The Other Linding Girl (10 page)

With remarkable tact, he refrained from asking why it was better that she should have gone, and presently they went on to the theatre.

Since Oliver Mayforth was efficient in this, as in most things, it turned out that he had tickets for the most popular show in town. And, as they settled into their excellent stalls, Rachel could not help reflecting that an evening with her uncle’s assistant surgeon was something of an event.

The audience was an elegant one, and Rachel looked round with interest, identifying with some pleasure a minor film star and a well-known author. She was just about to point them out to her companion when, looking up, she saw that two people were coming into the stage box. The woman was unusually good-looking, and wearing furs to make one gasp.

But it was not the sight of her furs which made Rachel catch her breath. It was the sight of her companion. For the man who followed her into the box was Nigel. ‘Why, there’s Nigel!” she exclaimed, before she could stop herself, “In the stage box.”

Her companion glanced upwards.

“Hm—yes. He’s certainly having a night out.” Oliver Mayforth sounded amused.

“But I don’t understand—” In her surprise, and her odd dismay, Rachel could not keep her thoughts to herself, “He was going to take out someone quite different tonight. An old lady he was hoping to interest in his research work. Dull, but rich and very charitable. A Miss McGrath.”

“Dull but charitable? Fiona McGrath?” Oliver Mayforth laughed. “Never let it be said! That
is
Fiona McGrath, and though she may be charitable—in fact, I believe I’ve heard she and her elder brother are—no one has ever called her dull. She’s a beauty, as you see, immensely wealthy, and probably the best catch in London. Where did you get the idea that she was dull?”

“I don’t know,” said Rachel. And she sat there staring at the rich and beautiful Miss McGrath, while dismay seemed to settle upon her—chill, complete and inexplicable.

CHAPTER IV

Afterwards, Rachel had some difficulty in remembering the first act of that play she saw with Oliver Mayforth. Others seemed to be finding it very amusing, but she was too busy thinking about Nigel—and the rich, attractive Fiona McGrath. And, however compelling the scene on the stage might be, what was happening in the stage box was, to her, of much greater interest.

Nigel himself was slightly in shadow, so that it was difficult to see his expression. But his companion was clearly visible in the light from the stage. Her furs were carelessly pushed back now, to display a really beautiful line of neck and shoulder. And—though it is true that no feminine charms have ever looked the worse for being framed in mink—she was, on her own merits, a lovely and striking figure.

Not in her first youth perhaps, Rachel thought, but all the more poised and elegant for that. The kind of woman who, in any gathering, would inevitably excite comment and interest.

In the first interval Oliver Mayforth suggested they should go out. And, as they rose to do so, Nigel suddenly noticed them, said something to his companion, and made a sign for them to come up.

“I think we're being bidden to the presence,” observed the assistant surgeon drily. “Would you care to go? Miss McGrath is quite a personality to meet.”

“Oh, do you think—?” Divided between reluctance and eagerness, Rachel hesitated. Then, afraid she must be appearing silly and awkward, she changed her tone and said, with more resolution, “Well, yes, it would be interesting.”

So they went upstairs to the box. And, as Rachel stepped into the confined space, she was immediately aware that Fiona McGrath’s claim to attention rested as much on personality as looks. It emanated from her, with a sense of power quite impossible to define.

She gave Rachel her hand when they were introduced, but with a touch of graciousness which assigned the younger girl quite unmistakably to a minor role. There was nothing either spiteful or snobbish about it, The simple fact was that she was accustomed to the centre of the picture, and she assumed it and held it, by right, against all comers.

“You are Sir Everard Linding’s niece, I hear,” was what she said But the tone, though agreeable, immediately and subtly cut Rachel down to the size of someone’s little niece from the country.

“Yes,” agreed Rachel, far more shyly than she had intended. “I’m working for him while his secretary is ill.”

“How clever of you,” said Miss McGrath, and turned to the two men.

It would always be that way, Rachel knew instinctively. For Fiona McGrath was what is known as a man’s woman. And, although she was much too well-mannered to ignore anyone deliberately, there was somehow very little opportunity for Rachel to take part in the ensuing conversation.

She had hoped so much for at least a word with Nigel on her own, but there was no question of this. Whether by accident or design Rachel was not sure. And presently the bell rang and she and Oliver Mayforth took their leave, Rachel feeling most curiously frustrated and out of humour with herself.

However, determined not to appear either critical or dejected (though she felt both), she managed to say quite brightly, on the way down,

“She’s very good-looking and—impressive, isn’t she?”

“M-yes. But one can’t sit on a drawing-room chair and eat caviare all one’s life,” was the unexpectedly humorous retort

At which Rachel laughed and—not very generously, she feared—felt her heart warm to Oliver Mayforth.

There was no further opportunity of speaking to Nigel that evening. But the next afternoon—presumably with Paula in mind—he arrived at the Harley Street house.

As it happened, Paula was staying late at school and, as Sir Everard was out, Rachel was working industriously alone in the study, when he walked in on her unannounced.

“Hello,” he said. “Are you the only one here to welcome back the black sheep?”

“Oh, Nigel!” She stopped work and smiled at him, with more obvious pleasure than she knew. “I didn’t hear you come in. Sit down. Paula stayed late at school, but she shouldn’t be long.”

He sat down—in what was really Sir Everard’s chair, stretched out his long legs in front of him, and enquired how she had enjoyed the play the previous evening. “Very much,” Rachel assured him. “And you?”

“Well enough—and Fiona found it delightful, which was more important.”

“Oh, you mean that—” Rachel sought a tactful way of putting it—“you mean that the evening was a successful one, from your point of view?”

“It was a good start. One can’t hurry these things.” And then, unexpectedly, he asked, “What did you think of her?”

“Of Miss McGrath?” She was slightly put out at being called on for a personal opinion. “Well, having got over the surprise of finding she was not an old lady—”

“Yes, where did you get that idea?” He began to laugh.

“I don’t know. Except that you spoke of the brother as though he were elderly. And I suppose one doesn’t think of charitable patrons as being youthful. Anyway, when I spoke of her that way on the telephone, you didn’t correct me.”

‘You didn’t give me time. You rang off.”

“That’s true. I remember now—Uncle interrupted me and I had to finish the conversation quickly.”

‘‘Well, now you have seen her, tell me what you think of her.”

Even then, Rachel felt reluctant to commit herself. But to prevaricate further would have been silly, so she said, with great fairness but no enthusiasm, “She’s very lovely, of course. And—charming.”

“But-?”

“Does there have to be a ‘but’?”

“If you use that tone of voice—yes.”

Rachel fingered the sheaf of papers on her desk rather absently, and at last she said,

“I met her only, for a few minutes, so it isn’t very fair to make a judgment. But I think, she’s a woman to appeal to men rather than her own sex.”

“You mean—” he shrugged impatiently—“that most other women would be jealous of her.”

“Oh, no, I don’t! Women aren’t so easily jealous of each other as that,” retorted Rachel with spirit. “But I think her combination of gifts has always given her the centre of the picture, which means that any other girl must feel a good deal diminished in her presence. And that’s not very easy to take, Nigel, however beautiful one’s disposition may be,” she added with a smile. He laughed at that and, leaning forward with his arms on the other side of the desk, asked with genuine curiosity,

“Did you
feel diminished in her presence?”

“I hardly felt that I shone,” Rachel confessed, with a touch of humour. “But then I wasn't the one who was called on to do so. It was you who had to make the good impression. Did you?”

“More than I dared to hope,” he admitted unexpectedly.

“Well, then—” her hand was suddenly still on the papers—“you should feel very satisfied.”

“Of course,” he agreed, but with a touch of restlessness not lost on her.

“And yet you don’t.” She looked up at him, “Why not?”

He was silent And she saw that a shut-in, almost sullen expression had replaced his usually gay and carefree look. She too was silent then, studying him with an attention she had never bestowed upon anyone else before. And suddenly it came to her that every line of that good- looking, faintly enigmatical face mattered to her—profoundly. It was not an entirely sudden discovery, but it was a deeply moving and strange one. And strangest of all was the feeling that, in that moment, she looked into him, instead of at him, and understood him as we usually understand only those we have known and loved all our lives. He had no need to tell her what was disturbing him so profoundly. She knew. And her tone was almost matter-of-fact as she said,

“It’s not an easy thing for you to say yourself, of course, but I suppose I can say it for you. She was interested in
you
rather than the work, wasn’t she?”

“She was,” he agreed, rather shortly.

“Well—” determinedly Rachel ignored the chill at her heart—“the one could lead on to the other very naturally. She might well finance your work just because she—likes you.”

“Did she strike you as a woman of half-measures?” he enquired almost roughly.

“No,” said Rachel slowly, “she didn’t. She struck me as a woman who knows exactly what she wants—and goes for it, no holds barred.”

“Very well,” he said deliberately. ‘You can work it out from there.”

She was quite still again. Then she passed the tip of her tongue over dry lips and asked,

“Could you really find out so much about her in one evening?”

“Yes,” was all he said. And then the sound of Paula’s eager voice downstairs warned Rachel that the conversation was almost at an end. But there was one more question she simply had to ask, and she voiced it without subtlety or forethought.

“Is the success of your work more important to you than anything else, Nigel?”

“More than anything else in the world.”

“You’re sure?” She had to press him on that point, even if, as it seemed to her, her voice was almost pleading.

“Quite sure ”he said harshly.

And then Paula came bounding into the room, to fling herself upon her uncle with cries of delight.

“Why,
why
have you been missing so long?” she wanted to know.

And immediately the ruthlessly determined man who had been talking such raw truths to Rachel was gone, and in his place was the gay, affectionate, teasing uncle. He laughingly parried her enquiries, kissed her, and finally allowed himself to be dragged off, to see something which she declared required his special attention.

Rachel was left alone, staring at her work, while she retraced the conversation which had just taken place, and its inevitableimplication.

“It isn’t as though he wants the money for himself,” she whispered, half defensively. “He needs it for his research—desperately. And she has it—all the money he could possibly require. He hasn’t even got to woo her— much. She likes him already, so completely and impulsively that she didn’t bother to hide the fact, even on that first evening. And she’s good-looking—and clever. And yet—and yet—” Abruptly, Rachel drew her typewriter towards her and began to work again, pausing only once, to. wipe away a couple of tears which, to her surprise, suddenly trickled down her cheeks.

The nest day, while she was working at the Nursing Home, word was brought to her that her aunt would like to see her. Hester was, she knew, making a good recovery by now, but it was the first time she had made any enquiry about her niece, and Rachel went immediately to Hester’s room— to find her sitting up in bed, contriving very cleverly to look both frail and glamorous.

She seemed quite pleased to see Rachel and, when greetings had been exchanged, remarked in a friendly tone,

“This is a stupid business, isn’t it? How are you all getting on at home without me?”

Rachel gave a reasonably reassuring account of things, while taking care to make Hester feel she was missed.

“I gather Everard has withdrawn his absurd ban on Nigel?” Hester studied herself in a small mirror, applied a dusting of powder to her attractive nose and then, before Rachel could reply to her half-question, put down the mirror and looked straight at the other girl. “How much do you know about what really happened, Rachel?”