Read Online Promise the Doctor by Marjorie Norrell - Free Book Online

any such emotion on her pleasant, smiling face as, a moment or so later, she followed him into the lounge. Joy, who was accustomed to assessing people as and when she met them, liked her at once. She seemed so tiny beside her tall, broad-shouldered son, and the way in which she whisked about, brewing the tea they all declared they would prefer in place of the—coffee, bringing out a tray of biscuits and cakes, all obviously home-baked, reminded Joy, amusedly, of a bright, alert little robin.
    ‘I suppose your father will be able to tell us something about the unfortunate young man when he comes in.’ She was speaking in reply to Quentin’s story of the accident to which he had been called and at which he had found Joy helping and herself and Pete as witnesses. ‘He’s still at the hospital,’ she concluded.
    Joy leaned slightly forward, acutely conscious of Quentin sitting opposite to her and watching her intently.
    ‘Would that be St Lucy’s or the General?’ she asked.
    ‘St Lucy’s.’ Quentin’s attention was arrested now. Surely he wasn’t going to be so lucky as to have this unknown girl suddenly thrust into the midst of his working life?’ The General is just out of the town,’ he explained. ‘St Lucy’s isn’t far away. You must have passed the entrance road on your way up.’
    ‘Then it can’t be very far from Fernbank?’ Joy asked further. ‘The house the late Miss Barnes lived in?’
    ‘And all her family before her for a generation or two gone by. I believe it was built by her grandfather,’ Mrs. Moyser contributed. ‘No, St Lucy’s more or less overlooks Fernbank, in a manner of speaking. That is to say St Lucy’s is at the top of the hill above the road where Fernbank stands, on what is known locally as “the shore road”. What made you ask?’ she went on. ‘Have you been visiting Mrs. Wrenshaw?’
    The question, Joy knew, was not one of idle curiosity. She had learned a great deal during her talks with the late Miss Barnes, and one thing she had learned had been the wonderfully closely knit community which made up the select residential section of Vanmouth.
    ‘It all seemed to begin in the war years,’ Miss Barnes had reminisced. ‘Somehow, when the first evacuees came along, right through every alert, every raid, even in other parts of the country, we all tended to draw nearer together. It was as though we drew comfort and assurance from one another just by being together ... not in those awful shelters, you understand. But by sort of banding together as a community, and, thank heaven, although that sort of thing is now looked upon as being a little old-fashioned and isn’t in keeping with what I’ve seen of the modern world of today, a great deal of that spirit has been left with those families who grew up together at that time, and I, at any rate, am thankful for it. We’re all interested in what happens to the rest of us, whether it be good or bad. If it’s good then we like to rejoice along with the fortunate ones, and if it’s bad ... well, it’s surprising what can be done to help even in the most hopelessly stricken cases, if only there’s more than one person to cope.’
    Now, remembering her old friend’s words, Joy knew the question for what it was, merely a friendly interest, and she felt a sudden warm glow of pleasure as she replied. It had made her feel she was already accepted as one of the community.
    ‘We have been visiting,’ she said now, ‘but only because Miss Barnes surprised me by leaving Fernbank and its contents to my care. I never expected any such thing...’
    ‘Then you must be the Sister she wrote to Mrs. Wrenshaw about,’ Celia said, nodding as though satisfied by something. ‘I never heard your name, my dear, but I know you made dear Muriel as happy as she possibly could be, so far away from everyone she knew and who knew her.’
    ‘I ... thought she was entirely alone in the world,’ Joy confessed. ‘No one seemed to come and see