LITMIR.BIZ

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going down with something—Karrie said nothing more until Farne had driven up to her door. On detecting movement, the security lights of her home switched on, and as Farne left the driver’s seat so Karrie got out of the car too.

      ‘Thank you for a very pleasant evening,’ she said sincerely, and, still feeling a mass of uncertainty, she offered her right hand.

      Farne glanced down at it but, instead of shaking hands with her, he took hold of her right hand in his left one, and caught hold of her other hand too. ‘It seems,’ he said, holding both her hands in his, his eyes on her face, ‘that I shall have to let you go.’

      Karrie opened her mouth to make some kind of comment. But there were no words there, and she closed it again. Farne still had hold of her hands—she was going nowhere.

      Then suddenly her heart started to drum, for his head was coming nearer. She stood there, unmoving, as gently Farne touched his lips to hers. It was an exquisite, tender kiss.

      And over all too soon. As was the evening over. For a moment she felt his hold on her hands tighten, then he was stepping back and letting go of her. Having already said her thanks for the evening, there was nothing more for her to say. She turned from him, at a total loss to know if she or Farne had been the one to put her door key in the lock.

      Without a word, she went in. She closed the door and when, an age later, or so it seemed, she heard his car start up and move off, she moved too. Silently, softly, her head in the clouds, the feel of Farne’s hands still on hers, the feel of his marvellous mouth still on hers, she dreamily started to climb the stairs.

      She got ready for bed, touching her fingertips to her mouth where his tender kiss had touched. She got into bed, and closed her eyes. Again, dreamily, she thought of him. Farne Maitland. She had been out for the evening many, many times, but that evening, she had to own, had ranked as extremely special.

      Her dreamy mood seemed to extend over into Sunday. Farne Maitland was still in her head as she showered, threw on a pair of trousers and a tee shirt, and went down the stairs. She headed for the kitchen. Her mother had help with the domestic work three mornings a week, but not at the weekend.

      ‘Good morning!’ she greeted her mother brightly. ‘Need any help?’

      Her mother was busy cooking bacon and eggs for her husband, and, as always, she refused any offer of assistance. But her eyes left what she was doing and fastened on her daughter. ‘How did your evening go?’ she asked, and was unsmiling.

      Somehow, and Karrie realised it was ridiculous, her evening suddenly seemed very private, and not to be shared with anyone. She gave herself a mental shake. For crying out loud—this was her mother!

      ‘Fine!’ she understated with a smile, and went on to babble on about where she and Farne had dined and what they had eaten. Her voice tailed off, however, when she became aware that her mother was looking just a mite concerned. ‘What...?’

      Margery Dalton began speaking at the same time. ‘He, Farne Maitland, seems—different from your usual boyfriends,’ she said carefully.

      He was hardly a ‘boyfriend’, but Karrie had to agree he was certainly different from anyone else she had ever been out with. ‘He is,’ she answered quietly.

      ‘Oh, Karrie, I fear so for you!’ her mother suddenly cried, every bit as though she had lain awake all night worrying about her.

      Karrie was quite taken aback, but attempted to rouse her mother’s sense of humour anyway. ‘That’s your job,’ she teased.

      But Margery Dalton, the bacon she was cooking forgotten, seemed to have worked herself up into something of a state. ‘He seems more—worldly than any of the...’

      ‘Oh, Mum.’ Karrie tried to quieten her mother’s anxiety. ‘If you’re using Travis Watson as a yardstick—everybody’s more worldly than Travis.’

      ‘But Travis is safe—and you’re as unworldly as he is. With this new man of yours, he won’t be content to...’

      ‘Mum, I probably will never see him again.’ Karrie, thought it politic to end the conversation.

      ‘You will.’ How could her parent sound so positive? Karrie wished she could be that confident herself! ‘Promise me, Karrie, that you won’t do anything silly,’ her mother urged in a sudden rush.

      ‘Silly?’ Karrie had no idea what her mother meant for a moment. But it did not take long for conversations she’d had with Margery Dalton over the past six years to come back all at once and make her meaning exceedingly clear. Silly as in getting herself pregnant!

      ‘Oh, you’ve no need to worry about...’ Her voice faded—she could see that her mother was looking extremely upset. Karrie smiled. ‘I promise,’ she said, without further hesitation—her mother had enough to contend with without being caused further grief if Karrie didn’t give her her word. At last she got a smile out of her mother.

      They met up as a family when breakfast was ready—her father was in a grumpy mood as he complained, ‘This bacon’s frizzled!’

      Margery Dalton charged straight into battle. ‘Don’t eat it, then!’ she bit back.

      Bernard Dalton gave his wife a venomous look and, not taking her orders, crunched his way through his breakfast and left the two women in his household to get on with their own thoughts.

      Farne had kissed her, Karrie mused dreamily, kissed her and squeezed her hands. Prior to that he’d stood with her, holding both her hands. ‘It seems that I shall have to let you go’ he’d said. Did that mean anything—or nothing?

      Nothing, of course, you chump! What did you think it meant? Well, precisely nothing, she supposed, but... Would he ring her next week, perhaps the week after? He’d left it four days before ringing her yesterday. Today was Sunday. Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, she counted. Would he ring her on Wednesday? Oh, she did hope so. But perhaps he wouldn’t ring at all.

      The fact that she must be looking as bleak as she felt at that thought was borne out when her father, looking her way, asked sharply, ‘What’s the matter with you? Are you sickening for something?’

      Karrie glanced at him, becoming at once aware that his questions had caused her mother to look at her too. With both parents studying her, Karrie knew a desperate need to be by herself.

      ‘I’ve never felt better,’ she answered brightly—and as soon as she could she went up to the solitude of her room.

      Once there, she faced that her father had not been so very wide of the mark when he had questioned what was the matter with her, and asked, ‘Are you sickening for something?’ She was. Something wonderous was going on inside her which she hadn’t been able to give a name to. She, was falling in love. Oh, my word!

      With Farne Maitland in her head the whole of the time, it had gone eleven before Karrie realised it. Aware that she couldn’t stay in her room for much longer if she didn’t want her mother coming up to check if her father had been right and there was something the matter with her, Karrie knew she would have to go downstairs. The problem with that, though, was that her father was far too observant, and, should he glance her way and find her, in some unguarded moment, looking anxious or dreamy, then he wouldn’t keep it to himself. Her mother would then be on to her. But, for Karrie, this fragile emotion that was gaining strength was, in its infancy, intensely private, and therefore not to be spoken of or shared.

      It was a sunny summer’s day, so she decided to risk the twice-a-week gardener’s wrath and do some weeding. Changing her slip-on shoes for a pair of plimsolls that had seen better days, she pulled back her hair and secured it in rubber bands in two bunches, and reckoned she looked workmanlike enough for her task outside.

      ‘It’s a shame to stay indoors on such a lovely day!’ she announced, popping her head round the drawing room door, where her silent parents were absorbed by the Sunday papers. ‘I thought I’d tidy up the rose bed.’

      The rose bed was tidy already, she saw. But

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