Sweet Sanctuary

by Charlotte Lamb

  Sylvia, dismissed in so casual a fashion, slammed out of the shop without a word. Helen laughed.

  "Exit Lady Macbeth!"

  Kate was taken aback and stared at her. "Not that bad, surely?"

  Helen shrugged. "I don't know—Sylvia is inclined to go about ordering everyone to have their heads cut off."

  "More like the Red Queen in Alice than Lady Macbeth!"

  Helen grinned at her. "Maybe. I've never liked Sylvia, nor she me—she brought you here today to emphasise the fact that I'm in trade while she's marrying the lord of the manor."

  Kate was amused. "Nicholas? That doesn't sound like him."

  "Oh, he wouldn't recognise the description, but Sylvia is the most awful snob, and she's determined that he shall assert his 'position'—as she sees it. Sylvia and I were at school together. She's always thought that one day she would marry well—she has an acquisitive mind."

  Kate remembered Mrs. Butler saying something like that. She hurriedly changed the subject.

  "Have you got any dresses with a longer line? I prefer a low hem."

  "Strip to your undies and I'll bring some suitable things in to you," Helen told her.

  When she returned she gave Kate's very plain underclothes a long, disapproving stare. "You need new lingerie as well—a girl should be pretty from the skin outwards. Top dressing is only half the answer."

  She selected a gay green dress of jersey wool. It slid down over Kate as if it had been made for her, fitting snugly at bust and waist, but flaring out at the hip.

  "Semi-Russian style," Helen explained. The calf-length skirt flew out as Kate turned to face the mirror. Around the neck ran a choker of black braid, which was echoed at the hem, in a line of three.

  "It suits you. Gives you colour and style—I think you ought to have your hair re-styled, you know." Helen considered her, head to one side. "A page-boy bob, I think—give you a new image. Why not really go for the Russian look? I've got something else which will follow through with the same general look."

  Kate felt a timid excitement stirring. "Do you really think—?" She looked at herself, her cheeks pink, her eyes bright. The vivid green deepened the impact of her colouring, gave a new drama to the muted brown of her hair and eyes.

  Helen was decided. "Of course—just look in the mirror! You need bold styles and colours. Pastels would make you invisible. Why else do you think Sylvia was so keen for you to wear pastel shades? She wanted to make you look negative."

  Kate flushed even deeper. "Why on earth should she bother?"

  "Don't ask me," Helen shrugged. "If you don't know the answer I certainly don't. Knowing Sylvia I'd say she was making sure Nick never noticed you. She may be sure of herself, but she's the cold-headed sort who make doubly certain when they can."

  "She can't be afraid of me!" Kate was pale now, her colour gone.

  Helen was indifferent. "Probably not, but she was always the malicious sort. She just likes to quash all possible opposition, as a matter of course."

  She went off to look for other garments and brought back a peacock-blue trouser suit, with a loose tunic belted at the waist, bringing in a Russian look again.

  An hour later Kate had bought a pile of clothes, including several new skirts and some delicious, fragile, floating blouses in crepe, with loose sleeves tightly cuffed at the wrist and neat round collars which gave her a little-girl look. She had also insisted on buying two new sweaters, polo-neck and cowl-neck, one scarlet, the other yellow.

  "I must have something to wear when I'm working with the horses. I can hardly wear my trouser suit!"

  They walked amicably to the Copper Kettle together. There was no sign of Sylvia in the crowded dining-room. Helen left Kate there, shaking hands warmly, and returned to her shop. Kate ordered, after a while, and ate a simple salad. Sylvia had still not appeared, so she went back to the dress shop.

  "Why not take the opportunity to have your hair fixed?" Helen suggested.

  "I ought to get back to Sanctuary. I do work there, remember."

  "How can you leave without Sylvia? The bus is very unreliable. It only runs a few times a day, and I don't know when it's due next."

  Kate was undecided, so Helen picked up the phone and began to dial.

  "Are you ringing the bus company?"

  "No—Nick," said Helen firmly.

  "Please, I'd rather not…" Kate was cut off in her stammered dismay when Helen spoke into the telephone.

  She was put through to Nick at once, and greeted him in a cheerful, intimate fashion. After a few friendly remarks, she explained the situation. Suddenly she handed the phone to Kate, smiling.

  "He wants to speak to you."

  Kate nervously said, "Hallo."

  "Helen says you want to have your hair done and buy some new shoes—will you be ready to leave at five? I'll drive you back myself if you can be at the Copper Kettle around five." He sounded abrupt but courteous.

  "Thank you," she said lamely.

  There was a pause, then he said tersely, "Five, then? Goodbye." The phone clicked at his end. She put the receiver down carefully.

  Helen looked enquiringly at her. "Well?"

  "He'll pick me up at five at the Copper Kettle."

  "That's marvellous. Come on, I'll take you down to the hairdresser."

  Feeling more like a puppet than a human being, Kate allowed herself to be hustled along to the hairdresser's shop. Helen gave her instructions clearly and left. Kate sat, watching in awed surprise, as the clever scissors clipped and darted around her head.

  Later, seated under the dryer, she was dreamily watching the passing traffic when she recognised Sylvia's car. A tangle of some sort had developed. Sylvia was impatiently hooting at the car in front. Beside her, his arm along the back of the seat, watching her with open amusement, was a rather distinguished man with silver-grey hair and a lean, still handsome face. His suit was elegant well-cut, expensive. He was, Kate judged, well on the wrong side of forty.

  Sylvia's father? Kate watched them curiously. Whoever he was, the stranger found Sylvia fascinating. Suddenly the blonde head turned and Sylvia looked at him in provocative interest.

  Again, Kate pondered on their relationship. There was, even at this distance, no doubt as to the intimacy of their acquaintance. But its nature was more difficult to assess.

  The traffic cleared. The little sports car shot away. Kate leaned back, frowning.

  When her hair was finished, she was delighted with Helen's inspiration. The sleek brown shine, the gentle wave where it curled inwards, gave her a new appearance. Her features were more interesting in their new frame. She was still not exactly pretty, she sighed, but at least it was an improvement.

  Helen was far more enthusiastic when she got back to the shop. She walked all round Kate, exclaiming in pleasure.

  "What did I tell you? Aren't you delighted?"

  "I do like it," Kate admitted.

  "Lukewarm! It's an enormous change for the better," Helen said firmly.

  Kate laughed. "I'm beginning to feel like the flower girl in Pygmalion! I don't feel myself at all."

  "Shoes now," instructed Helen.

  Kate groaned. "Must I? I'm worn out!"

  "Rebirth is tiring, I believe," said Helen blandly. "Don't spoil the ship for a ha'porth of tar! Shoes!"

  Wearily Kate followed her to the shoe shop. Soon the floor was littered with open boxes and discarded styles. Helen was inexorable. She would not settle for anything less than perfection, When at last Kate had acquired several pairs of shoes and a pair of elegant sandals, Helen agreed finally to release her.

  Laden with parcels and boxes, Kate sat in the dress shop watching the clock. Helen said happily that she would shut up shop early for once, and join Kate for tea in the Copper Kettle.

  "We can have a nice cosy chat over a pot of tea and some cakes, I'm starving. I skipped lunch today because my assistant is off sick."

  "Don't you close for lunch?"

  "No—we get a lot of our
custom during lunchtime because so many of the girls from other shops pop in in their lunch break."

  They found a corner table and settled down. The waitress brought them a tray of tea, smiled at Helen and wandered away.

  "What do you think of Nick?" Helen asked Kate suddenly.

  Kate jumped, her cheeks suddenly very pink. "What? Oh… h—he seems very pleasant."

  Helen looked at her in amusement. "Yes," she said calmly, "he's a charmer. Half the girls in Essex have fallen for Nick at one time. I had a crush on him myself when I was sixteen. I know the signs."

  Kate looked away from the probing, too clearsighted eyes. She hoped Helen was not reading too much into her stammered reply. The sudden question had taken her by surprise.

  But Helen was examining the plate of home-made cakes, choosing a slice of butter-iced sponge after a moment, and transferring it to her own plate.

  Picking up her fork, she murmured, "Do help yourself!"

  Kate hurriedly took a jam tart. It tasted of sawdust and she ate it automatically.

  After a moment Helen resumed her theme. "Nick was considered our local Lothario for ages. He took out various girls, but it never seemed serious. Then he met Sylvia—or rather Sylvia made up her mind that Nick would do for her. She'd known him for years, of course, in a distant sort of way. She'd been playing the field, just as Nick had—a new boy-friend every week. None of them were rich enough, so she singled Nick out and soon had him in a corner."

  Kate stared at her plate. "You make it sound more like a fight than a love affair!"

  "I've never believed Sylvia capable of any honest emotion," Helen said coolly.

  "You really don't like her, do you?"

  There was a little pauses Helen grinned, lifting her slim shoulders in a shrug. "Never could stand the sight of her—I hate being patronised."

  "She's very beautiful."

  "She knows it? That's most of the trouble—she's like the Lady of Shalott. She's looked into the mirror for so long that she couldn't bear the sight of life itself. She's self-obsessed."

  Kate pushed her plate away. "Poor Nick!" She said it lightly, but her heart was heavy.

  "Oh, yes, poor Nick—marriage with Sylvia will be perfect hell, I imagine." Helen frowned. "Unless somebody enlightens him about her, before the knot is tied."

  Kate hardly heard her. She was staring across the room, her brown eyes wide and vulnerable. Nick had just come into the Copper Kettle. He was closing the door, his back towards her, and for a brief second Kate could look at him without being observed.

  Then he turned, and she felt her heart begin to thud against her ribs, so that she was scared someone would hear it. Her throat felt dry and rough. Her hands were damp with sudden nerves.

  What's the matter with me? she asked herself irritably. I'm behaving like a schoolgirl. Vaguely she recalled what Helen had said—was that what was happening to her, was she infatuated with Nicholas, as Helen had been at sixteen?

  She brushed the thought away angrily. With an effort she looked at him, smiling calmly.

  He stood in front of her, staring at her, the grey glance skimming from her shining brown head to her elegant new shoes. Then he grinned at Helen. "Are you responsible for this transformation? She's a different girl!"

  "You approve?" Helen watched him curiously.

  Nicholas open his mouth, then closed it again. An odd expression passed over his face. After a moment, he smiled. "You're to be congratulated. You've altered her beyond belief."

  Helen laughed. "You'll soon have young men queuing up at Sanctuary for the honour of taking her out!"

  Nicholas sat down suddenly. "No doubt," he agreed brusquely.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Nick was very quiet as he drove back to Sanctuary. From beneath her half-closed lids Kate watched him, sidelong, his profile silhouetted against the pale dusk of the evening sky. The spring sunshine had evaporated. The dew was falling. A faint, delicious odour still clung to hedge and field, that untraceable scent of spring which is compounded of flowers, new grass and burgeoning leaf.

  In this shadowy atmosphere Nick looked suddenly unfamiliar once more. She remembered, with a pang, how he had seemed to her when they first met. How inexplicable are our first impressions, and how hard to pin down later, when constant contact has erased that first clear imprint. How had she seen him then? The executive type, smooth and well-groomed, with a sardonic expression?

  Well, she thought wryly, watching him, that was still what he looked like to the casual stranger, no doubt. He was wearing his office clothes, well-tailored, expensive and breathing an air of success. The dark hair was brushed down. The eyes, staring at the road ahead, were a wintry grey as they contemplated some mental problem or other. His well-cut mouth had a sardonic twist to it at this moment, too, as if those thoughts were ironic and made him contemptuous.

  Only now she knew what lay beneath this off-putting exterior. He could shed this skin with a shrug of his broad shoulders. The man about town, the successful architect, could in a second become a countryman, casually dressed and relaxed, tolerant, easygoing and charming.

  Which was the real man? she wondered suddenly. Was Nick really happier at Sanctuary, in his old clothes, tramping over the fields with Punch, Patch and Poppy? Or was this the real Nick, this elegant stranger with the cool, withdrawn expression, who drove without speaking to her and was a hundred miles from here in his thoughts?

  Perhaps that was the real reason for his involvement with Sylvia, that relationship which so disturbed his aunt? Was the Nick who loved Sylvia this man now seated beside her? Was that the real man? Had his aunt lost contact with him while she sought comfort in her dream world at Sanctuary, caring for the animals she rescued because she could no longer cope with the realities of life with Nick?

  Kate had never been able to understand why the warm, amiable man who loved his aunt had fallen in love with so hard, so cold a creature as Sylvia.

  She had believed until now that the shell Nick assumed when he left Sanctuary was merely a discardable disguise. Now she wondered if, perhaps, the shell were not the real man and the man his aunt thought she knew were truly a disguise.

  She shook her head, grimacing. Her thoughts buzzed in her head like bees in a hollow tree.

  Nick laughed. She jumped and looked at him with wide eyes. He smiled at her, his face so warmly familiar that her heart leapt in relief and delight.

  "You looked so funny! You've been making the most amazing faces and mumbling away…"

  She was alarmed. "What did I say?"

  "No idea! It was quite incoherent. I thought you'd fallen asleep and I was going to shake you when I saw you shaking yourself." He grinned at her.

  "I was trying to work something out," she said evasively.

  "Money worries? Anything I can do to help?" He was instantly alert, his eyes concerned.

  She shook her head. "Nothing like that."

  "Like to tell me about it?"

  "Thank you, but it wasn't really that sort of problem."

  He shot her a sideways glance. "You…you haven't been worrying about us, have you?" He was flushed suddenly. He turned his head back and stared ahead into the dusk. "I mean, I hope I didn't upset you when I kissed you. I lost my temper. I meant to apologise before, but I couldn't get round to it."

  "It didn't bother me at all," she said in a manner meant to sound lightly casual, but which came out somehow rather snubbing.

  Nick laughed again, but harshly. "I'm glad."

  He did not sound glad, she noted unhappily. He sounded… But she turned away from the thought as from, something that hurt.

  "All the same," he went on after a moment, "you must take what I said about Jimmy seriously. I did mean that."

  Yes, she thought, you meant that. But you didn't mean that kiss, the kiss so stupidly given and so irrevocably received.

  "Do you hear me, Kate?" He looked at her angrily, frowning. "Jimmy is a flirt. You seem to get on well with Helen. She knows Jimmy o
nly too well. Ask her if you don't believe me."

  "I don't need to do that," she said quietly. She had already recognised Jimmy. Flirts were not that hard to recognise, even for someone as inexperienced as herself. She had not been prepared to listen to Nick, that was all. She had not wanted him to lecture her as though… as though she were a child. That had been the painful point. Who wants to be considered a child when they are fully aware of their womanhood?

  Nick had misunderstood her, however. His face darkened again. "You don't need to? Of course, I forgot how much you want experience! I only hope you won't have to pay too highly for it. Nothing is cheap today, you know."

  The harshness of his tone was bitter to her. She did not answer him. It hurt too much to quarrel with him.

  After a moment he sighed. "I really don't know what's wrong with me! I seem to be turning into a surly bear. I'm sorry, Kate. I meant well."

  "I know," she whispered, smiling without looking at him.

  "Pax?"

  She smiled and nodded. "Pax."

  He took one hand off the wheel and briefly touched her hands where they lay in her lap. The contact sent an electric shock up her arm to her heart. Never in her life before had she been so aware of the effect emotion can have on the body. Her mind and her body had been separate until now. Suddenly every tiny emotion caused a reaction physically. She was conscious of every pulse in her body, every nerve-end, every beat of her heart. She was even more conscious of Nicholas. His separate intake of breath, his tiny movements, reacted in her. She felt as though there was a physical link between them, as though his blood pumped along her veins too, his breath filled her lungs.

  "You're at it again," he said, making her jump violently.

  "What?" She blinked at him.

  "Dreaming and grimacing… You must have the most horrific daydreams since King Kong!"

  She laughed, with an effort.

  He braked at the gates of Sanctuary, making her sit up in surprise. The lane was empty. There was no other vehicle in sight. The twilight had given a magic significance to every branch, every blade of grass. A pale, fading light irradiated the sky, in the east, and a thin moon swam in a web of transparent cloud. The birds were sleepily calling from their invisible nests. A cloud of midges hovered under one of the trees, rising and falling in a dark cluster.