Avoiding Mr Right (12 page)

‘I want to give a dinner party on board,’ she began.

Christina nodded. The film people, she surmised. She fished her notepad out of her pocket. ‘How many?’

The Princess grimaced. ‘Depends. Eight or so, I suppose. We can’t expect my husband to be here, of course.’ There was an edge to her voice.

Simon did not look up but he began to kick the rug ferociously. Christina said nothing but her heart went out to him.

His mother did not seem to notice. ‘Nor my brother, from the looks of it. Really, it’s too bad of them.’

Pru looked up from her position in the crook of her mother’s arm. ‘Uncle Kay is coming,’ she announced.

Simon turned his head.

The Princess gave her a squeeze. ‘Yes, darling, of course he is. We just aren’t sure when.’

She met Christina’s eyes over the top of Pru’s head. ‘Men,’ she said. ‘I don’t care for myself but I can’t bear it when they let the children down.’

Christina did not comment. She hardly needed to. She and the Princess were at one on the subject. The absent Prince could not have slipped much further in her estimation anyway, so she was not surprised by this revelation.

In fact, she thought wryly, there was only one man who came lower on her personal scale of values and that was Luc Henri. Which made it all the more crazy that a bit of her was still regretting that she had turned him down.

There was the sound of running feet on the deck above them. Violent voices followed. Christina recognised one or two key words. She put down her notes.

‘I think,’ she said carefully, ‘I’ve just realised what the port authorities wanted. Excuse me, madam.’

She pelted out of the stateroom and up to the bridge. Alarmed, the Princess followed.

The captain was nowhere to be seen. Two of the crew were standing there looking worried. A small boat was racing across the water towards them. The harbour-master was standing in its stern with a loud hailer. Fierce Italian fell about their ears. Christina winced.

‘We were supposed to move,’ she said to the crew crisply. ‘They want to berth that big yacht over there here. We should have cast off ten minutes ago,’ she added, in an edited translation of the screams from the launch.

She became aware that the screams were being answered in equally excitable Greek. Instead of moving the
Lady Elaine
, the captain and his first officer were leaning over the side, enthusiastically exchanging bilingual insults.

One of the sailors in the launch saw her and said something to his master. Captain Demetrius followed the pointing finger. He swung round, looking up. He saw her.

‘Get down here,’ he yelled, adding an unaffectionate epithet. ‘Tell that idiot I don’t understand a word he’s saying.’

It was only Christina’s professional standards that made her obey him—that and the faint, dwindling hope that she might be able to avert disaster. It was hopeless, of course. Translating, hauling on ropes that had got too wet to handle properly, running to pass information between Captain Demetrius and the harbour-master in the launch, Christina could see it coming.

Watched by excited children and a disbelieving Princess, the captain took the
Lady Elaine
through a series of complicated manoeuvres that seemed to take for ever but did not move her appreciably from her original mooring. Meanwhile, the big yacht, coming beautifully in under sail, got close and closer.

The harbour-master danced with fury and frustration in his launch. ‘Have these morons ever taken a rubber duck into the bath with them?’ he roared at Christina. ‘Do they know anything about steering?’

She did not translate that.

And then the captain gave one last, exaggerated turn to the wheel. Slowly, gracefully, the
Lady Elaine
swung her bow out to sea and rammed full into the side of the yacht.

The Princess screamed. The captain swore. The harbour-master flung his loud hailer into the air and howled. The children looked on with sparkling eyes.

And Christina sat down on the bottom step of the companion-way, dropped her head in her hands and gave way to helpless laughter, until she became aware of Simon standing in front of her, his eyes gleaming.

‘Now,’ he said with immense satisfaction, ‘Uncle Kay will
have
to come and take charge.’

CHAPTER SIX

C
HRISTINA stood up. ‘Oh, I think we can manage without His Highness,’ she said, ruffled.

She smoothed her hair, curbed her giggles and went to assist negotiations.

‘Where do you want us?’ she asked the harbour-master, at last.

She was editing Captain Demetrius’s inflammatory speech with abandon. It was clear that the harbour-master knew it. He glared at the captain.

‘Where I want this floating traffic hazard is somebody else’s harbour,’ he spat, but he could not resist cornflower-blue eyes. He sighed. ‘You are persuasive,
signorina.
And I suppose I would not want it on my conscience that I let Captain Blood up there loose on the high seas again. Very well. But you tell the Prince that he gets a new captain or this boat does not leave port. Understood?’

She nodded diplomatically but under her breath she said, ‘Gee, thanks.’

When the launch had gone, zipping over the waves like an angry wasp, she eyed Simon thoughtfully. She had been entertaining a suspicion about Simon for several hours. From the complacent look on his face now, she was almost certain that she was right.

‘Simon, you know how to get in touch with your uncle, don’t you?’

Complacency dissolved into consternation so fast that it was ludicrous. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he hedged. ‘Mother calls his office…’

Christina pursed her lips. ‘I’m not talking about your mother. I’m talking about you. I think you could speak to him right now if you wanted to. In fact, I think your uncle Kay may be lot closer than anyone thinks. And you know it even if your mother doesn’t.’

Simon went red.

‘Uncle Kay says Mummy is a nuisance,’ Pru remarked chattily. ‘Do you think he’ll say the captain’s a nuisance as well?’

‘I should think he’ll say we’re all a nuisance,’ said Christina, her antagonism fanned by the small girl’s artless confidence. What right had the man to be saying such things to Pru about her mother? Especially as he could not even be bothered to join the cruise that he had sent them all off on. ‘Simon—’

‘Oh, no. He likes you,’ Pru said with confidence.

But Christina was narrowing her eyes with intent at Simon. She flapped an irritated hand at this diversion. ‘Your uncle Kay doesn’t even know I exist.’

‘Uncle Kay knows
everyone
,’ Pru said proudly. ‘Sir Goraev says that’s what makes him a great man.’

‘Who is Sir Goraev?’ snapped Christina. ‘Court flatterer?’

That went over Pru’s head. It was probably just as well, thought Christina. This situation was hardly the children’s fault.

Pru was struggling to explain Sir Goraev. ‘He runs things. He ran things for my grandfather too. He’s very old and doesn’t like people. But he likes Uncle Kay.’ She was obviously quoting. ‘Uncle Kay never forgets any of his depin-dipen—’

‘Dependants,’ Simon supplied. His colour had returned to normal. He gave Christina a bland smile which set her teeth on edge.

‘I, however, am not one of his dependants,’ Christina snapped, quite forgetting that this was only a child. She caught herself, irritated, and sighed. ‘Simon, you’re a superior little beast. I hope you’re eaten by a giant jellyfish.’

He grinned, unconcerned.

But Pru was still on the old tack. She shook her head obstinately. ‘Uncle Kay knows all about you. He said—’

‘Pru!’ Simon stopped grinning.

Pru made a face but did not say any more. Christina wondered what their absent uncle had said to them. Something to worry them, from the looks of it. She reminded herself firmly that it was none of her business.

She went back to the kitchen and made a pastry case for a beef Wellington. She found herself bashing the pastry as if it were a personal enemy. As if it were the Prince of Kholkhastan, she thought with grim self-mockery.

As a result of the day’s disasters, the evening meal was late. Everyone succumbed to temper, from the children, who were overtired, to the captain. Demetrius whiled away the interval before dinner by drinking his way steadily through a bottle of brandy and received his tray from Christina with a slow smile that made her grateful that she had put on a long cotton skirt against the night air.

‘This is horrible,’ said the Princess, pacing the top deck restlessly after a screaming Pru had finally been coaxed into bed. ‘It’s supposed to be a holiday and I spend my time refereeing tantrums. Not all of them children’s.’

Christina nodded sympathetically. She tidied coffee-cups from the family meal onto a tray.

‘I’d really like to go ashore.’ The Princess looked wistfully at the harbour. ‘It’s not that late. I could meet a couple of friends. Maybe dance. Would you—er—cover for me?’

While she met Stuart Define?

‘I’ll keep an eye on the children,’ Christina said carefully.

‘Well, Pru anyway. Simon probably won’t let you. He’s holed up playing computer games in his uncle’s study.’ She sighed. ‘I don’t know what’s got into my son, Christina. He’s been so
rude
lately.’

Christina concentrated on the exact placement of a silver sugar bowl on her tray. She did not look at the Princess.

‘Perhaps he’s missing his father,’ she suggested in an even voice.

The Princess’s conscience did not seem to be touched. She snorted. ‘He should have got used to that by now,’ she said harshly. ‘My husband is like my brother. They compartmentalise. Women and children come in a very small compartment.’

Christina was startled into looking at her. The beautifully made-up face looked tight, as if the Princess was trying not to cry.

She said, ‘Have you got a boyfriend, Christina?’

‘We-ell—’

‘The boy the children were talking about—the one who teaches them swimming?’

‘No,’ said Christina.

But the Princess was too absorbed in her own train of thought to hear her. ‘Well, let me give you some advice: don’t let any man get a hold on you. Men are like children—the moment they see you’re fond of them they reckon they can do anything they like and you’ll put up with it.’

Christina’s thoughts flew at once to Luc. She had accused him of thinking that he could do any damned thing he wanted. It seemed he was not alone. He had been pretty sure of her. ‘Why drag it out? Don’t go back… I can give you a better time.’ Oh, yes, he fitted the Princess’s pattern all right. Had he detected that she was fond of him, then? At the thought her whole body burned.

‘I believe you,’ she said with feeling.

‘You’re a nice girl, Christina,’ the Princess said unexpectedly. ‘Don’t let them do it to you.’ She looked at her watch again. ‘Hell, I’m going. What have I got to lose? See if you can get Simon to bed by midnight. I’ll see you in the morning.’

She went. Christina washed up, set various trays for breakfast and went out onto the foredeck.

Most of the crew were ashore. The captain and his cousin were working their way down a second bottle of brandy and did not emerge from the bridge. The only light was in the study where Simon was presumably still playing with his laptop computer. Or perhaps he was watching a video.

Christina groaned inwardly. It was probably something violently unsuitable. No doubt it was her responsibility to stop him. She went to investigate.

But Simon was not watching any of the expensive screens with which the study was provided. Simon was using his mother’s mobile telephone. He had his back to the door. He sounded angry and upset.

‘I know, I know. But we can’t
wait
.’ He paused and then said clearly in answer to some question, ‘What? Nobody.’ Another pause, then, ‘When? Oh, that’s great. See you then. She
will
be surprised.’

He clicked off the phone, pushed down its aerial and folded the mouthpiece before putting it down on the desk. Christina closed the door quietly. Simon jumped and swung round.

‘Oh—Christina.’ He sounded more than startled. He sounded slightly guilty, she thought. ‘I didn’t hear you. I thought you’d gone with Mummy.’

Christina eyed him narrowly. ‘Was that what you were telling your father?’

Simon looked puzzled. ‘My father?’

‘Isn’t that who you were on the phone to?’

Enlightenment dawned. ‘Oh. No. That was my uncle.’

Having her suspicions confirmed so comprehensively was surprisingly unrewarding. In spite of her sympathy for Simon, Christina’s mouth tightened. ‘Do you report in daily?’

Simon flushed. ‘Uncle Kay told me I wasn’t to tell,’ he began unhappily.

She softened at once. ‘It’s all right. It’s not your fault. Your uncle told you to call him and you’re only doing what you think is right.’

And if I ever get my hands on that uncle I shall tell him what I think of men who expect children to spy on adults, she promised herself silently.

Simon did not look comforted. ‘He’s coming now,’ he blurted out.

‘Is he?’ Christina said gently. ‘That’s all right, then, isn’t it?’

‘I wasn’t supposed to tell you,’ Simon muttered.

She put an arm round his shoulders. ‘It’s all right. I won’t tell anyone else. Anyway, when will he be here? Tomorrow? Or the day after? So we won’t have to keep it secret for long.’

Simon bit his lip. ‘Er—no.’ He squirmed out of her hold. ‘I think I’ll go to bed. I’m very sleepy.’ He gave an exaggerated yawn. ‘Goodnight, Christina.’

‘Goodnight,’ she said, puzzled.

He went. She tidied up, closed the door after him and went slowly on deck.

It was a beautiful night. The stars were vivid. If you half closed your eyes you could imagine them rushing towards you on an icy, burning wind. Christina shivered, rubbing her arms. Like the icy burning at the core of her body when Luc Henri touched her, she thought wryly. Memorable but all in the imagination. Oh, why couldn’t she get the man out of her head?

She paced the boat restlessly, trying to do just that. She was not very successful. There was no one else about and her thoughts kept straying back to him, no matter how much she tried.