Moonrise Over the Mountains

by Lilian Peake

  “An engagement ring is part of the future, love.”

  They talked about everyday matters for some time. In the background Gayle could hear the sound of Rhoda washing the dishes after the evening meal. It sounded, judging by the conversation which rose over the clatter of crockery, as if her father was helping. They were laughing as well as talking, which again was unusual. Herbert was a serious man, often too serious even to laugh.

  Perhaps, Gayle thought, under Rhoda’s affectionate influence, he was changing and even growing happier. It would be wonderful, she reflected drowsily, if one day Rhoda were to get her wish. Rhoda as her stepmother. It sounded wonderful, better than Rhoda as her mother-in-law. Which, if she hadn’t been so tired and suffering pain from her bruises and still feeling shocked from her fall, should have made her think—and wonder.

  Mel, seeing her closed eyes, kissed her gently, made her comfortable and crept out.

  Rhoda stayed away from work next morning. After giving Herbert and Gayle their breakfasts, she washed up and tidied the house. In the afternoon she went to work, leaving Gayle dressed but lying on the settee in the living-room.

  The bumps and bruises were troubling her and there was a persistent throb in her head where it had hit the floor. Even her cheek was tender to the touch.

  She thought about Mel, and involuntarily her fingers curled stiffly, as if in her thoughts she was resisting the idea of wearing his engagement ring. It was such a decisive, public kind of step. It would take her even farther away from Ewan Pascall. She would have become an engaged woman in fact instead of theory, as she was now.

  Then she thought about Mel’s kisses—and inevitably about Ewan’s. Whose did she prefer, she asked herself restlessly, whose kisses stirred her to her depths, making her want to respond with all her being? She knew the answer, but she would not admit it, so she turned her thoughts away from it and found them safer roads to travel.

  The house was empty and quiet. Gayle drifted into sleep, only to awaken to the sound of a key in the door. Had her father come home early again?

  “Gayle?” Ewan’s voice came from the hall. “Where are you?”

  “In the living-room,” she responded, in a daze. As he entered the room, she tried to shake off her drowsiness and tidy her hair.

  In spite of herself she could not stop the colour from flooding into her pale cheeks. Nor could she deny the shattering effect his sudden appearance had had on her peace of mind. “What,” she asked, trying to mask her pleasure with indignation, “are you doing here? And how did you get in?”

  “Well,” he said, grinning, “since housebreaking is not one of the subjects I read for my degree in management, and since I don’t possess the incorporeal qualities of a ghost, I used a key. Your father’s.”

  He was carrying carnations, deep red and white. Under his arm was a parcel. The flowers he placed on her lap, the parcel remained where it was.

  “Ewan!” Her eyes shone. “For me?”

  “Who else?”

  “But why?”

  “Doesn’t a visitor always bring flowers to an invalid?”

  The light in her eyes dimmed. What other answer had she expected?”

  “A vase,” she murmured, swinging her legs to the floor. “I’ll put them in water.”

  His hand came out. “I’ll do it. But, first—”

  The parcel was conveyed, with care, to her arms. Puzzled, she unwrapped it. The lid of the box lifted to reveal a large crystal vase.

  “Ewan! It takes my breath away. It must have cost a fortune.”

  “It did.”

  “But—but why?”

  “To put the flowers in, why else?”

  “But to spend so much money, and on me?”

  He frowned and wandered away. “I owe you something. Indirectly I was the cause of your fall. I imagine,” he glanced at her, “your eyes were hazy—with tears?”

  So they were presents to ease his conscience. Again she asked herself, what else had she expected? When would she stop being so foolish about this man? When would she see sense and accept the fact that they were both engaged—to someone else, were both to marry—someone else?

  She held the flowers high to hide her face. “Perhaps. But it wasn’t your fault. I was to blame entirely for—for everything.” He did not deny the claim. Instead, he took the flowers and the vase to the kitchen and Gayle heard water running from the tap. Ewan returned with the flowers in the vase.

  “Since flower arranging never was one of my strong points,” he said, putting the vase on the window-sill, “I’ll leave that for you to do later.”

  Gayle thanked him again. He nodded and wandered across the room to stare at a watercolour on the wall. For a few moments there was silence, then, “In ten days’ time—” He turned his head. “You’ll be better by then?”

  “Of course!”

  He returned to studying the painting. “In ten days’ time, the designer for whom Carla is currently working---he’s French and has the unusual name of Hirondelle, although Carla assures me the only thing he ‘swallows’ is food and drink!—is staging a fashion show. Carla will be modelling a number of his gowns. His business is high fashion, haute couture. Pascall and Son don’t usually cater for that kind of clientele, but it’s on such fashions that buyers from all over the world base their selection of stock for the coming seasons.”

  He paused and moved to the window. He had exhausted the possibilities of the watercolour. Gayle’s eyes moved with him, and as the time went by her heart rate increased. Where was all this leading? Was his fiancée returning to England—and to him?

  He went on, “The fashion show will take place in Montreux, on the shores of Lake Geneva. I want you to attend.” There was a long, incredulous silence, then Gayle ventured, “But, Mr.—Ewan, I’m under notice.” Her voice lifted in a question. Was she still hoping that he would contradict the statement and say he had thrown the letter away, that he had never taken her resignation seriously?

  He said quietly, “I’m aware of that.” She pressed her lips together. So her resignation still stood. “It makes no difference to this. Your notice still has two months to run.”

  He strolled across the room and sat beside her. “You’ll fly to Geneva, travel by train to Montreux and book yourself into a good hotel. I’ll give you the name of it, plus all the details. It has everything a visitor could possibly want, including a swimming pool.” He smiled at her expression. “Don’t look so terrified.”

  “But, Ewan, I’ve never been abroad before.”

  “Then it’s high time you went.”

  “But,” she tried making excuses, “what about my father?”

  “Surely your neighbour can look after him?” She lifted her shoulders uncertainly and Ewan said, “Look, Gayle, I’m not deporting you from your home country, never to return. For most buyers this would be a routine trip. It will do you good, in experience and health.”

  She said, shooting a provocative glance at him, “You mean it might help to increase my stamina and in consequence, my efficiency as a buyer?”

  “You, Miss Stuart, are asking for a rude answer. And if you say much more, you’ll get it.” He lifted a finger and stroked her cheek. “Painful?”

  She nodded. “Not to mention the rest of me.”

  His eyes took in ‘the rest of her and she wished she were wearing something more attractive than the tight-fitting sleeveless top and patched pants she had pulled on. She apologised for how she looked.

  “I hadn’t expected visitors, certainly not the managing director of Pascall and Son!”

  He smiled at her, saying softly, “You’re asking for trouble. When the managing director of Pascalls is sitting beside a charming, enticing, rather provocative young woman, he becomes an ordinary man. If the girl beside him hadn’t been rather badly knocked about and bruised the day before, he would by now be behaving like an ordinary man and—” He shifted nearer, stretched his arm behind her back, felt her muscles contract and took his arm aw
ay. “I’m your friend, Miss Stuart. Remember? At this moment, literally a close friend.” He got up and roamed round the room. “About this trip.” He became businesslike. “I want to raise the standard of the fashion department. So, despite the fact that it goes against the grain—your grain—I want you to watch the show not only from the angle of fashion pointers for future trends in retail sales, but with a view to purchasing two or three of the gowns for sale in the store.”

  “They’ll be very costly. Too many would clean me out of money and upset my budget completely.”

  “I know you have a certain allocation of money to spend.” His tone was slightly irritable. “I realise such clothes will be expensive. But I want to conduct an experiment in promoting the sale of higher priced dresses. Doing, in fact, what Carla was trying to do before she left, only this time doing it openly, and not as a clandestine sideline.”

  Gayle frowned. Dared she tell him about her experiment, one she was conducting against his wishes and without his knowledge, in the sale of lower priced dresses? At this stage silence, she argued, was the best tactic to adopt. But there was one thing she could tell him.

  “I’m already following your fiancée’s example in one respect. I’ve bought a small number of couture-type gowns. I contacted some of Carla’s clients and persuaded them to patronise the store again. I told them about the dresses. Some of them came to look—and to buy. Which is one reason why my sales have increased recently.” She hoped he would not ask her to tell him the other reason.

  Instead, he raised his eyebrows, with approval, not with criticism. “Fine. Carry on the good work.”

  She looked down at her clasped hands. “I’ve only got two more months. Is it worth the expenditure of sending me on such an expensive trip?”

  She heard him cross the room. His fingers lifted her chin and he gazed into her ingenuous, wide-open eyes. A give-away smile tilted the corners of her lips and he threw her chin away.

  “There are two things you need. A trip abroad, which you’re going to get. And a spanking. When—and whether—that will be administered remains to be seen. But if it is,” he lowered his voice, “I know who’ll administer it. The managing director of Pascall and Son.”

  He swept out, leaving a palpitating, apprehensive, overexcited semi-invalid behind him.

  Gayle did not remain a semi-invalid for long. The following Monday morning saw her back at work. There were two days left before her trip abroad.

  Rhoda had promised to take care of Herbert. Mrs. Carrington was to run the dress department for the three days of Gayle s absence. On the evening before Gayle was due to leave, Ewan walked into her office. The customers were drifting out of the store and the staff were preparing to go home.

  “Got your passport?” Ewan enquired.

  “Of course.”

  “All right, all right, I was only asking. You told me yourself you were a novice at foreign travel. Have you sufficient money, travellers’ cheques and so on? What about clothes? You’re mixing with a crowd of sophisticated, worldly professionals. You mustn’t look like a poor relation.”

  She flushed. “There’s no need for the owner of Pascall and Son to be ashamed of its representative.”

  He grinned. “The thought never crossed my mind. You’ve got a swimsuit? You may fancy a swim in the hotel’s swimming pool. You’re taking a long dress? There’ll probably be a party or two.”

  “I’m going to work, not to play, Mr. Pascall,” she said witheringly. He turned up his jacket collar.

  “So the dedicated Miss Stuart will not relax for one moment while she’s away on firm’s business.” At the door he smiled. “Enjoy yourself, Gayle. Look on this trip as a holiday.”

  “A working holiday, Mr. Pascall.”

  He grinned again, raised his hand and went home.

  The hotel at Montreux was multi-storeyed and modern, its startling whiteness made dazzling by the brilliant contrast of the scarlet flowers growing in window boxes and hanging baskets on the balconies running the length of each floor.

  It seemed, by the smiles and the welcome in English which Gayle received, that she had been expected. “Your room booking was made from London,” she was told by the receptionist. “It is room fifty, first floor.”

  The receptionist beckoned to an attendant and the uniformed man carried the two cases up the curving staircase. Gayle had had little time so far to absorb the atmosphere of the place, but there seemed to be luxury even in the air, perfumed as it was by the scent of the flowers in every alcove and on every windowsill.

  No wonder, Gayle thought, Ewan had warned her to pack the best-looking clothes she possessed. It would take a great deal to live up to the exclusive standards of this hotel.

  The room was luxurious, too, with a bathroom attached. It even possessed its own refrigerator stocked with drinks. The balcony overlooked the lake—the beautiful Lake Geneva. Gayle, travel-weary though she was, unlocked the door which led on to the balcony and leant with a sigh of sheer delight against the rail.

  The beauty all around was breathtaking. Above, an intensely blue sky. Below, mirroring the blue, was the lake, its gentle ripple reflecting faithfully, and like a living, moving watercolour, the exciting outlines of the mountains and hills which towered above it.

  Idly she watched as a steamer, packed with sightseers, cut a feathered path through the water. In the distance, over the mountains, were benign masses of white cloud.

  With a sigh, she returned to her room, shook off her shoes and lay back on the bed. There were one or two pictures on the walls. Flowers, exotically coloured, held their heads high in a vase. There was a table for writing, along one wall a wardrobe-dressing-table and chest combined into one unit. The curtains were bronze-coloured and floor-length and the decor a delicate gold. The wall-to-wall carpeting was strewn with numerous thick-pile rugs.

  A telephone and a radio provided an outlet to the outside world. But, Gayle thought, stretching like a cat full of cream, who wanted the outside world? Who could possibly desire anything outside that great expanse of water, the buildings tall and small, public and private which clustered round it, and which made up this beautiful resort?

  It was late afternoon. Dinner, she read from the notice on the wall—she had to use her school French to translate—was at eight. It was a long time to wait. Over a bell near the bed were the inviting words, ‘Ring for room service.’ Dared she ring? Her finger hovered and, taking courage from the necessity of supplying her throat with reviving liquid, pressed the button.

  Room service was prompt and took Gayle by surprise. “Is it possible,” she asked in English, having abandoned all thoughts of attempting to get her meaning across in French, “to provide a pot of tea?”

  “Mais oui, mademoiselle,” the woman replied with a smile, “and perhaps some cakes?” The last phrase in excellent English.

  “Perhaps,” Gayle said, finding herself echoing the woman’s word. “I mean, yes, please.”

  The tea, when it came was reviving, the cakes, small, some with cream, too enticing to resist. When the tea-pot was empty and the cake plate too, Gayle showered and changed to opennecked top and tight-fitting slacks.

  What should she do now? The balcony beckoned again. The sun drenched her body and her mind, making her lethargic, too lazy even to think. This evening she would relax, because tomorrow was the fashion show and that meant work.

  The town, the unknown streets, the alien way of life, the feeling in the air of excitement and the thrusting spur of the desire to find adventure, all combined to make her pick up her handbag, take a jacket from one of the cases—she had yet to unpack—open the door of her room and swing along the corridor to the wide staircase.

  In the street it was the multiplicity of flowers she noticed first, masses of them wherever she looked. Everywhere there were roses, in bud, in early bloom, pinks and yellows and red. She could not resist the shops, although she had not the courage to go in and buy. There were cafes too, with their tables outside. />
  She found her way to the promenade and strolled along the lakeside gazing across at the snow-capped mountains. It was still early enough in the year for the snow to linger. The benches looked inviting and she sat down, legs crossed, elbow on knee, hand cupping her chin. She could not tear her eyes away from those mountains. Until someone came to sit beside her.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “Well,” the question was asked softly, “are you enjoying your first trip abroad?”

  Gayle’s head spun round. It wasn’t possible, it was her imagination, she was dreaming... “Ewan I—”

  He reclined against the back of the seat, arms fully stretched along its length, his legs stretched out, too. “Go on, what am I doing here? My word, you haven’t given me much rest. Just time for a quick pot of tea before you were up and out. I bet you haven’t unpacked a single thing?”

  She asked suspiciously, “How do you know I’ve had some tea? How do you know what I’ve been doing?”

  “How?” His gaze rested on her lazily. “If you had had eyes in your head, eyes which you used to see with instead of keeping half-closed because of your dazed state, you would know the answer to your questions. Ever since you arrived at London Airport this morning, I’ve been your shadow.”

  “So you’ve been following me? My tame private detective.”

  “That’s right,” he answered with a provocative smile, “checking on your movements. In the plane, if you had turned your head, you would have seen me at the back. If you had glanced over your shoulder out of the taxi window at Geneva, you would have seen me getting into the one behind. If you had wandered along the railway carriage you would have found me a few seats behind yours. If you’d looked round the entrance foyer of the hotel before you were given your room number and key, you would have seen me hovering in the background.” He smiled at her indignation. “And now do you want to know how I knew you sent for a pot of tea? My room is next to yours.”

  She turned on him. “So it was you who booked my room?”