The Tender Night

by Lilian Peake

  There was the sound of footsteps descending the stairs, one long flight after another. Shelley knew that when those footsteps came nearer, she would have to move Jamie out of the way. But the footsteps stopped just behind them.

  ‘Now I know,’ said the owner of the two highly polished shoes not far from Shelley’s head, ‘why the phone wasn’t answered. Mother’s help, Miss Jenner, as well as deputy head and substitute teacher, not to mention your real job of personal secretary to the headmistress?’

  Craig stepped past and stood in the hall looking at them. Shelley said fiercely, ‘You may be able to ignore a human being in distress, Mr. Allard, but I can’t.’

  ‘No feelings left inside you, I believe you said, Miss Jenner?’ he murmured silkily. ‘No male of the species was going to be allowed near you any more. What are you comforting so lovingly, so touchingly, if not a specimen of manhood, young, very young, though he may be?’

  Jamie had stopped crying and appeared to be listening, although he had not moved from his comfortable position against Shelley.

  ‘Jamie?’ Shelley looked into his face. ‘A sweetie, love?’ He nodded and walked with her into the office, his hand clinging to hers. Craig followed, watching while the sweet was handed over and the tear-stained face dried with a paper tissue.

  ‘Surely,’ Craig asked, a touch of hardness in his voice, ‘this is a job for the matron?’

  Shelley glanced at Jamie, then in answer to the question chose her words with care, words which she hoped the child would not understand. ‘Matron is not exactly renowned for her lightness of touch in cases of this kind, or for handing out sympathy like chocolates from a fancy box.’

  She glanced anxiously at the little boy. No, he had not understood. Or had he? ‘I hate Matron,’ he mumbled, round the obstacle of his sweet and pressed closer to Shelley.

  ‘All the same,’ Craig persisted, ‘it’s what the woman’s paid for. And you’re paid to type letters, not to act as a wet-nurse to homesick kids.’

  Shelley straightened her shoulders. ‘Look, Mr. Allard, if you’d—’ she took a breath, ‘if you’d ever been hurt, deeply, immeasurably, irreparably hurt as I have,’ another steadying breath, ‘although I doubt if it’s possible for any ordinary human emotion to penetrate your inflexible exterior,’ she ignored the tightening of his lips, ‘you’d know how it felt to be lost and—and abandoned and out of reach of comforting arms—the right comforting arms. Matron, with her brusqueness, would only have made matters worse, so it’s surely only common humanity if I do my inadequate best rather than allow the “right” person to do her worst?’

  But it seemed she had not convinced him. ‘So now you’re taking upon yourself the welfare of the pupils as well as the administration of the school?’ He rounded on her, taking her by surprise. ‘Who the blazes do you think you are?’ he asked savagely. ‘Are you under the illusion that you can run this place single-handed?’

  Shocked by the ferocity of his attack, she cried, ‘Will you stop baiting me?’ Her lip quivered and she felt the small hand cling even more tightly. The significance of that grip make her blurt out, ‘Don’t you realise we’re being overheard, every single miserable word we fling at each other is being registered on a small tape recorder of a brain? Don’t you realise the effect our quarrelling must be having on the third person in this room? To his sense of security which is already threatened to the point of extinction by his separation from his parents?’

  Craig looked at her curiously and there was silence for a full half minute. Then he moved, gently drawing away the little boy and putting him aside. His hands lifted and removed the glasses which framed Shelley’s eyes. His fingers found their way to her armpits, gripping her firmly. His mouth descended slowly, tormentingly, to settle on hers, forcing back her head.

  The pressure of his lips was hard, uncompromising and punishing, and to the girl at the receiving end of the kiss, it lasted an infinity of time. An involuntary reassuring sigh escaped from the small onlooker and Craig lifted his head, although his hands remained where they were.

  His glittering, cynical eyes mocked Shelley’s and he said, ‘There now, Miss Jenner, are you better pleased with our relationship? You think it has made our audience a little happier to think we’re friends instead of enemies? That we like instead of hate each other? And that he’ll go to his class now a secure, reassured little boy and forget for a while the pain and loneliness of homesickness?’

  Shelley could not answer, nor even nod. The kiss she had just been given had shattered her composure to such an extent that she wanted to find the nearest mouse-hole in the wainscoting and crawl into it, never to emerge again.

  ‘Go to your class, lad,’ Craig said gently, turning his head and smiling. Jamie nodded eagerly and ran off.

  ‘So,’ said Craig, removing his hands at last, ‘in one action I’ve achieved two things. I’ve discovered within myself a reservoir—small but significant—of the milk of human kindness which I never even guessed was there. And last but certainly not least, I’ve stormed the outer wall of that impregnable castle my mother asserts you’ve built around yourself.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘No small achievement for such an early hour.’

  As he reached the door, Shelley said dully, replacing her spectacles, ‘I’m—I’m sorry for losing my temper.’

  He smiled. ‘You must do it again some time. I enjoyed quelling it.’ In a mocking whisper, ‘The pleasure was all mine.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  Rarely an evening went by when Craig did not take Janine out. Her face reflected the happiness she was plainly feeling. Whether it was that she was flattered by the attention of a man a good deal older than herself, whether it was infatuation, or whether—and Shelley shrank from the thought—it was genuine love that made her sister walk about in a daze in the daytime and dash out in the evening at the first sound of wheel crunching on gravel, Shelley did not know.

  But she did know for certain that one day, soon, she would have to tackle either Janine, or Craig, or both.

  Emery came often to the lodge, too, contriving neatly to miss Craig, who he frankly admitted he did not care to face. But Shelley had no doubt that Janine told Craig of Emery’s visits. Let her tell him, she thought defiantly, and let him make what he likes of it. The kiss he had given her, intended though it was—so Craig had said—to put Jamie’s mind at rest, had humiliated her beyond words.

  Her only means of retaliation had been to cut Craig dead whenever they met, and if she did have to speak to him, she would do so as sharply and as briefly as possible. That her attitude did not please him she was fully aware by the animosity in his expression, but it made no difference to her behaviour.

  Emery was patient about Shelley’s lack of feeling where he, or any man, was concerned. He had heard of the unfortunate episode of the runaway fiancé, and had said that the man must have been crazy. With her fetching contours, which she stupidly concealed under shapeless clothes, any man who could see straight and walk straight would be drawn to her like the pointer of a compass towards the North Pole.

  All he asked, he said, was to be allowed to kiss her now and then—just to prove she was female—and this she condescended to allow him to do, although he did comment, on one occasion when he said goodnight, that it was rather like kissing an item which had just been taken out of the deep freeze.

  Craig continued to take Janine out. Shelley worried about their friendship. How deeply was Janine becoming involved? Even she, Shelley, prejudiced as she was against men, had to admit that there was an attraction about the man which, if she did not reinforce her barriers every time he came within sight, she herself would find difficult to resist.

  He was handsome, he was worldly, his self-assurance amounted to arrogance. He dressed well, even in his relaxed moments, and the car he ran put him into the higher income bracket. How could a girl as impressionable as Janine resist such a combination of charms?

  One morning Craig came into the headmistress’s office. Mrs.
Allard had gone to Middlesbrough to look at some secondhand educational equipment.

  Craig’s manner was cool. As she looked at him looking down at her, she experienced a thought so treacherous it filled her with dismay. If only, the thought said, he would look at me once, just once, the way he looks at Janine. Instead of that derision, if there could be a momentary softening, a smile, sincere and pleasing—

  She jammed on her mental brakes. What was she doing, hoping for an improvement in their relations, seeking a smile from him instead of a scowl, sympathy in place of studied cynicism? If so, she was wasting her time.

  Her glasses rested on the desk top. She rammed them on and glared up at him. ‘You want me?’

  ‘No.’

  The response was immediate and unequivocal, and spoken with a mocking, insulting smile. She coloured as she sensed the insinuation that in no possible circumstances could he regard her in that light. There also arose from somewhere inside her, like a deep-sea creature surfacing for the first time in years, a curious sensation of yearning.

  Stunted, half-developed though it was, it was unmistakable—and terrifyingly familiar. But what frightened her most was its potential strength, like a firework in a nightmare turning in mid-air into a life-destroying rocket. All the ingredients were there, she could sense it, it needed only a catalyst to cause the chemical reaction to come about. And the end result? she asked herself despairingly. An emotional upheaval which would make her relationship with Michael Townley seem like an adolescent crush.

  Craig sat in the chair at his mother’s desk. ‘Would you come over here, please?’ he asked distantly. ‘Bring your chair.’

  His fingers played with his mother’s desk calendar. It was the kind that rotated, the new date slipping automatically into place. The continuous clicking sound it made jarred on Shelley’s nerves, the fact that it would take a lot of her precious time turning it back to the correct date when he had finished fiddling with it ruffled her even more.

  ‘I don’t know whether my mother has told you,’ his glance flicked her like someone trying out the timbre of a wine glass, ‘but, having largely completed my research, I’m now in the process of writing a book. I—er—’ Click-click went the calendar, ‘I’m what you might call a two-fingered typist and—’

  ‘You’re asking me to help you out?’

  The narrowed eyes rested on her. The calendar was replaced on the desk, now hopelessly out of date. ‘How did you guess?’ He leaned back, crossing his legs, his eyes still on her. ‘Since you’ve come to the point so quickly, so shall I. Will you help me?’

  For a long time Shelley did not answer. Everything within her, her thoughts, her emotions, her better judgment urged her to say ‘no’.

  ‘I’ll make it worth your while.’

  She glanced at him indignantly. Was that what he thought was worrying her? But still she could not bring out that simple word ‘yes’.

  His eyes had not left her. ‘I believe you’re hoping one day to finance Janine in opening a shop of her own?’

  ‘What if I am?’

  He sighed. ‘I’m handling this badly.’ He leaned forward, clasping his hands over the desk. ‘Shelley,’ the word left his lips, hitting her and setting up such a vibration in the region of her heart she could hardly stand it, ‘I need your help.’ He smiled and her heart lurched drunkenly. What was the matter with her? First her name, than a smile from him and she was in such an emotional turmoil she might have been a fourteen-year-old experiencing her first infatuation...

  At last she answered, and the words came out dry and husky, ‘What do you want me to do?’

  His eyes held hers steadily. ‘I have four handwritten chapters. Some of the work is messy but most, I hope, is readable. Would you type what I’ve written so that I can get on with the corrections?’

  Without hesitation she replied, ‘Yes. But I’ll do it without money.’

  ‘Which is exactly what my mother said you would say. I discussed it with her and she agreed to let me ask you.’

  ‘But, Mr. Allard,’ Shelley said urgently, ‘if you mean me to do it in school hours, I’m afraid that’s not—’

  ‘In school hours, when you’re acting head, deputy head, welfare officer, secretary, comforter of weeping kids...’ He stood, pushing in the chair. ‘Of course not, woman. Have some sense. In your spare time. And the money will be yours whether you want it or not. I ask no favours of the girl who dislikes me as much as you do.’

  ‘When shall I start?’ she asked tonelessly.

  ‘This evening?’ She nodded. ‘Upstairs in my apartment. Time? Shall we say seven until—when? Until nine? Name your price.’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ll leave that to you.’

  ‘Fair enough. You’ll accept whatever I choose to pay?’ She nodded and he named a sum which he would pay her hourly.

  ‘Far too much, Mr. Allard.’

  ‘I hope, Miss Jenner, you’re going to work hard and be worth every penny. Otherwise,’ with a smile, ‘I shall demand my money back.’

  She answered seriously, ‘I won’t let you down.’

  He smiled as he answered, ‘The thought that you would had never even occurred to me. I have every confidence in—and admiration for—your professional integrity.’

  The emphasis on the penultimate word told her with painful clarity how little admiration he had for her as a woman.

  ‘Craig’s taking me out again tonight,’ Janine told Shelley over tea.

  Shelley said, doing her best to sound casual, ‘You’re not getting too involved with that man, are you, Jan?’

  ‘If you mean am I looking for a ring from him to put on my finger, no.’

  Shelley said with a gentle smile, ‘You haven’t really answered my question.’

  Janine shrugged. ‘I do like him, but—what’s the use? He’s way above me. I’m trying to stop myself getting serious, but it’s not easy, Shelley. He’s got everything, looks, money, status, brains. Me, I’m so dim I wonder he can stand me.’ She laughed and brightened.

  But Shelley did not laugh. ‘It’s not fair the way he’s paying you so much attention. If he’s just playing with you—’

  ‘Oh, leave it, Shelley. If he throws me overboard, I can take it. No doubt I’ll splash and flounder at first, but I won’t drown. There are plenty of other men around. In the meantime, I'm taking what’s offered. Like you should be with Emery.’

  ‘I told you, Jan, I want no deep involvement with any man. I’ve finished with all that.’

  ‘You’ve said that so many times I wonder if you’re really saying it to convince yourself?’

  Shelley looked up quickly. Her young sister was growing up, she was more perspicacious than she, Shelley, had given her credit for. And maybe Jan was right.

  Shelley explained that Craig had asked her to help him with his book. ‘I’m starting the work tonight.’

  Janine said with a laugh, ‘So if he’s late calling for me, I’ll know who’s to blame!’

  Craig was dressed and ready for going out when Shelley arrived. A twinge—was it of pain?—a quick twist inside her caught her unawares as she looked at him stretched out lazily on the settee. He lifted himself upright and his manner was as relaxed as his clothes.

  His jacket, high-collared, was unbuttoned. A belt hung, unfastened, from loops. His shirt was white and rollnecked, his trousers well-fitting. She experienced a feeling of panic as she looked at him. The sense of being on the edge of something devastating and entirely strange welled up in her again.

  ‘You look,’ he said casually, ‘as though you’ve just come face to face with an escaped animal from a zoo. I’m not wild, Miss Jenner. I won’t tear you limb from limb. Unless,’ with a grin, ‘you make too many typing errors. Relax, have a drink.’ He poured one from a cocktail cabinet. ‘Make yourself at home. When your sister comes here she takes possession.’

  ‘My sister’s been here?’ Her tone was sharp.

  ‘Yes.’ The drink was handed to her. ‘Why not?�
� He lifted his glass ironically. ‘Cheers’. He drank.

  ‘She—she just hasn’t mentioned it.’ Shelley sipped her drink.

  Craig’s lips curved into a taunting smile. ‘Now you’re wondering what we do up here.’

  ‘The thought never crossed my mind,’ she bluffed.

  ‘Come, come, Miss Jenner. And you a once-engaged, almost-married woman? You know the facts of life.’

  Shelley felt cold inside. Her sister here, at night, with this man, with his attractions, his knowledge of the opposite sex, his—his pulling power—there was no other way of describing the effect he had on a woman.

  The liquid left the glass and poured into her throat. Then she stood.

  ‘I’ve come to work, Mr. Allard.’ She took her spectacles from their case and put them on.

  He drawled, ‘Craig Allard put in his place. Must you wear those perishing things?’ motioning with his head.

  ‘My glasses? Yes, for work. Why?’

  ‘They hardly enhance your looks.’

  She coloured angrily. ‘I have none to enhance.’

  ‘I’m not going to disagree with that statement, even if you hoped I would. With that hairstyle, with the clothes you wear a schoolgirl wouldn’t be seen dead in, with the sour, reproving manner you choose to adopt in my—and who knows, any man’s—presence, who could possibly call you attractive?’ He folded his arms and dwelt on the fury and humiliation in her face. ‘I saw a girl once at your house—Janine’s sister it was—it couldn’t have been you!—dressed like a bride, soft, feminine, womanly ... kissable—’

  Shelley walked to the door, but he was behind her, gripping her by the shoulders, swinging her round. ‘Wrong way, Miss Jenner. The desk is over there, under the window. Typewriter’s at the ready, notes crying out to be translated into legible English. Let me lead you by the hand.’ This he took and grasped, despite her struggle to remove it. He pushed her down into the chair. ‘Paper, carbons, my notes.’ ‘And,’ belligerently, ‘if there’s anything I don’t understand?’