An Apple from Eve. Betty Neels
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of her. She must ring Ellen before she left the hospital and put off seeing her until the following day, and if there was enough of everything in the larder, she might make some little cakes for tea.
She toyed with the idea of bribing Mrs Cross to come over and serve it, but perhaps that would be a bit obvious—one could try too hard.
Polishing the hall table a couple of hours later, she found herself glad to have so much to do. She had been dreading coming home to a house without her father, but she had had no time to sit and broad. The nice old place had a neglected air with no one living in it, already it was beginning to come alive again, although there was still a good deal to be done. Euphemia had opened all the windows the moment she got in and Hoovered like mad because she had the feeling that he was the kind of man to ask her, ever so politely, to open this or that door so that he might see what was behind it. There were several bedrooms which hadn’t been used for months, so she raced around making them presentable with counterpanes and a brisk dusting. Several of the cupboards were stuffed with the boys’ things, too, as well as Ellen’s and her last year’s clothes, but these she decided, he would have to accept; they could be cleared out later.
She went to bed late after a sketchy supper and was up betimes, arranging flowers, polishing once more, turning the shabby rugs to hide the threadbare patches. Breakfast was as sketchy as her supper had been because she still had the cakes to make. She finished her housework, spent half an hour searching for the back door key, which no one had ever bothered about, and went to the kitchen to do her baking. There was time to make a fruit cake too and everything she needed to make it with. With everything safely in the oven she went upstairs, changed into the pale green jersey and the sandals, did her hair in a rather careless knot at the back of her head, made up her pretty face and went downstairs once more. The little cakes were done, and very nice they looked too. Euphemia made herself some coffee while she waited for the fruit cake to bake to perfection, arranged it on the Spode china plate, and walked across the green to the pub, where she ate fish and chips in the basket with a splendid appetite before going back to put the final touches to the tea tray.
She had planned to be in the garden, sitting at her ease with a book, when the doctor arrived, but she was doing her face once again when he thumped the knocker. He was early—wanting to catch her out, she thought crossly as she raced downstairs to open the door, so that her ‘Good afternoon, Dr van Diederijk’ was coldly said.
‘I’m early,’ his eyes searched her face, ‘and you’re annoyed about it. Would you like me to go away for half an hour?’
She pinkened with embarrassment. ‘No, of course not—it doesn’t matter in the least. Please come in,’ and because she felt guilty of bad manners she pointed out the torn carpet in a kindly way.
He stepped over the hole neatly. ‘I had noticed it,’ he told her. ‘A good carpet too—a Moorfields, isn’t it? You could have it repaired.’
She didn’t choose to answer this; anything could be repaired provided there was the money to pay for it. She asked haughtily: ‘Where would you like to start?’
He didn’t answer her at once but crossed the hall to take a leisurely look at the portrait hanging on the father wall. It had been done years previously as a surprise Christmas present for her father—her mother, Ellen, the boys and herself, painted in a charming group against the background of the oak-panelled wall in the sitting room.
The doctor said, to surprise her: ‘I hope you will leave that—it belongs to the house, doesn’t it?’
‘Well, if you don’t mind, I will—I haven’t anywhere to hang it…’
He turned to look at her. ‘I understand from Sir Richard that your sister will be living with an aunt—do you intend to do the same?’
It really wasn’t any business of his, but if she annoyed him he might not rent the house from her. ‘No, I shall stay at the hospital,’ and to forestall the next question: ‘The boys will go to my aunt for their holidays.’ She opened the drawing-room door, because that was the grandest room in the house even if shabby. She had polished and dusted and put flowers in the vases and it looked charming and welcoming too. The doctor wandered in and strolled around, asking none of the questions she had expected. ‘It’s an open fire,’ she pointed out unnecessarily, ‘and there’s a radiator under the end window—the central heating isn’t very modern, but it works.’
He nodded, went past her and opened the door on to the garden. He stood on the patio outside, still not speaking, and her heart sank. The garden was large, hedged with beech, its flower beds a riot of colour; it was also unkempt, its grass too long, weeds everywhere. Euphemia said quickly: ‘The garden will be tidied up before you—that is—if you take the house.’
‘Did I not make it plain that I would rent it from you?’ He gave her a cool enquiring look. ‘I will arrange for a gardener. Is there anyone who will housekeep? Perhaps you know of a good woman?’
‘There’s Mrs Cross, she came in each day while my…she’s a widow and lives just across the green, she’s got a sister who lives close by—she came in to help with spring-cleaning. I daresay she might work for you as well—it’s a large house for one, although I don’t suppose you’ll be using all the rooms.’
He wasn’t going to answer that either, but turned from the door. ‘Perhaps we might look at them?’
She showed him the sitting-room, shabbier than any other room in the house because they had all used it whenever they were at home, and then her father’s study and lastly the morning-room which was in fact a repository for fishing rods, tennis racquets, an elderly sewing machine and a catholic selection of books on the shelves which ran along one wall.
‘I shall clear all this away,’ said Euphemia, and he nodded.
The kitchen with the pantry beyond, a stillroom and what had once been the game larder was inspected quickly; he merely stood in the middle of the floor and observed: ‘If Mrs Cross is satisfied with this, I need not bother too much. Upstairs?’
She led him up the staircase and in and out of the bedrooms, most of them agreeably roomy, the smaller ones at the back of the house making up for their lack of size by their plain washed walls and plaster cornices. They were sparsely furnished, but what there was was old and graceful and, thanks to Euphemia’s hard work, beautifully polished.
Back on the main landing again, the doctor spoke. ‘Two bathrooms, you said?’
It sounded quite inadequate in a house of that size. ‘There’s a shower in the bathroom at the front of the house,’ offered Euphemia, unaware how anxious her voice sounded.
He agreed smoothly. ‘You have no objection to me having another shower put in—there’s a small dressing room adjoining this room…’ He strode across and opened a door and when she followed meekly: ‘At my expense, of course.’
‘If you want one,’ she conceded. Why a man living alone should need two bathrooms and two showers was beyond her, even if this fiancée of his came visiting, unless she was the kind of girl who brought Mum with her…she very nearly giggled and he threw her an enquiring glance. ‘You are amused?’ he wanted to know.
‘No, no, of course not. Is there anywhere else you would like to go? Then perhaps you would like a cup of tea?’
‘Thank you, that would be welcome. I’ll get in touch with my solicitor tomorrow and you will be hearing from yours shortly. I should like to move in within the next ten days.’
Euphemia’s mind boggled at the amount of packing up to be done in that time. She would have to get Ellen to help her and perhaps Mrs Cross, and as though he had read her thoughts: ‘May I suggest that your—er—personal possessions should be stored in one of the bedrooms—it will give you a great deal less work. I should be obliged if the morning room could be cleared so that my secretary will have a room in which to work.’
‘Yes, of course. Will she live here too?’
His tone withered her. ‘What a singularly