What a do . . . It was an expression of Maggie’s, and she could just hear her saying it, too. In spite of everything it induced a weak smile. Perhaps Sir Geoffrey would think twice in future before he attempted to force his way into someone’s house; he’d certainly got more than he had bargained for tonight. She’d bet his foot was broken.
Once in bed, her eyes travelled to her new clothes, laid out in regal splendour over the backs of the two easy chairs on the other side of the room. The dancing shadows from the flicker of the fire picked up the different shades of colour in the scarf and gave it an illusion of life as she watched, and she curled her toes beneath the blankets, the brandy having made her dozy. She would give the outfit its final press tomorrow, she was too comfortable now to do anything more than turn out the bedside lamp, but one thing was for sure - she wasn’t going to let that horrible man ruin her Christmas.
Her gaze moved to the small pile of gaily wrapped parcels on top of the little occasional table in front of the two chairs. There were gifts from Maggie, Florrie and Rebecca, and ones from Lady Harris, Lady Margaret, and even little Constance and William. Peggy had remembered her, and there was a tin of something - she felt sure it was homemade toffee - from Hilda.
Life never ran smoothly for long, it was the same for everyone, but there were plenty of good moments too. Tomorrow was Christmas Day, and Rodney was going to see her in her new clothes and she would meet his brother and his wife for the first time. It would be nice if she got on with Vanessa; she could normally hit it off with anyone if she tried, she thought dozily.
She continued to sit half-propped up against the pillows as she stared across the room at the glowing fire. She would light a fire in her bedroom tomorrow, although she wouldn’t bother with the other rooms whilst Eileen was away. But it was lovely to be warm and cosy in here, comforting . . . She could leave it well banked and it would be pleasant to come home to in the evening. Yes, she’d do that. She turned off the lamp and snuggled down under the covers, all thoughts of Sir Geoffrey gone, and within moments she was fast asleep.
It was Christmas Day.
It was Sarah’s first thought as she opened her eyes in the morning, and immediately her heart gave a little hop, jump and a skip, before she sat up in bed and gave herself a mental talking-to.
She was going to be cool, calm and collected today, she was, whatever she felt like inside. The people she would be mixing with would consider it bad form to show too much excitement about anything, but oh . . . She wrapped her arms round her knees and hugged herself tightly. It was going to be difficult.
She loved all her presents. Maggie and Florrie had bought her a matching set of scarf and gloves in bright cherry-red wool, there was a beautifully made blouse in soft blue flannelette from Rebecca and toiletries from Peggy and Lady Margaret’s children. Lady Harris had given her a box of chocolates and a very generous cheque, but it was Lady Margaret’s present that caused the ‘oh . . .’ from her lips and brought a brightness to her eyes. The stylish little gold brooch in its red velvet box was exquisite, and would go perfectly with her new outfit, she thought happily.
She was ready and waiting when Rodney rang the bell just before eleven, and as she opened the door to him, her face bright and glowing under its cascade of high silky golden curls, and her slim, full-breasted figure shown off to perfection by the cleverly cut clothes, he stared at her for a moment without speaking, and then he said, ‘You look lovely; quite quite beautiful.’
‘Thank you.’ She suddenly felt horribly shy, and it was on the tip of her tongue to tell him it was one of Lady Margaret’s cast-offs, but she didn’t. She didn’t know why she didn’t, she just didn’t, passing the moment off by saying, ‘Happy Christmas, and I hope you enjoy the one meal a year you can eat in peace.’
The church bells were ringing out as they drove into Windsor, and Sarah felt as if she was in some sort of dream, the beautiful car, her lovely clothes, Rodney at her side, all casting their own special magic, and the feeling lasted right until the moment she stepped out of the car outside Richard’s large imposing house, and Vanessa Mallard’s cool ice-blue eyes slowly dissected her bit by bit as her mouth said all the right things. In that moment she realized that the suit, although lovely, was two or three years out of fashion, that her brown shoes were quite wrong, and that Richard’s wife was perfect from the top of her head to the tips of her feet.
At thirty-six years of age Vanessa Mallard didn’t look a day over twenty-five, something she worked at every day of her life. The pale silky skin was flawless, her shining cap of sleek silver-blond hair cut perfectly to frame a face in which the slanted blue eyes and beautifully shaped mouth made anyone take a second, and then a third look. She was utterly self-absorbed, possessing a cold detachment which had allowed her, through nearly eleven years of marriage, to take and discard a string of lovers without a shred of guilt disturbing her conscience.
Born into a middle-class family where she had been worshipped and adored by over-indulgent parents, she had never done a day’s work in her life, and never intended to. She had flitted from one love affair to another from the age of sixteen, always growing bored within weeks with the current lover, until, at the age of twenty-three, she had met Rodney Mallard.
She had never doubted for a moment that she could dissuade him from playing Robin Hood to the working classes. Once he’d qualified - and she knew he would qualify well, his intelligence was formidable - he would step into the ready-made bosom of the family practice which only catered to the most genteel of Windsor society. Lunch at the Ritz, small select dinner parties, bridge afternoons and winter holidays abroad: Vanessa had had it all worked out to the finest detail, and the added bonus had been that she had fallen in love for the first, and the only, time in her life.
But it hadn’t happened. Rodney hadn’t let it happen. And now he had brought this girl, this
nobody
, into their home for Christmas lunch.
Vanessa took his arm, Sarah being on the other side of him, and drew them into the large, glass-roofed porch which she felt was such a
satisfactory
introduction to the house, and through into the wood-panelled hall beyond.
But he would regret it. She watched him as he greeted, and was greeted by, their friends, introducing Sarah as he went along. Oh yes, he would regret it all right. She would make very sure of that. Whoever this little chit was, wherever she had come from, she wasn’t having him. He was hers. He had always been hers. She ground her teeth silently as she watched Rodney raise a hand to Richard, and then make his way over to his brother. Yes, he’d regret this, and before he was too much older . . .
‘Sarah, my dear, good to meet you at last. I’ve been hearing a lot about you.’
In vital contrast to his wife’s coldly polite greeting, Richard’s was friendly and genuine, and Sarah warmed to him at once. After her first shock at seeing the mutilated face - fortunately when he had been engaged in conversation with someone else and unaware of her - Sarah had felt an overwhelming rush of pity, and this enabled her to smile back quite naturally now, concentrating on the warm brown eyes that were unmarred by the injuries that had seared and burnt most of the skin surrounding them. The left side of the head had received most of the blast, the left ear was almost entirely gone, and there were several angry red patches where the hair was refusing to grow, but the right side of his face had come in for a considerable amount of damage too.
Poor man. Poor, poor man. What he must have suffered, must still be suffering. And then, as Vanessa joined them, Sarah received a slight shock as the other woman said, her face straight and her voice cool, ‘Don’t let him embarrass you, Miss Brown. As I recall, Rodney has said very little about you.’
‘I’m not embarrassed.’ She was answering Vanessa, but smiling at Richard as she spoke. ‘And I’m very pleased to meet you too, it’s really very kind of you to invite me to Christmas lunch like this.’
‘Nonsense.’ The burns had dragged his lower lip to one side, contorting his smile. ‘You’ve met my wife, I take it? Come along and I’ll introduce you to the rest of the crew, they’re a motley bunch but we still call them our friends.’
‘Thank you.’
She smiled up at Rodney who was saying, his voice loud, ‘That’s right, that’s right, whisk her off as soon as she steps in the door, won’t you,’ and put her hand through the crook of the arm Richard had extended to her.
‘You have a lovely home.’ In truth the splendour of the house had staggered her, both on their approach up the long winding drive, and on entering the baronial hall of the huge stone-built building.
‘Thank you, my dear.’ He looked down at her, and again she concentrated on the gentle brown eyes. ‘We haven’t been here too long, as it happens. After my parents died and I came out of hospital, Vanessa decided she wanted something to occupy her mind and moving house seemed to fit the bill.’
He smiled, and Sarah smiled back, but she was thinking, What an upheaval after all he’d been through, and then she caught her thoughts as Richard continued, ‘It’s strange you know, but I don’t feel the house is mine yet, more that I’ve borrowed it for a time. Funny that, eh? No doubt I’ll settle in eventually.’
‘And your wife?’
‘Oh, Vanessa loves it.’ His voice was flat. ‘Yes, she loves it. It’s ideal for entertaining, of course.’
Yes, she supposed it was, but it wasn’t much like a home, was it, although the house was beautiful, and his wife more so. But Vanessa Mallard had something more than beauty, Sarah thought as she made all the right responses to the innumerable introductions. She had a kind of exclusiveness about her, and it had the unfortunate effect of bringing the savage disfigurement of her husband into even more painful prominence. They were like Beauty and the Beast. But no, that was cruel, there was nothing of the beast about Richard Mallard.
She glanced up at him at her side, and immediately the deep brown eyes smiled at her, emphasizing the last thought. No, he was lovely, kind and gentle, and she already liked him as much as she disliked his wife.
The next hour, until lunch was served at twelve thirty, went smoothly, and it was mainly due, Sarah acknowledged silently, to Rodney’s stoic encouragement.
He was there at her side when Richard finished the round of introductions and he didn’t budge again, his manner easy and his stance relaxed, as he kept their little group entertained with one amusing story after another. They were mostly about his work, and the humour was largely self-deprecating, but he was very funny. So why, she asked herself towards the end of the hour, why did she feel he wasn’t as equable as he would like to imply from his actions? It was an act, a clever, polished act maybe, but still an act.
And then, and through just a few well-chosen words, she felt she had an inkling of why he was on edge. The maid had called them for lunch, and as they walked through to the elaborately decorated dining room Sarah saw that Vanessa had taken Rodney’s free hand, his other holding his half-finished cocktail, and that the other woman was gazing up at him, her words soft but quite distinct as she said, ‘Do you remember our first Christmas, Rodney? When your mother had that wonderful fancy dress party? We made quite an impact, didn’t we? My Cleopatra to your Antony.’
‘I don’t remember.’ His voice was offhand and matter-of-fact, but there was something in his attitude that made Sarah feel uncomfortable, and then, as Rodney almost thrust his brother’s wife from him, he turned fully to her. ‘Come and sit down, Sarah.’
The plushly upholstered dark wood dining chairs were grouped round a table ablaze with crystal and silver, and as he said, ‘Here, we’ll sit here, shall we,’ and pulled out a seat for her, she said, ‘I think there are name cards.’
‘What?’
‘On the table, there are name cards where everyone is supposed to sit.’
‘I don’t believe it.’ It was soft but with a wealth of feeling, and for a moment she thought he was going to sit down anyway and ignore the place settings, but then he said, his voice attempting jocularity, ‘Well, well, a new version of hunt the thimble. This is the first time we’ve been so formal on Christmas Day.’
She knew, even before it was confirmed, that she would be seated at the opposite end of the table from Rodney, and she also had a good idea where their hostess was sitting when Vanessa cried in the next instant, her voice shrill and laughing, ‘Find your seats, everyone, find your seats. We’re all mixed up, I don’t want anyone sitting next to their partners, nothing so boring as that, it’s Christmas.’ And then Vanessa looked at her, and held the look for some moments, her pale pearly-blue eyes with their thick, darkened lashes opaque and cold.