Façade

by Jessica Steele

  'Your family are lovely people,' she told him quietly. 'It was very nice meeting them all.'

  'You could meet them all again if you wanted to,' said Rod quickly. 'We could…' The sadness that came to her eyes made him break off. 'You meant it when you said it wouldn't have done any good had I waited a while to ask you to marry me?'

  'Yes, I did,' she answered—kinder by far, she thought, to give him a straight answer than to skate around the issue.

  Though he was still not quite ready to let go, she found. For he was speedily then reminding her of how he had kept his promise that they would be good pals only that weekend and nothing more, adding:

  'We could go on being good pals, Sorrel. I haven't chased you this weekend. I wouldn't…'

  'No, Rod,' she had to tell him. 'It—wouldn't work.'

  Remembering her own dreadful heartache when at seventeen she had been made to realise that she would never see her love again, she very nearly weakened and said that she would see him occasionally, but instinct stopped her. Somehow she instinctively knew that the love Rod had for her was not the all-consuming fire of feeling she had for Ellis.

  'It's better this way,' she told him as gently as she could.

  Sure in her own mind as she was that she had never given Rod any reason to suppose that she felt anything as deep as love for him, her heart was heavier than ever when eventually she parted from him.

  A sigh escaped her as she closed the door of her flat, remembering the last time Rod had seen her home. But this time, if Ellis did not physically follow her in, he was there in her thoughts and was to immediately leave no room for unhappy thoughts of Rod Drury.

  By nine the next morning Sorrel had just about done with berating herself for the crass, idiotic, most stupidly self-indulgent person she had been from almost the moment Ellis had come from his house and seen her standing there in the pouring rain. As if he had been calling her all along—which just had to be another piece of self-indulgence that she could think such a thought, even while telling herself she would avoid walking near any house lest it be his—she had found her way to his home.

  But this morning she was done with self-indulgence, and any other indulgence too. While Ellis had her phone number and knew where she lived, even while she told herself umpteen times that he would not be contacting her, she was fully aware that the ring of the phone or. a ring at her flat bell would send her first thoughts flying to think that it might be him.

  It had occurred to her halfway through the night that merely to have her telephone number changed would achieve nothing. Ellis would still know where she lived. It had been getting on for five in the morning when what she had to do became clear to her.

  At five past nine, Sorrel telephoned the agents responsible for leasing her her flat, and asked them to sub-let it for her. At ten past nine, she left her flat and was on her way to see other flat-leasing agencies.

  Money, she was discovering again, was a very useful commodity. What she was looking for was a more modest type of apartment, the type of apartment that a working girl could afford.

  'It's like looking for gold,' said the third agent she visited, as if she didn't already know that. But, as his shrewd eyes dwelt on her expensive clothes, he considered her for a few more seconds, then said, 'Though if you can cough up a year's rent in advance, I might have something on my books.'

  Ready to snatch his hands off, Sorrel told him that a year's rent in advance should not provide too much of a problem, and she was then given details of the flat the agent had up his sleeve.

  When he described the small one-bedroomed flat, she was ready to take it sight unseen. But with his promise that he would hold it for her, she took the keys and went hurrying round to what she was sure was going to be her new abode.

  It was a small flat, as he had said, but it was fairly presentable, so that she could see nothing against her moving in straight away. She could take her time about changing the wallpaper, she thought, and hurried back to the agent to tell him she would have it. That her new flat was in a less salubrious area than the one she was living in mattered not a jot to her.

  Speed to her mind was essential then—she had a lot to do. Fortunately, since while the flat had no tenant its owner was not receiving rent, no objection was raised to her signing a tenancy agreement that day.

  Finding a removal firm who could transfer sufficient of her furniture to make her new abode comfortable was the hardest part, she found. Though when fast growing of the opinion that she would have to buy a camp bed since she was determined to be in her new flat by the weekend, she finally managed to run to earth a two-man band who said they would do the job on Friday afternoon.

  The next few days saw Sorrel, when she wasn't running up new curtains, feverishly packing and itemising all she would be taking with her. That some of her furniture would have to stay behind was of no great consequence. If her tenant, when found, didn't want to take it over, then she would sell it. . When the removal men turned up not at two o'clock as promised, but at gone three on Friday afternoon, Sorrel was so relieved to see them that the ticking off she had been building up to give them went completely from her mind.

  'Leave the things in the bedroom until last,' she told the wiry man who seemed to be the senior of the two. She had no wish to teach them their job, but to her mind, and with time going on, if her bed was the last article to be loaded, it would then have to be the first off. She was going to be whacked at the end of this day, and to have her comfortable bed set up was a first priority.

  Sorrel closed her eyes to chipped paintwork and a scratched table, as in and out of her flat the two men heaved and bumped.

  They had just gone out carrying her settee between them, when in no time she heard the sound of one of them returning.

  'That was…' As she turned, the word 'quick' died in her throat.

  To see Ellis Galbraith standing in her doorway, his eyes flicking round the room and coming to a stop when he saw the matching two chairs to the settee he had most likely just seen being carried to the removal van parked outside, made her wish furiously that the removal men had arrived at the time they had stated. It might all have been done by now. She might well have been in her new flat—Ellis would never have known that she had gone.

  Unspeaking, she surveyed him as he came further into the room, her composure returning as she realised he might know that she was moving, but there was no way he was going to know her new address.

  She was hopeful that since she had nothing to say, he might state the nature of his business. But, recalling that he never had yet given her any reason for why he had called, she was not too surprised that his opening remark should tell her nothing, save that he hadn't needed to stir himself to gather what was going on.

  'Doing a flit?' he enquired, his expression bland in the face of her not looking very pleased to see him.

  'I don't owe rent,' she told him waspishly. But she could see from the way he propped himself up against the back of an easy chair, the way he looked at her with one eyebrow ascending, that some comment she wasn't going to like would very shortly be coming her way.

  'But you owe your—landlord—don't you, Sorrel?'

  And, not done with his insolent questions, a taunting light had come to his eyes, when not waiting for a reply, he mocked, 'Get fed up with waiting for you to come across, did he?'

  'You…' she started to bite, then heard the two removal men coming back. 'I'm busy,' she snapped, of no mind to have a verbal set-to with other ears present. 'If you've got something concrete to say, say it and She broke off as the removal men came into the room.

  But she realised that Ellis didn't care who overheard what he said, as he took the risk of her not being so sensitive that she wouldn't scorch his ears with something acid in front of anyone listening. For, looking urbanely unruffled, he obliged by deigning, on this occasion, to tell her why, so untimely, he had arrived at her flat.

  'I called to ask you to have dinner with me tonight,' he
said pleasantly; his pleasant look staying although he had his answer in the sour look she threw him.

  'You have…' She stopped, the removal men looking at the two of them with open interest making her falter. It just wasn't in her then to reply, only to have Ellis come back with something which he wouldn't care if it embarrassed her or not. 'Come into the bedroom,' she told him, and could have killed him when, her only thought having been to get him out of earshot of the others, he murmured charmingly:

  'Now there's an invitation I won't refuse!'

  Furious with him, not seeing anything at all as funny as the smirking witnesses obviously did, Sorrel marched stormily into her bedroom and left him to follow or not as he pleased.

  She was in no mood to dress it up when the sound of her bedroom door closing told her that he had indeed taken up her invitation. And she was in no mood at all to sweetly turn down his, as she swung round to face him. In her view this should not have taken half a minute. She did not waste a second, but launched in straight away with:

  'In case you haven't yet got the picture, Ellis Galbraith, I'll clarify the position for you. I…'

  'This sounds as though it's going to be good,' he commented to interrupt her flow when she had just built up a fine head of steam.

  'It will be,' she said tartly, 'when you realise that for my part, I can do very well without seeing you again.'

  His expression was still relaxed, his manner easy still, but Sorrel did not miss the slight momentary narrowing of his eyes, before he suggested softly:

  'Scared, Sorrel?'

  She swallowed down more wrath that he had so effortlessly hit on that conclusion, and aimed a broadside at him to try to deflect any other conclusions he might reach.

  'Unusual though I'm sure it is for you to receive the big "E", Ellis, you'll just have to face it—you're just not every female's idea of a knight on a white charger!'

  It annoyed her intensely that instead of accepting gracefully that she had no wish to go out with him, Ellis should rock back on his heels as he favoured her with a thoughtful look that made her dearly want to know what he was thinking. She didn't like his second conclusion any better than she had liked the first.

  'You're still doing it.'

  'Doing what?' she snapped back, but wished she hadn't when he replied:

  'Running away.'

  'I'm n…' About to deny the charge, she halted, then shrugged indifferently. 'If that's the way you want to see my moving,' she said, and could have gasped at her own stupidity.

  For the shaken look that had come to him, the 'My God!' that left him, before he said, stunned, 'You're not moving flat just because I happen to know where you live!' told her that he had not been accusing her of physically running away from him, but of running away from any conversation with him that might go into areas which she did not want to face.

  Sarcasm was her only defence. Airily she let her eyes skim over him, hardening her heart at the weakness just having him with her evoked.

  'I believe, Ellis,' she drawled, 'that I may have mentioned your colossal conceit before.'

  But again she was to find that any attempt she made to cut him down to size was a non-starter. For as he recovered from the thought that he might be the reason for the removal van being outside, Sorrel saw that her sarcastic dart had not found its mark. The cool smile that was on his mouth told her that, as he challenged:

  'It goes without saying, of course, that you were going to let me know your forwarding address.'

  Sorrel had quite a line in insincere smiles herself. She selected one now, even as she thought 'over my dead body'. 'Of course,' she told him sweetly. 'Your name is right at the top of my mailing list.'

  His smile became genuine as amusement at her sarcasm briefly quirked the corner of his mouth. But his mouth had straightened, his eyes steady on hers as he suggested, 'Since I'm here, I'll save you the postage.'

  Like hell he would! she thought. No way was she going to do as he was asking and give him her new address. She rather thought he knew that anyway, for he waited no longer than a couple of seconds before he was on to another gambit.

  'Does the boy-friend get to know where you're going?'

  'Rod Drury, do you mean?' she asked in reply, needing a breather to assess what tack he was on now.

  'Safety in numbers?' he came back, reading her answer as meaning that she had more than one boyfriend.

  She didn't like his way of putting that question, any more than she liked the question itself, or any of this conversation.

  'I shan't be seeing Rod Drury again,' she told him flatly, wishing he would go. All was quiet in the other room again, and she wanted to go and check that a piece of furniture that wasn't supposed to go had not just been carted out. Though she did find a small relief that Ellis could not be so convinced it was on account of himself that she was moving, when he said quietly:

  'You thought it kinder to move than to give him any hope that you would marry him?' Sorrel looked at him, hoping her face was as expressionless as she was trying to make it. Then she saw him smile, as with some charm lie said, 'You must have quite a list of old addresses.'

  She did not miss the implication that he thought many men must have asked her to marry them and that she moved on every time someone got turned down. But that his remark should amuse her was unexpected, and she lowered her eyes lest Ellis, with his sharp perception, saw laughter there. Then, once more in control, she looked across at him, and had the hardest work in the world not to match his grin when sourly she told him:

  'You're getting very free with your compliments, Galbraith.' She turned her back on him and walked to the window, just the fact of him being there wearing down her resistance. 'I'm very busy,' she told him tonelessly, refusing to look at him again as she hoped he would take the hint.

  'Having dinner with me tonight?' he asked, his tone light.

  'No, thanks,' she replied, her back to him, her fingers gripping hard on to the windowsill. All was silent in the room, a silence that stretched. Soon Ellis would go without knowing where it was that she was going, and never would he know how much she wanted to go with him anywhere he asked.

  What was in his mind as he stood without saying a word, she had no idea. But when his deep voice suddenly broke the silence, and he said, 'Be happy,' she knew that those two words were his way of saying that he had accepted that she did not want to see him again.

  She did not move away from the window when the door of the bedroom opened and then quietly closed after him. And unshed tears were in her eyes as his last footsteps died away. Oh God, how much she loved him!

  Ellis did not look up to the window when he stepped outside the building. And Sorrel had all the evidence she needed that the prospect of not seeing her again had less than little the crippling effect that knowing she would not see him again had on her. For as one of the removal men admired Ellis's Jaguar parked next to the van, Ellis stopped to have a word, and though she could not hear what remarks passed between the two men, she was sure it was some goodhumoured banter when the sound of masculine laughter floated back up to the open window. She was feeling fairly frazzled when at long last she was able to say goodbye to the men who had moved her furniture, and closed the door of her new apartment. Though having her furniture placed more or less where she wanted it, and moving in, did not end there.

  But by the time she had unpacked and found homes for china, cutlery and cooking utensils, her nerve-ends had quietened. She even started to feel hungry as she undid the first of her suitcases and started to hang her clothes away. But if having found that by beavering away she was getting to feel better about having parted from Ellis a final second time, or so she told herself, Sorrel was not of a mind to get herself something to eat, when the time spent sitting down and disposing of anything she prepared would give Ellis free rein to take over her thoughts again.

  Determined as she had to be not to dwell on thoughts of him, she concentrated her thoughts on the totally emancipated woman she
was going to be. The sophisticated image she had adopted for a while had never been her anyway. What she must aim for now was something in between the still gullible person she knew she would always be deep down, and that aloof person who had never been quite her. Dear old Mr Ollerenshaw had meant her to have a good time, and she had tried, so from that point of view she was sure he would rest easy in his grave. But, basically, she was not happy with having nothing to do.

  Try as she would, Ellis insisted on not staying out of her thoughts for very long, as she remembered the 'Be happy', he had wished her. Well, she would be happy, she vowed. She was tougher now than she had been at seventeen. She would take a secretarial refresher— things were bound to have changed in the office world these last eight years—but she had been good at her job before, and she would be again.

  The thought jumped into her head from nowhere that she had probably been good at her job purely because it had been such a great joy to her each morning to go to work; to see Ellis; to do all she could to take the pressure off him and so leave him more time for more important work.

  Ousting Ellis from her thoughts again, the last of her clothes put away, Sorrel left her bedroom and pinned her thoughts determinedly on the career girl she was going to be; on the enjoyment she was sure she would find again in office work, regardless of whom was her boss.

  But although her sights were once more set on the fully emancipated woman she would be, she was to fall at the first hurdle. For finding, when she went to place anything on it, that the kitchen shelf had decided to give up the ghost, only just rescuing her coffee percolator before it went sliding into the sink, she was to discover that it wasn't any good to just push the few screws back and pray that they held—because they didn't.

  Not knowing one end of a screwdriver from another, even if she'd had one, she remembered that Rod Drury had left a handful of something he called Rawlplugs which he'd popped out for on her last moving day. She was sure she had seen them somewhere.

  Recognising that she had been totally and unpretentiously feminine on that occasion, with no Rod Drury there to help her this time, Sorrel refused to be beaten.