Comparative Strangers (7 page)

‘He’s been scratching at the door and whining these past ten minutes,’ Mrs Priddy said dourly, as she put the tray down. ‘I never did see a nosier dog’

Malory laughed. ‘He just likes to know what’s going on, that’s all.’ He pulled gently at the dog’s ears and Harvey moaned ecstatically. ‘Go and meet Amanda, Harv, and remember your manners.’

Amanda held out her hand and Harvey sniffed it with a certain amount of reserve before submitting to having the top of his head stroked.

‘He’s a darling,’ she said.

‘I’m glad you approve—and that he seems to like you. That’s quite an important hurdle,‘ Malory said, before adding casually to Mrs Priddy, ’Miss Conroy and I are going to be married.‘ He smiled at Amanda. ’Pour me some coffee, darling. I like very little cream, and no sugar.‘

Amanda was horribly aware her jaw had dropped open, and closed it hastily.

Mrs Priddy said sedately, ‘Well, the news isn’t totally unexpected, sir, as you must know. George and I wish you every happiness, I’m sure.’ She looked at Amanda. ‘If you’d like to see over the house, miss, I’d be glad to show you.“

Amanda spilled some coffee into the saucer. ‘Perhaps some other time,’ she managed, and Mrs Priddy withdrew, clearly disappointed.

Amanda said heatedly, ‘I wish you’d warned me you were going to say that. And was it strictly necessary?’

‘Absolutely,’ he said. This may be pretence, Amanda, but it has to be convincing. And it’s something you’re going to have to get used to.‘

‘Never!’ she said fiercely, and Harvey backed away with a low, startled growl.

Malory grinned slightly. ‘You’re going to have to learn to control your temper in front of Harvey,’ he said. ‘He’s far more sensitive than I am. Now, drink your coffee, and tell me what kind of a ring you’d like.’

‘A ring?’ she echoed helplessly. ‘Surely we don’t need to go to those lengths?’

‘And have everyone think I’m a cheapskate? Shame on you.’

She said, ‘It doesn’t occur to you that I might not want to wear someone else’s ring so soon?’

‘It occurs. Perhaps you could consider, at the same time, my feelings about bestowing a ring on a woman who has no intention of becoming my wife.’

Again, Amanda detected that trace of steel beneath the equable tones. She said in a muffled voice, ‘It’s just—an impossible situation.’

‘Only if you allow the surface details to weigh on you.’ Malory drank some of his coffee. ‘If you were playing a role on stage, you’d use the appropriate costume and props, wouldn’t you? Well, look on your engagement ring in the same light.’

She bit her lip. ‘One thing I can guarantee from all this. I’ll never lose my temper again.’ She poured herself some coffee, and took a piece of the shortbread which had accompanied it, as Malory had predicted.

As she nibbled on it, she found herself glancing around the room, assimilating her surroundings. It was a lovely room, she thought, and light years removed from the preternaturally tidy and soulless environment she’d pictured Malory purchasing for himself. It was light and airy, with its french windows opening on to lawns, now waterlogged. But in the summer it would be lovely to sit out on the grass under that tree, then wander in as the sun went down behind the distant copse…

She caught at herself. Long before the summer, she hoped she would have extricated herself from this hideous situation, although she had no idea what she would do next. Perhaps she would work abroad. The company which employed her had offices in Brussels and Geneva, and other girls had transferred successfully, sometimes for several years. She gave a faint sigh, and Malory looked at her interrogatively.

‘What is it?’

‘I’m just considering some of the options—when all this is over.‘

‘We have the next few weeks to negotiate first,’ he said with a touch of grimness. ‘Please don’t say or do anything to make anyone think our engagement is less than the genuine article’

She sighed again. 'I'll try.‘ She replaced her coffee-cup on the tray, and looked at the fire. ’There’s one problem you don’t seem to have considered,‘ she said stiltedly.

‘What’s that?’

‘Well, Nigel has given everyone the impression that we’re having some kind of raging affair.’ She tried to speak lightly, and failed.

‘It’s not much of a problem,’ he said slowly, ‘unless you’re afraid I intend to take advantage of the fact. I didn’t realise I’d given that impression.’

‘You haven’t,’ she said miserably. ‘I don’t even know why I mentioned it. My whole life seems to be upside-down these days.’

He smiled at her. ‘Well, let’s just say you have nothing to worry about.’ He paused. ‘I imagine an occasional peck on the cheek when other people are present is allowed?’

‘I suppose it’s unavoidable,’ she admitted.

Malory laughed out loud. ‘I’m glad I’ve never harboured any illusions about my sex appeal,’ he remarked. ‘Ten minutes with you, Amanda, would shatter them completely.’

‘I didn’t mean that the way it sounded, either,’ she said flushing. She got to her feet. ‘I really will go now, before I put my foot in it again.’

Malory rose, too. He said casually, ‘You’d better write down your London address for me—and your telephone number at work.’

‘Is that essential?’

‘It’s a fairly conventional request,’ he returned with a touch of impatience. ‘Your flatmates—the people you work with—will expect some kind of contact between us, however minimal’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said reluctantly. She wrote down the necessary information on a page torn from her diary, and gave it to him. ‘How long do you think we’ll have to maintain this charade?’

He shrugged. ‘Until our supposed romance is such stale news that we can part without causing a flicker of interest in the gutter press.’

She looked at him uncertainly. ‘And if Nigel won’t let it die?’

‘Nigel won’t have the choice,’ he said. ‘Anyway, he has a rally in Sweden coming up quite soon. That should absorb his attention.’

‘I suppose so.’ She was silent for a moment, then said stumblingly, ‘At the risk of repeating myself, I really am very sorry about involving you in all this.’ She gave a wavering smile. ‘You must wish you’d let me jump.’

‘The only difference would have been that we would both have got very wet.’ His tone was matter of fact. ‘Stop blaming yourself, Amanda. Being exposed for the first time to the malicious side of Nigel’s nature can be quite a shock to the system. It’s hardly surprising you didn’t behave rationally.’

‘How nice to be able to analyse the situation so accurately,’ Amanda said sourly as she walked to the door. ‘Don’t you ever forget you’re a scientist?’

‘Not very often.’ He didn’t sound in the least put out. In fact, he was smiling. ‘Goodbye, Amanda. I’ll be in touch.’

Amanda’s head was whirling as she drove home. She supposed she should be grateful that Malory hadn’t lost his temper and given her the tongue-lashing she knew she deserved, but in an odd way she would have preferred a storm of anger. Because the alternative was infinitely worse.

Of course, it made a kind of weird sense. Fighting the newspaper stories would only attract more unwelcome attention to them. A tacit acceptance of the situation seemed to be the answer.

But being forced to masquerade, even on a temporary basis, as Malory’s fiancee was a distasteful prospect. After all, in spite of everything they’d been through together, he was still an almost total stranger to her, and what she did know about him, she didn’t particularly like, she told herself roundly. His cool composure got right under her skin. But there was more to it than that. Under the politely civilised exterior he presented, there were signs of a formidable personality, she suspected.

She sighed. She would never call Malory a nonentity again, she thought uneasily.

And the next few weeks promised to be the most difficult of her life.

Amanda tucked the last file back in the drawer, closed the filing cabinet and locked it with a feeling of relief. It had been a very long day. Jeffrey Lane, her boss, had returned that morning from his vacation, and set the whole building by the ears. Everyone knew that Jeffrey hated holidays, and only went on them because his wife insisted. He invariably returned in a foul temper, bursting with frustrated energy, and this time had proved no exception. But every cloud had its silver lining, and Jeffrey’s determination to turn the company inside out had, at least, served to distract people’s attention from her rift with Nigel and its aftermath.

Secure and happy in her engagement, she had never realised before what a hotbed of gossip Lane Gerstein was. She’d looked on work as a sanctuary—an escape from her mother’s querulous and unceasing criticism—but it had proved the opposite. Since her return, she’d found herself exposed to every kind of innuendo and speculation. Only her pride had prevented her from reporting sick and going to ground at the flat.

Yet there wasn’t a great deal of peace there, either. Fiona and Maggie clearly thought she was mad to have split from Nigel, although Jane’s reaction had been kinder and more tactful. But there were altogether too many sudden and awkward silences each time she entered the kitchen or the living-room. And, since Malory’s unexpected announcement of their engagement in two of the leading dailies, and a short-lived revival of press interest in her love-life, it had been impossible to confide in her companions—even in Jane.

Anyway, she wasn’t sure she wanted to admit to anyone what a total fool she’d made of herself. In retrospect, she was frankly appalled by her behaviour, and thankful that no one else knew what a hash she’d made of things. She bit her lip. No one, of course, except Malory Templeton.

Since her return to London, he had telephoned twice, once at the office, and once at the flat, in-viting her to meet him, but each time she’d made an excuse and, thankfully, he now seemed to think that honour had been satisfied by his going through the motions of acting the attentive fiance, and was leaving her in peace.

Going abroad, even on a temporary basis, was beginning to seem an increasingly attractive prospect. If she went where she was completely unknown, she might be able to start dragging the rags of her life together again.

When she got outside the building, Amanda found to her annoyance that it had been snowing slightly, and the traffic was in turmoil as a result. She had to queue for ages for a bus, and when it came it crawled along while Amanda sat, hunched and miserable in her seat, gazing unseeingly through the splashed window.

The others were already home when she got to the flat. She was unzipping her boots in the hall when Jane appeared, grinning at her.

‘Had a nice day?’

Amanda shuddered. ‘Can we just draw a veil over the whole painful subject?’ she appealed. ‘What’s for supper?’

Jane grimaced. ‘Fiona’s macaroni cheese for us.’ Her eyes twinkled. ‘What you might be having is open to speculation.’ With the air of a conjuror producing a rabbit from a hat, she handed Amanda a bouquet of long-stemmed pink roses which she’d been hiding behind her back. The accompanying card said, ‘Dinner tonight’, and was signed with a single ‘M’.

They were waiting when I got back‘ Jane said triumphantly. ’Aren’t they absolutely gorgeous?‘

‘Why—yes’ Amanda agreed weakly.

‘Well, put them in water, and then go and get changed,’ Jane urged. ‘You’re awfully late, and he could be here at any minute.’ She lowered her voice. ‘And you don’t surely want to leave him to Maggie’s tender mercies. The last thing he’ll want to hear is what swine you’ve both been to poor old Nigel. And she’s quite capable of saying it, and more.’ She paused. ‘Hey, love, don’t look so stricken. I’ll fend her off if you’re not ready in time.’

Amanda gave her a subdued smile. ‘Thanks.’ She held out the roses. ‘Could you see to these for me?’

Jane’s brows rose. ‘If you like, but I’d have thought you’d want to arrange them yourself.’ She gave Amanda a searching look. ‘You’re all right, are you? You haven’t picked up this virus thing that’s going the rounds?’

Amanda shook her head, and went off to the bedroom they shared. She was still holding Malory’s card, and she put it slowly down on the dressing-table. This time, it seemed, she was not being given any option. She wondered if he’d penned the message himself. The handwriting looked firm and uncompromising, especially the single initial.

She bit her lip. This wasn’t so much an invitation as a statement, and she resented it. It was irksome, too, to realise that Malory wasn’t prepared to take the hint after all, and stay away from her.

She opened her half of the wardrobe and ran an indifferent look along its hanging rail. Perhaps she should have latched on to Jane’s suggestion about the virus, and got the girls to make her excuses when Malory arrived.

On the other hand, she would only be delaying the inevitable. It was obvious that Malory intended to see her, and the best thing would be to get it over with as quickly as possible.

She had a quick bath in the small, cramped bathroom, crouching under the usual rack of damp tights and undies, then dressed swiftly and unad-venturously in a silky black dress, long-sleeved and high-necked. She put on a modicum of make-up, and brushed her hair loose on her shoulders, before giving herself a swift, clinical inspection in the mirror. She looked neat, if unexciting, she thought. And if Malory expected more, then he was going to be disappointed.

She was tucking her purse and compact into her bag, when Jane stuck her head round the door. ‘He’s here’ she whispered. ‘And Maggie’s moving in.’

Amanda reached the living-room in time to hear Maggie say aggressively, ‘Don’t you believe in animal rights, Dr Templeton?’

‘I certainly believe in human rights.’ Malory sounded cool and faintly bored.

‘But you test your drugs on helpless creatures in your laboratories.’

‘When necessary, and under humane conditions.’

‘You think that justifies the suffering you cause?’

‘What I try and achieve is an alleviation of suffering for my fellow men’ Malory said flatly.

‘Would you care to volunteer to replace the aniused in tests?’

‘That’s a ridiculous idea!‘ Maggie said hotly. ’What I want is to see all testing ended by law.‘