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  Well done! his brain cried–the money had manifested itself in the dim light of the hall without being openly given or received; its purpose had been skilfully clouded over and yet its association with Emily’s accident clearly stated. All the fellow had to do was smile and murmur something.

  But Arnold turned his head and looked at the roll, even leaning forward a trifle to make sure what it was. Just as he was about to speak, Owen turned and swung the door open, saying as he did so, ‘Really must go . . . someone waiting at the club.’ He closed the door behind him and was off down the path with a feeling of elation like a man leaving the dentist’s. As he reached the car he gave a little laugh, realizing suddenly that from start to last Pierson hadn’t spoken a single word.

  CHAPTER 7

  ‘Just a cup of tea for me, I’m not hungry.’ Owen had spent Saturday morning and the best part of the afternoon in his almost empty factory, glad to be able to attend in peace to the papers that mounted relentlessly on his desk, pleased also to be out of Zena’s way. She had risen grumbling from her bed at breakfast time, feeling somewhat better, although not openly advertising the fact. Irritated–but not surprised–that Emily Bond hadn’t seen fit to turn up for work, she had spent the day dealing in a slapdash fashion with inescapable household chores.

  She helped herself now to a thick slice of Christmas cake. ‘I’m not sure that it’s as good this year,’ she said after a couple of mouthfuls. ‘Not as moist as it should be.’ Owen gave a grunt that might mean anything; he was listening for the sound of the news-boy at the front door. Ah–surely that was the crunch of feet on gravel. He stood up.

  ‘I’ll take my tea into the study. One or two things to see to.’ He escaped from the room, just in time to see the evening paper drop on to the mat. He snatched it up and went down the passage into the study. Five minutes later he sat back in his chair with a profound feeling of relief. Twice he’d been through the entire paper and not a solitary word about the accident; he could scarcely credit his luck. All he had to do now was hang about on Monday morning till Emily showed up and indicate to her with some force that there was no longer the slightest necessity for her to mention the incident to Zena at all.

  Might it be as well to flash a little more money about? He shook his head slowly. Not the wisest of actions. Some pressure he might apply? His brain flung up all at once a picture of the food scattered on the road; he remembered with a sudden nod of comprehension the uneasy way Emily had kept on about feeding the birds. He smiled, lifted his cup and drained the stone-cold tea. A word or two about her pilfering would ensure she kept her mouth shut; she wouldn’t be in the least anxious for that little matter to reach Zena’s ears.

  He settled his shoulders comfortably against the upholstery, leaned back and closed his eyes. Might slip down to the club later for an hour or two. But just for the present–he opened his mouth in a luxurious yawn–what better than a little nap?

  Ruth Underwood sat at her desk in the office she shared with Anthea Gibbs. In the half-hour they had been at work they had exchanged scarcely a word after the customary greetings. Monday morning was never a relaxed and chatty time but the atmosphere today was charged with tension. Each carefully avoided meeting the other’s eyes, not wishing to read there hope, expectation, hostility peering through the surface calm. Anthea looked diligently through a file; a thin, pale woman, with a dried-up look and a nervous habit of twitching her lips.

  Footsteps, voices in the corridor outside. A light rap on the door, the handle turned at once without any waiting for a reply. In her seat near the window Ruth drew a deep breath; a couple of yards away Anthea Gibbs sat rigid, both hands outspread on her desk.

  The marketing director came into the room without haste, a tall thin man with a look of impersonal amiability.

  ‘I’d like you to meet your new head of department.’ He glanced at both women in turn but his eyes came back to rest on Ruth. There was a brief scraping of chairs as they stood up. The director moved a few feet farther into the room, turning his head back to the door, raising one hand in a courteous gesture of invitation. He looked again at Ruth. ‘I’m happy to inform you that you’ve been appointed to the post of assistant.’ He gave her a pleasant smile.

  ‘Thank you,’ she managed to say, aware of the fierce pounding of her heart. She shifted her gaze and saw the face of the new man, standing behind him, a little to one side. Maurice! A wave of faintness swept over her, she thrust out her hands and steadied herself against the desk. Maurice Turner! Looking exactly the same as when she’d last seen him, fourteen months ago in London.

  ‘Mr Turner,’ the director said in a voice that seemed to have developed a curious echo. With a strong effort she forced herself to draw a long deep breath. To her unutterable relief her pulse began to slacken, strength returned to her limbs, the director spoke again in his normal voice. ‘I’m sure you’ll find Mrs Underwood a very able and loyal helper.’

  ‘I’m sure I will.’ Turner stepped forward, came right up to her desk and leaned across with his hand outstretched. He smiled at her with a teasing edge to his look. She murmured something, hardly knowing what she said; she felt his fingers clasp hers with a strong warm pressure. ‘We might have lunch together,’ he said easily. ‘There’ll be a good deal to discuss. I’ll be busy the rest of the morning but I should be free by one o’clock.’ He released her hand. ‘I’ll look in here then.’

  She thought of saying she couldn’t make it, she had another engagement. But from two o’clock onwards they would begin to work together; there was no way of avoiding that. It would be just as well to have a talk with him first, get matters straight. She felt a thrust of confidence. It would be all right, she could cope. She nodded. ‘Yes, I’ll be here.’ Not returning his smile but flicking him a cool level look.

  Nothing so very terrible had happened after all–and she had been promoted. Until this moment she had scarcely taken in the fact. Pleasure rose in her mind, and a brief thought of the car she would buy. Something else succeeded pleasure, a trace of excitement and an exhilarating sense of challenge, stimulus, almost of danger.

  Turner walked across to where the director was exchanging a casual word with Anthea Gibbs, unaware of the savage blow he had just dealt to that lady’s last hopes of promotion. Turner threw in a polite remark or two and then they were gone.

  Ruth dropped into her chair as soon as the door began to close behind them. She felt deeply elated, powerfully alive. Maurice Turner in that incredible moment suddenly here, in her own office, her new boss–calling for her in less than four hours’ time!

  ‘Congratulations,’ Anthea said in a voice chipped from ice. ‘You must be very pleased with yourself.’

  An unpleasant thought struck Ruth suddenly like a physical blow. Was it conceivable that she hadn’t after all been promoted on merit–that she owed her good fortune to the skilful manipulations of Maurice Turner?

  ‘It’s ten minutes to one. Surely you can knock off now.’ Kevin Lang leaned across the curved counter of the library and seized Jane’s hand. ‘Come on, there won’t be anything fit to eat if we don’t get to the café by one o’clock.’

  ‘Sh!’ Jane pulled her hand away, frowning at him. ‘Keep your voice down!’ she added in a fierce whisper. ‘I’ve another ten minutes to do.’ They had spent a good part of Saturday and Sunday together, walking down by the river, eating sandwiches in the Milbourne snack bars, dancing in cellar discothèques, and talking, talking, talking. Already she felt as if she had known him for years.

  She gestured him aside as a man came up to the counter with an armful of books. ‘Quite a collection you’ve got there, Mr Pierson.’ She smiled in a friendly fashion as she wielded the date-stamp. Travel books, the memoirs of a field-marshal, a couple of light romances, some popular detective novels. ‘Something for all the family.’ She remembered his father, old and ill. ‘Better news at home, I hope?’

  Arnold gathered up the books. ‘Not too good, I’m afraid. Thank you for
asking.’ As he moved away Kevin came back to the counter.

  ‘It’s one o’clock now. Get your coat and come along.’ She rather liked the way he seemed to think he had some right to order her about; it gave her a soothing sense of security.

  ‘All right, I won’t be a moment.’ She went swiftly off to the staff cloakroom.

  Five minutes later they were standing squashed together in the gangway of a bus carrying them towards the café. The bus halted suddenly, throwing her off balance. ‘Steady on!’ Kevin slipped an arm round her shoulders. She looked through the misted windows at the crowded pavements, the shoppers hurrying home.

  ‘I know that man–he came into the office on Saturday morning.’ Kevin glanced out through the open door of the bus, over the heads of descending passengers. ‘He wants to buy a house, he’s taken a furnished flat for a few weeks while he’s looking.’ Jane turned her head without any very compelling interest. ‘Rather a gorgeous creature he’s with,’ Kevin added lightly. ‘I wonder who she is.’

  Jane followed his gaze with keener attention and saw with an abrupt dampening of her spirits the blonde head and graceful shoulders of her stepmother. Ruth was talking animatedly to a tall heavily-built man, the pair of them just about to enter the doors of a restaurant.

  ‘He’s taken up some new position in the town,’ Kevin said as the bus jerked off again. ‘I showed him over the flat. Quite a pleasant fellow. He just wants a small house, he’s a widower, no children.’

  ‘Did you really think she was very beautiful?’ The day began to look grey and cheerless to Jane.

  ‘Who?’ Kevin drew his brows together.

  ‘The woman he was with.’

  ‘Oh–her. Yes, I suppose so. Not my type of course. Too old. And anyway I never go for blondes.’ He grinned at her. ‘I prefer them young and brown-haired.’

  A shaft of sunlight shone through the bus window. Quite a bright day after all. ‘She’s my stepmother,’ Jane said gaily, recklessly. ‘The woman you saw. You must come along and meet her sometime. And you must meet my father too. I think you’ll like them both.’

  At five o’clock one of the engineering staff put his head round the door of Maurice Turner’s office. ‘You might like to take a look at this.’ He waved a newspaper. ‘The local evening rag. It’s got a piece in about the new appointments.’ He came up to the desk and dropped the paper in front of Turner. ‘That photograph you gave them must go back a year or two.’ He smiled with a trace of malice. ‘Makes you look a good deal younger.’

  ‘You know how it is,’ Maurice said with easy charm. ‘Detest having my picture taken.’ He ran his eye over the column.

  Sarah was already at home when Arnold walked up the garden path. They had shared the purchase of a small car a few years back but as often as not it was Sarah who used it to drive to and from work. Arnold preferred to walk, even in the worst weather.

  ‘Do come up here,’ she called out when she heard the sound of the front door. ‘Have you seen the evening paper?’

  ‘No.’ He didn’t raise his voice by very much, disliking her habit of opening a conversation from several yards away. ‘I’ll be up in a moment.’ He hung up his coat and went slowly up the stairs to his father’s room, glancing past Sarah towards the bed. Walter lay propped against the pillows; he looked alert and pleased.

  ‘How are you, Father? Feeling a little better?’

  Walter gave an impatient nod. ‘We’ve just been reading about you in the paper.’ Arnold frowned. ‘About the accident,’ Walter said. ‘A nice little piece. They put in a bit about me as well.’ Delighted to know folk hadn’t forgotten the time he’d gone out under fire with Yorke, after Cottrell.

  Sarah looked critically at the column. ‘A pity they’ve used that old photograph. I suppose they unearthed it from their files.’ She held the newspaper out to him. ‘Don’t you want to see it? It seems you’re quite a hero.’ She flicked him a sardonic glance but there was a tinge of pride and pleasure in her voice.

  Arnold took the paper, bending his head and making a show of reading it. But the word hero had roused in him such a strong wave of revulsion that it was all he could do to remain in the room. As soon as it was decently possible he laid the paper down on the chest of drawers.

  ‘Has the doctor been again?’ he asked with concern. ‘What did he have to say?’

  ‘Never mind the doctor.’ Walter waved the question aside. ‘I’ll have that paper again if you’ve finished with it, I want to take another look, read it properly.’

  ‘I’ll go and have a wash then.’ With a deep sense of relief Arnold made his way past Sarah, out of the room.

  It was nearly ten when Owen Yorke let himself into The Sycamores. He was feeling relaxed and cheerful. A companionable evening at the club–he hadn’t bothered to go home after work, he’d had a civilized meal in the members’ dining room, getting his secretary to phone Zena and deliver a message about an important appointment. And there had been a meeting afterwards, very satisfactory, they’d settled the final arrangements for the Presidential Ball. He’d even managed to fix up a ticket for Linda Fleming, had contrived to get her included in another party. Very skilfully done, he was pleased with the way he’d handled that, casual, the air of a man suddenly remembering a request from a customer, a hint of universal benevolence for those engaged, however humbly, in the same trade, a notion of goodwill towards newcomers to the town, a suggestion of fatherly–and nothing more than fatherly–interest in the welfare of a struggling young widow.

  He would ring Linda in the morning, as soon as he got to the factory, tell her the good news. The possibility of a discreet little run out somewhere quiet tomorrow evening crossed his mind; one or two snug hostelries he knew, well out of sight of Milbourne eyes. He was smiling as he opened the sitting room door.

  Zena had fallen asleep in front of the television set. For a couple of minutes he stood looking down at her with compassion and a kind of tolerant friendliness that rose sometimes from the ashes of old and passionate love. He touched her gently on the shoulder.

  ‘Wake up, Zena.’ She stirred and opened her eyes.

  ‘What time is it?’ She yawned and glanced at the clock.

  ‘Would you like some coffee? And a few sandwiches?’ He spread his hands in a gesture of generous goodwill. ‘Just say what you fancy.’

  When he had gone off to the kitchen she glanced round for her cigarettes; they were lying on the carpet beside her chair–and beside them, the evening paper, still precisely folded. As she exhaled a long spiral of smoke she turned the pages idly, her fingers suddenly arrested by the sight of a face from long ago.

  ‘Turner!’ she said aloud on a note of pleased surprise. ‘Maurice Turner!’ One of the old crowd, the gay lads of her dancing days. She read the paragraphs with avidity. Back in the county after all these years! Actually working in Milbourne now! Well, well, well . . . Her brain began to take in the other details, the brief mention of a less important appointment, Mrs Ruth Underwood to the post of Mr Turner’s assistant . . . Twice she read the column; speculation, deduction chased across her mind.

  She stood up, crossed to the corner cupboard and poured herself a tot of brandy, then she settled herself comfortably into her chair and let her mind range over a host of notions.

  How would Neil take Ruth’s promotion and the fact that in all probability she would now be earning a good deal more than himself? London . . . Turner had been working in the London branch, according to the paper, that would surely be the headquarters of British Foods . . . why would he want to come to Milbourne? Drawn back to the haunts of his youth, perhaps? She sat up suddenly. Ruth had worked in London . . . and now Ruth was to be his assistant . . .

  Memory flicked up all at once another item from its complicated files, Arnold Pierson in that odd, unstable time after the war, kneeling by her chair, gripping her fingers so tightly that she almost cried out, talking, talking . . . smashing down the dam and releasing the torrents . . . it had been Turner!
Of course! Turner had been his captain!

  A fierce current compounded of pleasure and excitement flowed through her. She sprang up and almost ran over to the phone, snatched up the receiver and dialled Arnold’s number; it was engaged. She sighed with disappointment; the current began to ebb. She waited for a minute and then dialled again, no longer quite certain of what it was she had wanted to say. She heard again the engaged signal and in the same moment the sound of the trolley being wheeled from the kitchen. She replaced the receiver, feeling suddenly rather tired and flat.

  Owen thrust the door open, came smiling in with the laden trolley. ‘Here you are! Quite a delicious little spread. Hope I haven’t been too long!’

  ‘I did know there’d been some kind of accident,’ Linda said into the receiver. ‘One of my customers told me her husband’s car had been run into. But I’d no idea either you or Mrs Bond had been mixed up in it. I’ve just been reading about it in the paper.’ She paused briefly, then added, a little shyly, ‘I was very interested at what it said about your getting a medal in the war.’

  The image of Arnold had recurred to her several times since she’d firmly despatched him on his way on Friday evening. More than once she’d found herself regretting not having accepted his invitation to the theatre. And then–the piece in the paper–the realization that when the accident happened he’d been only a few yards away from her door, about to call, perhaps, or even, more intriguingly, simply drawn back to the neighbourhood that housed her. But above and beyond all, Linda dearly loved a hero. She hadn’t been able to prevent herself from seizing the phone as soon as she’d digested the news.

  ‘I liked the photograph,’ she said lightly. ‘I suppose it was taken during the war.’ A very good-looking young man–and Arnold still had a fine, solid, prepossessing appearance. A man to be relied on, an arm that would snatch one out of the path of danger. She began to feel relaxed; a pleasant glow spread through her.