LITMIR.BIZ

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saw a long black car purr smoothly into the drive and elegantly wind its way to the front of the house. Butterflies entered her tummy, her confidence flying as, taking up her small evening bag, she left her room and went down the stairs.

      Once in the hall she stood composing herself as she waited for Farne Maitland to ring the bell—he’d think her more than eager if she had the door open before he’d got within yards of it.

      The bell sounded. She swallowed and suddenly felt extraordinarily hot. She went forward and pulled back the stout front door, some kind of greeting hovering on her lips. But as she stared at the tall man, with that darkish hair and those piercing blue eyes, her voice died on her. He too seemed stuck for words, though she discounted that a moment later.

      He surveyed her from where he stood, and then the most devastating smile winged its way from him to her and, his tone light, he said, ‘I refuse to believe there is anything false about you, Mr and Mrs Dalton’s daughter, but, tell me truly, did your hair become that fantastic colour completely unaided?’

      Her insides went all marshmallowy, but from somewhere she found an equally light tone to reply, ‘I would never lie to you, Mr and Mrs Maitland’s son. It’s never seen a chemical dye. My father’s not in at the moment, but come in and meet my mother.’

      Still feeling a little shaky, Karrie turned about and led the way into the graceful drawing room. Though Bernard Dalton was rarely, if ever, on the receiving end of it, her mother had charm. She conversed pleasantly with Farne who, with abundant charm of his own, chatted in return until, all courtesies dealt with, he commented, ‘I’ve a table booked for eight.’ And, her mother, acquainted with the fact that Karrie would not be ravenous for a sandwich when she got home, said goodbye.

      That was when Karrie discovered that she had worried needlessly about being unsophisticated. For Farne Maitland seemed to enjoy her company as much as she enjoyed his, and from the start there was never a moment when he allowed her to feel gauche or awkward.

      ‘Have you lived here long?’ he enquired as he steered his car down the drive.

      ‘All my life—I was born in this house,’ she replied.

      ‘You find it convenient for getting in and out of London daily?’

      ‘Far from it,’ she smiled, starting to feel more and more relaxed. ‘But that’s where my job is.’

      ‘I’m glad,’ he responded.

      ‘Glad?’ Why was he glad it took her an hour each way to get to and from her place of work?

      ‘Glad you no longer work for your father.’

      ‘Is there anything you don’t know?’ Honestly! His research into her background hadn’t stopped at just finding out her first name, address and telephone number!

      ‘What’s the point of taking the responsibility of being on the corporation’s board if I can’t take advantage of the perks of the job?’ he grinned.

      Her heart flipped over. My word, was he something else again! ‘I expect you’re always checking the files of Irving and Small’s personnel department?’ she suggested.

      Farne took his glance briefly off the road and gave her a warm look. ‘You’re the one and only—and I wouldn’t lie to you,’ he said softly, and something wondrous which she couldn’t give a name to started happening inside her. His eyes were back on the road when he asked, ‘Are you going to forgive me that—in complete confidence, in case it worries you—I had the director of Personnel fax me your application form and CV yesterday?’

      Wow! Karrie took a steadying breath. ‘Do I get to see your curriculum vitae?’

      ‘Ask anything you want to know,’ he offered, and she could not help but be impressed by his utter openness.

      Her dinner with him went splendidly. Farne had a table reserved for them at a discreet, stylish—and, she suspected, very expensive—eating establishment in London. And, true to his word, he unhesitatingly answered every question she put to him. Although, since she didn’t want him to gain the impression that she was over-eager to know everything about him, she made her questions as impersonal as she could.

      ‘Do you live in London?’ she asked.

      ‘I’ve a house here,’ he answered.

      ‘You should have said. I could have—’ She broke off, the I could have met you here left unsaid.

      But she had to laugh when he stated, ‘We didn’t have much of a telephone conversation, did we?’ And added, to her startlement, ‘I was afraid if I stayed to say more you might find a reason not to come out with me.

      Her eyes widened, she stared at him. ‘I... You... You’ve never been turned down yet, have you?’ she challenged. Forget her accusation that he’d been stood up. She didn’t believe it for a moment.

      ‘Oh, ye of short memory,’ Farne reproached her. ‘Have you forgotten how, only last Tuesday, you preferred to wash your most remarkable hair rather than go out with me?’

      ‘Ah!’ she said, and smiled, and looked at him as he, unsmiling, looked back at her.

      ‘Devastating!’ he murmured.

      ‘I know,’ she replied, trying to pretend that her backbone hadn’t just turned to so much water. ‘But I do my best. So, you live in London, you work in London, where do you go for holidays?’

      ‘Holidays? What are those?’

      ‘It’s tough at the top,’ she offered.

      ‘Heartless woman. Where do you go?’ he wanted to know.

      It was eleven o‘clock before she knew it, and they hadn’t had coffee yet! ‘Can you believe that?’ she gasped.

      ‘May I hope you’ve enjoyed the evening as much as I?’ he asked, as an attentive waiter appeared just then, bearing the coffee.

      ‘It’s been wonderful,’ Karrie answered truthfully, and didn’t want it to end.

      ‘Would you like to go on to a club?’ Farne suggested.

      But Karrie, having been quite truthful about the evening being wonderful, suddenly started to feel a little concerned that it should be so. First dates were often stilted, difficult experiences. First dates. Would he ask her out again?—oh, she did hope so. She closed her mind to such thinking. ‘I don’t think so,’ she refused nicely. It had gone eleven now. Farne had to drive her home yet, and then get back to his place. And while, okay, he might be able to cope effortlessly with arriving home with the morning milk delivery, if this evening got any more wonderful she was going to have one dickens of a job keeping her feet down on the ground.

      Disappointingly, he did not press her, but accepted her decision without question. Without, she noted, looking in any way disappointed himself.

      They drove to her parents’ house in comparative silence—so different from the way they had been tonight—and Karrie started to wonder if maybe she was the only one who thought the whole evening so marvellous.

      Farne had seemed to be enjoying himself, though, and, as he’d indicated, he hadn’t hung back from answering anything she wanted to know. She had learned that he was an only child, like herself, and that his parents lived in Dorset. Also that from the age of seven he had been sent to boarding school.

      That piece of information had shaken her a little at first. It had somehow seemed quite dreadful to her that anyone should think of packing any child as young as seven off to school and away from home. Although, on thinking about it, thinking about her own childhood, fraught by angry rows and arguments, those times she had put her fingers in her ears hoping not to hear them, she just had to pause to consider which of them had had the happier childhood. Still, all the same—boarding school at the tender age of seven!

      ‘You’re very quiet, Karrie?’ Farne suddenly broke into her thoughts.

      ‘You’d

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