LITMIR.BIZ

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baby! You stupid, pretty little idiot! You naive, gullible—Heaven give me patience!’

      He gripped her shoulders, looking at her intently. Suddenly they heard Simon’s voice outside in the hall. She saw the tension come swiftly into Jason’s face as though he’d made a lightning decision, and the next moment he pulled her hard against him, sliding his arms about her body, lowering his head and crushing her mouth with his own.

      Abruptly the pictures flickered out into blackness.

      Time and again her memory stopped at this point, and only resumed several moments later, with the sight of Simon’s face, white and distraught.

      ‘You cheating little bitch,’ he cried. ‘You scheming, deceitful—All this time I thought you loved me, but you had your eyes on a bigger prize, didn’t you? I trusted you!’

      She tried to protest, but he cut her short. ‘I loved you. I’d have given my life for you, and the moment my back’s turned you go straight into my brother’s arms. What else have the two of you been up to?’

      ‘Nothing,’ she screamed. ‘Simon, please—it’s not what you think.’

      ‘It seemed clear enough to me. Oh, God, Cindy, how could you do this?’

      All the guests seemed to be there behind him, listening to his heartbroken accusations, witnessing her shame.

      ‘Listen to me,’ she begged through her sobs.

      ‘Listen to you! I never want to listen to or even think of you again. Get out of my sight.’

      ‘That’s enough!’ Jason intervened. ‘You’ve made your point, Simon. Now leave it. It’s over.’

      ‘Yes, it’s over,’ he choked. ‘Over, Cindy, over! And I thought you and I were for ever.’

      He turned and fled upstairs. She followed him, but found his door locked against her, and her frantic hammering produced no response. At last she slid to the floor, sobbing in despair.

      She didn’t know how long she stayed there, but eventually Jason came to tell her that all the guests were gone.

      She looked up at him through eyes blurred with tears.

      ‘You—you did this on purpose,’ she choked.

      ‘Yes, I did it on purpose. Come on, get up.’

      He put his hands under her arms and hauled her firmly to her feet. She went with him because there was nothing else to do. She had nobody but Simon, and now he’d turned against her.

      Jason led her to her room, and said curtly, ‘Pack your things. You’re leaving in the morning.’

      She clung to the hope that she could see Simon before she had to leave, but in the early hours she heard a car start up beneath her window. She ran and opened it, and was just in time to see Simon drive away.

      He’d gone out of her life for ever, disillusioned, believing that she’d betrayed their love.

      But the true betrayal had come from his brother, who had forcibly kissed her, knowing that Simon was about to come in and see them. Why, oh, why couldn’t Simon understand that? Why had he believed the worst of her so easily?

      Jason insisted on driving her to the railway station. She left behind every gift, every last tiny piece of jewellery that Simon had ever given her.

      But she left behind much more than that: youth and dreams, hope, love, and a belief that the world was good. She’d been brutally robbed of them all.

      As she stood now, looking at her own tense, sad face in the wardrobe mirror, she understood for the first time how totally these things had been drained from her, and how empty was the woman they had left behind.

      She shut the door abruptly and went downstairs.

      The kitchen had changed since she was last here. The old one had been a monument to antiquity. The new one paid lip-service to tradition, with oak beams on the ceiling and copper pans on the wall. But the gadgets were modern, as Hilda demonstrated with pride.

      ‘I had to talk him into it,’ she said, pointing at the ceiling to indicate Jason. ‘He likes the old ways, and the old values. But I told him, this kitchen may have been good enough to cook for Queen Victoria, but it ain’t good enough for me.’

      ‘Did Queen Victoria ever visit Tenby Manor?’ Elinor asked.

      ‘So they say. Wouldn’t surprise me. Anyway, I put up with it as long as I could, then I said, Either that ancient kitchen goes, or I do.’

      ‘And what did Mr Tenby say to that?’

      ‘He said, “Hilda, Tenby Manor would go to pieces without you.” And there was a man in here, taking measurements, the very next day.’

      Elinor was surprised. Even discounting the story’s more colourful details, the bottom line was that Jason Tenby had listened to Hilda. But of course, by modernising, he’d improved the value of the house.

      The outer door, which had been slightly ajar, was pushed open and a muddy black spaniel scampered into the room.

      ‘Bob, you rascal,’ Hilda called, ‘where have you been hiding?’ She offered a titbit, which the spaniel pounced on. ‘He’s Jason’s. Nobody’s got much time for him now, poor little thing, so he spends his life wandering around the grounds.’

      ‘Mr Tenby’s? He didn’t—’ Elinor checked herself on the verge of saying that Jason hadn’t had a dog when she was last here, and substituted, ‘He didn’t seem the kind of man to keep a pet.’

      ‘He’s more than just a pet. He wins prizes at all the dog shows. Pedigree as long as your arm. Not that he looks it now, because he’s covered in mud. But he’s actually Lord Robertson Winstanley Mooreswell of Hatley Place,’ Hilda pronounced triumphantly, adding as an afterthought, ‘The eighth.’

      I can believe that, Elinor thought. Even this man’s dog has a pedigree.

      Bob bounded towards her.

      ‘Stay away from me!’ she said sharply. Then she coloured and added, ‘His paws—’

      ‘Yes, you don’t want them on your nice clean uniform,’ Hilda said.

      Elinor agreed, but not without a touch of shame. For a moment her hostility to all things Tenby had extended to the innocent animal who’d been welcomed because he had the pedigree she herself had lacked.

      To cover the moment she began to ask about the house. ‘It’s a big place to manage on your own.’

      ‘I’m not exactly on my own. I clean Jason’s room because he doesn’t like strangers in there, but, for the rest, a couple of cleaning women come in from the village. My Alf does odd jobs and looks after the kitchen garden.’

      She concentrated on the supper she was preparing, and told Elinor that it would be ready in an hour.

      ‘Meat and two veg, with plenty of gravy,’ she announced with pride. ‘I do it for him every day. And a good solid pudding for afters. If only he did more than pick at it! Never mind. I’ll build him up.’

      Elinor forbore to comment that Hilda wouldn’t build Jason up by cooking meals that obviously didn’t tempt him. The time wasn’t right.

      From outside she could hear someone coming down the stairs, leaving the house and driving away.

      ‘That’ll be the factory manager,’ Hilda said. ‘He’s been getting his orders.’

      ‘You mean he’s been up with Mr Tenby?’ Elinor asked, startled.

      ‘He comes here twice a week. Dr Harper—that’s Jason’s GP—tried to stop him, but Jason got into such a fury he had to back down.’

      ‘I think I’d better have a word with Mr Tenby.’

      She found Jason lying still and silent. It

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