A Convenient Gentleman. Victoria Aldridge

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СКАЧАТЬ back the pang of homesickness. ‘I miss her, too,’ she confessed.

      Charlotte sighed and her eyes drooped. Her hand in Caro’s felt far too hot for comfort, despite her complaints of the cold. ‘Twenty years apart. Such a long time, and because of such a silly quarrel…’

      She was asleep in seconds. Caro waited for a while, but her aunt seemed comfortable enough, so she tiptoed back to her own room. The meagre fire she had lit for herself had long since died out and when she pulled back the curtain the room was flooded with cold moonlight. She undressed swiftly without a lamp and pulled on the old, comfortable nightgown that always reminded her of home. Then, shivering, she slipped between the cold sheets, finding the still-warm bedpan with grateful toes.

      She was so tired that she had expected to fall asleep immediately, but instead she lay staring blindly at the ceiling, missing the creaking of ship’s timbers beneath the wind and the waves. The silence here unnerved her, and although there was an occasional burst of noise from the bar below the sound was so muffled by the snow on the windowpanes as to be almost imperceptible. It was hours later when she heard the creaking of the stairs and the sound of quiet footsteps coming down the hall. Feeling suddenly very alone she sat up, pulling the blankets around her protectively. Too late she remembered that she hadn’t locked the door.

      The footsteps stopped outside her room. Scarcely daring to breathe, she silently padded to the door and felt for the key. There wasn’t one. She gripped the doorhandle tightly, resisting the pressure as she felt it being turned on the other side.

      ‘Caroline?’ Mr Thwaites whispered hoarsely. ‘Are you awake?’

      ‘Not at this hour, I wouldn’t think, mate,’ snarled a familiar voice beside him.

      ‘Mr Matthews?’ Caro whispered incredulously.

      ‘Yes.’

      She wrenched open the door and looked down at the little, whiskery, beloved face. Harold Thwaites seemed to have vanished silently into the shadows.

      ‘Oh, I’m so pleased to see you!’ She flung her arms around Mr Matthews and hugged him tight. He tolerated it for a full five seconds before pushing her away.

      ‘Enough of that!’ he said gruffly.

      She drew him into the room and stared at him incredulously in the moonlight.

      ‘I can’t believe it! Oh, this is wonderful! When did you arrive in Dunedin?’

      ‘This evenin’. I shipped out from Sydney same day as you.’ He looked disparagingly around the room. ‘You ready to come home now?’

      She sank down on the edge of her bed. ‘No,’ she said mulishly.

      ‘You’ve made your point, girl. Your ma’s beside herself, your pa wants you home safe again—’

      ‘But I can’t go home!’ she burst out. ‘Not now! Aunt Charlotte’s not well, and the hotel needs rescuing and Mr Thwaite’s cheating her, I just know it and—’

      ‘Hey, hey, hey!’ He held up a hand in protest. ‘Just slow down and tell me what you’re talking about.’

      So she did, and he stood listening intently, nodding from time to time in what she hoped was agreement. His silence when she had finished, however, was ominous.

      ‘Well,’ she said after a moment. ‘You can understand why I can’t go home.’

      He scratched his head. ‘I can understand why you won’t go home, girl. But why you should stay here beats me. You don’t owe your aunt nothing!’

      ‘But I do! She’s so sweet and helpless…’ She ignored Mr Matthew’s derisive snort and added, ‘I’m not leaving Dunedin until she’s out of trouble and that’s that. Now, do you have any money?’

      ‘What?’

      ‘Money. Did Father give you any before you left Sydney? I’m sure he would have.’

      He looked shifty. ‘Can’t say that he did…’

      ‘Yes, he did. He would have given you enough to get us both home, if nothing else.’ She held out her hand. ‘That will at least pay some of the staff wages. It may even be enough to open the dining room again,’

      Mr Matthews stepped back, his eyes widening in panic. ‘Your pa’d skin me alive if I gave your aunt so much as a penny! I’d never dare set foot in his house again!’

      His consternation was so real that Caro uncharacteristically stopped arguing and lowered her hand. ‘Oh, this family feud is so ridiculous! Well, I’ll just have to think of something else.’ Somewhere in Dunedin a clock chimed three o’clock and she struggled to stifle a yawn.

      ‘Tomorrow,’ Mr Matthews said. ‘We’ll think of something tomorrow, girl. Now you get back into bed and keep warm.’

      She couldn’t stop the next yawn. ‘I’ll find you a room along the hall…’ But he told her in no uncertain terms that he was perfectly capable of finding a room to ‘bunk down in’ and left her after several more admonitions that she return to bed directly. The bed was cold, and her feet felt like ice, but Caro was so happy she scarcely noticed. Mr Matthews was sleeping across the hallway and everything was right with the world. She fell asleep almost immediately with a smile on her face.

       Chapter Three

       ‘A h, here it is!’ Caro hauled the heavy book up from under the registration desk, thumped it down triumphantly and blew the light layer of dust off the leather cover. The motes danced in the pale winter light pouring in through the long front windows of the Castledene Hotel.

      Outside had dawned the loveliest imaginable spring day. The previous day’s snow still clung to the hilltops, but Caro had gone for an early-morning walk around the outskirts of Dunedin, with Mr Matthews puffing behind all the way, and she had returned with a clutch of bright daffodils. They sat now in a fine crystal vase on the registration desk, lending an air of cheerful welcome to the otherwise formal entry hall.

      ‘Oh, dear.’ She looked across to where Mr Matthews sat glowering at his feet. ‘Nothing has been entered in these books for over four months.’ Mr Matthews, who had a profound suspicion of anything on a page, merely shrugged. ‘I wonder who’s been keeping record of everything bought or sold since then?’ she murmured to the empty air. ‘I would have thought that would have been Oliver’s job.’

      ‘Or yer aunt’s,’ Mr Matthews said shortly.

      Caro glanced up at her aunt’s door at the top of the stairs. She had looked in on her earlier, but Charlotte had been still sleeping restlessly and Caro hadn’t liked to disturb her.

      ‘She’s not well, Mr Matthews.’

      He snorted rudely. ‘Never has been, that one. Never been sober, neither.’

      ‘Don’t be horrible!’ Caro said indignantly. ‘I meant, she’s not well physically. She’s not strong, and only recently widowed, and I don’t think she’s ever had to run a business before.’

      ‘Neither have you,’ he retorted. ‘What do you know ’bout books and figures and all that? СКАЧАТЬ