My Heart Has Wings (19 page)

The road to the village of Merecombe skirted a stretch of moorland, purple with heather under the tender, arch of the evening sky. The air smelled of crushed thyme, and braken lay golden
in
the long day’s heat. Larks, soaring up into the sky, poured out pure fountains of song. There were probably masses of ripe blackberries tucked away in the sheltered hollows, Jan thought, and wondered if she would have time to gather some before she went home. Pursued by housewifely visions of preserving pans bubbling with bramble jelly, she felt distinctly cheered.

She didn’t hear the big car purring behind her. Coasting silently down a slight gradient, it slid to a halt at her side.

“Like a lift?” Mike asked.

As she climbed in beside him her weariness magically vanished. For one ghostly instant it seemed as if time had gone into reverse. Lark song and evening sunlight, and Mike
in
his big red sports car materializing unexpectedly... just like that evening weeks ago when he had overtaken her on the way home from work and asked her to have supper with him. The evening their oddly disturbing friendship had really begun.

It seemed that Mike too was remembering, for as soon as she was comfortably tucked into the low bucket seat at his side, he said: “We’re going to have that long-promised dinner together at last, Jan! And this time I refuse to be fobbed off by family birthday parties, or Flying Club dances, or
...”
He paused for a moment. “Dark misunderstandings of my good faith!” He gave her a quizzical sidelong glance, a tentative eyebrow raised inquiringly. “Have you quite forgiven me for that silly
Ariel
mix-up, Jan?”

Sensitive colour flooded her cheeks; “I’m the one who ought to be asking forgiveness, Mike. It was dreadful of me to doubt you.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Mike said generously. “It was very natural in the circumstances.”

“But I was entirely wrong,” Jan persisted, “to put such an exaggerated value on personal loyalty. There are more important loyalties. I found that out last night, pretty grimly ... when for a little while it seemed as if Father had been helping Gerda Byrrsen to send information to
Ariel
.”
She broke off with a shiver.

Mike’s hand reached out and felt for her own. “You poor kid! What a time you’ve been through.
It was Erica who led you to believe I had been detailed to spy on you, wasn’t it? Daker told me.
I
t isn
’
t like her to be so tactless!” His voice was suddenly
stern
and hard.

“She didn’t realize how it would hurt me,” Jan said quickly
. “
And I suppose it ought
not
to have
h
urt. But I thought you’d simply been cultivating me
in
o
r
der to find out about things at Regency
T
errace ...
that...” her voice f
altered ... “there
was no
other reason for your friendliness to me. That
did
hurt, Mike!”

“I should hope so!” Mike said with emphasis. They were passing the White Hart now, cruising along the narrow village street, picking up speed as they came out into open country again. “I’m taking you to a little inn on a cliff top overlooking the sea,” he told her “It’s rather, a find of mine. I th
in
k you’ll like it.”

Darling, she wanted to cry out, if you were
taking me to a cellar to feed on dry bread and water I’d like it!

Hedges rich with hazelnuts and scarlet rowan berries flashed by; farms, villages, stretches of heather, fields of golden co
rn
. It was dusk when they reached the Pack-horse Inn. They ate in a candle-lit raftered room, at a small table set in a deep bow window that was so close to the cliff edge it seemed to hang over the sea. There were no other diners, and when the elderly waiter who hovered attentively throughout the meal had brought in the coffee and departed there was only the moon for company, young and new and tender above the softly breathing tide. They could hear the waves breaking gently against the bastion of rock beneath the open window. The warm air flowing
in
was sweet with night-scented stock, and the salty tang of the sea.

“We’ve waited a long
time for this, Jan!” Mike said softly. The look
in
his blue-grey eyes couldn’t possibly mean what it seemed to mean, Jan told herself hurriedly. She began to talk, a little wildly, about today’s flight, asking how many tests there were likely to be before Daker and his team o
f
experts were satisfied that the new plane might be put into production.

There was a lot of work to be done, Mike told her. “Speed trials, altitude flying—a whole programme of experimental stuff. Think you can stand it, Jan?”

Her hazel eyes were very wide and golden
in
the candlelight, her colour changing with the swift wild beating of her heart. “What ... do you mean, Mike?” she faltered.

Leaning across the little table he took her two hands into his own. “Am I being too cocksure about all this, Jan darling?
”
he asked humbly. “I love you so much ... I
thought...
I hoped
...
you had guessed, for I’m not much good at putting it into words. What I’m trying to ask you now is if you think you could stand being ma
rri
ed to a test pilot. It’s a pretty jumpy assignment for a wife at times. You had a small sample of it today. I
...
well, I just wondered how it all struck you ... if you felt you could cope?”

Moonlight and candlelight and the sound of the sea ... suddenly it was all glory and all the music of heaven crashing about her.

“Cope!” she echoed feebly. “Oh, Mike!”

Maybe it wasn’t a very eloquent answer but apparently it was all Mike needed. Sliding along the curve of the window seat with one swift impulsive movement, he was at her side, gathering her into his arms.

It was so incredible, so utterly unexpected
...
and yet—all at once—so natural, so absolutely right. As he kissed her she clung to him, tears on her lashes.

“Jan,” he
said softly “dear Jan! You did know we were meant for one another
...
didn’t you?”

“I
...
didn’t dare to know,” she whispered. “I thought you loved Erica.”

“I do love Erica.” He held her a little away from him, studying her tense, uplifted face. “Erica and I have been fond of one another in a sisterly and brotherly fashion ever since I walked into her nursery—when she was somewhere about five—a lonely schoolboy, adrift in the world. But this”—he drew her closer—“this is different, darling. This is ...
us.
You and I finding we belong to one another
...
like two halves of a whole; so that without each other we’d be lost, not quite completely alive. Oh, heck, Jan!” he broke off with an embarrassed laugh, “I told you I was no good at talking about it. I’m only good at this!”

But even as he kissed her, the wonder of his words echoing in her heart, the shadow of Erica lingered. That queer, strained conversation they had had this morning while Mike was flying. Erica hadn’t sounded in the least sisterly then. Puzzled, unhappy, utterly unlike her usual confident self
...
wondering so diffidently if she had been too sure of Mike. Well, apparently she had! Jan summed it up pityingly.

“Have you told her about us, Mike?” she asked presently, when speech was again possible.

“Told whom?” he asked in a bemused voice.

“Erica.”

He shook his head. “There wasn’t anything to tell
...
until now, was there?” He smiled down at her, triumph and tenderness in his glance. “But now I can shout it from the housetops. Announce to all and sundry that we’re a team. Think of it, Jan! The two of us working together
...
playing together ... you waiting for me when I’m out on a flight; not in a cold impersonal office, but in our own home!”

“I am thinking of it,” Jan whispered incredulously, and with a small contented sight moved closer to him, resting her head against his heart.

They did not speak of Erica again as they drove back to Merecombe. There was so much else to talk about, so much to feel and discover in these precious first moments of their love. So many plans to discuss.

So that it was with a sense of shock they found her
...
sitting a little disconsolately on a vast settee in the brightly lit lounge, a pile of cigarette stubs in an ashtray on the low table in front of her.

She greeted them with a timorous smile that wrenched Jan’s heart. “I came back
...
” she offered flatly. “It was so dull at home—such an anti-climax after the excitement of the day that I drove to Kingsfold about tea-time, picked up my plane and hopped over here. I thought maybe we’d have a party; but there was only Daker in the hotel when I arrived. He gave me dinner and went to bed.”

“Not very gallant of him,” Mike pronounced lightly as he drew Jan into the circle of his arm. “We did have a party,” he said significantly. “Just the two
o
f us.”

Erica looked steadily from one to the other, her blue eyes brave and unblinking. “That’s how you wanted it, wasn’t it, Mike?” she said.

“Yes
,
” he replied incisively, “that’s how I wanted it. How we both wanted it. It doesn’t surprise you, does it, Rikky dear?” he ended more gently.

For an imperceptible instant she paused; then impulsively she jumped up, her face alight with a courage Jan could only marvel at. Her smile was assured now, her voice under perfect control, saying: “No, it doesn’t surprise me in the least, Mike darling. I’ve guessed for some time the way things were heading with you two
...
In fact,” she added with a wry smile, “I seem to have known more about it than Jan did!”

“We’re going to be married as soon as makes no odds,” Mike broke in exultantly.

“Congratulations!” Erica offered—a shade woodenly, but with determination. She put out her hand to Jan. For a moment their glances held, Jan
’
s golden eyes dark with pity and concern. Then Erica said softly, “It’s all right, Jan! Don’t worry. I
’
m glad. I really am. I’m not grudging you your happiness—you deserve every bit of it. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, sitting here alone this evening, waiting for you and Mike to come in. Maybe you understand better now what I was trying to say to you this morning. Maybe I understand it better myself. It’s simply that this simmer I’ve been jerked out of all my old grooves
with a vengeance!”
She laughed shakenly. “But it
’
s best that way.
I’
m too young for grooves and set habit. Mike was a
habit
...
”

“
What on earth
...
?” Mike began in mystification
.

Erica l
aughed again—more certainly this time.
“
It
’
s all right, Mike; Jan knows what I’m talking about
...
it’s not very important really, just a postscript to a rather odd conversation we had this morning. What
is
important and what I’ve been longing to tell you both, is that
...
there are fresh horizons. I heard from the University this morning that my thesis has been successful.
I can go into research now. I’ve been discussing with
Daker
this evening. He thinks I’ll have
no
difficulty
in
getting into the Hampsfield Establishment—to work on rocket propulsion with Geoffrey Farrow. Something I’ve always longed to do. Geoff is ter
r
ific—dedicated, brilliant, perhaps the most outstanding of the younger scientists of this generation. It will be wonderful to
j
oin his team.”

“Oh, Erica, I’m so glad,” Jan said warmly, trying to feel that rocket research was an adequate substitute for romance—and
failing
utterly.

But Erica’s face was clear with pride as she lifted it to Mike, her brilliant eyes unclouded. “I’m going places, Mike!” she said softly.

Putting his free arm about her, he dropped a light kiss on her brow. “That’s splendid, Rikky dear! In fact, it’s congratulations all round tonight. Let’s have a bottle of champagne and drink to our dazzling futures.”

Freeing herself gently from his touch, Erica shook her head, smiling. “The bar is closed,” she pointed out, “and it’s late. I’m going to bed.”

Long after she had left them Mike and Jan were still sitting on the couch she had vacated—talking their hearts out, as lovers do. It was easy to imagine symbols in the most ordinary trifles this night of heightened emotions, but the bu
rn
ed-out cigarette ends on the table before them kept on intruding themselves upon Jan’s consciousness. She could see Erica sitting here alone, where she now sat with Mike—her dreams going up in smoke, the past consuming itself, leaving only
ashes of memory and desire. She had sounded so genuinely enthusiastic, speaking of the research
career ahead of her
and the brilliant young
man
with whom she would work. Perhaps she would marry him, Jan mused. Find love blossoming in the kindly climate of interests shared. Stranger things had happened. But whether she married or not, she would have her work, absorbing, satisfying. Like Helen finding comfort in her singing
...

Breaking a silence that had lasted too long, Mike peered into her face inquiringly, a whimsical eyebrow askew
.
“Are you still with me darling?” he asked softly. “A penny for those long, long thoughts that are bringing a frown to your noble brow!” With a tentative forefinger he stroked the frow
n
away. The gentle intimate caress brought stars to Jan’s eyes. Would she ever get used to this miracle of belonging to Mike ... sharing her very thoughts with him?

“
I was just thinking of Erica and Helen,” she said. “How seemingly self-sufficient they are. Erica with her research, Helen with her music Clever, artistic, unusual
...
while I’m just an ordinary person with no outstanding abilities. And yet it’s with me you’ve fallen in love, Mike. I wonder why?”

“A leading question!” Mike laughed. “And a pretty comprehensive one. It would take me quite a while to answer it. In fact I shall probably be finding fresh and wonderful answers to it for the rest of our life together. All the years ahead of us, Jan; think of them!”

A shadow crossed
Jan’s face, as swift
and unbidden there came to her the memory of that interval of pure terror this morning when Mike was in the air—silent and overdue. All the years ahead of them! There hadn’t been many for Helen and Jock. With a shiver she thrust the comparison aside, but her voice wasn’t altogether steady as she whispered, “The years ahead, Mike!
I
can only think
now
...
and that’s more glory
than I can properly take in!”

“Now,” he echoed softly, “and forever, Jan.” His
grey
eyes burned with a sudden passionate conviction.
“
Whatever happens, my darling, our
love is indestructible. I want you to remember that. Hold on to it
...
always
.
”

Now
...
and forever. As they kissed the timeless moment held them; the mystery that is eternity brushing for an instant, like passing wings, the mundane hotel lounge.