His Lordships Daughter

by de'Ville, Brian A

  “If it’s money, leave me out. I haven’t got any!”

  Phyllipa frowned. “No! It’s not that at all. I just want you to point Steven in the right direction.”

  “How?” June asked

  “He will get a letter from the bank tomorrow morning.”

  “As quickly as that?”

  “Braseby doesn’t hang about.” Phyllipa explained. “He goes for the jugular. Now! You have been Steven’s secretary for ages and probably know how he reacts to adversity in his business field. Don’t you?”

  June thought for a while “Yes I suppose I do.” She finally said. “I’ve seen most of his working moods. Why?”

  Phyllipa ignored the question. “What will be the first thing he will do when he gets the letter?”

  June shrugged her shoulders. “He’ll come into my office and ask me to read it, to ascertain that what he is seeing is really there. Then when I’ve verified it and made a few soothing remarks, he’ll go and hide for half an hour and lick his wounds.”

  “Is that all?”

  “No. when he has calmed down a bit he will come back and instruct me to advise the bank that he is on his way.”

  “Won’t he make an appointment with Clive?”

  “No! He will go straight down there.”

  “What then?”

  June threw her arms in the air “I’m only guessing now, because this has never happened before, but he will probably ask me to arrange a meeting with another bank.” She took another sip of her drink. “What you have to understand is that Steven is a designer. He makes things work which other people only dream about, and in his hands, complicated problems become child’s play. But, when it comes to business matters where money is concerned, Steven is still a designer.”

  “Poor guy!” Phyllipa sighed as she took a business card from her handbag and handed it to June. “This is no fault whatsoever of his. But, when he does ask you to put some feelers out, send him to these people.”

  Steven Grant’s secretary took the card and read it, then looked at her companion “Am I doing the right thing with this.”

  Phyllipa scowled “Do you want the company to fold? I doubt whether there is another bank around who will touch that overdraft, and you know what bankers are? They won’t be interested in why the Imperial has foreclosed, only that it has.”

  June put the card in her pocket. “I just hope I am doing the right thing, that’s all.” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at her friend. “Are you sure that we are not a little out of our depth here?”

  “Positive! he is going to need the money, and I’m going to see he gets it.”

  June shook her head. “I just hope you know what you are doing.”

  “All the company will be doing is transferring its overdraft, that’s all.” Phyllipa pointed out, anxious to prove to her friend that what she was doing was right. “And, we are merely providing him with another facility.”

  “We?”

  Her companion sighed and drank the last of her soda water. “It will be my family’s money which repays the debt.” She explained, almost apologetically, “And it will mean this company can stay open and carry on trading. Is there a problem with that?”

  “I don’t think so but Steven may find one.”

  “Steven won’t know.” Phyllipa threw out her arms to emphasise her point. “All of it is being serviced through a nominee.”

  June’s eyes narrowed. “The way I see it, you could gain control of the company.”

  Phyllipa shook her head in exasperation. “I don’t want the bloody company! I just want things to remain as they are! I feel responsible for what is happening and I don’t want anyone to get hurt.” She got to her feet. “Does Steven know that you are engaged to Clive?”

  June stopped putting her shoes on and looked up in alarm. “Of course not. Nor do I want him to.” She sat back in her chair and gazed at Phyllipa. “I do take your point, though. If he finds out you are behind all of this and that I am involved somewhere, he is going to put two and two together and come up with five.” She glared at her friend. “In my opinion what you are doing is extremely dangerous. Within the company it could be the start of World War Three.”

  Phyllipa nodded. “Yes. Well, what would life be like if we didn’t have a bit of excitement occasionally?”

  “That’s what you call it is it?”

  “Look! You can come up with a million reasons why I shouldn’t do this, but, ignoring every one of them I shall sleep peacefully in the knowledge that what I am doing is one hundred per cent right! And as far as Steven finding out? We will cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  Seriously, June studied her friend for a few moments, She smiled. “Alright! But, just you mind you don’t get your feet wet.”

  Chapter 11

  “You appear to like whatever it is you are doing!” Lord Hemingham said, looking rather fondly at his daughter.

  “I wouldn’t be doing it if I didn’t.” Phyllipa watched her father. She knew he was fishing again.

  “You’ve been doing what you are doing for six months now.” He said referring to the bet. “One job! One company! One year!”

  “Yes! One knows!” his daughter murmured.

  She was sitting at her writing desk in the library at Roseland’s, having decided to return to her father a few nights to keep him company.

  “Will you be staying on after the twelve months is up?”

  Phyllipa, writing to some old school friends, put her pen down. “I’m not sure. I like the work, I like the friends which I have made and the routine suits me. If you had asked me that question a couple of weeks ago I would have categorically said yes, but, something popped up a few days ago and it may change things.”

  Her father looked at her. “Oh?”

  Rising to her feet, she walked over to her father. Kissing his cheek she pulled up a chair and sat opposite him. “That bloody Breseby pall of yours…”

  “He’s no pal of mine.” Her father protested, interrupting.

  “He’s been poking his nose, indirectly into my business.”

  Her father looked at her anxiously! “Has he now?”

  Phyllipa nodded. “SG Packaging, the firm which employs me, banks with him, and out of sheer bloody mindedness, because I am not going to marry his son, he has decided to call his money in.” she looked up in the air “Stupid man! It is causing me problems.”

  “I don’t like people who poke their nose into your business, Phyllipa, directly or indirectly, what does Steven think of it all?”

  “He won’t know until he gets tomorrow’s post.”

  “Will he cope?”

  “He will if I’ve anything to do with it.” She insisted crossly.

  “Good! I like him. And I don’t wish to see him get embroiled in something outside his control.” He rustled the newspaper in his hands. “You are rather fond of him aren’t you?”

  She smiled “I’m fond of a lot of people father, but I am just employed by Steven. That’s all there is to it.”

  “That is not the impression which I am getting.” He chuckled. “Do you know what I think?”

  “What?”

  “I think your boss is in love with you!”

  His daughter walked back to her desk and sat down again. “I like him. In my opinion, he’s a winner and my idea of what a man should be, but, I wouldn’t go as far as to admit I am in love with him, because I am not!” her thoughts momentarily returned to his hatred for her New Yorker. “In fact there are times when he can be extremely tiresome!” she looked defiantly at her father. “But, then you know how careful I have to be.”

  “Of course I understand that but it is reassuring that you like him.” He turned in his chair and looked at her. “Before you start writing again, I could give you some sub-rosa information about Braseby – if you wanted that is?”

  Phyllipa looked up with an interested look on her face “It would be very welcome father.”

  “There are two large accounts wh
ich the Imperial Bank has serviced for the past thirty years. Losing both would cause them considerable embarrassment and would hurt them, financially!”

  “I’m listening.”

  “The first is a company called, “Locotrend”. They make bits for railway engines and things like…”

  “And the second?”

  “Kristex. They make..”

  “We print their cartons.” His daughter interrupted.

  Her father opened his newspaper again. “I know you do.” He said silently chuckling to himself.

  Phyllipa sat with a bemused look on her face. “Working for a living is not quite as straightforward as it sounds is it ?”

  “No!” he assured her, with a shake of his head. “It isn’t.”

  “There seems to be a great deal of subterfuge about it?”

  Henry Inchcape-Gore laughed out loud. “That is why the family never chose to do it.”

  His daughter nodded, gazed into space for a few seconds, smiled, then got on with catching up with her friends for the next half hour, bought her correspondence up to date. Finally stamping the last envelope, she walked through to the hall, placed them on a table for collection by the butler, yawned and looking at her watch, returned to her father and kissed him goodnight!

  Walking through the house to her own private quarters, she was changing into something easier when David’s arms wrapped themselves around her waist. Earlier on in the day, she had phoned him to come up to the house, and here he was, on time as usual, eager and willing to transport the pair of them into pleasurable bliss of sexual gratification.

  “Tonight, I feel a little jaded.” She told him, as he suckled impatiently in her rapidly engorging nipples. “So we’ll forget the New Yorker.” Her breathing deepened as her long fingers grasped his stiffening manhood, massaging the pleasure zoned head. “Tell me.” She suddenly asked, an enquiring look in her eye “If I were to tie you up by your hands and feet and whip you, what would it do to you?” David shrugged his wide shoulders. “It would hurt me!”

  “Is that all? Wouldn’t it make you randier, wouldn’t it take you to your sexual peak?”

  He shook his head. “No, it wouldn’t. It would just hurt me, that’s all!” he kissed her mouth. “That’s your pleasure Phyllipa, not mine!”

  “In that case I won’t do it.” For a few moments, her mind went back to Steven. His refusal to hurt was still prominent in her mind and she thought by asking the right people the right questions would she finally work out why. Many times in her young life she had prayed that someone close would be there to guide her through the difficulties of growing older, but it was not to be. There had never been anyone around. Her mother had been taken from her when she was just five years of age. The bonding years broken by a drunk driver, leaving her very much alone. Consequently, all relationships since then had been strictly surface ones. Come-day, go-day affairs without a shred of emotion in any of them causing her very existence to merely constitute the gratification of her carnal appetite. Her father, realising he could never be the substitute for the maternal link supplied her with tutors, governesses and even a companion. But, Phyllipa had found difficulty in disclosing her innermost thoughts to salaried strangers, so they had all gone.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by David. “Are you alright?” she shook her head. Her voice was soft “Let’s call it a night.”

  Chapter 12

  Opening her “Instructions for the day” file, Phyllipa shuffled through the papers looking for anything which appeared to be special, but it was still the same old stuff. Her watch told her it was 9.30. In the morning and she knew that any minute, Steven would be reading his morning mail and his usual hopes for a normal day would be shattered.

  Stifling a yawn with her hand, she sighed, reached doe the telephone, banged eleven digits into the dial and spoke to Maisie, her financial advisor. “Phyllipa Gore, here Maisie.” She said speaking into the handset. “Good morning! Do we know anyone at a company called Locotrend? Anyone will do. A friend of a friend, even? ok, I’ll leave it with you!” Finishing the call, she replaced the receiver. If there was a back route into one of the Imperial Bank’s major accounts, her financial advisor would find it.

  Leaving her office, she walked through the works checking that her responsibilities were working, nodded her head with satisfaction as she saw they were. Steven was sitting at his desk with his head in his hands, when she walked through his office door. He looked up at her without smiling and Phyllipa’s heart reached out to him “Is it as bad as that?” she asked.

  He flicked a hand through his black hair. “One day I get good news and the next I get bad news. “He complained. “It’s like living on a bloody roller coaster.” He stopped and gazed at her “You always look so good. Do you ever have any problems?”

  “Obviously, you have had some bad news, do you wish to tell me about it?”

  He raised a thin smile. “It’s just business, and, sometimes I wonder if it is all worth it? Why don’t you and I jet off into some sun soaked haven and leave all this behind?”

  “Is that what you would like?”

  He rose almost wearily from his chair. “You don’t want to hear about my problems, but, as of this moment, anyone can have this company.” He put his arm around her waist and kissed her face. “But, ask me in an hour’s time and they’ll have to fight for it.”

  June was right, Phyllipa conjectured. Their boss was licking his wounds. He had received the banks letter and at the moment was taking time out with himself.

  “Is there anything I can do?” she asked.

  “You could marry me.”

  “What! In the mood that you are in? On your roller coaster?” No thanks! .”

  A faint smile crossed his face again. “Forgive me! But I’m a little down at the moment, but I know me, and before you can say Jack Robinson! I shall come bouncing out of whatever it is that I’m in.”

  Gently taking his arm from around her waist, she moved to the door. “Perhaps you will give me a shout when you finally emerge.” She said, leaving him standing there. Although she felt desperately sorry for him, she couldn’t openly sympathise with him as she wasn’t supposed to know anything about what was troubling him. But, she couldn’t be hypocritical either. His problem was her problem and she would correct it in the only way she knew how. On the other hand, it would be interesting to see how Steven handled adversity? He father had asked her if, in her opinion, could he cope? And, without being certain, she had answered in the affirmative. The experts always reckon that the secret of business survival when trouble presents itself is a short ordered retreat into some personal limbo where the alter ego clicks into positive thinking and the wheat and the chaff become separated, and it looked as if that was exactly what Steven was doing.

  Passing through into June’s office, she carefully sat in a soft chair and looked at her friend.

  “It’s D day out there.” Steven’s secretary said, a wry smile on her face.

  “Yes!” Phyllipa nodded her head. “I have already spoken to him.”

  “Did he confide in you?”

  “No! He just said it was business.”

  “Funny business. If you ask me anything.” June retorted. “Clive and I nearly fell out over it last night.”

  “He must follow the family line.” Phyllipa explained.

  “Well! If that’s what the line is, they can stuff it.” June replied angrily. “It doesn’t seem quite right that innocent people should get caught up in some old man’s dream of marriage that wasn’t on in the first place.” She looked at Phyllipa, accusingly. “It wasn’t on, was it?”

  “Of course not, but it’s happened hasn’t it? Through no fault of his own, Steven has fallen down a big hole! Now you and I have got to get him out. Or would you prefer to leave him down there, while you argue the propriety of the thing.”

  “No! Of course not, but it just seems so bloody stupid, that’s all.”

  Phyllipa smiled at her “That’s lif
e!”

  June picked up her pen from the desk and threw it down again. “No! It’s not. Not my sort of life, anyway. And I’m pretty certain it isn’t Steven’s either. I’m just a plain country girl and all this wheeling and dealing is a little beyond me.”

  “Blame your future father-in-law.” Phyllipa murmured.

  “Yes, he’s got a lot to answer for.” June looked at the time on the wall. “I could murder a drink. Clive told me this company was a first class bet on paper. Profitable, dependable, and all charts rising. And yet, Lord Braseby sees fit to dump it.”

  Phyllipa flicked some strands of her wayward hair back into line. “Yes, well. Business acumen seems to go out of the window where bloody mindedness is concerned. But, please don’t keep looking at the down side of this thing, June. Do what has to be done and give Steven that I address I gave you, otherwise we are all out of a job.!”

  “And bang goes your grandmother’s necklace, eh?”

  A wry smile crossed Phyllipa’s face. “Huh! There is more at stake here June than that. In fact, there is more at stake than the Imperial Bank and this company put together.”

  June stared at her. “Really! You have always given me to understand you know nothing about city business?”

  “I don’t.” Phyllipa shrugged her shoulders. “I’m just making things up as I go along. Everyone else seems to be doing it, and I am not thick!”

  “No!” June looked at her from narrowed eyes. “Perish the thought!”

  Phyllipa laughed. “You don’t trust me do you?”

  Her friend tapped the desk with the end of pencil, obviously wondering how to answer such a direct question. Then, she slowly shook her head. “I like you, you know that. I like you a lot, but I’m not into this “Money no object” sort of thing. And when I meet people that I don’t understand I tend to be wary.”

  “Does all that mean you don’t?” Phyllipa’s laugh deepened.

  “You think it’s a bit of a joke, don’t you?”

  The grin disappeared from her friends face “No! I don’t. I’m just trying to save two hundred and seventy thousand people from being slung on to the scrap heap, or have you forgotten that?”