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'Phooey!'

For all Teddy hadn’t said as she had in the past, ‘Don’t be home late, will you,’ Gerry parked her car in its usual spot ready for a quick getaway and walked smartly along the pavements to Arrowsmith’s. She was almost at the swing doors before Basil Dyer caught up with her.

‘Better?’ he asked, his pleasant face smiling a welcome. ‘I’ve missed you around die place.’ Basil would have said more, in fact he looked all set to give her the lowdown on the gossip she had missed since being away, but someone else attracted his attention, and she left him in conversation on the ground floor and made her way up the stairs. It was nice of him to say he had missed her around the place, it made her feel more like a person and less of a number.

As she turned into the corridor that housed her own office, her footsteps hesitated and came to a faltering stop outside the door she was to go through. She heard footsteps coming along the corridor behind her, which effectively made up her mind for her—anyone who had any business being on this floor would wonder what she was doing hovering outside her own office door.

It was a huge anti-climax to have built herself up to go through the door, only to find both offices empty. Relief vied with disappointment, and as Gerry sank down on to her chair behind her desk, she determined she would never let herself become so keyed up again—her legs felt quite weak and she had to take her handkerchief from her bag to deal with her moist palms.

The snap of the door handle being turned had her eyes riveted to it, tension again flooding through her, only to leave her fighting to look natural when a stocky man of about forty came through the door.

‘You must be Geraldine Barton,’ he said, coming into the room and holding out his hand. She liked his easy smile, she thought, as he introduced himself. ‘I’m William Hudson—I like my coffee black and my tea sweet.' Gerry had to smile in answer; he had an infectious way with him. She stamped down on the sudden panicky feeling that she might never see Crawford again, for all she had only moments earlier been dreading exactly that. ‘That takes care of the priorities,' William Hudson gave her no time for further thought. ‘Would you like to come through to my office and we’ll see what’s to be done—though knowing my cousin I’m sure everything will be in apple pie order.'

Her first day back turned out to be quite pleasant. During the day she learned that William Hudson with his wife, two sons and a daughter had moved from London last week. Learned that he had visited the Layton branch on previous occasions and already knew most of the senior executives, though one or two stopped by during the day to make-him welcome. Although none of his visitors stayed very long, the interruption of their calling, together with the fact of William’s newness to the job, for all she thought he was as capable and decidedly more efficient than Mr Gillett, meant that they were nowhere near finished as the hands of the clock neared five.

In two minds whether or not to ring Teddy and tell her she would be late, Gerry’s train of thought was interrupted by William glancing at his watch.

‘You’d better get off now, Gerry,’ he said, looking at her with his easy smile, having no difficulty in shortening her name. ‘Crawford made a point of telling me you were not to work overtime.’

Gerry wanted to protest, wanted to say she didn’t want any favours from Crawford—wasn’t she already too far in his debt? But a picture of Teddy watching for her from the window flashed through her mind, and she gave in without a fight, except to say, ‘Are you sure?’ her eyes falling to the calculations she had been checking with him.

‘Positive.’ Again the sunny smile. ‘You wouldn’t want me to be nailed to the yard-arm on my first day, would you—there’s nothing here that can’t wait until tomorrow.’

Now that she was getting used to the A35—it had seemed as though she was driving a totally different car at first—Gerry quite enjoyed the drive home. She prepared to wave to Teddy as she slowed down to turn on to the -drive, but for once Teddy wasn’t there.

Gerry found her in the kitchen, and to her surprise discovered that her sister seemed to have lost her fretful anxiety at being on her own for most of the day. Mrs Chapman’s company must be a help, of course, she thought, as she greeted her twin before going to say hello to her two nieces.

‘Is it that time already?’ Teddy sounded so cheerful, bubbling over, so like she had been in the old days that Gerry had to turn away so she shouldn’t see the light of gladness for her in her eyes. ‘How did your first day go— has it taken the stuffing out of you?’

‘No, it was fine. My new boss has arrived.’

‘You haven’t see Crawford today?’

Gerry told her she hadn’t, and edged to the living room to take a peep at Emma and Sarah who had been happily enough occupied until they had seen their aunt, but who now raised their arms, both wanting to be picked up at once.

With one child apiece, Teddy told her she could tell her about her new boss over their meal. ‘I’ve some exciting news of my own,’ she said, looking down at the child on her hip, whose dimpled hand was bent on investigating her hair.

Gerry looked at her enquiringly, but Teddy was busily engaged in untangling Sarah’s fingers. Then Emma decided to copy her sister, and for the next couple of hours they were kept busy with the needs of the children.

Knowing Teddy of old, Gerry knew there was no point in pressing her to tell her what her exciting news was. As a child Teddy had been prone to keep everyone on edge until the last moment, building up the drama until she could no longer keep it to herself. Tonight, though, Gerry had a suspicion that the news Teddy had to reveal was being kept back because she had no idea how to go about telling her what it was. She thought of several things it might be that Teddy had to tell her, but none of them could be termed ‘exciting’, except the one thing that came to mind again and again, and that was that Teddy’s news was connected with the friendship she had witnessed growing between her sister and Paul Meadows. She might be jumping the gun, and of course it was early days yet, but Paul could have called to-day while she was out at work.

She was certain suddenly that it was something to do with Paul and her sister was perhaps a little shy to tell her, for all she had never suspected Teddy of being shy, while admitting that love did funny things to one. Look at how her own thoughts had gone haywire since she had discovered her love for Crawford. She decided it would only need a gentle prodding word and all Teddy’s news would come flowing out in a rush.

‘Shall we talk about your news, Ted, or do you want to hear about my William Hudson? I’ll confess I’d rather hear your news first.'

Their meal over, Teddy selected an apple from the fruit bowl and carefully began to peel it. ‘I’ve come into some money,’ she said after a few moments.

Just like that—she hadn’t dressed it up. Just a bald statement giving no indication of whether it was five pence or five pounds, or even from whom she had come into it.

‘Where ... who ...?’ They had been hard up for so long, and Teddy’s statement had been the last thing she had been expecting to hear.

Having got started on the subject. Teddy was no longer reticent in telling Gerry the rest of it. Gerry learned, her eyes growing wider and wider, that some time last month Teddy had sent a relative of Mark’s a photograph of the twins, and had received a letter back inviting her and the twins to stay for a while. Teddy had written back saying the expense of making the visit had been beyond their means—and today a cheque had arrived for five hundred pounds.

‘Five hundred pounds!'
Gerry repeated in astonishment, unable to take it in. ‘You did say five hundred pounds?’

Teddy confirmed that she had, and went on enthusiastically to say how they could all have new clothes. ‘It’ll be marvellous, Gerry, won’t it—after all the scrimping and saving, to be able to go into any store we like and buy just what we want. We could buy a washing machine if we wanted—I’m so fed up doing all the washing by hand. I know you do your fair share of it,’ she amended hastily, as in all honesty she was bound to do.

Gerry secretly thought a washing machine would make a big hole in the five hundred pounds, but it wasn’t in her to take the light out of Teddy’s face. It was the first time her sister had mentioned scrimping and saving. She had tried her best not to let Teddy see how carefully she worked out their budget, though she guessed now Teddy must have caught a glimpse of one of her many tottings up, since they not only shared the same cottage, but the same bedroom too. They talked for some while about the money till Gerry remarked:

^!
I didn’t know Mark had any relatives still living, much less that you’d sent off a picture of Emma and Sarah.’ She had thought Mark had been brought up in a children’s home. She was sure Teddy had told her there had not been one solitary relative able to take him in when his parents had been killed, but she must have been mistaken.

‘Oh yes, I knew he had this great-aunt. I’d forgotten about her myself, actually, then when we had that lovely picture of the twins taken—you know the one,’ she said, and described a snap taken in the garden not so long ago, which Gerry had to admit was a delightful picture of them. ‘Well, I suppose my motherly instinct reared up and I wanted to show off to someone.’

Gerry smiled at her understandingly. She knew exactly how Teddy felt. She’d wanted to take that snap to the office—had thought of showing it to Basil Dyer thinking that since he was so happy with his own children he might be interested to see it, only of course, since no one at Arrowsmith’s had known of her home circumstances, she had thought better of it.

‘Anyway,' Teddy went on, ‘you know how we value the privacy of our correspondence—and I wasn’t sure if the old dear was still at the address I wrote to, so I didn’t say anything.’

Gerry acknowledged without rancour what Teddy was saying. They had been brought up to regard each other’s letters as private, and she’d always agreed that a letter from one person to another deserved the right to be private and not looked at by anyone other than the person it was intended for. She couldn’t help a small feeling of wanting to see the letter from Mark’s great-aunt, though, but Teddy had effectively blocked that wish by reminding her of the value of private correspondence.

By the end of the evening they had decided they would set off as early as the twins would allow on Saturday morning, and take the Layton storekeepers by storm. On a laughing note they went to bed, Teddy barely able to wait for Saturday morning to arrive, and Gerry thinking how completely wrong she had been with her thoughts of her sister and Paul Meadows.

Half way through the following morning Gerry looked up to find William Hudson standing before her, his face showing a little boy smile, which denoted, Gerry thought, that he wanted something and was half ashamed to ask for it.

‘Does going and fetching me a packet of smokes come into the duties of P.A.?’ he asked. ‘I’ve run out and I’m expecting a phone call any minute.’

‘Which brand?’ Gerry asked easily, rising from her chair.

On the way back she bumped smack, bang into Robin as she turned round one of the corners. Since their relationship at one time had been so close, though looking at him now she began to wonder what she had ever seen as so wonderful about him—he didn’t bear comparison with Crawford—she felt she couldn’t very well just walk straight past him.

‘Are you better?’ he asked, seeming only to wait until she told him she was, before he was telling her he had been ill. ‘Had ’flu,’ he went on. ‘My first day back.'

He didn’t look too well even now, Gerry thought, as she commiserated with him. But then from what she could remember of him he never did have a very good colour, and she paused to think herself very fickle to have forgotten so much about him when she had thought at one time of living out the rest of her years with him. The idea made her shiver involuntarily, and she smiled to cover it —there was only one man for her, and she might as well plan her next holiday on the moon for all the chance there was of Crawford ever returning her feelings.

‘I intended to get in touch with you before I went sick,' he told her. ‘But no one seemed to know where you lived, and Personnel guard their files as if they suspect the K.G.B. are after them.’

Robin's conversation, his seeming not to be content with the two of them being a couple of people who just happened to work for the same company, had her seeking for an excuse to get away from him.

'I must dash, Robin,’ she said, brandishing the cigarettes she had just purchased. ‘My boss is gasping for these.’ Robin made a protesting movement as she made her getaway. She didn’t turn around, and hoped he had got the message that she was not interested in renewing their friendship.

The door to William’s office was closed when she got back, but knowing he hadn’t any appointments fixed for that morning, she didn’t think twice about opening the door and going through. But once there, she stopped dead, and a lot of colour flooded her cheeks, forcing her to grip tightly on to her self-control as she saw the tall, athletic figure of Crawford Arrowsmith come away from the window. She knew he had fixed his sights on her, but she felt incapable of looking at him after that first glance, and without a word, feeling too choked to speak, she placed the cigarettes she had purchased, together with the change, on the desk in front of William, and turned to make her escape, with William’s, ‘You’re an angel, Gerry,’ following her through the door.

Back at her desk she fought to regain her self-control. Idiot, idiot, she berated herself. Why couldn’t she have tossed him a casual ‘Good morning’? He hadn’t spoken to her either, admittedly. Not that she’d given him much chance, merely dropped the cigarettes and change on the desk and bolted.

She was glad Crawford was taking some time talking to his cousin. It gave her precious time to collect herself together, gave her time to don her ‘touch-me-not’ air. When Crawford came through that door, as indeed he must— unless she was lucky enough to be at lunch when he came out and went, she hoped, back to London—she wanted to be fully in charge and mistress of her wayward emotions.