by Peggy Gaddis
Judy watched them vanish out of sight, and then she went on to the stable where the head stableboy, Bandy-Legs, was waiting uneasily.
“Wasn’t that Starlight Miss Parker was riding?” Judy asked sternly.
“Yessum, Miss Judy, sho’ was,” Bandy admitted unhappily. “I was getting her saddled for you when Mist’ Bix and the lady come along, and the lady, she say she won’t ride no horse but Starlight. I try to tell Mist’ Bix Starlight was your mount, but she says she gonna ride, and Mist’ Bix he say to let her.”
Judy drew a deep hard breath and jammed her clenched fists into the pockets of her well-worn jodhpurs.
“Is it all right, Miss Judy?” Bandy asked anxiously.
“Of course, Bandy. Mr. Bix is boss, now that the Old Gentleman is ill,” Judy said through her teeth.
“I’ll saddle one of the other horses for you, Miss Judy, if you tell me which one,” Bandy offered anxiously.
“I think I’ll skip riding this morning, Bandy. You and the other boys can tend to the exercising today. There’s lots to do in the house,” said Judy, and turned to go back.
Halfway to the house, she encountered the tall, blond young man who had shared the sports car with Marise the day before and said a pleasant, cool good morning.
The young man’s eyes lighted up as he studied her, and he said happily, “Well, hello, you! So this is my reward for getting up at the crack of dawn. I didn’t meet you last night, because I couldn’t have forgotten.”
“You didn’t meet me because I’m the housekeeper’s daughter,” Judy said a trifle dryly. “Were you planning to ride?”
The man looked startled.
“Who, me? Perish the thought!” He shook his head and glanced at her riding attire. “But I see that you are.”
“I’ve given up the idea,” Judy answered. “Have you had breakfast? It’s a bit early for the staff. Did you get up early or just stay up?”
The man grinned. “Who can sleep with the blasted racket those birds make?” he answered. “I’ve often heard the country was a quiet, peaceful place. But this place certainly isn’t, what with roosters yodeling long before daybreak, waking up the blasted birds, who then start. And besides, Terry snores.”
Judy repeated, “Terry?”
The man grinned. “My roommate,” he explained, “though I’m sure he’d want to break my neck that I had said so.”
“You needn’t have had a roommate if Mother had known in time how many guests were arriving, and I’ll see to it that another room is made ready for you by tonight,” Judy told him. “I’m afraid I can’t do anything about the birds, though. After all, it is spring, and they’ve got a lot of work to do, building nests and all that.”
The man looked down at her with a warm, admiring smile.
“You’re cute,” he told her, and added, “also lovely and very sweet. And I don’t even know your name. Mine’s Mayson, by the way. Roger Mayson.”
“I’m Judy Ramsey,” she answered, and put her hand for a moment in the one he extended. “Now if you’ll come to the house, I’ll see about some breakfast. Mam’ Chloe should be up and about by now. But if she isn’t, I can fry bacon and scramble eggs and make toast.”
“I said you were sweet and lovely,” Roger told her happily. “You are also very kind to a starving man.”
He walked beside her to the house. Inside the kitchen, she found Mam’ Chloe and two of the maids scurrying about. Mam’ Chloe was planted in the middle of the vast kitchen, hands on hips, sharp eyes on the maids, and her voice was laying down the law in no uncertain terms.
She paused briefly as she saw Judy, and then her brows drew together in a slight scowl as she saw Roger Mayson behind Judy.
“ ‘Mornin’, sir,” said Mam’ Chloe sullenly. “Breakfast’ll be ready directly.”
“Thanks, Mam’ Chloe,” said Judy politely. “Is Mother down yet?”
Mam’ Chloe eyed her sternly.
“Miz’ Beth don’t get down to breakfast till eight o’clock,” she reminded Judy unnecessarily. “And it ain’t even seven now.”
Judy nodded. “Then Mr. Mayson and I will have breakfast in the housekeeper’s quarters.” Over her shoulder, she asked Roger, “If you don’t mind?”
Roger met Mam’ Chloe’s hostile eyes with an ingratiating smile that seemed to have no effect whatever on her bad temper and said, “This kitchen is so clean and attractive, I wouldn’t mind if we had breakfast right here on this big table.”
“Go ‘long into the dining room. I’ll send you breakfast,” said Mam’ Chloe curtly.
Roger smiled at her, but did not relax. He followed Judy across the hall and into the small breakfast room where she and her mother had taken their meals for years.
“She’s a tartar, isn’t she?” Roger murmured as the door closed behind them, shutting off the sounds from the kitchen.
“Well, she was born here, like her parents before her and their parents, too. They had been slaves, of course. Mam’ Chloe was freed when she was just a child; but her parents refused to leave and just stayed on as salaried staff. It’s that way with practically everybody at Oakhill. We’ve none of us ever lived anywhere else, and I don’t suppose any of us would really like to.”
She broke off, and her mouth tightened. But before he could question her, the door opened and a maid came in with glasses of well-chilled orange juice, a tall pot of coffee, a cream jug and a sugar bowl and two cups that she put down at Judy’s place.
Accepting the coffee that Judy poured for him, Roger asked her curiously, “You’ve always lived here?”
“I was born here,” Judy told him. “So were my mother and her parents. The first Jason Bullard came here when all this was just a wilderness. He brought some of the yeoman farmers who had worked on his place in England, and they all buckled down and carved Oakhill out of the wilderness. Or aren’t you interested in the history of Oakhill?”
She smiled disarmingly at him.
“I’m interested in anything that interests you,” he told her.
“Aren’t you nice?” Judy purred mockingly.
He grinned, unabashed by her sarcasm.
“You’d be surprised how nice I can be, once you get to know me,” he assured her.
Judy’s pretty mouth thinned slightly.
“Somehow I have doubts that will happen in the foreseeable future; that is, unless Miss Parker has decided to spend the rest of her life here. And I have even graver doubts that she has any such intentions.”
“Heaven forbid,” Roger said with more vehemence than was quite polite. “She only came down to collect Bix. As soon as he is free to leave, she’ll be off and away—complete with entourage, of course.”
“Of course.” Judy’s voice was polite, all but expressionless.
Roger eyed her cautiously.
“I’m afraid you don’t think much of Bix and his taste in friends, do you?” he asked quietly, and the words were so unexpected that Judy flushed.
“This is his home, any time he cares to use it,” she began.
“That’s not what I asked you,” he reminded her.
“I don’t know his guests well enough to like or dislike them,” Judy said stiffly.
“But you do think it was very bad taste for him to invite a crowd down while his grandfather was so ill, don’t you?” he persisted.
Judy’s head went up, and her eyes met his.
“Don’t you?” she answered his question with another.
Roger made a slight gesture with his hands palm upward that was the equivalent of a shrug and said evenly, “Marise wanted to come; and whatever Marise wants, she gets.”
“Marise!” Judy repeated. “It’s a funny sort of a name.”
Roger grinned.
“It’s really Mary Louise, but as she was learning to talk, she contracted it to Marise. She was one of those infants who always spoke of herself in the third person. Marise wants; therefore Marise must have,” he explained. He added quietly, “So you really mu
stn’t blame her for being such a spoiled little brat!”
Judy’s eyes widened. “I wouldn’t think of daring to blame her for anything, but I’m surprised that you call her a spoiled brat! Aren’t you in love with her?”
“Me?” Roger’s shock was apparent in his voice and his manner. “May the saints preserve me from that!” He seemed to find the whole idea very unattractive, and Judy’s bewilderment increased.
“Then why do you go around with her? I mean, if you think she is a spoiled brat and all that, then why—” She broke off as Roger’s expression altered sharply.
“Because, Pretty Thing, the people in charge of her estate feel she needs a bodyguard, and I’m it,” he explained, and went on swiftly, “That’s a secret. She doesn’t know it. She’d scream the place down if she knew that anybody dared to think her incapable of taking care of herself. It apparently never occurred to her that a girl as rich as she is could easily be kidnapped, or let herself in for blackmail that might last all her life. She is very impulsive; goes wherever she wants to go, and never bothers about any kind of precautions. I first met her in a joint where she had no business being, even with the entourage. I was on the bongo drums, and she took a fancy to them and, in a way, to me. She invited me to join the gang for the rest of the evening. The next day an emissary from her guardians looked me up, investigated my background as carefully as if they were going to send me overseas on a secret mission, and the next thing I knew, I was a private bodyguard to the very wealthy Miss Parker!”
Judy had listened, wide-eyed.
“So that’s how it all came about!” she marveled aloud.
Roger grinned, but his eyes were wary.
“And now I suppose you despise me and would appreciate it very much if I took myself out of your sight,” he drawled.
“But why should I despise you?” Judy asked, unable to follow his reasoning. “I can readily understand that she might very well need a bodyguard, and I think she is lucky to have you look after her.”
Roger drew a relieved breath.
“You really are a nice child, and thanks a whole heap,” he told her.
“For what?”
“For understanding and not despising me,” he replied.
She hesitated for a moment, and then she asked, because it was something she very much wanted to know, “Is Bix a bodyguard, too?”
“Good grief, no!” Roger burst out, and his eyes on her were suddenly sharp. “Bix is, at the present moment, the man she thinks she’d like to marry, whether he likes the idea or not. In fact, if he doesn’t like the idea, that will make it a challenge; and she won’t rest until she gets him to the altar, even if a few months later she takes herself off to Paris or Mexico for a painless and prompt divorce.”
Judy flushed painfully.
“You don’t give him credit for much sense, do you?” she demanded.
Now his expression grew pitying.
“I’ve known the gal for some years, Judy, and I have long ago learned that whatever she wants—”
“I’ve known Bix since cradle days, and I refuse to believe he is stupid enough to be taken over by a girl he doesn’t love, even if she is as beautiful and as rich as Marise Parker!”
Roger’s brows went up, and he studied her for a long, thoughtful moment almost as though he were seeing her for the first time.
“So it’s like that, is it?” he said very softly at last.
Judy’s chin was still up, but she could not quite meet his eyes now.
“Like what?” she mumbled.
“You are in love with Bix.” Roger stated it flatly, made it a statement and not a question. “Well, poor you!”
Judy’s face flooded with bright, hot color.
“Don’t you dare pity me!” she flashed at him childishly.
“I’m sorry,” said Roger, but his tone indicated that he was not really concerned. “I only meant that if you are in love with Bix, you’d better sharpen up your weapons and move in fast and slug it out with Marise. She’s a pretty predatory critter and observes no rules of fair fighting—”
Judy stood up and said coldly, “Thank you for the good advice. I’m sure, since you know her so well, it is good advice. But just because I’ve known Bix since we were kids doesn’t necessarily mean that I am in love with him.”
“Of course not.” Roger’s tone was coaxing, conciliatory.
“If you’ve finished breakfast and will excuse me, I’ll see about having a room prepared for you and get your things moved,” she said coldly, and stalked out, head held high.
Roger stood where he was for a moment, and then the door behind him opened and he turned, thinking possibly Judy had had second thoughts and had returned. But it was her mother who came in and who paused, startled at the sight of Roger there in her own quarters.
“Oh, good morning, Mr. Mayson, you’re up early,” Beth said politely. “And did you have a good breakfast?”
“Delicious, thank you, Mrs. Ramsey.” Roger held her chair for her, and when the maid came in with Beth’s tray, he indicated his chair and asked, “May I?”
“Oh, do, by all means,” Beth answered, and added to the maid, “Bring Mr. Mayson some more coffee. Toast, perhaps?”
“Thanks, no, it was a very ample breakfast,” Roger assured her. “I had the luck to share it with your very charming daughter, Judy!”
Beth looked up from the glass of orange juice she had just lifted and asked, puzzled, “Judy is already back from her ride?”
“I don’t think she went for a ride this morning,” Roger answered. “It seems that Bix invited Marise to ride the horse Judy usually rides, and she didn’t seem disposed to choose another one from the stables.”
Beth’s eyes widened and she looked away from him.
“So Miss Parker is riding Starlight this morning!” she said softly. “She’ll miss Judy almost as much as Judy will miss her.”
Roger nodded, his eyes still on her with a curious, enigmatic look that she was too abstracted to notice.
“This is a very beautiful place, Mrs. Ramsey,” he said after a moment. “Oakhill, I mean. You must all love it very much.”
“You mean because several generations of our ancestors have been born, lived and died here?” she drawled. “I suppose Bix told you about that.”
“Well, no, Bix never mentioned Oakhill until he got the word about his grandfather being so ill, and felt he should come and pay his respects,” Roger answered frankly.
Beth’s eyes lowered to her plate, and she crumbled a bit of toast before she managed an answer.
“I’m sorry Bix could not have come to pay his respects while his grandfather was still conscious and could have known of his presence,” she said quietly.
“I see your point,” Roger answered. “But of course he has been very busy this last year or so, I understand.”
“Since he met Miss Parker?” Beth was deliberately probing.
Roger nodded. “I believe his activities have increased quite a bit since then,” he admitted cautiously.
Beth’s mouth thinned.
“I can imagine,” she drawled, and looked straight at him. “And yours, Mr. Mayson?”
She couldn’t quite be sure, but she thought there was a tinge of color in his tanned face, and his eyes did not quite meet hers.
“Oh, I first met Miss Parker four or five years ago, and my activities haven’t changed very much,” he answered. “She is a lot of fun, and a lovely girl. A bit demanding, perhaps, but when she gets her way, which is about ninety-nine percent of the time, she can be charming. And when she doesn’t get her way, she makes a tropical hurricane seem like no more than a gentle spring breeze.”
Beth studied him curiously.
“You are very frank, Mr. Mayson. Doesn’t anybody like her? Bix was appallingly frank, too.”
There could be no doubt now that there was a tinge of brick-red beneath the sun-tan on Roger’s cheeks as he looked away from her and said, elaborately casual, “Oh, a girl
as rich as Marise never lacks friends.”
“Friends?” Beth probed. “Or hangers-on?”
Roger’s grin was faint and mirthless.
“Hangers-on, of course, Mrs. Ramsey. But isn’t that always the way when a girl is young and beautiful and scandalously rich? She doesn’t really have time to make friends, do you think?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Beth answered, “never having been either young, beautiful or scandalously rich. But it doesn’t sound like a very full or rewarding life.”
“I suppose not. But Marise seems quite satisfied with it, and that seems to be what matters, doesn’t it?”
“You know her much better than I do, so I’m afraid that’s a question you’ll have to answer for yourself.”
Roger said grimly, “Then I’ll say I don’t know anybody who enjoys life more than Marise, except possibly for one thing.”
“Dare I ask what that is?”
“She has everything in the world she could possibly want, so she has nothing else to wish for. And for a girl like Marise, that’s an unhappy state of affairs.”
Beth’s mouth twisted slightly.
“My heart bleeds for her,” she mocked.
Roger grinned heartily. “So does mine! And now, if you’ll excuse me, thanks for a very fine breakfast.”
He nodded his thanks and strode from the room, while Beth sat ignoring her cooling coffee, her thoughts very busy. So Marise had everything she wanted, did she? Beth wondered if that included Bix and told herself wearily that undoubtedly, judging from the evidence at hand, it probably did.
Chapter Six
Judy heard the clop-clop of hooves on the drive, looked from the window of the room that was being prepared for Roger and saw Bix and Marise returning from their ride. Even from there she could see the frosty-looking sweat on Starlight’s neck and the flecks of foam on her jaws, as she fought the too tightly held bridle.
She turned and, without a word to the two maids who were busily getting the room ready for Roger, ran down the stairs and out of the back door to the stables.