Firth

by Vaso

  'Don't believe everything you read in the papers,' she said carelessly. 'I'd have thought that you of all people would realise that.'

  'So it's not serious?'

  'Does it matter to you whether it is or not?' Vanessa was curious.

  'Daniel hasn't said anything to me.'

  'Were you expecting him to? Does he usually discuss his girl-friends with you?'

  'Sometimes.' He frowned at her. 'He's keeping remarkably quiet about you at the moment.'

  She managed an amused laugh. 'Are we worrying you, Max?'

  'Not at all,' he said. 'Are you going to marry him?'

  'He hasn't asked me-—yet.'

  'And when he does?'

  'That's my business,' she told him coolly.

  She expected him to leave it at that, but he didn't. 'Are you in. love with him?'

  'You surely don't expect me to answer that question?' She was fencing with him now, deliberately dodging the issue. He had no right to question her like this. But where Max was concerned rights didn't come into it. He expected her to supply him with the answers because it suited him, whatever reservations she might have about

  doing so. Well, for once he was going to be disappointed!

  'No, you're not in love with him, are you? Exactly what game are you playing, Vanessa? Are you hoping he'll marry you so you can heave a sigh of relief and abandon that so-called career as an actress?' There was a harsh, taunting note in his voice as he fired the questions at her.

  She wasn't going to lose her temper with him, she told herself. But it was an effort. 'Perhaps,' she said calmly. 'Who knows?'

  He looked as .if he would like to shake her. His hands clenched into two fists as if he was having trouble keeping them off her. 'You mean if someone better comes along you'll drop Daniel like a hot brick. But, in the meantime, being seen out on the town with him is doing you no harm at all.'

  She shrugged. 'If that's what you like to think,' she said.

  'It's the truth, isn't it?'

  'I don't have to justify myself to you, Max, and I don't intend to. My private life is my affair.'

  'Don't come running to me when it all blows up in your face, that's all,' he snarled.

  'You're the last man on earth I'd run to under any circumstances,' she said emphatically.

  He slammed out of the rfoom without deigning to reply and Vanessa turned back to her work again. In any other man but Max she would assume that all those questions about her relationship with Daniel betokened jealousy. But Max Anderson didn't care enough about her to harbour such an emotion. He didn't care about anybody except his arrogant self. And yet she couldn't stop herself loving him. What kind of masochist was she to suffer the pain that he inflicted on her and come back for more?

  She said as much to Daniel. 'I'm a fool. I don't know why you waste your time with me.'

  'I like you,' he told her simply. 'I could do more than like you, if you'd let me, Vanessa.'

  She made a stifled sound of protest. 'No. It's no use.'

  He took her hand. 'Not now. Not yet, perhaps. But later, when you've got over Max.'

  Vanessa shook her head. 'No. It wouldn't be fair to ask you to hang around on that kind of basis. I like you as a friend, but that's it. I ought to love you, you know.' She smiled at him. 'Goodness knows, most women would grab at the chance. You're attractive, intelligent, good-humoured, kind, understanding——'

  'Don't go on,' he said hastily. 'You make me sound like a parcel of virtues. Too boring for words!'

  'Oh, you've got your faults. Haven't we all?'

  He laughed. 'You needn't catalogue those. I think I know them by now.' His face was serious again. 'I'm not going to stop seeing you, Vanessa. Don't ask me to do that.'

  She hesitated. 'All right, I won't. But——'

  'I know. I won't push my luck. And, Vanessa——'

  'Yes?'

  'I'm always around if you need help. Remember that, will you?'

  Thank you.' She was grateful to him for taking the line he had. She knew that she would miss his cheerful, undemanding company if it was suddenly taken away from her. At the moment she needed something or someone to take her mind off her troubles.

  She threw herself into work and finally completed the play script. It seemed to have taken years to finish, but that was Max's fault. He had expected her to cope with a mass of day-to-day secretarial work as well and had

  been constantly amending and re-writing pages that she had typed. It had been a back-breaking job and she had become heartily sick of it, but at last it was done. She looked at the slim blue folder that contained the neatly typed work with some satisfaction. Job specification completed, there was nothing to keep her here any longer. She was free to go and, away from Max's dis-turbingtepresence, make some attempt to put him from her mind.

  'It's done,' she told him, when he entered the living room, half an hour after she had completed the task and was engaged in tidying up some routine details of correspondence.

  He walked over to the desk, opened the folder and studied the last few pages carefully. Vanessa waited. She wasn't worried that he would find errors. She had checked and double checked and she knew they had been typed immaculately. Her eyes lingered automatically on him, admiring the strength in the long brown fingers that held the papers. She could never look at his hands without recalling how they had stroked and caressed her to a state of mindless rapture. Would any other man ever have the same effect upon her? She doubted it somehow. But it was a foolish daydream of hers to hope that Max would ever want to make love to her again.,

  'Yes, that's all right.' He jammed the pages back in the folder and slung it back on the desk, turning to look at her as he did so.

  She didn't know what reaction she had expected from him. Praise at a job well done, she supposed. Well, it was evident that none was forthcoming. 'So I can go now,' she said cautiously.

  'If you want to.'

  'I thought you'd be glad to see the last of me.'

  'You've "certainly caused me more upset than the average secretary I've employed,' he agreed. There was a pause. 'My other girl isn't coming back.'

  'So?' Did he mean he wanted her to stay on?

  'You could continue working here, if you liked. Your typing's not bad and you've dealt with everything else reasonably well. In time you could be quite useful to me.' His voice was level, containing no hint okexpres-sion.

  'Could I?' Vanessa asked. 'How very kind of you to say so.' For one wild moment she thought of swallowing her pride and accepting his offer, however ungraciously it had been made. But then reason reasserted itself. There was no point dragging herself here every day, hoping against hope that one day Max would suddenly reform his opinion of her. Better to cut loose completely, however painful she found it. There was no point in waiting for a miracle to happen.

  'So what's your answer?'

  For one self-deceiving moment Vanessa almost fooled herself into thinking he sounded interested in her reply. Then she pulled herself together and told herself she was mistaken. 'No, thank you,' she said coldly.

  'It's a genuine offer. A permanent job.'

  'I don't want it, thanks.'

  'I don't suppose you've got anything better lined up, have you?' he asked.

  That's not your problem,' she told him calmly. Til manage somehow.'

  'If you turn it down, that's the end of the matter as far as I'm concerned. Don't think the job will be waiting for you still when you change your mind and come and ask for it again.'

  'I wouldn't dream of doing any such thing.' She raised her chin defiantly. 'I've had enough of this place and its owner to last me a lifetime!'

  There was a white, tense look about Max's mouth as if he was struggling to keep his temper in check and finding it a hard task. 'You don't mince words, do you?'

  'Did you expect me to?' she flared.

  'No, not really. But if you're in the mood for a spot of plain speaking you can answer me this. Are you going to move in with Daniel?
Is he going to be your meal ticket from now on?'

  'It's nothing to do with you. It's not your concern what I do with my life.'

  'I'm making it.my concern,' he said grimly. He seized hold of her and gave her an impatient shake. 'Are you going to Daniel?'

  'Find out!' she spat defiantly, struggling in vain to escape arms that held her fast to him, immovable as steel bands.

  'I fully intend to, one way or another. And, as I remember, you've always responded to my methods of persuasion in the past.' There was devilment in the face that was so close to hers. She knew that if he kissed her she was lost for all time.

  'All right,' she capitulated. 'If you really want to know, I don't see it matters one bit. Yes, I'm going to Daniel.'

  'You scheming little bitch,' he said softly.

  She didn't know why she had lied to him. She would sooner fly to the moon than land herself on Daniel, although she had no doubt at all that he would be only too delighted if she did so. She supposed that, in a strange kind of way, she was trying to live up to the blackened picture that Max had drawn of her activities. Let him think the worst of her! She didn't care any more so long as she never had to set eyes on him again. And, by the look of his face, pale with anger, she had achieved that aim.

  'I make the most of the chances that come my way,' she said with assumed carelessness. It was the sort of remark that she had heard Lydia make many times by way of self-justification, but she had never expected to use it on her own account.

  'And so do I,' he replied harshly as his mouth bent to claim hers with sudden intensity.

  Vanessa despised herself for responding, but she couldn't damp down the fires of desire that sprang to ready life as Max made her mouth his own. He was taking her in anger, but she didn't care, didn't think of anything beyond the shattering sensations that his kiss was arousing. Nothing mattered except the pounding in her head, the excitement rising within her, the need to be his and his entirely.

  When he released her he was smiling, but it was a smile of cold satisfaction. He knew what he did to her, the effect his body had on hers, and that kiss had been a calculated breach of her defences. He had wanted to reduce her to a trembling mass of emotion and he had done so quite deliberately.

  'Does Daniel kiss you like that?' he asked her.

  'I won't tell you.'

  'You don't need to,' he said cruelly. 'Your body answered for you. Whatever it is you're craving for, Daniel isn't satisfying you.'

  'And you can, I suppose?'

  'Haven't I just proved it to you? Do you want me to demonstrate again?'

  'No,' she said hastily, turning her face away from him. She couldn't take any more without breaking down completely.

  'I thought not.' He sounded contemptuous. 'You're rather a coward when it comes to facing facts about yourself, aren't you?'

  Only where he was concerned, she thought, but didn't

  say so out loud. 'When do you want me to leave?' she asked instead.

  He looked indifferent. 'You can go now, if you like. I don't give a damn.'

  He wouldn't. 'But it's only eleven o'clock,' she protested.

  'Oh, I'll pay you until the end of the day, if that's what's worrying you.'

  'But isn't there anything else I could be——'

  'There's nothing here for you,' he said, and words summed up everything that she felt about him. It was hopeless even to care any more. Max Anderson wasn't -for her. He never had been.

  She tidied up her things in silence while he watched her broodingly. There wasn't much to take away with her—a couple of pens, a few bits of make-up from the desk drawer, a box of tissues. She packed them in her bag, blinking back the tears of reaction to his cruel words that were already starting to her eyes. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing .that he had hurt her, she vowed.

  'Well, that seems to be everything.' He could see that for himself, but she said it anyway in a falsely bright voice. Til be going, then, if you're quite sure that——'

  'Quite sure,' he said firmly. 'Goodbye, Vanessa.'

  She managed a strangled sound that approximated to 'goodbye' and almost ran from the room, despite her intent to remain cool and calm. In the lift to the ground floor the tears that she had held back streamed unchecked. She scrubbed furiously at her cheeks with her handkerchief as she walked to the bus stop, conscious that she was attracting the attention of passers by.

  When Jill got home that evening she greeted her suspiciously red around the eyes, but determinedly cheerful, and with news to give her that, in her sister's view at least, took precedence over the reason for the partingof the ways with Max Anderson and postponed questions on that score.

  'Jonathan rang me. It's strange how it works out sometimes. No news of any work for ages and now, according to him, the chance of the century, if I do all right at the audition tomorrow.'

  Jill pulled a face. 'Don't build up too many hopes, love. Remember what happened last time.'

  'I know. But this one's different, he says. A better chance for me and a nice meaty part. Anyway, whatever happens, it's work again, or the possibility of it. I'd almost forgotten what a stage looked like. And if I'm lucky and get the part there'll be a six-week tour of the provinces before we hit London. Plenty of time to work myself into the role and get over my nerves.'

  'Just see that you get it, that's all,' her sister cautioned.

  'Wet blanket!' Vanessa accused her, and Jill laughed.

  'Have you told Daniel the good news yet?'

  'Yes. We were due to go out tonight, but now I'll have to stay in and go over some likely audition pieces.' Vanessa smiled, remembering his enthusiastic response. 'I think he was more thrilled than I was about it all.'

  It was strange really. Only a short while ago she would have been over the moon at the prospect of a second chance to show that she had talent and to work in the theatre that she loved so much. Once it would have been all she had asked from life. But how she knew that there was so much more that she wanted. Her single-minded passion for work had waned, diluted by an equal feeling for a man who cared nothing for her.

  As she set off for the audition next morning Vanessa was resolved on one point at least. She was going to do her level best to get the part. And, if she got it, she would work as hard as was humanly possible to perfect

  it. She would show Max Anderson that, for once, one of his forcefully expressed opinions was wrong. She would make him eat his words about her acting talents.

  She was nervous, naturally, but she did her best, hoping it would be good enough. The part that she was being considered for seemed tailor-made for her in her present state, she thought. It was that of a.young girl gripped by an obsessive love for a man who cared nothing for her. Her descent from reality into a terrifying world of shadows and delusions was brilliantly written. It was a gem of a part, Vanessa realised from her brief glimpse of the script, and she ached to play it.

  Like the other actresses present she gave the speech that she had prepared for the occasion and then attempted a short scene from the play that had been picked out as a test for them. She was given ten minutes to study it, not nearly enough by any standards, and was then summoned on stage to run through it, the stage manager, a young, casually dressed man in his early thirties, reading the other part in the piece, that of the man the young girl loved.

  Vanessa had heard him with the others who had gone before her. He read the lines clearly enough, but, after playing the scene through with nine different girls, he was beginning to get bored and he sounded it. He looked at his watch as she walked on to the stage and called down to the stalls, 'How many more to get through? Is this the last one?' as if she didn't exist.

  She'd make him sit up and take notice! Vanessa decided angrily, her nerves suddenly vanishing in a wave of indignation. Just who did he think he was? She launched into her first speech with a confidence born of blind fury.

  She was allowed to go to the end of the scene. Nobody stopped her halfway with the
brief 'Thank you' that had been the fate of some of the others. When shefinished "she sensed a buzz of excitement in the dim blackness beyond the stage. She was sure she had done well even before the stage manager came over to congratulate her on her reading. His bored tone had vanished after the first few seconds and he acted the piece for all he was worth, giving her all the help and encouragement that he could.

  'You were great,' he said, coming over to where she stood, exhausted by the nervous effort that the last few moments had entailed. 'You've got the part.'

  She managed a grin at him, her anger suddenly evaporating. 'And how long have the powers-that-be been listening to you when it comes to hiring and firing people?'

  He laughed. 'They'll agree with me, you'll see.'

  And he was proved right. She was asked to wait, but after only a few more minutes she was told the part was hers. The man who was to direct the play came over to give her the news. 'We'll be in touch with your agent about the details of salary, etc. Rehearsals start next week. See you then.'

  Vanessa floated out of the theatre on wings, barely touching the pavement in her excitement. She rang Jonathan with the good news, then got in touch with Jill and Daniel. For half a second she was tempted to ring Max and tell him. She had a childish desire to prove to him that, even if he thought she was a lousy actress, other people had thought differently. But that would hardly change his opinion of her. Max Anderson didn't care what other people thought. He was so sure he was always right. He would only receive her news with some cutting remark that would upset her, however much she tried to ignore it. Let him read about it all in the papers, she decided. He could make what he liked about the news.

  She celebrated, of course. Daniel brought champagne