The second collection of 3 great novels by Mary Burchell Page 4

  " It's too cold," Julia declared.

  *'0h, no! Not with a coat on," Leoni said rather eagerly, forgetting she had nothing but her old tweed school coat for the occasion.

  Julia, however, always remembered everything to do with clothes, so she said, "Well, take something from the cloakroom at the end of the hall, then."

  Then she went off, leaving Leoni to her own devices, and Lucas, who seemed to know his way around very well, took her out into the hall and, opening the door into the small cloakroom, coolly selected a light overcoat with a thin but silkily soft fur lining.

  "But I don't even know whose this is," protested Leoni, as he put it around her shoulders, leaving her arms free.

  "Why, mine, of course," he said, looking extremely amused.

  And she went out into the garden with him, wondering whether the "of course" meant that only someone with his own personal touch of flamboyance would wear such a garment, or simply that he would hardly have been likely to give her any coat but his own.

  Whatever the reason, she pulled the coat around her with the most exquisite satisfaction, and found something strange and delicious in the fact that it was a possession of his that felt so soft and warm and protective against her bare arms.

  "Won't you be cold yourself?" she asked a little shyly, as they stepped out into the bright, cool moonlight.

  But he dismissed that with no more than a shake of his head, and said, "So you're Miss Frendall now, and quite grown up. Funny, I never thought of you with a surname, somehow,"

  "You never thought of me with a name at all, I expect," Leoni declared with a laugh.

  "Oh, yes. You told me your name that time at the gate, you know."

  " But you'd forgotten it, hadn't you? "

  "No, he said. "No, I hadn't. You were so anxious to tell it to me, for one thing. And it was so entirely unsuitable, for another."

  "Oh!" She was slightly chagrined. "Don't you like my name?"

  "Of course. But at that time you were so small and grubby and—pathetic." He hesitated before the last word, and brougnt it out finally as though he were a little surprised to find himself using it. "And then when you laid claim to such a splendid and dignified name—well, that was rather pathetic too. I suppose that's why I remembered it."

  Leoni thougnt she would not much have liked anyone else to use the word "pathetic" of her twice in a couple of sentences. But, as she glanced at Lucas Morrion in the moonlight, she saw that his strong, dark, good-looking face was very thoughtful, and she knew suddenly that he was not being at all patronizing—only reliving a most unfamiliar experience and, a little surprised at himself, putting it into words.

  "I think,'* she said rather gently, "that you must have been an unusually understanding and sympathetic boy."

  "I?'* He looked at her in astonishment. Not in the least, I assure you.'*

  She laughed softly at that, and after a moment he said, "Why do you laugh like that, Leoni?' *

  "How did I laugh?'*

  "As though you thought you knew a lot about me— perhaps a little more than I knew myself **

  "Oh, I—didn't mean that. I couldn't, you know, because I hardly know you at all." She stopped, and then, as he seemed to be waiting for her to say more than that, she added slowly, "I think I laughed because you sounded quite shocked at being accused of sympathy and understanding. You ... you rather fancy yourself as a hard-hearted cynic, don't you?**

  She felt very daring as she said that and was a good deal surprised to find she had voiced her thoughts so frankly.

  It was he who laughed that time, however.

  "Hm ... so you think Fm a bit of a poseur'^''

  Leoni began to think she was getting into conversational deep waters.

  "Well, you . .. you don*t seem to enjoy life very much, and yet I can't imagine why you shouldn't."

  "Really?" He sounded genuinely surprised. "Why do you think I should, come to that?''

  "Well, you're young and obviously healthy and good-looking and—"

  "Oh, thank you." He seemed amused that she stumbled rather over the last advantage.

  "And then everyone says you're very rich," she added hastily, because she didn't want to be trapped into saying any more about his looks.

  "And with all that you think a man must be happy?"

  "I think," Leoni said gravely, "that with all that a man might well consider himself fortunate."

  "Are you by any chance lecturing me, my little would-be niece?" he inquired, with an undercurrent of laughter in his voice.

  "Would-be niece!"

  "Well, didn't you try your best to make me your uncle?"

  "Oh, I... I... that's years ago. I couldn't imagine you as any sort of uncle now, she exclaimed.

  "Thank God for that," he declared with mocking emphasis. And suddenly she remembered what Norman Conby had said about his not having too good a reputation with her sex.

  "Do you think perhaps we ought to go in now?" she asked rather timidly.

  "Why?" he said carelessly.

  "Well, it ... it must be nearly supper time and—and—"

  "You think it's not altogether safe to wander in the moonlight with a hard-hearted cynic?" he suggested amusedly.

  "I didn't say that," protested Leoni quickly, rather alarmed that he should read her thoughts so well.

  "No, no. Not in words, of course. Your tone said so quite plainly, Leoni. Shall I assure you categorically that you are quite safe with me, lovely though you are?"

  She didn't know what to say because his slightly mocking tone made him seem a stranger. Her step grew slower. Then finally she stopped altogether and said, "I wish—you wouldn't talk like that."

  "Like what?"

  "Oh, so that you sound quite, quite different from the young man you were."

  "But I am quite different from the person I was then, Leoni." He was serious now. "That's nine years ago, you know. And a lot can happen in nine years."

  The moon came out rrom behind a cloud just then, and the scene around them was immediately etched in sharpest black and silver. The expression on his face, too, was as clear to her as if it had been daylight—clearer perhaps, because with the element of color missing one saw only the somber lines, the rather grim set of mouth and chin, and the half-angry melancholy of the eyes.

  with a quick gesture she could never afterward explain, she put her hands on his shoulders, so that the coat would have slipped from her if he had not caught it and drawn it gently around her again.

  "Lucas!" She used his name quite easily. "You're really unhappy, aren't you? Not just pretending. I'm sorry. I wasn t lecturing you, really. Just talking stupidly about

  things I don't understand because—because I don't know very well how to make conversation. *'

  She saw the lines of his face relax then, and he laughed softly. He was still holding the edges of the coat, but he made no attempt to touch her or draw her toward him.

  "You're very sweet," he said slowly. "And it isn't you who should apologize for talking stupidly. Tell me—what did I say just now that annoyed you? I'll take it back."

  "Oh, I... I wasn't annoyed exactly."

  "But you said you wished I wouldn't talk like that."

  "It was just when you—you were laughing at me and saying I was lovely."

  "On, but really I can't take that back." His eyebrows went up in rueful amusement. "It's true, you know. Hasn't anyone else ever told you that you 're beautiful?"

  "No—at least—" She remembered Norman Conby. "Well... well, someone else said something about it this evening."

  "Norman Conby?" he inquired with a sort of good-natured contempt, which she felt was entirely unjustified.

  "He's very nice! "sheexclaimed indignantly.

  "But not in the habit of telling a girJ she's beautiful the first time he meets her. He usually follows all the conventional stages of approach," he retorted carelessly. "I'm surprised to hear he said it—that's all."

  "He said it very kindly and—a
nd inoflfensively," Leoni declared rather shortly.

  "Not at all as I did, eh?" He smiled down into her eyes.

  Leoni had never before that evening found it difficult to return anyone's glance, but for the second time her lashes came down before Lucas Morrion's half-amused, half-searching scrutiny, and there was an odd little quality of drama about the few moment's silence.

  Then into that silence intruded the crisp sound of footsteps on the gravel path. He must have heard it, too, because he put her quickly from him, and a moment later Norman Conby came into sight around the thick clump of laurels at the end of the path. Leoni hoped she appeared as cool and self-possessed as her companion.

  Certainly Norman Conby seemed to see nothing wrong, and he said quite pleasantly, "Julia sent me to tell you two

  that supper has started. I think she is anxious in case you miss any of the pleasures of this evening, Leoni."

  "Oh, thank you. We—we were just coming anyway,'* Leoni exclaimed a little breathlessly, rather as though she felt she ought to excuse or explain herself.

  It was Norman who took over the pleasant duty of looking after her at supper, and seeing to it that she had everything she wanted and was made to feel that, with the possible exception of Julia, she was the most important person at the party.

  When so much kindness and attention was being expended on her behalf, Leoni knew it was more than ungrateful of her to wish for the notice and interest of someone else. But she could not repress a slight feeling of disappointment that Lucas had no chance—or, at any rate, failed to make himself any chance—of prolonging their exchange of reminiscences and impressions.

  He accepted back his coat from her with a smile, but she was very much afraid that his conventional murmur, in answer to her thanks, included the words "good night." Certainly for the rest of the evening she saw nothing of him.

  She had some hope that he might appear again at the end of the party—that, since he was one of the family, he might even turn out to be staying in the house until the next day. But her hopes remained unfulfilled. Julia's beautiful birthday party came to an end without Leoni seeing anything more of Lucas Morrion.

  When Norman Conby said good night to her, he added, "Don't forget that I shall expect to see some more of you, either here or in London."

  "London?" exclaimed Julia, who was standing arm in arm with Leoni, bidding the last of her guests good night. "London? Whatever makes you think you'll see Leoni in London?"

  "Why, you know, Julia. I may have to go to London when I start a job, at the end of term," Leoni said.

  "Job?" Julia looked extremely vague about anything so distasteful as a job. "Oh, well, you shouldn't cross stiles till you come to them." By which Julia presumably meant that some happy fate might still prevent Leoni from ever having to do more than sit back and enjoy herself for life.

  Leoni laughed and shook her head.

  "It's not crossing a stile to look ahead like that. Tm rather going to enjoy earning my own living, anyway."

  ^'That's a point of view beyond you, isn't it, Julia?" Norman said amusedly as he went off.

  "To be quite frank, it is," Julia remarked equably to Norman's retreating,back. "But I know you're funny aoout these things, darling,"she added tolerantly to Leoni. "And, as a matter of fact, I believe daddy means to say something to you about your future and all that sort of thing this weekend."

  ''Does he?" Leoni was immediately intensely interested. "What is he going to say, Julia? Do you know?"

  "Oh, I suppose the sort of thing parents love saying, you know," Julia said indulgently.

  "But I don't know the sort of thing parents love saying," Leoni reminded her.

  "No, of course not." Juha looked at her reflectively. "I somehow forgot that. It must be awfully weird not having any parents to manage. And though they can be a bit trying sometimes, they're awfully nice if you bring them up the right way."

  Leoni brushed this digression aside.

  "What does your father want to speak to me about, Julia?"

  "Well, really, I don't know," Julia confessed. "We'll go and ask him."

  "Oh—perhaps it's a bit late to bother him tonight," Leoni protested immediately. "He may be tired."

  "Nonsense," Julia declared, scoffing at the idea that a party could tire anyone. And dragging Leoni with her she went back into the drawing room, where Mrs. Vandeem was lying back in a chair enjoying a cigarette, and Mr. Vandeem was asking, in a purely rhetorical manner, where the devil all his best whiskey had gone.

  "Daddy, here's Leoni. Didn't you want to speak to her about something?" demanded Julia, whose method of approach was always direct.

  "No, thank you," said Mr. Vandeem, helping himself to what was presumably his second-best whiskey. "Except to say I hope she has enjoyed herself "

  "Oh, 1 have " Leoni exclaimed fervently.

  But Julia said, "Don't be silly, daddy. You know there

  was something you wanted to say to her about her future or a job or something. Mother told me you did. * *

  **You might just as well tell the child, Harold/* Mrs. Vandeem remarked at this point. "We're not a board meeting, so you needn't make a speech. Tell us in three sentences."

  Mr. Vandeem, who rather fancied himself at board meetings, to tell the truth, looked somewhat annoyed at this reference. And, apparently feeling that his own womenfolk were somewhat out of sympathy with him, he addressed himself almost exclusively to Leoni.

  "Well, my dear, the report for the year has been extremely satisfactory—or, rather, I should say that your report for your last year at school has been extremely satis-good. I understand you have done very well indeed in the business-training class, and that when you leave at the end oftheterm, ina month's time—"

  "Oh, daddy, we know when the term ends,*' interrupted Julia. "After all, it's our term."

  But Leoni, who was listening with an air of attention which would not have disgraced a shareholder waiting to hear of an interim dividend, pressed her friend's arm for silence.

  "As I was saying," Mr. Vandeem repeated patiently, "when you leave at tne end of the term—in a month's time— you will be very well qualified to enter the business world."

  "And so you're going to give her a job in your office. Why couldn't you say so outright, daddy? And what are you going to pay her?" inquired Julia cheerfully.

  Mr. Vandeem was as nearly annoyed with his daughter as it was possible to be on her eighteenth birthday at this totally unjustifiable stealing of his verbal thunder.

  "Julie, will you please learn to allow your parents a few words of their own sometimes. You come pestering me to talk to Leoni about her future at a ridiculous hour of the night, and then it transpires that you merely wish to say all there is to be said yourself I don't really know why you bothered to bring me into this." He sipped his whiskey with some bitterness.

  "Oh, that's all right, daddy dear." Julia came and hugged him, whether he liked it or not. "I just couldn*t wait for the climax anymore. The suspense was too awful. But

  there's lots that you can tell Leoni now. AH about the sort of job and how much she'll get and so on."

  "In any case, Mr. Vandeem, I'd like to hear what/ow were going to say," Leoni told him, with perfect truth. "I don't even know that Julia's guess was right. I ... I can only hope—"She stopped nervously and smiled at him with such a nash of eagerness on her cheeks that Mr. Vandeem was entirely mollified.

  "Well, well," he said kindly. "My idea certainly is that you should find employment m my firm. The only point I want you to think over is whether you would prefer to work in my own office locally, or whether it would be better for you to work in the Londfon office. If you—"

  "Oh, much better here, daddy!" declared Julia immediately. "There's no need for her to go to London among strangers. And she'd have to Ihe there and I mightn't see much of her."

  "It is Leoni's life we are arranging, my dear," her father pointed out with rather heavy patience. "Her views really are more important t
han yours.

  "Well—" Leoni began. "Of course I would rather stay here, in one way. But I don't expect you'd give me the choice without some good reason. What would be the advantage of choosing London, Mr. Vandeem?"

  "Much more chance of advancement, my dear. Much more chance," Mr. Vandeem assured her. "The London oflfice is three or four times the size of the local oflRce, and, since you're a clever and hardworking girl, you might do extremely well there. It's worth considering. By the time you were thirty—"

  "Oh, but who wants to think about when they're thirty?*' cried Julia. "Besides, Leoni will be married years before then. After all, this office business is just a stopgap until one meets the right man, isn't it?"

  Mr. Vandeem sighed heavily, but since he knew this novel view of an office career was not peculiar to his daughter, he nobly refrained from comment.

  "Mr. Vandeem, may I think it over?" Leoni said.

  "Of course, my dear, of course. Talk it over with matron, too. There isn't any hurry."

  "It's wonderful, any way I look at it," Leoni told him earnestly. "Thank you again and again. I'll work terribly

  hard, Mr. Vandeem, whichever office Tm in. You ... you won *t be sorry you gave me the chance."

  "I'm sure I won't, child," Mr. Vandeem said, feeling quite extraordinarily glad that he had paid out money for the last two years to see that this nice, appreciative little friend of his daughter was properly tramed. Intelligent child, too. She really paid attention to what one said, and even allowed one to finish what one was saying.

  "Well, run along to bed now, girls." Mrs. Vandeem got up from her chair with a yawn. "And don't spend hours talking in your rooms. There's all tomorrow to discuss the party and Leoni's future and everything else."

  She kissed them both good night and, on this special occasion, so did Mr. Vandeem. Julia then said, with apparent casualness but great sincerity, how much she had enjoyed her party and how awfully sweet her parents had been to do exactly what she wanted. And finally the two girls went upstairs to bed.