Next Door to Romance (23 page)

Sir Gerald clicked his tongue in an expression of amused resignation.

'That woman! Quite the nicest member of the family, but her middle name must surely be indiscretion! One can hardly wonder that Cosgrave has so often got exasperated with her! Still, there it is—confirmation of what I've said. Cosgrave, for some unknown reason, lost his nerve—and Saville was waiting his chance to take over. Incidentally he's made a brilliant job of it. He's contrived to give an impression of an empire built on foundations that will last for ever, whereas in fact, the way things were going there were no foundations at all to speak of. Yes, a brilliant piece of work!'

'And something with which Evadne could help him as I never would have been able to,' Lisa said quietly. 'I should always have made the same sort of blunders that Mrs Cosgrave does. I'd already made some, in fact.'

'Yes—well, you were bound to,' Sir Gerald said gruffly. 'Your trouble is the same as Mrs Cosgrave's— you're both too nice and too honest—' he stopped short at the pain in Lisa's face. 'Sorry, old lady, I shouldn't have said that,' he said regretfully.

'But it's the truth, isn't it?' Lisa said steadily. 'That Mr Cosgrave isn't very nice or very honest? And that Mark will be just such another—if he isn't already?'

Silently Sir Gerald laid his hand over hers and held it very tight, and Lisa needed no other answer.

Lisa walked home with her head in the air and her lips pressed together in a thin, firm line.

She knew what was ahead of her. A difficult, bitter time for which she had no one to thank but herself. She had been stupidly, perhaps wilfully blind. Everyone else, it seemed—her parents, Uncle Gerald, Tom, had disliked and mistrusted Mark. Only she had been deceived by his gaiety and charm.

'But there are two Marks,' she told herself restlessly. 'The one who at least
thought
he loved me for a little time, and the other who would never dream of letting anything, even love, stand in the way of achieving his ambitions—and that's the one who has won!'

For, though she lacked confirmation, she was reasonably sure why Mark had jilted her and married Evadne, and it was a totally different reason than that he had discovered he had made a mistake and cared more for Evadne than he did for her. That would at least have been something beyond his control. But this—!

Mrs Cosgrave had spoken of Mark having taken control of the firm's affairs. Well, what more likely than that though Mr Cosgrave had no choice but to agree to that, he had none the less made a condition which would mean he had some sort of control over Mark—in other words, he must marry Evadne.

Or was it that Mark himself had decided that to do so strengthened his own position if, later on, Mr Cosgrave recovered his health and was to take the lion's share of the prosperity which Mark's skill had brought to the firm?

One or the other—it really didn't matter which, for the answer was the same. Mark's guiding star was ambition, not love.

It hurt Lisa more than anything had hurt her in her life before because, until now, she had never met men who valued neither integrity nor the well-being of those who cared for them.

Her father, Uncle Gerald and—yes, Tom—had been the men on whom she had unconsciously based her standards. You could rely on them being neither selfish nor dishonest and so she had foolishly come to believe that all men were like them. It had left her completely vulnerable and now, shatteringly, she knew that she had been wrong and that the man who had taught her so was the very one whom she had cared for most.

She caught her lip between her teeth and forced back a sob. She mustn't lose control of herself. She'd been a fool and as a result had been badly hurt. But that was her affair. No one else should suffer if she could help it. Pride dictated that.

Her parents had got to know, of course, and they would not be deceived. They would know she was desperately unhappy and they would suffer with her. But at heart they, like Uncle Gerald, would be glad she wasn't going to marry Mark and so would read far more than was justifiable into every sign that could possibly be interpreted as meaning that she was getting over it.

And of course, sooner or later she would get over it. Mark's image would fade into the past and she might even be able to look forward again. At least, common sense suggested that.

But no matter how true it might be, it didn't help now. It was, she thought wryly, rather like having a tooth out with a local anaesthetic. For a while afterwards, one felt no pain at all. Then the numbness wore off—

Her lips quivered and, almost home, she turned sharply off the road and so to that sparkling stream that she and Tom had sat by that early May morning which seemed so long ago. But now she was not conscious of the beauty which surrounded her as she flung herself face down on the short, dry grass and buried her face in her arms. But even then she couldn't cry. The hurt went too deep for that. Instead, heavy, dry sobs racked her—

At last even they stopped and she told herself that she must pull herself together and face up to telling her parents. But it required too great an effort to move and so she lay there, very still, utter dejection in every line of her slim, tense body.

Tom, watching her silently from behind the shelter of a great oak, clenched his hands in the effort it needed to stay where he was. Every natural human instinct urged him to go to Lisa and do his best to comfort her, but that, he knew, was out of the question. For the moment at least, nothing and no one could help her except her own courage and pride. And for another, he knew Lisa too well ever to let her know he had seen her like this with all her defences down. That would humiliate her even more than she already was.

He swore softly under his breath, his hands clenching and unclenching. If Mark Saville had come along at that moment, it would have gone hard with him!

Then, as Lisa stirred slightly and he thought she might be getting up, he slipped silently back the way he had come.

Half an hour later, Lisa returned to the house, and though she was very pale, she had gained complete control of herself. Tom thanked his stars that he hadn't let her know of his presence, for now, unaided, she had taken the first and perhaps the most difficult step of the long, hard journey she had got to take if there was to be any future happiness for her. And that should do more for her self-respect than any amount of help from someone else could have done.

Yes, he was thankful, for her sake, but, he thought grimly, no one would ever know what torture it had been to stand aside and let her fight it out for herself.

Somehow or other Lisa contrived to keep up appearances. It wasn't easy, especially when she intercepted the anxious, loving expression in her mother's eyes, though that, she told herself, was only to be expected and one just had to grin and bear it.

But at least no one who mattered referred to what had happened. What, after all, was there to be said when, as she knew quite well, they were thankful that Mark had gone out of her life, though, as she had known would be the case, they grieved for her unhappiness.

For one thing, she was very, very grateful. Everyone conspired to keep her so busy that she had hardly a spare moment to think, which was just what she needed.

Not that it was always possible to forget. Memory played treacherous tricks. Something quite small and unimportant in itself would bring back a vivid mental picture of Mark, of his gay charm and the happiness they had shared. Or had Mark ever been really happy? Had he always had the fear in the background of his mind that though she attracted him, she might be a millstone round his neck when it came to achieving his ambitions? Perhaps, really, Mark should be pitied. To be torn two ways, knowing that it was impossible to gratify two such divergent desires—

And that she could find it in her heart to pity the man who had treated her so shabbily was, if only she had realized it, the turning point for Lisa. Nothing Mark could do now or anything she remembered about him would ever hurt so much again.

As far as Lisa knew, Mark never came back to the Manor again. Certainly she never saw him and at least he had the good taste not to seek her out. He had written to her once, a week after his marriage to Evadne. But what he had said Lisa had no idea. . For a long time she sat very still with the letter lying on the table before her. Then, without opening it, she burnt it. After all, there was nothing he could say that would make any difference.

After that, nothing except hard work—the harder the better, and the determination not to make a pest of herself to other people.

It worked out pretty well. Celia, short of a kennel-maid, asked her if she would fill in temporarily for a few hours a day, and in addition, without comment from either of them she slipped back into helping Tom during surgery hours. Occasionally, too, he asked her to come on his rounds, but always, as he made clear— and she realized it was the truth—because he needed her help. That being the case, she could go with him without any sense of being in his debt for giving her a break.

These trips were all the more enjoyable because Tom had at last bought a new car—a really new one, not just a good secondhand one—and though it wasn't in the same class as that white beauty that Mark had had, it was none the less extremely good. What was more, Tom let her drive it, which was pure joy.

But there was another aspect to the purchase which intrigued Lisa more than anything else.

'Tom,' she said thoughtfully one glorious day when the autumn tints of the trees were flaming in sunshine that would have done credit to midsummer, 'have you been left a legacy? Or won the pools or something?'

'Not so much as won a raffle at a charity bazaar,' Tom said cheerfully. 'Did you want a loan?'

'Of course not!' Lisa disclaimed energetically. 'But this car—she must have cost you quite a lot—'

'She did,' he agreed feelingly. 'Though, of course, I traded in the old one.'

'All the same—' Lisa pondered.

'Come on, out with it,' Tom encouraged. 'Not like you to pull your punches, least of all where I'm concerned!'

'No, perhaps not,' Lisa agreed. 'Well, it's just this, Tom—I know you well enough to be sure that you wouldn't have bought it if you hadn't known you could afford it.'

'Quite right,' Tom acknowledged. 'So—?'

'Just—' she began tentatively, 'it made me think that having another vet in the district hasn't affected your practice as much as you thought it might.'

'No, it hasn't,' Tom replied, though without any sign of the satisfaction he might have reasonably felt. 'Actually, I've met with an astonishing degree of loyalty. There have been the few backsliders, of course, but not enough to matter. At least, not to me. It's Enderby I feel sorry for. Because, what with people sticking to me and this having been a summer singularly free from animal epidemics, he simply can't be building up his practice at all! And not only was that something I'm reasonably sure he was told he'd be able to do, but a certain person isn't going to be willing to subsidize him indefinitely without any results!'

'No,' Lisa said slowly. 'As a matter of fact, I've been wondering if, since his illness, Mr Cosgrave is very much interested in anything very much. One doesn't see anything of him, and he certainly doesn't seem interested in local affairs.'

'Poor chap, I don't think he's got what it takes these days to be interested in anything,' Tom said compassionately. 'I met Mrs Cosgrave a day or so ago and—' he shook his head.

'Just what did she say, Tom?' Lisa asked. 'I—I always liked her, you know—'

'Same here,' Tom said gruffly. 'Even if she does at times seem rather a twitterpate! Well, as far as I can remember she said that goodness knew she'd give any thing for Simon to get better—and she meant it. There were tears in her eyes. And then she went on to say that all the same, it was a long time since he had needed her as he did now and that it meant something to him as well as to her that they were together again, if I knew what she meant.'

'I'm glad,' Lisa said softly. 'Truly glad, Tom.'

'So am I, though as a matter of fact, I don't quite know why—yes, I do. Your people have never lost one another, Lisa. But the Cosgraves had. Now, as she said, they're together again. It—it boosts one's faith in the married state, and heaven knows, these days, that's all to the good.'

Neither of them found anything to say for a while and then Lisa, realizing that they were approaching the Ranstead kennels, asked him to drop her off.

'Celia can always do with a hand just about now,' she explained.

'Yes, but how will you get back?' Tom wanted to know.

'Oh, Celia will run me back. Or I could walk, if it comes to that,' Lisa said easily.

'Well, all right, but give me a ring if you get stuck,' Tom insisted.

Lisa promised, but with the mental reservation that she would take care not to get stuck. She had no right to depend on Tom to get her out of difficulties.

She made her way to Celia's trim little office, but stopped short of going in. The door was ajar and it was impossible not to hear the angry voices speaking on the other side of the door. One was Celia's and the other Lisa recognized as Robin Enderby's.

'I told you before and I tell you again,' Celia said furiously, 'no, no,
no
! Quite apart from anything else, I'll never have any use for a man who—'

'You don't give a chap a chance,' Robin interrupted bitterly. 'Even a known criminal isn't condemned without a fair trial, but you—' his voice cracked disparagingly.

'All right,' Celia retorted indifferently, 'so you're not a knave. Then you must be a fool! You
were
to have believed a story that shouldn't have deceived a child of five! Well, all right, if that's what you want me to credit. But it doesn't make any difference. Either way, I've—'

'No use for me,' Robin finished the sentence for her. 'All right, you've said enough! I've got the message, and I won't trouble you any more. You can rely on that!'

'Good!' Celia said crisply. 'So there doesn't seem to be anything else to say, does there?'

The door was flung violently open and Robin blundered out, nearly knocking Lisa over. He apologized to her in a dazed sort of way, but she didn't think he really knew who she was.