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He would be pleased to see her, he had wanted her to come, but surely she should be feeling more than this? It was as though seeing him was like the meal she had just eaten, pleasant, satisfying. She had only said goodbye to him yesterday, but she wasn’t hungry for him and she never would be. If she didn’t see him for years she would never starve from wanting him, and perhaps that meant she was incapable of real passion. She hadn’t thought about it before. At twenty-two she had believed she was happy, but the underlying restlessness of the last few days suddenly centred on Michael Ames’ unknowing head.

If I’m bored with him now, she thought, what would it be like in ten years’ time? What would it be like being married to him? She left the dining room, and half her cheese and biscuits, and went up to her room. She was thankful she had booked herself in. She could leave in the morning, he need never know she was here, and when Michael returned she would try to find a kindly way of suggesting they should see rather less of each other.

This wasn’t Michael’s fault. How could she complain that a man bored her when he had the same tastes she had, and most of the same opinions? That had to mean she was boring too, and perhaps she was. Sitting alone in the dining room she had suddenly felt brittle and bloodless, as though she had settled for second-best all her life, and unless she did something pretty drastic, pretty soon, that was all she was ever going to get.

She couldn’t see herself making any big dramatic gestures, she was too inhibited for that. She couldn’t change her job, she loved it, but she might change her decor, and paper that wall in her apartment in jungle colours.

She realised she was clutching the gold and onyx medallion on its thin golden chain, and that showed her how confused she was, because at one time in moments of stress she had held on to that like a talisman. Once she wore it night and day, but in recent years only when it suited her outfit, and now here she was with it pressed tight between her clasped hands.

She had dropped her handbag and paperback on the bed and she looked down at Duncan Keld’s book and said, ‘You haven’t helped any.’ She was supposed to be a writer herself, but his work was immeasurably better than hers, which was rather depressing. In the pages she had read before dinner the fictional characters had seemed more alive than most of the living people she knew, and she resolved to do her very best to get that interview with him.

She still didn’t like him, but that had nothing to do with it, and Roz could be right, the Man of the Month could be getting too cosy. This time perhaps Pattie could produce a really thrilling character study.

She hardly ever acted on impulse, but now she sat down on the bed and picked up the phone and asked for Duncan Keld’s number. She wouldn’t say who she was. Unless he enquired she would just give the name of her magazine, and ask if they might come along and get a story to coincide with his TV serial. He wouldn’t know her voice because she’d never spoken to him, and if he remembered her when he saw her—well, she’d cross that bridge later.

The phone rang and she waited, still holding her health and happiness medallion because she needed to be lucky. But the man’s voice sounded older and it wasn’t Duncan Keld. He was sorry, but Mr Keld was away, he would be for several weeks, and Pattie grimaced and asked,

‘I suppose you couldn’t give me another number? It’s rather urgent.’

‘Mr Keld is in Yorkshire and not on the telephone.’

‘At the lodge?’

There was a slight hesitation, then the voice admitted, ‘That is correct,' and Pattie thanked him.

She was nearly halfway there. Nobody was expecting her back in London and she didn’t want to stay here. She had friends up north, or she could put up in small hotels, and if she turned up on Duncan Keld’s doorstep in the middle of the Yorkshire moors surely he would let her in. He’d only looked at her for about a minute twelve months ago, and she didn’t have the kind of face that men remembered. It was all right, but there was nothing outstanding about it. Besides, even if he did recognise her Jennifer Stanley was looking happy again now.

Roz had said this was a challenge, and seeing if she could land Duncan Keld would be more exciting than returning home and decorating her apartment, no matter what wallpaper she selected.

Of course she might feel different in the morning, and go down and have breakfast with Michael, and tell him she hadn’t joined his table last night because she’d realised he was with business colleagues, not because she simply hadn’t wanted to. She would sleep on it. And she did. But she woke still sure of one thing: she wasn’t breakfasting with Michael.

She had breakfast in her room and came out about ten o’clock when he should have left. But she still moved warily. She would feel an idiot if he caught her creeping down the stairs, or settling the bill, or of course he could have seen her car in the car park— and that stopped her in her tracks.

But there was no sign of Michael, and no note in her cubbyhole, and she drove out of town feeling quite pleased with herself.

She was a good driver, and she had only had the car serviced a few weeks earlier so it was going well. It looked very cold outside. Iron-grey was the pervading colour. The sky was unbroken and heavy, and colours of houses and people all seemed to have merged into greyness. But it was warm in the car and Pattie played cassettes. There were too many news bulletins on the radio, and although she was travelling this way on work she was actually on holiday, and she could do without gloomy headlines.

She sang softly to herself with the singers, and made good time reaching the village where she had stayed last summer. She had an excellent memory for places. Like her sense of direction it was almost photographic. Once Pattie had covered a route she seemed to file it somewhere in her head, and she had no doubts about being able to find that hunting lodge, which was about six miles over the moors.

But summer and winter had different aspects. This little town, which had glowed in mellow sunshine, now looked shuttered and alien, and her new impulsiveness took over again. Driving conditions weren’t too bad yet, but that sky was threatening. Once she stopped at the small hotel, where she had stayed previously, she was going to be loath to turn out again today. She remembered where the lodge was, but another half hour’s driving would pinpoint it for her, so that tomorrow, even if there should be snow, she would know exactly how to reach it. Then, in the morning, she would return and knock on the door and try to make her peace with Duncan Keld.

It was all very different from the last time she had driven along here with three other girls. The road, winding between the glowering hills, had the same twists and turns, but the hills were darker. She passed a farm, ticking it off in her mind, some sheep huddled together. The trees were black and bare edging the road and when she turned off on to a track, climbing higher, no trees grew, and she could feel the wind beating against the door panels of the car.

She could see the lodge, squatting on the hillside, with smoke spiralling out of the chimney, and she kept going. She might knock now, and chance her luck while she felt lucky. She was in a state bordering on euphoria, as though she had done something daring and clever, and in that moment the end nearly came.

She was watching the lodge instead of the track so that she didn’t see the patch of smooth ice, and her wheels had locked and her car had slithered over the unwalled edge before she could make any attempt to get out of the skid. The car went completely out of control, bouncing down what seemed to be a precipice and was a fairly steep hill, and although her seat-belt held her she felt as though she was being shaken to death. Then it began to roll, over and over, and her world became a nightmare kaleidoscope, splintered and screaming, and she knew she was going to die. She screamed and beat the air and the tumbling metal box that was taking her with it down into hell.

Then she was rocking, shaking, but not falling any more, and she thought she could smell petrol and remembered the flaming end of falling cars on TV and began to fumble with her seat-belt, sobbing and praying, her fingers-without feeling. Somehow the clasp sprung loose, and she tried a jammed door and then another that gave, and clambered out on top of the car and jumped and began running.

She didn’t look where she was going. She just ran before the car exploded, climbing higher, getting away from it. She didn’t stop to think she might have broken any bones. She hadn’t, but a sprained ankle wouldn’t have stopped her. She was paranoid with panic, and she didn’t stop at all until she was at the top of the hill, then she fell to her knees and slithered face down, fingers clutching the coarse frozen grass, heaving her heart out.

She had never been so close to death. She was in deep shock, whimpering like a puppy, and finally raised her head and looked around with dazed eyes.

She saw the car below. It hadn’t exploded, but it had fallen a long way, and it lay on its side, the white paintwork scarred and dented, and it began to dawn on her how lucky she had been. She could have been dead. She could have been horribly injured, lying where no one might find her for days.

She clambered up the hill, but now she began moving her arms and legs slowly, stretching this way and that, unable to believe that she was comparatively unhurt. There was no blood, and no bones seemed to be broken. Ahead the smoke still rose from the lodge chimney and she began to stumble towards it, sobbing, but now from relief.

On foot it seemed a long way. The wind was icy, and when she reached the greystone building with its heavy wooden door she was so exhausted that she could hardly summon the strength to knock. She leaned against the door, her frosted breath rising. She couldn’t shout, it would have come out in a whisper, but she did bang her fist, slowly and as hard as she could.

Then she closed her eyes and waited. Nobody came. She beat on the door again, waited again, then she made herself shout, ‘Hello. Anybody there? Hello!’

The silence was unbroken, and a boost of adrenalin gave her energy enough to bang with both hands and yell good and loud. There was a fire in there. Somebody had to be home. Somebody had to answer. But nobody did, and she tried to peer in through the windows.

It was dark inside, except for the flicker of firelight, and she kept up her calls of ‘Hello’, tapping the window panes, stumbling round the house, to the back where she almost fell over a great log pile.

He would be coming back, because the fire was burning, but if nobody helped her soon she was going to catch pneumonia at the very least. More probably freeze to death because—oh, God, it was starting to snow. Little feathery flakes were floating down, tangling in her eyelashes, although she couldn’t feel them on her face or her hands because her skin was as cold as the snow.

She had to get inside. Front and back doors were locked, so she would have to smash a window. There had to be something she could smash the glass with, but as she tapped on a small window it moved slightly and she pushed, and it wasn’t latched.

She had been wrong believing she was at the end of her tether when she reached the lodge. She had reserves enough left to haul herself up and wriggle herself in through the narrow aperture. She landed on a sink, and this was shelter even if the door of the room was locked. She could huddle in here until help came. But the latch lifted and the door swung open and in an inglenook fireplace logs smouldered, and she ran towards them crowing with delight.

She didn’t move for a long time. She stayed in the blessed circle of warmth, until the blood was prickling painfully in her veins and she had to rub the circulation back. When she stood up she was trembling and she held on to the arm of a chair while she looked round the room.

A very big room, almost the whole of the ground floor; rugs on flagstones, easy chairs and an old table. But she was in no state to notice the furniture, and she went to a door that opened on to a staircase and called, ‘Is anybody up there?’ although if there was they were either deaf or dead.

She really had the shakes. She would have given pounds for a cup of strong sweet tea. She had landed in the kitchen, where there was a Calor gas stove, but she didn’t know how to turn it on, and she daren’t trust herself to balance a kettle on the logs.

Then she saw the bottles on a dresser. One was brandy, and if ever she had needed a brandy for her health’s sake she needed one now. It splashed when she poured, she could hardly hold the bottle, but she finally got a good measure into the glass and added a little soda water, then carried it back to the fire.

As soon as she had moved away from the direct heat she had felt cold again, which showed she was still in shock, and now she huddled down in a massive old armchair in front of the fire, pulling a rug over her.

She had never taken a drink this strong before. It scalded her throat and made her head swim before she was half way through it, but she gulped it down and within minutes she was asleep.

She could have slept till morning. She was in deep slumber when she was woken, so that she opened heavy eyes and stared stupidly, still slightly drugged by the brandy.

He could have been part of a bad dream—big, looming over her. Her head ached, she was aching everywhere, and she was still slowly and painfully regaining consciousness when she heard him say in a harsh voice that went through her brain like a buzz-saw, ‘How in hell did you get in here?’ and before she could answer, ‘Never mind how, just get out!’

‘I
can’t
go anywhere,’ Pattie croaked. ‘My car crashed.’

He showed no sympathy. He just went on glowering down at her, and as she raised her head pain stabbed so that she winced and he said, ‘Sure it isn’t a hangover?’

The empty glass was beside her. The way her hands had been shaking when she’d poured it out she could have spilled some of the brandy down her, she could be reeking of the stuff. She said stiffly, ‘Sorry, do let me pay for it, but I was shaken up. I ran my car off the track and I climbed in through a back window to get to the fire.’