The Tender Flame Read online

  ‘Then it’s morally wrong of you to go about looking as though you could do to wrap yourself round a huge steak.’

  ‘You could add all the trimmings and a mountain of chips and I’d still look like this. Can I help it if I’m naturally skinny?’

  ‘Slender sounds nicer,’ he admonished. ‘If you haven’t been dieting, and I’ll take your word for it that you haven’t, then it must be the other. He’s not worth it, you know.’

  ‘Who isn’t?’ she queried, looking perplexed.

  ‘The man who walked out on you.’

  ‘I got over him months ago,’ she said ingenuously and with belated regret, because she didn’t have to advertise the fact that Martin had walked out on her. ‘This man didn’t walk out on me.’

  That slipped out without thinking. She had had David Spedding in mind when she said it, but the last thing she intended to do was gossip about him to a stranger.

  ‘The inference being that he walked out on someone?’ he said with uncanny perception.

  This time Jan thought before she replied. For the last few moments she had been trying to work out who he might be. Strangers weren’t uncommon in Willowbridge, which was pretty enough to attract tourists. But tourists came in youthful-looking twosomes kitted out in jeans with haversacks on their backs, or they tumbled out of cars in family groups, Mum, Dad, offspring, sometimes Gran and Grandfather, and quite often with the family pet in tow. A man on his own might be here for market day, but he would definitely be of farming stock, and Awesome Mouth had a citified look about him. Two other possibilities still remained. Mrs. Grant, the Mrs. Grant of the Manor House, was reputedly interested in selling some valuable porcelain and an oriental painting in ink on silk, and it was said she had invited a dealer over to appraise them and give her a price. Awesome Mouth might be the dealer. The remaining possibility was quite balking. He could be David Spedding.

  Afterwards, if someone had asked Jan why she did it she would have had to admit she didn’t know. There was a feeling of revenge in gossiping about David Spedding to a stranger. She could hit back at him for Annabel, safe in the knowledge that the parties concerned meant nothing to him and the talk wouldn’t stay in his mind to be repeated all over Willowbridge, as it would have been if she’d aired her views to one of its inmates. Indeed, in a few hours he would have departed, probably for ever. On the other hand, if the stranger turned out to be David Spedding, never would she have a better opportunity of telling him a few home truths than this moment while she was still unaware of his identity.

  She took a deep breath and said: ‘He walked out on his wife and child, would you believe?’

  He replied unperturbably, with just a cynical lift of one eyebrow: ‘Quite easily. There are some despicable characters in this world.’

  On reflection, Jan wasn’t certain whether the eyebrow action was cynical, or if he was teasing her naïveté. If this latter was his intent, it served its purpose. It goaded her to further indiscretion.

  ‘You can say that again! This one didn’t even come back to attend his wife’s funeral.’

  He was Awesome Mouth again with a vengeance. He said bitingly: ‘Perhaps he had a reason.’

  Funnily enough, this is what Jan had said in his defence in the face of local condemnation. It was a relief to voice the disapproval she’d had to keep bottled up. ‘I’ve tried to be charitable about this, but I can’t. There isn’t a reason that will stand up to his nonappearance on that day.’ And now she wasn’t hitting back in revenge any more, she was having a reaction. She’d had to be brave for Stephanie’s sake, but the truth was she’d never dwelt at such close quarters with death before. Her beloved grandmother had been very ill once, and near to death, but unlike Annabel she had recovered.

  Jan had been with Annabel, looked after her, had barely let go of her hand during her last hours. At the same time she’d had to keep a bright face for Stephanie’s sake. In Stephanie’s eyes she represented grown-up calmness and authority. But she didn’t feel grown-up or calm. She felt very young, very insecure; she needed someone to come along and take command of the whole horrible situation. She wanted to object to the role that had been forced upon her. She wanted to scream and shout. She wanted strong arms to hold her, and a strong shoulder upon which to sob out her fear and frustration. She needed to lash out at the man who hadn’t been there to shoulder his responsibility.

  ‘He’s callous and heartless,’ she said with deep feeling that verged on hate.

  She heard the stranger’s sharp intake of breath, but she was too incensed to react to it. ‘I know the crash wasn’t his fault in that his hand wasn’t on the steering wheel, but if Annabel hadn’t married him in the first place she wouldn’t have been in the car at that particular moment, so that makes him indirectly responsible for her terrible injuries which chained her to a wheelchair.’ She had said his fault, but she might as well have said your fault, because she knew he was David Spedding.

  He said: ‘Go on.’ Something she had every intention of doing because she had vaulted the barriers of commonsense and was past heeding the tone of his voice.

  In the circumstances it was silly of her to say: ‘You can’t know—’ Of course he knew—‘and I shouldn’t be telling you all this—’ That was rich, hysterically rich—‘but as a result of the crash which happened as they were on their way from the church to the wedding reception, Annabel was severely crippled. Not that I ever heard her utter one word of blame against him.’ She couldn’t resist getting that dig in. ‘She was marvellous. Brave right up to the end, which was two weeks ago. And he—’ Her voice choked on emotion—‘that husband of hers didn’t think enough about her to come to her funeral. You would have thought he’d come, wouldn’t you, if only to comfort his little girl?’

  ‘You are right about one thing.’ And now Awesome Mouth awesomely surpassed the name she had given him. ‘You shouldn’t be telling me all this. Do you always gossip so indiscriminately to strangers, Miss Ashton?’

  She could have tossed back her head and retorted, ‘But you aren’t a stranger, are you?’ Instead she feigned surprise, because of course Annabel’s husband would know the name of the person who was looking after his child. ‘How do you know my name?’

  Before he could answer, the waitress arrived with the coffee tray.

  ‘Allow me,’ he said, reaching for the coffee pot.

  She was glad he took the task upon himself because her shaking fingers would have disgraced her. She thought that she was lucky he didn’t pour the coffee over her head. She could no longer hope that by some miracle he would turn out to be the dealer here to see Mrs. Grant about the sale of her possessions. The dealer would have no cause to know her name.

  What had she done? How could she have been so foolish? If only she had stopped to think exactly where her folly would lead. She had deliberately antagonised the man she hoped to soft-talk into letting her stay to look after Stephanie.

  ‘I’ve just come from Ralph’s office. He said that Annabel had engaged the services of a young woman who would fit your description. He said if I hung around I’d be likely to meet up with you as it was your time to fetch Stephanie from school.’ He broke off to ask: ‘Isn’t she a little on the young side to be going to school?’

  ‘It’s play-school, not proper school with lessons and things. It’s good for her to mix with other children, and while her mother was ill it was a godsend to have her out of the house for a few hours each day.’

  ‘Of course.’ His face was a mask. ‘You’re not eating.’

  She looked at the toast and cakes the waitress had brought with the coffee. She was too choked to eat. ‘I’m sorry. I’m really not hungry. But thank you for your solicitude.’

  He snorted. ‘Don’t fool yourself. I’m thinking of myself. I don’t want you to pass out on me.’

  Jan’s stomach fluttered. Breakfast was a meal she frequently skipped without mishap, and today she’d been too busy mulling over her problems to bother about lunch. The
error of her ways showed in her white face. She suddenly felt herself keeling over.

  She didn’t properly blank out, it was as if a wave of weakness had washed over her, and as she would have fallen off her chair she was aware that he reached out to grab hold of her.

  ‘Nicely fielded,’ she said with a feeble flash of humour.

  An answering smile warmed his eye for the briefest moment before it slid behind a crust of ice. ‘This is ridiculous. Looking after Stephanie is a job for a woman. What was Annabel thinking of when she engaged you? You are little more than a child yourself. Just how old are you?’

  At the interview that was something Annabel hadn’t asked. She hadn’t bothered to ask much at all, and Jan hadn’t volunteered the fact that she was twenty. Anyway, twenty wasn’t all that young, but he would think it was. She decided to tag on a year or two, and ended up making it four.

  ‘I’m twenty-four,’ she said.

  His eyes flicked over her in mocking disbelief. ‘That makes it worse. A mature woman of twenty-four acting like an irresponsible child! Why are you shaking?’ he asked abruptly. ‘Are you frightened of me?’

  She was terrified of him, but she could answer truthfully: ‘I’m shaking because I’m very wet and very c-cold. I’m so wet I don’t seem to be drying out.’

  ‘M’m, yes. Let’s fetch Stephanie out of that school and get you home and into some dry clothes. What possessed you to come out wearing only a dress and sandals in this downpour?’

  ‘Obviously,’ she said grittily, ‘it wasn’t raining when I set off. It didn’t even look like rain.’

  ‘Nonsense! It’s looked like rain all day. Are you going to carry on arguing in this stupid fashion and risk getting a chill, or will you be sensible and do as I say?’

  His hand was already raised to alert the waitress who came hurrying over with the bill. As he handed the money over to the girl, Jan noticed he could smile quite charmingly when he chose. But when his eyes came back to her they were dark and icy again. She had a queasy notion that no way could she talk herself back into the job she so desperately wanted to keep.

  Of course, he hadn’t actually said he was David Spedding. She was straw-grasping again. It wasn’t impossible for him to be a distant relative of Annabel’s who had only just got news of her death, someone who would be equally familiar with the names and the set-up, but with her luck it was most improbable. There was little doubt in her mind that he was Annabel’s errant husband.

  ‘You are . . . aren’t you?’ she said.

  ‘Aren’t I what?’

  ‘Annabel’s husband?’

  He didn’t answer, presumably because they were crossing the road to get to the long low building where play-school was held, and he was keeping his eye on the oncoming car.

  He had taken her arm to guide her across, and the sensual shock of his touch stole her breath away in the most weird fashion. Her reaction was instant and hostile. She shrugged free of his grasp and challenged haughtily: ‘You are David Spedding, aren’t you?’

  They had gained the pavement, and now his prompt reply cut through the last lingering wisp of hope. ‘Yes, I’m David Spedding,’ he said.

  As he looked at her, Jan had the strangest feeling that he was asking for her forbearance and understanding.

  But almost immediately he shattered the illusion by querying crisply: ‘What’s the drill?’

  ‘We go in at this door and we are supposed to wait in the cloakroom. Listen! It sounds as though the class is still in session. Yes, look!’ Peering through the glass partition at the teacher, book on knee, in the centre of a semicircle of entranced little faces. ‘There’s Stephanie.’

  ‘Where? Which one?’

  After that, what more was there to understand? He didn’t know his own child. And there was something sadder and infinitely more bitter to swallow. Stephanie wouldn’t know him.

  It wrung Jan’s heart to have to answer the query in the child’s upturned eyes as, the moment class was dismissed, she came running up to them.

  ‘Look who’s here, Stephanie. It’s your daddy.’

  Swallowing roughly, almost blinded by a sudden rush of tears, Jan was on tenterhooks as she waited to hear what the little girl would say.

  The simplicity of a child’s acceptance is a wonderful thing.

  ‘Have you brought me any sweeties?’ Stephanie asked.

  ‘I just might have some in my suitcase,’ he replied after a long pause.

  Jan frowned at the look of struggle on his face. At the same time her throat filled as she witnessed his tender regard of the little girl. How could she equate this obviously caring man with the black villain who had deserted his wife and daughter, and had not bothered to get here for his wife’s funeral?

  She shook her head, but the muzziness wouldn’t clear. As though from along way off she heard David say: ‘My car is parked in the square.’

  His hand on her elbow commanded her feet to walk. This time instead of wriggling free of his hold, she was grateful for the strength it provided.

  ‘Are you all right, Miss Ashton?’

  What a ridiculous question to ask. Of course she wasn’t all right. She wished she’d taken notice of him and eaten something in the café. She wished she’d eaten some lunch. She wished she didn’t feel so cold and shivery. She hoped she wasn’t going down with a chill.

  ‘I’m fine, thank you,’ she said, clamping down on the strange little stirring of warmth that he should care enough about her wellbeing to ask, before he effectively did it for her.

  As before, it was not solicitude that had motivated his enquiry. With disconcerting coolness he said: ‘Then will you please pay attention. I’ve asked you twice to get in the car, and then we can be on our way.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  She scrambled in beside Stephanie who was already installed on the ample front seat. The little girl, who was beaming happily, had taken to David with a naturalness that was mind-boggling. Yet why Jan should be surprised by this, she didn’t know. She had been preparing Stephanie to expect her father ever since Ralph, the solicitor, had dropped the word in her ear.

  ‘There! Quite comfortable? Not too squashed?’

  She stretched her legs out under the bonnet in a demonstrative way. ‘I’ve plenty of room, thank you.’

  David had spoken to her as though she were Stephanie’s age, which wouldn’t have been too bad if he’d chosen to look at her the way he looked at Stephanie.

  And where did that alien thought spring from? She disliked David Spedding and all the cruel, callous things he stood for. If her hatred of him had lost its kick it was because she was feeling under the weather. She couldn’t expect her thoughts to maintain their strength when she felt so weak. If she’d been on top form she wouldn’t have been taken in by that perplexed yet tender little smile that played about his mouth when he looked at Stephanie. It was probably no more than conscience qualms. But that was odd in itself, because she hadn’t credited him with having a conscience. The feeling she’d had of being in sympathy with him had no proper substance, and if ever it returned she’d do well to blow it right out of her head again.

  If she was ever in danger of softening, it wouldn’t hurt to remember that by his own actions David Spedding had presented a cast-iron case for resentment. A cunning person can tender up a bad look to make it look like a good look, but actions aren’t prone to camouflage and speak for themselves.

  There was something else, of a more basic nature, that she should have remembered but didn’t.

  David slid the key in the ignition, but paused before switching on. ‘Just a thought. There is food in the house?’

  Jan’s look of dismay served as answer.

  ‘I thought as much.’

  ‘I can rustle up plenty of eggs for an omelet and there’s . . .’

  ‘I want a meal, not a snack. I won’t be long.’

  He got out of the car and marched across the road to the string of shops. He returned, in due time, with two carrie
r bags which he placed on the back seat.

  ‘The natives were curious, and friendly. It could be,’ he said with a mischievous, mocking glint in his eye, ‘that they were friendly because I didn’t feed their curiosity. I didn’t introduce myself.’ He then asked in a gravely speculative voice: ‘Am I right in thinking that if I’d told them who I was, I would have got a very different reaction?’

  Jan was taken aback. Could he be serious? ‘Do you need to ask that?’

  ‘Not any more,’ he said soberly. ‘Your face has supplied the answer. So everybody shares your unfavourable opinion of me. It’s only what I expected.’

  How else could Jan take that but as an admission of his guilt and negligence? Conscious of Stephanie sitting between them, nothing more was said on the subject. Jan doubted that anything more would have been said even if Stephanie hadn’t been there.

  His forethought meant that she was able to serve up a deliciously cooked meal of steak, button mushrooms, buttered new potatoes and salad. Followed by a chocolate pudding that was Stephanie’s particular favourite, and always went down well with adults as well.

  She had taken extra pains with the meal, hoping to prove that she was not the featherbrain he imagined her to be. She had always loved cooking, and had been an apt pupil, progressing from the guidance her mother was equipped to give her to more adventurous book recipes, and last year she had attended an advanced cookery class at nightschool. Not quite sure about David’s taste she had opted for simplicity and perfection.

  ‘At least you can cook,’ he said.

  This praise, negative though it was, was gratefully received. Jan’s own appreciation did not match up. She was developing a sore, scratchy throat and the steak, though tender enough, was difficult to swallow.

  ‘Do you mind waiting for your coffee until I’ve put Stephanie to bed? It’s later than her normal bedtime.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear that. I was beginning to wonder.’

  She knew she must not let him goad her, so swallowing on that unjust criticism she said stoically: ‘She was granted an extension tonight because you are here.’ And then—this was more in the nature of an enquiry—‘I have a room to prepare for you.’