Forgotten Fiancee

by Lucy Gordon

  Justin stared at him, appalled. “You’ve changed more than I thought,” he said. “At one time you’d never have said a thing like that.”

  “Does that mean your memory’s come back?” Greg asked quickly.

  “No, nothing’s come back. But I can remember before that. You were always on at me to let people off the hook, and I used to pull you out of nightclubs because you had to be at work early.”

  “Much time I’ve had for nightclubs since you went away!”

  “Did I load too much on you?”

  “No, I’m fine. I enjoy it. Like I said, it’s taught me how right you were about everything. I thought you’d be pleased that I’ve seen the light at last, and I find you sliding about in the mud like some hayseed, talking about not wanting to be seen with me.”

  “I was having a good time.”

  “And catching your death of cold.”

  “Quit sounding like Mom,” Justin complained with a grin.

  “You were always the first one to catch cold. Once, you even managed to get bronchitis in a heat wave.” Greg regarded his brother with concern. “You’re sickening for something now, aren’t you?”

  “Nonsense, I’m fit as a fiddle.”

  “Then why do you keep coughing?”

  “Okay, okay, I caught a little cold. I’ll dose myself with hot milk and aspirin and be fine tomorrow. What brings you down here unexpectedly, Greg?”

  “Several things, chief of which is concern for you. This latest mad idea—Merton’s Farm.”

  “Has that gone through all right?”

  “Oh, we’ve bought it. At least, our subsidiary, Greenfield Estates, has bought it. I won’t even try to tell you what old Benton said when he heard you wanted to rename Kwikbuild Inc. Greenfield Estates.”

  “I was afraid a name like Kwikbuild would cause alarm around here,” Justin said, grinning.

  Greg sighed. “I also understood you wanted Kwikbuild sold off because it wasn’t achieving its performance targets. I’d started looking for buyers, but then you change your mind—”

  “Then I’m sorry if I confused you. I want Greenfield for myself, my own personal baby. I’m going to take complete charge of everything.”

  “You’re going to be a farmer? Then let me tell you that you haven’t got the aptitude. I’ve had Merton’s looked over. It’s a mess. The place is going to rack and ruin.” He stopped as a waiter approached them and began to clear away the plates. To his surprise he found he’d eaten the whole of the steak and kidney pie. It had been excellent.

  Justin ordered apple pie and ice cream for them both. “But it must be Denton’s ice cream,” he warned. “You’ll like it,” he told his brother, who merely stared at him, beyond speech.

  Rather to his own dismay, Greg did enjoy the ice cream, but his alarm that Justin’s mind was wandering only deepened.

  As if by telepathy Justin said, “There’s method in my madness. I wanted you to taste that stuff so you’ll understand what I’m planning.”

  “You’re going to make ice cream?” Greg asked weakly.

  “No, just to help Denton go on making it. I’m not planning to farm that place. I’m going to build small commercial units that will facilitate the making of ice cream, traditional furniture and so on. I might even take over one of the units myself—” he held up his hands “—and put these to some use. I’d almost forgotten that I was an engineer. Perhaps it’s time to remember. There’ll be a place for Joker, too, so that all that misused intelligence finds a proper outlet, and—”

  Greg groaned. “I don’t know who Joker is, and I’m not going to ask, for fear of having my ear bent with any more pearls of backwoods wisdom. I’ll just remind you that units that size aren’t economic. You’ve said so yourself.”

  “Not if they’re on their own, but they can work as part of a greater whole. I’ll make them economic. It can be done, with proper investment and imaginative planning. I’m going to put Hall wood’s resources behind these people, get them export contracts. One unit will be a technology shop where they can hire time on state-of-the-art facilities. There’ll be all the latest software. The whole countryside can use the facilities, but my people will have a generous discount.”

  Something in the way Justin said my people made Greg stare at him, but he said nothing. He concentrated on his apple pie and ice cream to give himself time to think.

  “What about planning permission?” he asked at last. “This is agricultural land.”

  “That’ll take some negotiation,” Justin agreed, “but I’ll get the permissions I need because it’ll benefit the area. There’ll be jobs for young people, so they won’t have to leave the village. And when your surveyor went over the farm, did he notice that beautiful house?”

  “Yes, he thought it might be worth something if it was put in proper repair. You could sell that for a tidy sum—”

  “I’m not going to sell it, I’m going to live in it.”

  “You’re really stuck into this toy-town arrangement, aren’t you? What about your work at head office?”

  “I’ll stay in overall control, but I can put the dayto-day running in the hands of a deputy.”

  “Me?” Greg said at once, eagerly.

  “I’m not sure. I’m not happy with what you’re becoming.”

  “I’m becoming like you.”

  “That’s what I mean. I don’t want you making my mistakes.”

  “Justin, you can’t give this to anyone but me. I’ve done a good job while you’ve been away. Just look at the figures—”

  “I’ll think about it. But if I do give you the reins you’ll have to put up with me looking in regularly to make sure you’re not throwing any widows and orphans onto the streets.” He saw his brother’s face and added gently, “That was a joke, Greg.”

  “Joke?” Greg sounded as though his ears had deceived him. “You made a joke?”

  “Why not? Other people make jokes.”

  “Yes, other people. Not you.”

  “Well, it takes practise, but I’m getting the hang of it,” Justin said, a tad defensively.

  “Have you told anyone down here about this scheme—raised their hopes?”

  “No,” Justin said thoughtfully. “I’m saving it for the right moment.” He saw Greg’s expression and said, “Forget it. I’m not going to change my mind. Greg, try to understand, I want to do this. It’s a challenge. I enjoy making money, and I’m going to make it with this place. The old firm is no challenge anymore.”

  “Now there you’re wrong,” Greg declared, glad to be on firm ground again. “There’s another reason I came here. I wanted to talk to you about the Hampson contract. We wanted it badly, but lost out to Sedgewick’s. But Sedgewick only beat us by slashing their prices too much, and the word on the grapevine is that they can’t cope. If we move fast we can still get in there, squeeze them out and take them over on our own terms.”

  “Then we’d be the ones who couldn’t cope,” Justin observed.

  “Not if we slash their work force by half. With our capacity we can manage the contract on the other half.”

  “What about the people who’ll lose their jobs?”

  “Industry is rationalizing and downsizing all the time. People expect it these days.”

  “But how will they manage?” Justin persisted.

  “It’s not our problem. You can fulfill your dream of making Hallwood’s the biggest firm of its kind in the country, and then the world.”

  “Is that my dream?”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten that, too. I’ve heard you talking about it for the last ten years. You used to say that only the grand vision mattered, not the details.”

  “But you’re talking about throwing people out of work,” Justin said. “Are people just details? How many small people will we have to crush to achieve this dream?”

  As he said the words he had an eerie sensation, like being haunted by a snatch of a tune, heard once, long ago, an echo from another world.
He rubbed his eyes.

  “What is it?” Greg demanded, alarmed. “Nothing. It’s just that—Greg, did you and I ever have this conversation before?”

  “I’ve never heard you talk like this before in your life.”

  “Strange. I just felt I was covering old ground. I guess I imagined it” He passed a hand over his eyes.

  “You’re not well,” Greg insisted. “You ought to pull out of that tug-of-war.”

  “Are you kidding? I’m the anchor man. They need me.”

  “Don’t you think this game has gone far enough?”

  “That’s all you think it is? Just a game?”

  “All right, a vacation. You’ve enjoyed yourself among the little people, because they’re a pleasant change, but now it’s time to come back to the real world.”

  “Greg, do you think the lives these people live are any less real than yours? That they matter less because they have time for each other?”

  He saw his brother regarding him helplessly, and realized that Greg didn’t even understand the question, never mind have an answer.

  They talked little for the rest of the meal. Each was uneasy with the change in the other. Justin longed to get home to Haven. His head ached, and he felt more feverish than he was going to let his brother suspect.

  Greg drove him back and dropped him off outside the store. Justin didn’t invite him in. He wasn’t ready to bring his two worlds together. But as Greg was turning the car he saw the door open and a young woman appear in the light. She embraced Justin, laying her cheek fondly against his. They went into the house arm in arm. Greg was thoughtful as he drove to his hotel, and once upstairs he immediately got on the phone.

  “Marguerite? Thank goodness I found you in. It’s worse than we feared.”

  He was having the old dream again. There was the brick wall, and the mist was dragging at his feet as he felt his way along. There was the corner, with its hint that here at last he might find the answer, but, as always, the man appeared, blocking his way. But this time it was different. Instead of himself, it was Greg who stood before him. Justin awoke with a shudder.

  “What is it, darling?” Sarah hurried in, closing the door behind her. “You were shouting in your sleep. Is it the dream again?”

  “It’s changed. The man in my way is my brother. I’ve turned into him—no, he’s turned into me. That’s what’s happening to him.” He pulled himself up in bed and ran a hand through his hair. “Talking to him tonight was eerie—like talking to my own ghost. He wasn’t always like that. It’s the firm—it’s so big it does something to you, makes you forget people.”

  “But you can discover them again,” she reminded him.

  “Yes.” Justin gave a brief laugh. “Poor Greg. He thought I’d gone mad. I must make him understand, too. Luckily he’s younger. He’s got time to see the light. In fact—”

  He stopped. He’d been on the verge of telling her about his plans for Merton Farm. It would be nice to see the pleasure in her face. But he’d resolved to wait.

  “In fact what?” she asked.

  “I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

  “No, tell me now,” she protested, laughing.

  “It’s a surprise.” He took her hands. “We have to talk, Sarah. There are things I want to tell you, but I want to win that medal first.”

  “It’s only an old bit of tin,” she told him.

  “No, you know it’s more to me than that. It means everything I’ve discovered here, and when I give it to you—well, then we’ll talk. Perhaps we’ll set our wedding day.” He saw the shadow on her face. “You do love me, don’t you, Sarah?”

  “You know I love you.”

  “As much as you loved him?”

  “Much more,” she said. “Someday I’ll try to let you know how much more. You’re the man I always wanted him to be. Before we can marry I have something to tell you, too. And when I’ve told you, you may not want to marry me.”

  “Nothing could make me not want to marry you,” he said simply. “Nothing in the world.” He touched her cheek. “Good night, my darling.”

  When she’d left him he fell into an uneasy doze in which he was haunted by something that had been said that night. If only he could pinpoint it… Yes! That was it!

  How many small people will we have to crush?

  He’d said those words, and the sudden consciousness of having heard them before had shaken him. The feeling was there again now, more strongly than ever, maddening him with its elusiveness.

  The world tilted wildly. He was sitting in the dining room of the hotel arguing with Greg—he was sitting in his London apartment, arguing with Sarah—he couldn’t think how she’d come to be there, but she was looking at him from disillusioned eyes and saying that people mattered. How many small people must be crushed? No, that was himself. He’d said that to Greg tonight. But she’d said it too, once, long ago, in another life….

  He was on the brink of a momentous discovery. The inside of his head was like a child’s kaleidoscope, an unformed mass of details, but when he looked at them the right way they would make a pattern. If only…

  And then the world tilted back. The pattern fell into place. He sat up, staring into the darkness with shock.

  He knew.

  Chapter Eleven

  At the first crack of dawn Justin let himself out the side door and wandered over onto the green. The ducks quacked sleepily and paddled to the side, expecting tidbits, but for once he had no eyes for them. He was engrossed in his inner turmoil.

  The past two years had returned to him with sudden, shocking clarity. He understood everything. Sarah was his love, and Nicky was his son. There was no other man standing between himself and her. The beloved she had spoken of with such tender longing that it had roused his jealousy was himself. Despite his behavior, her love had remained golden true. And when he’d returned to her she’d opened her arms.

  A whole layer of himself seemed to have gone. It was the layer of suspicion, and once it would have made him read the worst into her silence. The thought of how much she’d known and never told him would have made him feel vulnerable and angry. But he was wiser now, and he knew, without asking, why she’d kept silent. She’d known that he wasn’t ready, and she’d let him reach the truth in his own time, in his own way.

  And Nicky, that strong, bright little boy, a son any man would be proud of. Free of the tricks adults used to obscure the truth, he’d seen Justin with clear eyes, instinctively preferring his father to all other men. The half glad, half painful tenderness Justin had felt was the age-old, mysterious bond of the same flesh, the same blood. And this was the child he’d wanted to destroy. Now he understood the fierceness of Sarah’s refusal. She had known even then what he was only now discovering.

  “Sarah.” He whispered her name. It had a beautiful sound. She was his true and beloved Sarah, if he’d only had eyes to see. He’d won her love, and thrown it away, oaf that he was.. But by some miracle he’d been given a second chance, and this time he’d set his feet firmly on the path that led to her.

  He could remember the night Sarah had told him about Haven. It was as clear now as it had been vague then. While his conscious mind had barely noticed, some deeper part had clung to the knowledge and offered it when he needed it. It hadn’t been coincidence that brought him here. His heart had known where it was taking him, and why.

  “You were there all the time, weren’t you?” he murmured. “All through the last two years, you were there in my heart. Part of me knew you from the first moment. Not remembered, but knew you were the one I needed, the only one.” He murmured her name again, and seemed to hear her answer him. The sound of her voice was beautiful, saying his name.

  “Justin!”

  He looked up, realizing he wasn’t imagining it. She was really there, watching him with a combination of tenderness and exasperation that seemed to him, at that moment, the very essence of love. It was the look of a wife, he realized, for that was what she was, his true
wife, the wife of his heart, the wife he should have married long ago, but he hadn’t understood.

  “How can you be so silly as to come out here in the rain without covering up properly?” she demanded.

  “It’s not raining, Sarah.”

  “It is raining.”

  To his amazement, it was. He hadn’t noticed it start. The air was cold, and his shirt was already wet. The church clock struck seven. He’d been sitting by the duck pond for two hours.

  “Come in at once,” Sarah insisted.

  “Quit nagging,” he said with a grin.

  “If you acted sensibly in the first place I wouldn’t need to nag,” she pointed out with irrefutable logic.

  “True.” His eyes never left her adorable face. “I love you, Sarah.”

  “I love you, too. Come in out of the rain. Justin, why are you staring at me like that?”

  He didn’t need to ask like what? He was staring because she looked different. He could see so many other faces superimposed on the one she wore now—the tender, glowing look she’d given him so often in the days of their first love, the gallant smile with which she’d covered heartbreak when he broke it off, the distraught expression he’d seen a few moments before she vanished. But that was gone. Now there were only love and contentment in her expression as she stood there, chivvying him, like a wife, to take care of himself.

  It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her everything. But no, he thought. First he’d win the tug-of-war medal, then he’d give it to her. He’d tell her his plans for Merton Farm, how he wanted the farmhouse to be their family home. And he’d beg her to forgive him for the past. Except that he knew she already had.

  He showered and did his best to hide how poorly he was feeling. A couple of aspirin helped, and his feverish flush was covered by his tan. Nothing must be allowed to spoil today.

  To his dismay Sarah had cooked him an enormous breakfast, eggs, bacon, sausage, toast and marmalade. “It’ll build your strength up,” she said.

  “I could eat a horse,” he lied in his heartiest voice. In fact, even toast and black coffee would have been an effort, but he valiantly maintained his role as a man at the peak of health. “Come along, woman. Serve it up! I’m starving.” He thumped his breast, gorilla style, and Nicky crowed with laughter.