Hostile engagement

by Jessica Steele

  Rupert's conversation over their meal was still enthusiastic about his job, and he went on to tell her how he and Mr Gilbert had spent the day. 'We were in the office most of the time,' he said. 'Mr Gilbert certainly knows a thing or two—I shall have him with me for a week and I intend to learn everything from him I can.' He pushed his dessert plate away from him. 'Lord, I'm tired—I thitired-I have an early night.

  Lucy had been half wondering and dreading if Rupert would be going out that night—even if it was only down to the local for a celebratory pint she knew she would have been on pins until he came home wondering if he had fallen in again with any of the set that had led him astray, and on hearing Rupert state he had no intention of doing anything other than going to bed, she realised then that she herself had not been absolutely certain that her brother had given up his old-new ways. She felt guilty at the thought, so much

  * * *

  so that undecided through the day whether or not to ring Aunt Dorothy and tell her she wouldn't be coming after all, she now thought to prove her trust in her brother by going, and while she was away, she decided, she wouldn't for one minute wonder if Rupert was getting up to anything.

  Will you be all right if I go to Aunt Dorothy's on Friday?' she asked, and feeling uncomfortable as Rupert looked at her sharply as if guessing her earlier thoughts, 'I meant will you be able to cope-you know, with your meals and things.'

  `Of course I can cope-you go. I might give Harry Burnside a ring at the weekend—he'll know if there's any new female blood in the area.'

  Lucy laughed at the wicked lecherous look Rupert affected and relaxed. Harry Burnside had been a friend of her brother's in the pre-Archie Proctor days. If he was taking up with Harry and his set again she knew she had nothing to worry over.

  On Friday morning after checking that there were enough supplies in the house to keep Rupert going until she got back, Lucy set off in her Mini for Garbury, making good time and pulling in to check the route on her map when she got to Bamford. She had been this way many times, but always before it had been with her father at the wheel and she had been too intent on looking about her to notice much of the route they had taken.

  It was raining when she reached Garbury and with the vagaries of an English summer had turned quite cold, but when she drew up outside her aunt's stone cottage, the welcome she received was as warm as was the welcome meal Aunt Dorothy had prepared for her.

  Their greeting over, Lucy's case upstairs in the bedroom she was to use, and a meal inside her, her aunt plied her with questions as to how she and Rupert were going on. There had been a few tears shed between them as they had

  discussed the days when Lucy's parents and Dorothy Varley's sister had been with them, but they both brightened up when Lucy said Rupert was now working, but for all Aunt Dorothy was family and knew of the change in their circumstances, Lucy felt she couldn't tell her any of what Rupert had been up to before he had started his job.

  `I'm so glad for Rupert,' Dorothy Varley said sincerely. `It's what he's always wanted to do, isn't it, and it's good to know the future seems to be panning out.' Then in the way of most female relatives with an unattached niece of Lucy's age, asked, 'And what about you, 'Lucy? What have you been doing just lately? Any young men on your horizon?'

  Painfully Jud sprang instantly to mind. Lucy didn't think Jud could quite be put into the category of 'nice young men'—nice was not the word to describe the man who she felt sure would have raped her had she lifted her hand to him again—but he was the only one she wanted, and in the same way she hadn't been able to tell her aunt about Rupert, she found she couldn't tell her about Jud either, though she wondered if she would have felt better if she could confide in someone about him.

  `You're a romantic, Aunt,' she accused softly, and bent to fondle her aunt's all-sorts dog Ragamuffin, commonly known as Muff, who had been allowed in now that their meal was over.

  Lucy had always enjoyed her visits to Garbury, and this visit was no exception. Though constantly when by herself or out with Muff whom she took off on long walks, she was always aware that the delights around her as she looked over moors or strolled through woodlands were not as thrilling to her as they once had been, though she did find some peace in their splendid solitude.

  It was Tuesday of the following week before she thought she ought to give some mind to going back to Priors Channing. If nothing else, Rupert would soon need to have the larder re-stocked, and loath though she was to admit it, she

  was secretly longing for a sight of Jud. It would be enough just to see him, she thought, and into her mind's eye flashed a picture of him the last time she had seen him. His fury with her then seemed to live and breathe fire on her now as she relived the scene and hurriedly she fixed her mind on anything that would take that image away. That night she broached the subject of going back to her aunt. She had already stayed longer than she had intended.

  `I shall be sorry to see you go, Lucy,' her aunt said when Lucy told her she would be going home on Thursday. 'I've so enjoyed having you to stay—you remind me so much of your dear mother-you have the same gentle way with you that she had.' Lucy coloured as she recalled that awful slap she had served Jud with and hoped the need never arose to have to confess it to her aunt. 'I've been meaning to say this the whole time you've been here,' Dorothy Varley went on, not noticing Lucy's heightened colour as she bent to remove Muff's collar. 'But in the event of Rupert marrying before you-and I know you well enough to know you would rather he and his wife had Brook House to themselves—well, I wanted you to know that if Rupert marries first, it would give me the greatest of pleasure for you to come and live here with me.'

  `Oh, Aunt,' Lucy said softly. She hadn't given the matter any thought herself, but as her aunt had said, yes, she would want to leave Brook House when Rupert married. There was no 'if' about who married first, she knew without thinking twice that there was only one man she would ever want to marry, and since she might as well cry for the stars as hope Jud would ever want to marry her, she knew she would never marry.

  `The house will be yours one day anyway,' Aunt Dorothy went on briskly, seeing a sudden glint of tears in her niece's eyes, which was brought on as much by her aunt's kindness as by her own private thoughts. 'What you do with it when I'm gone won't worry me—I just wanted you to know

  there'll always be a home here for you.'

  Lucy said goodbye to her aunt on Thursday with mixed feelings. She had found a degree of peace in the tranquility that had surrounded her aunt's cottage-though cottage was a misnomer, since it had four bedrooms, each of them being occupied when they had visited as a family, with herself sharing a room with her aunt when Rupert had come with them. She knew, even before her first sight of Jud again, that in going back to Priors Channing any peace she had found would be shattered, for she would be unsettled knowing he was but a few miles away.

  Rupert was glad to see her. He had taken Jud's remarks about having someone in to do the heavy work to heart, she discovered, and in her absence had found a Mrs Turton from the village who starting last Monday was willing to come in twice a week to help with the housework. Lucy was pleased to see none of Rupert's enthusiasm for his job had lessened.

  `It's great,' he told her after asking after Aunt Dorothy, and making the polite enquiry whether Lucy had a nice time. She could see he could barely wait to get these politenesses out of the way before he told her all he had been doing. But for all he went on to say he was now working on his own, Mr Gilbert having left, Jud's name was barely mentioned save that Rupert had sometimes passed him driving in the opposite direction as they both went to their places of employment.

  As the weeks went by Lucy saw nothing of Jud. Not that she expected to; it was hardly likely, she thought, that he would call at Brook House anyway. If he wanted to see Rupert about anything, then he would ask him to come up to the Hall to see him, and even if she and Jud were still engaged, there would be no need at all for him to come and see her since Carol Stanfi
eld and Jud's mother lived many miles away from Priors Channing, and they wouldn't know if he called or not. Briefly Lucy wondered if Jud had

  told his mother their engagement was at an end and hoped that if he had he had broken it to her gently, though she chased herself round in circles when she reasoned that if Mrs Hemming knew, then Carol Stanfield would know, and that wasn't what Jud wanted, was it?

  She gave up worrying about it and went upstairs to change. She intended to go into Dinton shopping soon, and though prior to the shattering discovery that she was in love with Jud it hadn't mattered to her whether she arrived in the centre of Dinton in jeans or whatever she wore, she still had in her mind's eye the picture of bumping into Jud in the High Street.

  She had lost weight in the six weeks since she had returned from her stay with her aunt, she discovered when she zipped up the skirt of her lightweight mustard suit. The weather had turned cold again and she rather thought her cotton dresses might not get another airing until next summer, but one never knew. Going over to the mirror to apply a light film of rusty pink lipstick, she noticed hollows in her cheeks that hadn't been there two months ago. She hadn't paid much attention to her face just lately, finding it difficult to meet the pain in her eyes. But now she saw she had a fragile look about her, and not sure she liked it, combed her hair this way and that in an attempt to hide the hollows in her cheeks. It was no good, whichever way she did her hair, she was still left looking the same. In the end, with a thought of, blow it, I'm not likely-to see him anyway, she combed her dark cloud of hair into its usual style and went downstairs to grab up a basket on her way out and set off for Dinton.

  She needn't have bothered, she thought, a sigh escaping her an hour or so later as she left Dinton behind, her purchases completed. She had seen plenty of other people she knew in the High Street—had avoided by appearing to be in a tearing hurry having to stop and chat to Mrs Arbuthnot, who she felt sure would not have been able to carry on

  a conversation without mentioning her engagement.

  Almost at Brook House she was driving down a narrow lane when she saw a car approaching from the other direction. Colour flared in her face and her stomach churned over as she recognised instantly the sports car that belonged to Jud. She slowed down as she knew she had to when her first impulse was to put her foot down and go roaring past him—if it wasn't for the narrowness of the lane who knows, she thought as the two vehicles crawled towards each other, for Jud had reduced his speed too, she might even have managed a breezy wave as she passed him, but if they didn't want to take the first layers of paint off each other's vehicles and since there was nowhere either end of the lane a car could back into to allow the other to pass, short of reversing the whole length of the lane, they had to crawl by each other.

  Her colour subsided when, her window open, she made a play of seeing she did not touch his car, but as they drew level even though she was determined he should think she was concentrating too hard to look at him, of its own will it seemed, her head came up and she looked straight into those cold, hard, so well remembered grey-green eyes, and was struck again as she had been that first time she had spoken to him when she had gone to the Hall to demand the return of her ring, by the remote hardness of the man. She knew then that he had not forgiven her for the swipe she had taken at him.

  `Good morning,' she said carefully, her face matching his for coldness, or so she hoped. She felt sick when he refused to answer her and looked away-it was so much what she had feared—then her head was jerking up again to hear him say :

  `I've just left Brook House.' She saw his eyes were giving her close scrutiny, but if he noted the hollows in her cheeks, he didn't comment on them. 'I'm having a dinner party at the Hall on Friday night-I want Rupert to be there. I

  didn't think you would come as his partner unless I asked you personally.'

  He was right there. Nothing would get her up to the Hall with or without a personal invitation, much as she yearned for the sight of him.

  `I don't know that I shall be free,' she said lightly with the air of someone whose engagement book was full to overflowing, and received one of Jud's icy looks for her trouble.

  `Despite all efforts to the contrary,' Jud told her coldly, `word is circulating that your brother had been ...' he paused, then inserted, 'for the want of a better phrase—letting the side down.' He continued to look at her in that hard way, saw from the way she had grown pale that his words were sinking in, then grated harshly, 'Make sure you are free on Friday,' then pressed his foot on the accelerator and moved forward.

  Lucy set her own car in motion without realising she had as it came to her with a sinking feeling that gossip in the village, as in any small community, would be rife with the fact that Rupert had been hitting the high spots in company with Archie Proctor. Word was probably out too, no doubt originating from Archie Proctor, that Rupert had been gambling away money he couldn't afford to lose. And while it wouldn't bother Jud one bit what anybody thought of him—the Careys had always had a high standing in the community, and if Rupert was to prove that he was still socially acceptable, then the best way for him to do it was for him to attend Jud's dinner party on Friday night.

  But why was it necessary for her to attend as well? The way Jud had issued his invitation had made her think she was the last person he wanted to invite. She was still trembling from her encounter with Jud when she arrived at Brook House and forced herself to drink a steadying cup of tea while she tried to think up every imaginable excuse for not going.

  The only trouble was, with half of her wanting to attend the other half of her was sure it was the last thing she wanted, and as one half argued against the other, she could think up no excuse that Jud wouldn't see through, and since he was so determined she should be there she wouldn't put it past him to leave the Hall and come and get her if she didn't show up with Rupert. That very thought made her tremble again, for both their tempers were likely to flare if that happened and she didn't trust herself not to give herself away with some unthinking remark made in the heat of the moment, and Jud was too shrewd not to take apart anything she might let slip—her heart turned over just thinking of Jud finding out that she loved him.

  Rupert mentioned the invitation when he came home that night. He seemed unaware that there was any special reason why the Carey brother and sister need attend, but it was obvious that he was quite looking forward to going, and it came to Lucy then that Jud would have had a dinner party anyway—that it hadn't been laid on specially for her brother's sake-she had been so het up after seeing Jud she hadn't been thinking straight, though what Jud had said about Rupert 'letting the side down' and everyone knowing about it did ring true.

  When Rupert said, 'You needn't come if you don't want to,' he looked down at her ringless left hand, and for all Lucy hadn't discussed the matter with him, he seemed to be aware that she was still sensitive about it. 'I mean,' Rupert went on, 'if it's going to be an embarrassment to you, I'll tell Jud you're not feeling well or something.' Lucy knew then that she would be going. If any of Jud's guests were ill-mannered enough to look down their noses at her brother, she would be there to give him support.

  `I'm looking forward to going, Rupert,' she told him, `and I won't feel in the slightest embarrassed.'

  As she sat before her dressing table mirror putting the finishing touches to her make-up on Friday night, she

  hoped that lie would see her through the evening; her stomach was already churning over like a cement mixer and she doubted she would be able to eat a thing.

  It had been difficult deciding what to wear. She had more than enough dresses in her wardrobe to choose from, but discarded one after the other until in the end she put a stop to her dithering, telling herself it was only dinner up at the Hall for goodness' sake—she'd dined there scores.of times before Jud Hemming had bought it, and once since, she recalled, but that didn't make her choice any easier.

  When she joined her brother downstairs, she was dressed in a f
lame-coloured dress of a fine material, that had at one time been a shade too tight, but money being no object in those days she had purchased it just the same, thinking to diet her already slender frame down for a week before she wore it. Tonight it fitted her perfectly, being low at the back, hugging her curves at the front and nipping in to her tiny waist to fit over her hips and fall away in a slight flare at the hem. With it went a matching gauzy stole that did little in the way of keeping her warm, but gave the whole effect a touch of class when draped loosely over her shoulders.

  `Wow!' Rupert exclaimed when he saw her, giving her ego the boost it needed. 'I never noticed before, but I've just realised I've got a beautiful sister.'

  `You're not so bad yourself,' Lucy replied, hoping he wouldn't perceive how nervous she was about the evening in front of them. 'You should wear a dinner jacket more often.'

  Rupert preened himself vainly and made her laugh, then said, 'Well, if the mutual admiration society has finished, let's get going—I'm starving!'

  Every light at the Hall seemed to be ablaze as Lucy and Rupert parked behind several other cars on the drive; fortunately Rupert had thought to put the top on his sports

  car so Lucy's hair was not blown about as it would otherwise have been.

  On going through the imposing front door of the Hall, the first person Lucy saw was Jud. He was guiding some of his guests into one of the main reception rooms, but he saw her and Rupert and excused himself to come over and greet them, adding to Lucy, 'You know where the cloakrooms are if you want to titivate.' Lucy couldn't get away fast enough.