Betty by the Numbers: Cars Redux

If you've taken a look at The Huge Roses, my Betty homage, you may have noticed a Rolls Royce Phantom and an elderly Subaru.  They are, of course, sub-homages to TGB.  (If I were fully homage-ing, I would have my heroine drive an American make, but elderly Subaru are the quintessential New Hampshire vehicle for students, recent grads, and almost anyone else in the state who's not wealthy.  Rich folk drive younger Subaru, ha ha, and the RDD comes to grief in a rented Mercedes -- you don't drive rear-wheel drive in New Hampshire in the winter, for silly's sake!)  I love Betty's anomalous interest in, and knowledge of, hot car models.  It adds a touch of butch competence to the froth of dresses and souffles in her stories.  The great medical scenes of the early canon lay the foundation of gender-irrelevant competence, but the car-knowledge is a fun garnish.  So here's a redux of BbtN: Cars.

Did you know this figurehead-thingy is called 'The Spirit of Ecstasy'?  I have got to hitch me a ride in a Rolls...

Well, this slice-and-dice proved something I’d kinda noticed whilst paging through the canon:  as Betty aged, either she or her editor decided detailed information on our hero’s chariot was unneeded or unwanted – or else Betty lost touch with or interest in the automotive world.  In the last 68 books, from 1985 on, our hero drives either a Bentley or a Rolls (sometimes called a Rolls-Royce), with the very occasional Jaguar, Daimler or Rover for back-up.  Only two of those late books identify which model of Bentley, and there are no specifics on the Rolls-Royces.

That’s a long way from the early years, when every Rolls is a Silver Shadow drophead coupé, Merlin or Corniche; Rovers are Land, Range or TC 2000s; and Aston Martins, Panthers and Lamborghinis zoom across the Afsluitdijk.  One notices, too, that in later years our hero is apt to explain his Rolls or Bentley by saying that he needs a big car to accommodate his large frame.  In earlier years, he was apparently content to cram himself into a sporty Italian model that must have required tucking his knees into his underarms.  And, incidentally, those cars were seriously ugly – check all the photo research the Founding Bettys have generously done.

Of course, in early years he also had a back-up car, to vary the ergonomics a bit.  In the first three years (1969-71) and nine books she published, Betty’s menfolk average 2.1 cars each.  From 1972-79, over 37 books, they average 1.7 apiece, and then from 1980-2001, 89 books, we’re down to just 1.1 vehicles per man; 80 of them have a single auto and nine have two – Titus Tavener of Dearest Love (1995) has three.  The average for all 135 heroes is 1.3 cars each.  The most conspicuous consumer of automotive goods is Fraam der Linssen of Ring in a Teacup (1978), who kept a Panther 4.2, a Rolls-Royce Carmague, a Range Rover and a Mini.  Which one do you think he passed down to Fraam Jr. sixteen years later?

The final count:  of the 180 cars Betty names for her menfolk, Rolls Royce wins the checkered flag, with 59 product placements.  The Bentley folks are close behind, with 50 mentions.  Since 38 of these children of fortune own multiple luxury automobiles – let’s just tot up some maths here – that means 44% of perfect husbands drive Rollses and 37% drive Bentleys.  Only two heroes – Jonkheer Max van Oosterwelde of Visiting Consultant (1969) and Radmer ter Bavinck of The Moon for Lavinia (1975) – drive one of each.

And what do the gentlemen drive when not in those exemplars of British automaking?  Other exemplars, mostly:  eleven Daimlers (typically Sovereigns) and ten Aston Martins lead the pack, with nine Jaguars almost keeping pace.  Six Rovers and six Bristols make a nice showing.

I was surprised to find four Panthers on the list.  That has got to be some kind of early-childhood fixation of Madame Neels’s, because no one could love that thing on first sight.  There are also four Minis, which are more likely to be wifeys, as no one as vast as an RDD will be comfy in a Mini.  The ones, twos and threes include:  Jensen, Volvo, Iso Grigo, Mercedes, BMW, Citroën, Porsche, Lamborghini, Iso Lele, a shabby Fiat, Maserati, Lagonda, Ferrari and – say it with me – “The Man in the AC 428 Fastback!”  I do think it impressive, and interesting, that Betty Neels had so detailed an interest in automobiles.  I read once that she didn’t know how to drive (it was in a Harlequin author profile, in response to a question about what she’d do differently in her life, or something like that), yet she obviously had strong opinions on how, and in what, it ought to be done.  She routinely praises her heroes for fast driving, and a few heroines in earlier books have ‘advanced driving certificates,’ as a point of pride.

And back here at home, I recently quit my career and had to give up the dream of augmenting my nearly-new Corolla with an elderly Miata for summer days.  Ah, well.  It’s worth it not to have a career that makes me stress-eat to the point of not being able to wedge myself into a Miata anyway.  And the Corolla has a sunroof, so life could be worse!

Betty in the Wild: The Mid-western US

I'm off on a big road trip around the USA, staying with a few Bettys as I go.  Here are a few snaps from part one of the trip.

I started out traveling from my home in Washington, DC, to Betty JoDee's home in Pennsylvania.  She has a lovely, sunny corner in her manse where she can sit quietly and do her embroidery while the children play around her feet.  This little workbasket holds her threads and yarns.  (Probably -- it's not like I'm going to look in it.)












Next up:  Detroit.  I loved Detroit, and plan to go back to get a look inside the art institute there, which is gorgeous on the outside.  That's in the Midtown neighborhood; Downtown has Tigers Stadium (and Lions, but I didn't feel like walking extra blocks in the wrong direction) and an Alpine-style pub/restaurant that felt Austrian enough to make Magic in Vienna a reasonable choice.

Ironically, MinV is one of the few with no pets.

Here are a few tigers for Cordelia & Charles.

The Millenium Bell - I love public sculpture.

More Salzburg then Vienna, really

Then I was off to Chicago, where Sarah and Hugo enjoyed the view from my friend's high-rise apartment (most Betty heroines are, I know, at least a bit squeamish about heights, but not Sarah Ann if I recall aright.)

Serendipity brought me to the Lyndon Bridge in rural Illinois, over the Rock River.  It was threatened with demolition, so people from near and far chipped in to preserve it.  Donors got metal plaques affixed to the bridge's wooden planks.  Most just said the donor's or honoree's name, but some went farther.

The bridge now connects a swathe of cornfields to a smallish residential cluster, edged by cornfields.

Jenny & Eduard climbed at least one tower to be together.

Elk Horn, Iowa, is home to the not-exactly-world-famous Danish windmill. Beatrice and Oliver visit Copenhagen!

Windmill

Scale model of windmill

Plus they have an electric-car charging station!

Iowa City is mostly just home to the University of Iowa, and surrounded by... cornfields!  I went to the semi-Amish village of Kalona for the fall festival in a very light drizzle.  The talent show featured many teen and pre-teen girls in spangled leotards -- would Betty approve?  The Amish were not wearing leotards.

Not a fraternity house; a sorority house.  Never While the Grass Grows is perched on a not-quite-empty soda bottle I had to travel to find; Pi Alpha Phi takes its landscaping seriously.

A housing co-op.  I did not live in anything like this in my student days.

Home to the world-famous Iowa Writers' Workshop.

For sale at Kalona Visitors' Center, and really beautifully made.

My route did not take me through Nebraska, but tried to keep me on the Iowa/Nebraska border.  I wasn't having any of that nonsense, so sidetracked a bit to the mighty Missouri River and across it.  Sarah Ann danced on the bridge at Avignon, so I tried a few steps on this bridge -- with all the self-consciousness of a middle-aged woman jigging for trans-continental truckers in the middle of not much of anywhere.

The mighty Mo and I are buddies of long standing.

Betty by the Numbers: Emergency!

I once Heimlich-ed the Jonkheer, and he once swatted my goddaughter in the head when her hair caught fire as she blew out her birthday candles.  I have hauled a blind, elderly spaniel out of an artificial pond, and I’ve chased two large purse-snatchers and the young, medium-sized stranger whose purse they were trying to snatch down an alley.  (She hung on, shouting, “That’s all the money I have;” the snatcher gave a vicious jerk, the strap broke, the woman fell to the pavement, clutching her purse.  I jogged after her assailants for a moment, then wondered what I’d do if I caught up to them, and turned round.  I gave her a hand up and a wad of mostly-unused tissues, and opened my arms slightly in a ‘hug-if-you-want-one’ gesture.  She stared at me for a few seconds, gulped, sobbed, grabbed the tissues and then launched herself onto me.  “You were great,” I repeated, over and over, patting her back.  She was fine, the corn chips in my groceries, which had been banging against my knees as we ran, were fine (this is important as they were, at the time, hard to find and expensive in Dublin), and so we strolled south slowly as she recovered, and she told me all about Cowes Week, which isn’t as much fun as my initial hypothesis of Cows Week would be.)

My two earthquakes have been uneventful, and I don’t recall any gas mains or bombs exploding while I’ve been nearby.  I tend to stay clear of political and protest rallies, though did once get an amazingly charismatic grin and a wave from Bill Clinton – one of the perks or hazards of living near Washington, DC, I suppose (shoals! shoals! paddle faster!!).  By great good fortune burning houses haven’t come my way much, nor floods.  Growing up outside Boston in the 70s, blizzards and snowstorms were cause for celebration – no school!  popcorn over the fire!  Pretend to be Laura Ingalls!  I also lived on a steep bend as a child, and would of course offer tea to anyone smashing a car into the rock that helped mark it, but that didn’t happen too often.  The closest I’ve come to amputating a leg was sitting with a stranger who’d broken hers just by stepping off the curb at a bad angle until the ambulance came.  “It’s broken,” the paramedic said; “It can’t be,” the woman replied, and who wouldn’t?  If you ever need a tracheotomy performed with a ball point pen, do not come to me, even though I did once walk a new neighbor up the street to the emergency room after she sliced a chunk out of her finger.  When I sliced a chunk out of my own finger, everyone in Paris generously pitched in to help get it stitched, for free and absolutely beautifully, according to my doctor back home.

If you must experience an earthquake, try to make it the kind that hit the east coast of the US in August 2011, causing minimal injuries, zero deaths, and some cracks in the Washington Monument that a crew of lucky daredevil masons got to repair live on internet TV.

I would not have thought, incidentally, that I could fill two paragraphs with tales of my adventures in courage and kindness to strangers.  Please take a moment to think over your own experiences; I bet you’re more deserving of a Scout badge than you realize.

Thank you.  How many did you get?  I’m not surprised (I hope), but I shall be deeply distressed on your behalf if you’ve ever had as much excitement in any three- or four-month period as poor Julia Pennyfeather, who begins the winter of 1971 with a blizzard at her Scottish patient’s home, where she’s forced to forage for diabetes-friendly provisions and chivvy the sole household attendant into keeping the fires going for several chilly and gastronomically-repetitive days, then heads down the M1 and encounters a multi-car pile-up replete with corpses, then, after making it to the Netherlands without incident, gets lost in a cold, rainy woods and falls asleep on the ground risking exposure, and then gears up for overtime as a polio epidemic sweeps the village.  By The Fifth Day of Christmas, she was past due for some tender words and jewelry.

Or how about the unlucky (in some things) Daisy Gillard, whose RDD keeps Discovering Daisy (1999) covered in water-weeds, scum, dirt, blood and sand as she, again in the course of a very few months, falls into a canal, gets knocked out by muggers, rushes to the aid of an elderly woman hit by a car, and gets caught in a violent windstorm on the beach.  For her, I should think just remaining upright and dry would constitute an HEA.

 

Daisy and Julius's third son, Devon, carrying on a family tradition

In case you haven’t guessed, 79 Nurses: A Neels Database-to-Be includes a column for emergencies.  Here come the caveats:  first, it’s subjective.  One person’s emergency is another person’s heavy cold.  Second, sometimes an emergency takes place deep into the book, when I am comfortably disposed on the couch without a Post-it® note or pen and paper handy, and I’m in no mood to leap up and grab computer, and then I doze off a bit and forget all about it, so maybe an emergency or two never makes it into the spreadsheet.  Finally, maybe on a grey Sunday, Aunt Snooty-Nose’s vicious lies to our hero about his beloved’s abrupt departure from the family home feels like an emergency, while on a sunny Saturday of a long weekend, beanpole-ish stalker Helena von Youwishsister’s vicious lies to our heroine about how soon she’ll be Mrs. Dr. Helena just feel like a minor snooze.  So.  Nothing’s set in stone, gentle readers.

With that understanding-of-sorts, I count a total of 211 emergencies over 135 books, or 1.6 per book – per heroine, really, because bar Gijs van der Eekerk’s succor of some offstage drunks with severed arteries, which Beatrice sadly misinterprets as a night out with an imaginary strumpet (Wedding Bells for Beatrice, 1994), our heroine gets involved every time.  Unless, that is, she’s one of the lucky seven who experience no catastrophes on the road to true love.  Betty ran out of natural disasters, muggers and car crashes intermittently in the 1980s, with one heroine getting off scot-free in each year from 1980 to 1983, and then in 1987 Rachel Downing makes it through a novel unscathed – unless you want to count as an emergency having one’s presumed boyfriend show up in a hotel lobby with a floozy, take one look at one’s thunderstruck face and declaim a blithe, “Oh, well – Off with the Old Love.”  Then, in her last five books, all copyright 2001, Betty imagined just three emergencies, with Emma’s Wedding and The Doctor’s Girl relatively unscathed.

Of those who are subject to adrenaline rushes, four of our heroines, or 3%, including the Misses Pennyfeather and Gillard above, suffer four calls to battle stations; 13, or 10%, engage in three pulse-pounding adventures; 45, or 33%, get through two sticky situations; and 66, or 49%, are distressed by a single disaster.  But what disasters they are!  Car crashes, bus crashes, bicycle crashes, plane crashes, whatever the boating equivalent of a crash is, measles, whooping cough, flu, stroke, coronary, diabetic coma, runaways, fire, flood, war...  Jiminy!  There’s not a single famine, actually, except maybe way offstage when Julius mistakenly decides Daisy can stay out of trouble for a few weeks and hies himself off to Africa to set up a feeding station (Discovering Daisy).  And, of course, lots of grimacing into the increasingly-empty larder whenever we get stranded in the snow.

The most common emergency is what I’ve called an “endangered individual.”  They’re not necessarily sick or injured, but they’re at risk in some way.  Of our 211 stat situations, 23%, or 49, involve abandoned or neglected babies; runaway brides, wards and sisters; evil kidnapping step-relatives; people trapped in toy stores or creaky cottages; lost grannies, kiddies or heroine-ies and their ilk.  Next most common is illness and injury, at 20%, or 41, of our incidents, although only one of laburnum-seed eating.  Then come vehicle crashes of one sort and another, at 17%, or 36 pile-ups.  Criminal assault accounts for 11%, or 23, of misfortunes.

 

‘Nuff said, people

I was taken aback by that number, actually.  In her first 21 books, Betty had only one assault, perpetrated by a patient overdosed on cannabis trying to choke Staff Nurse Parsons.  Chalk up a Victory for Victoria (1972), however, as Alexander van Schuylen arrives to save the day.  In the next 35 books, I count six assaults, but three are against animals and one is by an animal, so they’re not quite the same as when Sister Loveday Pearce gets threatened by three youngsters – three easily-quelled youngsters, it transpires – on the street, or Louisa Seymour overdoses her infant niece and nephew (Cruise to a Wedding in 1974 and Winter Wedding in 1979).  In the last 79 books, from All Else Confusion in 1982, when tinkers kidnap little sister, through Daisy’s mugging, we have 16 assaults, which accounts for 20% of the books and 15% of the incidents in that period.  Phoebe, Charity, Emily, Beatrice, both Sarahs, both Daisys, Mary Jane, Julie, Henrietta, Bertha, Ermentrude and Claudia are all involved somehow or other in muggings, or injured whilst thwarting burglaries.

“Medical events” differ from illnesses and injuries in that they’re wider-spread or more chronic.  Hence, I get a category with 9%, or 18, of the emergencies, including ’flu, polio, whooping cough and measles epidemics, as well as angina attacks, stroke, heart conditions, a diabetic coma and a bizarrely threatening Belgian woman with a filthy home.  I did not count every patient in extremis as an emergency, since they’re mostly just part of Mary Jane Julie’s professional responsibilities.  Nor did I count as separate incidents each of the many, many ailments from which Valentijn van Bertes’s nephew and godson suffers, as they are nearly innumerable.  Thank goodness Hannah (1980) is unrelenting in her care and optimism, or the poor little plot device would not have made it out of NICU.

 

Quick!  Line up the kiddies and the white coats; there's polio in the village!

Ready, Betty Keira?  There are 12 incidents (just 6% of all emergencies, and only 9% of the books, dear) of people or animals being thrust somehow into canals, ponds, one loch and one gully.  They make for exciting scenes, though, beginning with poor George Rodman and the littlest van den Berg Eyffert falling into the deadly-cold water whilst skating on unsafe ice due to the criminal scheming of beanpole-thin yet big, fat liar Therese LeFabre.  That’s in Damsel in Green (1970).  In Tangled Autumn (1971), we get our first animal thrown overboard:  Sappha finds a puppy tied up in a brick-bound sack and thrown into a canal to drown.  She falls in effecting rescue, and is in turn rescued by Rolf.  After that, there are only another three critters sacrificed to the exigencies of dawning love – plus a few kids, a Norwegian or four, and an overweight Londoner.

Eleven storms, ten fires, seven blizzard/snowstorms, six bombs and six births (five humans, one horse), three demonstrations turned rowdy, and two each of floods, wild winds, non-bomb explosions and earthquakes.  One roof caves in, and one armed conflict breaks out in Bosnia, requiring surgical aid.  Add them all up, and you get quite enough excitement for any literary career.

And who suffers from all these catastrophes?  He does – just three ruddy times, for heaven’s sake.  Gerard gets lost in a Scottish mist, and meets up with Deborah and a clutch of schoolgirls in Stars Through the Mist (1973).  Deborah’s one of the four-emergency ladies; she also gets a tractor rollover, a retainer cutting her hand, and a Fiat-crunching auto accident.)  Jake breaks a leg rescuing a fjord-faller in Midnight Sun’s Magic (1979), and Lauris and Julia are both caught up in a brief but violent passing demonstration in At the End of the Day (1985).  He doesn’t count as a victim, incidentally, if he only strode through the rubble to pluck her out, or launched himself into the icy pond to retrieve her and the neighbor child.

And he need do so quite frightfully often, as our heroine is the victim in 52, or 25%, of emergencies.  Mostly just once in the course of a book, but five of the ladies suffer two horrific fates, and that poor, dear Daisy Gillard counts as victim in the canal-fall, the mugging, and the windstorm.  (Incidentally, Julius saves her from none of these!)

I’m sending Daisy one of these shirts, and expect Dr. de Huizma to write the appropriate prescriptions.

Betty also has it in for kids, who are the victims of some 17%, 35, of her imagined horror shows.  His family members are put at risk 19 times (9%), and hers 16 times (8%), with considerable overlap with the children category.  Animals are made to suffer in 14 incidents, including an especially tricky spate during the Carter administration – in 15 books from 1977’s The Hasty Marriage to 1980’s Caroline’s Waterloo, we have six incidents of animal abuse, including a dog hit by a car, a cat tortured by youths, a kitten stuck in a tree, a dog lost in a storm and found in a canal, a rabbit caught in a snare, and a pregnant donkey abused by tinkers.

By contrast, the elderly are roughed up only 11 times (5%), and faithful retainers only five (2%).  This says something about career choice, I believe.  Or lifestyle choice.  Or something.

The big wrap-up:  I count 119 emergencies where dramatic rescue by hero or heroine is warranted.  This does not include little brothers with rheumatic fever – they need patient nursing and holidays abroad, not drama – or fires in Northern estates in which the firefighters are on their own to haul those needlewomen out of the attic, and Gerard only arrives in time to take Julia south in his Rolls.  However, in those cases where she, he or they must effect a rescue:  she starts 49 of the rescues, for 45% of the time.  He joins in on 40 of them, since she’s gotten wrapped up in weeds, or her arms aren’t powerful enough to lift the old lady from the well, or her fear of heights overcomes her, etc.  He gets full credit for the rescue in 39% of cases, or 43 incidents, since she’s the victim, for silly’s sake.  They work together, more or less equally, over 27 situations – that’s 25%, and really the best way to show high likelihood of their H actually being EA.  Think of George and Phoebe laboring together over those laburnum-seed afflicted youngsters, or Tishy and Jason making sure the bull doesn’t get to Georgina and the baby.  Teamwork!  The essence of marriage!

 

Beautiful but deadly: a laburnum tree in flower

Looking at the full list, I'm inclined to shake my head a bit at Betty's penchant for shoving young women, nephews, stepdaughters, grannies and absent-minded dads into the path of onrushing disasters.  One must admit that it works, though.  Love is, after all, a matter of hormones, and nothing gets the hormones flowing like a farmhouse on fire.

PS:  I am sure we all have some truly dreadful stories we could tell of crashes, medical disasters and the like.  I don't mean to downplay the horror of of those in any way.  My lighthearted tone is not intended to offend, and if the subject or style of this essay causes you any distress, I do most sincerely apologize.

Three for a Wedding - Discussion Thread

Three for a Wedding features one of the most evil governesses in Neeldom (I can think of one other that gives her a run for her money - Miss Murch from A Girl to Love). She threatens and manipulates her charge, lounges around reading glossy magazines, invites friends over for drinks and beats puppies in her spare time. Discuss your opinion on the 'not telling Lucius about his evil governess' thing.

Thankfully our hero drives a Jaguar XJ12--we need to keep monitoring his good taste as to autos since that regrettable incident of several weeks ago (see the Ring in a Teacup Panther de Ville Automobile Debacle). The Jaguar XJ12 earns an 'uncrushable' rating.

At a museum Phoebe sees an engraving of 'some medieval gentleman having his leg amputated and, from the look on his face, taking grave exception to it'. First of all, thank you Betty. Second of all, ouch. Third, way to work in some medical 'art'.

'She spoke cautiously, not quite happy about holding conversations in the North Sea while swimming' I rather imagine it would be a little difficult to speak at all while swimming in the ocean there. I mean, it's not like the North Sea is a calm lake. I'd be concentrating on my swimming too.

Phoebe goes to visit the war memorial at Dam Square--'treading their way among hippies'. This is not the first or last time Betty mentions hippies - as a group that's best to be avoided. The Founding Bettys grew up near Eugene, Oregon - the hippie mecca of the northwestern United States. We never found them to be of any particular worry - maybe our brand was a little different. The ones around us were mostly about peace, love, tie-dye and doobies. Mostly. The Founding Bettys graduated from the same dang high school as Ken Kesey (I'll let Betty Keira tell the story about him coming to speak at a school assembly). They have passed on a legacy that lives on today at the Oregon Country Fair (which I've never gone to) and the Saturday Market (which I have - it's more about handicrafts - and it's held in the middle of the city - not out in the woods). Here's a partial list of Country Fair Do's and Don'ts from the Fair website:
What to bring to have a fabulous time...
Your festive spirit.
Your big smiles.
Your sparkly duds - beads and feathers and costumes are always welcome.
What to leave home to have a fabulous time...
All your cares and woes.
Alcoholic drinks.
It may suggest leaving alcoholic drinks home, but I didn't see that doobies are banned (btw - the girl with the black sticker applied isn't actually naked from the waist up - she has flower pasties - and I'm not talking about food). I have never actually been (or had a desire to go) to the Country Fair. I'm not too sure about Betty Keira.

Schevingenen is referred to as a 'Dutch Brighton'. Except for a scene in The Chain of Destiny wherein the heroine is ditched at the Panorama Mesdag by her patient's philandering brother so that he can sneak off with a married woman, there are no other hints that it's 'that' kind of place. I imagine it's rather a more family friendly holiday spot.

Blow Hot, Blow Cold--1969

Blow Hot, Blow Cold, Visiting Consultant, Visiting Surgeon, Surgeon from Holland. What do all these have in common? They're the same book. Okay, they're almost the same book. My copy of Visiting Consultant (published as a Best of Betty Neels in 2001) refers to a dance being conducted with a CD player. Dear me, Harlequin. You think the electronics are the most out-dated thing in a Betty Neels?

Theatre Sister Sophia ('Sophy') Greenslade is inching inexorably towards 26. On the asset side of the ledger she has a pair of gorgeous eyes, a quick sense of humor and a loving family. On the debit side she has the primary responsibility for that loving family (two brothers, a sister, a granny and Sinclair (her deceased father's ex-batman)), no social life and a shy personality. Oh and she's short.
When she finds her youngest brother on her sidewalk in the custody of Mr. Tall-Dark-and-Glowering her heart gives a thump. She was, she told herself, very angry. Little brother Benjamin was chasing The Blot (the dog) and the family cat (whose name fails to make the cut) into a Bentley-traveled street.
Him: Oh, so you're Sister Sophy.
Her: What of it?
Him: The boy might have dinged my fender.
Her: Oh I'll show you a dinged fender...
It doesn't go well but he is left with an impression that she is a girl with skills. Brother managing, dog naming, two-fingered whistling skills. He is instantly smitten.
Professor Jonkheer Maximillan van Oosterwelde (39 and hot, hot, hot) is taking over for Uncle Giles (her godfather and the chief surgeon) for several weeks. Sophy is skittish but they settle down to a placid working relationship wherein he shows a maddening tolerance for minor nursing hiccups. (Is there anything more abhorrent than being patiently tolerated?)
One day, while stuffed into her office for coffee and digestives, Bill, a young resident surgeon, leans over and makes plans to come over to her house. Ah, young love!...but it's not what you think. It's not what Max thinks, come to that. Bill is in love with Penelope, Sophy's 15 year-old-sister, but is 'man enough to hide it' until she's older. In the mean time he helps her with her trig homework and takes them to the zoo.
Editorial Note: I think that's just about the most adorable side story in the History of Neelsdom. Now forget it. Betty does.
Overhearing this, Max manages to work in a cutting remark while offering her a lift home. Loosen up, Sophy and sit back. Isn't Bill Evans rather young for you? Grrr. Sophy knew it had been a mistake to lean back against the leather seats of his socking Bentley.
It is wonderfully satisfying then, when told about Bill/Penelope (I tried in vain to mash up their names into something treacly like Bennifer or Brangelina or TomKat but, alas, Peneloill didn't fly.), he has to climb off his high horse.
Max begins to make himself at home with her family--meals together, outings with the children--Uncle Giles is Max's godfather too and that seems enough to be going on with but it doesn't look like he's really in need of her company and she's shy of butting in where she might not be wanted. So, obeying an instinct she can not as yet articulate, Sophy arranges her off-duty and her free time so as to avoid him. She knows, in a secret corner of her mind, that he spells danger. However, since the whole point of him being with her family is to see her, he notices her absence. Storming into her office, he announces, 'What have I done?'
Well, she's not sure yet either and when he lays into her, telling her that he is not interested in laying violent hands on her or in flirting with her (true. He wants to put a ring on it.) she can do one of two things:
A) React huffily and deny, deny, deny. (Always a favorite choice.)
or
B) Acknowledge a painful, if humiliating, truth. (I vote this one!)
I'm afraid I've become a real old maid in the last few years. Oh, Sophy.
I just love her in that moment. There she is, up to her chin in responsibilities and no social life to speak of and this man (this hot, hot man) is shaking her composure. What she ought to have said was, 'What have you done? You've made it impossible for me to look at another man for the rest of my life and, since you're impossibly out of my league, this means you've doomed me to a spinster's life. Thanks for nothing.'
It is the next day, while scrubbing up for surgery, that she has her forehead-slapping dawning realization.
Oh dear. What now?
When we have leisure, you shall explain that remark to me.
Indeed, I will not, sir.
What now? she asks. Now, she has to try and set him up with her gorgeous friend Mary. (Just go with it.) This involves some subterfuge on her part and is a hilarious failure (Do you know what we talked about? Delayed primary suturing. He...held forth.) and Max doesn't waste any time getting Sophy alone to explain a thing or two:
I'm not available.
...I understand perfectly what you mean.
I wonder if you do.
Drat. That and references to Max's 'evenings out' strangle any faint hope that she might let him know she rather likes him in their pram.
What's a girl to do--muddled in love and snatching at her pride like a flyaway hat? Make up a boyfriend, that's what.
He is John Austin (a name she chooses because it's easy to remember. She promptly muddles it.) who lives in Harrogate and is a bank manager with dark hair and blue eyes and isn't too tall.
Editorial Note: Max knows she's lying right from the get go and he manages to flog that horse into the ground over the course of the book. Sometimes Max uses John Austin as a weapon, sometimes a tool, and sometimes a joke. I feel sorry for Sophy already. Fibbers never prosper.
They go on a smashing date though (because the legendary John Austin is in Harrogate. And then Max invents a cock-and-bull story about a sick dinner partner and some handy tickets.) and it reminds us that they are really ideal for one another.
But at this point in the plot you're thinking to yourself, 'Golly, I sure wish an unsuitable houseman would get Sophy drunk or her parents would die (taken!) or a bomb would go off at the hospital.' Hospital bombs and an ensuing fire? That we can do.
While operating, little whorls of smoke start to eddy under the door and Max orders Sophy to take herself off while he and the anesthetist finish up without her. Her refusal to retreat is merely one more jewel in her eternal crown.
Tucking her firmly under his arm, Max runs the gurney out of the OT just as the roof begins to collapse. They've saved each other's lives but there's no time for breathless romantic interludes. It's all hands on deck as the wounded are shunted to various other hospitals and triage is done in the hospital conference room. When she comes off duty (many hours later) he has come to take her home. But not before a little pity kissing which you might think, given the mythical status of her boyfriend, would be just what the doctor ordered.
Since the operating theatre is...ahem...out of operation, Max returns to Holland--not before making a thorough goodbye of nearly everyone excepting Sophy. She rates a fortifying handshake given in the company of others. She's a bit hurt and bewildered but Max, no doubt, thinks that since he can't say goodbye the proper way (kissing and proposals) than he'd best not do it at all.
When his letter comes, begging her to take a temporary position with him as theatre sister in Holland for three weeks, she doesn't want to say yes. But she has to or there's no book so she lets herself be persuaded.
We leave behind all of the charming secondary characters we've grown to love in England just as Sophy does. They are hardly mentioned again.
Just as soon as her plane touches down in Holland, Max whisks her off to meet Mevrouw van der Wijde. Tineke.
Him: Hey, Sophy, baby, let's swing by and meet a gorgeous and wealthy widow woman who is totally unrelated to me. She possibly wants to check you out because she, as my main squeeze, has the right to object to my female employees.
I totally forgive Sophy for misconstruing their relationship. Max did say he wasn't available and already had a best girl. I guess this is she.
Her suspicions are confirmed when she asks another nurse why Max is 'of course' not free on Friday. Does he sleep in a coffin and drink the blood of the living? Is he moonlighting as a lounge singer? No, responds the nurse (mortified to think she might be repeating gossip), he...um...always goes home...where Tineke also is.
Editorial Note: Betty glosses over the details but it is difficult to construe what the embarrassed Dutch nurse thinks this to be as anything other than a weekly friends-with-benefits booty-call. In the land of the RDD, why else would they not be married? I can just picture Maise-the-ward-maid explaining things with a cigarette dangling from her lips: They ain't playing Canasta, I'll tell you that right now.
While in Holland, Max discovers that Sophy is having a birthday. Within minutes Max arranges flowers and then a surprise dance at his house later that evening. Wow. That seems ripe with intention.
But, to round out the numbers, Max invited a European gigolo. No, not really. Harry the Inoffensive is a social butterfly but there's no harm in him...right up until he gets Sophy's number and dances her around the floor. That's what comes of failing to properly vet your guests, I suppose.
Max's jealousy prompts him to conduct a really proper row.
Him: Hey, happy birthday. Let's insult your taste and age and judgment in relation to Harry. Oh, and John Austin...er...Morris...I know about him too because, among your other myriad faults, which, as you can see, I have listed here with appendices and cross-referencing notes, you are a terrible liar. Have I said happy birthday?
She's humiliated at being caught out and called...names but manages to preserve her dignity with small talk. His response is to kiss her into next Tuesday.
He wants his face slapped, is what he wants.

Happy Birthday.

He's in a grotty mood in the morning too and is her own particular demon in OT. But seeing her really upset pops his bubble. He makes some really handsome apologies and she is friendly enough to accept them.
Him: So...this might be a good time to talk about Booty-Call Tineke.
What a bummer the phone rings.
He tries again the next day but she heads him off at the pass. I'd much rather you didn't tell me. Anyway, I know. He is surprised (No one ever expects their text-messages to be hacked...) but she has to run off for an outing with Tineke so that's that.
Upon her return, Max needs her to assist in a difficult amputation and we get to see his sterling qualities. You're a kind and good man, Doctor. Dear me, Sophy, don't speak so soon.
Harry the Inoffensive has chased her down at last and invited her to a concert. Max invites himself along with another group of friends just to keep his eyes on our girl and then cuts her evening off with a made up message about on-call duty.
He presents himself to her the next morning so that she can rain fire and brimstone over his head but she admits good-naturedly that he hadn't, in fact, ruined her evening. What a shame that he can't let it go at that.
That's better. What a pity your choice of boy friends is so unsuitable. John Austin didn't do you much good, either, did he?
He deserves her tears-crowding-her-throat, 'I hate you.'
How awkward it is, then, to have to thank him, mere hours later, for bringing Uncle Giles and Aunt Vera (oh, England hasn't sunk into the sea?) over for a visit.
Her apology (which I don't think she had any business making) prompts him to observe:
It's blow hot, blow cold with you, isn't it?
Um. Pot, Kettle. Kettle, Pot.
But he makes yet more handsome apologies. (Huzzah! The Titanic is turning!) This is beginning to remind me of some lyrics from one of those moody 90s bands Mijnheer van Voorhees used to listen to: If I dig a hole to China, I'd catch the first junk to Soho. Max is digging but he's a not a grudge holder and is quick to retrench.
He asks her to stay another week and also to come to a dance at his house. (A ball! Lots of stories end at a ball!) But Tineke is out in the car so he's got to go.
She sneaks into the party and he finds her by herself on a quiet bench.
'You're shy, aren't you?...you yourself and all you say and do, is a never-ending delight to me.'
Editorial Note: Yay! He finally gets her. All that teasing about John Austin was a much bigger deal for her than for him. She's stood up to it very well but he's got some ground to regain.
He regains it in an even more secluded parlor (lovely place for a spot of snogging if you don't have a lay-by handy) and she's having the time of her life until Tineke bursts in, crying and babbling in Dutch. Max escorts her from the room and puts some firm RDD arms around her while she cries hysterically into his waistcoat.
Do you blame Sophy for leaving? I don't.
Max practically drags her by her hair back to his house the next day and tries to tell her about Tineke but he's not in a very conciliatory mood to begin with and she isn't either. She rushes in with her version of events which are pretty damning: Your booty-call is a nice woman and she broke us up and I saw you holding her like you cared!
And then she throws the book at him. And by 'the book' I mean she more than implies that he was preying on her because she was just a plain nurse with no money and was, as such, fair game to someone in his position. (Gasp! That's going to leave a mark.)
Even though Max is the only one in the room to know that her version is bunkum, he doesn't leap into the breach with the truth. He's too hurt and his only retaliation is to deny her tea and kiss her cruelly. (But she still probably liked it. I would.)
On her final day in Holland, Tineke comes to Sophy's room. Oh dear, did I do this? Max was covering for me and Karel van Steen who have loved each other for years but were too dirt-stupid to marry each other in the first place. His wife was incurably insane (Honey, is that what the married men are selling these days?) until she died with suspicious convenience on the night of the dance. Max has been letting us carry on at his house every Friday while he plays Canasta!
Sophy, with a bravery not unlike members of Pickett's Charge or that of the fabled Light Brigade, knows she's going to her doom as she lays siege to Max's office. She gets out a very strangled explanation and then runs for it. He so catches her.
The End

Rating: Oh my heck, did I love this. Please forgive the choppy review. There was so much wonderfulness that I had to leave out and I sometimes think that ripping apart a book you loathe is easier than adding anything and doing justice to a book you love.
Sophy is so adorable. It helps to think of her as Charlie Bucket from Willie Wonka. Max is her sweet shop that she looks at longingly but avoids because, well, why torture herself when she can't have him? And then, because she is so good and honest and loving, in the end she gets the factory, the chocolate and all the Oompa-Loompa slave laborers for her very own.
She fibs a ton which is much funner to read than the ladies who are faultless and stoic and if you're looking for a read that has more drama than some of Betty's later work (but less tragedy than, say, The Hasty Marriage) then this would be a perfect read.
Max is no slouch either. He's distracted by L'affair Tineke (Everyone claims that they find it impossible not to like her but, yet, I do--most vilely.) and horribly eaten up with jealousy when Inoffensive Harry enters the scene (which leads to drama and indiscretions). He twits her about John Morris-Austin way too much until finally (FINALLY) figuring out that her shyness is making his overture seem mean instead of teasing. (He does twit her about it again after this discovery but only when in a rage and goaded to it.) He is otherwise chasing her skirt satisfactorily--doing a lot more wooing than I was able to stick in anywhere in the review.
Betty abandons the British family as soon as the protagonists move on to Holland which, given how charming everyone is, is a bummer.
But that doesn't matter because I'm giving it a Lashings of whipped cream with a cherry on top anyway.

Food: She enjoys the 'post-prandial aroma of toasted cheese' (yum), Quiche Lorraine, treacle tart, roast pork, Daisy chicory, Tournedos Benjamin (ordered in honor of her brother), cauliflower cheese, beef (That's it. Just 'beef'.), digestives dispensed with 'a matronly air', coupe Clo-Clo that she orders just for the name and a great deal of italics food.

Fashion: A serviceable tweed coat that you want to kick to the curb, an amber Thai silk that sounds gorgeous (if off-the-peg) and gets worn everywhere, a squirrel coat that I find it difficult to imagine as anything less than an outfit-wrecking catastrophe, a lambswool shirtwaister and a jersey shirtwaister. Sophy's Staff nurse shows up at the hospital fire wearing a purple trouser suit and an overpowering fox fur hat.