Connie to meet her companion, but because he had said that he wanted to go to his hotel as quickly as possible.

  ‘Come in,’ invited Connie, ‘I’ll knock up a meal and some tea,’ and added as an afterthought, ‘Sorry about the hair, I’ve just washed it.’

  The doctor smiled charmingly at her, but shook his head. ‘I should have liked that, but I really must go.’ He turned to Julia. ‘You’ll have a lot to do tomorrow, I expect, so I won’t bother you, but may I call for you about six? We could have a meal before we leave and iron out any problems.’

  ‘That will do very well,’ stated Julia calmly, wondering how she could bear to see him go. But he did, almost at once, and Connie closed the door and pulled her into the little sitting room and sat her down in one of the shabby armchairs by the gas fire. ‘Tell me at once,’ she breathed, ‘where are you going?’

  Julia told her while they got supper together; she told Connie about her stay in Drumlochie House too—at least, she told her most of it. It was when they were parting for the night that Connie asked, ‘What about James?’

  ‘And what about James?’ asked Julia in her turn, a little coldly. ‘He doesn’t own me. I’ve never encouraged him to think that I would marry him, you know; he’s conceited enough to take it for granted—and George and Maureen have egged him on…’ Her beautiful black brows drew together in a frown, she looked flushed and angry and quite strikingly lovely as she stood in the doorway of Connie’s spare bedroom. ‘James,’ she said with vehemence, ‘makes me sick!’