Harbour House

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXIX, Issue 13325, 30 April 1941, Page 3

Harbour House

INSTALMENT XXVIII. b een a long time calling." I apology this time. Janice t , amm ered, "Well, you're such a ■ c\- oerson • • • •yes, we've been very busy at the . Bl ,!fa.i lately." Bard, in the /I outside, yawned, and ended fvUn in a whine. He was bored Jy i endless day in which his master had taken no part , anice rushed into the silence. »Yes, Lacy's been doing too much, t think that's why he has ioo • • • x , ~ ~ nken this flu so badly .... . Yes , I expect so Sister Martin said politely. (Doesn't look after him, probably; yesterday's ashes in the fireplace; he very likely can't even cook.) There was another brief silence.

"Perhaps you'll like to run up andse ehim • • -?" Janice said des-

perately. Sister Martin smiled then, a surprisingly vivid smile. »No, I don't think so. He probably would "bless visitors, and, anyhow, he and I see one another at least once a day."

Janice's troubled mind had run on to thoughts of afternoon tea. Cub had taken the last of her plum cake to school that morning; the only thing in the house was a sponge cake, baked the .day before, when the wind was blowing from the east, a quarter that damped down the most cheerful fire that could be coaxed in the big old-fashioned stove.

There was no help for it. She brought in afternoon tea in the fragile old English china that had somehow survived years of rough usage, bread-and-butter cut wafer-thin, the despised sponge-cake in heavy, sunken-looking slices.

She poured the tea, and sat on the edge of the chair, still in her mornving overall, and tried to think of conversation. After a while, they drifted to gardening, and got on rather better. It was still quite early when Sister rose to go. "If you'll excuse me . . . ."

Janice walked with her politely to the front gate, and she had scarcely regained the house when .there was a heavy knocking at the surgery door.

She found a rough-looking man standing outside, his hand bound in a dirty rag. He leaned toward her confidentially, and his breath smelled of liquor. "Doctor in?"

"I'm sorry, you'll have to go to Doctor Beverly. Doctor Gardner is sick, and can't see anybody."

"What's he sick for?" the man demanded truculently. "Doctors haven't any right to get sick!"

Janice wished illogically that Sister had stayed another five minutes. Through the gap of the garage gate _ e saw the grey coat disappearing. x °t for worlds would she have called her back.

"I'm sorry, but you will have to ?0 to Doctor Beverly," she said firmlv.

I want to see Doctor Gardner!" wr visitor announced loudly, with the unreasoning obstinacy x of one * h o has taken too much drink. F °r answer Janice resolutely closthe door. she suffered an infant's panic for fear he should bater u in, but she peeped from the *' ndow ' and saw him retreating suleily down the path, swearing as he went,.

* * *

engthening spells of summer gather were beginning to bring J Shore Town the customary week-noliday-makers and camping Parties rn U s - ine summer shacks along e beach, deserted for so many p e ° a Uths ' began t 0 take on the ap--s( j a! 'ance of activity, and abbreviatJ athin S garments flapped from oa S t . and ' fence s. The three stores tfcej aterf ront blossomed into iw bfief and Profitable period of v aoiWa fil tnr» s and ice-cream and pic"oati » Ule summer visitors, as a Cerc "! g p °Pulation, Lacy was coning mai % with sprained ankles, : sca " ect bites, and an occasional B ishtT S - CaSe ° f sunburn ' and oue Form* Ce °P en ed the door to a shorts , WOman in sandshoes and . . her right hand tied up in an ![ s bandage. ki» „. Is the doctor's place? Is he £tle demanded.

By JOYCE WEST

"He is," Janice admitted reluctantly. "But he's only just come in, and he's supposed to be having his tea. If you could wait a few minutes he will see you." The young woman looked at her companion with an expression of relief.

"I'll wait. I know it's an appalling time to come .... but we had to wait for the tide to row across the Inlet. I ran a fishbone into my thumb yesterday, and it's beginning to hurt like the very devil." Janice brought the two of them into the waiting-room, and turned on the lights. "The doctor won't be long."

"That's right," said the prospective patient airily. "Don't let him hurry. I guess I can live another ten minutes."

. "When I grow up," said Cub, from a corner of the kitchen table, where he was wrestling with his homework, as Janice returned, "I'm going to be a doctor, but I'll be the kind that has a brass plate with his hours on —lO to 12, and 2 to 3, or somen ting like that."

"Probably," said Lacy, without bitterness, around a mouthful of hastily gulped tea, "and a consulting room with carpets three inches deep, and a silk hat . . . ."

Lacy was not long in the surgery, and when he returned he brought his patient and her companion with him back into the kitchen. "Is there a drop left in the teapot, Janice? Miss Wayne doesn't feel too good . . . ." Miss Wayne sank thankfully into the chair near the stove. She was white and shaken-looking, but she still retained enough spirit, Janice observed, to turn her eyes provocatingly to Lacy's. "Not too good! That's a very polite way of putting it ... . when it's your fault for slicing me up as neatly as a Chinese torturer." Janice brought her hot, steaming tea and biscuits, and she accepted them greedily, her bare knees crossed, her tousled, honey-coloured head leaning back against the shabby cushions of Lin's old basket-chair. "I'm terribly sorry to be such a confounded nuisance .... How soon do you think the tide will be high enough for us to get back?" She was pretty, Janice decided, not so young after all, but very nitely attractive with her honey-col-oured hair, and her brown tan, and her red, demanding mouth. She talked on, and her quieter companion sat sunk contemplatively in 'the window-seat, drinking tea, her shadowed eyes missing nothing. She was younger, thinner, more remote, her green linen frock slashed down to reveal her brown back to the waist, her nails long and pointed, and painted vividly scarlet. Miss Wayne was. certainly not quiet. She had them all in convulsions of laughter .... even Janice, unwillingly over her description of crossing the inlet in a borrowed boat.

'«.... we didn't even know if there was a doctor in Shore Town, but we shouted over to the next camp ... a man called Stathom . - . and he called back yes, and pointed out your pine trees. So there we were setting off like Columbus in a

leaky dinghy . . ."•" Janice had put more wood on the fire, and Miss Wayne drew her chair closer.

"How mad to come for a summer holiday and enjoy a fire " "Speaking as a medical man," said Lacy calmly, "I may say you haven't enough clothes on." "How polite you are!" said Miss Wayne on a peal of laughter. "There's a jersey here, in your case, Mab," her friend pointed out, contemplatively, from the windowseat. r "So there is!" said Miss Wayne, who was Mab; "throw it over, will you?" (To Be Continued)