Second Best Wife (23 page)

Georgina started, realising that he must have spoken before but she had been too busy dreaming to listen to him. 'Of course I'm coming! Celine will need me —imagine being shut into that shed for hours. William, you don't think—'

'No, I don't,' he said with comfortable certainty. 'Celine is used to Miss Campbell's ways. She's had to cope too often in the past not to do so now.'

'It wasn't much of a life,' Georgina mourned. 'I hope Stuart realises that!'

William's face relaxed into an indulgent smile. 'I'm sure you'll tell him if he doesn't, my little Amazon. He won't dare treat her badly with you around to put him right.'

Georgina's gaze swept upwards over his face. His eyes were amused and shone like liquid amber with some other emotion as well. Her heart went into some swooping acrobatics that made it difficult for her to breathe.

'You ought to be in bed,' she told him. He looked completely exhausted. 'I thought you wanted a good night's sleep.'

'So I shall, once we've got Celine back safe and sound. If she's at all nervous, she can share your bed tonight, and then neither of you will feel lonely.'

'But, William—'

'Come on, love. Tomorrow is another day!'

And he would be working! She checked the rising hope within her that he might have other plans of his own—plans that would include her! — and tried to concentrate on the matter in hand.

It was easier to do that once they were outside and there was only the light of the waning moon to guide them along the narrow path towards the village. They had to go past the factory to get there and Georgina went running ahead, calling Stuart's name as she went.

'We're here!' Celine's voice answered her. 'Georgie, is that you? Oh, Georgie, I knew you would come! And Stuart came too! He fetched Rabahindre with the key of the shed and let me out. I don't know when I've been so happy!'

The two girls flung their arms round each other. 'She's gone,

Celine, and this time she won't be back. You'll never see her again!'

Celine choked with emotion. ‘I'm
glad
she came! It doesn't matter what she did in the past, this time it all came right! William said it would, but I didn't believe him then. I do now! Stuart won't let anyone look after me now except himself, not even you—isn't that wonderful? Oh, and Georgie, he doesn't
care
that I'm not very bright and all that. He thinks I'm beautiful!' She paused to allow this remarkable fact to sink in, quite unconscious of her listeners' united reaction.

‘But, Celine, we all know you're beautiful,' Georgina said at last, almost humbly.

‘Oh yes,
that!'
Celine dismissed her loveliness without interest. ‘But Stuart thinks I'm a beautiful woman, not a thing to be looked at. That makes all the difference, you see. Oh, Georgie, I‘m so happy I could burst!'

Stuart retrieved her from Georgina's embrace, making no more than a half-hearted attempt to put everything on a more normal footing. ‘She's trying to tell you that we intend to get married,' he muttered to William. ‘With or without your permission,' he added with a grin. ‘I was going to wait until she'd seen a bit more of life, but this last incident has convinced me she's seen more than enough! What she needs is a loving, stable background.'

William shook his extended hand with vigour. ‘I couldn't agree with you more! Do what you like with her. I'm going back to bed!'

CHAPTER TWELVE

‘I thought it might be a good time to take you over the tea factory,' Stuart suggested.

Georgina tried to look enthusiastic. ‘Why not?' Why not, indeed? she added to herself. It would be hours and hours before William would be home. He could have looked in and wished her good morning before he had gone, but he hadn't, and by the time she had decided he was not coming and had hurried into her clothes in case she might be in time to have breakfast with him, he was already long gone.

'Jennifer might enjoy it,' Georgina forced herself to add. 'She ought to see as much as she can while she's here.'

Stuart's eyes flickered. 'How long is she staying?'

'Until she decides to go, I suppose.'

Georgina sounded so dispirited that Celine was concerned for her. 'Surely she won't stay now?' she exclaimed.

It was unfortunate that Jennifer should choose that moment to saunter out into the garden to join them. It was the first time she had seen Celine in the full light of day and the look in her eyes was far from being one of unmixed admiration.

'You must be Celine. Well, you don't have to worry, I wouldn't stay anywhere with you around! Very bad for the morale! And, since you're all too shy to ask me, my morale is sagging badly at the moment without having to listen to you telling me how
de trop
I am to
dear
Georgina's perfect marriage! I'll go as soon as my car gets back.' She smiled wryly at Celine's bewildered stare. 'You have to admit I was useful there! How else would you have got rid of the old harridan?'

She wouldn't have been here,' Celine answered with a logic Jennifer was far from appreciating. Her usual sunny smile broke across her perfect features. 'I'm glad she was, though. Stuart says we can get married at once now.'

'Stuart?' Jennifer's whole aspect changed at the prospect of meeting a man and not having to make do only with members of her own sex. 'Were you here last night?'

Stuart smiled briefly. 'I was outside.'

Jennifer took a step nearer to him, her whole being concentrated on his lightest word. 'How wonderful!' she breathed. 'I hope Celine knows how lucky she was to have you rescue her? I quite thought that that little enterprise was going to be left to Georgie. My sister, you know, thrives on manipulating people in and out of incidents of her creation. She has a chronic need to look after everyone all round her. Only there's a snag. There always is a snag, isn't there? Everything has to be done in the way she thinks will be best for you! Take care she doesn't make you out to Celine to be some kind of medicine she has to take three times a day to keep her nerves under control. Romance and nasty medicine don't go well together —and I can see you're romantic just by looking at you] One romantic can always spot another, can't they?'

Celine's lovely smile changed to stony displeasure. 'It isn't my nerves, there's nothing wrong with my nerves! I'm not very clever and I have bad dreams, but if Stuart doesn't mind, why should you?'

Georgina thought it was time she took a hand in the conversation herself, dragging herself away from her own attack of the miseries to deal with her sister. How Jennifer loved stirring things up with her little wooden spoon! But she wasn't going to spoil Celine's happiness, not if she, Georgina, could prevent it.

'Jennifer, don't!' she rapped out.

Her sister turned innocent eyes in her direction. 'Don't what?'

But it was Stuart who answered. 'I've heard a lot about you, Miss Perry,' he said quietly,
'not
from Georgina, but from William. He always said you had soft, gentle manners and a nice nature. Pity he was mistaken.'

Jennifer gasped. 'What do you mean?'

'I mean Georgina has had a lot to put up with from you in the past, but you won't have her around in the future to smooth your path for you. Shall I hand you a good laugh, Jennifer? Georgie gave your letter to William on the plane as you told her to. Anyone else would have torn it up unread, but not Georgina Ayres! William was furious, as you hoped he would be, but after a while he began to think there was more to it than Georgina hanging on to it until it was too late for him to do anything about it. He decided Georgie was the one who was telling the truth.'

'He never said so to me!' Georgina blurted out.

'He will, when he gets around to it,' Stuart said comfortably. 'Meanwhile, shall we go across to the factory?'

It was a subdued party that made its way along the path towards the factory. Stuart ignored their sulky faces and insisted they paid attention as he plucked a twig from one of the tea bushes and showed them how the white flowers grew underneath the leaves, facing down towards the ground.

'This is the bit which is picked,' he went on. 'Two leaves and a bud, never more than that. That's what those women are doing over there.'

He led them on into the factory, ignoring Jennifer's cries that she didn't want to go up the rickety steps that led to the upper storey of the factory.

'This is where the leaves are put to dry,' he explained, pointing to the long racks that stretched their way across the room. 'There's a complicated system of air vents that help desiccate them. One of my jobs is to see that they're not left here too long, or for too short a time. After that, the leaves are passed through these rollers —' he pointed out the giant, electrically operated machines — 'and a chemical change begins to take place. Oxygen combines with the aromatic juices which are released and fermentation begins. The leaves change colour from green to copper and it takes judgment to know exactly when they are "done". The final stage is the firing, which arrests any further oxidization by baking the tea evenly. It depends where the tea is to be marketed as to how much firing we do in the factory. If it has to travel through the Red Sea, for example, it would get a further baking there, and that has to be allowed for.'

He rushed them round the building, going rapidly from one process to another, until they came to the place where he did the most difficult part of his work, the tasting area.

'Teas have such lovely names!' he enthused, putting the kettle on to boil. 'Pekoe, Orange Pekoe, Pekoe Souchong, Tippy and Flowery, among others. When you taste them you should be able to tell the major differences between them for yourselves.'

Georgina took the cup of tea he handed her and sipped it carefully. 'Is this a good tea?' she asked him.

'One of the best. Try this and you'll see the difference.'

She did and, even to her indifferent palate, it tasted rougher and more bitter than the first tea. 'Are there many different grades?' she pressed him, her interest now thoroughly caught.

He grinned. 'How about pungent, malty, pointy, bakey, thick, coppery, dull or bright? We tasters have our own jargon to describe every kind of tea. How would you like the job?'

He looked over her head as the sound of shod feet came

through one of the open doors. 'At last!' he exclaimed. His smile widened as William joined them. 'I thought you were never coming! Pity, though, you're going to remove my star talent from our tea-tasting competition. I suppose you won't wait for her to finish the course?'

'Not today,' said William. 'She'll have to come back some other time.'

Georgina clasped her hands together. 'Shouldn't you be working?' she squeaked. She cleared her throat, and her voice came down a whole octave. 'I didn't expect you for ages!'

'I've been working! Good God, woman, I've been working since dawn to hurry things on and get back to you, and you don't even look pleased to see me!'

Georgina's eyes fell before his. 'I am—of course I am. Only you couldn't even be bothered to wish me good morning, so how am I expected to greet you now?'

William sighed. 'That's my Georgina! How about with a kiss?'

But Georgina couldn't, not with Jennifer standing there watching her, ready to pick holes in her performance. 'Not now!' she said urgently.

He appeared to find that riotously funny and her anger against him kindled into a steady blaze.

'Very
funny!' she jeered at him. 'But you've yet to prove to me that you want my kisses!'

His laughter fell away from him. 'That's true.' His tawny eyes challenged hers, making her feel quite dizzy with their impact. 'But if you think I'm going to do that in front of witnesses, you have another think coming. Some things are better done in privacy —'

'Because you're ashamed of me!' Georgina flung at him.

His lips twitched. 'I want to spare your blushes —'

'You could have fooled me!'

'—but that isn't the same thing at all,' he went on calmly. 'That's because I don't want others to think I married anyone as stupid as you seem determined to be.' He shook his head at her. 'Really, Georgina, don't you ever think things out before you come rushing out of your corner, ready to do battle with all and sundry? Well, you're not fighting with me, my girl! Not today! Today you're going to learn what it means to be a wife —'

She panicked. 'I won't come with you!'

The golden flecks shone bright in his eyes. 'Won't you, Georgie? Why not?'

'Because — ' she floundered. 'Because I don't want to!'

The gold flecks changed to warm laughter. 'You have, a lot to learn, little Georgie, and I'm the man to teach it to you. Give in gracefully and come along, my love, because you're coming whether you want it or not, and you know it!'

If she ran, she thought, if she ran hard enough, she could still make her escape through the open door. But what would she do then? She eyed him with all the nervousness of a trapped animal and saw the purpose with which he in turn was regarding her.

'You can't carry me the whole way back to the house!' she declared with a lift to her chin.

'I won't have to!'