SLOWLY the weeks turned into months and the house in Mayfair became more of a home both to Rose and Lance. She had always felt convinced that once he started to work his interest in the business would grow, but even she was
surprised at the diligence and enthusiasm he displayed. He left the house every morning before nine and rarely returned before six. Even at weekends he was busy studying papers and documents in the library until finally she was forced to protest that he was working too hard!
It was a Sunday morning and she had come in from posting a letter to her father to find Lance pouring over a sales sheet.
"If I worked twenty-four hours out of twenty-four," he answered, "it'd still take me years to catch up on all I've neglected."
"You can never make up for lost time, Lance. Anyway, it's not good to work without a break. You'll get stale."
"Rubbish. I love every minute of it." He flexed his muscles. "I think I'll start playing tennis again though. I'll ring Susan and see if she'll give me a game."
"Susan?"
'Yes. She's a crack player — Wimbledon class."
He picked up the telephone and Rose went into the hall and hung up her coat.
When she returned Lance was standing by the fire.
"I've just had a word with Susan," he said. "She'll give me a game this afternoon and we'll come back here for tea, if that's all right with you?"
"Perfectly," Rose said and wished desperately that she could have played with Lance instead. The longing was so intense that it gave an edge to her voice and he glanced at her sharply. But she was not looking at him and he turned back to the fire.
That afternoon was the first of many Lance and Susan spent together and eventually it became a regular week-end habit. Not only Sunday but Saturday too they would spend playing either tennis or squash, returning to the house in the late afternoon exhausted but in high spirits. Watching Lance laugh and joke with Susan, Rose realized how much they had in common, an affinity formed not only by similar enjoyment but by an equal vitality. Occasionally Alan came over for tea, but when he saw Susan was a regular week-end visitor he
dropped out and Rose saw little of him.
As the winter days grew shorter and the weather colder she spent more time indoors and the hours dragged heavily past. The cold weather also gave her unusual pain in her hip, making her limp more noticeable. Embarrassed by it, she hardly went out at all and wondered what she could do to pass the time.
Life as one of the idle rich did not suit her, she realized one particularly long and dreary winter's afternoon. Yet without any creative ability there was litde she could do except take a job or join in the social round of the women in Lance's circle. Yet what was
Lance's circle today? He was working so hard that he had no time for night clubs or parties and the people who dined with them were mostly business acquaintances with one or two friends from his university days. It was all so much as Rose had wished that she wondered at herself for daring to be discontented and knew that had her marriage been a real one there would have been no discontent at all. A child would have been the answer to her boredom. She trembled at the thought and resolutely pushed it to the back of her mind. But it was not something that could so easily be dismissed and restlessly she got up and walked around the room. Her leg dragged painfully and she stopped by the fireplace and stared at herself in the mirror. Her tweed dress was in the best of taste as were the pearls at her throat and the earrings in her ears. Her hair was cut in the latest fashion and her make-up accentuated her eyes and mouth, yet there was no laughter in the eyes, yet it was a face
from which the animation had gone and with it had gone youth. Unutterably depressed, she sank on the settee and buried her head in her hands.
She was so deep in misery that she did not hear the door open and it was only when she felt a hand on her shoulder that she realized Alan had come in.
"What's the matter, Rose? Are you ill?"
It was useless lying to him, for the tears were still wet on her cheeks and she brushed them away.
"I'm just a bit tired and depressed."
"I'm not surprised. You should go out a bit more. Haven't you any friends ? I'd have thought as you'd worked in London for so long…"
"I can't have the same friends now, Alan. It wouldn't work out. When I came back I got in touch with some of them but they were as embarrassed as I was.
Anyway I've never had any close girl friends."
"Where's your father?"
"At Cambridge." She blew her nose and put her handkerchief away. "No, as soon as I feel better I'll try and get a part-time job. But at the moment I can't stand for more than a few minutes at a time."
"Even if you could stand you couldn't get a job again. What would people say?"
She laughed. "You sound like Lance."
"I'm sorry, Rose, but it's true. It would be unthinkable for you to take a job.
You could open your own florist's, though, there'd be nothing wrong with that."
His suggestion started her imagination working and she remembered that at one time she had thought it would be a good idea to open a flower section in some of the larger supermarkets. Diffidently she told Alan and he nodded approvingly.
"You needn't take up much space to begin with, until we see how it goes, but certainly the supermarkets in the expensive districts would be ideal locations.
Talk it over with Lance." He walked over to the door. "Which reminds me, I
came back to collect some papers for him and he'll wonder what's happened to me. It's a file he was working on last night."
He walked out and she waited for him to return. A few moments went by and she crossed the hall to the library. Alan was standing at the desk, a bundle of photographs in his hand. They were some that she had taken a few weeks earlier when she had gone with Lance and Susan to the country. It had been one of the nicest days she had spent. Lance had bought her a miniature camera and she had used it to take pictures of them without their knowing.
They were candid and amusing, with some particularly lovely ones of Susan. It was at these that Alan was staring with an anguish she had never before seen on his face and suddenly his inexplicable behaviour over the past few months became understandable. She knew now why he refused to come to the house when Susan was there and why, on the occasions when he did meet her, he persistently talked to her as if she were a schoolgirl. He had once said he was in love with someone and did not stand a chance of marrying her and Rose was convinced that the girl was Susan.
She came in and closed the door behind her and at the sound Alan started guiltily and dropped the pictures on to the desk.
"I didn't mean to pry," he said abruptly. "But… but I saw them. They're very good."
"They are, aren't they? Particularly of Susan. I like the one of her that I took by the car, don't you?"
"Yes," he said without looking at it.
Rose held up the picture to which she was referring. "It's really caught her gamine expression," she said softly, "and the tilt of her nose. Look at it, Alan."
"I don't need to," he burst out. "I can see it with my eyes closed!"
Rose put the pictures down. "Susan is the girl you once told me about, isn't she? The girl you said you didn't stand a chance of marrying."
He busied himself with the folder in front of him, stacking and re-stacking the papers.
"Yes," he said at last. "Yes, she's the one."
"Does she know how you feel about her?"
"No."
"Then how do you know you don't stand a chance?"
"I'd rather not talk about it, if you don't mind."
"Why?" Rose asked sharply. "You were always more than willing to give me advice even when I didn't want it. Even a few moments ago when you came into the drawing room and found me crying it never entered your head to go out and pretend you hadn't seen me."
He had the grace to look ashamed and sensing her advantage she said: "I'm sure Susan likes you. Why don't you at least ask her out?"
"What for? Do you think I, could ever afford to keep her? She's out of my class."
"I didn't have any money," Rose said gently.
"You can't compare a woman with a man. If a poor girl marries a rich man everybody says jolly good luck to her, but if the boots on the other foot and the girl has the money, what do you think they'd say about the man? They'd call him a fortune hunter."
"Why are you so concerned about the mythical 'they'? Isn't it Susan's opinion you should be concerned with?"
"Susan's a young twenty. She doesn't know what it is to work for a living and all the people she mixes with are cut from the same pattern. You don't
seriously think she'd be interested in Lance Hammond's secretary?"
"I don't know what Susan thinks. All I do know is that you should give yourself a chance. So far you're deciding what Susan does or doesn't want, but you haven't the courage to find out whether she happens to want it as well!"
"I don't intend to either. For heaven's sake, Rose, do you think this is
something I've decided on the spur of the moment ij Susan's never been in love with anyone and if I were to succeed in winning her I'd feel I were taking advantage of my position. After all, she regards me as almost one of the
family."
Rose looked at him incredulously. 'You don't mean to tell me you're waiting until she falls in love with someone else before you tell her how you feel?"
His expression told her she had guessed correctly and her incredulity changed to exasperation. "Really, Alan, you might give other people good advice, but when it comes to your own affairs you're the biggest fool in the world!"
"Thanks," he said and picked up the folder.
"Don't be angry."
"I'm not. At least not angry with you, just with myself. I shouldn't go on staying with Lance. As long as I do I'll never get Susan out of my mind."
He flung the folder down and rubbed a hand across his eyes. Seeing him so dejected she knew a great urge to comfort him and overwhelmed by
tenderness, she put her arms around him.
"I'm sure you're wrong about Susan. Let me have a word with her and find out what she thinks about you."
"No! You're not to say a word to her. Not a word! If you do I'll never forgive you."
"All right," she said quickly. "I won't."
For a long moment he remained staring at her, then the tenseness left him and he leaned forward and kissed her gently on the mouth, a kiss of thanks and friendship.
"I hope I'm not breaking anything up," a cold voice said and with a start of guilt Alan's hand dropped from
Rose's shoulder as he stared at the man framed in the doorway.
"Lance, I—I didn't know you were coming back."
"Obviously. If I'd realized I'd be interrupting a scene like this I'd have warned you of my return."
"Alan saw the pictures I took last week," Rose said quickly, "and he—"
"You needn't go into any explanations," Lance interrupted. "You're at perfect liberty to kiss whosoever you like. But I'd advise you to be more circumspect in this house. Servants are inclined to gossip."
"Lance! You're deliberately misunderstanding what happened. Alan wasn't making love to me. He was kissing me out of friendship."
"I told you you needn't go into explanations," came the answer.
Anger at his rudeness decided Rose against replying to him. If he wanted to believe the worst of her so much the better. At least it meant he did not suspect she was in love with him.
She looked at Alan. "You'd better go."
He left the room and only when Lance was alone with her did he speak again.
"I told you a little while ago, Rose, that if you wanted your freedom you should come and tell me."
"And I told you that if ever the question arose, I would." She looked at him directly. "I don't mind you misjudging me, but I don't think it's fair you should misjudge Alan. He was not making love to me. He was merely telling me
something about his past. It upset him and I…" her voice trailed away and she stared at the fire, hating herself for the tears that threatened to overcome her.
But Lance finished the sentence. "What you're trying to say is that it was your maternal solicitude that prompted you to kiss him."
Still not trusting herself to speak she nodded.
"I believe you, Rose," he said suddenly. "I'm sorry if I was rude."
She swung round, so full of relief that the tears she had held back overflowed down her cheeks. Lance moved close and looked at her intently.
"I've been leaving you alone too much lately. You're not used to being idle and you need something to do."
"I know. I was going to talk to you about it. I'd like to open a florist section in a couple of the supermarkets—or even just one of them to begin with."
"It sounds a good idea," he said quickly, so quickly that she felt he had hardly given it thought. "But you're not well enough to think of working yet, and I'm not going to have you brooding round the house until then." He gripped her shoulders. "How would you like us to go to Cannes for a month?"
"But I thought you were busy?"
"Not so busy that I can't get away. The business managed without me for years. It can manage without me again for another month. In fact, the more I think of it the more enjoyable a holiday seems. I'm not going to take no for an answer, Rose. We'll leave for France tomorrow."
"But I don't want to go."
"Well, I do. Now, no arguing."
Realizing that once he had made up his mind it was hopeless to disagree with him she went upstairs to supervise her packing.
Disappointment at the ease with which he could drop his work robbed her of the elation she would normally have felt at going away on a holiday, and with distaste she looked at the growing mound of clothes that her maid was laying on the bed. Lance's life had been a holiday for so long that it was stupid of her to expect him to work for more than a few months at a time. But her
disappointment with Lance would have changed to surprise had she been able to overhear the conversation taking place between him and one of his directors.
"I know it means I'll be leaving you to handle the negotiations," he was saying,
"but my wife needs to get away. If anything crops up urgently I can always fly back, but right now I owe it to her to take her off to the sunshine."
He replaced the telephone and walked back to the fire.
How much more he owed Rose than just sunshine! He owed her her health and her happiness. Yet it seemed he could give her neither. The months of their marriage had not drawn them more closely together and her need to love someone was so great that she had turned towards Alan. Not that he blamed Alan. Idly he wondered what the two of them had been discussing to cause his secretary to look so distraught. Whatever it was it had aroused Rose's
sympathy and, tenderness. She had once displayed the same tenderness to him and it had resulted in her being maimed. He clenched his fists until the knuckles showed white. Whatever happened, his duty towards her remained the same: to make her as happy as he knew how.
He glanced at his watch. Half past five. An hour ago he had no intention of leaving the country, yet now he was impatient to be away. Would it be a good idea to ask his mother to come along? Rose liked her and it would be added companionship for her. He picked up the telephone and got through to the house in Cambridge where Didi was staying. Her voice at the other end of the line was as he had always remembered it — gay, light and far younger than her years.
"Lance, how lovely to hear from you. Yes, I'm having a wonderful time here.
How are you and Rose ?"
"Fine. We're going to the villa tomorrow. I thought maybe you'd like to come with us."
"I'd love to. But it isn't convenient."
"Why? What are you doing? You haven't been up to Town once."
"I know, darling. But I've been improving my mind. I've read nearly all the books in John's library and I've taken up gardening too!"
"Well, come and garden at the villa."
"Darling, if things don't turn out the way I've planned you'll probably see me before the end of the week."
"What sort of things?" Lance asked sharply. "Mother, you're not up to anything silly, are you?"
"Of course not. Now I can't talk any more, darling. We've got people to dinner and I must change. But I promise you'll be hearing from me before the week's out."
"Mother! I want to—"
Didi quietly replaced the telephone, a smile lifting her mouth. Tonight would see the beginning or the end of all her plans. Plans that she had persevered
with dignity over the past few months.
She went up to her room and looked through her wardrobe carefully before
She went up to her room and looked through her wardrobe carefully before