Britannia all at Sea by Betty Neels

Author:Betty Neels [NEELS, BETTY]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance, Fiction
Publisher: 0
Published: 2011-03-11T00:00:00+00:00

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CHAPTER SIX

HALFWAY UP the staircase Britannia roused herself sufficiently to say: 'I'm too heavy," but the professor didn't speak, keeping up a steady, unhurried pace until he reached the gallery above. Emmie was ahead of him, ready with the door open of a room at its end. She had the bed turned down too and a blanket spread on it on to which he laid Britannia, who, feeling its warm security and seeing Emmie's kind face peering at her, not surprisingly went immediately to sleep.

She didn't sleep for long, although when she woke it was to find that someone had got her out of her clothes and put her in a nightgown; she vaguely remembered lifting arms and raising her head and Emmie's voice murmuring comfortingly, and now she lay, nicely propped up with pillows, the bedcovers turned back, disclosing an ugly, swollen ankle. She was frowning at it when Emmie came back with the professor at her heels.

His "Hullo, feeling better' was laconic, but his examination of her foot was meticulous and very gentle. He hadn't quite finished when Britannia asked: "Please will you telephone Mijnheer Veske? If someone could lend me a dressing gown he could take me to Arnhem…'

"And what do you propose to do in Arnhem?" the professor wanted to know without bothering to look at her.

"Well, get this strapped, then…'

"I believe that I am still capable of strapping an ankle." His voice was silky.

"Oh, I'm sure you are," soothed Britannia. "What I mean is, I wanted to get away from here-at least, I don't want to, if you see what I mean, but it would be so much nicer for you."

"You have a quite nasty contusion over your left eye, probably a little concussion as a consequence, which would account for your muddled conversation."

Indeed her head did ache; she had done her best and she suspected that her ankle would become even more painful before it was strapped. "I don't feel quite the thing," she admitted.

"That is hardly surprising." He sounded austere. "I am going to strap that ankle. It is a sprain. I was able to take a look at it while you were in a faint. Tomorrow you will go to the hospital and have an X-ray of it, and also of your head."

"But I'm going home-all the arrangements…' Her tired head whirled at the very thought.

"Leave the arrangements to me. You'll not be going home for a few days. And now let us attend to your ankle."

Britannia lay still, willing herself not to let out so much as a squeak of pain. She clasped Emmie's kind hand and squeezed it hard, and when the professor had finally done, thanked him in a trembly voice.

She got a grunt in reply and an injunction to drink the tea which would be fetched to her and then to go to sleep. "There's nothing much wrong with your head that a good sleep won't cure," remarked the professor with impersonal kindness.

She opened her eyes to look at him, leaning over the end of the bed, staring at her.

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