by Ivan B
Derek remained silent. She moved and sat on the grass in front of him. “I’m here under false pretences. I work for the Inland Revenue Investigation Department, not Ipswich Hospital. I did start a job there, but the responsibility of it became too much.”
She waved her short arms around. “I’d gaze at this slide of a segment of somebody’s lung and be expected to pronounce whether or not they had cancer, or some other dreadful decease, and get it right 100% of the time. I’d had a bad day, well a bad month actually, and I saw an advert in the paper for a job that required the applicant to have a degree, any degree, and be willing to have excitement injected into their lives. So I applied.”
She shielded her eyes against the Sun for a moment before shuffling into Derek’s shadow. “It never said that it was for the Inland Revenue, but it was. Basically I’m an undercover agent.”
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Derek asked.
“Not normally, it’s not criminals I deal with, normally it’s companies that believe their outside the tax-laws of the land.”
Derek pointed towards the Hall, “And you’re investigating them?”
She nodded, “You should see their tax-returns. High turnover, large cashflow, virtually zero tax. They claim an enormous amount for tax-fee expenses and an even bigger amount on tax-exempt stately home maintenance.”
Derek nodded and Gwen blurted out, “Everybody at the office thought it was a huge joke, ‘Let’s send Gwen off to a dating agency as an undercover agent, might be worth a laugh, might be a blind midget there.’”
She gazed up at him, “I never expected to find a potential partner here, why should I? After all I’ve never found one anywhere else and frankly it’s why the boss sent me. He told me in my briefing that he didn’t want the operative he sent here to have any distractions or end up with divided loyalties and that’s why he was sending me, as I was the person most likely not to appeal to any of the men present.”
She closed her eyes and rocked back and forth, “And then Treasa turned up. I’ve always had a thing about being short, meeting here rather alters that perspective.” She turned and looked at Derek, “And then you chose me on the first day. At first I thought you were merely being polite and keeping your options open. You know go with Gwen to watch the others. But it’s not like that, least not for me. You’ve walked into my life and turned my carefully guarded world upside down.”
He reached down, held her hands and led her to sit on his lap. “I did wonder what you were up to. I saw you coming down the staircase all dressed in black. For a moment I thought you were some sort of journalist. These places always attract undercover journalists, especially places that might be attractive to the rich and famous.”
She tickled his chin, “And are you rich and famous?”
“Definitely not.”
He kissed her and they spent a good few minutes undergoing intensive lip massage.
When they did break they attacked the contents of the cool-bag. Gwen munched her way through the first roll. “What sort of cheese is this?”
“Tom wouldn’t say.”
They ate the other two rolls, a packet of crisps each and enjoyed a cup of coffee. Gwen looked at her watch. “It’s only just gone one and there have been six weddings since eleven o’clock. That’s an average of one ever twenty minutes.”
Derek watched as a wedding party left. “They’re not all the same. There were four weddings between eleven and twelve, then a five-minute wedding, that is if they could get married in that time, followed by a fifty minute wedding. That is if you can time between going in the side door and coming out on the steps to have your photos taken.”
Gwen stood up for a better view. “And it’s always the same photographer.”
Derek chuckled and pulled a leaflet out of his pocket. “Minton Hall photographs”, he read drolly, “We take your picture and then transmit them to our studio where we print them for your collection or for us to courier to your reception. It’s all part of the Minton hall experience.”
She gazed at him in disbelief, “You’ve got one of their wedding leaflets. I couldn’t find any.”
“I asked the young lady in the wheelchair for one, she was most obliging.”
Gwen gave a huff, “Well I couldn’t do that or she’d assume it was wishful thinking or I was on some sort of drug induced trip!”
He said softly, “Don’t do yourself down, beauty is more than skin deep.”
He went to drink some of his coffee and stopped halfway. He swallowed as if digesting something uncomfortable. “Actually,” he said miserably, “it may be me who’s on a drug induced trip. Tripping into fantasy land on the drug of your kisses.” He swung his eyes up to look at her. “I have a little problem.”
He paused, Gwen waited. Was he about to tell her the secret she already knew? He gave a shallow cough. “A few years ago I got to thinking about children. Maybe it was the male ego wanting to seed his genes around, I don’t know. Anyway I signed on as an artificial insemination donor. I knew you could do it confidentially and so I wasn’t worried about publicity. They wanted a blood sample, actually five blood samples, and a seamen sample before they would register me.”
He looked away. “They turned me down. At first I was worried that I had some nasty blood disease I didn’t know about, but it wasn’t that.” He turned a pair of sad eyes onto her, “My sample had a zero sperm count. As they delicately explained, a zero count made it less than useless. I thought it must be a mistake and paid a vast sum of money to have another sample checked out at a private clinic. They didn’t say zero, but said it was so close to zero as to be a good approximation.”
His voice dropped to a whisper. “So if it’s children you want, I’m not your man, not now, probably not ever.”
Gwen relaxed, he was saying the words she wanted to hear. She didn’t say a word, instead she remounted his lap and sat on his legs with one of her legs each side of his while half-kneeling on the bench. She kissed his nose. “When you find mister right you stick with what you find. I came here expecting nothing and met mister wonderful, I’m not about to walk away because mister wonderful thinks he has a flaw. I said before that the thought of having children frightened me. Now I know that if we do, by adoption, if will be a conscious choice. The main thing is that I’ve got you.”
He threw his arms around her and held her close, she suspected he was crying.
Later, she fished in the cool-bag and took out a small carton of drinks. She felt his eyes on her as she drank. She laid the drink to one side. “There’s this French Surgeon,” she said without preamble. “I met him at Ipswich Hospital when he’d come over to rebuild a young boys face after he’d fallen three stories onto it.”
She shuddered at the memory of the boy’s face. “He reckons that he can do me a face job without any drastic bone-splitting surgery.”
She flicked her eyes to Derek and then away. “He thinks he could fold my cheekbones slightly back and reduce the hollowness around my eyes. Then it’s just a matter of rounding off my lower jaw, rounding off my upper skull, chiselling away some of the bone across my forehead and lifting my eyebrows to further enhance my eyes, giving me a nose job, thickening my lips and bingo, I’ve become oriental.”
She took a deep breath, “He thinks that he can use the flatness of my face as an advantage rather than a detriment, that is if I don’t mind looking non-European. Once he’s rounded my skull I’ll also be able to wear a wig.”
“Wig? Why wear a wig?” he spluttered, “Your hair is a lovely blonde colour.”
“Haven’t you noticed the bald patches?”
He stroked her hair, it felt silky smooth, but she was right it was thin in places and he noticed that even the lightest of stoking cause a fair crop of hairs to dislodge themselves from her skull. Her eyes flicked back to Derek, “Says once he’s finished, and with a decent black wig, I could pass off as a Geisha Girl.”
Derek grinned, “Rather think your accent would give you away.”
She managed a smile, “Welsh Geisha Girls are all the rage, didn’t you know?”
It all sounded horrendous to him. He put his arm around her, “You don’t have to do this for me, I met you as you are and I like you as you are.”
She gazed at him, “But could you live with me if I changed my face.”
He had the sense to realise that whatever was driving her ran deep, very deep. He stroked her chin with his index finger. “It’s you I love, the real you, the inside you. If you want to change your face I’d support you every step of the way.”
She leaned against him. “How many operations?” He asked.
“Five or six over a couple of years, it depends how fast I heal and the swelling and puffiness heals. Between operations he said that I’d look worse, so it’s all or nothing.”
“Six,” exclaimed Derek in horror, “That many?”
“One to move the cheekbones, one for the jaw reshaping, one for the skull reshaping, one for the removal of bone above the eyes, then the nose job and finally a little cosmetic surgery to give me typical oriental lips, almond shaped eyes and flap my ears out slightly.”
She made it sound like a cake recipe. “Sounds painful.”
She lowered her eyes, “He said that’s the downside, apparently bone reduction is absolute bloody misery.”
He squeezed her slightly, “Then why do it?”
“Because I look in the mirror every morning and realise what an ugly bitch I am. No make-up helps. As I told you, my oldest brother told me the best thing I could do would be to move to Arabia and wear a burka, I recall his words every day.”
She moved round so he could fully see her. “People stare at me a checkouts, laugh at me in pubs. Can you honestly say you find me attractive?”
“Yes.” The answer was swift and unequivocal.
He stroked her chin again, “But if you want to go through all that I’d stand by you.”
“I…,” she hesitated, “I might also ask for a little breast reduction, if I’m going to look oriental then I might as well finish the job.”
He briefly kissed her on the lips and put his hand over her heart, “It’s what’s in here that matters. If it’s important to you I’ll stand by you.”
She sat silently for a while and then took a deep breath, “But it’s a risk. He wants to do a series of operations, not one big job, more operations increases the risk of infection. If I got an infection I’d have to pause so I could end up looking worse for years, maybe for ever.”
He gazed into her eyes, “You can’t put me off. I’ve found you and I intend to keep you.”
She burst into tears, “I never expected this, I was not prepared for this, I’m afraid that I’ll wake up from a dream or you’ll go back home and see one of your beautiful show-business friends and realise what I really look like.”
She sniffed, “Think about it. Can you imagine walking into a restaurant with me?”
“Trouble is,” he said wistfully, “I can’t imagine walking into a restaurant without you, not now.”
She sobbed and he held her. She was ugly, small, mis-proportioned and sounded like an advert for the Welsh Tourist Board, but she was his and he wasn’t about to let her go, not now, not ever.
Chapter 31
Excursion: Cameron & Riona
“I still can’t believe they told you by text message!” Exclaimed Cameron
Riona flicked him a glance as she drove the bright yellow BMC Mini Cooper as if she were riding an Arabian Hunter. “They didn’t. That was my solicitor telling me when the reading of the will was.”
He shook his head, “That means your family didn’t even tell you he’d died, isn’t that worse?”
She shrugged, “My family all over, get the matter over and done with and then tell Riona.”
He shook his head in disbelief again, “And to read the will before the funeral, that’s obscene!”
She licked her golden teeth, “Won’t be a funeral, Lord Hardcastle left very clear instructions. His body was to be donated to medical science and after that no funeral, no memorial services and absolutely no obituaries.”
Cameron wondered, not for the first time, about Riona’s aristocratic family. He then nearly screamed as Riona changed down and overtook a lorry. Cameron was a careful driver, he always braked early, kept a safe distance from the car in front and used the highest gear possible to conserve fuel; Riona did absolutely none of those things. She drove like a maniac possessed, braked at the last minute, screamed around corners and was constantly thrashing the engine to its limit in low gears. Cameron gritted his teeth and held onto the sides of his seat while bracing his legs against the floor. Riona glanced at his stiff frame and smiled to herself, “Don’t worry,” she half-yelled above the engine noise, “my ancestral home is ten miles North of Norwich so once I turn right here,” the car shuddered as she executed a high-speed turn off of the A140 trunk road onto a country lane just wider than the car, “there’s only three miles to go.”
If her driving on trunk roads worried Cameron, her driving on country lanes scared him witless and he was somewhat relieved when she suddenly swung through a pair of wrought iron gates, each the size of a football goal-mouth, and sped between a pair of small gatehouses placed either side of the entrance to emerge onto a wide gravel drive. His eyes nearly popped and he involuntarily shouted, “STOP!”
She obligingly skidded the car to a halt. Sitting in front of them at the end of a tremendously long drive stood what was undoubtedly a stately home. Built of what looked like dark sandstone it lowered on the horizon full of windows and balconies and sporting at least two turrets and one tower. Riona grinned at the expression on Cameron’s face. “Nice little pile isn’t it?”
Cameron swallowed, “Your family own that?”
Not any more, its National Trust now, open Fridays to Tuesdays, closed Wednesdays and Tuesdays. We just own the land, my family live round the back in what we call Hardcaslte Mansion
“Round the back?”
“You’ll see.”
She ignored the drive and took to a perimeter track keeping the stately home to the left. About a mile later Cameron realised they were heading towards another stately pile of bricks, this one being a double fronted three story building made of white sandstone. Riona grinned at the expression on Cameron’s face. “The Hardcastle’s main house since 1993, used to be our neighbours, but they went bankrupt and father took it over.”
Cameron swallowed, “Just how big is that?”
She shrugged, “Not spend much time here in the last few years, not really welcome. In Edwardian times it used to have sixteen bedrooms in the house, twelve for the family and eight for the servants. However, I believe that my step-mother has been modernizing the place and has reduced the first floor to nine en-suite bedrooms, I don’t know if she’s got round to the servant’s floor yet.”
Cameron turned and looked at her, “Main house?”
“There’s a converted stable block behind and a set of garages.”
He swallowed again, “What’s downstairs?”
Riona half closed her eyes, “Drawing room, Library, Study, two Sitting rooms, Dining room, Ladies parlour, Kitchen, Hall and Snooker Room. Used to be a third small lounge, but I think it was converted into a large shower room when my Grandmother became wheelchair bound.”
She swung onto a block-paved standing area, “There’s also a basement and a wine-cellar.”
Cameron muttered to himself, “Nine bedrooms.”
“Don’t kid yourself,” she said casually. “It’s an eighteen century design so some bedrooms are only reached by going through others.”
Cameron surveyed the immaculate landscape around the building, “Is it listed.”
“Unfortunately only the outside, , so my step-mum’s playing havoc with the inside.”
She pulled up at the front door and almost immediately a sixty-something tall grey-haired imposing man in a black suit came down the steps. Cameron wasn’t sure
, but he got the impression that the man bowed. “Good morning Miss Riona,” he intoned, “everybody’s waiting in the rear sitting room.”
Riona glanced at her watch, “I thought the meeting was after lunch?”
The man half inclined his head, “Her ladyship said that they might as well have it as soon as you arrive so as not to interrupt her routine too much, she wants to play bridge this afternoon with the ladies circle. Will you and your companion be staying Miss?”
She grinned, “No need to be so formal John, this is Cameron - my husband.”
Cameron rounded the car and held out his hand. John hesitated for a spilt second and then shook it while staring into Cameron’s eyes. Riona giggled at Cameron’s expression, “John’s been with us for as long as I can remember, he taught me to drive.”
Cameron chucked, “Well I won’t hold it against him.”
She banged he elbow into Cameron’s ribs, “Not cars you clot, four-in-hands.”
She gave John a beaming smile, “There should be a parcel arriving by courier from Norwich; I’ll need to take it with me.”
“Not staying Madam.”
“Not today.”
Cameron noted the change of address from ‘Miss’ to ‘Madam’ as a round faced grey haired plump homely looking woman in a light blue shapeless dress came out of the house, Riona threw her arms around her and they hugged one another. “This is Blanche, John’s wife.”
Cameron shook hands and then, to Blanche’s surprise, gave her a kiss on both cheeks reasoning that this woman was the nearest thing to a normal mother Riona had. John gave a polite little cough, “I fear they are waiting madam.”
Riona led Cameron through a gargantuan oak-panelled hallway into a small chintz wallpapered corridor and then through a large doorway into an imposing room with three settees and two large armchairs all covered in some expensive looking red fabric and all occupied. Riona gave a casual wave and squatted onto a small two-seater high-backed oak pew that sat just inside the door patting the woodwork for Cameron to join her. He squeezed himself in. He thought he heard Riona mutter, “Let battle commence”, but it could have been, “This’ll rattle her tent.”