‘So it’s really true,’ Lesley said, but her wide green eyes rested curiously on his expensive sports car. ‘Last night, I half believed you were all joking.’
‘Joking!’ Dominic gave a hollow laugh. ‘It’s a joke I’ve lived with all my life, little Yseult, and I haven’t found it very funny.’
‘Tell me about the hotel,’ she demanded now.
‘It’s in the new part of the house—the part you’ve been living in. But if you stay, you’ve got to move to the Manor proper where Jennifer and Great-grandma and I live. This new part is closed up normally at this time of the year, but we had a big party of Americans for the whole of January and when they left, Great-grandma took the notion that she’d like to stay in that part as well. Jennifer was going to be away, I was at the Home Farm, so we had our housekeeper, Mrs. Piper, move over to look after Great-grandma and her companion just when you three put in an appearance. Convenient, wasn’t it? But Great-grandma decided last night that she wanted to get back to her own cosy quarters in the old house and off she’s gone this morning. She’s over ninety, you know, and we like to indulge her little whims.
‘You’ll like the Manor proper, the Old Manor we call it, tucked cosily at the back of this monstrosity. It’s the original house, built of grey Cornish stone.’
‘Monstrosity?’ echoed Lesley, staring at the Elizabethan black and white front towards which he had gestured.
Yes, that’s the new part.’
‘The new part? But—but it’s old, Elizabethan, surely,’ Lesley said now.
‘Pseudo,’ he shrugged. ‘It was built about a hundred years ago by an ancestor who’d struck lucky, one of our roving ancestors of whom there have been a large number.’ And he cocked a brilliant quizzing eye in Lesley’s direction.
She refused to take up the challenge of his laughter. ‘The hotel... Mr. Defontaine didn’t have any compunction about turning a home ... your home into that?’
He made a gesture. ‘To do him justice, he hadn’t much choice. You must have heard of the predicament of most of England’s stately homes. Not that this is a stately home in a big way and neither Jennifer nor I worry about this part. It’s the old Manor we love. But in order to keep even that going, to pay the expenses of rates and upkeep, there’s got to be some sort of income.
‘As to the sort of hotel it is—well, smallish but very exclusive and fantastically expensive. We’re very choosey about our clients and more or less the same people come year after year and, as I said, pay fantastic prices. But it’s very well run. Blake sees to that, and sees to it too that Jennifer and I work like galley slaves during the season.’
‘I’m sure he does,’ she said slowly. ‘My sister Rita says if we stay we too will be slaves, and Blake will be the slave-master.’
Dominic laughed discordantly. ‘Your little sister has got something there, Yseult. That’s what we all are ... his ruddy slaves.’
Lesley turned away. She had found out what she had wanted to know. There had been no joke last night. Just the stark reality that the Trevendone inheritance was in Blake Defontaine’s hands, and for the sake of the twins she had brought from over the sea, she must do her part in discharging the debt.
CHAPTER VI
The first month would end tomorrow and they were still here. Sometimes in her sheer fury against her boss—the slave-master, as Rita persisted in calling him—Lesley asked herself why after the first day she hadn’t got up from her typewriter, flung his notes into his face and departed.
But always it was the thought of the twins that restrained her. Here they had a home, comfort and healthy surroundings. Where else could she, on the salary she could earn, provide so much?
That was one of the conditions she had made in her brief interview with Dominic and Blake Defontaine.
‘I’ll stay,’ she said quietly, ‘and work to the very best of my ability to earn our keep. But I won’t have Rita and Richard tied down to any sort of job. They’re too young and their education isn’t finished. In the holidays they could perhaps help, but that’s all.’
Defontaine looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Your anxiety for the welfare of your ... er ... brother and sister does you credit, Miss ... er ... Trevendone. We’ll discuss them later.’
Lesley did not look up, though once again she wondered whether that was something else he had guessed—that she wasn’t really a Trevendone? If so, he was just being his usual subtle scheming self, saying nothing outright till it suited him to do so. But it was no good getting angry because he was mocking her. She would have to steel herself to accept his hateful mannerisms if she was going to work for him.
‘We’ll stay for a trial month,’ she went on firmly. ‘By then I shall know if I can cope and whether the twins have settled. It will also give you both the chance of judging whether you want me to stay in the post.’
‘Posts,’ interposed Dominic with a sly look at Blake Defontaine. ‘Don’t forget you’ll be working for the hotel as well as being secretary for Blake. And that’s a full-time job, I would imagine.’
‘I don’t mind how hard I work,’ Lesley said between her teeth, driven as she always seemed to be into excesses whenever she was with Defontaine. ‘In Australia, the Trevendones paid their way by hard work’—that wasn’t strictly true so far as Ralph Trevendone went, but they weren’t to know that. ‘Now we’re here I’ll do the same. I’ll put in long hours to settle even a small part of the family debt.’
‘The sentiments do you credit,’ murmured Blake Defontaine, and a faint cynical smile twitched one corner of his mouth.
She turned on him. ‘At least I could do something to save Jennifer and Dominic working like slaves,’ she flashed. There was a tense little pause. Dominic shuffled uncomfortably. Lesley’s green eyes were fixed on Blake. His gaze, ironic, veiled, slid from hers. He cleared his throat. ‘Quite,’ he said, and then, after a pause, ‘Right, you can start tomorrow. Use today to move into the old Manor and get settled there. Tomorrow I’ll show you the type of work I want you to do for me, and Dominic can give you an idea of what clerical work needs to be done on the hotel side.’
That had been twenty-seven days ago and tomorrow she must find out whether she was to stay. Nearly a month since she had begun work here and now there were daffodils round the orchard trees and in the ornamental beds lining the courtyard and blue, pink and white hyacinths a glory of colour in the sheltered beds on the south side of the Manor.
Lesley took the last sheet of paper out of the typewriter, covered the machine and turned to look out of the window. For the past month she had worked in this little office at the end of the great hall in the new part of the Manor near to the big reception desk. She went towards the window behind her, revelling in the sunlight and the warmth which came from the sun, though outside there was a blustery March wind and to her it was as cold as it had been in February.
Lesley thought again: A month! We said we’d give it a month’s trial and the time is up tomorrow. I wonder...
She hadn’t really wanted to start thinking about her employer, but it was something she found difficult not to do. He was so dominating, so strong, so ruthless that he overshadowed everybody else in the Manor. He was, as she had decided that first evening when she had heard of the family debt, he was Trevendone.
And the odd thing was that everybody acknowledged it and gave way to him at every turn. Lesley reflected that she had never heard anyone challenge a single statement—at least not to his face. The staff of the Manor obviously held him in the deepest awe and respect—and even more. She had discovered the first suspicion of that ‘even more’ in her first week of working here.
Blake was away for a couple of days and though he had left her enough work to occupy her during his absence she stayed in the office late in the evenings and completed it well before time. That gave her the opportunity of finding out more about her hotel work which Dominic was supposed to supervise.
Lesley found it was almost impossible to pin the young man do
wn and his knowledge of the job seemed to her scanty in the extreme. His handsome face became more sulky as she persisted. ‘Look, Yseult my darling, why don’t you relax and stop worrying? I’m an outdoor sort of bloke, not an office clerk. My responsibility around here is really the Home Farm, and that’s enough for one ordinary fellow. We’re not all supermen like Blake. Mrs. Thomas, your predecessor, was efficient—I’ll say she was, and even Blake admitted it, which is something—so I never interfered. If you really want to know about the job, sweetheart, I suggest you find Mrs. Thomas. She lives in a bungalow in St Benga Town. But, darling, why worry?’
Lesley was coming to the conclusion that Dominic seldom did. That afternoon, however, she took him at his word and drove the Mini to a small bungalow on the outskirts of the town.
She was welcomed by a smiling little person who invited her in. ‘Yes, I was Mrs. Thomas, but I remarried last week and I hardly knew how to write telling Mr. Defontaine. He has always been so good to me, so considerate.’
Lesley received this surprising information in silence and looked round the sitting room which showed evidence of packing.
‘I’m in the most frightful muddle,’ the other confessed. ‘It all happened so quickly—Mr. Raybold’s proposal and his being able to sell his hotel. It’s only a small place really, but he had a splendid offer and he’s taken it. He’s always wanted to travel and so have I.
‘Do sit down, Miss Trevendone.’ She swept some books from a chair and plumped up the cushion. ‘You did say Miss Trevendone, didn’t you? That’s odd really, because I thought I knew all the members of the family—just on nodding terms, as you might say. It’s Mr. Defontaine who is the mainspring at the Manor, and don’t you know it when he’s away!’
‘I’m a distant relation on a visit from Australia and I’ve been doing some typing for Mr. Defontaine,’ Lesley explained. ‘Mr. Dominic Trevendone suggested I come along here to ask you about your method of book-keeping and accounts.’
Mrs. Raybold smiled. ‘Mr. Dominic—now there’s a charmer for you, but no idea about office work. I just used to tell him to run away and let me get on with it. It was easier in the long run.’
Her face took on a worried line. ‘That’s what has worried me and made me feel really guilty—letting Mr. Defontaine down. You know, it was the one thing that made me hesitate when Mr. Raybold proposed. You see, I know how difficult it is to get a really efficient receptionist book-keeper for seasonal work. I feel awful.’
Lesley said quietly, ‘I’ve done book-keeping and accounts in an office in Australia, so I have the general idea. Mr. Defontaine wondered if I might be able to take over ... if you could give me a few tips. Have you time?’
Mrs. Raybold’s face cleared. ‘Of course I’ve got time. I’d do anything to help Mr. Defontaine. He’s a grand person.’ Lesley left her three hours later, her face rather thoughtful. Mrs. Raybold had been a great help, had showered Lesley with good advice and even congratulated her on her good fortune. Lesley thought it was all rather odd.
So good! So considerate! The memory of the phrases and Mrs. Raybold’s glowing face as she had uttered them remained with Lesley as she drove back to the Manor. Hardly the sort of description she would have used about the slave-master, she thought wryly.
Another of his great admirers was Sorrel Lang, though that relationship was different, as Lesley was the first to admit. ‘After all, if you are madly in love with a man you are naturally convinced that he is a person set apart, and that was Sorrel’s attitude.
She was always at the Manor House. She kept her horse in the Trevendone stables and rode with Blake most days. Even .now when he was once again in London on business, she came to ride on the beach and stay for lunch with the family in the dark little dining room of the old manor.
She never bothered to disguise her hostility to Lesley, but she seemed to have started an odd sort of love-hate relationship with Rita, who had always been keen on riding and didn’t hide her admiration for the young widows beauty and her daring if rather slapdash horsemanship.
Lesley couldn’t disguise her surprise when, on the day before Blake was expected back, Sorrel strolled into her office and said, casually, ‘Rita says you’re thinking of driving into Exeter tomorrow to buy some boots.’
Lesley looked at her warily. ‘I haven’t any really decent ones. I ought to have got a pair in London when Rita bought hers. I thought I’d go in the morning, as I’m quite up to date with my work.’
‘Better come with me, then.’ Sorrel’s voice was still casual. ‘I have to go in for a fitting and it seems stupid to take two cars. I know the road and you don’t, and my car is bigger and faster.’
Lesley hesitated, wanting to refuse but not quite knowing how. In a way it would be churlish to draw back from the first offer of friendship which the dark girl had made, casual though it had been.
Perhaps it wasn’t really a sudden change of attitude. If the rest of the family knew Sorrel was going to Exeter it would look very mean to them if she didn’t offer to take Lesley and strange, too, if Lesley refused to accept it. So...
‘Thanks, I’ll be glad of the lift,’ she said briefly.
‘Be ready at nine. I want to get back here for one o’clock lunch. That should give us more than two hours in town, long enough for me to have my fitting and do some shopping and for you to buy your boots.’
Sorrel’s car was a big Italian model which she drove badly and far too fast. The girls exchanged very few remarks during the journey, for Lesley was watching the road so that she could use her own car next time. Sorrel wasn’t in a good mood, it would seem, for she snapped out very brief replies to the few polite remarks Lesley felt constrained to make and in the end Lesley settled for looking at the scenery, marvelling at the greenness of the fields and admiring the trees still standing with their delicate lace’ outlines against a pale blue sky.
Sorrel parked in the Cathedral close and then said briefly, ‘The High Street is just over there and you’ll find plenty of shops. Be back here at twelve prompt, not a minute later. And if we do miss each other there’s a coach station further up the High Street.’
She turned away and Lesley, feeling that she was dismissed, wandered over to look at the shops in the precincts and then through a narrow street into the main thoroughfare.
She made her purchases within the hour and then browsed round the shops for another half hour, going back to the parking place well before the time Sorrel had mentioned. But there was no car—at least no Italian model.
Lesley wandered around the parking places without success. Then she thought: I didn’t wait to see, but she probably drove off to wherever she had her appointment. She’ll come back here at twelve and pick me up.
But the Cathedral clock boomed out the hour, then the quarter, then the half, and Lesley guessed that Sorrel wouldn’t come now. She’d better go and find where the coach station was. Actually she wasn’t particularly upset. Sorrel had been an uncomfortable companion this morning and her driving was erratic and fast—not a safe combination. Lesley told herself comfortably that she would be happier returning on the coach.
She didn’t feel quite so contented when she eventually reached the coach station and found she couldn’t start the journey back to St Benga Town till ten minutes past five and that it would take all of two hours.
Actually it took about forty minutes longer, for all traffic on the road was held up by a giant transporter moving at a ‘snail’s pace. When she finally reached St Benga Town it was dark and the local bus which passed the Manor gates had gone. So there was nothing for it but to walk.
She arrived back in the small panelled hall of the old Manor House to find, a reception party awaiting her—and heading it, Blake Defontaine, his eyes tile cold colour of dull pewter.
So he was back, a day early, and she supposed that coldness on his face was because she had taken a day off. ‘Where the hell have you been till now?’ he demanded as he strode up to her.
His une
xpected return and his abrupt question plus the fact that she was overwrought put her immediately at a disadvantage. She went very white and began to stammer. ‘I walked. I’d been expecting—to come back with Sorrel, but somehow I missed her. I waited for a long time, but eventually I had to get a coach.’
She sat down abruptly on one of the straight-backed chairs. ‘And what about the man you picked up ... or who picked you up ... in Exeter?’
Jennifer, who had been hovering in the background with the twins, now said rather accusingly, ‘Sorrel rang up at lunch time. She said you hadn’t come back to where she’d left the car, and after she’d waited and waited she’d concluded you were returning with the man you’d been talking to in the Cathedral precincts.’
Lesley was still trying to recover her breath and Richard, elbowing the rest of them aside, came to bend over her. ‘You aren’t hurt, are you, Les?’ he queried anxiously. His hand was on her arm, and his thin young face a mask of alarm. ‘We’ve been worried stiff, Rita and me. We knew you wouldn’t go off with someone else if you’d promised that Sorrel woman you’d meet her. What happened?’
‘I told you, she wasn’t there,’ Lesley said in a faint voice. ‘I ... I ... waited and waited. The only man who spoke to me in Exeter was that salesman who was staying at the King’s Arms when we were there. As I got out of Sorrel’s car, he was just passing and he said, “Hello, Miss Australia, so you’re still around,” and I said “Yes.” That was all. So I came home by coach.’
Beside them, Blake was standing listening to every word.
‘I phoned and found the coach arrives at seven-ten,’ he said, his voice sharp. ‘The connecting bus along the coast leaves five minutes later. Look at the time now!’
Lesley got up, her chin tilted. She had recovered her breath and her spirits. ‘I’m looking ... and what time I arrive here is no concern of yours, Mr. Defontaine. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go to my room.’
The Girl From Over the Sea Page 11