by Sue Peters
'I don't mean to one of their sort. I mean yours,' he said with unexpected boldness. 'Mother wants Marcia to marry class. I think she's got her eyes on your Doctor Raven,' he chuckled with a mischievous look.
'He's 'not my Doctor Raven,' Nan disclaimed ownership, and wished she did not have to. Her head began to throb, probably it was the after-effects of her anger over the badger setts, and she wished she could go home. It had been a long day. She and Keir had been out early to try and catch the gipsy couple before they moved on, and there had been no rest for either of them since. She looked round for Keir. She would have to wait until he was ready to go.. She spotted him on the other side of the room, dancing with Marcia, and wished fervently that she had got her own little car. She could be independent then, Keir could have gone on dancing with Marcia for as long as he liked, and she would not have to wait and watch. Her own feet flagged.
'Sorry,' she apologised to Rodney, finally giving up all pretence of trying to dance. 'It's been a long, hard day. I don't think I've got the stamina of your friends,' she confessed ruefully, watching their energetic contortions. It could hardly be called dancing, everyone seemed to be' doing their own thing, interpreting the music in the strangest ways. Only one or two couples were dancing in the conventional manner. Keir and Marcia were.
'Oh, they'll keep it up until daylight. They probably didn't get up until midday anyway,' the boy said cheerfully. 'I shall just clear off and leave them when I've had enough. They won't mind.'. His own indifference to his birthday guests equalled that of theirs to him, and Nan began to see what he meant by hangers-on. Vaguely she pitied the Lisles, particularly Rodney. They had so much, and so little. And the boy seemed to be the only one of them with enough perception to realise just how little. The other three seemed, intent on trying to take things away from others, she thought with weary disgust. The hospital—the badger setts—and now Keir, if Marcia and her mother had their way. Who they were taking Keir away from, she refused to ask herself.
'Here's your escort, come to collect you,' Rodney meant well, but the manner in which he spoke, as if she was some sort of parcel to be tossed into the Land-Rover and taken home when it was convenient to Keir, gave an unexpected impetus to Nan's resentment, and she flared angrily.
'I've told you he's not my escort,' she snapped, ignoring Rodney's surprised look, and careless that Keir and Marcia had joined them, and heard what she said.
'Whose is he, then?' Marcia asked sweetly, and smiled up into Keir's face. 'We can't let the poor darling feel he doesn't belong, can we?' She ran her fingers lightly up the lapel of his jacket, looked as if she would have liked to run them along the square line of his chin, but didn't quite dare. 'Whose shall we say he is?' Small pearl teeth glinted in a merry smile, that did not reach her eyes. They were as hard as agate, and bored into Nan's with a look that carried an unmistakable challenge.
'Please yourself,' Nan shrugged indifferently, unwilling to join in the silly by-play. 'Yours—or Edwina's—whichever you like.'
She did not know what made her say it, except that something in Marcia's attitude stung her beyond endurance, making her want to hit back to hurt. And watching the colour drain from Keir's face, leaving him chalk white, and looking angrier than she had ever seen him, she knew she had done the wrong thing.
CHAPTER SEVEN
'How did you learn about Edwina?'
He spoke tautly, throwing the words at her through the angry silence in the darkness of the car. Except for saying goodnight to their hosts, he had not spoken since she mentioned Edwina's name—at least, not to Nan. He met Marcia's invitation to, 'Come again as soon as you can,' with smiling politeness, and Nan knew he heard and took note of Rodney's eager, 'Remember what I promised, Nan. I'll be in touch,' because he scowled blackly as if he disapproved, but he made no comment, and Nan offered him no explanation. It should be obvious to Keir that she was not dating the boy. The idea was ridiculous; he was years younger than she was. But even so, that would have been none of Keir's business either.
'I saw her name. It was on the photograph in your bedroom.' She spoke haltingly and stopped, unable to go further. Why couldn't she explain how she came to see the thing? she asked herself miserably as she crept into bed later. Surety he would have listened if she had told him, and understood how it had come about that she had seen Edwina's picture? Instead, her own silence condemned her— a silence she could not break because of a misery-born constriction in her throat that stopped any utterance, even in her own defence. Even when he flung at her in white-faced fury, when they parted in the hall.
'Now you've pried until you've discovered something, perhaps you're satisfied. Make what you like of it!' And without even saying goodnight he strode past her and disappeared into his room with a final sounding click to the door.
It's because I'm upset about the badgers, Nan excused the two tears that rolled unchecked down her cheeks, others following them until her face was wet by the time she had, donned her nightdress, for once unable to enjoy the sight of its lacy delicacy in the mirror as she automatically brushed her hair, and sponged her cheeks for the second time in a vain attempt to stop her tears by the application of cold water.
'I could do with Timmy's Teddy bear,' she told herself mournfully, feeling loneliness drop over her like a grey mist, that even her accustomed habit of drawing up the blankets round her ears could not blot out tonight. But grown-ups did not have the solace of a friendly Teddy bear to whom they could pour out their hearts, and be sure of silent understanding. Grown-ups, however wretched and vulnerable they might feel, only had a cold, impersonal pillow to receive their unhappiness, and when that got damp it retaliated by making the cheek that lay on it sore by the next morning.
Nan creamed it with solicitous fingers, wincing as she touched the tender skin. Thank goodness for make-up, she thought. She did not use it very often, and then only sparingly, but this morning she needed something to disguise the signs of her overnight distress. She creamed her eyelids too, they were worse than her cheek, but the cream did its work well, and by the time she went reluctantly downstairs to breakfast only faint traces showed around her eyes, and if anyone questioned she could excuse that as tiredness, and the heavily smoke-laden atmosphere of the party room ,last night.
The face cream saved her morale, but, it did nothing for her spirits. They seemed to lower themselves a notch with each stair she descended. She dreaded meeting Keir.
'Hello, Rose.' She responded listlessly to the red-haired maid's cheerful morning greeting, and let out a small sigh of relief as she entered the breakfast room and found her relatives already there, and patently not in a talkative mood.
'Late night parties don't suit me. Too old,' grumbled Oliver Gray, and lapsed into a silence that his wife was obviously glad to share, so that neither was inclined to comment on Nan's own uncommunicative mood any more than they were on Keir's when he joined them with a curt 'Good morning' five minutes later, which he made do for all the table except Timmy. Nan had heard him speak to the child in the hall as they came in together, in his usual kindly tone.
'If you've finished your breakfast Timmy, you can go and feed Fluffy.' Rose tactfully released the chattering child from the morose atmosphere, which she seemed to regard as being the morning after the night before, and receiving Mary Gray's nod of permission, the boy happily scampered away.
'Now will you tell me what you've done with Edwina's photograph?' The moment the door shut behind Rose, Keir spoke coldly into the silence, and his three companions looked up at him in undisguised surprise.
'Done with it?' Nan stammered, taken off her guard. 'Why, nothing, of course. I left it on your dressing table top.'
'You couldn't have done. It's not there now. If this is your idea of a joke ...' Regardless of the presence of her uncle and aunt, he made no effort to hide his anger, and glared at Nan across the table.
'But it must be there, it couldn't have walked.' Nan's indignation rose to match his own. 'I was going to e
xplain how the glass got broken, but I didn't get a chance yesterday.'
'Oh, was you looking for your picture, Doctor Raven?' Unasked, Rose reappeared with a replenished coffee pot. 'Miss Nan put it on your dressing table top, sir, but I thought if you wasn't careful, like, you might put your hand on it and get yourself cut, so I brought it down and popped it in a paper bag.' She chuckled suddenly. 'Everything fell out of your drawer when I pulled it. It came out all of a sudden, right on to me lap, what with it sticking and all, but the picture hit a chair leg,' she sobered. 'I'm right sorry about that. Miss Nan was going to tell you about it, and get some more glass put in to mend it for you. Have some more coffee, now, it's nice and fresh,' she poured him out another cup. 'I'll go and fetch your picture for you now.' She said it in much the same manner that she might have told an upset Timmy she would fetch his Teddy bear. 'There, look,' she reappeared, pulling the picture frame from out of a large paper bag. 'It's only the glass as is broke, it hasn't spoiled the picture. I'm right sorry about it, but it couldn't be helped,' she said nervously.
'You weren't to know the picture was in the drawer, Rose, it wasn't your fault. I should have told you.' Keir took it from her hand with a quiet 'Thank you,' and she left the room happily, leaving behind her a pregnant silence at the breakfast table. Keir looked directly across at Nan.
'I'm sorry—' he began, and stopped. The anger had died from his face, leaving it white and drawn, and his eyes, once again, held the bleak expression she had come to recognise as an almost permanent feature when he first came to Minster House. Recently he had begun to lose it a little . . . He still held the photograph upside down as Rose had given it to him, not attempting to turn it over and look at it.
'May I see it?' Mary Gray held out her hand. 'There's a very good handyman in the village. If it's only the glass that's damaged, I'm sure he'd do an excellent job of renewing it for you.'
With the briefest possible hesitation, Keir turned the photograph frame over in his hand, and still without glancing at it himself he passed it over to Mary.
'Oh, he'd do that for you, I'm sure,' she told him confidently. 'What a good job it didn't damage the surface of the photograph, it's much top nice to spoil,' she said thankfully. 'Edwina ...' her voice was reflective, 'it's an unusual name —and a beautiful face,' she smiled at him.
'Edwina was my wife.'
'Your wife?' Oliver Gray looked startled. 'I didn't know ...'
'Was your wife?' Mary Gray broke in with a warning shake of her head that silenced her husband abruptly.
'Yes.' Keir spoke through set lips. 'She died in a car crash —the one I told you about.' He glanced at Nan, and swiftly away again.
'The car was a write-off. I wasn't in it at the time.' Poignantly his words came back to her. So that was what had happened to his car, And to his wife. It was over & year ago since the crash, he had said so. And yet he still could not bear to look at Edwina's photograph. To be reminded.
'That's why I wasn't able to come down to Minster with you after your trip to London,' Keir explained quietly to his partner. 'I had to be available at the time to finalise the settling of Edwina's estate. I believe I mentioned it . ..'
'Yes, you did say something about clearing up an estate,' Oliver Gray nodded. Keir had not told him what estate. Nan could imagine him giving only the briefest explanation, wearing his reserve like an armour against further pain, retreating rather than face people's sympathy. No wonder when he came to Minster House first he had commented that he felt old; Nan remembered that, too.
'Don't distress yourself, Mary.' Keir took the photograph back from her hand and spoke quietly, checking her troubled exclamation. 'It's over a year ago now, getting on for two, I suppose,' he looked faintly surprised. 'One forgets how the time goes by. The estate took a long while to settle, but even that was in the final stages by the time Oliver asked me to throw in my lot with him.' He smiled briefly across at his partner. 'It's helped a lot, coming here,' he admitted. 'And eventually,' he glanced again at Nan, 'one—adjusts.'
How much had he really adjusted? Nan wondered, remembering how his face had drained of its colour when she flung Edwina's name at Marcia the night before. She felt badly about that. The moment her anger had evaporated she bitterly regretted giving way to the impulse, and now she knew who Edwina was—had been—she felt even worse.
She clipped another sprig of sage and laid it in the trug beside her on the lawn, staring at the aromatic contents but not seeing them. Musing over the events at the breakfast table, 'Another couple of sprigs should be enough,' she murmured, her mind only half on her job, so that she gave up and sat back on her heels, pushing a wave of hair out of her eyes.
'What are you going to do with that lot, now?' A shadow fell across the herb border, and she looked up to find Keir watching her, an interested gleam in his eyes and—yes, she noted with relief—a small smile curving his lips upwards. He must have decided to let bygones be bygones.
'Keir, I'm sorry—about last night.' She looked up at him, his head outlined against the bright sky, and wished she could see his eyes, but the sun was in her face and it was impossible to tell clearly what his expression was.
'And I'm sorry about this morning, so that makes us even.' Suddenly he hunkered down beside her, reached out and picked a sprig of mauve flowering thyme, crushing it gently in between his hands and then burying his face in his palms to breathe the sharp scent of it. 'Let's both forget it, shall we Nan? And start again?' He looked straight at her then, not touching her; his arms were lightly balanced on his knees, but so close to her that his eyes looked deeply into her own, probing her delicate, heart-shaped face turned upwards to his. Wanting to be—friends? In her relief, Nan was willing to settle for anything, and she nodded happily. His smile broadened.
'Now that's settled,' he said, 'perhaps you'll answer my question.'
'What question?' What had he asked her, except was she willing to start again? Presumably he meant go back to where they had left off. She knew that would not suffice for long, her present mood would not last, and when it passed the longing would come back again. Longing for more than just friendship. Hearts would not stand still, they had a will of their own, Nan discovered, that did not. always coincide with, the wishes of their unfortunate owners.
'What are you going to do with this lot, now?' He repeated his earlier question insistently, and Nan relaxed.
'That's an easy one to answer,' she told him lightly. A lot easier than the question she thought he meant, but she did not say so. 'I tie them in bundles and hang them from the ham hooks in the beams of the kitchen ceiling. They'll dry off slowly there, and hey presto! we have enough herbs for the winter.'
'Since I hope to partake of the results, I'll do my part towards the preparations,' he said gravely, and without more ado dived his hand into his trousers pocket and produced a tangled bundle of thin string, in the middle of which resided a battered-looking pocket knife with a broken blade.
'Oh, Keir!' she gurgled helplessly, regarding the sorry mess with merry eyes. Produced from the pocket of a faultlessly cut Savile Row suit, the sight hopelessly upset her gravity. 'You're as bad as Timmy,' she accused him. Of all the chinks she had discovered in his armour, she suspected this one revealed most of Keir as he really was. The small boy that, thankfully, still lay within the self-contained outer covering of the man, who she knew now was as vulnerable to pain as she was herself.
'I can't think why women make such a fuss about what you keep in your pockets.' Keir looked at the tangled handful lovingly. 'It's all useful stuff.'
'And in such a knot you can't find an end anywhere,' Nan scolded him happily. 'You get your knife blade open, and I'll sort this lot out. It looks as if you've been playing cat's cradle with it.' She found an end and became absorbed in unravelling it.
'Cat's cradle?' Keir looked taken aback. 'Do you know, I'd completely forgotten about that. We used to play it when we were children.'
'You hadn't forgotten it really, you'd j
ust disremembered,' she said comfortably. 'I told you, you don't forget your roots.'
'You'll have to teach me to play again.'
'Timmy will teach you.' She spoke quickly. She dared not teach Keir herself. Twining the string around his fingers to make the cradle, taking it on to her own, their hands would touch . . . 'I've got to make a start on the corn dollies for the harvest festival,' she excused her unwillingness. 'They're bringing the sheaves from Coton Hill to start dressing the church tomorrow. We haven't got long,' she remembered guiltily, 'and the dollies take quite a time to weave. I've promised two.' She wished now she had not been quite so rash, but it was too late to retract.
'I've seen the made-up dollies,' Keir held the bundle of sage sprigs upside down, and tied it firmly, 'but I've never actually seen one woven.'
'If you're in tonight, you'll see two started. Aunt Mary's promised to help with one, and I'm doing the other.'
'You said we could go blackberrying.' A small, disconsolate voice reminded her of her promise, and Timmy edged his way between them, accompanied by Sauce.
'Stop pushing,' Nan protested as the mongrel thrust an eager nose against her to see what she had got in her lap. 'Hang on to him, Timmy, he's tipping me over—too late!' she laughed ruefully, and rolled off balance on to the grass, the untied sprigs of herbs scattering around her like a green garland.
'I'll pick them up.' Timmy dived to the rescue, and the mongrel, having discovered nothing more interesting than a few bits of stick and leaves, padded off elsewhere in_ search of something that held more excitement.
'Nan says you'll teach me how to play cat's cradle.' Keir let the boy tie the next bundle, and under his careful eye even use his knife to cut the string.
'Can't you play?' The boy sounded amazed at such a lack. 'I'll show you if you like,' he agreed, 'but what about the blackberries?' He returned to his main interest. Games like cat's cradle were for winter nights, when it got dark early.
