by Cody Young
“You’ve got petrol in the car,” said Roy. “I could wheel you out there, stick you in the car, and we could be down at the Dog and Whistle in no time.”
Michael was silent for a moment, thinking fast. The idea rather appealed to him. “Can you drive a car, Roy?”
“I drove a van once in London. I drove it fast too, coz it was nicked.”
Michael felt a flare of surprise, but then accepted this tidbit philosophically. He should have known with Roy. “There won’t be much traffic on the roads, so I suppose we could risk it.”
“Grab your hat and scarf then, Mister, and we’ll get going. At least she’ll see that you mean business.”
• • •
Katie knew she shouldn’t have agreed to go upstairs with Tom. But how could she tell him about their little girl when it seemed the whole village had turned out downstairs — boozy old men telling jokes and wheezy stories, laborers throwing darts and spilling beer on the floor, village busybodies listening in.
Tom’s room was much too small for a big, loose-limbed chap like him. It was an attic room, with a low sloping ceiling, and a little gabled window. Katie felt safer in front of it, looking across the green and through the trees to a nice view of the river beyond. It would be getting dark soon.
She turned back and glanced awkwardly at Tom, who seemed lost for words, too.
Tom sat down on the bed and patted the space beside him.
“I’m all right where I am,” she said stiffly.
So Tom joined her at the window, stooping to look out over the village green.
“Lovely place,” he observed. “I shall think about you here in this peaceful place while I’m in the war. Will you write me?”
She didn’t want to say yes, but wasn’t sure she ought to say no, either. What harm would a few letters do?
Except that she hated receiving his letters, full of mixed messages and references to broken promises. Instead, she skirted his question.
“Where will they send you?” she asked.
“How would I know? I suppose it won’t be Greece now. I’d rather have liked a look at Greece.”
Katie smiled. That was the Tom she had known in Ireland. Full of mad schemes to see the world and enjoy himself at somebody else’s expense.
He was right behind her now. He put his hands on her shoulders and she didn’t stop him. He was an old friend, and perhaps he did have a prior right. Seeing him made her realize how out of place she was here in this English village and even more so at Farrenden Manor with Michael. Who was she trying to fool? Herself?
She could feel Tom’s body close to hers, though she would not turn around to embrace him. She could feel him leaning closer, his warm breath on the side of her face, and she sensed the very moment when he decided to lower his lips onto the curve of her neck.
• • •
The red sports car drew up right outside the Dog and Whistle.
“I’ll go inside and find her,” Roy said as he jumped out and dashed into the pub. Michael had no choice but to wait in the passenger seat, since they had left the wheelchair at home.
Roy was gone for about ten minutes, while Michael waited impatiently wishing like hell he had not entrusted any part of this mission to a surly, twelve-year-old boy. He should never have allowed Roy to interfere in his troubled romance with Katie, if that’s what it was. Michael glanced uneasily at the pub, with its jolly hanging baskets of flowers and its shabby thatched roof. The old gray straw was shedding in places, making the place look like it needed a trip to the barber. Michael sighed. Could he, with any degree of legitimacy, say that he was romantically involved with Katie? His feelings had run high when he met that O’Brien fellow, that’s for sure.
He must be. Romantically involved, that was.
Roy came hurrying out of the pub alone and Michael frowned as he leaned over the door to hear the news.
Roy’s face was grave. “She’s gone upstairs with him, Mister.”
Michael swallowed hard and glanced away. “Dear God.”
“Shall I ask the landlord to go upstairs and tell her you’re out here waiting? Or do you want to try to get in there yourself?”
Michael stared at the walnut dashboard, as if the answer should be written there for him. “I can’t face people laughing at me. And I don’t want that Tom fellow to know I can’t walk.”
“So you’re gonna just wait here until she comes out,” Roy challenged. “What if she’s in there the whole night?”
Michael glanced up at the inn’s gabled windows. He knew where the guest rooms were — he’d been there with a girl himself on more than one occasion. Roy glanced up, too, and they both saw the curtains being drawn in one of the upper rooms. They couldn’t see the face, but the arm was definitely male.
“Bloody hell,” Roy cursed. “She’s in that room with him, sir!”
Michael gave a heavy sigh. He ran a hand over his face.
Think fast, man, think fast. That’s what he always used to will himself to do when he was up above the clouds in his Hurricane.
The enemy has made his next move clear — decide on a course of action and carry it out, straight away. The image that came to Michael was of Katie, kneeling beside the broken plate on the scullery floor, tears in her eyes and drops of blood on the floor. She was scared of this man O’Brien, scared of the power this man had over her. And he would hurt her again if he got the chance.
“Come on, sir. Make a decision,” Roy begged.
She needs rescuing, Michael realized, and he was the man to do it. If only he had his legs, he be in there in a trice. But he had to think laterally now.
“Honk the horn,” he instructed Roy.
“What?”
“Just sound the horn, for heaven’s sake!”
But Roy still looked flummoxed and Michael became impatient. He reached over, and started squeezing the horn like the whole village was on fire.
The landlord came running out, wiping his hands on his linen apron. “Do you need me to bring you a drink, sir?”
“No,” said Michael, still blasting away on the horn. “I’m trying to attract my housemaid’s attention.”
People came to the doorway while others stared out the tiny windowpanes. Some stopped what they were doing on the village green to stare in amazement.
“Looks like you’ve got the attention of the whole bleedin’ village,” Roy observed.
The landlord wiped sweat off his anxious forehead and gave Michael a bewildered look “Your housemaid, sir?”
“Yes. She has been lured into your drinking establishment by a young Irishman of ill repute,” Michael said with as much lordly aplomb as he could muster.
Roy tugged at Michael’s sleeve. “Look, Mister, there she is. Up there!”
Katie stood in the window of the upper room, and was struggling to open the casement itself. She finally forced it free and leaned out. She clapped a hand over her mouth in surprise when she saw Michael, but she looked delighted to see him.
“Katie!” he yelled. “He’s had his chance. He’s not good enough for you, darling. Come away with me!”
She looked thrilled, and Michael saw her chest heave with emotion. She was tearful but vindicated.
They could all hear Tom in the background, the rise and fall of his Irish accent begging her not to make a fool of herself. They all saw Katie turn to him and ask, “So I can make myself into a fool with you instead?”
Katie’s face reappeared at the window, and she waved at Michael and Roy. “I’m coming down, right now.”
She appeared moments later, running across the yard outside the pub, with Tom O’Brien in hot pursuit.
“So, Kathleen. Is that how it is? Some rich bloke takes an interest — and all he has to do is beep his horn and you go running. It’s all lies and promises, no doubt.”
Katie turned to face her old flame, for what Michael hoped would be the last time. “You were the one good at the lies and promises, Tom. He hasn’t made me any promises.
But he’s come to fetch me home.”
Michael opened the passenger door. “Hop in then,” he commanded. “Plenty of room if I budge up.”
“I know. It isn’t the first time we’ve had to share,” Katie reminded him and flung herself into his arms. Michael gave her a rather flashy kiss. He knew perfectly well he was making a meal of her not just for himself, but for Tom.
Roy tooted the horn to get their attention again.
“Where to, milord?”
Katie was the one who answered. “Home, James, and don’t spare the horses!”
Chapter Sixteen
Michael sat at his desk, preparing to order some more horse feed so they wouldn’t run out again. Determined to set the whole farm running like a well-oiled machine, as it had done in his father’s time. It was a noble goal, but unfortunately, he was in no mood for it. Last night, he had felt on top of the world. The girl of his dreams had left that great dolt and stepped merrily into his car — into his arms, no less. She’d been overflowing with gratitude.
But this morning he was full a doubts and dark thoughts. What would she have done if Roy hadn’t driven him to the village? Would she have managed to free herself from that man’s clutches? He rather doubted it. Anyone could see that Katie still carried a torch for O’Brien, despite his appalling treatment. This morning, he’d watched Katie at breakfast this morning as he always did, and she had been absent-minded. When the radio broadcast came on with news about the war progress, she had turned up the wireless and paid a lot more attention than the day before.
She cared about Tom, that was obvious. Michael’s stomach clenched. Perhaps she would have been touched deeper still in the bedroom at the Dog and Whistle if Michael hadn’t interrupted things. He tossed his fountain pen down onto his desk. What did he care about running the farm when it was only pure luck that Katie woke up here at Farrenden instead of in the arms of her unreliable Irishman?
Michael hated luck. It was luck that he had landed on that roof and broken his back, and it was luck that he survived to tell the tale. Luck led him to meet Katie in the first place, and luck could just as easily steal her away from him again.
Unless he did something about it.
If he could only get well again he was sure she’d stay. And not just because she was sorry for him, either. If he could stand on his own two feet, strong and virile like Tom, then perhaps she would allow herself to fall in love again. He realized with a heart-searing pang through every part of his body that could still feel pain, that he longed for Katie to forget Tom and fall in love with him.
• • •
Katie was in the library on her hands and knees polishing the claw feet on the armchairs when she heard him call out for her. She sensed the anxiety in his voice — and something more, something like anger.
“Katie!”
Did he imagine she had nothing to do all day except to be at his beck and call?
“Katie! Come here this minute! I need to speak with you.”
She abandoned the duster and the furniture polish and stood up. She untied the strings of her apron and threw it into the armchair, and then she ran along the hallway to his study.
“What is it, sir?”
He looked flustered as she came into the room. “Those papers we brought back from London. The ones the doctor gave us. Where are they?”
Katie hesitated. Lying was never her best talent. “I … can’t remember, sir. Maybe Mrs. Jessop moved them.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. She’s banned from my study since the incident with the ration books. You are the only person who’s been in here except for me.”
Katie bit her lip and didn’t reply.
“Where have you put them?” he said, in a stern tone of voice.
She knew she couldn’t answer him with a lie. “In the outside toilet, sir.”
A look of shock flashed across his handsome face. “What?”
“I thought you’d finished with them. I … ”
“But I need them, Katie. I want to telephone the surgeon today. I want this bloody back of mine sorted out.”
“Now, sir. I don’t think you should rush into anything. I don’t think — ”
His blue eyes widened. “You don’t want me to do it. That’s why you took the papers. You’re hoping I’ll forget all about it?”
Katie’s heart thumped inside her. She knew how much the idea of getting better meant to him — however unrealistic it was. “Yes.”
“You admit it?” He looked incredulous. “You hid the papers, on purpose?”
“Yes.” She gazed back at him, trying to summon the courage to say what she needed to say. “There’s too much risk involved, sir. You’ve recovered so well from your accident. Why tempt fate and take a gamble with your health now?”
“I’d gamble anything to be able to stand on my own two feet.”
Katie gave a rueful laugh. “You would, would you?”
“Yes, I bloody well would. Think about it, Katie. Think how different my life could be.”
“The doctor said the surgery might make things worse, Michael. I was there, remember? You asked me to be there.”
“But, Katie. I want things to be like they used to be. I want — ”
“I know what you want.”
“Do you?” he said, bitterly. “I don’t think so.”
“Yes I do. You want to be the man you were before. You want to walk and run and impress everyone and go rushing back to win the war. But you’re in love with a dream, sir.”
He swallowed. “You don’t think those things are possible?”
“No. I don’t. I hate to be the one to break it to you,” she said, wanting to go over to him and reach out and touch his troubled face, but not daring to. “But … you are kidding yourself, if you think the surgeons can work miracles. They’re doctors, that’s all, with hopes and dreams of their own. Maybe one day they’ll be able to repair injuries like yours, and make people as good as new, but for now that’s just a wild hope. They’d all like to be the first doctor to make a breakthrough. You’re not a fool, sir. Don’t go and be a guinea pig in some medical experiment. You are too important. Too valuable. Don’t you see?”
He stared up at her with anguished blue eyes. Trying to make sense of what she was saying. “I’m useless, Katie. To you. To the war. To everyone.”
“Don’t say that!” The sound of her raised voice was a surprise, even to Katie, but she continued. “Don’t say it, and don’t think it, either. You are not useless. You have work to do the same as we all do. You have this huge farm to run.”
“Hammond runs the farm. You know that.”
“Hammond will run it into the ground if you don’t watch out. He’s too busy chasing skirt to care. You should stand up to him.”
“Stand up to him?” Michael’s face flushed with anger and bitterness. “Stand up to him! How the hell do I do that, exactly?”
“You know what I mean.” Katie didn’t know if she had the nerve to keep going, seeing him look at her like that. But she had to convince him. She had to talk him out of this. She owed him — for helping her out last night. She’d come so close to making a huge mistake with Tom and his lordship had saved her. She wanted to do the same for him. “For heaven’s sake, you are twice the man that Hammond is. That Tom is. You proved that to me last night.”
He blanched. They both knew that it cost her dearly to speak of her foolishness with Tom. But at that moment Katie would have said just about anything to convince him.
He nodded, as if grateful for her sacrifice, and his expression softened. “I always liked to be the one to save the day, Katie. And when I had my health and strength, it was easy to play the hero. These days, it’s more difficult.”
“You are the same man, sir. You can still win this war, but you’re fighting on a different battlefield now. Forget the past. Find your strength and your courage and put them to good use. Please.”
There was a long, long pause. Katie was terrified she’d overste
pped the mark. He was not someone who took commands. He was someone who gave them. He could order her out of the house at a moment’s notice. She waited for his anger to erupt, for his pride and his fear to get the better of him. But his tone of voice was quiet, when he finally spoke.
“I’ll consider it.”
“You promise?” she asked, softly.
“Yes.”
• • •
Katie took the bus to Great Farrenden — where she knew there was a Catholic church. She heard mass for the first time since she got to Farrenden Manor and thought seriously about saying her confession. She hadn’t let Tom touch her, but she had been tempted. It wasn’t that she still loved Tom; in fact, she felt a fierce hatred for him. But he was part of her old life.
He was familiar, and he was all she had ever known. And he was her link with the little girl they had made in one of their brief, embarrassing trysts. Against the old oak tree, perhaps, or on the storeroom floor at Tom’s parents’ shop.
She felt a surge of shame that she had ever let Tom have his way with her, and vowed that things would be different from now on.
Not that she had been entirely successful in her resolve. She blushed at the thought of the scene outside the tavern. His lordship had put on a fine performance to help her escape Tom’s clutches. She had played along with it, and was very grateful for the rescue. But that didn’t mean that she and Michael were courting. Of course it didn’t. That was unthinkable.
She knew full well that Michael took a very liberal, modern view of sex — one the priest at the alter would certainly not approve of, she reminded herself sharply. She knelt down on the uncomfortable bench in the church pew to pray for a strengthened resolve and to become a more dignified person than she had ever yet managed to be.
Chapter Seventeen
Days went past, and Michael spent the best part of them sulking in his room. Katie knew he needed time, but the children were less understanding.
“Where’s Mister Lord?” George kept asking, “I want to play dogfights on the front lawn, and it’s no fun without him. Where is he?”
“In bed with a cold,” Katie lied.