A Happy Meeting

‘Go on with you! Buttering me up… What have you been doing with yourself?’

‘Working.’ He sat down opposite her. ‘Grandmother, do you know of a Mr Tims of Sherborne?’

‘Of course I do. He is my solicitor, has been for years—must be all of seventy.’

‘Do you suppose he would allow me the sight of Mr Preece’s will?’

‘Been to see that girl again, have you?’ Lady Merrill’s old eyes twinkled with amusement.

‘I met her on the road as I was coming here. She looked like a small wet hen. I gave her a lift home and got her to talk. I fancy Mrs Preece has—shall we say?—misunderstood the terms of the will…’ He explained briefly and his grandmother nodded in quick understanding.

‘So if she has been misleading the girl and the housekeeper things can be put right, the housekeeper can leave and the girl will be free to find herself a job.’ Her old face puckered in thought. ‘What kind of a job would a wet hen be able to get?’

The doctor laughed. ‘I think that if she were free and independent she might begin to look like any other girl. Have you any ideas?’

‘I’ll think about it. Go and phone George Tims and then come and play cribbage?’

Mr Tims was co-operative. The doctor might pop in any time he chose during the next day. Dr van der Linus went back to the drawing-room and bent his powerful mind to the problem of allowing his grandmother to win without her suspecting it.

Undoubtedly there had been a misunderstanding, Mr Tims assured the doctor the following morning; Miss Mogford was free to leave when she wished and would receive her legacy without delay. ‘Mrs Preece will miss her; she has been with the family for many years and will be hard to replace. Mrs Preece is a delicate lady, unable to do a great deal, but of course she will have Cressida—such a sensible girl.’

The doctor agreed blandly and drove back to the house. The little wet hen deserved a chance. She was, he supposed, possessed of the normal skills of a well-educated girl; she should have no difficulty in getting herself a job, but what as? She knew nothing about computers; he felt sure of that. Probably she couldn’t type or do shorthand, and she would be no good as a nurse; far too small for a start and with far too soft a heart. Not that he approved of nurses who didn’t have soft hearts, that was a vital part of being a decent nurse—but he suspected that she would allow personal sympathy with the patient to supplant nursing expertise. It would have to be something around the house, he thought vaguely. Were there companions nowadays? He wasn’t sure, but there were au pairs from whom all that was required was common sense, an ability to do chores around the house, like children and animals and be willing to babysit. He knew that; various of his married friends had them. She would have a roof over her head too…

He was turning in at Lady Merrill’s gate when he found the answer.

Over dinner he told his grandmother what he had in mind. ‘I shall want your help, my dear,’ he added.

Lady Merrill listened carefully. ‘This is really rather fun. You do realise that I shall have to do this through a third person? I cannot appear on Mrs Preece’s doorstep out of the blue. Let me see, Audrey Sefton knows her. Leave it to me, Aldrik. Is the girl presentable?’

He leaned back in his chair. ‘She has a pretty voice and nice manners. Beautiful eyes and no looks. I suppose dressed in the right clothes she would do very well in the most exacting of households.’

‘Yes, dear—but how does she get these clothes if she has no money?’

‘I’ll see Mr Tims. A small sum held in some sort of reserve for her use or something similar.’

His grandmother gave him a sharp look. ‘You’re going to a great deal of trouble, my dear. She would probably get herself some sort of work if she were left to do so.’

‘Oh, I’m sure she would. I shall be going up to Friesland in any case and I’ll see Charity and Tyco. Charity might like company for a few months, at least until the baby is born, and that will give Cressida time to look around and decide what she wants to do.’

‘Yes, dear? Will you stay up there?’

‘I’ve no appointments there until the middle of the month. I’m tied up in Leiden almost as soon as I get back. That will give me a chance to see something of Nicola…’

‘I’m sure she will be pleased to see you again. There’s nothing definite, I suppose, dear?’

‘No, Grandmother. We are both sensible people; a deep regard and a full knowledge of each other’s character seems to me to be essential before marrying.’ It sounded pompous but he disarmed her with a grin.

His grandmother gave him a loving look. He was her very favourite grandchild and she wanted him to be happy. He loved his work as a consultant physician and he was very successful. He had money, friends, and those who worked for him liked him. All very well, she thought, but he has no idea what it is like to be in love. Nicola was a cold fish, elegant and witty and wanting, Lady Merrill suspected, only a secure place in her comfortable world, never mind the romance.

He left the next day, promising to come and see her as soon as he could spare a few days. ‘I’ll be driving Mama over before Christmas,’ he promised her.

Two days later Mrs Preece came down to breakfast looking annoyed. ‘So vexing—I had planned to go into Yeovil and do some shopping; now that wretched Mr Tims wants to call this morning. Hurry up and eat your breakfast, Cressida, and get a tray ready. If he doesn’t stay I’ll still have time to go. Bring the coffee as soon as he gets here.’

Cressida went to the kitchen, laid a tray for coffee and told Miss Mogford, ‘Half-past ten, he said in his letter. She didn’t tell me why, papers to sign, I expect.’

Mr Tims arrived punctually and Mrs Preece, eager to get to Yeovil, didn’t keep him waiting. Cressida carried in the coffee, wished him a cheerful good morning and made for the door.

‘What I have to say concerns both Cressida and Miss Mogford, Mrs Preece. I should like them both to be here if you would be so kind.’

Mrs Preece flashed him a look quite lacking in kindness. ‘Really, Mr Tims, is this necessary? They are both busy around the house.’

Mr Tims looked at her over his spectacles. ‘It is necessary, Mrs Preece.’

So Cressida fetched Miss Mogford and they sat awkwardly side by side on one of the big sofas, wondering what on earth was going to happen next.

Mr Tims cleared his throat and opened his briefcase. ‘I was looking through Mr Preece’s papers very recently and it occurs to me that there may have been a misunderstanding concerning Miss Mogford’s legacy. According to the will she is entitled to claim it whenever she wishes; she may in fact leave as soon as she wants and the money will be paid to her. There is no question of her having to remain in service until she is sixty. I believe that was the impression given her at the time of the reading of the will; mistakenly of course.’

Miss Mogford said gruffly. ‘You really mean that? I can pack my bags and go and still have the legacy?’ She looked at Mrs Preece. ‘Madam told me that I would have to stay or I wouldn’t get the money.’

Mrs Preece hastily adjusted her features into a look of apologetic regret. ‘Oh, dear, I’m sure that was never intended. Silly me, I never have been any good at this kind of thing.’

She smiled charmingly at Mr Tims, who said politely, ‘Well, no harm done, I imagine.’ He turned to Cressida. ‘If at any future time you should decide to leave home, I am entrusted with a small sum of money, sufficient, I trust, to start you off in whatever venture you may consider.’

‘Oh, Cressida would never dream of leaving me,’ said Mrs Preece quickly. ‘My nerves, you know. It is essential that I have someone to take care of me and she is very used to that.’

Cressida said nothing, merely thanked Mr Tims and offered him more coffee. He refused, and said that he had another client to see in the neighbourhood, and Miss Mogford got up to show him out. Mrs Preece bade him goodbye in a cold voice—he hadn’t shown her the sympathy she had expected—and Cressida shook hands, saying nothing but looking at him with eyes alight with damped-down excitement. By jove, thought Mr Tims, those lovely eyes of hers made a man forget her ordinary looks.

When he had gone Mrs Preece said sharply, ‘Of course there is no question of your going, Miss Mogford. I’m quite prepared to give you a bigger wage, and after all this has been your home for years.’

Moggy’s severe features became even more severe. ‘You pay me weekly, Mrs Preece. I’m giving you a week’s notice as from today.’

She turned on her heel and marched briskly back to the kitchen, leaving Mrs Preece speechless. But not for long!

‘The wretch, after all I’ve done for her. Go after her, Cressida, and tell her she must stay. What am I to do without a housekeeper?’ Tears of self-pity rolled down her carefully made-up cheeks.

Cressida, a-fire with the prospect of freedom, sat down on the arm of a chair. ‘No, I won’t tell Moggy anything of the sort,’ she said calmly. ‘You’ve never done anything for her and you can get another housekeeper.’

Mrs Preece’s eyes bulged. ‘Cressida, have you taken leave of your senses? How dare you talk to me like that, after all I’ve…?’

She stopped because Cressida was smiling. ‘I’m going too, Stepmother.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. What will you do? And you’ve no money.’

‘I’m very experienced in housework and Mr Tims said that there was a little money.’

‘Rubbish. No one will employ you.’ Mrs Preece changed her tactics. ‘If you will stay, Cressida, I’ll make you an allowance. I’ll get another housekeeper and you can train her. I simply cannot manage without someone to run this house. My nerves…’ She gave Cressida a wan smile. ‘What would your father have said?’

‘He would have told me to pack my bags and go,’ said Cressida promptly.

Cressida lay awake for a long time that night. She intended to leave at the same time as Moggy although just for the moment she had no idea as to what she would do. London, she supposed vaguely; surely there would be work of some sort there. If she had a roof over her head she could save most of her wages and then train for something, she wasn’t sure what. But to be free and live her own life—she uttered a sigh of pure content and fell asleep.

In the light of early morning she lost some of the euphoria. She wasn’t sure if she had enough money to get to London, for a start—she would have to see Mr Tims—and when she got there, then where would she go? This was something which would have to be settled before she left home; she was a practical girl; to arrive in London with no notion of where she was to lay her head that night was bird-witted. Something would have to be done about that.

Something was. Mrs Preece, sitting languidly in her drawing-room, refusing to do anything about rearranging her household, declaring that she felt ill enough to take to her bed, was forced to pull herself together when Miss Mogford came to tell her that she had a caller: Mrs Sefton, who lived some miles from Minton Cracknell but whom she had met on various occasions at other people’s houses. She didn’t like the lady overmuch; overbearing, she considered, with an amused contempt for weak nerves and women who couldn’t do the washing-up for themselves. That she lived in a large house, well-staffed and well-run, had nothing to say to the matter; Mrs Sefton was perfectly capable of running the place single-handed if it were necessary and that without a single grumble.

She breezed into the room now and bade her reluctant hostess good morning. Her voice wasn’t loud but had a penetrating ring to it, so that Mrs Preece closed her eyes for a moment.

‘A lovely morning,’ declared Mrs Sefton. ‘You should be out. There’s the autumn fête at Watly House this afternoon—aren’t you going?’

Mrs Preece said faintly that no, she didn’t think she felt well enough.

‘Well, you look all right,’ said Mrs. Sefton.

‘My nerves, you know.’

Mrs Sefton, who had never quite discovered what nerves, when mentioned by their possessor, meant, ignored this.

‘I’m here to ask a favour. That gel of yours, Cressida, I’ve a job for her…’

‘She doesn’t need a job,’ said Mrs Preece, sitting up smartly.

‘I know someone who needs her—an old friend of mine, Lady Merrill, desperately needs a companion for a few weeks while her permanent companion has a holiday.’ Mrs Sefton, pleased with her fabrication, added in ringing tones, ‘Not much to do you know—just a few chores. She’s just the one for it. I’m sure you can manage without her—I don’t suppose you see much of her anyway, she goes out a good deal I dare say.’

‘Cressida likes to stay at home with me,’ said Mrs. Preece sourly.

‘Does she? In that case she’ll know just what to do for Lady Merrill. She lives north of Sherborne, quite easy to get at—just the other side of Charlton Horethorne.’

Miss Mogford came in with the coffee and Mrs Preece poured it with a shaking hand. ‘I’m quite sure that Cressida won’t wish to leave me,’ she said in a die-away voice.

‘Well, let’s have her in to speak for herself,’ said Mrs Sefton. She stopped Moggy on her way to the door. ‘Ask Miss Preece to come here, will you?’

Mrs Preece opened her mouth to say something tart about guests giving orders in someone else’s house and then thought better of it. Mrs Sefton was well known and liked in the county and she was known to give her unvarnished opinion of anyone or anything she didn’t approve of. Moggy hurried back to the kitchen where Cressida was making the junket Mrs Preece ate each day—it was supposed to keep the skin youthful, she had been told.

‘Drop that, Miss Cressida,’ said Moggy urgently, ‘you’re to go to the drawing-room, there’s a Mrs Sefton there, wants to see you.’

‘Why?’ asked Cressida. ‘The junket will curdle…’

‘Drat the junket. Your stepmother is in a rage so be careful.’

Cressida might be a plain girl but she was graceful and self-possessed. She greeted Mrs Sefton, grudgingly introduced by Mrs Preece, in a quiet voice, and sat down.

‘I’ve a job for you, my dear,’ said Mrs Sefton, not beating about the bush. ‘An old lady—a great friend of mine—is in need of a companion for a few weeks and I thought of you. Would you care to take it on?’

‘You can’t leave me, Cressida,’ said Mrs. Preece in a fading voice, ‘I shall be ill; besides, it is your place to stay here with me.’

Cressida gave her a thoughtful look and turned sparkling blue eyes upon their visitor. ‘I should like to come very much,’ she said composedly. ‘I have been planning to find a job now that our housekeeper is leaving. When would this lady want me to start?’

Mrs Sefton, primed as to when Miss Mogford was leaving, was ready with an answer. ‘Would Thursday be too soon?’

‘That is quite impossible,’ observed Mrs Preece. ‘I have had no replies to my advertisement for a housekeeper and Miss Mogford leaves on the same day. Cressida must stay until I find someone to run the house for me.’

‘Oh, surely you can manage to do that yourself?’ asked Mrs Sefton. ‘I dare say you have outside help from the village?’

Mrs Preece had to admit that she had.

‘Well, then, get them to come more often,’ said Mrs Sefton cheerfully. ‘I dare say you might feel much better if you had something to do.’ She smiled in a condescending manner at her hostess. ‘And do come to the fête; there’s nothing like having an outside interest, you know.’

She got to her feet. ‘So be ready on Thursday, Cressida—you don’t mind if I call you that? Someone will fetch you directly after lunch.’

She looked at Mrs Preece who wished her a feeble goodbye. ‘You must excuse me from getting up,’ she whispered dramatically. ‘The shock, you know…’

‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Mrs Sefton, ‘for I didn’t realise that you’d had one. I dare say we shall meet. Do you go out at all socially? I have seen you on several occasions at dinner parties and were you not in Bath last week? At the Royal Crescent, dining with the Croftons? Cressida was not with you?’

‘Oh, yes—a long-standing engagement. Cressida hates going out, she is very much a home girl.’

Mrs Sefton raised her eyebrows. ‘Then in that case, this little job will give her a taste of the outside world, will it not?’

With which parting shot Mrs Sefton took herself off.

Mrs Preece wept and cajoled and threatened for the rest of that day but to no good purpose. Moggy was adamant about leaving, she packed her things and then went to help Cressida with hers. ‘I can’t think why you stayed, Miss Cressida, you could have gone months ago…’

‘I wasn’t going to leave you here, Moggy,’ was all Cressida would say.

Miss Mogford stared at her, her arms full of clothes. ‘So that’s why you’ve put up with your stepmother’s tantrums. I’ll not forget that, love. If ever you need help or a home or just someone to talk to, I’ll be there waiting and don’t you forget it.’

Cressida put down the shoes she was polishing and cast her arms around Miss Mogford. ‘Moggy, you are a darling, and I’ll remember that and I promise that I’ll come to you if I need help or advice or a bed. I shall miss you.’

Moggy’s stern countenance softened. ‘I shall miss you too after all this time. It hasn’t been easy, has it? But everything’ll come right now. You really want to go to this old lady?’

‘Yes, oh, yes, I do. It’s a start, I can get a reference from her and I suppose I’ll get paid—I forgot to ask—I’ll save all I can and besides Mr Tims said there was a little money for me. I’d better go and see him tomorrow… No, I’ll phone, he can send the money here.’

She wrapped her shoes carefully and put them into the shabby suitcase. ‘We’d better go and start dinner. Stepmother’s alone this evening.’

‘Well, don’t let her put upon you,’ advised Miss Mogford firmly.

Cressida turned eyes shining like stars upon her companion. ‘I won’t, Moggy, never again.’

CHAPTER THREE

BY LUNCHTIME on Thursday Cressida could feel nothing but relief at leaving her home. Mrs Preece had tried every gambit known to her in her efforts to make Cressida and Miss Mogford change their minds. She had had no success and had resorted to bad temper and reproaches, despite which Cressida had been to the village and arranged for one of the women who came to help in the house to move in temporarily until a new housekeeper could be engaged. She had met the postman on the way and he had given her a letter from Mr Tims—a registered letter containing a hundred pounds and a note—couched in dry-as-dust terms, wishing her well and advising her to use the money prudently until such time as she had a permanent job. Cressida, who hadn’t laid hands on anything like that sum for some time, skipped all the way home—rather clumsily because her ankle still pained her at times.

No sooner had she entered the house than her stepmother called to her from the drawing-room. ‘Since you’re not going until after lunch you might as well get it ready. I’m far too upset to eat much; I’ll have an omelette and some thin toast and my usual junket. You had better open a bottle of white wine too.’ She picked up the novel she was reading. ‘And don’t bother to say goodbye, you ungrateful girl. I’ll have a tray here.’

Cressida went to the kitchen and found Miss Mogford in the process of getting ready to leave. The baker’s van would be calling shortly and the driver was giving her a lift to Templecombe where her sister had a small cottage. Her old-fashioned trunk and cardboard suitcase were already in the hall and as she sat at the kitchen table, wearing her best coat and a rather terrifying hat, she looked as stern as usual but when Cressida joined her her face crumpled.

‘That it should come to this—you being turned out of your own home…’

‘Well, I’ve turned myself out, haven’t I, Moggy? I hate leaving and so do you but we shall both be a lot happier. After all, it hasn’t been much fun since Father died. Has stepmother paid you your wages?’

Miss Mogford nodded. ‘I had to ask her for them. And what about you, Miss Cressy? Will you be all right? Supposing this old lady is too much of a handful?’

‘Old ladies, on the whole, are rather nice, Moggy, and in any case it’s only for a few weeks then I can pick and choose.’ Cressida spoke bracingly because Moggy sounded worried, but she felt uncertain of the future, although she had every intention of making a success of whatever she ended up doing. Leaving her home was a sadness she hadn’t quite realised, but to stay forever, pandering to her stepmother’s whims, was something no longer to be borne. She had been longing for something to happen and now it had and she would make the very best of it.

‘There’s the baker,’ she said, and bustled her old friend out into the hall. ‘Now you’ve got my address and I’ve got yours, we’ll write regularly and as soon as we can we’ll have a few hours together.’ She put her arms round Moggy’s spare frame and hugged her. ‘I’m going to miss you dreadfully but you’re going to be happy and so am I.’ She planted a kiss on the housekeeper’s cheek. ‘Now off you go. I’ll be leaving in an hour or two…’

Miss Mogford spoke gruffly. ‘If your poor pa could see you now, he’d turn in his grave. This isn’t what he intended.’

‘Well, never mind that, Moggy, we’re both getting a chance, aren’t we? It’s rather exciting…’

She walked Miss Mogford out to the van and found that the driver had stowed the luggage in the back, and was waiting to settle his passenger into the front seat. The last Cressida saw of Moggy was her elderly face rigid with suppressed feelings staring out from under that hat.

In the kitchen, warming the milk for the junket, Cressida shed a few tears. She hadn’t meant to, they had oozed out from under her lids and she had wiped them away at once. She was going to miss Moggy, she was going to miss her home too and those of her friends whom she saw from time to time, but, she told herself firmly, this was something she had wished for and now it had happened and she must make the most of it. She made the junket, then beat the eggs for the omelette and cut herself a sandwich, for there wouldn’t be time for anything more.

Her stepmother was making things as difficult as possible—she wanted fruit and more coffee and a novel she had put down somewhere and simply had to have. Cressida attending to these wants, gobbled her sandwich as she tidied the kitchen just in time to get her elderly tweed coat as a car drew up before the house. Her stepmother’s tray hadn’t been cleared and nothing had been done about dinner that evening; Cressida, feeling guilty, didn’t mind. She went quietly from the old house with her two shabby suitcases and was met on the doorstep by an elderly man with a weatherbeaten face who wished her good day in a friendly voice and stowed her luggage in the boot of the elderly Daimler.

She had gone to the drawing-room on her way out, and, despite Mrs Preece’s wish, had been determined to bid her goodbye.

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