Off with the Old Love. Betty Neels
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speak, for he went on, ‘There’s a party next week—you simply must come, darling. Buy yourself something eye-catching; everyone who’s anyone will be there.’
She thought guiltily of the dresses she had bought in the last few months, worn a few times and then pushed to the back of the wardrobe because Melville had hinted, oh, so nicely, that to be seen more than a couple of times in the same dress just wasn’t on. She said quietly, ‘I’ll have no chance to go shopping and I’ll be too whacked to go to any parties.’ She turned to smile at him. ‘You’ll have to find another girl, Melville.’
She had meant it as a joke; his easy, ‘It looks as though I’ll have to,’ took her by uneasy surprise. She spent the next minute or two mentally reviewing the next week’s lists and the off-duty rota. It was take-in week, too; there was no way in which she could alter the unalterable schedule.
‘Well, let’s worry about it later,’ said Melville and parked the car.
The club was brightly lit and very full. It was also elegantly furnished. They were ushered to a table a little to one side and Melville at once began to point out the well-known people around them. When a waiter came he turned to Rachel. ‘You need bucking up, darling. How about vodka?’
She could hardly mention her empty stomach. Instead she murmured that it gave her a headache and could she have a long cold drink?
Melville shrugged in tolerant good humour. ‘Of course, my sweet. What shall it be?’
‘Tonic with lemon and ice, please.’ She sat back and looked around her. The suit she was wearing had no chance against the ultra-chic women there, but that didn’t worry her overmuch, just as long as Melville liked what she wore.
Their drinks came and with them a dish of crudités, some salted nuts and potato straws. None of them filling, but better than nothing. She nibbled a few carrot sticks and crunched a potato straw while Melville turned his head to wave to an acquaintance. He turned back presently and began on a long and amusing story about the production he was working on. He was handsome and entertaining and paid her extravagant compliments which she never quite believed. Not that that mattered, for he was in love with her; he had told her so many times. One day he would ask her to marry him and she was sure she would say yes. Her eyes shone at the thought so that Melville paused in what he was saying; she really was a remarkably pretty girl, although she was proving disappointingly stubborn about taking more time off. ‘Let’s go somewhere and dance?’ he suggested.
She said with real regret, ‘Oh, Melville, I can’t. We start work at eight o’clock tomorrow morning and I’ll have to be on duty before then.’
He frowned and then laughed and caught her hand. ‘You really are the most ridiculous girl I’ve ever met. I could get you a part in my next production, or find you some modelling work, but you choose to spend your days in your revolting operating theatre.’
‘I don’t want to do anything else. It’s not revolting, either.’
He picked up her hand and kissed it. ‘You dear creature, so earnest. Tell you what, I’ll pick you up tomorrow evening when you’re off duty and we’ll go somewhere and have a meal.’
‘It’s take-in week. I might get held up, but I’d love that. Somewhere where I won’t need to dress up, Melville.’
‘The nearest Lyons,’ he assured her laughingly. ‘And now, before you say it, you want to get back, don’t you? Duty calls and so on.’
They took some time to get out of the club; Melville stopped so many times to greet people he knew. Rachel felt very proud of him. Sometimes, but not always, he introduced her with a casual, ‘Meet Rachel,’ and she smiled at faces which showed no interest in her and listened politely to what they had to say, although none of it made much sense to her.
At the hospital he leaned over and opened her door and then kissed her. ‘I won’t get out, darling,’ he told her. ‘I must go back to the office and work for a while.’
She was instantly worried. ‘Oh, not because you took me out?’ she wanted to know. ‘Now you’ll have to stay up late working…’
‘I’d stay up all night for you, darling.’ He smiled as he closed the door and with a wave shot away.
Rachel went to her room, made a pot of tea, ate the rest of the cake and put her uniform ready for the morning. Lying in a hot bath she mulled over her evening; it had been delightful, of course, because Melville had been with her, but hunger had taken the gilt off the gingerbread. It was a pity, she mused, that she was in love with a man who didn’t always remember to ask her if she were hungry, while there were several young men on the medical staff who would have whisked her off to the nearest café for a meal at her merest hint… She frowned. It was strange that, whereas she would have no hesitation in telling any one of them that she was hungry, she found herself unable to tell Melville.
She got into bed, meaning to lie and think about him. He was very good-looking, she reflected sleepily, not tall but always so beautifully turned out. He wore his dark hair rather long and his voice was soft and his speech clipped. On the edge of sleep, she found herself comparing it with Professor van Teule’s deep slow tones—not a bit alike, the two of them; the professor was twice the size for a start…
The Professor walked into the theatre at exactly eight o’clock and Rachel, however easygoing his manner was, had taken care to have everything ready. Sidney, the theatre technician, was standing ready, her nurses were positioned where they would be most required, Dr Carr and his patient were there, the latter already nicely under, and she herself stood, relaxed with her trolleys around her. He bade everyone good morning and she watched his casual glance taking everything in; he expected perfection and she took care that he got it. George and Billy had taken up their places and the Professor waited quietly while they arranged sterile sheets round the patient before putting out a hand for a scalpel.
It would be a lengthy operation—a gastroduodenostomy—but since most of the Professor’s work was major surgery, involving all the clap-trap modern methods could devise, Rachel went placidly ahead with what was required of her, by no means disturbed by the paraphernalia around her. She sent the nurses in turn to their coffee, and then Norah, and when at last the Professor stood back from the table, she nodded to the nurse nearest the door to warn Dolly that coffee would be a welcome break.
The patient borne carefully away, the other men followed the Professor and Rachel stripped off her gown and gloves, made sure that Norah was laying up for the next case, and went along to her office. There was no room for them all, but somehow they fitted themselves in and left her chair empty. She poured the coffee and handed round the biscuit tin and, since the Professor had already had his, handed him the patient’s notes when he asked for them. He sat hunched up on the radiator, writing up the details of the operation, while the others discussed where they hoped to go for their holidays.
‘What about you, Rachel?’ asked Dr Carr.
George grinned across at her. ‘Oh, our Rachel will be on her honeymoon—somewhere exotic.’
She coloured at that although she answered matter-of-factly, ‘Chance is a fine thing—I can’t very well have a honeymoon without a husband.’
She was aware that the Professor had stopped writing and was looking at her but she didn’t look at him. Although she had to when he asked casually, ‘Did you have a pleasant evening, Rachel?’
The look was grateful; it gave the conversation a turn in a different direction. She didn’t mind being teased in the least—three brothers had inured her to that—but somehow she was shy of talking about Melville.
‘Lovely,’ she told him. ‘We went to a club—I’ve forgotten its name—and it was full of beautiful models and the kind of people you see on the TV.’ She put down her mug. ‘I’ll see if they are ready for you, sir.’
He glanced at his watch. ‘We’re behind time. George, I may have to leave the last case to you, but I’ll be in this evening.’ He got to his feet and went unhurriedly