A Nurse's Duty by Maggie Hope

Author:Maggie Hope
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781448118564
Publisher: Ebury Publishing
Published: 2012-05-14T23:29:12+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

SURELY PATRICK FEELS as I do? thought Karen. He could not cut her out of his life, forget about her altogether. He loved her, she knew it in her being. It was you ran away from him, not he from you, she told herself. You don’t want him to come, you know it will ruin his life. Forget, that was what she had to do, forget all about him.

She was standing by the yard gate. Beside her the rowan tree was coming into full leaf. It was summer already, the winds were light and warm. But still she couldn’t stop her heart racing every time she heard the familiar rumble of the cart or the roar of an engine on the road at the end of the track.

She couldn’t help the aching need within her either, the deep physical ache which sometimes threatened to consume her. She placed her hands on her stomach and concentrated on the baby. At least she had the baby, Patrick’s son. Or maybe his daughter, a girl who would look at her with Patrick’s clear grey eyes ringed with dark lashes, and that way she would always have something of Patrick with her.

On Saturday Robert came back to see her and they drove down into Stanhope and on, across the ford over the River Wear and up the steep fell-side to Bollihope Common, the great breadth of moorland which divides Weardale from Teesdale. He stopped the car about halfway between the dales and they sat quietly, looking out over miles and miles of heather and bracken to where the distant horizon lay shrouded in a shimmering mist. Robert had put down the car hood and Karen could feel the sun on her head and neck, pleasantly warm. Sheep baa-ed all around them as they cropped the turf which edged the heather and a curlew cried mournfully close by. They were too near to its nest probably, thought Karen abstractedly, it was worried. Its cry sounded so human, so sad, it brought ready tears to her eyes.

Quickly she looked out over the moor, away from Robert, until the moment passed. A peewit flew low over the ground only a few yards away, trying to draw the intruders away from its nest. It too was worried for its young. And what of her young? She had the baby to think of. She had to provide for it and protect it, even though Patrick was gone from her life. Oh, why had she listened to Sean? Why had she not stayed a little longer at least? She and Patrick were meant to be together. Dear God, she cried silently, give me strength.

‘Karen?’

She looked at Robert who was turned sideways in his seat, watching her anxiously. ‘If you are sure you want me, I’ll marry you, Robert,’ she said. ‘But I have to be sure you want the baby an’ all, you can see that, can’t you?’

Robert smiled and the smile lit up his face so that it glowed.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.