Charity (16 page)

‘Hey, don’t be embarrassed,’ he said. ‘What’s your name?’

His confidence was startling. Although some of the older boys could be quite cheeky when they were in groups, alone they were almost as nervous and tongue-tied as she was.

Charity had noticed this boy before, but then he was the kind of boy who would stand out anywhere. Jet black hair in need of a cut, dark blue eyes and golden shiny skin.

‘Charity Stratton,’ she said. ‘But I shouldn’t be talking to you. I’ll get into trouble.’

‘I’m Hugh Mainwaring,’ he grinned. ‘Don’t you ever do anything you aren’t supposed to?’

‘Not often,’ she replied, unable actually to remember when she had last broken a rule. ‘I must go back now.’

‘No you mustn’t.’ He shook his head in disbelief. ‘I’ve watched you from the dorm window. You don’t usually go back until six o’clock. It’s only half-past four.’

It gave her the oddest sensation to know he was that familiar with her movements. But he was right. She didn’t have to go back. It would be a long, dull evening just like all the others and she hadn’t even got a book to read.

‘But you have to be back for tea at five!’ She smiled triumphantly. ‘And you can’t go in the refectory in cricket clothes.’

‘Shows how much you know about the sixth form,’ he retorted. ‘We can make our own tea up in the study, any time we like. We can even go into the village and scoff in the café if we’ve got any money left.’

‘But you aren’t allowed to talk to kitchen maids, especially sitting in long grass outside the grounds?’

For a moment their eyes met and they both smiled.

‘That’s a silly rule,’ he said. ‘I’m leaving at the end of term. No one can see us from here and what harm is there in a little chat?’

There didn’t seem to be any harm. Sitting in a field with the kitchen door just fifty yards the other side of the wall, afternoon sun burning into their skin, birds singing and the sweet smell of grass all around them.

He lay propped up on one elbow, some few yards from her, sucking a blade of grass as he talked.

He told her he came from Yorkshire, that his father was a lawyer and he planned to be one too. He had a place at Oxford for October, but he was spending most of the summer holiday at a friend’s house nearby in Five Ash Down.

‘There’s a pub nearby that wants a couple of waiters,’ he said gleefully. ‘I worked there last summer and it’s wild. Loads of students help out and they’re a real crazy bunch. I’ve known my friend Rob since we were at prep school. He’s a bit quiet, but this cottage his parents are letting us stay in is fantastic. We’ll be able to have all-night parties, because his folks are clearing off on holiday and leaving us alone.’

Although she was nervous about being in such close proximity to a boy, something about his open and friendly manner made her relax, as if she were merely talking to an interesting person on a train or bus.

Yet the conversation wasn’t a casual one. He spoke of his family as if he didn’t care for them much. A neurotic mother who was always arranging dinner parties and whose schedule he upset when he came home. His father he described as ‘distant’. He implied that his parents were snobs, only interested in their social standing and his achievements.

‘I wish I had some brothers and sisters,’ he said wistfully. ‘Maybe my parents wouldn’t expect so much of me then. I bet you’ve got a wonderful family?’ he added, with a woebegone expression that reminded her curiously of Toby.

‘Not now,’ she said and to her surprise found herself telling him everything.

It just came out. If anyone had told her she would spill everything out to a stranger, she would have laughed. She felt a little self-conscious about her London accent and the huge divide between her poor background and his wealthy one. Yet she found herself revealing it all as if she’d known him for years.

‘Oh shit, Charity.’ He shook his head in almost disbelief. ‘That’s terrible!’

‘I don’t know why I told you.’ She tried to laugh and make light of it, feeling faintly ridiculous.

His teeth were even and brilliantly white, lips beautifully shaped and plump. Although he must be almost eighteen and his voice was deep, his skin had the peachy softness of a younger boy.

‘Everyone needs someone.’ He reached out and touched her hand. ‘My first year at Bowes Court was hell. When I went home my parents were always rowing. I was so miserable I could have jumped off the tower. But that’s nothing compared with what you’ve had to live with. Have you got any friends?’

She looked down at his hand and he removed it immediately, dropping his eyes from hers almost apologetically.

‘Not really. There was a girl called Carol here until recently. We used to spend our time together, but there’s no one now.’

‘The big redhead!’ he nodded. ‘But why do you stay?’

She explained that for now she had no real choice, that she needed experience before she could look for a better job. But then she admitted that the thought of the long summer holiday was worrying her.

‘You could get a job at the pub I was talking about,’ he suggested. ‘It’s great there, always packed out, I could ask for you!’

She wasn’t sure Geoff and Lou would approve of this, yet a vision of spending the long holiday with other young people and him, made bubbles of excitement rise within her.

‘Would you? I’d love it, I’m sure I’d be good at it!’ she said impulsively.

‘Of course you would,’ he grinned broadly. ‘Besides it would mean I could see you too.’

All at once she remembered her position and the danger of being caught talking to him. He was, after all, a pupil and an attractive one at that. She was flattered by his interest in her, but she had to get away now, before someone saw her with him.

She jumped up quickly. ‘Look I must go. I really liked talking to you Hugh. But you know how it is.’

‘It’s an archaic and snobbish rule banning us from mixing with the staff,’ he said indignantly, getting up from the grass.

Hugh had more experience with girls than most of the other boys. Last summer he’d done some heavy petting with an older barmaid called Angela and in the Christmas hols there’d been Wendy who worked in the local grocer’s. The sort of girls his parents would approve of wouldn’t let him get closer than a chaste kiss. But in the last few months, fired by stories from other boys and pin-up pictures in magazines, he had found himself dwelling on girls constantly and he was desperate to get some real experience before going on to Oxford.

He wasn’t the only boy in the sixth year to notice Charity. Duncan Gooding raved about her blonde hair; Antony Curlew went into raptures about her blue eyes and her wide mouth. But while other boys merely observed her from a distance and fantasised about kissing, or even screwing her, Hugh had been determined to get to know her. Running into her today wasn’t an accident. He’d planned it: he’d been watching her movements for weeks, waiting for an opportunity. If he was honest, all he’d wanted until now was to score points. If he’d been able to go back to the sixth form and boast that he’d kissed her, that would’ve been enough. He hadn’t for one moment expected her to be so well spoken, or so intelligent. He certainly hadn’t expected to really like her.

‘Another week and I won’t be a pupil any more,’ he said, frantically trying to think of some way to persuade her to see him again. ‘Couldn’t you meet me one evening?’

He didn’t know how he could get out unseen, but he was desperate enough now to try.

Charity just stood there looking at him. Something stirred within her. It was like goosebumps, butterflies in her tummy and a faint electric shock all at once. It was tempting to agree, but she remembered Carol telling her how it was always the staff who got punished, while the boys only got a telling off. She’d also pointed out that public schoolboys used kitchen maids for practice at seduction. They wouldn’t dream of having one as a real girlfriend.

‘I daren’t.’ She dropped her eyes from his and backed away. ‘If Miss Hawkins found out I’d be sacked immediately.’

For all his lack of experience, Hugh noticed the ‘I daren’t’ rather than I don’t want to, or I can’t. He felt as if there was already a bond between them and he wasn’t going to give up easily.

‘Then I’ll have to think of something else,’ he grinned. The sun was behind her, turning her hair to a fuzzy gold halo, and he longed to reach out and stroke it. ‘I can’t see how they can make something of us running into one another accidentally.’

‘I must go now,’ she murmured faintly.

She turned and ran to the side gate into the school grounds, but as she pushed the gate open a low whistle made her turn.

He had sprinted right down to the other end of the wall, obviously intending to climb over into the wood. He raised one hand to say goodbye and disappeared out of sight.

It rained solidly for the next two days and the forlorn view of green and grey landscape from the window seemed to heighten the feelings growing inside her. Try as she might, Charity couldn’t banish Hugh from her mind. No book could hold her attention and the clock hands seemed to move even more slowly than usual.

On Friday morning the rain had stopped, and watery sunshine was trying to peep through the clouds, but as Charity washed the last of the pots and pans she had made up her mind to forget Hugh and walk to the library that afternoon to find some new books.

It was just before three when she emerged from the staff door. She had changed her overall for jeans and a sweater, and her library books were in a shoulderbag. Pausing for a second at the top of the steps from the kitchen, she glanced at the sky.

Black clouds were gathering. Could she get to the village and back before the rain came? Undecided she hesitated. The thought of another afternoon indoors held no appeal, but neither did a soaking.

To her left was the path round the school towards the drive and the main gates. That was the way to Heathfield and the library, yet some strange instinct was urging her to walk over the grass, open that side gate and slip out across the fields towards Mayfield.

She turned back, ran down the steps and dumped her bag of books just inside the kitchen door. Then before she could change her mind again she ran back up again and straight across the still wet grass to the gate.

Once in the old orchard she noticed the patch of flattened grass where she’d sat with Hugh two days ago. Her heart fluttered, her plimsolls were soaked and it felt cold, but still she walked on straight across the field, over the stile and on to the footpath that led through the woods, hoping against hope he would appear.

‘Charity!’

Startled by his voice, she turned to see him bounding across the roughly ploughed field on her right. To her surprise he was dressed in running shorts, a school striped rugby shirt and plimsolls.

Joy surged through her, making her forget the school rules, the imminent rain and the cold.

‘Miss Hawkins might be looking out her window,’ she blurted out, looking back towards the school down the hill.

‘She went into Heathfield,’ he rasped out, bending over and clutching his stomach as if he had a stitch. ‘I saw her get in the car with Giles, they overtook me up the lane. That’s when I doubled back over the fields. I hoped you’d come.’

His clothes suggested that this meeting was pure chance and Charity felt oddly hurt by his casualness.

‘Perfect cover, eh!’ He looked down at his bare legs splattered with mud. ‘No one would suspect me of meeting a girl like this! You aren’t embarrassed by me being dressed like this, are you?’

‘No.’ She felt a sense of kinship with him now and, as he said, it was the perfect cover.

‘I came out yesterday and the day before,’ he said as he walked briskly up the hill beside her, into the wood, peering round at her face. ‘I didn’t think you’d come, really. Not when it was raining so hard. But I hoped you would.’

That admission sounded as if his feelings were the same as hers, and as they reached the far end of the wood Charity felt safer. From the old log where she’d often sat to rest there was a clear view down the hill. Even if someone did come up the path, they would have more than enough time to separate before they were seen.

‘It was nice talking to you the other day,’ she said hesitantly as she sat down. ‘But I –’ She stopped short not knowing what to say.

He stood in front of her, looking down at her, muscular tanned legs slightly apart, hands on his hips.

‘Don’t say you don’t like me?’

His expression made her feel odd. There was hurt in his dark blue eyes.

‘No. I’m just scared of getting the sack,’ she said.

The clouds were growing darker and thicker by the minute. Mayfield in the distance was shrouded in mist and it was getting colder.

Hugh sat down next to her, his legs stretched out in front of him. He wiped some of the mud from them with a clump of grass.

‘If you met me after I’d left the school, say at a pub or a party, no one could say anything!’

Carol would have known how to handle this. Charity had no experience to fall back on. Was he trying to say he wanted her as a girlfriend? Or was he merely looking for someone to talk to?

‘I feel awkward,’ she stammered. ‘I’m not used to boys, apart from my brothers.’

‘We’re just people,’ he shrugged. ‘Besides, I like you!’

She giggled with embarrassment and felt slightly less intimidated.

‘Lots of the other boys have got girlfriends,’ Hugh said. ‘I’ve often wanted to ask them how you go about it, but you can’t ask things like that, can you?’

‘Carol used to know about all that,’ Charity volunteered. ‘She was very good at talking to people.’

‘So are you.’ He turned to her, his face thoughtful. ‘And you’re much prettier than her, lots of the other boys fancy you.’

‘None of them ever see me,’ she laughed, liking the flattery but not believing it.

‘We see you going up and down the stairs. We watch you laying the tables.’ He grinned. He couldn’t possibly admit that Jackson, one of the other sixth-formers, claimed he always thought of Charity when he masturbated. Or indeed that the sight of her small bottom and slim legs in her shorts had kept him wide awake for the past two nights. It seemed to Hugh that there had to be something special here. He hadn’t told anyone he’d spoken to her, even though it would have boosted his image in the other boys’ eyes. She was his secret, and a deliciously sweet one.