New Surgeon at Ashvale A&E (13 page)

‘Sam,’ she said. ‘It’s good to see you. Come in. Is everything all right? There isn’t a problem at work, is there?’

He smiled and shook his head, following her along the
hallway towards the living room. ‘I just wanted to make sure that you were all right and to check that your central heating problem had been fixed to your satisfaction. My maintenance man said he had fitted a new pump for you, but you’d need to give it a trial over a few days to make sure it was working as you wanted.’

‘It’s fine,’ she told him. ‘There are no problems at all, and he fixed the slates and the roofing felt for me, so everything’s drying out now. I was really pleased with what he did.’

‘That’s good. I was sure he’d sort everything for you. I thought maybe we could go over the arrangements for the fund-raiser if you’re not too busy?’

‘Yes, of course. That’s a good idea.’ She showed him into the living room, where Craig was down on his knees playing peek-a-boo with Becky. The baby was holding a soft book in her hands, lifting it to cover her face, and every time Craig gently tugged it down and peered over the top of it, she burst into giggles that made her whole body shake.

Craig looked up as Ruby walked into the room and came to his feet, greeting Sam with a nod and a smile.

‘I wondered if Craig might come along and judge the dog show for us,’ Ruby said, glancing at Sam. ‘We need someone who knows what to look for, don’t we?’

‘That’s true.’ Sam’s expression didn’t show what he thought of that idea, but Craig seemed happy enough to go along with it.

‘I don’t have to work next weekend, so it shouldn’t be a problem,’ he murmured. ‘I told Ruby that I’d been out to your estate a couple of times to tend to the horses.’ He studied Sam thoughtfully. ‘I don’t think you were there at the time, but the stable manager was around to deal with everything. You certainly have a beautiful place. It seems to me it will be ideal for a fund-raising effort like the one you have in mind.’

‘I hope it will work out all right.’ Sam made a brief smile.
‘All we need is good weather, although we can hold the major part of the activities in the various barns and outbuildings if there’s a problem.’

Becky began to shuffle along the floor, alternately rolling, sitting and scrabbling her way towards the two men. Ruby watched her, guessing that she was intent on finding Craig, but all the baby could see from her vantage point were two pairs of trouser-clad legs.

The infant began to tug at the nearest pair, clutching the fabric with her fists and pulling herself upright onto wobbly legs. Sam looked down to see what was going on, and Becky looked up, expecting to see a familiar face.

When she saw that it was Sam whose legs she was clutching, she sank down onto her bottom and began to wail. Sam’s face was a picture, a comical mix of consternation and astonishment.

‘Oh, dear,’ Ruby said with a laugh. ‘That didn’t quite work out the way she expected, did it?’ She sent Sam a quick look. ‘It’s just that she’s more used to Craig being around. He was often here when Sophie or I came to visit our grandparents, so she’s grown up knowing him.’

She picked up the child and gently tried to soothe her tears, all to no avail because now that Becky was nearer to Sam, it seemed to make the situation worse, and her crying became louder.

Sam winced, and Craig made a rueful face. ‘That’s my cue to head for the door, I think,’ he said. ‘All the animals seem to be going along fairly well, Ruby, so you shouldn’t have any worries on that score. I’ll call in again in a few days’ time to see how you’re doing and find out if there’s any news about Sophie. I just wish there was something I could do to help out. She’s such a sweet girl, it doesn’t seem right that she would have gone unless there was a strong reason. I hate to think that she’s ill and needing someone to look after her.’

‘I’m pinning my hopes on her answering my message,’
Ruby said, lightly jogging Becky in her arms to distract her attention. ‘Like you say, she could be ill or troubled, or both.’

Craig slid his arms around her and held her close for a second or two, taking a moment to tickle Becky under her chin. ‘If you have any more worries that someone might be following you,’ he told Ruby, ‘let me know. It will only take a phone call, and I’ll come and find you.’

‘Thanks, Craig. I’ll remember that.’

She showed him out, waiting as he went to his car, and then she watched him drive away.

Becky had stopped crying by now, and Ruby took her back into the living room, placing her down inside the playpen, where the infant practised pulling herself up and down with the aid of the wooden bars.

‘What was that about you being followed?’ Sam asked, his dark brows drawing together. ‘Has someone been bothering you?’

She shook her head. ‘I had the feeling that someone was hanging around outside, but it was most likely just my imagination working overtime.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Why would I? Anyway, you weren’t here, and it happened after I left work. It was nothing.’

He looked at her oddly, and she wondered if perhaps finding Craig here had unsettled him. It couldn’t have helped, either, that Becky had cried on seeing him. It was a bit like a rejection…not anything that mattered, but one more thing that put him at odds with the world.

She made a pot of coffee, and they talked for a while about how things were being organised for the fund-raiser at his family estate. ‘I managed to get a local band of musicians to come along on the day,’ Sam said, ‘and there’s a dance group who’ll perform some lively, modern routines, so that should help to draw a crowd.’

‘Sounds good.’ Ruby glanced over at the playpen and saw that Becky was rubbing her eyes. ‘I asked around and found some people who will provide refreshments. I think it should turn out to be a real success. We’ve sold a lot of tickets in advance, and even though we aren’t asking much of an entrance fee, it looks as though that will bring in a sizeable sum on its own.’

‘I just hope we’ll make enough in the end to provide a boost to the A&E unit. I’m really keen to get the board to think again about closing us down, and this might buy us time, at least.’

She nodded. ‘There’s only one thing bothering me about all this, and it’s more of a personal thing,’ she said. ‘I’d like it if I could bring Becky along with me. I don’t want to ask Mary to watch her for such a length of time, and I know my parents would help out, but they were planning on going over to a nearby town where Sophie used to work, on the off chance she’s gone somewhere familiar. They just want to look around and see if they can find anyone who’s seen her.’

‘That’s not a problem,’ Sam said. ‘I thought you would want to bring her. I’ll come and pick you up if you like. That way you won’t have to worry about anything, and you could even have something stronger than lemonade to drink if you felt like it.’

She smiled. ‘Thanks, that would be great. I’m relieved to be able to bring her along with me. Mary said she would look out for any sign of Sophie coming back to the smallholding, so all in all we have most of the options covered.’ She sent him a quick, thoughtful glance. ‘Did you think any more about meeting up with your brother?’ she asked. ‘Only, it occurred to me that he might enjoy seeing all that was going on at the family estate next weekend. It’s part of his heritage, isn’t it, and his boys probably don’t have much idea of their true background, living where they do.’

‘You don’t need to concern yourself with my family or our
well-being,’ he said. His features stiffened a little, as though he was disturbed by her comments. ‘My background, my upbringing, my home life, isn’t anything that you need to worry about.’

She looked at him, feeling chastened. Had she gone too far? He was a man of mercurial moods, one time holding her close and showing her how much he cared for her, and in almost the next breath he was mentally pushing her away.

She didn’t know what to make of him, yet suddenly it dawned on her that she wanted to bridge that gap between them. She yearned to be closer to him, both in a physical and in an emotional sense, but the chances of that happening were in a state of flux. Over these last few months he had somehow managed to work his way into her heart, and she had no idea what she was dealing with.

‘I
DIDN’T
realise how much stuff I would have to bring along with me,’ Ruby said as Sam helped her with Becky’s pushchair and several bags that went along with it. The day of the fund-raiser had dawned, a bright, warm, beautiful day, where the sky was a perfect, cloudless blue, and the air smelled fresh and sweet. He’d picked her up, as promised, in his gleaming silver saloon car that promised luxury and comfort and delivered it magnificently. Now they had arrived at his family’s country home, and after a quick, eye-opening glance at the glorious Georgian mansion, Ruby concentrated her attention on unloading everything from the car.

‘It’s just that I need to have Becky’s food and drink, nappies and so on with me, along with a change of clothes in case of calamities—well, you know how messy she can be with food, don’t you?’ Ruby added. ‘And that’s without the toys and odds and ends to keep her occupied throughout the day.’

‘It looks as though you’ve come to stay for a week,’ Sam murmured, his mouth curving in a smile. ‘Not that I’d mind at all if you wanted to do that. I do tend to rattle about the place. Having you around to keep me company would be a more than welcome intrusion.’

She made a rueful face, trying not to acknowledge the playful gleam in his eyes. ‘I doubt you’ll say the same once the
crowds arrive here,’ she said. ‘You’ll probably find you’ve had enough of visitors for a long time. And half an hour of Becky’s crying would probably be enough to put you off for ever.’

‘Oh, I don’t know about that.’ He turned to glance at the baby, who was still strapped into her car seat, a relaxed, faraway look in her eyes, as though she was biding her time contentedly until something more exciting happened. ‘I’m sure she and I will learn to get along.’ He picked up the floppy bunny and moved its arms and legs in a funny dance, so that Becky giggled and reached for it, opening and closing her fists in a familiar gesture. He made it dance again, and this time she chuckled so hard that her whole body shook.

Ruby laughed. ‘You’ve found her soft spot. She takes bunny to bed with her. She won’t be parted from him, unless it’s for food.’

Sam helped her to set up the pushchair and slid the bags into the rack underneath. ‘I’ll take you into the house and introduce you to my housekeeper, Sarah. She’ll see to anything you need today and help you out with Becky if necessary.’

‘Does Sarah work every day, even at the weekends?’ Ruby was curious about everything to do with Sam’s home life. He said very little about it, and she tried to glean bits and pieces wherever she could.

‘No, we have two housekeepers who both work part-time, and generally they sort the hours between them. Sarah volunteered to come in today. Her husband and children are coming to enjoy the day out, so she can give them lunch here and generally join in the fun. She’s been with us for a long time, so she’s really like one of the family herself.’

Ruby unclipped Becky’s restraining straps and settled her in the pushchair, leaving Sam to lock up the car. She glanced towards the house. ‘It’s really quite beautiful,’ she murmured, ‘with all that lovely stonework and those long, arched windows. When you said it was symmetrical, I was expecting
something refined and austere, but it’s absolutely wonderful. It’s big, but it’s not imposing at all, just perfectly designed with those L-shaped side extensions. And as to the grounds, well, from the front it looks like something from a landscape painting with all those mature trees as a backdrop.’

‘I’m glad you like it,’ he said. ‘It’s all been designed to be pleasing on the eye. In fact, it’s more like two U-shapes back-to-back with extensions to the sides. That gives us more privacy in the gardens that are planted in the shelter of the L-shapes. You’ll see, when I give you a quick tour, that we have glass doors opening out into those gardens. Around the back of the house, the outbuildings are arranged around a courtyard, with the stables to one side and the barns and grooms’ quarters on the others.’

They walked towards the front entrance, where stone urns provided splashes of colour, filled with bright, flowering begonias and waxy green foliage that spilled out over the sides. The walls of the house were covered in an attractive reddish-bronze-coloured ivy that had been neatly trimmed.

‘So will people be intruding on your courtyard space today?’ she asked. ‘I thought when you said we would be using fields for the event, everything would be staged well away from the house.’

‘It will. We decided to erect some marquees on the fields, instead of using the barns. I just thought I’d show you the house and garden first, so you’ll have a chance to look around. Besides, I expect you want to give Becky time to be free of the pushchair and stretch her limbs before we go and see how things are set out.’

‘That would be good. That was thoughtful of you.’

Inside the house, they walked through a wide hallway and then turned into a huge T-shaped area that made up the kitchen, dining and utility room. The kitchen was magnificent, with oak beams, gleaming units and copper pans on display.
A woman Sam introduced as Sarah was bustling busily about, laying a large oak table with plates of triangular sandwiches, pizza slices, a large ham and bowls of salad. She added a selection of cheeses and fruit.

‘It’s good to meet you,’ Sarah greeted Ruby. She was a middle-aged woman, with soft brown hair and friendly grey eyes. ‘And is this young Becky that I’ve been hearing so much about? Would it be all right if I hold her for a while? Will she take to me, do you think?’

‘Of course you can hold her. I think she’ll be okay with that.’ Ruby glanced at Sam. ‘She does have moments when she decides to be awkward, but she seems to be in a good mood today.’

Sam winced. ‘I’m on my best behaviour so as to try and make friends with her,’ he told Sarah. ‘I haven’t had much luck with her until today.’

‘Are you talking about young Becky or Ruby?’ Sarah chuckled, giving Ruby a quick smile as she reached out to hold the infant. ‘He told me how you speak your mind and tell him where he’s going wrong. Keep on doing that, is what I say.’

Ruby felt her cheeks fill with a rush of warm colour. ‘It’s a habit I ought to curb,’ she said. ‘He is my boss, after all.’

‘He still needs to listen sometimes,’ Sarah murmured. She cuddled Becky. ‘It never does any harm to take a moment every now and again.’ She tickled the baby, making her smile, and the infant grasped the decorative buttons on Sarah’s blouse, delicately testing out the size and texture of each one with her fingertips.

Watching them gave Ruby a poignant reminder of how it had been when Sophie was at home and she would lift Becky in her arms and cuddle her. A feeling of overwhelming sadness washed over her. Where was her sister? Why couldn’t she find her and take care of her?

‘If you two women are going to talk about me as if I’m not
here, I’m going to take Ruby away from here and show her around,’ Sam said. ‘Divide and conquer, that’s the way I see it.’

Ruby pulled herself together. Sophie would have loved to be here. Maybe one day soon she would return, and all the heartache would be a distant memory.

Sarah laughed. ‘You go ahead,’ she said, looking at Ruby. ‘I think Becky will be all right with me if you want to leave her for a while. I hunted out the old playpen from the attic and put it in the dining room, so she can amuse herself in there if need be.’

‘That sounds perfect.’

‘I forgot to tell you that Sarah loves babies,’ Sam put in, his mouth tilting at the corners.

Ruby smiled. ‘I can see that. That’s great, Sarah, thank you.’ She could see that Becky was content to be with Sarah, and if there should be a problem, she wasn’t going to be far away, was she?

‘And any time you want to eat, come and help yourselves to what’s on the table,’ Sarah suggested. ‘I’ll keep everything covered up so that you can pick at it as you like throughout the day, and there are plenty of cold drinks in the fridge.’

‘That sounds like my kind of heaven,’ Ruby said with a grin. ‘Thanks, Sarah.’

She went with Sam to explore the rest of the house. The sitting room was across the hall in another T-shaped section that included a study-cum-library. ‘This is where I tend to work in the evening,’ Sam said, showing her into the study. ‘I have all the reference books I could want in here, along with a computer and Internet connection, and I find it quite peaceful, especially after a tough day in A&E.’

‘I can see how you would feel that way,’ Ruby said. ‘Everything is so perfect…all those bookcases, and that beautiful old oak desk…but it’s comfortable in here as well, isn’t it? I love the armchairs and that grand fireplace…and the view from the window…’ She looked out through the wide,
arched and glazed doorway to a paved terrace, and beyond that to a sweeping lawn surrounded by flower borders filled with banks of hollyhocks, asters and sweet williams in varying shades of pink through to blue. ‘I could just imagine myself sitting here writing my magazine columns and keeping my medical website up to date.’

She put a hand to her mouth fleetingly as it dawned on her that he might misconstrue that, but he said softly, ‘I can imagine that, too, though I tend to think of you working away on your computer at the farm, surrounded by the clutter of family life, and looking out every now and again at the pond and the meadow at the back of the house.’

‘As opposed to the neat and tidy, wonderfully organized way of things here?’ She gave him a wry smile. ‘I have to move all sorts of bits and pieces off the desk or table before I can get down to work, and when I look outside I see a meadow full of buttercups and celandines, not to mention the odd daisy or two…and sometimes a few hens wandering about, or the ducklings following their mother to the pond. My life is very haphazard, but this all fits you to perfection.’

‘Oh, I don’t know…there’s a lot to be said for the laid-back, relaxed and hassle-free approach. I haven’t ever tried it, but I must say it has a certain appeal.’

She stared at him in astonishment. ‘Good heavens, the shell is cracking, the barriers are breaking down. Wonders will never cease. Are you sure you’re feeling all right? Next thing, you’ll be giving it all up to go trekking in the mountains or on safari in Africa.’

His mouth curved in amusement. ‘Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. It would at least have to be gold panning in Australia.’ He laid an arm lightly around her waist and led her to the door. ‘I think we should continue with the tour, don’t you?’

The intimacy of that gesture was enough to cause a wave
of heat to ripple throughout her body, but she tried not to think too much about that. He was intent on showing her around, nothing more, and she had to remind herself that her priority today was to take care of Becky. She couldn’t simply abandon herself to thoughts of getting close to Sam, could she?

The sitting room was a haven of peace, a long, wide area, furnished with deep, luxuriously upholstered sofas, low coffee tables and graceful plant stands that held exquisite flower arrangements or trailed silvery-green fronds. The floor was pale oak, and the room was filled with light from long, arched windows and doors that opened out on to a paved area surrounded by a low stone balustrade.

The garden here was landscaped, with borders of flowering shrubs laid out in circular swathes, and rustic arches and fences here and there, covered by rambling roses. To one side, there was a carved wooden seat beneath a trellised arbour near to a rockery area with a waterfall that flowed gently into a large lily-clad pond.

‘It all takes my breath away,’ Ruby said softly, gazing out. ‘You must be so content to live here amongst all this splendour.’ She turned to face him but caught sight of his briefly bleak expression before he pulled his features into the semblance of a smile.

‘I might have been,’ he murmured, ‘but life has ways of intruding and causing havoc.’

She gazed at him, expecting him to go on, but instead he seemed to straighten up and said quietly, ‘Perhaps we should finish the rest of the tour later. I have to go and welcome everybody to the event, so, if you like, we could go and prise Becky from Sarah’s arms and take her to see what’s going on, or you could stay and help yourself to something to eat and drink.’

‘I’ll come with you,’ she said quickly. ‘I don’t want to miss out on anything.’ She didn’t know what he had meant by that remark about life intruding and causing havoc, but perhaps it
had something to do with his family and the fact that this beautiful house was empty most of the time, except for himself, and the people who were employed to keep the estate in perfect order.

Becky was happy enough to be settled in her pushchair once more and seemed to be very taken with the crowds that had gathered on the field to one side of the estate. Music floated over the air, a bright, cheerful tune that put everyone in the right sort of mood from the beginning. The smell of hot roast meats wafted towards Ruby as she passed by the barbecue stand, and the refreshments tent was doing a roaring trade already.

They stopped to look at the various stands, where vendors were selling all kinds of wares from autumn bulbs to necklaces and children’s toys. Sam bought a colourful plastic windmill for Becky, handing it to her so that she could watch it spin in the faint breeze.

Ruby rescued it as Becky reached out to grasp the rounded tips and stopped it spinning. ‘I think I’ll fix it to the side of the pushchair so that you can just watch it going round,’ she told her. ‘We don’t want the toy broken before we even manage to get it home, do we?’

Becky frowned, but once Ruby had put the windmill in place, she settled down to watch in fascination as the wind caught the plastic fronds and whirled them around, so that the colours formed a rainbow pattern.

‘That will keep her occupied for a while,’ Ruby said.

Sam nodded. ‘Since we’ve reached the bandstand, I’d better go up there and do my bit,’ he said. ‘I’ll announce the raffle and tell people about the events that will be going on, just in case they’ve lost their programmes.’

‘And tell them what it’s in aid of,’ Ruby reminded him. ‘Tell them to dig deep into their pockets and purses because we want to fund state-of-the-art equipment specifically for our
A&E. They can’t close us down if we’re the best port of call in the area, can they?’