The Nurse's Child Read online

  She frowned at herself in the rear-view mirror and pursed her lips thoughtfully. Did she want to be part of all that again?

  Yet it wasn't as a pupil that she was contemplating entering its hallowed walls. If she was offered the job she would be working as a nurse, and if she came across any kids as lonely and mixed up as she'd been, at least they would have a listening ear.

  The school was in much more salubrious surroundings than the big hospital where she'd worked on a busy main road in London. The whole area around it was clean and fresh, the air like wine.

  Her eyes widened. The man who'd been in the bar the night before had just got out of a car farther along the parking area. What was he doing here for goodness' sake?

  He was alone, so she decided that he wasn't a parent delivering a child for lessons. She sat back in her seat and watched him, aware once again that he was a very striking man.

  The faces of those he'd been with hadn't registered, even that of the choking Charlie. She'd been vaguely aware of the woman who'd given her the chilly glance having angular features, but that had been it. Yet she remembered every detail of this man's face.

  Though it seemed to be set in a different mould this morning. He looked serious, businesslike. He must be one of the teaching staff, she thought and, getting slowly out of her car, followed him through the school's imposing entrance.

  He was nowhere to be seen when she got inside and she was relieved. She'd been a joyless creature the night before and she was pretty sure he wouldn't be falling over himself to make her acquaintance a second time.

  When she presented herself to Anita Frost, the school secretary, Freya was even more surprised. It was true that the face hadn't registered the previous evening but the cold stare was easy enough to remember.

  When she'd explained why she was there, the woman said, 'You were in the hotel last night, weren't you? I see now why you were so good when Charlie swallowed the nut. You have nursing experience.'

  Freya nodded. This was weird. She'd already come across two people who'd been in the bar last night. Were Charlie and the others going to turn up inside Marchmont's student halls? Perhaps it had been a staff night out.

  'The governors are assembling,' Anita Frost was saying. 'If you'd like to take a seat, I'll inform you when they're ready to see you.'

  As she waited Freya could hear girlish voices raised in their morning hymn. The words of 'When Morning Gilds the Skies' were drifting over and she thought that nothing had changed Very much. The hymns were the same. The smell of hot young bodies was the same. This might be one of the county's top schools, but its basic ambience was no different from any other place of education.

  She was the one who'd changed. Not just because she'd grown out of her 'wild child' ways but because she was unfulfilled. Marriageless, childless and all of her own doing.

  Maybe she would take this job if it was offered to her. She'd always liked working on the children's ward. In a place like this there would be an abundance of them. She could always pretend that one of them belonged to her if Poppy's wild imaginings came to nothing.

  There were six school governors, four men and two women, seated around a heavy oak table, and as she settled herself in the solitary chair opposite, the confidence that Freya usually displayed almost deserted her.

  Long-lashed blue eyes were fixed on one of the men opposite in even more amazed surprise. So that's why he's here, she was thinking. He's not a parent or a teacher. The man is one of the school governors! Please, let him have a short memory.

  If he had, it wasn't that short.

  'Hello, there,' he said. 'We meet again.'

  She gave a sickly smile.

  'Yes. It would appear so.'

  An elderly man who seemed to be in charge of the interview panel looked up and fixed her with piercing grey eyes.

  'So, Miss Farnham, you are already acquainted with Dr Richard Haslett, the school's medical officer.'

  If her composure had been slipping before, it had disappeared completely now. The guy was a doctor! Someone had called him 'Doc' the night before but it hadn't registered ... not until now.

  She tried to pull herself together.

  'Yes, I am, although we only met briefly,' she said coolly. 'And I have to say that when we met I had no idea that he was someone I would be working with if I was employed here.'

  'That is so, Amos,' the man in question told the elderly inquisitor. 'Miss Farnham saved one of my friends from choking with a speed and efficiency that should have told me she had nursing experience.'

  'I see,' the other man said and picking up Freya's cv that was lying in front of him on the table, he suggested drily, 'Let's proceed.'

  As the interview progressed Freya discovered that the vacancy had arisen because the member of staff who had previously held the position of Sister had been forced to take sudden retirement. Medical problems of her own had been the cause and the school was treating the appointment of a replacement with some urgency.

  Each of the governors had questions they wanted answering and she felt her confidence returning as she made her replies. Until the doctor said, 'A lot of the girls here at Marchmont get very homesick. They need kindness. To be made to feel that they aren't as alone as they think. Do you feel that you could help in that way, along with looking after their health?'

  He was observing her consideringly and Freya sensed that her abrupt manner of the night before had been noted and was now being challenged.

  'I was at boarding school myself,' she told them quietly. 'My father sent me there when I lost my mother. I was bereft and lonely and turned to the first person who offered me affection.'

  'And was that the nursing sister?' Richard Haslett asked.

  'No, I'm afraid not. But I think it shows that I do know what it feels like to be a child away from familiar surroundings.'

  At last it was over and she was told that they would be in touch in a few days' time. As she left the building Freya knew that, foolish as it seemed, she wanted the job. Even though there wasn't a child in sight who even vaguely resembled herself, she noted as girls of all shapes and sizes streamed out of morning assembly.

  As she went to her car she was wishing she could have had another word with Richard Haslett. If she hadn't wanted to talk to him last night, she did now.

  She wanted to persuade him that she was the right one for the job, which she was sure he would find rather strange after her aloofness of the night before.

  Hopefully he wouldn't think it had anything to do with himself. Yet she had to admit that meeting him again had increased rather than decreased her interest in being involved with the health care of the pupils of Marchmont School.

  He came out just as she was about to pull away from the front of the building and she stopped the car and got out.

  'Hello, again,' he said easily. 'Are your ears burning? You're being discussed.'

  'And you aren't taking part?' she questioned.

  He shook his head. 'No. But I've already said my piece. I have a waiting room full of patients who are more concerned with what ails them than who the governors of Marchmont are going to appoint to deal with the health of their boarders.'

  'So you're a GP,' she said.

  'Yes. With the help of a junior partner I run the village practice and am also under contract to the school as medical officer.'

  'I see,' she said slowly.

  'Do you want the job?' he asked abruptly.

  'Yes. I think so. Would you say I have a chance?'

  'Maybe. Some new young blood is needed in that quarter. But the trouble with Amos Bradley, the chairman of the board of governors, is that he lacks vision. Always goes for the safe option.'

  'And you don't think that would be me?'

  She sensed reserve in him and knew she wasn't wrong when he said, 'I've really no idea. If you'll excuse me, I must be off. The folk in my waiting room aren't going to disappear into thin air.'

  'So what did you say about me?' she persisted as he
started to move towards his own vehicle.

  'You don't think I'm going to tell you that, do you?'

  He wasn't the only one withdrawing into their shell.

  'No, of course not,' she said hastily, and watched him go on his way with the feeling that she'd just put herself at a disadvantage.

  The phone was ringing when she opened the door of her London apartment and Freya wasn't surprised to hear Poppy's voice at the other end of the line.

  'So how did it go?' Poppy asked.

  'Well,' Freya said slowly, 'on the downside, I didn't see an eleven-year-old who looked like me. However, I only, had one look at the pupils and there were too many of them to scrutinise. Also, as we've both agreed many times, there's nothing to say that my daughter has my looks. She might look like her father.'

  There was silence for a moment as Poppy took in that indisputable fact but, rallying quickly, she went on to ask, 'And what about the job?'

  Still on the downside, I met one of the school governors the night before the interview and I wasn't at my best.'

  'So you've blown it.'

  'Maybe. I don't know. But you'll be surprised to hear that I found myself hoping I might get it.'

  'Really! That's good. Did you see my Alice?'

  'No,' Freya told her laughingly. 'I went in at the front door and left by it an hour later. The girls went past me as they left the hall after assembly but there were dozens of them. It was just a blur of faces.'

  'So it's wait-and-see time,' Poppy said.

  'Yes,' she agreed, and for some reason a face came to mind. That of a GP-cum-medical officer-cum-school governor.

  CHAPTER TWO

  It was true, what he'd said. Richard Haslett did have a lot on his mind. Not only did he have a waiting room full of patients, his daughter had come home from her friend's that morning with a gastric upset and instead of dropping her off at school he'd left her tucked up in bed with his housekeeper in attendance.

  He knew it wasn't serious—probably the after-effects of the meal she'd had the night before—but he wasn't taking any chances.

  They'd lost Jenny from a simple thing that had turned into a nightmare. A bite from a horsefly that within hours had brought on septic shock. His wife had never had a lot of resistance to infection and nothing that the hospital had done had been sufficient to halt the dreadful consequences.

  As he drove the short distance to the practice his thoughts switched to the woman that he'd just left. He'd recommended that they offer her the job and wasn't sure why.

  Maybe it was because all the other applicants had been older and he felt that someone of her age group would have a better rapport with the pupils. Or perhaps it was because she came over as very cool. Not the type to panic in an emergency. Yet most nurses were like that, it came with the training.

  She'd been expensively dressed. Did she need the job? Or had she other reasons for applying? There was something vaguely familiar about her. He'd felt it last night in the bar and would have liked to have made her acquaintance, but after he'd experienced the chill she'd given off he'd left her to it.

  This morning she'd been more pleasant but still rather reserved. Yet it didn't stop him from wondering about her.

  However, his curiosity would soon be appeased if she was offered the job and accepted it. They would be involved with each other, taking care of the children's health problems, even though he would be based in the village and she at the school.

  The words leapt up at her from the paper as Freya unfolded the letter that had come in the morning post. 'Application... successful... to commence...Monday...October first... please confirm...'

  So three weeks into term time she was being offered the post of Sister at Marchmont School and she hadn't changed her mind. She was going to accept.

  If there was even the slightest chance that one of the girls at Marchmont School might be hers, she wasn't going to pass it by...and to a lesser degree there was the attractive and intriguing Dr Richard Haslett.

  It was the first time in years that she'd looked at a man with any interest and it had been unnerving. She had her life mapped out...to find her child and move on in her career. All else was of secondary importance.

  At the moment she wasn't making much progress on either front. In the matter of her daughter, she wasn't likely to. She was only too well aware that once a child had been adopted it disappeared, unless the adoptive parents were prepared to allow contact with the mother.

  In her own case she'd forfeited any chance of that by running away. Leaving her baby in the hospital and doing nothing about it until it was too late. She supposed that the punishment fitted the crime. When she could have kept her baby she'd given in to her father's grim determination, and now that she was desperate to make amends she couldn't find her.

  Her remorse was. unending, but at that time all she'd been able to think of after the birth had been that the baby's father, Alan Walker, hadn't wanted her any more and to her father she had just been an encumbrance. It had been months later after nearly dying of pneumonia that she'd started to face up to what she'd done, but by then it had been too late.

  And with regard to her career, that was also being prodded by the long finger of time in the form of her own health. If she took the position at Marchmont she would be sidestepping, not moving up in nursing circles. Nevertheless, it was what she was going to do, and if she found that she'd made a mistake it wouldn't be the first time, far from it.

  The sanatorium where she would reign supreme was spacious and well equipped and the small suite of rooms leading off it that would be hers was likewise. The view from her bedroom window was breathtaking, the rolling fields of Gloucestershire laying their abundance at the foot of the Cotswold Hills.

  She could also see the cluster of stone dwellings that comprised the village, with the spire of the church rising skywards. Somewhere nearby would be the medical practice where Richard Haslett ruled the roost. When would they meet again? she wondered.

  All had been in order when Anita and Marjorie Tate, the school matron, had shown her round her domain. When the secretary was called away, leaving the older woman to conclude the welcoming routine, Freya had been glad to see her go.

  The matron was a different matter. Plump and pleasant, she was completely opposite to Anita Frost. And they were both going to be concerned about the welfare of the girls.

  She wasn't due to start her duties until the following day and by the time she'd unpacked and settled in it was still only the middle of the afternoon, which made her decide to head for the village.

  When she'd visited Marchmont School the first time she'd put a colour rinse on her hair, toning down its golden fairness to a muted brown. She'd known it had been overreacting but had felt that if there had been a child there looking as Poppy had described her, she didn't want any likeness between them to be immediately apparent to anyone but herself.

  When she'd found that she'd been offered the position she'd gone back to brown again and now, as she strode out of the school grounds, to the onlooker she was a slender figure, brown-haired, blue-eyed, dressed in a smart tweed suit, moving purposefully towards the village, hoping that she might meet Richard Haslett again.

  The main reason for her being there amongst the Cotswolds would have to wait until the following day when she started mixing with the pupils. In the meantime, given the chance, she was about to renew an acquaintance.

  She wasn't to know that Richard Haslett had been on the school premises while she'd been settling in and was now about to drive back to where he'd come from in time for the early evening surgery.

  When the car pulled up beside her Freya recognised it immediately and she halted beside a hedgerow that was still bright with wild flowers.

  He was winding down the window and as he looked across at her he said, 'So you're back with us.'

  'Yes. I take it that you must have put in a good word for me.'

  'It was more like old Amos realising for once that the girls need
young blood in the school.'

  So their decision hadn't had anything to do with him, she thought with sudden savage disappointment. She'd been taking too . much for granted.

  He saw her expression and wished he'd been truthful. Told her that it had been mainly at his persuasion that they'd employed her. But it was too late now. Perversely he'd not wanted her to know, though he didn't know why.

  'So where are you off to?' he asked.

  'I'm going to the village. I didn't see much of it when I was here before.'

  If Richard thought it strange that she was off in that direction before she'd had the chance to get her bearings at the school, he didn't comment and merely said, 'Hop in, then. I'll take you there.'

  Not wanting to appear too eager Freya was tempted to say, 'Thanks just the same, but I was looking forward to the walk,' but instead found herself accepting the offer and seating herself beside him.

  'I've just been to see one of the pupils,' he said as they pulled away. 'You might find her seeking you out tomorrow. Or on the other hand, she may have recovered. It looked like the onset of tonsillitis. I've left a prescription so she may well be much better in the morning.'

  'I didn't see you,' she said in surprise. 'Where did you examine her?'

  'In Matron's room. We didn't want to interrupt you while you were unpacking.'

  'I see,' she said smoothly, feeling vaguely disappointed that within seconds of meeting him again he was talking work and yet he hadn't bothered to seek her out while he'd been on the premises.

  'Do you live in the village yourself?' she asked casually.

  'Mmm. I do.'

  They were on the outskirts now and he was pulling up in front of a house built from the same golden stone as the school.

  'This is where my daughter and I exist.'

  'Exist?'

  'Yes. That's what it feels like ever since my wife died suddenly.'