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‘Very unpleasant,’ she said fiercely, and her eyes glittered. ‘He has a very poor opinion of me now. He thinks I’ve been corrupted by a life of idleness and too much money. He was sitting at my table. I left him sitting there.’

‘I see. You sold yourself for a bottomless bank balance, is that it?’

‘Something like,’ Kate muttered almost to herself. ‘It was unjustified!’ Her eyes sparkled with indignation. ‘I’m just the same as I always was. And now, if you don’t mind, I’m trying to forget about it so I’d rather not be reminded.’

‘A lesson learned, Kate?’ He raised a dark eyebrow sardonically. ‘It couldn’t have happened if you’d had somebody with you, if you’d taken Nanny and Philip or my mother.’

That was a thought, she didn’t care for, it made her feel vaguely guilty, so she switched to another facet of the subject. ‘I wonder who this friend is, the one he’s staying with? I’ve never heard him mention anybody from this part of the country before.’

‘Who knows?’ Jerome glanced at his watch. ‘Come to bed, Kate, it’s getting cold in this kitchen. Hattie switches the heat off at night—like you, she has a saving disposition, almost cheeseparing!’ With an arm about her he drew her up the stairs and as the bedroom door closed behind them, he held her quietly while his hands smoothed away her dressing gown and then her nightdress. She stood in his arms, a slim, curved, pale column in the fugitive moonlight, quite still and waiting.

‘So you’re just the same as you always were?’ He murmured the words against the skin of her neck and into the curve of her shoulder. ‘You haven’t changed at all, Kate?’ And she thought he was laughing as his lips found her eager mouth.

Kate slept only for a few hours. She woke at six and in the pale light turned to examine her sleeping husband. She liked looking at him when he was asleep for at least two reasons. He didn’t know she was examining him, so she didn’t have to be shy or discreet about it. She didn’t have to school her face or hide her eyes, and her mouth could be as soft and tender as she liked. Secondly, as she had noted before, he looked a lot younger and even a bit vulnerable when he was sleeping. It was a pity he had to lose that look when he woke up, she infinitely preferred him without his veneer of hard, glossy, worldly-wise sophistication.

And what was she going to do about loving him? Nothing! She couldn’t stop, it had crept up on her quietly without her noticing and now it was part of her. To stop now would be like cutting off her hands or tearing her heart out. She wouldn’t be complete any longer.

She gave a little rueful smile. She wasn’t at the ‘I’ll lie down and let you walk all over me’ stage, she very much doubted if she ever would be, but she was pretty near it. It made of her life a hell which she wouldn’t have changed for any heaven that didn’t contain Jerome. And she still didn’t know how long it would last! Reluctantly she dragged her eyes away from their rapt contemplation and huddling herself into her dressing-gown and gathering up an armful of fresh clothing, she went off to the bathroom.

When she returned to the bedroom Jerome was still sleeping, so she tiptoed out and down to the kitchen where Hattie was energetically beating up her scrambled egg mixture. She spared Kate a sour glance.

‘Early bird this morning! What’s wrong, aren’t you well?’

‘Yes, I’m quite well, thank you.’ Kate’s eyes twinkled. ‘What did you think might be the matter with me?’

‘Morning sickness!’ Hattie gave her a cynical look. ‘It’s what usually gets young wives up an hour before time.’

Kate shook her head mournfully. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you, Hattie, but no!’

Hattie sniffed. ‘You aren’t disappointing me,’ she snorted. ‘It’s the missus you’re disappointing. Well, if you’re not ill, what do you want in my kitchen at this hour of the morning?’

‘Advice.’ Kate put on a slightly worried look. ‘Jerome came in at two this morning. I gave him some of your ham and chicken thing and a cup of tea before he went to bed. Now he’s still asleep, and he never sleeps after seven o’clock. Do you think I should wake him, take him up a cup of coffee or something?’

‘Leave him till eight; you can take him some coffee then.’ The old lady’s voice harshened. ‘Don’t stand there dithering in the doorway. There’s a pot of tea made and if you want some, come in, shut that door and sit at the table I can’t stand people hovering about.’ Briskly, she poured the tea, sparing Kate a searching glance. ‘All smiles now you’ve got your man back, aren’t you? Well, don’t think to get round me with your soft ways, because you won’t do it! Do you want a piece of toast with your tea?’

Kate sat on the side of the bed giggling, as she retailed parts, but only parts, of this conversation to Jerome while she watched him drink the coffee she had carried upstairs.

‘A friend for life,’ he gave it as a serious judgment. ‘You’ll be able to turn her round your little finger.’

Kate wanted to wail at him, ‘Why can’t I do it with you?’ but instead she asked sedately how long he was here for.

‘Three days,’ he was bland. ‘I’ve given myself three days’ holiday, then I have another visit to the States. After that, things should be fairly quiet for a while.’

Kate removed herself from the side of the bed and picked up the empty coffee cup and saucer. ‘Mmm, I’m glad of that. A few more of these hectic weeks and you’ll be suffering from jet lag.’

Jerome raised himself once more to a sitting position. ‘Kate,’ he sounded surprised, ‘you’re becoming wifely!’

‘Is it a bad habit?’ she queried from the doorway. ‘Not to worry, though, unlike distemper, it isn’t catching!’

Philip hailed the advent of his uncle, after such a short absence, with noisy enthusiasm and promptly started misbehaving. Despite Kate’s protests that he was only a little excited, Jerome banished him to the nursery, from where his roars of disappointment could have been heard in the next county.

‘Our nephew has a healthy pair of lungs.’ Jerome was unmoved by the noise and blandly escorted Kate out to the little Morris. ‘Get in!’

Kate hesitated. From the window of the nursery, Philip could be heard at full volume.
‘My
go for a ride!
My
go in car!’ He was having a little difficulty with his pronouns, but he was making his wishes abundantly clear.

‘Couldn’t we take him ...?’ she voiced the suggestion hesitantly. ‘He’s only a little boy....’

‘No, we can’t,’ Jerome was firm. ‘He has to learn that he can’t have everything his own way.’

‘He doesn’t,’ she protested. ‘He doesn’t have everything his own way.’ She stood by the little car, the pale sun shining on her chestnut hair and her mouth set in an obstinate line. ‘He’s very good ordinarily, it’s just that he wants....’

‘Precisely.’ Jerome was also obstinate and he cut through her plea in a hardhearted fashion. ‘He wants!’ He cocked his head to indicate the roars of temper coming from the window. ‘I suppose you and my mother, not to mention Hattie as well, have been spoiling him to death. No wonder Nanny’s having trouble with him!’

‘That’s not true,’ Kate said fiercely. ‘We don’t spoil him, we love him. Every child needs love. I don’t suppose you went short of it when you were Philip’s age. You were probably just as much of a pest at times as Philip is.’

Her remarks bounced off his indifference and he merely told her to get in the car. ‘In the driving seat, please. I want to see what sort of a driver you are.’

She settled herself behind the wheel and glared at him. ‘I’ve been driving for six years,’ she said between gritted teeth.
‘And
I passed my test first time. I’m perfectly competent and I don’t need you to tell me whether I can drive or not!’

‘Drive, Kate.’ He was implacable.

The demonstration of her driving ability was not a success and to be honest, Kate had to admit to herself that, had she been an examiner, testing herself, she would have failed herself without any doubt. For some stupid reason Jerome’s very presence in the passenger seat made her nervous. He didn’t say a word or even look at her, but she could feel waves of disapproval coming from him and hitting her as she missed gears, went too fast or too slow and made an appalling mess of at least one road junction. They had covered about fifteen miles before he told her to pull in to the car park of a country pub.

‘We’ll have lunch here,’ he decreed, and with a hand firm about her elbow, he led her to the bar.

‘Not a very good demonstration,’ was his comment as they sat at the dining table, and Kate found herself wondering how she could ever have thought she loved him. No woman in her right mind could love this arrogant, scathing monster, this ultimate in male chauvinism. She didn’t love him at all, she hated him! He was insensitive, he didn’t have an ounce of understanding or human compassion and she wished she’d never seen him. She had a wild desire to get up, stalk out and drive away, leaving him stranded here, but she stifled the desire almost as soon as it was born. It wouldn’t do any good. He would probably take the little car away from her, and she didn’t want that.

‘We can’t all be perfect,’ she smiled sweetly. ‘I’m not usually as bad as I was this morning, but, to be candid, I find you a bit off-putting.’ And she turned her attention to her lunch, devouring fried scampi and afterwards pineapple fritters with an unimpaired appetite while he talked casually about the weather, the political situation and other boring subjects. Gradually she found herself relaxing and by the time she had finished her coffee, she was quite good-tempered again so that she was able to get into the little car and drive it back calmly and competently, without being a danger to other road users.

‘Much better,’ he gave her a brief smile as she drove into the garage and switched off the ignition.

‘And may I drive it?’ It took a great deal of self-control to get the required submissive note into her voice, but she did it.

‘Mmm,’ he leaned across and kissed her so that her heart started to bang like a drum. ‘It was much better that time. Your trouble, Kate, is that you tend to become too emotional. It wasn’t me that made you so bad when we started out, it was your bit of temper because you couldn’t have your own way about Philip. You can’t concentrate on driving when you’re like that. You need a cool head and a quiet mind. But yes, you can drive, but not alone, please. You can take Mother with you, she likes jauntering about and she won’t distract you as Philip would.’ He sounded so infernally priggish that she forgot how pleasant the kiss had been, how much she had wanted it to go on and on.

As she came round to the front of the house, her eyes fell on the red sports car parked by the door and she gave an inward squeal of rage. Estelle was here, and she would stay to tea and quite possibly dinner as well. Kate masked her disappointment beneath a bright and sparkling smile. Jerome was only here for three days and one of those days was nearly gone already. She didn’t want to share him with the black-haired, passionate wench, but the wench would stick like glue and she knew it! Estelle would stay on and on and on, she would have to be practically thrown out, and all the time she would be making her sweet little nasty remarks and ruining everything.

‘Oh, look!’ Kate maintained her bright smile. ‘Your girl-friend’s called. Isn’t that nice! I do hope she stays for tea.’ She looked up and surprised a faint smile on his face.

‘Not
my girl-friend, Kate, and you know it!’ he drawled. ‘I’ve no time to spare for girl-friends. I’ve got my hands full at present trying to satisfy a very demanding wife!’

Kate
squealed with ill-concealed irritation and for one moment was tempted to throw the hairdryer on the floor. The only thing which stopped her was the knowledge that it wasn’t her hairdryer. Had it been hers, she would not only have thrown it on the floor, she would have changed her soft slippers for a pair of cloggy mules and jumped on it! But the hairdryer was on loan from little Dodie and, as with the vacuum cleaner, in Dodie’s hands it probably worked. In Kate’s, it did not. For nearly half an hour she had been sitting here in the bedroom, trying to dry the heavy hank of wet hair which hung down her back, and all she had achieved so far was a tremendous blast of cold air. There was no heat to be had in the thing.

Kate moved her slender shoulders irritably and shivered. Perhaps she’d got the setting wrong. She pointed the business end of the dryer away from her and examined the switch. The little red arrow pointed firmly to HOT; maybe it didn’t work on this setting, so she switched it to WARM and held a tentative hand in the blast. Nothing happened, the blast was as strong as ever, but the temperature did not rise by one degree. She switched to COLD; again there was no change, and then she tried OFF and the blast died away. She didn’t know why she was bothering, she had already tried all these things and it was becoming increasingly evident that whatever worked the heating had died on her.

Kate had one last try with the dryer, shivering in the icy blast as it struck her damp head. That head was beginning to feel like the tip of an iceberg and the remainder of her body was cooling rapidly. There was only one thing to do, go down to the kitchen, open all the dampers of the solid fuel cooker and the oven door and try to dry her hair there.

Kate gazed down at herself. She was wearing her old dressing gown over her undies and a pair of scuffed slippers on her feet. Not the ideal wear for kneeling on a rug with her head halfway up a chimney, but fortunately there was nobody to see her and there wouldn’t be for the rest of the afternoon.

Jerome was in New York. He hadn’t asked her to go along with him this time and she had been hurt about it. She wouldn’t have gone even if he had asked her, but all the same, it would have -been nice to be asked. Jerome’s mother, together with Nanny and Philip, had gone to spend the afternoon in Matlock, mainly to replenish Nanny’s diminishing hoard of knitting wool; Hattie had taken the early bus to Calver where she was visiting an aged aunt and little Dodie had gone home yesterday, sick with a gumboil which was distorting one side of her face until it looked like some overripe fruit, red and shiny and threatening to burst. Dodie was now in her bed and suffering the injections of antibiotics with the same stoic fatalism as she had suffered her gumboil, so Kate had the house to herself.