A Very Special Man

by Marjorie Lewty

  There were only three ‘possibles.’ Two were advertised by a secretarial agency. The third wanted a ‘secretary to the managing director of a small but up-and-coming company making plastic containers.’ It didn’t sound very exciting, but Chloe set off for the address given and, after asking her way several times, ended up in a back street in one of the few parts of the city that hadn’t yet been rebuilt after the war. The name of the company appeared on a wooden gate and she pushed it open and found herself in a yard where three cars were parked. Two were battered little jalopies. The third was a low-slung, olive-green sports car with a black hood.

  She stood quite still and it was as if her heart turned over and then began to beat again in slow thuds. She moved across the yard to the car, in a sort of dream. It couldn’t be—it was too much of a coincidence. She looked inside and began to breathe again. The same colour, the same make, but a much earlier model. The leather on the front passenger seat was worn. Thrown across the back seat was a grubby travelling rug and a cardboard box stacked with coloured plastic containers.

  It was ridiculous, and outside all reason, but Chloe couldn’t have applied for that job if her life had depended on it. She left the yard and made her way back to the centre of the city where she had parked the Mini. Then she drove home. Fortunately, in the middle of the afternoon, the road was not busy; which was just as well, for her mind was not one hundred per cent on her driving. She kept on thinking that she hadn’t much in the way of results to show for her day in Coventry, but at least it had shown her one humiliating thing. It wasn’t going to be as easy to put Benedict Dane out of her mind as she had supposed.

  But by the time she arrived home she was feeling rather foolish. How stupid to turn tail and dash away just because she had seen a familiar-looking car! She would probably see many of them in the future and she would have to get used to it. She would phone the secretarial agency straight away, and perhaps make an appointment for tomorrow.

  Jan was upstairs with the children and didn’t hear her come in. She went straight into the sitting room and sat down beside the telephone, unfolding the newspaper to find the agency number. But before she could lift the receiver the bell tinkled and then began to ring. The sound was so close to her ear and so unexpected that it made her jump and her voice shook a little as she gave the number.

  At the other end of the line a man said, ‘Chloe ? It is you, Chloe?’

  Immediately she thought, Benedict Dane! Then she realised it wasn’t; this voice was more clipped, not so deep.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘this is Chloe Martin.’

  There was a light laugh. ‘Remember me?’

  Roger! She drew in a quick breath. ‘Of course,’ she said warily, and waited for him to speak again.

  Another laugh. If it hadn’t been so out of character she might have thought he was embarrassed. ‘You don’t sound very pleased to hear me,’ he said.

  ‘Should I be?’

  There was a short silence. When he spoke next his tone had changed, become grave and earnest. ‘Look, Chloe my dear, I know this must be rather a surprise to you, but I should very much like to see you and have a talk.’

  ‘I don’t think,’ said Chloe, ‘that we have anything to talk about, Roger.’

  ‘Oh yes, but we have.’ He was using his masterful voice now, the voice he would use on a timid witness. ‘I went to see your aunt this morning and she told me you were staying with your sister for the time being.’

  ‘Yes, I am,’ said Chloe, and added hastily, ‘So it’s really hardly worth your while coming all the way here, Roger. If you have anything to say to me—’

  He was continuing as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘—so I drove up to Kenilworth straight away. I’ve booked in at the De Montfort Hotel and I’d like you to have dinner with me there this evening. I’ll pick you up about six.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Roger,’ began Chloe. She didn’t want to see Roger again, or talk to him, or listen to him talking. ‘I’m afraid I shan’t be free—’

  But Roger had rung off.

  Jan came into the room as Chloe was replacing the receiver, her lips pursed in futile annoyance. ‘It was Roger,’ she said. ‘He’s turned up at the De Montfort. He wants me to have dinner there with him.’

  Jan grinned. ‘They put on a jolly good meal.’

  Chloe groaned. ‘Oh goodness, I don’t want a good meal—not with Roger. It’s finished—over—done with—dead as a dodo. I just don’t want to see the man again. We haven’t a thing to discuss.’

  Jan was regarding her with an odd look. ‘He must think you have. It might be as well to convince him that you’re finished with him before…’

  She let the words trail away and Chloe glanced sharply at her. Was Jan still harping on the possibility of Benedict Dane returning? ‘Oh well,’ she said crossly, ‘I suppose I’ll have to see him, now he’s come all this way, but I wish he hadn’t.’

  The children were particularly noisy and inclined to be fractious over tea and Chloe escaped upstairs to bathe and change before the bathroom was needed. She dressed carefully, but without any particular pleasure, in the one dress she had brought with her that would be suitable— a cream jersey with a perky, coffee-coloured bolero, edged with narrowly-pleated chiffon. When she had done her face she looked at herself in the mirror and saw that there was a faintly heightened colour in her cheeks and her eyes were very bright. The light of battle, she thought grimly. If Roger, for some reason or other, had decided to renew their relationship, then she had to make him believe that she wasn’t prepared to, and that might not be easy. Roger could be very charming and very persuasive if he wanted to.

  Jan insisted on lending her a shawl that Derek had bought for her on their honeymoon in Morocco. ‘You need a wrap,’ she insisted, touching the fine, sand-coloured silk lovingly, ‘and I shan’t be wearing it myself for the moment. There’s the bell now, that’ll be Roger. I’ll go and let him in, shall I?’

  She ran down to open the door and Chloe witnessed their meeting from the landing. ‘Janice—how delightful! I hope you’re all quite recovered ?’ Roger, in an immaculate dark suit, held out his hand to Jan with a warmth of greeting that contrasted strangely with all the horrid things he had said about her only last week. ‘Chloe—my dear!’ He moved forward as she came downstairs and would have kissed her, but she twisted her head round to look down at Emma, who came rushing into the hall like a small torpedo, launching herself at Roger, her small face wreathed in smiles. Then she pulled up short. ‘It’s not him!’ she shouted accusingly. ‘It’s not Aunt Chloe’s boy-friend.’

  Roger, evidently determined, to make a good impression on all and sundry, patted Emma’s head and smiled down at her tolerantly. ‘Oh yes, I am Aunt Chloe’s boyfriend,’ he assured her, but she pushed him away furiously. ‘You’re not, you’re not!’ she spluttered, and burst into tears.

  Jan, muttering apologies, picked up her struggling offspring and carried her bodily into the kitchen, from whence the sound of scolding and howls could be heard.

  Roger, mystified but still smiling, turned to Chloe. ‘What was all that about?’

  She pulled Jan’s shawl round her shoulders. ‘Nothing really. Emma’s been difficult since she had ’flu. Shall we go?’

  She expected to see the small, second-hand car that was the best Roger had been able to afford, as a law student, but instead an elegant Porsche stood at the kerb.

  ‘I borrowed Dad’s car until I can get a new one of my own,’ he told her casually, opening the door for her.

  ‘What happened to the Imp?’ Chloe enquired as he got in beside her.

  The big car glided away almost silently. Chloe couldn’t help comparing it with Benedict Dane’s equally powerful sports car, frankly, noisily flamboyant, and vastly more exciting than this great purring cat of a machine.

  ‘I have an Allegro on order,’ Roger explained. ‘That’ll do for the moment. Later on I’ll probably settle for something better; a Lancia, possibly, or a Mercedes.�
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  Chloe considered enquiring flippantly if he had won on the Pools, but restrained herself. Roger had asked for this meeting and he was conducting it on his own terms, as formally as if he were working on some important brief. She glanced sideways at him as he drove the short distance to the centre of the town, and thought he looked different. The youthful Roger with the untidy hair and tine uncertain temper—the Roger she had imagined herself in love with—had disappeared. This Roger was smooth, self-assured, very much master of himself and the situation. She waited for some clue that would explain the change.

  The De Montfort Hotel was proud of its excellent reputation. For a small town hotel it was unusually luxurious and well-appointed. Roger looked round the elegant dining room as they took their seats at a corner table, and nodded approval.

  ‘I booked in here on the off-chance, but it seems quite a reasonable place,’ he admitted condescendingly. He smiled at Chloe across the table. ‘You’re looking very pretty this evening, Chloe,’ he said, and she felt that she had been awarded four stars for excellence, along with the hotel.

  They were more than halfway through the meal before Roger did more than make casual conversation about the food, the place, his new car. But at last, when the cheeseboard had been offered and he had carefully selected a choice ripe Stilton, while Chloe nibbled a biscuit, he leaned forward towards her and said, ‘Were you surprised to hear from me last night, Chloe?’

  ‘A little,’ she replied guardedly. ‘I assumed our last meeting was the final one.’

  He laughed lightly. ‘Silly girl, of course it wasn’t. I was in a real paddy that night. Surely you didn’t take it seriously?’

  ‘On the contrary,’ she said, ‘I took it very seriously indeed.’

  ‘But Chloe—dearest’—with the wryly humorous twist of the mouth that had once endeared him to her—‘you couldn’t possibly have thought I’d walk out on you just like that.’

  ‘You did walk out, just like that,’ she pointed out calmly. ‘And you took your ring with you, so naturally I assumed we were through. Certainly that was what I wanted.’

  She saw a flicker of annoyance cross his face. Roger meant to conduct this case on his own terms; it was really most tactless of the witness to add her own comments. But the annoyance passed immediately and he laughed, a tolerant laugh that set Chloe’s nerves jangling. ‘I can see there was some sort of misunderstanding,’ he said, ‘which is why I decided to come up here and put things right between us.’

  Put things right indeed! Chloe wasn’t a girl to bear grudges, but he couldn’t unsay the vicious things he had said that night. But what if he apologises? she thought in sudden panic. What can I say then?

  Coffee, at Roger’s request, was served to them in the lounge, which was large and extremely comfortable and empty except for two white-haired ladies at the far end of the room who were talking with transatlantic enthusiasm about the historic monuments they had been visiting.

  Roger pulled his chair near to Chloe’s and drew a small box from his pocket. ‘We’ll restore the status quo, shall we?’ he smiled, and took the small, well-remembered diamond cluster ring from the box. ‘Very soon I shall be able to buy my wife something much better than this, but for the time being I thought it would be nice for you to have the original one back. For—shall we say—sentimental reasons.’

  Chloe looked round uneasily. Two more parties had now come into the lounge and one of them was settling at the table next to theirs. ‘Aren’t you taking rather too much for granted, Roger?’ she said in a lowered voice. ‘We had a difference of opinion—remember?’

  ‘Oh, that!’ He waved it away. ‘That’s in the past, my sweet. The whole situation is quite different now. I could have told you before, but I wanted to keep it as a surprise that we could share when my ring was back in its proper place—on your finger.’ He moved his hand as if he would take hers and then, with a glance towards the next table, seemed to think better of it. ‘The fact is,’ he went on with a small, complacent smile, ‘that I’ve landed an appointment well worth waiting for. I’ve been accepted into one of the best firms in town. Only a learner as yet, of course, but I think I can say now that my future’s assured.’

  So this was what had happened to make such a change in him! Success had done more than gone to his head; it seemed to have altered his whole character. Or perhaps he was just acting the part, which made him rather pathetic. But she couldn’t afford pity. She only knew that this meeting had confirmed the fact that she wasn’t in love with him.

  She murmured congratulations and he looked at her reproachfully. ‘You don’t sound very excited, Chloe.’

  ‘Excited? Well, no. I’m very, very pleased for you, Roger, and I wish you the best of luck. But it doesn’t really concern me personally.’

  ‘Oh, my dear girl, of course it does. This doesn’t make any difference to the way I feel about you. I still want you for my wife.’

  She looked at him and saw him as he would be twenty years hence—rich, successful, almost certainly a Q.C. His fair hair, now sleeked down, would have thinned; his spare frame filled out comfortably; he would live the good life among Top People. And he would be very satisfied with himself. She could almost see his wife—soignee, witty, exquisitely dressed. And his wife’s name wasn’t Chloe. ‘Thank you, Roger,’ she said, ‘but I don’t think—’

  He wasn’t listening. ‘You see, Chloe, we can start off properly now, as I always intended to. We shall be able to afford a flat or a small house in a decent neighbourhood and—’

  She had to stop him. ‘Roger, please don’t go on. We’re not going to get married, you know. I meant what I said. When you walked out that night it really was the end.’

  He blinked and she saw that he still didn’t believe she wasn’t playing hard to get. Then he smiled tolerantly. ‘You’re not still holding that against me? It’s not like you to harbour resentment, Chloe. I may have said some harsh things, but you weren’t altogether blameless yourself, were you? A lovers’ tiff, that was all it was, and now I’ve come back to make it up. I took the first step, remember.’

  Yes, she thought, her heart sinking a little, it would be ungenerous to deny that. It would also be rather cruel to say, ‘I don’t love you, I know now that I never did, and I don’t want to marry you.’ She sensed that his pompous self-confidence was only a veneer, at the moment. He was wearing it as he was wearing his new, formal, well-cut suit. Rather desperately she tried to think of some way to make him understand that wouldn’t be too hurtful.

  The party at the next table had settled down now and their backs were turned. Roger reached for her left hand. In another moment he would have slipped the ring back on her finger and unless she made an unpleasant scene she would begin to feel well and truly trapped.

  She moved her hand away quickly. ‘Roger, there’s something I must tell you. I’m sorry, but—but I’ve met another man.’

  His chin jerked up as if she had slapped his face. His cheeks turned pale and then the red colour began to creep into them. ‘I don’t believe it,’ he said. ‘You can’t have done.’

  ‘But I have. Oh, I know it’s rather sudden, but—but, you see, I considered myself free. I was free. And—and these things happen, you know,’ she ended rather weakly. She thought about Benedict Dane, and what actually had happened, and she had an almost painful desire to giggle.

  There was a long silence while Roger stared at her, his expression hardening as it was borne in upon him that this was one case he had lost for good. ‘So that was what the child was talking about—Auntie Chloe’s boy-friend,’ he mimicked. ‘Some fellow you’ve picked up here, I take it?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘Some fellow I picked up here.’

  ‘You haven’t wasted much time, I must say. You might at least have told me when I phoned and not agreed to come out with me.’

  ‘You didn’t give me a chance to tell you,’ Chloe said. If only she had thought of this way out before, then she might have save
d them both this most unfortunate encounter. If only Benedict Dane had come back as he promised! She was in no state to work out exactly what difference that would have made.

  Roger shrugged, replaced the ring in its case slowly and deliberately and put it back in his pocket. ‘There’s no more to be said, then. I just hope,’ he looked keenly at her—‘that you won’t live to regret it.’

  To regret that she had thrown away such a marvellous catch? Poor Roger, his pride had taken a knock. But she had surely done the kindest thing in letting him know she had fallen suddenly, unexpectedly, for another man. So much kinder than telling him that he himself was unacceptable to her.

  He stood up, signalling to a waiter. ‘If you're ready, we’ll go. I had arranged to stay overnight, but as things have turned out I shall drive straight back to London.’ He smoothed his hair back. ‘It will suit me better, as a matter of fact, as I have a very important meeting at midday. You won’t mind if I get a taxi to take you home to your sister’s?’

  He was being very polite, very stiff, very distant. And so relieved did she feel that she wouldn’t have minded running all the way on her own two feet, but she had to carry this through to the end. ‘Thank you, Roger,’ she said meekly.

  She stood up too, while Roger dealt with the waiter, and picked up her handbag and Jan’s shawl. Then, as she looked up, her eyes widened and she froze suddenly. She had caught the merest glimpse of a man passing across the foyer beyond the doorway, but she would have known that lithe, arrogant stride anywhere. With a sinking dismay she admitted to herself that she could have picked Benedict Dane out immediately from any crowd.

  She walked stiffly beside Roger into the foyer, her heart thumping in great heavy beats. Would Benedict Dane see her, and if he came up to them how would he greet her? Would Roger take it that this was the man that she had fallen in love with? Her mind boggled.

  ‘I’ll get them to order a taxi for you,’ said Roger, and turned to the reception desk at the same moment that Benedict Dane turned away from it.

  He came towards them, smiling easily. ‘Well met, you two. Jan told me I’d find you here. And this is Roger? I’m Benedict Dane.’ He held out one hand to Roger in the friendliest way, the other he placed on Chloe’s shoulder in a gesture that might have been merely a casual greeting. Or it might have been intimate, possessive. It might have said, ‘This girl is mine now.’