Kitty Little (38 page)

‘I understand.’

‘It’s not because I’m afraid, or because I want to go. The others will be home too in four or five weeks, but I must go now, and do what is right for Tessa. I must take her home to her family.’

He stared down at his hands, not looking at her as he spoke. ‘What about you, and your family?’

‘I have a daughter,’ Kitty told him, quite calmly. ‘It’s long past time I reminded her that I’m her mother. You spoke once of us both keeping secrets. Well, Dixie is mine. At least, she isn’t meant to be a secret but I’d never mentioned her to you. Perhaps some of the others did. It wouldn’t have mattered if they had.’

Owen smiled. ‘Your company is clearly loyal, for none did.’ Again a small silence. ‘You’re married then.’

Kitty gave a short laugh of amusement at this assumption. ‘Oh no, perhaps I was prone to foolishness on the odd occasion but there’s no need to make it a lifetime’s pursuit, is there?’

He looked up and smiled, a mixture of interest and puzzlement in his eyes. ‘Is that because he wasn’t the right man after all, or do you have a natural antipathy to marriage, as you do to Welshmen?’

Kitty pulled a face at him. ‘Don’t start all that again. I thought we’d called a truce.’

‘We have. We have.’ He laughingly held up his hands by way of apology. ‘So tell me about this chap. What’s he like? Is he the lost love you’ve also kept secret? Tell me what went wrong.’

Kitty jumped down from the wall, and, before walking away, told him to mind his own business.

Owen naturally insisted on accompanying her safely to the ship, and it was not until they were bumping along in an old army vehicle that the story began to unfold. Perhaps they both felt the need of something to occupy their minds, other than the coffin they carried in the back but Kitty found herself pouring out all her troubles to this man she’d dubbed an arrogant Welsh-man. She related how she’d loved Archie for years, and how it had come about that he’d rejected that love and married Charlotte. ‘Now he claims that it was all a mistake, that he still loves me. It’s almost more than I can bear.’

‘Yet he betrayed you.’

‘That wasn’t entirely his fault.’

Owen gave a snort of disbelief. ‘He was dragged kicking and screaming to her bed, was he?’ Kitty flushed but said nothing and he continued in a quieter tone. ‘There are many different kinds of love. Perhaps he loves you in a different way.’

‘No, no. He says he loves me properly, not simply as a brother. Charlotte was wrong about that. It was Charlotte’s manipulations that drove him away from me in the first place. She was incredibly clever. You wouldn’t believe the lies she told, how she poisoned his mind against us both. I can see it all now, looking back.’

‘Both?’

‘Well there was Esme too. She’s my friend. We both loved Archie but agreed that whichever he chose, the other would stand back.’

‘And he chose Charlotte instead of either of you?’

Kitty looked out of the window at the countryside unravelling slowly like a bright green ribbon beyond the confines of the vehicle, wishing suddenly she’d never embarked on this discussion. It was so hard to explain to an outsider what it had been like. ‘He loved us all, in his way, do you see?’

Owen gave a shout of hollow laughter. ‘So this man, who claims that he still loves you, also loved your friend and betrayed you both for Charlotte, to whom he is now married?’

‘Something like that,’ Kitty agreed in a small voice.

‘My God. How does he do it? How can you care for such a bastard?’

Kitty flushed with anger. ‘Don’t call him that. I knew you wouldn’t understand, that it was a waste of time trying to talk to you.’

‘Sorry, sorry. Only, you must see Kitty, that he isn’t worthy of you. If a man allows himself to be led by the nose by a manipulating woman, he must be either willing or a fool. Perhaps both. Do you want him to leave this Charlotte - for you?’ He negotiated a row of pitted holes in the road, lurching sideways as the car bumped and bucked over the ridges.
 

Kitty grasped the door handle. Held on tight. ‘No. Yes. Oh, I don’t know.’ Was that what she wanted, for Archie to abandon his marriage for her sake; which seemed such an irrevocably shocking thing to do. He never would, of course. Too scandalous for words.

‘I don’t want to talk about it any more.’

But he was weak, she thought. If she were honest with herself, she’s always known that. And he could at times seem quite cold and heartless, utterly devoid of emotion, while at others he could be entirely sweet and kind, generous to the point of carelessness with his money and possessions. But then perhaps it was less generosity than a desire to seek an easy route through life. Could it be that it was this very weakness which had allowed Charlotte’s wickedness to flourish?

Tears were choking her throat as Kitty thought back over the pain Charlotte had caused; her complete lack of scruples in her efforts to get exactly what she wanted most. Archie. Or at least to get her hands on his title, which he never used, and his wealth, which he didn’t care about. Kitty knew that she really shouldn’t allow this to bother her, not after all this time, that she should let him go. It was just that Archie had always been there for her, an essential part of her life ever since she was a young girl. Even more so since she’d lost Raymond, her beloved twin. Was that why she still clung to him, still defended him so tenaciously?

They drove on in brooding silence, neither speaking to the other. For much of the journey the army car had been slowed to a crawl by the usual congestion of military traffic, now they were entirely alone on an empty road, skirting woodland that fringed green meadows where the occasional French farmer bent to his weary task. Some time during that long afternoon it began to rain, beating down on the car, washing the windscreen so that visibility became increasingly difficult. They hit a stone or boulder on the rough road and the vehicle suddenly skewed crazily out of control and lurched to a halt. ‘Damnation. We’ve got a puncture.’

Owen climbed out of the car and kicked the offending wheel in irritation. Even in the few seconds it took to examine the torn rubber, he was soaked to the skin.

Kitty stood beside him, equally wet. ‘What now?’

As one they both glanced around them. It was past five o’clock, the surrounding countryside of woods and undulating fields already growing dark. ‘We need to find shelter. Deal with this in the morning.’

‘In the morning? Do you expect us to sit in this freezing vehicle all night?’

Owen again looked about him, his red hair now dark and slick with rain, and grinned as he pointed. I think we’re in luck. That looks like an old farmhouse on the edge of that wood.’ He snatched up the haversack containing some light provisions they’d brought with them and, ignoring Kitty’s protests, grabbed her hand and started to make his way through the long wet grass, dragging her behind him.

‘What about poor Tessa? We can’t leave her alone.’

‘She won’t notice. And if we aren’t to be joining her in that coffin, we need somewhere safe, dry and warm to lay our heads.’ It made sense, hard though it seemed, and Kitty made no further argument but ran with him through the rain.

It was little more than a cottage, the door swinging open as they walked through into a single room. It looked as if it had been ransacked, or someone had left in a hurry. Drawers had been pulled open, clothes strewn about, photographs of elderly parents left lying on the floor as if someone had riffled quickly through them, choosing what they needed and abandoning the rest.

‘Let’s hope they survived,’ Owen quietly remarked.

They decided not to risk lighting the old wood burning stove, in case the smoke alerted enemy interest. But it was cold in the farmhouse and Kitty shivered. Owen at once took off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders. It felt a strangely personal thing to do, to wrap her in a garment still warm from his body. ‘Taking off my uniform jacket while still on duty. Another rule broken, but who is to know? Let’s say I’m off duty now.’

As he broke the bread they’d brought with them into two pieces and handed one to Kitty, together with some cheese, she watched his fingers working, gazed upon the smattering of pale freckles on the backs of his hands. She hadn’t realised until this moment how familiar those hands had become to her, and how much she would miss them.

They sat at the old kitchen table, munching gratefully on the food, thankful to put the horrors of war from their minds for a while; trying not to remember the devastating end to their last performance, or even think of poor Tessa outside in the truck, in the rain. Kitty felt she needed this respite, this time to clarify her thoughts before returning home and facing the more mundane problems of Archie and Charlotte. It felt so peaceful sitting here, so calming after the trauma of the last few days.
 

‘I first went on stage at the age of six.’

 
Kitty looked up in surprise. That he should break the silence with this new, and unasked for, piece of information about his past, was so astonishing Kitty almost forgot to eat as he began to talk.

‘When I was growing up, moving from place to place with my stage-struck parents, one month Paris, the next Rome, Switzerland or even to far distant India, do you know what I most longed for?’

Kitty smiled. ‘A home of your own?’ It seemed to be the logical desire for a boy who was constantly travelling, quite the opposite to her own dreams. He shook his head.

‘For my parents to love me. The theatre has always been in my life. I loved acting; put my heart and soul into my work, gave every scrap of emotion I possessed to each part, yet whatever I did, however hard I tried, it was never quite good enough for them.’

‘For goodness’ sake, why?’ Kitty’s eyes were alight with compassion.

‘Because I wasn’t my sister.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘She was called Francesca; two years younger than me and not only exquisitely beautiful but a rarely gifted actress, for all she was but a child. She died when I was fifteen. Drowned while out in a boat with a friend, one beguilingly warm spring afternoon. I knew from that day on, that I could never compensate my parents for their loss. They’d much rather it had been me who had died, you see, and not Francesca. She was their bright, shining star, their future. My poor mother, demented by grief, actually said as much once.’

‘Oh, but that’s terrible. Perhaps she didn’t really mean it. She was just upset.’

‘Was she? I wonder. Perhaps it is only human nature to want what we cannot have. And they couldn’t have Francesca, so they came to love her more.’

He gazed at her with those shrewd, assessing eyes of his, and Kitty found herself mesmerised by their grey-green depths. ‘What are you trying to tell me?’

‘Isn’t it obvious? That maybe Archie only loves you because he can’t have you. He married Charlotte, whether for the right reasons or not it’s too late to say, and now finds he isn’t happy. What is more natural than to yearn for the girl he might have married.’

Kitty flung back her chair and stormed to the other side of the room, putting up her hands as if wanting to stop the sound of his voice. ‘That’s the most callous, cynical remark I’ve ever heard in my life.’

‘Hold on, don’t be angry till you hear me out.’ He came to stand before her and because there was nowhere for her to run to, her protests, when he took her by the shoulders, were faint. ‘I’m not blaming either you or Archie. It’s simply human nature, that’s all I’m saying. I’m sure he does care for you, in his way, but he seems to have been easily led astray so perhaps you had a lucky escape.’

‘That is complete tosh. Utter nonsense.’ Kitty was almost shouting at him now and saw how he winced, dropping his hands helplessly to his sides. ‘If Archie says he loved me -
still loves me
, then he does. And I still love him.’

Owen actually laughed out loud, making the crimson in her cheeks flood right to the roots of her soft brown hair. ‘I wonder if you have sufficient experience of love to make any sound judgement on the matter.’

‘How dare you?’ Kitty, thoroughly outraged, fought to restore her self esteem. ‘What the hell do you know about me? Are you implying that I’m frigid, or some sort of freak?’

He shrugged and a muscle tweaked the corner of his mouth into a wry smile. ‘Are you saying that you
are
experienced? A woman of the world. Well I suppose if you’re unmarried and have a child, you may well be.’ His hands were again gripping her shoulders, drawing her close, then sliding about her waist and pressing her against the hardness of his body. Kitty knew she should protest and push him away, but all resistance seemed to melt from her. His face was a mere breath away, close enough for a kiss; which is exactly what he did next. His kiss was soft, light, quite casually done and with complete and utter tenderness. She almost felt like weeping. When it was over, Kitty had quite forgotten the thread of her argument.

He pushed a strand of hair away from her eyes, wide and brown and riveted upon his. ‘Are you still cold?’

She nodded. ‘A little.’

‘We ought to get some sleep.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘I’ll see what’s upstairs.’

As he went to investigate, Kitty wrapped her arms protectively about herself, pulling his jacket closer. She didn’t dare think what was going to happen next, or where, exactly, they were going to sleep. She didn’t even know what she wanted any more. He was a good looking man, and with more tenderness in him than had at first been apparent. Inside, she felt a strange ache, a longing for Owen to kiss her again. Yet she still loved Archie. Didn’t she?’