by Daphne Clair
'Oh, that was lovely!' Stacey exclaimed after running up the beach to their towels, hair and body streaming with salty water. She picked up a towel and dabbed at her face, then began rubbing her hair.
'Nature-child!' Graeme teased lazily. He had left the water earlier, and was lying on his own towel, hands behind his head. 'Personally, I think I prefer a nice calm swimming pool.'
'Oh, how can you!' Stacey laughed. 'So tame!'
'Yes, and safe. And clean,' he added, leaning over as she sat beside him, to brush sand from her legs.
'Sand isn't dirty,' Stacey protested.
'Mmm, just gritty,' he said. 'Don't you ever wear a cap?' he asked, watching her rubbing at the ends of her hair.
Stacey made a face. 'Can't stand them,' she said. 'I suppose my hair looks terrible in rats' tails.'
Graeme shook his head. 'You never look terrible to me,' he said quietly. 'As a matter of fact, you look rather mermaidish. I think it suits you.'
Stacey smiled at the compliment and turned away as Fergus and Tricia, walking hand-in-hand up the beach, came to join them.
Fergus bent and picked up Tricia's towel and handed it to her. She smiled at him as she took it from him and it was such a revealing smile, Stacey involuntarily thought, I wish I felt like that about Graeme. Fergus was less revealing of his feelings, but she was fairly sure that for him Tricia was someone special. Lucky pair! Suddenly she remembered with piercing clarity exactly how it had been between herself and David. What she felt for Graeme was just a very pale shadow of that youthful emotion. But maybe the intensity of first love could never be repeated. Maybe she was yearning for the unattainable.
Later in the afternoon, she persuaded Graeme to go for a walk along the beach, and when in the shadow of the rocks in a secluded part of the beach he took her in his arms, demanding compensation for being made to walk so far, she wound her arms about his neck and kissed him back with some abandon. But it only made her feel slightly cheap and disgusted with herself, because she knew her enjoyment of the moment was all on the surface, while for Graeme it went much deeper than that. She was relieved when the noisy advent of a family party clambering over the rocks made them pull apart from each other. And she turned away as Graeme steadied his breathing and ran a shaking hand over his hair. She would never let that happen again, Stacey decided. Unless she decided to marry Graeme. It was simply too unfair.
They stopped on the way home for a meal, and then Fergus, whose car they had used for the trip, dropped off Tricia and Graeme at their homes. Stacey was relieved that there was no chance for a prolonged farewell between Graeme and herself. He kissed her quickly on the lips before leaving the car, and that was that.
Fergus just raced her to the bathroom, leaving her calling laughing insults through the door as she stood in the passageway outside.
'How long will you be, anyway?' she called to him.
'Not as long as you,' he answered.
Stacey made an exasperated sound and turned away to find Alex coming towards her.
'Beat you to it, did he?' he grinned. 'Go along and use my shower, if you like. I'm going out for about an hour.'
'Thanks,' she said, glad to take advantage of the offer. Before he came, she would have used the shower there as a matter of course.
Washing the sand out of her hair under the force of the shower, she reflected that Graeme had a point about the relative merits of the beach versus a nice clean swimming pool. But all in all, she thought she preferred the necessity of rinsing out sand and sea-water to the alternative of chemically treated pool water.
She was about to get into bed later, automatically putting her hand to the locket that should have swung round her neck, when she realised it wasn't there.
Pure panic struck for seconds. She had lost it at the beach—taken it off when swimming arid dropped it somewhere in the sand. Then she remembered that she had been wearing it when she went to have her shower. It must be in Alex's bathroom.
It was not very late. Alex could still be up. She hastily donned a light robe and went barefooted along to his room. There was no light under the door, but she tapped softly on the panels.
No sound. Perhaps he was still out. She could slip into the bathroom and collect the locket herself. She opened the door and stepped into the bedroom. And just as she noted the light under the door of the bathroom, that door opened and Alex stood darkly silhouetted against the light. She gasped, and he made a sudden movement with the towel he had been holding in his hand, whipping it round his waist and tucking it in firmly, while Stacey blessed the darkness which while not disguising the fact that he was naked, had veiled it sufficiently,
'Stacey?' he said.
'I'm sorry I' she said. 'I thought you were still out. I left my locket ‑'
'Oh, yes.' He sounded utterly casual. 'Turn on the light. It's by your hand, there.'
As she didn't move immediately, he added, with a faint thread of laughter in his voice, 'It's all right, I'm quite covered now.'
Stacey fumbled for the switch and blinked as the light came on. Alex was picking up a towelling robe from the end of his bed and shouldering into it without any great hurry. He tied the belt at his waist, and then moved to the chest of drawers and picked up her locket. He didn't bring it to her, but stood with it dangling by the chain from his fingers, looking at her with a little smile on his lips.
'Can't you sleep without it?' he asked softly.
Reluctantly, Stacey moved towards him. 'I just wanted it back,' she said, and reached for the locket, swaying on the end of its fine gold chain.
His hand jerked a little, and for an instant she thought he was going to flick the locket away from her, playing some silly teasing game. But he didn't, and her hand closed around the gold heart. He still held the chain, and for a moment it stretched between them, the tension on its gold links matched by a less tangible tension in the air, as their eyes locked above it.
Then his other hand came up and cradled hers, and he opened her fingers and dropped the chain into her palm, closed her fingers over it and stood holding her hand in both of his.
'Why do you wear it?' he asked quietly. 'Sentiment? Habit?'
'Remembrance,' she said. 'It's all I have left.'
His answering voice was still low, but it shook with intensity. 'Good God, Stacey, you have your whole life left!'
'Yes, I know,' she said wearily. 'Only—you see, it feels like only a half-life.'
'Stacey!' His hands moved to her shoulders, pulling her close suddenly, and she looked up into his face with startled eyes, to find his blazing into hers with an emotion that was unmistakable—and shattering.
For just an instant she rested against him, her body tingling into awareness of the demands of his. Then she pushed her closed fists against his chest, saying 'No!' in an anguished whisper, and frantically pulled away from him.
She backed towards the door, fumbling for the handle, and watched the passion in his face change to contempt.
'Very well, Stacey,' he said. 'Run away again.'
He might have been going to say more, but she had shut the door in his face and was running back to her room.
She fastened the locket about her neck with fingers that shook and climbed into bed, huddling under the covers.
She avoided being alone with Alex after that. Not, she told herself, that the odd little episode was likely to be repeated. It had been a momentary aberration, born of proximity and circumstance, and probably Alex was just as anxious to forget it as she was. He seemed to be going out of his way to treat her in a pleasantly friendly fashion, so neutral that she sometimes wondered if she had imagined those tension-fraught seconds when he had held her in his arms in his room.
But her body remembered them too well, and even thinking of it brought it back to the tingling warmth she had experienced then.
Of course she had run away from it—from him. He should have been grateful to her for bringing them both back to reality.
She saw no sign
of gratitude—in fact no sign that he even recalled what had passed between them at all. But although he did not avoid her, and even seemed deliberately to seek her out sometimes, she did sometimes think he went out of his way to avoid touching her. Or was that simply an indication of her own hyper-sensitivity where he was concerned? Perhaps he was better at putting things into perspective than she was. After all, nothing had really happened, at all.
The college prize-giving traditionally took place in the evening, and afterwards the teachers and their wives or husbands were treated to a few drinks and supper to round off the entertainment. The guest speaker and the college board of governors would also be there.
Helen Coleman received an invitation, and showed it to Stacey.
'Guest speaker, Gideon Newnes,' Stacey read aloud, impressed with the name of a lone ocean voyager and author of several books on the sea. 'Lucky you. What I wouldn't give for the chance of meeting him!'
'Meeting who?' asked Alex, wandering into the room at that moment.
'Gideon Newnes—you know, the author and seafarer. He illustrates his own books, too. I have two of them myself. They're beautiful.'
'Yes, I know his work. I didn't know you were a fan. I take it you've heard that he's to be guest speaker at the college prize-giving this year.'
She handed him the embossed card in her hand. 'I've just been reading my mother's invitation. You and Fergus will be going, too, of course?'
'Yes. Although, being teachers, we don't get a printed invitation like this. Do you want to come?'
'As a gate-crasher?' She made a little face.
'As my partner,' he said quietly. 'Will you?'
'I ‑' she hesitated. Her mother had an invitation in her own right, no doubt because of the voluntary hours she was putting in teaching spinning and weaving for Roger Pearce. If she did not accept Alex's invitation, she would be the only member of the family who would miss out on the evening. 'Well—all right,' she said. 'Thank you, Alex. We can all go together.'
'Yes, so we can,' he said, and if there was a slightly dry note in his voice, she decided to ignore it, and whatever implications it might hold.
Alex's house was virtually ready for occupation, but he had decided to put off moving into it until the school holidays started. Stacey wondered if he was also reluctant to move away from her mother, who these days was more gay and happy than Stacey had ever seen her. She quite often went to the house with Alex, and sometimes they would be fairly. late, having called in to Roger Pearce's place on their way home.
Once or twice he came to have tea with them, presumably at her mother's invitation, as a way of repaying his hospitality. Stacey found that she liked his quiet manner, sometimes breaking into unexpected humour that banished the rather sad look in his eyes. In fact he seemed happier altogether than he had at their first meeting. When a chance remark he made led to the information that his wife had died two years before, she began to understand that sadness, and to be glad that grief was apparently receding for him.
When the prize-giving evening arrived, and he came over to their party afterwards, she was pleased to see him and greeted him warmly. But when he bore her mother off to the other end of the room to meet someone he wanted to introduce her to, Stacey wondered how Alex would react.
However, with impeccable manners, he devoted all his attention to herself, as his partner for the evening, even ignoring a couple of attempts on her part to rejoin her mother and Roger Pearce.
'Come on, Stacey. You wanted to meet the guest speaker,' he said as she edged towards the corner where her mother was now seated. 'Now's your chance.'
Adroitly he edged them into the small group around Gideon Newnes, and prevailed on the college Principal to introduce them.
The sailor-author shook her hand warmly, and was sincerely pleased when she mentioned that she owned some of his books. His eyes lit up when she mentioned that she particularly enjoyed the paintings which illustrated the books, and he said, 'I really wanted to be a painter, you know. I'm actually not good enough for my paintings to stand on their own, but they make acceptable illustrations.'
'A modest talent put to very good use,' Alex interpolated. 'Stacey paints, too.'
'You do?' Sea-blue eyes swept over her with renewed interest. Stacey reflected that the photographs on his book-jackets did the man less than justice, being all bearded jowl and windswept hair. At the moment the beard was neatly trimmed and the hair swept back over a high forehead. He was a good-looking, dynamic man who had given a fast-paced, exciting talk at the prize-giving.
'Only in an amateur way,' she said, in response to his query. 'And sometimes at work, where I do displays for the window.'
'You work in a shop?'
'A bookshop ‑' she told him where.
'I know it,' he said. 'Do you sell my books?'
'Oh, yes indeed,' she assured him. 'They're very popular.'
'I'll drop in and see you some time,' he said. 'To see how sales are going. Perhaps I'll autograph a copy of my latest book for you.'
His eyes were smiling a question at her, and she answered without hesitation. 'That would be very nice. Thank you.'
Gideon Newnes gave her another lingering smile before turning to meet someone else who was eager to speak to him, and Alex's hand on her arm pulled her out of the circle.
'He's got a cheek,' Alex murmured in her ear as they moved away.
'Why?' she asked, her lips still curved in a small smile.
'You know why. Making a date with my girl right under my nose!' He was smiling, too.
'I'm not your girl.'
'You were obviously with me.'
'Anyway, it wasn't a date,' she added.
'What, then? An assignation?'
Stacey laughed outright. 'I think I'd call it a—a tentative arrangement,' she said. 'Do you disapprove?'
'Disapprove? Would it make a difference if I objected?'
She turned to look at him curiously. 'Why should you object?'
Alex was still smiling, but his eyes were suddenly penetrating. 'Playing games, Stacey?' he asked softly.
Suddenly it wasn't funny any more. Stacey was at a loss. 'I don't know what you mean,' she said.
He looked at her intently, then said, 'I don't object. As you say, why should I?'
He spoke lightly, but there was a tight look about his mouth, as though he was thoroughly fed up about something. Following his gaze, she. saw her mother laughing up at Roger Pearce as he leaned on the back of her chair, and thought she understood.
CHAPTER TEN
Gideon Newnes strolled into the bookshop a few days later. He caught Stacey's eye and winked over the head of the middle-aged woman she was serving, waved away one of the younger girls when she approached him to offer service, and began to inspect the books on the shelves and racks around the shop.
By the time she was free, he had found a copy of his own latest book.
'Do you have a copy of this yourself?' he asked.
'No, not yet.' She named the two which she did have.
'I'd like to buy this,' he said, smiling down at her with those sea-blue eyes twinkling.
Suspecting what for, she took it rather hesitantly, but she could hardly refuse to sell it to him, so she took the money from him and made to wrap it.
'Just a moment,' he said, taking it from her and opening the front cover. He took a handsome silver pen from his breast pocket and wrote quickly on the fly-leaf. Then he turned the book so that she could read it, saying, 'It's yours.'
She was relieved to see that the message was not too personal. Simply, To Stacey—from Gideon Newnes.
'Thank you very much, Mr Newnes,' she said, 'but really, I shouldn't accept ‑'
'It's no good to anyone else,' he pointed out, with truth. 'And why shouldn't you accept it?' he added. 'Even the Victorians allowed a man to give a girl a book, if I recall. Books, flowers and chocolates, wasn't it?'
'Yes, I believe so,' Stacey smiled. 'It's very generous of you. Thank you.'
'Oh, but I have an ulterior motive,' he smiled. 'I'm hoping to persuade you to have lunch with me.'
'You don't need to bribe me to do that,' Stacey laughed.
'Then you will?'
Most certainly she would, and did. It was a pleasant hour, which she enjoyed very much, and when Gideon suggested dinner and dancing later in the week, she was quick to accept that invitation, too.
She was quite unprepared for the ensuing contretemps when she told Graeme why she was unable to go out with him that particular night.
He was quite furious. 'You said you were thinking seriously about me,' he said, accusingly, over the phone.
'I am,' she assured him, trying to calm his temper with reason. 'But I haven't made any promises to you, Graeme. I'm still free to go out with other men if I choose.'
'Which you do choose!'
'Yes. You mustn't mind ‑'
'I do mind! I'm in love with you. How do you expect me to feel when I know some other man is taking you out?'
'I'm sorry if it bothers you ‑'
'Bothers me? You really have no idea what you're doing to me, do you?' he demanded.
'Oh, Graeme, I'm sorry you feel this way.'
'Are you? Will you cancel this date then?'
For a moment she hesitated. It upset her to have him react this way. She was fond of Graeme, and although Gideon was good company and it was flattering for her to have a well-known personality take an interest in her, she had no feeling for him other than interest and liking. She was tempted to comply with Graeme's request to save his feelings and avoid an unpleasant argument.
But something inside her revolted at the capitulation to a kind of emotional blackmail. Graeme had no claim on her and no right to dictate who she might see or go out with. If she gave in this time, she could expect that he would feel he had a right to do the same thing again. If he could he would cut off any contact she might have with potential rivals.