Connie’s Courage (19 page)

Harry went white. His words had been wrenched from his heart, and against the warnings of his head. They were the truth and not lies! It hurt his heart and his pride that Connie should refuse to believe him.

It was obvious that she did not feel the same way about him as he did her, he decided miserably.

‘I apologise. I spoke out of turn. I had no right … I shouldn't have said anything.'

The wooden voice; the way Harry was turning away from her without making any attempt to break down the barriers she had put up against him; without even trying to change her mind or convince her that he had truly meant what he had said, told their own story – at least so far as Connie was concerned. He did not love her at all, despite what he had claimed.

Bitterness and pain filled her, destroying the
fragile bubble of joy that had shimmered inside her. If Harry had really loved her, he would have fought harder to convince her. The truth was that he had probably regretted his words as soon as he had uttered them, she told herself fiercely, and had been only too relieved to have her reject them.

Too upset to remain, she turned and hurried down the stairs.

Of course, word had got round the hospital about what Connie had done and she was summoned before Matron to explain herself.

‘I understand that you wanted to help your friend, but did it occur to you to consider the risk you might be putting your colleagues and our patients under? And if you did not, why did you not? You realise that I shall have to insist on you being quarantined?

Connie bit her lip. ‘I observed all the safe practices, just as if I had been nursing a patient here in isolation, she protested doggedly.

‘I understand what you are saying, Pride, but you will present yourself in the isolation ward upon leaving here, and you will remain there until our Chief Medical Officer permits you to leave. You will, of course, not receive any pay during the time you are not working.

Blindly Connie turned and walked through the door to where another nurse, heavily protected from any chance encounter with germs Connie
might be carrying, was waiting to escort her to the isolation ward.

If she had been privy to Matron's thoughts though, she would not have been quite so downhearted. Although Matron naturally had to think of the Infirmary first, inwardly she was aware that Connie had shown not just first-class nursing techniques, but also selfless dedication. She was, Matron decided, her bosom heaving with approval, an excellent example of the high standards and effectiveness of the Infirmary's teaching practices!

‘Harry, you aren't listening to me.'

Woodenly Harry tried to force himself to smile politely, as Rosa chided him and gave him a reproachful look.

The warm summer sunshine shone in through the windows of the stuffy parlour, and Harry suddenly longed sharply for the fresh salty air of New Brighton, and to be walking along the pier with his mother and his sisters. And Connie! Connie! Just thinking about her brought a sharp ache of longing to his heart.

Her rejection of his foolish declaration of love still hurt him, but he acknowledged that he had, in part, only himself to blame. He should have courted her more gently, more slowly. Shown her that he respected as well as loved her.

Were the world privy to what he knew about her, it may well make a different judgement, and one that would reflect badly on him, as well as Connie herself. But he no longer cared. There were other schools where he could teach – not
as highly acclaimed perhaps, but they would have one another and somehow they would manage.

Lost in his own dreams, Harry was barely aware of the angry grimness in Rosa's eyes as she watched him. He was not behaving as she had planned for him to do. And yesterday she had received a letter from her cousin Gerald's sister, Phyllis, confiding to her that she was sure that her brother was about to propose to the heiress he had been pursuing. Which meant that she had to move fast if she were to announce her own engagement first, as she was determined to do.

Phyllis had no idea of Rosa's feelings for her brother, or of her already considerably intimate involvement with him. Those secret meetings, and stolen kisses and caresses, were known only to the two of them for obvious reasons, and her frequent visits to see her ‘dearest cousin, had been little more than a device to enable her to be with Gerald.

She couldn't understand why on earth Harry was taking so long to propose to her. After all, she had given him enough hints and opportunities. She couldn't afford to waste any more time though. She would have to take matters into her own hands now.

Fixing a smile on her lips, she began sweetly, ‘Papa has been asking me if you have yet made a formal declaration to me, Harry! He will be very angry with you if he thinks you are trifling with my affections, and indeed he has told me that he
is disappointed that you are being such a laggard, and so am I.'

Whilst she was speaking she had placed her hand on his arm, and Harry had had to control an ungentlemanly desire to shake it off. Now he could feel the shock surging through his body like ice water freezing his veins. The tiny hairs at the back of his neck lifted, as he struggled to make sense of what Rosa was saying.

How on earth could half a dozen forced and uncomfortable meetings between them; meetings which had been forced upon him by Rosa's own father, possibly constitute any attempt to trifle with Rosa's affections? There was nothing about Rosa he had any desire whatsoever to trifle with, Harry acknowledged guiltily. In fact, if anything, what he felt toward her was something much closer to wary distaste than desire.

For all her outward docility and sweetness, Rosa had an implacably strong will, and could produce hysterical outbursts of shattering intensity whenever she was thwarted. To Harry, she was a duty her father had thrust on him, and one he felt increasingly burdened with. Rosa's announcement appalled him, and his first instinct was to roundly and soundly contradict her words. But Harry had a gentle soul and had been brought up to be good-mannered, and thoughtful of the feelings of others. Even so …

Rosa, I have behaved toward you with propriety at all times,' he told her firmly. ‘And I am sure
that your father knows this. After all, it was at his suggestion that -'

‘Harry, what are you saying? she interrupted him immediately, her voice starting to rise as she added, ‘you know how much I love you. And you have made me believe that you return my feelings!

She had started to tremble and her eyes were filling with tears.

Why on earth was he being so difficult, Rosa wondered angrily. Surely he must know how very fortunate he would be to get someone like her for his wife. He was the poorest of all the teachers, with no income other than what he earned, whereas she - whilst according to Gerald, not a wealthy heiress - did have an allowance from her father and an income from the money left in trust for her by her mother.

Marriage to her would greatly enhance his financial position and his status within the school, and were it not for her all consuming desire to get back at Gerald, there was no way she would consider him as a husband.

That he should seem so unaware and appreciative of his good fortune was fostering resentment inside her that she was finding hard to contain. It was, she decided furiously, a great pity that she couldn't find a more suitable candidate for the role of her husband!

The plain truth was that Rosa was used to getting her own way. She had learned young that
the merest hint of a temper tantrum from her was enough to have her father cravenly giving in to her. Gerald, of course, had been totally impervious to such manipulation, but Rosa had believed that Harry was made of much weaker, and far more gentlemanly, stuff than her cousin.

Gerald she knew, for instance, would have no qualms whatsoever about forcing his heiress into marriage by compromising her, if he had to; just as he had had no qualms about seducing Rosa, and then laughing at her when she had let him see that she had expected a proposal.

Harry could feel his discomfort growing, and to his shame, with it, his panic. He felt as though he was being sucked down into a frighteningly dangerous quicksand from which there was no escape. Behind the emotion in Rosa's eyes he could see a sharp gleam of hard calculation, which alarmed him even more.

‘You must not tease me so, Harry,' she told him determinedly. ‘How can you be so cruel? I know you love me. Do you think I would have allowed you the liberties I have, if you didn't?'

Harry stared at her. What on earth was she talking about? There had been no ‘liberties' either taken or wanted, even if he had been forced into Rosa's company by her father's insistence that he helped Rosa with her plans to impress the parents of their pupils.

‘Do you think my father would have allowed us to be alone together if he did not think of you
as my fiancé?' she continued, pressing home her advantage. ‘If you do not propose to me now, Harry, you will be totally disgraced. My father will see to that!

Rosa cast him a reproachful look.

‘You should have proposed to me at Christmas. I was expecting you to do so, and so was my father! Everyone was expecting you to do so, Harry, she told him dramatically, and Harry felt untruthfully, ‘and you have shamed me by not doing.

Propose to Rosa? There was only one woman he wanted to make his wife! Harry tried to think of Connie behaving as Rosa was doing but it was impossible to imagine Connie playing out such a role. Connie. How his heart ached with love for her! As it would never ever ache with love for Rosa.

He took a deep breath. This whole ridiculous business had to stop right now. ‘Rosa. Please listen to me. I beg you to … He was trying to be gentle, but as he struggled for the right words she suddenly flew toward him and gripped hold of his gown. Her waiting ears had caught a sound that Harry's had not – her father was approaching.

‘No, Harry. I beg
you,'
she interrupted him passionately. ‘I beg you not to deny my love. You must not deny me. I shall not let you!

As he opened his mouth to protest, to Harry's shock, Rosa suddenly pressed her own mouth hotly and intimately against his. Harry felt his whole body stiffen in rejection, but Rosa continued to press herself up against him.

‘Dear me! I trust this tender scene I am interrupting means that I am about to receive a request from you for my daughter's hand, Harry.'

Harry went cold as, as though on cue, Rosa's father walked into the room.

He was a charitably-minded young man but he could not help noticing the gleaming look of triumph Rosa cast him, as she stepped demurely away from him.

‘Harry has just asked me to be his wife, Father, and was about to seek you out.'

‘I should hope so, indeed,' Mr Cartwright agreed sternly, before adding, ‘Harry, you may present yourself to me in my study before you leave.'

Harry listened in disbelief. This couldn't be happening!

But it was, and as he looked into the faces of the Head of House and his daughter, Harry was filled with the heart-sinking realisation that he was caught in a trap from which, as a gentleman, there was no possible escape.

A little enviously Connie paused as she crossed the busy entrance hall. Outside the sun was shining brightly, and she had just seen Mavis saying an obviously reluctant goodbye to Frank.

Sometimes just recently, it seemed to Connie that everyone she knew, apart from herself, was courting, and all the rumours that there could soon
be a war had not helped. Young lovers were rushing to marry for fear of being parted.

Even Josie had confided blushingly to them the previous week that she had been asked out. ‘'E's nobbut a delivery lad, like. He delivers me aunt's bread.

‘Well if you like him, Josie, there's no reason why you should not go out with him, Mavis had assured her in a kind motherly voice, before adding firmly, ‘but you mustn't let him take any kind of liberties with you.

‘Oh no, Ted's not that sort,' Josie had assured her quickly. ‘But if there is to be a war and he gets to be called up …

‘We don't know that there is to be a war yet, Josie, Connie had told her sharply, ‘and if there is to be one, somehow I don't think His Majesty will be needing the likes of a baker's lad, not when he's got so many fine soldiers to call on.'

Josie had bristled a little at Connie's dry comment, but, as Connie had confided to Mavis later, she didn't want Josie doing something she might regret, because she thought her admirer was going to be called for a soldier.

‘Everyone says that if there is to be a war then it will be over within weeks, Connie had reminded Mavis.

‘Oh, Connie, I do hope it doesn't come to that, Mavis had responded. ‘When one sees some of the poor soldiers from the Crimea.

They had both fallen silent, thinking about the
limbless men who sold matches on street corners, in an effort to earn a few shillings. Sometimes little more than rags were wrapped around the stumps of their amputated arms or legs, and there was always somehow a look in their eyes that made one want to hurry away.

She wouldn't have anyone thinking that she was envious because her friends were walking out with someone, and she wasn't, Connie decided, tossing her head a little. Because she wasn't. Not for one single minute!

Mavis had seen her and was making her way over to her, beaming happily. ‘Connie, it's the most beautiful day,' she announced dreamily.

‘You'd think any day was beautiful if you were going out with your Frank. I reckon you think the sun shines out of his backside,' Connie teased Mavis earthily. ‘Time was, when all we ever heard of you was, Harry this, and Harry that, and now that brother of yours might just as well not exist, because it's all Frank says, Frank thinks …'

No sooner was Harry's name out of her mouth than Connie wondered angrily what on earth had made her utter it. The last thing she wanted was to have Mavis thinking she was sweet on her brother! If she did, she was bound to say something to him, and then he might start thinking that she, Connie, was regretting the way she had turned him down. And then he might …