Next Door to Romance Page 2

  'I think I did,' she agreed. 'But what's worrying me is—will she say the same sort of thing to Mummy and Daddy—or to other people so that it gets round to them? It would make them so unhappy.'

  'Well—' Tom considered the matter in his usual deliberate way— 'she may talk—she's that sort. But then everybody knows she is, so precious few people take any notice of her malicious clap-trap. Least of all your people. They're much too sensible.'

  'They would be—if this was about anybody but me,' Lisa replied. 'But because it is me, then they could so easily begin to wonder if, perhaps, there was something in it—something to which they'd unintentionally blinded themselves—'

  'I see what you mean,' Tom acknowledged. 'Give me a moment or two to think that one out, Lisa.'

  'All right,' she agreed, and fell silent.

  They had left the buttercup field now and were skirting the edge of another where regular lines of tender green shoots were sprouting, and had almost reached the river before Tom came up with an idea.

  'How would it be if you were to get a job?'

  'But, Tom, I can't do that!' Lisa reminded him a little impatiently. 'I've got to be at home. You know perfectly well Chat though Mummy never makes a fuss about it, her arthritis really does make it quite impossible for her to do housework!'

  'Well, I can offer you a job which would mean that you could still be at home,' he told her.

  'You could, Tom?' Lisa said uncomprehendingly. 'But how?'

  Tom hesitated. He could, indeed, have offered her a job—a full-time one which would last so long as they both lived, and it was on the tip of his tongue to tell her so. But he put the temptation aside. The candid directness of Lisa's eyes convinced him that this would not be the time—if, indeed, there would ever be a time—

  'As my secretary-cum-assistant-cum-receptionist,' he explained with a crispness which entirely distracted Lisa's thoughts from the significance of that pause.

  Lisa's eyes widened in perplexity.

  'But I lend you a hand now—'

  'I know you do—and I don't know what I'd do without your help. But I need more now Teasdale's practically out of it. With the book work, for one thing—on a business footing, of course.'

  'I'm not sure I could do that,' Lisa said doubtfully. 'You know what a duffer I am over figures. Besides—'

  'Well?'

  'Well, I like helping you, Tom. So how could I possibly—'

  'Let me pay you for what you do?' Tom had no difficulty in following the way her thoughts had gone. 'Now, just you listen to me, my girl. Try to see it from my point of view. How do you think I feel, taking advantage of your friendship and good nature to get out of paying you a penny for all you do? And even more than that, how can I possibly ask you, very coolly, if you'd kindly do more without making it a business proposition? And before you answer one, get this clear. I'm not trying to make a job out of nothing just to suit you. I'd rather have you than anybody else, Lisa, but you can take my word for it, if you don't feel you can take this on, then I'll have to find someone else!'

  'Honest Injun?' she asked seriously.

  ' "Cross my heart and hope to die, cut my throat if I tell a lie!" ' Tom recited as gravely. 'So how about it, Lisa?'

  'All right,' she promised. 'If Mummy and Daddy agree, it's a deal!'

  'Splendid!' Tom said briskly. 'Then I'll ask around and see what the current rates for that sort of work are.'

  'Ask whom?' Lisa asked suspiciously. She had a conviction that Tom would try to pay her too much!

  But he had an answer ready.

  'Dr Mayhew's secretary—Miss Jenkins. She does the same sort of work—only, of course, she's not in any danger of being bitten by any of Mayhew's patients—so, naturally, I'll pay you more.'

  'Oh no, you won't,' Lisa contradicted firmly. 'Miss Jenkins has had a lot of experience. I haven't. So you should pay me less—'

  'Look, we'll compromise,' Tom told her. 'I'll say no more about the possibility of you getting bitten if you'll hush up about yours and Miss Jenkins' relative values. O.K.?'

  'O.K.,' Lisa agreed, but was conscious of no feeling of elation because her worry was cleared up. In fact, she even felt depressed.

  Tom had, she knew quite well, found a perfect solution to her problem, and one that ought to make Mrs Blewett stop being a nuisance. And yet she couldn't entirely welcome the arrangement.

  The trouble was that though she accepted quite willingly the knowledge that she was needed at home, it was so difficult not to want to spread her wings, and this morning the feeling had been particularly strong. Everything seemed so young and venturesome, and she wanted to share in that spirit of challenge.

  But now, if her parents agreed to Tom's suggestion, and she knew quite well that they would, she would be more than ever tied to the house. Involuntarily she sighed and then, feeling guilty of ingratitude, she glanced down at her silent companion, hoping he hadn't noticed that revealing sigh.

  And Tom, flat on his back, was fast asleep!

  'Poor old Tom!' Lisa thought sympathetically. Despite his denial, he was tired. Well—she looked at her watch—he could have at least an hour's sleep—

  Her eyes lingered momentarily on his face. It wasn't handsome. His red hair wouldn't have been everybody's choice, and his features were anything but regular. But there was an essential kindness and integrity there, and even in his sleep there was strength. You could trust Tom! It was queer, she thought, that though she had only known him for a couple of years, she felt as if he had always been part of her life—a good solid background on which she could rely.

  Half an hour passed. Lisa, sitting motionless with her back against an ancient oak tree, had her wish. The kingfisher flashed not once but many times across the stream, a streak of electric blue. Parent moorhens passed with their flotilla of chicks swimming valorously in line astern—Lisa felt a pang of tenderness. The little, little things, so toy-like and yet so determined! A fish jumped leaving ever-widening circles in the water. Bees buzzed energetically about their business—

  It was a good day! Lisa, hugging her knees, felt a surge of happiness as she gazed at the checker board of fields, lush with new growth and bordered with their protecting hedges and trees. One had a sense of the renewing and continuity of life, of the orderly progress of the seasons that was reassuring in a world where so many people seemed to drift with no real plan of life before them. And that, of course, was her own trouble —What did the future hold for her, and what could she do to make sure that it was as rich as human endeavour could make it?

  And still Tom slept on. Lisa's forehead puckered slightly. Tom was tired and common sense dictated that he should sleep. She knew that and sympathized —but it wasn't very exciting!

  How wonderful it would be, she thought wistfully, to have a companion who was as nice as Tom but who, in addition, made one feel—well, special! As if absolutely no one else could take one's place. For a few moments her thoughts ran rosily on. She could put neither name nor face to this visionary lover, yet she felt she knew so much about him.

  Tall and dark and athletic. Not perhaps conventionally handsome, but with the sort of face made one want to look at it a second—and a third time. And above all, a man who did something—who was on the way to making his mark in the world.

  'In fact, just exactly the sort of man who wouldn't look twice at me!' Lisa thought ruefully.

  'Damn!' Tom exclaimed so loudly that Lisa jumped. Tom was sitting up, vigorously mopping his face with his handkerchief. 'Dew off the tree,' he explained. 'It hit me right in the eye!'

  Lisa, forgetting her dreams, chuckled enjoyably.

  ' "The hillside's dew-pearled",' she commented, capping his earlier quotation.

  Tom grunted, looked at his watch and jumped to his feet.

  'Great Scott, is that the time!' he exclaimed. 'You shouldn't have let me sleep on like that!'

  'Why not?' Lisa asked carelessly. 'It's early yet, and anyway, you weren't snoring. Otherwise I might�
�'

  'I don't snore,' Tom said indignantly. 'But I want to drop in at Bourne Farm before I start my ordinary day's work. Come on, let's get moving!'

  He held out a hand, and Lisa, taking it, was hauled to her feet.

  Just for a moment, Tom held on for what, to Lisa, seemed an unnecessarily long time.

  'Yes, Tom?' she asked breathlessly.

  Abruptly he let her hand go.

  'I thought you'd lost your balance,' he explained gruffly.

  'No,' Lisa said lightly, 'I didn't lose my balance— you didn't give me a chance to!'

  And before he had time to reply, she turned her back on the little river and began walking back the way they had come. She had not gone far before he caught her up.

  'I say, Lisa, nothing wrong, is there?' he asked anxiously.

  'Good gracious, no,' she assured him, limpid-eyed. 'How could there be?'

  'Well—'

  He was interrupted by someone sounding a motor horn —sounding it rather impatiently, in fact.

  'Now what?' Tom asked with a sudden ill humour unusual in him. 'In the deuce of a hurry, isn't he? I wonder who he thinks he is?'

  Lisa didn't reply. Drawn up at the side of the road was a car. Its cream paint and metal work gleamed in the sunshine. It had beautiful lines and the lavish finish which told even Lisa's inexperienced eyes that it had cost a great deal of money. Then, as quickly as the idea occurred to her, she forgot all about it because it simply didn't matter. What was important was that here, out of the blue, as if the Fates themselves had been listening, was the very man she had dreamed of so short a while ago!

  Tall and dark and with the leanness of an athlete. Not handsome—or was he? It was difficult to know for sure because he was smiling—a smile that produced two puck-like lines from his eyes to the corners of his mouth—and he was smiling directly at her.

  'I say, I'm frightfully sorry to make a pest of myself, but could you possibly tell me where the deuce I am?'

  Blue eyes! If she had given it a thought, Lisa would have guessed that with that dark hair, they would be dark eyes. But no! Blue! And how much more intriguing—more disturbing—

  'You're in Addingly,' Tom said shortly.

  'That's fine!' the young man said cheerfully. 'But where's Addingly?' He peered at the map he had spread across the wheel. 'It doesn't seem to be here—'

  'If you'll tell me where you want to go—' Tom suggested with a shortness that annoyed Lisa. For goodness' sake, why get upset because someone had lost themselves? It was so unlike Tom—

  'What a brain!' the young man said very gravely but with a twinkle in his eyes for Lisa. 'A really practical notion! Well, I'm looking for Bardley Manor, and a more elusive place I've never come across—and that's just the trouble. I haven't come across it. It eludes me!'

  There was a brief silence. Bardley Manor! Why, there could hardly be anyone in Addingly who hadn't been talking about Bardley Manor for months past!

  From the time it had been built some two hundred years ago, the Manor had, until recently, changed hands only once. Succeeding generations of the original owners who had built the house had lived there for over a hundred years. Then, having lost most of their money, they had sold out to a family named Webber. But wars and accidents and ill health had whittled it down until, some five years previously, only three elderly sisters survived. They had all died within a few months of one another and the property had remained empty and neglected ever since. Somewhere in America, so it was understood, there lived a many-times-removed cousin to whom it now belonged, but he had no interest in living there and put it up for sale.

  But no purchaser had been found, and it looked as if the house would gently decay into a heap of dust and rubble when Addingly was electrified by the news that at long last a purchaser had been found. That this was true was quickly proved, for a horde of workmen moved in and there were rumours of renovations and alterations which would have made the old Miss Webbers turn in their graves. But no one knew just what had been done, for the gates were kept fast closed and visitors were quickly seen off the premises. Which all made for a most intriguing mystery, particularly as no one had been able to find out who the purchaser was.

  But while mystery was the breath of life in Addingly, its residents resented the fact that, skilful though they were at minding other people's business, in this case they had more than met their match. There were rumours, of course. The new owner was someone in the public eye who wanted privacy. Or, perhaps, a criminal whose face was far too well known for him to be accepted by decent folk. Even someone so terribly scarred by an accident that they wanted to hide from the rest of mankind. But something dramatic and out of the way it must be! That the new owner might be a perfectly ordinary person to whom it never occurred that his private affairs were of such importance locally was dismissed without consideration.

  And now here was this—well, not ordinary young man, he was far too attractive for such a description as that, but certainly not extraordinary young man enquiring the way to the Manor—

  He must have read a question in both Lisa's and Tom's faces, for he laughed and shook his head.

  'No, I'm not the mystery man! Though heaven knows why anyone should bother to make a mystery of it, except that I suppose so little happens in the country that anything—well, anyway, Mr Cosgrave, to whom it does belong, is my boss. And since I'm due there in—' he glanced down at the gold watch on his wrist—' in another ten minutes, I'd be eternally grateful if you'd put me on my way! The old man doesn't like to be kept waiting.'

  'Turn back the way you've come, take the first turning on the left and the second on the right. That will bring you to the Manor gates,' Tom said crisply. 'Shouldn't take you more than five minutes or so—so your job should be safe!'

  'Tom!' Lisa protested reproachfully, but the young man didn't seem in the least put out. He laughed, started up, backed neatly up Honeypot Lane and so was off with a gay wave and a shouted word of thanks.

  'Egotistical show-off!' Tom commented acidly, his eyes following the cream car until it vanished from sight.

  'Tom, what on earth's the matter with you?' Lisa demanded, her own eyes reluctantly leaving the curve in the road round which the car had vanished. 'In all the time I've known you, I've never known you be so rude to anyone!'

  'I've never met anyone before to whom I took such an instantaneous and deep-seated dislike,' Tom explained emphatically.

  'For goodness' sake! But why?' Lisa wanted to know.

  'Why?' Tom looked at her bleakly. How on earth could he tell her the truth—that he had been bitterly, blackly jealous? Or the reason for his jealousy—that in a few moments a complete stranger had brought a look to Lisa's face that he himself had never been able to. 'Because I've no use for the rising young executive type —which he obviously is. I've met some of them, and every mother's son of them has been smart, slippery and determined to get on in the world no matter how ruthless they've got to be!'

  'I think you're beastly unfair!' Lisa told him angrily. 'I suppose the truth of it is, you're jealous—' Tom caught his breath, '—because he's got a better car than you'll ever have—'

  'And is a lot better looking and can afford to dress like a tailor's dummy,' Tom finished savagely. 'Yes, that's it, I'm jealous! Why shouldn't I be? A country vet wearing scruffy tweeds with a jalopy for a car and a face made up of odds and ends of features—'

  'Tom!' Lisa, troubled at the bitterness in his voice, slipped her arm through his. 'But you love your work —you wouldn't change places—'

  Tom bit his lip.

  'No, I suppose I wouldn't,' he admitted. 'But sometimes, one doesn't seem to be getting anywhere—oh, forget it, Lisa! I'm tired, I suppose. And he was such a very sleek, well-groomed young man—just got under my skin! I'll say good-bye to you here because, as I said, I wanted to look in at Bourne Farm again before I start surgery. Be seeing you!'

  'Yes,' Lisa said absently, and then, as he was swinging away from her: 'Oh, Tom, about
tonight. We were going to the Cricket Club dance—but we won't if you're too tired—'

  'Never in your life!' Tom declared roundly. 'Perhaps we won't stay very late, but we're certainly going. 'Bye!'

  Lisa walked slowly back to the house and, Tom's moodiness forgotten, a little smile curved her lips. She had got up that morning with the conviction that it was a day full of promise, and though she wouldn't have found it easy to explain why, she knew that she had not been disappointed.

  As for the young man who had brought that smile to her lips, he sped on his way whistling gaily. He was, as he was quite willing to admit, essentially a town-dweller, and he thought this business of old Cosgrave 'buying the Manor was sheer nonsense—though he was careful not to give voice to his opinion! The country, to Mark Saville, was simply somewhere through which you drove as quickly as possible on your way from one town to another. But now he was willing to admit that, perhaps, it might have its own attractions.

  As he passed through the Manor gates he spotted a printed notice fixed very crookedly in one of the lodge windows and despite his haste, he stopped long enough to read:

  ADDINGLY AND BARDLEY

  CRICKET CLUB

  ANNUAL DANCE

  AT THE

  VILLAGE HALL

  ADDINGLY

  Saturday, May 23rd

  7.30 p.m.—11.45 p.m.

  Tickets: Within

  A village hop! Very definitely not Mark's cup of tea! And yet it might be worth putting in an appearance, particularly as Evadne wouldn't be down, for the week-end—

  CHAPTER 2

  Lisa dressed for the evening's festivities in a bemused state of mind. Fortunately, though officially this was Tom's one evening off during the week, he had been called over to the Ranstead Kennels to see a suspected case of hard-pad and was not back yet. So it didn't matter that every now and again Lisa would stop doing anything to stand perfectly still, her hands lax, lost in daydreams—