Worthy of Marriage

by Anne Weale

  Perhaps in the bathroom next door. Or perhaps making coffee in the kitchen. Was he feeling as good as she was? How many times had they made love? She hadn’t kept count. She only knew that every part of her, from her ears to her insteps, had been kissed and caressed in a way it would have been very easy to mistake for the real thing.

  The way she had made love to him had been the real thing. But she doubted if he would guess it. He would think she had more experience than was actually the case, never suspecting that it was her love for him, not lots of practice, that had made it easy to toss away all inhibitions and do whatever came naturally. Things she had only read about, never done with anyone else.

  Now, in the bright light of morning, it made her blush a little to remember everything she had done in the silvery shadows of the night.

  Presently, coming down to earth and remembering that they had to go to the hospital, she jumped out of bed, retrieved her nightdress and robe from the back of the chair where he must have put them this morning and, without pausing to put them on, hurried out of the bedroom to go to the upstairs bathroom for a quick shower.

  Had Grey opened the kitchen door while she was passing it, it wouldn’t have bothered her. The passion they had shared in the small hours had taken her far beyond the sort of embarrassment she might have felt at being caught naked by him yesterday.

  It took her twenty-five minutes to brush her teeth, shower, dry, put on clean clothes and attend to her hair and make-up. She was on the landing, about to go down, when she heard voices in the street. Two people, a man and a woman, were conversing in Spanish. Even though he wasn’t speaking his own language, she recognised the man as Grey.

  Lucia opened the nearest of the landing’s windows and leaned out. Below her was their Spanish neighbour, wearing her quilted dressing gown—a garment that in rural Spain was acceptable street wear—and waving her hands in the air. Smiling down at her, holding the draw-string bread-bag that usually hung behind the kitchen door, Grey was looking happier and more relaxed than at any time since Lucia had known him.

  ‘Buenos días,’ she called down to them.

  They both looked up. She saw Grey’s smile fade, changing into an expression she could not define. Then he made some polite excuse to their neighbour and moved towards the front door.

  He was closing it behind him as Lucia walked down the staircase.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said again. ‘You’ve been to the baker’s, I gather. I didn’t think you knew where it was.’

  ‘I didn’t. I asked,’ he said, walking into the kitchen and putting the bag on the worktop.

  And then, as she joined him, he took her in his arms and kissed her.

  Presently he said, ‘I thought you’d still be asleep. I was going to bring you breakfast in bed.’

  ‘Let’s have it in the garden,’ she suggested, knowing that what she would rather do was forget about breakfast and go back to bed.

  In the moment before he withdrew his arms from around her and turned away to start fixing the coffee, it was evident that Grey had the same idea. But also that he wasn’t going to act on it.

  Lucia put out a tray and the necessary china and cutlery. While she busied herself, she wondered if Grey intended to talk about the change in their relationship or if, from a man’s point of view, there was nothing to discuss. It had happened and that was that.

  The first thing he said, when they were sitting at the garden table, now spread with a checked gingham cloth, was, ‘Whether or not Mum is allowed to leave hospital today, I think they’ll advise against her flying home. I’m going to call Larchwood and tell Jackson to bring the car down. It won’t take him long to get here using the French autoroutes.’

  ‘Does he speak any French?’

  ‘No, but he’ll manage. He’s a resourceful guy. It’ll be an adventure for him.’

  Lucia peeled a mandarin to eat with the freshly-baked barra Grey had wrapped in a napkin to retain its warmth. When he opened the napkin and offered her the basket, the fragrant aroma seemed to encapsulate the magic of this place where, if only for a little while, she had experienced unforgettable happiness.

  ‘Perhaps I’ll ask Braddy to come with him,’ said Grey. ‘She was a nurse for a short time before she married. She’s the ideal person to look after Mum on the way back. That would leave you free to fly back with me…via Paris. We could spend a few nights there and be back by the time they arrive. How does that sound to you?’

  ‘It sounds wonderful…but what is your mother going to think about it?’

  ‘At this stage, she doesn’t have to know. It’s better she isn’t aware of any…complications until she’s fully recovered. She’ll think we’re going straight back to the UK. Three is a crowd in the back of the car and for you to sit beside Jackson wouldn’t please him. He likes to have the front to himself.’

  ‘It still seems rather…deceitful,’ said Lucia. ‘And what if something went wrong and they needed us…especially you?’

  ‘If there were the smallest likelihood of that I’d arrange for her to be taken home in an ambulance. We have insurance cover for that contingency. Otherwise Jackson can keep in close touch with me by mobile. He can call me without knowing where I am.’

  He drank some coffee, watching her closely over the rim of the cup. The look in his eyes was the one she had seen from the landing window but failed to interpret.

  His tone was matter-of-fact as he went on, ‘The crux of the situation is that you and I need some time together. Apart from the pleasure aspect, there are things I need to tell you…discuss with you.’

  ‘Can’t you tell me now?’

  ‘There isn’t time.’ He looked at his watch. ‘By the time we’ve finished breakfast we’ll need to leave for the hospital.’

  It wasn’t clear to Lucia why they couldn’t discuss whatever it was on the way there. But she didn’t intend to press him. The longer she knew him, the more strongly she sensed that Grey was a man already burdened by pressures she could only guess at. She didn’t intend to add to them. If he wanted to postpone the discussion, so be it. Love was about giving people whatever they needed. If he needed her to be patient, she would do her best to contain her own urgent need to know where they were heading…if anywhere.

  On the way to the coast he didn’t say much. But, on a straight and quiet stretch of road, suddenly he took one of her hands from her lap and kissed her knuckles.

  ‘Did my beard rasp your lovely skin last night?’ he asked. ‘I should have taken time to shave. But one doesn’t think of those things in the heat of the moment.’

  ‘I didn’t notice,’ she said, smiling at him. It wasn’t strictly true. She had been dimly aware of the roughness of his cheeks and chin, but it had been a part of his maleness; one of the many exciting differences between them, like the muscular feel of his backside and the hard power of his shoulders.

  Now, as she watched his hands on the steering wheel, she longed to feel them caressing her. It made her feel guilty, but she couldn’t help hoping the medics would want to keep Mrs Calderwood in hospital for another twenty-four hours.

  Then she and Grey could spend another night together, which wouldn’t be possible with his mother in the house. It wouldn’t feel right to make love with Rosemary in the room above them. Lucia had an uneasy feeling that, despite the older woman’s extraordinary kindness to her, she would not be pleased if she knew what had happened last night.

  At the hospital, Grey parked the car. As he pulled on the handbrake, he turned to her. ‘This may be our last time alone for a while. Let’s make the most of it.’

  He released his seat belt and, leaning closer, took her face in his hands and kissed her.

  Lucia fumbled to release her own strap and, when it was free, and regardless of who might be looking, slid her arms round his neck, returning the kiss with enthusiasm. For the first time in her life, she understood the overwhelming need for another person that drove people to do mad, reckless things.

  I
t was Grey who broke off the kiss. ‘We must stop this before…’ His voice husky with desire, he left the sentence unfinished.

  As they drew apart, he gave her a rueful grin. ‘You’d better go in ahead of me. I need to cool down for a minute.’

  The admission pleased her. If only she could have the same effect on his heart.

  ‘OK.’ She touched his cheek. This morning it was closely shaved, but still the texture of his skin was different and subtly exciting.

  She got out of the car and made her way to the hospital’s entrance.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  SHE found Mrs Calderwood out of bed and dressed.

  ‘Where’s Grey?’ asked his mother, after they had exchanged good mornings.

  ‘He’ll be here in a minute,’ said Lucia. ‘Did you have a good night?’

  ‘Not bad, but tonight I’ll be back in my own bed…I mean the one at No 12,’ said Rosemary. ‘They’re letting me go, thank goodness.’

  ‘That’s wonderful,’ said Lucia, firmly quashing her own secret disappointment that she would have to wait until Paris to spend another night in Grey’s arms.

  ‘They’ve been very kind to me, but it’s a peculiar feeling…being in a hospital where you don’t speak the language,’ said Rosemary. ‘It makes you feel like a child…not in control of the situation. What’s keeping Grey? Is he talking to one of the doctors?’

  ‘I think that was his intention when he sent me ahead,’ said Lucia, feeling this answer was allowable as there was no way she could tell his mother the true reason he was delayed.

  ‘I expect from now on he’ll try to wrap me in cotton wool,’ said Rosemary. ‘It wouldn’t surprise me if he tries to put an end to these trips of ours, but I’m not going to stand for that. In high summer it’s too hot and crowded to travel unless you have to go then, like parents of school-age children. But in September I thought we might go to the Greek islands.’

  Grey caught the tail of this remark as he joined them. ‘That depends on your health, Mum,’ he said, crossing the room to kiss her.

  ‘I’m sure my health will be fine. I refuse to be mollycoddled.’

  When, on the drive back to No 12, she learned that Grey had already instructed Braddy and Jackson to set out for Spain as soon as they could, Rosemary was indignant.

  ‘That’s ridiculous, Grey. A completely unnecessary expense.’

  ‘I don’t think so, and nor does your doctor. I had a taste of charter flying when I came down here this time. For someone who hasn’t been well, it’s far too stressful. You’ll enjoy a leisurely run back through France. Lucia and I will fly back.’

  To Lucia’s surprise, his mother did not question this arrangement, though she continued to grumble about his fussing.

  That night they all turned in early. But although she had a lot of sleep to catch up, for some time after switching off her light Lucia lay thinking about Grey in the bedroom on the ground floor.

  She felt sure there was no possibility of his tapping softly on her door, nor did she wish it to happen, with his mother in the next room. But she was counting the days until they would be alone again.

  What was he going to tell her when they reached Paris? Was he going to invite her to become his mistress until such time as he tired of her? But such an arrangement wasn’t practical while she was working for his mother. Perhaps he was going to suggest that she transferred to his payroll.

  Would he really have the gall to suggest that she become, in effect, his toy? Did he think that, because she had once closed her eyes to the possibility that her work was being used for illicit purposes, there was nothing she wouldn’t stoop to?

  Thinking about it, she reached the disturbing conclusion that, where Grey was concerned, she had no moral scruples. If he wanted her, he could have her…on any terms. After all, who would be hurt by her becoming his mistress? Only herself. She had no parents to be ashamed of her. No close friends at hand to deplore her behaviour.

  Then another aspect of the situation struck her, making her give a stifled groan. There were his mother’s feelings to be considered. She would disapprove strongly of her son and her protégée being linked in an irregular relationship. Like most of her generation, Mrs Calderwood accepted but did not concur with people living together, and certainly not when there was no intention of permanance. The idea of Grey having a mistress would be anathema to her.

  I couldn’t hurt her like that when she’s been so good to me, thought Lucia wretchedly. A couple of nights in Paris that she will never know about: that I can’t deny myself. But anything more…no, it’s not on.

  Two sleepless nights in succession, for different reasons, left Lucia looking decidedly wan the next morning.

  Last night Grey had insisted that his mother have breakfast in bed. When Lucia went down to the kitchen, the kettle was switched on but the bread-bag was missing from the back of the door. She began laying a tray for his mother, tensing a little when she heard the front door opening. Would he seize the opportunity to kiss her? Or did he intend to stay at arm’s length until they arrived in Paris?

  She did not have to wait long to have her question answered.

  He came into the kitchen, tossed the bag on the counter and put his arms round her, the way he had yesterday morning.

  ‘I missed you last night. Did you miss me?’

  ‘Yes,’ she admitted.

  ‘Good.’ He bent his head and kissed her the way he had in the car, with the same effect on them both. ‘I want you. It’s hard to be patient,’ he murmured, close to her ear.

  Lucia drew back. ‘You mother might disobey your orders,’ she pointed out. ‘I’m sure you don’t want her to walk in and find us like this.’

  ‘Not at the moment—no,’ he agreed. ‘But it’s very hard to keep my distance.’

  Nevertheless he moved away from her, leaving her feeling curiously bereft. Being in his arms felt so right, so natural.

  It was Lucia who took Mrs Calderwood’s breakfast tray up to her. She found Rosemary propped on all four of the double bed’s pillows, gazing out of the window at the mountains across the valley.

  “‘Look thy last on all things lovely, Every hour”,’ she quoted. ‘Who wrote that?’

  ‘I think it was Walter de la Mare,’ said Lucia.

  ‘Until something happens to remind us, it’s so easy to forget that life doesn’t go on for ever,’ said Rosemary.

  ‘I know. I took freedom for granted until I lost it,’ said Lucia, placing the tray across her employer’s lap. She straightened and looked at the mountains. ‘I wonder, if we lived here, if we’d feel trapped after a while. It seems a paradise now, but—’ She left the sentence unfinished.

  Part of the reason the valley seemed like paradise was because Grey was here. Without his presence, it would still be a beautiful place but her heart would be somewhere else…wherever he was. Conversely, places where she wouldn’t choose to go—arctic wastes, deserts, jungles—would be endurable if he was there.

  ‘I like to travel, but I should never want to live abroad,’ said Rosemary. ‘I should miss the girls and my grandchildren. I like to be close to my family.’

  It was on the tip of Lucia’s tongue to say, But what if your family wanted to go to the ends of the earth? Would you make them feel they were deserting you? She kept the thought to herself. Fortunately none of Rosemary’s brood had been footloose. But Lucia’s father, when young, had given up the offer of a job on an Australian newspaper because it would have upset his mother to part from her only son.

  There was a tap on the door and Grey came in.

  ‘I’ve just had a call from Braddy. They crossed the Channel by the Euro Tunnel yesterday afternoon, found a comfortable place to spend the night and had a first-class dinner. By tonight they’ll be close to the border. Once they’re over the mountains, it won’t take them long to get here. They might make it by tomorrow night.’

  ‘Where can they stay?’ said his mother. ‘They’ll need a rest before we set o
ut for home. I must say, nice as it is here, I am rather longing to be back in my own surroundings.’

  Grey said, ‘There’s a small hostal near the next village, catering mainly for mountain-walkers, so the baker tells me. I’ll go and see what it’s like. Would you like to come with me, Lucia? Mum will be OK on her own for the short time it will take us to check the place out.’

  ‘Yes, do go, my dear,’ said Rosemary. ‘You know the sort of place Braddy will or won’t like. I don’t want her to come all this way and be uncomfortable when she gets here. Jackson won’t care what it’s like as long as it’s clean. Men don’t mind having to rough it, but Braddy is a bit of a fusspot.’

  To be alone with Grey, even if not for long, was an unexpected bonus. However on the outward drive he kept their conversation on impersonal matters and Lucia did not feel encouraged to raise the subject in the fore-front of her mind.

  The hostal was a bit on the spartan side, but the showers and loos were immaculate and they both felt that Braddy would find it acceptable for the short time she would be there.

  All the way back to No 12, Grey talked about Jackson who, thirty years earlier, had once been another of his mother’s ‘lame ducks’. They had met in court, she on the magistrates’ bench and he, then in his twenties, on a charge of being drunk and disorderly.

  ‘She offered him a job as a handyman. If my father had known, he would have been as furious as I was when she brought you to Larchwood,’ said Grey, with a sideways glance. ‘Her judgment was sounder than ours. Jackson has more than justified her faith in him, and so have you.’

  ‘I haven’t been around long enough to prove that,’ Lucia said lightly.

  ‘You’ve proved it to me.’ His tone and his smile were warming beyond measure.

  But, later, during lunch, his mother said something that quenched Lucia’s optimism that, despite all the signs against it, they might have a future together.