Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous

collection of fantastic novels by

bestselling, much loved author

ANNE MATHER

Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the

publishing industry, having written over one hundred

and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than

forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.

This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance

for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful,

passionate writing has given.

We are sure you will love them all!

I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun— staggered by what’s happened.

I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.

These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.

We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.

Proud Harvest
Anne Mather

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘BUT he is Carne’s son, Lesley,’ Mrs Matthews exclaimed in the same tone of frustrated affection she often used to her grandson. ‘Surely that means something to you.’

Lesley finished her coffee before replying, regarding her mother over the rim of the coffee cup with hazel eyes presently darkened to brown with impatience. The long curling lashes did nothing to disguise the indignation burning in their depths, and Mrs Matthews shifted rather uncomfortably under their penetrating gaze.

‘What are you trying to say, Mother?’ Lesley enquired at last, setting down the fragile cup in its equally fragile saucer. ‘Has the idea of babysitting begun to pall?’

‘To pall, no!’ Mrs Matthews was offended now, wrapping the folds of her satin wrapper about her, putting a nervous hand up to touch the immaculately combed set of her hair. ‘It’s just that—well, as I say, he is Carne’s son, and I see no reason why he shouldn’t be allowed to spend at least part of the holiday with his father—–’

‘You see no reason!’ Lesley’s eyes sparkled angrily now. ‘And what about me? Don’t I have any say in the matter?’

‘Oh, of course you do.’ Mrs Matthews made a sound of exasperation with her tongue against her teeth. ‘It was just a suggestion, that’s all. I might have expected you would react emotionally instead of rationally. Lesley, people can be practical about these things, you know. Why, if everyone behaved as you do, the world would be in a very sorry state!’

‘And isn’t it?’

Mrs Matthews rose from the breakfast table with a sigh, and went to get herself one of the small cigars she favoured from the carved onyx box on the mantelpiece. Lighting it with the heavy silver lighter that squatted beside the cigar box, she drew on it deeply before turning to face her daughter again.

‘I don’t intend to get involved in reactionary discussion with you, Lesley,’ she stated at last, holding her head stiffly. ‘As I say, I thought you might see reason—–’

‘Reason!’ Lesley bestowed another irritated glare in her mother’s direction and then rose abruptly from the table. She was late. It was after nine already and she still had to get across town. She’d never make it, but with luck Lance wouldn’t be in before ten as it was Monday morning, and there was nothing spoiling.

Brushing the crumbs from the skirt of her brown suede suit, she turned to face Mrs Matthews. ‘Don’t you know those things are bad for your health?’ she exclaimed acidly, but her mother merely pulled a face.

‘Why should I worry about my health?’ she retorted. ‘No one else does.’

Lesley, on her way to the door, halted uncertainly. ‘Now what is that supposed to mean?’ Her brows drew together in sudden concern. ‘You’re not—ill, are you?’

Mrs Matthews sniffed. ‘Would you care if I was?’

‘Oh, Mother!’ Lesley glanced helplessly at her watch. ‘I don’t have time for discussion right now.’ Talking about Jeremy had already taken up far too much time. ‘Can’t we leave this until later?’

‘That’s what I mean,’ declared her mother peevishly. ‘You never have time for anything—or anybody. Why, even your own son is a nuisance—–’

‘Mother!’ Lesley’s angry interjection cut her off in full spate. She reached for her handbag with hands which she found to her annoyance were trembling, and slung the strap over her shoulder. Then she looked at her mother again. ‘I’ll see you around five-thirty, right?’

Her voice was cool and although Mrs Matthews inclined her head in silent assent, she did not reply. Lesley hesitated only a moment longer and then wrenched open the door and left the room, closing it with a decided click behind her.

The lifts were all engaged, and she fretted impatiently until one chose to stop at the fourth floor. Downstairs, she barely answered the hall porter’s greeting as he pulled open the door for her, and his eyes watched her doubtfully as she hastened down the shallow steps to the pavement. It wasn’t like Mrs Radley to rush past him like that, and he hoped nothing had happened to that young son of hers. She had looked upset, and his brows drew together in a sympathetic frown. Always cheerful, that was Mrs Radley, always interested to hear about his wife and his family, never too busy to listen, not like some he could mention. That mother of hers, for example. Thought she was a cut above everybody else, she did. Well, what if her husband had been a brigadier? He was long dead now, and she was just plain Mrs Matthews. Her daughter, she was a different kettle of fish altogether. And that son of hers—regular little tearaway, he was. Pity her marriage hadn’t worked out, but that was the way of it these days. Girls weren’t content to stay at home and look after their families. They wanted a career, too. Equality. He grinned wryly. When were men going to be made equal? that’s what he wanted to know.

Meanwhile, Lesley was reversing her Mini out of the underground parking area that adjoined the block of flats, totally unaware of having aroused such strong feelings. Her own feelings occupied her thoughts to the exclusion of everything else, and in consequence she almost ran into the back of a grey Jaguar parked opposite. Jamming on her brakes, she took several calming breaths before making a second attempt to turn, and her delay was heralded by several irate horns from other commuters baulked by her incompetence.

‘All right, all right,’ she groaned frustratedly to herself, as a cream Cortina nudged closer, and most ungentlemanly signs were made to her to move on. ‘What a start to the week!’ she muttered, and glancing in the rear-view mirror bestowed a smile of annoying tolerance on the driver of the vehicle behind.

But as she cleared the garage and joined the press of motorists streaming towards the underpass, her brief moment of stimulation passed and she found herself worrying over the things her mother had said. Perhaps she had been hasty. Perhaps she did expect too much of her mother. But without her assistance, what could she do? She couldn’t afford a full-time nanny, even for holidays. The school fees alone were disastrous, and without Carne’s contribution, Jeremy would have to have gone to a day school, which would have caused more problems. Of course, that was what Carne would have preferred, but she refused to admit that his feelings had played any part in her determination to send her son to boarding school.

Anyway, Jeremy was there now, and had been for almost a year. He hadn’t seemed to take any harm from it. He was certainly a self-possessed little boy, but weren’t all children nowadays? In any case, there had been no alternative, so that particular aspect of the matter was not worth considering. Holidays were something else again.

Lesley chewed unhappily at her lower lip. What would she do if her mother refused to look after Jeremy? Who could she turn to? They had no other relatives, not on their side of the family anyway. And she could hardly ask one of Carne’s sisters to have him while refusing his own father the opportunity. She sighed. She would not let him go to Carne, though. She couldn’t! Ploughing through cow-pats all day long, mucking out stables, rolling about in the hay! His clothes would be ruined in no time, and she had no money to buy him new ones. No—somehow she had to make her mother see that proposition for what it was. Besides—a small expletive escaped her as a taxi swerved across her path and turned his thumb up at her—it was extremely doubtful that Carne would even consider it after not seeing his son for almost three years.

The Mini swept down the underpass and joined the jam at the other side. But it was gradually moving and she dropped down into bottom gear and allowed the wheels to maintain a steady roll forward. In spite of her preoccupation with her own problems, she became aware of someone watching her. Turning her head, she encountered the admiring stare of a young man in an exotic sports car cruising beside her in the next lane. Having attracted her attention, he kissed his fingers to his lips in an extravagant gesture, and she guessed he wasn’t English. But it was good to know that in spite of her harassed feelings she could still attract the admiration of a handsome man, and her fingers went automatically to touch the honey-gold strands of hair that lay over her shoulder. Straight hair it was, but expertly cut to accentuate the oval shape of her face and tilt gently beneath the curve of her jawline. Her lips parted in a faint smile, and then there was a sickening crunch right ahead of her and she realised she had run into the back of the car in front. At the same moment the second stream of traffic surged ahead and her handsome admirer left her to face the purpling countenance of the middle-aged owner with the dented fender.

‘Women drivers!’ he grumbled, as she got out to face him. ‘Well? I’m not paying for this.’

Lesley assured him that it was all her fault and he was somewhat mollified. She gave him her address, and the address of her insurance company, and then examined the damage to her own car. One of her headlights was broken, and her own fender dented, and as the man drove away she reflected that as usual she had come off worst. In addition to which her insurance premium was bound to be increased next time, and she got back behind the wheel wondering whether it wouldn’t be simpler just to use a cab. But one could never get a cab at this hour of the morning, and besides, when Jeremy was on holiday she liked it for getting about …

Jeremy.

Depression swamped her once again. Whoever would have thought that one small boy could cause so much heartache? But she loved him desperately, and she was determined to keep him. Somehow she would make arrangements for the holidays, even if it meant bringing him to the office with her. That wouldn’t go down too well, of course, and it would be hard on Jeremy having to keep quiet for hours on end. But she was confident that Lance would not sack her out of hand, she was too valuable to him, and if it was a matter of one or the other, she was sure he would not object. Eight weeks was not so long, and three of those she would be on holiday herself. She found her fingers crossing on the steering wheel. It might never come to that. Her mother would not refuse to have him. Just because at Easter he had broken her Chinese vase … and poured salt into the sugar bowl … and played Red Indians with her ostrich feathers … and smuggled that disgusting little mongrel into the flat and hidden him under his bed …

Lesley hunched her shoulders. Perhaps he was too high-spirited for a woman of sixty to handle. Particularly a woman who had already worn herself out looking after her own child, or so she said. Lesley sighed. Had she been such a trial? She had quite fond memories of her youth. Of course, her father had been alive in those days and he and she seemed so much alike. Perhaps it was the later years, after her father was dead, when she had been at university. Her mother had hated all the sit-ins and demonstrations she had joined. Mrs Matthews’ politics were so arbitrarily conservative and she had been appalled by the left-wing young Socialists Lesley had brought to the house. She had not realised that it was all a phase. That an active mind demanded activity, of whatever persuasion. But in one respect her anxieties had been realised. Lesley had remained staunchly independent in her attitude towards men and Mrs Matthews had been convinced she would never get married. It would have been better if she hadn’t, Lesley thought now, not without some bitterness. Then Jeremy would never have been born, never have become the problem he was today. And yet … She drew the Mini to a jerky halt at the barrier marking the precincts of W.L.T.V. and forced a smile for the security officer as he raised the barrier for her. If she was honest with herself she would admit that she did not entirely regret those years with Carne. They had been an experience she was not likely to forget. And should she ever be tempted to do so, Jeremy—her darling Jeremy—was there to remind her.

She had still not got over the thrill of seeing her name on her parking lot. Mrs Lesley Radley, it read, right alongside Lance Petrie, Controller of Programmes. Her official designation was Personal Private Secretary, but she was more than that. She was his right hand, his assistant, the person everyone came to who wanted an audience with the big man. She was fortunate, she knew that. If she hadn’t worked at W.L.T.V. years ago she would never have stood a chance of getting where she was today after only two years. But Lance remembered her, and forgave her for walking out on him.

As she crossed the concrete apron of the car park to the swing glass doors of the executive building, she remembered how aggressive she had been when she first came here eight years ago—twenty years of age, straight out of university with a degree in both arts and languages, confident that she could change the face of civilisation. Lance had been the producer of a current affairs programme in those days, and she had applied for a job as his assistant. When he had asked her what she knew about news and broadcasting she had arrogantly maintained that she had what was lacking in television today—a fresh eye, an unbiased view, an original approach. He had been amused by her ignorance, she realised now, flattered by her determination to work for him, and willing to give youth a chance to prove itself. Within six months, he had changed her whole outlook on life, showing her the cracks in both the socialist and capitalist systems, making her aware that government in any form was ultimately a victim of its own prejudices. She had learned with him and from him, until that fateful day they drove north to Yorkshire to interview a young farmer with radical views on Britain’s entry into the European Common Market …

The wide, chequerboard tiling of the hall reflected the watery rays of a sun just struggling to clear the clouds that lingered after last night’s rainstorm. Lesley smiled at the receptionist, asked Albert, the commissionaire, how his arthritis was faring in this damp weather, and took the lift up to the penthouse floor.

Lance had done just as well as she, she thought now, entering the panelled outer office where she had her desk. From current affairs producer to Controller of Programmes in seven years was not bad going. Still he deserved it, she decided generously, taking off her jacket and hanging it on the stand. He was well informed and well liked, and no one else at W.L.T.V. would have taken her back after abandoning her career like any lovesick schoolgirl.

Her boss was not in, as she had hoped, and she had sorted through the pile of mail on her desk and laid aside those requiring his personal attention before he put in an appearance. Lance Petrie was a big man, both W.L.T.V.-wise and physically. Easily six feet in height, he rarely took any exercise, and in consequence years of liquid lunches and business dinners had put on several inches of girth. He had bristling ginger eyebrows and a voice that could strike fear into the strongest constitution, but Lesley had long learned that his bark was worse than his bite. He never did anyone a bad turn, unless they had done him one first, and his friends at W.L.T.V. numbered larger than his enemies, which was quite something for a man in his position.

Now he ambled into Lesley’s office with deceptive deliberation, and after answering her proffered ‘Good morning’ he looked over his shoulder at the letters she was studying.

‘Anything interesting?’ he enquired, and she cast a swift look up at him before replying: ‘Only this invitation to speak at the Guild Luncheon. They must have enjoyed your speech last year to ask you to make a repeat performance.’

‘Hmm.’ Lance sounded doubtful. He leant over and flicked the invitation aside. ‘Car going okay?’

His change of subject was so abrupt that the sound Lesley was about to make became strangled in her throat. When she could speak, she said faintly: ‘My car?’

‘Whose else?’ He straightened. ‘Well? Is it?’

Lesley sighed. ‘By that I gather you know it’s not,’ she exclaimed, and the heavy brow furrowed.

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘It was an innocent question. I just wondered why you were late this morning as well as Friday.’

‘Oh!’ Lesley’s cheeks went pink. ‘You were in earlier.’

‘I was here at nine-thirty, yes,’ Lance agreed, thrusting his big hands into the pockets of his jacket and consequently pulling it all out of shape. ‘So what’s happened with the Mini? Don’t I pay you enough to keep it in working order?’

Lesley moved her shoulders apologetically. ‘I had a bump,’ she confessed. ‘I ran into the back of one of those foreign cars. I don’t know what it was, but I bent the fender.’

‘And that’s why you were late?’

Lesley hesitated. ‘Well—no.’ She looked up at him honestly. ‘It’s Jeremy, actually.’

‘Jeremy?’ Lance looked concerned. ‘He’s not ill, is he?’

‘Oh, no. No.’ Lesley made a rueful sound. ‘If only it were that easy! No, he’s due home for the holidays in ten days’ time, and—my mother has decided it’s too much for her to have him around the flat all day.’

‘I see,’ Lance nodded. Like Lesley, he too had been married, but perhaps fortunately his wife had been unable to have children and when they split up, no one had been hurt but themselves. ‘I guess he is a bit of a handful for a woman of her age.’

Lesley fiddled with the papers on her desk. ‘Yes.’

‘And there’s no one else who could care for him while you’re working?’

She shook her head. ‘No.’

‘What about his father—–’

‘Oh, please …’ Lesley felt she couldn’t go through all that again. ‘Carne doesn’t want him. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to ask him. Not after all this time.’

‘Why not? Jeremy’s his son, too.’

‘I know, but—well, Jeremy would be unhappy.’

‘Why should he be? With animals to care for and all those acres to run free across! My God, it’s any boy’s dream, Lesley. He’d soon adapt, you’d see.’

‘No.’

‘What do you mean—no?’ Lance stared at her consideringly for several unnerving seconds, then he uttered an astonished laugh. ‘Dammit, you’re scared!’ he exclaimed. ‘You don’t want to ask Radley because you’re afraid the boy will enjoy himself.’

‘Oh, don’t talk such nonsense!’ exclaimed Lesley, forgetting for the moment to whom she was speaking. Then: ‘I’m sorry, but—please, Lance, this is my affair. Let me handle it my way.’

Lance gave a disgruntled snort. ‘You’re getting possessive, do you know that?’ he told her provokingly. ‘If you’re not careful, you’ll turn into one of those jealous old women who cling to their sons like leeches, and try to pretend they don’t need a husband!’

Lesley gasped. ‘What a rotten thing to suggest!’

‘But apt, wouldn’t you say?’ he countered, rocking backwards and forwards on his heels and toes.

‘I’m twenty-eight, Lance. Not exactly in my dotage yet, you know.’

‘And Jeremy’s seven—I know. But in thirty years’ time, you mark my words …’

Nodding annoyingly to himself, he went into his office and closed the door, and Lesley applied herself with unnecessary aggression to her typing. But her fingers kept hitting the wrong keys, and she was glad when Elizabeth came round with the tea-trolley and she could give herself a break before continuing.

There was a production meeting at eleven, and as Lance’s secretary she was expected to take notes, so that filled the rest of the morning in. Then, in the afternoon, Lance gave her some dictation, and finished by apologising for criticising her that morning.

‘It’s all right,’ insisted Lesley stiffly, but Lance was determined to make amends.

‘It’s not all right,’ he argued. ‘I don’t have any children, so how the hell can I pass judgment on anyone who has. Look, if it’s any help, you could bring him into the office a couple of days every week. So long as he sat quietly while you were working—he could bring books and crayoning pencils, couldn’t he? I guess you’re not working all the time, and maybe it would be possible for you to take an extra day off here and there …’

‘Oh, Lance!’ His unexpected understanding was disarming. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

‘Don’t say anything,’ he advised gruffly. ‘I’ll probably regret it bitterly. Now, will you get Manders on the phone? I want to know why The Mike Harris Show has dropped out of the top ten ratings.’

For once there were no last-minute problems to attend to and when Lance came into her office at four o’clock it was to tell her that she could go and see about getting her car fixed, if she liked.

‘Go to Henleys and mention my name,’ he said. ‘Tell them you need it urgently. And I’m not joking. I expect you to be at your desk on time in the morning, car or no car.’

‘Yes, Mr Petrie.’ Lesley hid her smile, but for all that, she knew he meant it. Punctuality was one thing he demanded.

Outside, the pavements were bathed in bright sunshine. Carrying her jacket, she got into the Mini and drove to the garage Lance had suggested. It wasn’t far from the studios, and the owner knew her employer very well. They were old drinking cronies, and a calculated examination of her car solicited the information that he could have it ready for the following afternoon.

‘Will it be very expensive?’ asked Lesley anxiously, recalling her mounting insurance premium, but the man shook his head.

‘Tell your boss I’ll make up the difference on that old banger of his next time he brings it in for a service,’ he retorted with a grin, but Lesley doubted Lance would appreciate such humour when it was directed towards the vintage Rolls-Royce he had rescued from the scrap heap. Still, she returned the man’s smile and thanked him for his help and then hurried away to Baker Street station to take the underground to Russell Square.

It was still barely five o’clock when she turned into St Anne’s Gate and saw the soaring block of apartments where her mother had chosen to move six years ago. Once her daughter was comfortably married, Mrs Matthews had seen no reason to keep on the small house in Hampstead, or at least that was her story. Lesley knew that she had been finding it hard to make ends meet, and the sum the sale of the house had raised had given her a nice little nest-egg. The pension she received was not large, but that together with the interest from her capital had ensured she would not starve. What she had not bargained for was that Lesley might return home only two years after she had moved into the flat bringing with her a lively two-year-old who had been used to the kind of freedom a city flat could not provide.

Lesley sighed. Perhaps she should have found her own place, maintained the independence she had guarded so jealously. But when she left Carne she had needed some place to hide, and her mother had seemed the most natural person to turn to. And indeed, Mrs Matthews had been very tolerant, she conceded, taking Jeremy to and from his nursery school, babysitting when Lesley had had to work late or at weekends. But they were all growing older, and as her mother had less patience, Jeremy demanded more.

A dust-smeared Citroën station wagon was parked out front of the apartments and Lesley’s eyes flickered over it speculatively. Someone cared about their car even less than she did, she thought with satisfaction, noticing the clutter of maps and old cartons in the back, the magazines strewn haphazardly across the rear seat. Farming magazines they were, she saw in passing. She mounted the steps to the swing doors and smiled as the hall porter came to open the door for her.

‘How are you, Mr Peel?’ she asked, with genuine interest, and his monologue concerning their Sandra’s grumbling appendix carried her into the lift.

But as the metal casing hummed easily up to the fourth floor, her thoughts returned irresistibly to the station wagon outside. It was such a coincidence that it should be there today when every free moment seemed to have been filled with thoughts of Carne, and Jeremy, and the life she had run away from. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, refusing to admit that Lance’s accusation had scraped a nerve. She wasn’t afraid of Jeremy’s reactions to his father. Good heavens, he scarcely remembered him after all this time. They would have nothing in common—just as she and Carne had had nothing in common …

The lift whispered to a halt and the doors slid open. Pushing her weight away from the wall of the lift, she stepped out into the corridor, smelling the familiar, if not particularly agreeable, smell of pine disinfectant. The flat she shared with her mother was several yards down and she sauntered towards it slowly, her brows drawn together in a frown. Why should she be letting Lance’s words disturb her like this? After all, Carne had stopped seeing his son, not the other way about. Why should she blame herself if he chose to ignore their existence, and most particularly, why should she feel any guilt because Jeremy was growing up knowing nothing of the land that was his heritage? His heritage was hers, a heritage of city things and city people. Everyone said that this was where it was all happening. People converged on London from all over the world. Jeremy might never know how to plough a field or wean a foal, but then he probably wouldn’t want to.

She found her key and inserted it in the lock and the door opened silently into the tiny entrance hall of the flat. The hall was made tinier by her mother’s insistence on keeping an old chest, inlaid with ivory, which Lesley’s father had brought back from India, but it reduced the floor space to a minimum. Last holidays, Jeremy had hidden inside it and terrified them all by falling asleep and almost suffocating himself.

Lesley was closing the door again when the sound of voices coming from the living room attracted her attention. It was so unusual for her mother to have callers. She seldom associated with her neighbours, and Lesley usually knew when one or other of her friends from Hampstead days was expected to call. Besides, Lesley hesitated, it sounded like a man’s voice …

Her mouth went dry, and she deliberately closed the door so that they should not hear her. A cascade of staggering thoughts was tumbling through her head—the conversation with her mother that morning, the dusty station wagon outside, with the farming magazines spread over the seat, and now a man’s voice.

It was Carne. She was sure of it. She would know his low husky drawl anywhere. Hadn’t she always admired his voice, its throbbing timbre which had had the power to send shivers of excitement up her spine. But no longer, she reminded herself severely. She was no eager student any longer, she was a grown woman, mature and she hoped, sophisticated. So what was he doing here? Had her mother sent for him? Of course, she was home earlier than they could have expected. It was usually nearing six by the time she had negotiated the rush hour traffic.

She turned quickly, and as she did so she saw her reflection in the convex mirror hanging above the Indian chest. Wide, anxious eyes stared back at her, lips parted apprehensively. Impatience brought a frown to her forehead. Why did she look so anxious? Why should she be apprehensive? She had nothing to fear. So why did she suddenly feel like letting herself out of the flat again as quietly as she had come in?

Biting her lips to give them a little colour, she ran a smoothing hand over the heavy curtain of her hair, and turned to the door. She put out her hand, hesitated, and withdrew it again. Unwillingly, she could hear their voices now, and shamelessly she was listening.

‘Lesley simply doesn’t know,’ she heard her mother saying, a sigh of resignation in her voice. ‘I couldn’t bring myself to tell her.’

‘Then you must.’ Carne was always so unfailingly practical, thought Lesley maliciously. ‘She’s not a child. She would understand.’

‘I don’t believe she would.’ Mrs Matthews paused, and Lesley grew impatient for her to continue. What wouldn’t she understand? And how could her mother discuss it with Carne and not with her?

‘Do you want me to tell her?’

Carne was speaking again, and Lesley could stand it no longer. Whatever was going on, she was involved and therefore she had the right to know about it. With trembling fingers, her hand closed round the handle, and she propelled the door inward.

CHAPTER TWO

CARNE was standing on the rug in front of the marble fireplace. The fire was seldom lit, there being a perfectly adequate heating system supplied to the flats from a central generator, and besides, no one needed a fire in summer. In consequence, the grate was screened and Carne’s long, powerful legs were outlined against a ridiculously fragile tracery of Chinese fans embroidered on to a turquoise background. Lesley’s mother collected Eastern things, and the room was a conglomeration of Japanese jade and Indian ivory, and hand-painted Chinese silk. Their oriental delicacy made Carne’s presence more of an intrusion somehow, and his height and lean, but muscular, body seemed to fill the space with disruptive virility. Standing there in close-fitting jeans and a collarless body shirt, he was an affront to the ordered tenor of the room, and most particularly an affront to Lesley’s carefully controlled existence.

She barely glanced at him, yet in those few seconds she registered everything about him. He hadn’t changed, she thought bitterly. He was still as imperturbably arrogant as ever, caring little for people or places, showing a fine contempt for the things she had always held most dear. In spite of a degree in biochemistry, when his father died Carne had been quite prepared to give up a promising scientific career to take over the farm that had been in their family for generations, but Lesley, when she learned this, had been horrified. It had been one of the many arguments she had had with Carne’s mother, yet hardly a conclusive factor in her final decision to leave him. She knew deep inside her that there had been much more to it than that, an accumulation of so many things that clutching at his lack of ambition was like clutching at a straw in the wind. They had been incompatible, she decided, choosing the most hackneyed word to describe the breakdown of their relationship.

Now, looking at her mother, who had risen rather nervously from her chair, she exclaimed: ‘Exactly what must I be told, Mother? What is it that I wouldn’t understand?’

By ignoring Carne, she hoped she was making plain her resentment at finding him here, but it was he who spoke as her mother struggled to find words.

‘Listening at keyholes again, Lesley?’ he taunted, and she could not argue with that.

‘You’re home early, dear.’

Her mother had clearly chosen to avoid a direct answer, but Lesley refused to be put off by Carne’s attempt to disarm her.

‘Why is Carne here?’ she demanded, returning to the attack, and she sensed rather than saw the look Mrs Matthews exchanged with her husband. There was a pregnant pause, then he spoke again.

‘Your mother has angina,’ he told her flatly, despite her mother’s cry of protest. ‘A heart condition that’s not improved by the company of a boisterous small boy!’

Lesley’s legs felt suddenly weak, and she sought the back of her mother’s chair for support. ‘Angina?’ she echoed stupidly. Then: ‘But why wasn’t I told?’

‘I imagine because your mother hoped you would notice she wasn’t well,’ Carne remarked cuttingly. ‘It’s one thing to shout about independence, and quite another to expect someone else to help you to accomplish it!’

Lesley stared at him indignantly, hating him for his calm pragmatism. His returning stare had all the emotion of a hawk poised above its prey, and she guessed he felt no sympathy for her feelings of outrage and betrayal. How could her mother have confided in him? In the one man who in all Lesley’s life had been capable of making her feel mean and selfish, and spoiled out of all measure.

‘Why have you come here?’ she demanded again now, and this time her mother chose to answer.

‘I asked him to,’ she spoke fretfully. ‘Oh, Lesley, don’t be angry. I had to confide in someone.’

It was incredibly difficult for Lesley not to show how upset she really was. ‘Why not me?’ she exclaimed, with feeling. ‘Why not me?’

‘I believe your mother thought that if she could persuade you to let Jeremy spend his holidays at Raventhorpe, it wouldn’t be necessary to worry you,’ put in Carne dryly. ‘But I gather that hasn’t met with any success.’

Lesley refused to answer that. Instead, she concentrated her attention on her mother. ‘Look,’ she said carefully, ‘I’ve—I’ve managed to make some—arrangements for the holidays—–’

‘What sort of arrangements?’

It was Carne who asked the question, pushing back the dark chestnut hair from his forehead, unwillingly drawing her attention to the fact that when he lifted his arm, his shirt separated from his pants and exposed a welt of brown midriff. Carne’s skin had always been brown, but as he often worked in the open air with only a pair of cotton pants to protect his lower limbs, his chest and shoulders and the width of his back were bronzed and supple. In spite of all the bitterness that had gone before, she could still remember the feel of that smooth skin beneath her fingers and her nails digging into the strong muscles when they made love …

Dragging her eyes away from him, she forced herself to look only at her mother. ‘I—I spoke to Lance today,’ she began, and felt a certain squalid satisfaction as she sensed Carne’s stiffening. ‘He—he’s quite willing for me to take Jeremy to the office with me. He can read or use his cray—–’

‘No.’

Carne’s rejection was low, but succinct, and Lesley was forced to acknowledge it. ‘I don’t think it’s anything to do with you.’

‘Which shows how wrong you can be,’ he retorted smoothly.

‘Oh, please …’ Mrs Matthews sought her chair again. ‘I never intended this to degenerate into an argument. I know how you feel about Jeremy, Lesley, never doubt that. But Carne was the right person to turn to, can’t you see? He is the boy’s father!’

Lesley’s eyes sparkled dangerously in Carne’s direction for a moment, before she said: ‘That’s meant a lot to him in recent years, hasn’t it. Or has he been seeing Jeremy behind my back, too?’

‘Lesley!’ Carne’s voice was grim, and briefly she felt ashamed.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said stiffly, addressing her mother. ‘But you know as well as I do how often Carne has troubled to see Jeremy since I left Ravensdale—–’

‘You little bitch!’ In a stride, Carne had covered the distance between them and was gripping her upper arms with fingers that dug cruelly into her flesh. ‘You little bitch!’ he repeated, less emotively, his gaze raking her shakily resentful features. ‘You know as well as I do why I stopped seeing him. You’d confused him enough as it was. A father who appeared at weekends and holidays is no father at all to a toddler barely out of his nappies, and you know it.’

‘That—that’s your excuse, is it?’ she got out jerkily, and his brown eyes darkened to appear almost black, filling the area around the dilated pupils with ominous obscurity.

‘Yes, that’s my excuse,’ he agreed savagely. ‘How do you salve your conscience, I wonder?’

Lesley tore herself away from him, rubbing her bruised arms with fingers that trembled. ‘You always were a bully, weren’t you, Carne?’ she countered, but it was a defensive reaction, born of the desire to escape the physical awareness she had always had of him, an awareness heightened by the heated scent of his body and the raw sensuality of the man himself. It was an unconscious trait, but it was there, and she knew she was not the only woman to be aware of it.

Mrs Matthews was looking distinctly distressed now, and ignoring Lesley Carne turned to her. ‘Do you want me to go?’ he asked gently, but Lesley’s muffled ‘Yes’ was overridden by her mother’s hurried denial.

‘Lesley had to know sooner or later,’ she said, and pointed to the cigar box on the mantelpiece. ‘Please—could I have one of those? I really need it.’

Lesley stood by feeling childishly sulky and admonished as Carne lit her mother’s cheroot, but she couldn’t deny the fluttery feelings in the pit of her stomach. She wondered what would have happened if she hadn’t run the Mini into the back of the other car that morning, if she hadn’t got out of work early and come home and surprised them. When would her mother have mentioned Carne’s visit? When would she have revealed that her heart could not stand the demands put upon it by a child of Jeremy’s age and temperament? When would she have disclosed that she was actually negotiating arrangements without even consulting her daughter!

Panic gave way to angry indignation once more. It was as if she, Jeremy’s mother, had no say in the matter. And Carne was obviously a willing accessory. And why not? It was, no doubt, exactly what he wanted. Once he and his mother got Jeremy to Ravensdale they would have eight weeks to work on him, eight weeks to twist everything Lesley had ever told him, eight weeks to turn him against the woman who had borne him. Self-pity swamped her. Carne’s mother had always hated her, had always resented the fleeting hold she had had over her precious son. Jeremy was that son all over again, the grandson she had always wanted to be there to take over Raventhorpe when his father retired. The long tradition of the Radleys was weighted against her. What possible defence did she have against that?

Carne straightened from lighting her mother’s cheroot and regarded her coldly. ‘I suggest this matter needs further consideration,’ he remarked, toying with the heavy lighter. ‘I’ve arranged to stay in town overnight. I suggest we meet for dinner, like the civilised people we are supposed to be, and discuss what’s to be done.’

Lesley stiffened her spine. ‘So far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing to discuss,’ she retorted icily, but his gaze never faltered.

‘I’m staying at the President,’ he went on, mentioning the name of a comfortable three-star hotel in Russell Square. He glanced down at his casual attire. ‘I need a drink and a shower, but I’ll be back here to pick you up in—say, an hour and a half?’

Lesley licked her dry lips. ‘You can’t force me to go out with you, Carne.’

‘For God’s sake!’ He swore angrily. ‘I should have thought you’d have got over that childish temper of yours by now!’

‘Why should I? You haven’t.’

‘Lesley …’

Mrs Matthews’ fretful protest silenced any cutting retort Carne might have been about to make. Instead, controlling his anger with admirable skill, he said: ‘I’ll give you two hours, Lesley. That should be long enough for your mother to convince you that you can’t go on running away from life’s unpleasantnesses.’

‘Like you, you mean?’ she taunted, and then turned away, despising herself for behaving like a shrew. But it had been quite a day, and it wasn’t over yet.

She heard Carne bidding her mother goodbye, and half turned as he let himself out of the apartment. His brooding gaze swept over her and found her lacking, and she concentrated her attention on her clenched fists as he closed the door behind him.

The room was strangely empty after he had gone, but her mother was there and her eyes were full of reproach.

‘How could you, Lesley?’ she exclaimed, pressing out the half smoked cheroot with unsteady fingers. ‘Making a scene like that! I never thought you could be so—so vindictive!’

‘Vindictive?’ The word brought a sound of protest from Lesley’s lips. ‘Me? Vindictive?’

‘Well, what would you call it?’ Mrs Matthews demanded. ‘I asked Carne to come here, and this is my home, after all. How could you speak to a guest of mine in such a fashion?’

‘A guest of yours?’ Lesley stared at her ludicrously. ‘Mother, Carne is my husband? Separated, it’s true, but husband, nevertheless! You can’t accuse me of being rude to my own husband!’

‘I can, and what’s more, I do,’ declared her mother, with a sniff. ‘I think Carne showed remarkable restraint in the face of outright provocation. Jeremy is his son as well as yours, Lesley, whether you like it or not. And any court in the land would grant him custodial rights if he chose to make a case of it.’

Lesley trembled. She couldn’t help it. It sounded so coldblooded somehow, and her mother had put her finger on the one thing she had always fought against considering.

‘Carne—Carne doesn’t need Jeremy,’ she said now. ‘I do.’

‘Try convincing a magistrate of that.’

‘Mother!’ Lesley stared with anguished eyes. ‘Mother, what are you trying to do? To make me give Jeremy up?’

Mrs Matthews shrugged. ‘I’m just pointing out that Carne has been very patient, but I shouldn’t push him any further if I were you.’

Lesley pressed her lips together for a moment. ‘You mean—I should have dinner with him?’

‘I mean that if Carne is willing to give the boy a home for the holidays, you should be glad to let him go.’

‘But, Mother, the only time I see Jeremy is in the holidays!’

‘That’s nothing to do with me.’ Mrs Matthews rose painfully to her feet. Her lumbago was troubling her today and so far as she was concerned, the discussion was over. ‘I’m going to my room—–’

‘Wait!’ Lesley took an automatic step forward. ‘You—you still haven’t told me about—about the angina.’

‘There’s nothing to tell.’

‘But what did Dr Forrest say?’

‘He said I should rest more. That I shouldn’t get excited,’ she added, with a returning look of reproof.

‘Oh, Mother!’ Lesley linked and unlinked her fingers. ‘If you’d only told me …’

‘What, and have you speak to me as you spoke to Carne!’

‘That’s not fair …’

Her mother made a dismissing gesture. ‘I’m going to lie down. Don’t bother about making me a meal. I’ll get something later, if I’m hungry.’

Lesley watched her mother’s progress across the room with troubled eyes. Not least among the many things that troubled her was the realisation that her mother could hide a thing like that from her—and for how long? That was another of the questions that still needed answering. With a despairing sigh, she sank down on to a low couch and pushed back the heavy weight of her hair with both hands. Was she really so unfeeling? Was she so wrapped up in her own affairs that she had no time for anyone else? She had never thought so, but now … It seemed incredible that that morning she had had no notion of what plans her mother had been nurturing, or indeed that even as she lunched in the staff canteen at W.L.T.V. Carne was at that moment driving down the M.1. from Yorkshire, intent on keeping an appointment which must have been made days ago. It hurt to think her mother could deceive her, and while she didn’t seriously believe there had been other meetings, nevertheless a little of her trust had been undermined.

Leaving the cluttered paraphernalia of the living room, Lesley went into her bedroom, the room she shared with Jeremy when he was home. She supposed that situation would not be approved by a court of law, but as the flat only had two bedrooms, there was no other alternative. Short of sharing her mother’s bedroom, of course, but naturally Mrs Matthews wanted a room to herself. If Lesley had thought of what might happen in the future, as Jeremy got too old to share her room, it was along the lines of them perhaps acquiring a larger apartment, but she had never really considered what she would do if her mother should object. Carne was right, in one way. Her independence did depend on her mother to a large extent at the moment, but once Jeremy was old enough to be left alone, she supposed there was no reason why they shouldn’t get a flat of their own. But all these things had been hazy, nebulous, distant possibilities that would work themselves out in the natural order of things. Now all that had been changed, and suddenly she was faced with the practicalities of the present, and with the disturbing realisation that her mother had put all their futures into Carne’s hands.

The bathroom was vacant and she turned on the taps to silence the frenzied screaming of her nerves. Sprinkling essence liberally into the bath water, she watched the deep green liquid melt and dissolve, to rise again as balls of foam that made a fluffy white carpet over the surface. What could she say to Carne to make him see that by reappearing in Jeremy’s life now, he could only confuse the boy again? Confuse? Her lips twisted. She was confused. Carne already knew that. By springing her mother’s illness upon her, he had successfully diluted her arguments, just as the bath water had diluted the essence.

It was a marvellous relief to sink down into the heated suds, and allow the softened water to probe every pore of her tense body. She needed to relax, to think coherently. She needed to restore every shred of composure before encountering her husband again.

It didn’t help to realise that seeing him again had upset her more than she had expected. In the early days after their break-up she had seen him on several occasions, but always in the company of her mother and Jeremy, and in the aftermath of that final devastating row which had ended with her bundling Jeremy into her car and leaving, a defensive numbness had coated the more vulnerable areas of her emotions.

Maybe if she had had warning of the meeting, if she had had time to gather herself, so to speak, so that when she faced him she had behaved with coolness and sophistication, and not given in to those entirely schoolgirlish taunts and provocations. Maybe then she would not be feeling so raw now, so exposed to all the pain and misery that had both preceded and followed her separation from Carne.

She lay in the bath too long and had to hurry with her dressing. Somehow she had accepted that she had to have dinner with him, if only to prevent her mother any more distress. That she had brought the distress on herself meant less than Lesley’s guilty neglect of her mother’s health, and after satisfying herself that she looked neither too young nor too sophisticated, she went into Mrs Matthews’ bedroom.

Her mother was lying on the bed reading a magazine, and judging from her appearance, she seemed to have recovered from her earlier upset. Lesley hesitated in the doorway, not quite knowing what to say, and then she casually flicked the skirt of her flared jersey dress.

‘Does this look all right?’

Mrs Matthews regarded her critically for a moment, over the top of the magazine. ‘Shouldn’t you wear a long gown?’ she enquired, and Lesley expelled her breath on a long sigh.

‘I don’t think so,’ she replied. ‘After all, I don’t know where we’re going, do I?’

‘I thought most young people wore long clothes these days,’ averred her mother rather peevishly, and Lesley wondered if she was being deliberately obstructive.

‘How are you feeling now?’ she asked, changing the subject, but Mrs Matthews was still looking at her dress.

‘I suppose it is pretty material,’ she decided grudgingly. ‘You always did suit blue and gold. But don’t you think those sandals are too high? You may have to walk. Carne will probably leave his car at the hotel.’

Lesley examined the slender heels of the leather strapped sandals on her narrow feet. ‘I thought they looked rather nice,’ she murmured doubtfully, then, as the doorbell rang: ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘Don’t start worrying about me now, Lesley,’ her mother retorted shortly. ‘You never have cared about anyone but yourself.’

The accusation was so hurtful that for a moment Lesley could only stare at her. Then the doorbell rang again, more peremptorily this time, and with a helpless shake of her head, she went to answer it.

But at least her mother’s barb had one effect. It stiffened Lesley’s failing resolve and the feeling of injustice that filled her gave her confidence to face whatever was to come.

Carne was leaning against the wall beside the door when she opened it, but he straightened at her appearance and she thought with a pang how like old times this was. Their attraction had been immediate and mutual, and every spare moment he had had, or could make, Carne had driven the two hundred or so miles to see her.

But that was all in the past. The Carne Radley who accepted her stiff invitation to step into the flat this evening was older and infinitely more mature, his dark brown mohair lounge suit as immaculate as his jeans had been casual earlier. A special occasion, then, she thought, with bitter humour. Carne didn’t put on his best clothes for everybody. His detached gaze barely registered her appearance and she wondered if she’d not bothered to change whether he would have noticed.

Mrs Matthews appeared as Lesley went to collect a lacy scarf to put about her shoulders. She greeted Carne warmly, and Lesley wondered if she had any real feelings for Jeremy at all. Didn’t her mother realise that by forcing her hand, she might create a situation none of them could control? Jeremy had a mind of his own, but he was too young to be forced to choose. Carne had bowed out of his obligations. Why wouldn’t her mother accept that?

When she came back, Carne was handing her mother a glass of the sherry she kept for special visitors, but Lesley noticed he wasn’t drinking himself. Mrs Matthews sipped the glowing brown liquid delicately and asked whether all the rain they had been having had caused any problems. Carne explained that the ground had been very dry from the previous year and the absence of snow through the winter that followed, but he agreed he had got tired of wading through acres of mud.

Listening to them, Lesley felt a pang. When she first went to Raventhorpe paddling about in Wellingtons had been all part of the marvellous sense of freedom she had experienced. After years of academic slog, it had been fun to help bring in the cows or feed a motherless lamb with a baby’s feeding bottle. She had tramped the fields with Carne, and gone with him to market. She had drunk halves of bitter in the Red Lion, and listened to the talk about crops and feed stuffs and if she had had to share Carne’s attention with the other men, she had cherished the thought that when their bedroom door closed that night, she would have him all to herself for hours and hours and hours …

Those were the days before she had Jeremy to care for, when she hadn’t had the time to listen to Mrs Radley’s continual barbs or care if she ridiculed her naïve attempts to accomplish some task Carne’s mother tackled without effort. She had been free to come and go as she pleased, and only as her pregnancy began to weigh her down was she forced to spend more and more time in the house. She had a hard time having Jeremy, and although Carne had insisted she have the child in the maternity hospital in Thirsk, it was weeks before she felt physically strong again. Another black mark against her, she thought now, remembering how Mrs Radley had jeered because she had not been able to feed the baby, and maintained that she had had her four children without complications and been out in the fields again with them sucking at her breast. Lesley hadn’t disbelieved her. Carne’s mother seemed capable of anything. Except liking her … Maybe if he had married the daughter of one of the local farmers, she would have felt differently. Marion Harvey had obviously expected to occupy Lesley’s position, and even though Carne was married had lost no opportunity to spend time with him. They had had a different set of values from her, Lesley decided coldly. No doubt Marion was still around. The wonder was that Carne hadn’t asked for a divorce before this and married her. Unless she had married someone else, of course. That was always possible. And it didn’t necessarily mean there would be any drastic change in their association. Marion had lived on a farm all her life. She knew all there was to know about the relationship between the male and the female of the species. No doubt she’d learned it first hand from an early age, thought Lesley spitefully, remembering how Marion and Mrs Radley had laughed when she had asked why the bull spent its days tethered while the cows ran freely in the pasture. No, she had been all wrong with Carne. She was city born and city bred and, in Mrs Radley’s opinion, too soft to cope with life in the Yorkshire dales.

She dragged her thoughts back to the present as Carne’s cool eyes turned in her direction. ‘Are you ready?’ he asked quietly, and she inclined her head. She doubted she would ever be, but she looked at her mother and murmured: ‘I’ll see you later.’

‘Don’t hurry back on my account,’ Mrs Matthews averred, apparently determined to be awkward, and Lesley’s twitching lips scarcely formed a smile as she walked towards the door.

She walked quickly along the corridor to the lift, and to her relief it was already occupied when it stopped at their floor. She and Carne squeezed inside, and the door closed behind them creating an absurd intimacy that would have been suffocating without the presence of other people.

It was an escape to cross the entrance hall and emerge into the cool evening air. It was pleasantly warm now, not so humid as it had been earlier in the day, and Lesley allowed the scarf to fall loosely about her waist and over her forearms.

Realising she could not continue leading the way as she had been doing, she looked up at Carne as they reached the bottom of the apartment building steps, eyebrows raised in polite question. There was no sign of the station wagon she saw apprehensively, and she was very much afraid her mother was going to be right about him leaving it at his hotel.

‘I’ve booked a table at a small Italian restaurant in Greek Street,’ he informed her. ‘Do you feel up to the walk, or shall I hail a taxi?’

There was a challenge in his eyes, and before she could help herself Lesley exclaimed: ‘I can walk!’ although her feet quailed at the anticipation of nearly a mile in the sandals she was wearing. She should have accepted her mother’s advice for the good sense it was instead of assuming she was just being obstructive, but she determined that Carne should not suspect she had doubts.

By the time they were passing the railed environs of the British Museum, she was almost ready to concede defeat. Carne had kept up a blistering pace, striding along beside her with a complete disregard for the length of her legs when compared to his. She was not a small girl, but she was not an Amazon either, and she was not accustomed to walking much anywhere, although she would never admit it to him. She should have dressed in a sweat shirt and cords and Wellingtons, she thought resentfully. Obviously he imagined he was out on the Fells, and that his dinner would get cold if he didn’t get back in time to eat it!

Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to keep pace with him, but she was never so relieved than when St Giles Circus hove into view. The towering mass of Centre Point was ringed by traffic lights, and they crossed with a crowd of other people to go down Charing Cross Road.

Antonionis was not a new restaurant, but Lesley had not been there before. She couldn’t help wondering how Carne had known about it, but she had no intention of asking. It was no business of hers how often he chose to come to London, but she did wonder if he came alone.

The lighting in the restaurant was low and discreet, the tables set between trellises twined with climbing shrubs and vines. There was music provided by two men who played an assortment of instruments between them, but mostly arranged for piano and guitar.

Seated on the low banquette that made a horseshoe round the table, Lesley surreptitiously slipped off her sandals and pressed her burning soles against the coolly tiled floor. She closed her eyes for a moment, the relief was so great, but opened them again hurriedly when Carne asked: ‘Are you feeling ill?’

‘What?’ Lesley’s response was guilty. ‘Oh, no. No.’ She swallowed. ‘I—er—I’ve never been here before.’

Carne studied her slightly embarrassed features for a few moments longer, and then transferred his attention to the white-coated waiter hovering at his side.

‘We’ll have the wine list,’ he said, speaking with the cool assurance Lesley had always admired. ‘And bring us two Campari and sodas to be going on with.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The waiter withdrew and Carne’s attention turned back to Lesley. But she had had a few seconds to compose herself, and to shuffle along the velvet seat so that now they were seated at right angles to one another. It was easier than facing him, although she was conscious that if she moved her feet too recklessly they would touch his ankle.

‘So,’ he said, toying with his dessert fork. ‘Isn’t this civilised?’

Lesley decided there was nothing to be gained by antagonising him again, and forced a faint smile. ‘Isn’t it?’

‘And how is he?’

‘How is who?’

For a moment her mind had gone blank, but Carne patently didn’t believe her. ‘Well. I don’t mean Lance Petrie,’ he retorted coldly. ‘Or your latest boy-friend.’

‘I don’t have a boy-friend!’ exclaimed Lesley indignantly, and then cursing herself for allowing him to get under her skin, went on more evenly: ‘I’m sorry, I was miles away. You mean Jeremy, of course.’ She paused, striving for control. ‘Well—he’s fine. So far as I know.’

‘What do you mean? So far as you know?’

Lesley sighed. ‘I mean I get a weekly letter from him. All the boys are expected to write home at least once a week. It’s not much of a letter usually,’ she reminisced, forgetting for a moment to whom she was speaking, and then recovering again, added: ‘He was all right when he wrote a week ago.’

Carne’s eyes glittered in the muted lights. ‘It never occurred to you to suggest that he might write to his grandmother and me, did it?’ he demanded, and she flushed.

‘You showed no interest in him,’ she exclaimed defensively, and ignoring his angry oath, finished: ‘Besides, it’s possible the boys at school imagine his parents live together. Jeremy might not have confided in them. And writing two letters would create—difficulties.’

The waiter reappeared with their Camparis, and accepting the wine list Carne said they would order their meal in a few minutes. The waiter smiled, and after bestowing a warm glance on Lesley, departed once more.

Carne cradled his glass in his hands, warming its frosted surface with his fingers. ‘What have you told him about me?’ he asked at last, and Lesley chose her words carefully.

‘He—he doesn’t remember you at all …’

‘You haven’t told him I’m dead, have you?’ Carne demanded savagely, and she hastened to reassure him.

‘No. But—well, since he’s been old enough to understand, you’ve not been around, and—I don’t suppose he’s had time to formulate any ideas.’

‘Did you tell him you walked out on me?’

Lesley concentrated her attention on the ice in her glass. ‘I—I told him we weren’t—happy together. Until recently, he was just a baby, remember?’

‘So as soon as he was old enough to start asking questions, you packed him off to boarding school.’

‘No!’ Lesley was horrified. ‘What else could I do?’ Then, realising this could lead to all kinds of alternatives, she added: ‘I went to boarding school myself.’

‘I didn’t,’ remarked Carne dryly.

‘No, well, that’s nothing to do with me.’

‘I know. But what kind of education my son gets is to do with me.’

Lesley took a gulp of her Campari and soda before asking doubtfully: ‘What—do you mean?’

Carne hesitated a moment, and then shook his head. ‘Later. Right now, let’s get back to why we’re here, shall we?’

‘Mother’s—illness?’

‘Among other things.’ Carne frowned into his glass. ‘Look, Lesley, I think I ought to come straight to the point.’

‘To the point?’ she echoed faintly.

‘Yes.’ He paused. ‘I want you to agree to letting Jeremy come and spend his summer holidays at Raventhor—–’

‘No!’ She interrupted him before he could finish. ‘No, I won’t agree to that, and you have no right to ask me.’

‘No right?’ He made a sound of annoyance. ‘My God, you’re a great one to talk about rights! Well, okay, maybe I have let you have your own way for so long that you’ve come to the entirely inaccurate conclusion that I intend to let you go on that way. But deep down, you must have known that sooner or later I’d want my turn!’

‘Your turn!’ She forced herself to return his cold gaze. ‘Jeremy’s not a toy you can pick up or put down at your leisure.’

‘I know that.’ Carne glanced round as if afraid their raised voices were being overheard. ‘But I was fool enough to believe that given time you’d come to your senses.’

‘To my senses?’

‘Stop repeating everything I say, for heaven’s sake!’ He took a deep breath. ‘Lesley, you might as well know, I’ve been corresponding with your mother ever since you left Ravensdale.’

Lesley gulped. ‘Corresponding with—oh!’ She broke off abruptly as she realised she was repeating him yet again. ‘Checking up on me?’

‘In a manner of speaking. I wanted to be sure you were all right. You and Jeremy both.’

Lesley stared at him contemptuously. ‘You can’t seriously expect me to believe that.’

‘Whether you do or whether you don’t is immaterial,’ he retorted. ‘But like I keep telling you, Jeremy is my son. I haven’t forgotten that, even if you have.’

‘Oh, I haven’t forgotten,’ she exclaimed bitterly. ‘What part has my mother been playing? Watchdog? A spy to let you know if I went out with another man so that you could gather a case to take Jeremy away from me? Your mother would like that, wouldn’t she? She was always jealous that there was one person who preferred me to her!’

‘Stop it!’ His jaw had hardened angrily. ‘I expected you’d have grown out of such childish ideas by now. Why bring my mother into it? This is between you and me.’

‘Oh, no.’ She shook her head. ‘It was never just between you and me. She was always there to take your side, to assure you that you could do no wrong.’

‘Oh, God!’ He raked back his hair with long impatient fingers. She noticed it was longer than he used to wear it, brushing his collar at the back, but still as thick and straight as ever. He had never worn a hair dressing, and she had loved to slide her fingers through it …

Now, he controlled his features, and said: ‘The fact remains that I stayed out of Jeremy’s life when it seemed that you could do most for him. Coming down to London to see him wasn’t a satisfactory arrangement, and you know it. So I decided to wait—–’

‘Like a vulture!’ she muttered, but he ignored her.

‘—until he was older and could be told the truth.’

‘And you think that time has come?’

‘I don’t know. All I know is, your mother wants out of the present arrangement. So far as I’m concerned, the boy can come for a holiday and nothing need be said. It’s up to you.’

Lesley’s mouth felt dry in spite of her steady sipping of the Campari and soda. ‘Let—let me get this straight,’ she got out unsteadily, ‘you’re saying that if I let Jeremy come to you for the holidays, you’re prepared to take it no further?’ She put a confused hand to her head. ‘What do you intend to tell him?’

‘I’ve told you, that’s up to you.’

‘Oh, no.’ Lesley moved her head slowly from side to side. Raventhorpe meant Mrs Radley, and Mrs Radley would not be prepared to say nothing. ‘Your mother would see that Jeremy was told exactly what a poor substitute for a wife I had been. Somehow she’d make him believe that I was the guilty party.’

‘And weren’t you?’ demanded Carne violently. ‘I didn’t walk out on you—take your son away from you!’

Lesley shifted uneasily on the banquette. ‘You know, this is getting us nowhere …’

‘I agree.’ He finished the liquid in his glass, and summoned the waiter. ‘I suggest you consider the alternatives. Either you give me the temporary custody of my son willingly, or I’ll take you to court and prove that I can give him a better home life than you ever could!’

CHAPTER THREE

THE menu was not large, but it covered many of the traditional dishes of Italian food. Lesley chose a chilled fruit juice and lasagne, although she doubted she would be able to eat any of it. Still, the waiter was not to blame for her present predicament, and she hoped he would not blame her if she did not do full justice to the chef’s ability. Carne ordered spaghetti with a bolognese sauce, and then studied the other diners indifferently as Lesley sought to open the conversation again.

She would not have believed he could present her with such an ultimatum. Either … or … How could he be so dogmatic after all this time? For over two years now, she had had complete charge of Jeremy’s welfare. He couldn’t opt out like that and then opt in again just because it suited him.

Clearing her throat, she said: ‘I—I don’t want this to degenerate into a slanging match, Carne, but I doubt a court would approve of your abandoning Jeremy for more than two years …’

‘Damn you, I did not abandon him!’ he exclaimed, turning to glare at her. ‘I’ve told you. I corresponded with your mother. I was aware of what was going on.’

‘Then why did you let me send him to school? Why didn’t you step in before he started his education?’

Carne sighed. ‘Last year—last year there were problems.’

‘How convenient!’

‘No, it wasn’t convenient at all, as it happens.’ His mouth tightened. ‘But what we’re talking about right now is this year, these holidays.’ He paused. ‘What are you afraid of?’

Lesley gasped. ‘I’m not afraid of anything.’

‘Then why don’t you want me to see the boy?’

‘You can see him any time you like.’

‘In your presence—I know.’

‘What’s wrong with that?’

‘Everything.’ He waited until the waiter had set Lesley’s fruit juice in front of her, and then continued in a low voice: ‘Let’s put the record straight, shall we? You had a hard time having the boy, I accepted that. I also accepted that you found it hard to recover your strength after you got back to the farm. It was a hard winter, I know. It wasn’t conducive to recuperation. But I did everything I could. I gave you a room to yourself—I even kept away from you because I knew you couldn’t bear me to touch you—–’

‘That’s your story!’ she burst out hotly, and he heaved another sigh of resignation. For several seconds he continued to stare at her and then, with a gesture of defeat, he left her to drink the glass of orange juice.

Lesley tried to calm herself. At every turn he was able to disconcert her, forcing her into reckless retaliation, destroying the façade of composure she was trying so unsuccessfully to maintain.

She swallowed the fruit juice and the waiter removed her glass. If he wondered why his two customers should be talking so earnestly one minute and then so obviously estranged the next, he was too professional to show his curiosity, but Lesley sensed the sympathetic looks he cast in her direction.

Realising it was up to her to say something, she murmured: ‘How serious do you think my mother’s condition is?’

It was an effort to get him to respond to her again, and she could tell by his expression that he knew that as well as she did.

‘All heart conditions need to be taken seriously,’ he retorted shortly. ‘I suppose it depends on the age of the person and how strenuous a life they lead.’

‘Well, Mother doesn’t have a particularly strenuous life,’ Lesley ventured consideringly. ‘I mean, she has Mrs Mason come in three mornings every week to do the housework, and I usually prepare dinner when I get home. She doesn’t bother with much at lunchtime, unless she’s having a friend over for the day, and occasionally she goes out to play bridge.’

‘Until Jeremy comes home,’ Carne put in dampeningly, and she was forced to concede that this was true. ‘Which brings us back to the point of this meeting,’ he continued coldly. ‘Well? Are you going to fight me?’

Lesley’s brown eyes, so unusual with her fair colouring, flickered upward. ‘Fight you?’

‘Didn’t you always?’ he retorted. ‘God knows why you ever married me! God knows why I was fool enough to ask you!’

The lasagne lay in thick tomato sauce, a meaty filling between thin slices of pasta. Looking at it, Lesley wondered how she had ever imagined she could taste it. She felt sick, and her fork moved it sluggishly round her plate. It even made a sickly sound, and she pressed her lips together and looked anywhere but at her plate.

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