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Miss Robertson. Dani opened her mouth to explain, belatedly, that she was Mrs Robertson, but he was gone, ducking out of the back of the tent without another word. When she peered out after him, he was striding in the direction of the house, the script flapping in his hand and his long legs covering the ground rapidly.

She was going to have to endure more than an hour in his presence, cooped up in a confined space with him and his inflammatory temper. Dani took a deep breath and tried to steady herself. If it had been any other occasion, any other occasion at all, she would have turned coward and refused to go on, but there was no excuse that she could offer, and the thought that her puppets might never be used at all made her set her jaw firmly and decide to go through with it.

She stepped out of the booth for a breath of air. It had been hot inside; hot and airless and stifling. She and Les had practised the play many times before, but never on such a day. The canvas seemed to be attracting the heat and Dani leaned against the trunk of the cedar tree and closed her eyes. She could feel a prickle of perspiration on her forehead and upper lip and even the brevity of her pale yellow sundress with its string-like straps that fastened into two bows at her shoulders and showed off the faint tan she had acquired was not helping her to feel cool. A bikini would be more suitable for the atmosphere inside the tent. She fanned herself with her own copy of the script and prayed that Les might return unexpectedly.

There were to be no miracles that day. When the personal address system announced the attraction of the puppet show and she slipped reluctantly back inside the booth, Prentice McCulloch was beside her as she wriggled her hand into the first puppet.

Not a word was spoken as he picked up Saint George and one of the minor characters and laid his script on the shelf, but she was nervously aware of stage-fright as she checked her own assortment of puppets for the last time. Prentice was unprepared, whereas she and Les had practised for hours with the vet's wife coaching them from the front of the booth. He could do the voices but he had not had a chance to practise the movements of the puppets above his head as he worked them, and a thousand things could go wrong.

'Good luck!' She did not really want to talk to him, but the words were out before she could stop them. 'We'll just have to do the best we can.'

'Don't know about your best, lady, but mine's pretty good.' He drawled the words without looking at her, but she raised an eyebrow at his confidence and sighed inwardly.

'You'll have to shout,' she said warningly. 'Don't forget.'

'Yes, ma'am.'

'And if your arms get tired, you can rest your elbows on the ledge.'

'Naturally.'

'I am trying,' she hissed furiously, 'to help.'

'Thanks very much.'

Dani wanted to hit him. Never before had she experienced such a red rush of anger, and never before had one person so infuriated her. She had a sudden vision of the two of them engaging in a furious battle inside the tent and everyone outside watching as the booth rocked and swayed. Immediately the anger vanished and she had to choke down a bubble of laughter. Anxious laughter. She had never attempted anything like this before and although she could not be seen by the audience, she was fully aware that most people knew who was working the puppets.

'Ready?' Her voice came out as a nervous squeak.

'Yes.' He turned to look at her then, their faces only a few inches apart, and Dani saw the pearling of sweat on his forehead. Lord, but it was hot! 'Good luck.' He winked, suddenly and unexpectedly, and she was close enough to see that his eyelashes were as long and black and thick as her own. She nodded to acknowledge his words and then pulled on the cord that would raise the curtain.

It had only been running for five minutes when Dani realised that she had seriously underestimated Prentice. His Saint George was truly heroic and the voices he gave to his minor characters were better than anything Les Whelen had attempted. His confidence and his apparent mastery both of the script and his puppets inspired Dani. Instead of being nervous for both of them, she ceased to worry about his performance and concentrated on making her own equal to his. Lady Lucinda was a breathless, tremulous heroine and the pantomime horse raised laughter every time it put in an appearance.

After ten minutes Dani knew that the audience were on their side, and that the laughter was all coming in the right places. She relaxed a little and began to enjoy herself, marvelling at the smoothness of the performance and even grinning a little as she put up the horse again and heard the ripple of applause that greeted his entrance. She moved him along the stage a little so that he was following Saint George, and her arm brushed along Prentice's side.

It was like being jolted by electricity. She was conscious of taking a deep breath and of pulling her arm away, but now she was forced to acknowledge that she could feel the heat of his body and the vitality in it as if they were pressed closely together.

He was watching her. She spoke her lines automatically, but in the gloom of the booth she could see that he was smiling, his teeth very white in his tanned face, his jade eyes knowing and full of laughter. He held her eyes with his own and she was powerless to look away, but instead was forced to stare into them until she felt as though the sea had her in a strong undercurrent and was pulling her down and down into its inviting depths. His eyes were the sea and she was happily drowning.

'The dragon!' It was a life-saver and she clung to it. 'Let me help you . . .' and she dragged her gaze away and assisted him to fit it on to his hand, drawing the green material up his arm and straightening out a bent spine. The hairs on Prentice's arm were soft and silky, and suddenly she was again in danger of being sucked out to sea by that innocent touch of her fingers on his skin. The inside of his elbow, bare and vulnerable, drew her strangely and she would have laughed at her own silliness if she had not felt so impossibly drawn to him.

Impulsively, without thinking about it, she pulled her handkerchief from her pocket and mopped his face with it. He was working hard, and the strain of having to bend his back and still manoeuvre the puppets above his head, was beginning to tell. He looked hot, and the gentle side of her nature felt sorry for him. His eyes thanked her and then the dragon made his appearance.

Prentice made him slink on from the side of the stage, working his arm at an incredibly uncomfortable angle to get the right effect, and Dani tilted her head backwards so that she could see what he was doing. She should have thought of bringing him on from the side like that. It was remarkably effective and Prentice's voice, when he made the dragon talk, was a wonder of gruffness.

If only they weren't so close. Alternatively, if only they knew one another better so that she could show her admiration by squeezing his free hand or saying something to him that he would not misunderstand. On impulse, when Lady Lucinda made her next entrance, Dani added a touch of hero-worship to the puppet's voice.

At this stage of the play they had to work two puppets apiece^ and Dani had no choice but to brush against Prentice as one of her characters moved across the stage. His body felt as hard and firm as it had looked when he had been sitting up in bed on that memorable morning, and when she leaned a little further towards him and he tried to shift his frame to make way for her, she heard a stifled laugh close to her neck.

'This is bad management,' he whispered as he allowed her to duck under his left arm. 'Can't you keep to your own side?'

'No,' she muttered back, and then she gave her attention to the Lady Lucinda again, cursing Les Whelen's wife who had thought the changeover would be appreciated by the adults watching, who would know that the puppeteers were working in a confined space. She had also said that it would make the puppets more realistic to be moved from one side of the stage to the other. With Les it had worked perfectly well, but Prentice had not anticipated the move, and Dani realised suddenly that she was blocking the script from his sight. The Lady Lucinda moved smartly, back to her own side of the stage, but not before Dani had been unable to avoid brushing against Prentice's body again, and as she said her lines, she recalled vividly the feel of the muscles of his thigh and his arm as she had squeezed by him.

When had she last been stirred by the proximity of a man? Dani could not remember. Nor could she recall a time when her pulses had raced so fast or when she had felt suddenly and unaccountably nervous and shy.

What did she have to say next? The loss of concentration put her next speech out of her head, and when she glanced down at her own copy of the script, she saw that she had forgotten to turn over the page. Both her hands were occupied, and even when she closed her eyes for a second and thought desperately, she could not remember her lines.

Prentice's script! She leaned over to look at it and once again he had to move to make room for her. Now she
could
feel his breath on her cheek again, and as she found her place and read the lines, she felt his mouth touch her ear.

It was so unexpected, so totally and utterly unlike the Prentice McCulloch that she thought she knew that for a moment her mind went blank again. All she could feel was the light pressure of his lips against the curve of her ear and then the tingling warmth as he worked his way down to her neck. This wasn't happening! Wildly Dani wondered how she was supposed to concentrate on her lines while this disconcerting, arrogant man was nuzzling the soft, vulnerable spot just above her collarbone.

They had almost finished. This was Lady Lucinda's last speech before Saint George closed the play. Dani wanted to pull away from Prentice but there simply was. no room and anyway, she rationalised, he would have to stop this oddly exciting teasing when his turn came to speak. When his mouth moved away she was both relieved and disappointed.

Lady Lucinda finished her speech rather breathlessly and Dani relaxed, waiting now for the final action of the play when the two puppets would embrace. One more minute and she could push her way out of the back of the booth and the stifling heat could be left behind her for a while. And so could the closeness of Prentice McCulloch.

The stage now had only the two principal characters on it. Dani wriggled her hand free of the second puppet and when Prentice held his arm out mutely, she stripped the puppet of the Blue Knight from his hand and put it aside. Just a few more moments, a few more seconds, and she could break free of this man's disturbing presence and calm her chaotic heartbeat.

His hand was touching her jaw, turning her towards him. Wonderingly Dani looked into his face and saw that same expression of curious intentness that she had glimpsed earlier. Prentice finished what he had to say, Dani moved her puppet closer for the final embrace, and then Prentice's face was coming towards her own and his free hand was cupping the back of her head to prevent her moving away. Then his mouth closed over hers.

Dani had never been kissed like that before. Not with that kind of single-minded purpose, not with that kind of thoroughness or that hint of muted passion that she thought she sensed behind the firm lips that were waking dormant sensations and desires inside her that she had long forgotten. His lips moved over hers with a careful gentleness as if, for once in his ordered life, he was not sure how she would respond, and after a moment's hesitation in which she was passive and unresisting, she allowed the barriers to fall a little and kissed him back.

Lady Lucinda and Saint George moved closer to emulate the actions of their masters. Prentice's hand moved down Dani's back to slide around her waist, drawing her closer to the hardness of that male body that she had been so nervous of earlier, and she raised her hand and shyly and tentatively touched his shoulder as the kiss lengthened and deepened until Dani became aware of nothing but his mouth and his arm and the incredible heat that emanated from him. It was Prentice who, with great presence of mind, lowered the curtain on the hero and heroine on stage.

'I think you owed me this.' He released her lips just long enough to make the statement and then claimed them again.

'I did?' Dani's question was an incoherent mumble.

'Yes, you did.' His lips traced a path from her mouth up across her cheek to her eyelid, feathering across the soft surface and making her tremble. 'I found your watch, remember?'

'Mmm.'

Dani tried to tell herself not to be so flustered by a single kiss. It was a temporary closeness in the heat of the moment, a release from tension because the play had gone so well, a fleeting encounter with an attractive man.

She denied the thought even as it crossed her mind. It was more than that to her. She had come alive under his touch, and had felt warm and glowing and vital. Now, as he stepped back, she felt it all fading away leaving her drained and miserable. Why, oh why had he kissed her? It would have been so much better if he had remained distant and formal.

The people outside were applauding. For a second Dani and Prentice looked at one another and she was held spellbound by the expression in his eyes. Then he was holding up the back flap of the tent, catching her hand and pulling her out with him.

'Go and take a bow.' His face was alight with laughter and triumph that they had done so well.

Dani obeyed him without question, going around to the front of the booth and, hands held awkwardly behind her back, face going pink, she smiled at the people who were clapping. She did not like to be the centre of attention, not like this, not when she could still feel the pressure of Prentice's mouth on hers and the strength and security of the embrace in which she had just been held. Couldn't everyone see that she had been kissed and was still reeling from the pleasure of it?

One more nervous smile and then she could escape. She had been aware of Prentice's eyes on her back as she stood in front of the booth, but when she turned impulsively, meaning to bring him forward and explain his part in the show, she saw that he had gone and the disappointment inside her was keen and biting.