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'
Then I'm sorry for her,' he declared stubbornly, 'but it doesn't alter the fact that he's shown no inclination or desire to see her since his accident and he probably never will again.'

'He might, if you'd
—'

'No!' He snapped the word at her, his eyes blazing angrily. 'I will not be argued with on the matter any more, Helen, now leave it!'

'Very well.' Her own submission surprised her no less than his use of her Christian name, though she doubted if he realized he had done so. She had to admit, but only to herself, that it was no concern of hers if he chose to bar Tracey Owen from his home; it was not her place to argue otherwise, but she wondered if a word with Doctor Neath would have any result. He usually listened to the old doctor, even admitted that he was usually right, so perhaps he could be persuaded to bring his influence to bear. There was more than one way to deal with Mr Evan Davies.

Conversation was almost non-existent at breakfast, and she longed for the more garrulous company of Mrs Beeley as usual, even though she would probably have had to listen to a tirade against Tracey Owen for daring to defy her employer. She ate little and rose to leave as soon as she politely could, anxious to get away from the silence that enveloped them. She had reached the door and was about to open it when he called her back. Standing in the centre of the room, the flame of a match held to the briar until the smoke wreathed about his face and hid his expression. She turned reluctantly to face him. ‘Yes, Mr Davies?'

She was conscious of his gaze fixed on her hair and wondered if her cap was awry, putting up a tentative hand to check. ‘Are you naturally golden-haired?' The description as much as the question made her stare at him. Most people referred to it as blonde, an adjective she disliked.

'
Why—yes.' Her surprise was plain on her face and she could not resist adding: 'Why?'

'
I thought it might have been red,' he answered blandly and, she felt sure, provokingly. ‘Your temperament suggests it.' She recalled Emlyn’s description of her as a 'lion-tamer 'and his expressed surprise 'that she had challenged Evan's authority and got away with it. Now Evan himself was making more or less the same suggestion, however obliquely.

'
I'm sorry if you think I was rude,' she said quietly, restraining her impulse to be even ruder, only with difficulty. 'I'm not usually so—'

‘Fiery?' Again he gave her no time to finish the sentence. 'No, I don't imagine you are. Doctor Neath has described you as very sweet and gentle. I suppose he hasn't yet had the misfortune to cross your path.'

She flushed, wary of his sudden garrulity, uncertain of his motives. 'I can't think why the doctor can have called me that. I'm only normally even-tempered.'

'
Hmm.' She could have sworn that it was amusement that glinted in his eyes behind the very convenient smoke-screen.

She hated the thought that he was laughing at her and sought to escape. 'If you'll excuse me,' she said, leaving the room and closing the door none too gently behind her.

Emlyn greeted her reappearance with flattering enthusiasm. 'Let's get the torture over and then we can talk,' he said. 'Or play cards. I'm in a winning mood today.'

'You always are!' she retorted. 'But we won't play cards. You can read that book I brought you last night.'

He looked taken aback at her refusal. 'Why not?' he demanded.

'
Because I prefer not to,' she told him. 'When you've done your exercises you can rest for a bit. You get too excited when we play cards and it's not good for you.'

'I'm not a baby!' he retorted. 'Don't treat me like one, Helen!'

'
You're a patient,' she said firmly, 'and as such you do as
I
think best.'

‘Oh?' She did not like the way he said that nor the oddly speculative look in his eyes as he watched her move about the room. 'You haven't by any chance been fighting with Evan, have you?'

She made no reply for a moment, ignoring the bright glint of mischief and curiosity that followed her. 'I am not in the habit of quarrelling with my employers, Now please be quiet while I get you ready. You can ring for Dai if you will.'

‘Plenty of time,' he said, a smile on his face. 'And you have been fighting, I can tell. You look very angry and very, very beautiful, and it's not likely that either Mrs Beeley or Dai can have made you that mad, so it must be Evan.' Seeing that he had not rung the bell for Dai Hughes she moved over to his bedside to do so herself and he lost no time in taking advantage of it. He grabbed her hands firmly in his own, his eyes glittering at her wickedly as she tried to free herself.

‘Emlyn, stop it!' She looked as angry as she sounded, but he merely pulled a face at her, tightening his grip. 'Let me go!'

‘It's much more fun being able to sit partly upright.' he told her, and pulled at her hands sharply so that she lost her balance and fell across the bed and into his arms. He held her tightly, as he had done before, but this time she managed to reach out a hand behind her and pushed hard at the bell-push to summon Dai Hughes. It would not have been too difficult to release herself, but in doing so she could have done him harm, for it was very easy to jar the injury and perhaps set him back quite a long way. She would not risk doing that.

‘Let me go, Emlyn, please,' she pleaded trying to push against the strength of his arms, while he sought her mouth to silence her protests. Determinedly she turned her head away, still struggling, and looked at the finger she still had on the bell push.

The sound of hurrying footsteps on the stairs and the realization of what had happened came as one horrifying revelation. It was not Dai Hughes coming in answer to her urgent ringing, it was Evan. In her confusion she had pushed the wrong button, and Emlyn, all unaware, still held her firmly, half lying, half sitting on the bed, her dress and her hair rumpled as she tried to avoid being kissed.

A moment later Evan came into the room, anxiety and curiosity plain on his face and Emlyn stared at him for a moment unbelievingly. He took only a second to realize what had been happening and Helen saw the chill of anger in his eyes. 'Stop it, damn you!' His voice, cold and angry, had the required effect and Emlyn released her almost as if he feared physical retribution.

‘I thought something was wrong.' He looked at her in such a way that she knew without being told that he laid the blame for the incident at least partly on her. 'Why did you ring the bell?'

'
I touched the wrong bell. I'm sorry, I meant to call Dai Hughes.' She felt like running to her own room and hiding her face, though Emlyn was already recovering his composure and smiled at his father blandly.

'Spoilsport,' he told her. ‘You don't have to look so shocked, Evan. Good lord, I was only kissing the girl, wasn't I? At least I was trying to, only she was hoping Dai would come and rescue her. She was in such a state she rang the wrong bell, that's all.'

'
That's quite enough,' Evan told him chillingly.

‘I'm quite aware that you can take advantage of Miss Gaynor even as you are, and if it happens again she'll be sent away.'

'Oh, no you don't!' Emlyn retorted, grinning at Helen standing by his father wishing she was miles away and had never seen Glyntarrach. There was something so horribly impersonal about the way he had threatened to send her away.

'
I won't have you behaving like that,' Evan said, his voice hard, so that the younger man blinked at him in surprise as if he had never before heard it so unfriendly. 'You will either treat Miss Gaynor with respect and courtesy or I'll get someone better able to cope with you and less of a temptation as well.'

‘It was only fun,' Emlyn protested, running a hand through his dishevelled hair, but Evan was looking at Helen, her face flushed with anger and embarrassment, her eyes bright blue and sparkling with a mixture of temper and unshed tears. She hated them both at
that
moment.

'I
don't think Miss Gaynor shares your view,' he
said.
'
Do
you ?'

She raised her eyes and looked at him,
prepared to
finish with the problem once and for
all but instead she
shook her head.

'
I—I suppose I should have
known
better
than
to be caught a second time,' she said slowly. '
It
won't happen again, Mr Davies, I assure you.'

'I wish I could assure
you
.' He sounded less angry now and more regretful, not only for his son's behaviour but his own as well. 'Are you sure you can manage; you're all right now?'

'
Yes, thank you, really.' She attempted
a
smile which somehow only succeeded in making her look more woebegone. He leaned across her and pushed the button that would summon Dai Hughes, and when he straightened up it was to glare at his son blackly.

'I’ll stay until Hughes arrives,' he told him. ‘And I hope for your sake that Miss Gaynor doesn't decide to take her revenge on you during your exercise period; I wouldn't altogether blame her if she did.'

'She won't,' Emlyn assured him with the certainty of experience. ‘She never does, do you, Helen?'

'Then it's more than you deserve!' his father retorted as the door opened to admit Dai Hughes.

During the next four weeks Emlyn progressed steadily and, while he had made no more attempts to kiss her, he teased her unmercifully and talked incessantly about what they would do when he was completely fit again. It never seemed to occur to him that once he had reached that condition Helen's work would be finished and she would be gone. Either he refused to face the prospect or he was convinced that by then she would have changed her mind about him. He was, she realized, an incurable optimist.

He could now take a few steps under her guidance and with Dai Hughes' strong arms and back to lend support when it was needed. He grew more and more irrepressible as his recovery progressed. It helped him to talk about what they would do when he could walk again, but it worried Helen that he never considered the alternative to her staying. She had spoken to Doctor Neath about letting Tracey Owen come and see him when she had recovered herself and she was now better again, she knew, but the old doctor had been dubious about crossing Evan on such a touchy subject and she had had to relinquish the idea of his co-operation. There must be some way, she thought, of making Evan change his mind, but she had not yet summoned the necessary courage or cunning to speak of it again.

For some reason she found difficult to define, she had not expected him to be so tall. It was always hard to tell a person's height when they were lying in bed or even sitting up, and he looked so much like an impudent schoolboy that it had been quite a shock to discover that he was at least as tall as his father and equally as overpowering when on his feet.

The first time he stood by her, supported by Dai Hughes, he looked down at her with his dark eyes sparkling wickedly. 'You are a little creature, aren't you?' he teased her. ‘No wonder I thought Evan looked like a giant beside you. You're a real tiddler!'

'
I am not a tiddler!' she protested indignantly, to Dai Hughes' amusement. 'I'm quite capable of keeping you in order, so just you concentrate on what you're doing and talk less.'

'Yes, ma'am.' He bobbed his head solemnly and she realized, not for the first time, that the impudence and incessant chatter disguised a nervousness that he would never have admitted, even to himself.

He moved a little more each day and already the confines of the bedroom chafed his impatient spirit. He wanted to go here and there, always asking her for longer distances than she felt were wise, and as Doctor Neath was in agreement with her, he was obliged to make do with a few steps across the bedroom each day. 'You walk before you can run, my lad,' the old doctor had admonished him, and he had complied, but grudgingly.

Now that he was so much more active, even though it was for only short periods at a time, it meant much more work for Helen, for he was a demanding patient and she was always glad when her half day enabled her to get away for a while. Once Owen Neath had gone back Emlyn had once or twice asked her to stay with him and she had complied on condition that they both relaxed for an hour or two. This afternoon, however, he had demanded that they play draughts since the inactivity bored him—a childish game at which he was particularly adept and so won every game.

He had just roared his triumph yet again when the door opened and Evan came in, his gaze going straight to Helen still in her uniform. 'Isn't this one of your half days, Miss Gaynor?' he asked, and she nodded, feeling like a truant caught in the act.

'It is,' she admitted, 'but I—'

'I've told you my feelings in the matter,' he interrupted shortly. 'You will take your rest days and not stay with Emlyn, but since you seem to think he needs someone to stay with him, I'll stay for a while.' The black eyes dared her to argue, so she meekly got up from her chair and went to the door, followed by Emlyn's angry gaze.

'
You don't have to go,' he called after her, and she turned her head to look not at him but at his father.

'
I do,' she said quietly. 'Mr Davies is my employer, not you.' She was quoting his own words, though it was doubtful if he would remember them as such, but she knew him well enough by now to know that he would not take the remark without commenting on it.

'
It's for your own good,' he told her, before Emlyn could reply. 'It isn't right that you should give up your free time as you do.' His expression told her that he was aware of the other times she had spent with his son instead of taking advantage of the break. Emlyn looked no less stubborn than his father, but he was motivated by entirely selfish reasons, she knew that, and for a moment she stood just inside the door comparing the two of them as they both looked at her. So alike and yet so different. Now that Emlyn was no longer helpless in his bed she could better compare them and for the first time she realized how little older Evan looked than his son. He was still a young man, of course, only thirty-seven if Owen Neath were to be believed, and for some reason the thought disturbed her and sent a flush of colour into her cheeks so that she turned hastily and would have gone out.