The Proposal. Betty Neels

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СКАЧАТЬ we not?’ he asked easily. ‘And this is a good place for them to run freely.’

      ‘I don’t own Bobo,’ said Francesca, at pains not to mislead him. ‘He belongs to Lady Mortimor; I’m her companion.’

      He said, half laughing, ‘You don’t look in the least like a companion; are they not ladies who find library books and knitting and read aloud? Surely a dying race.’

      If he only knew, she thought, but all she said cheerfully was, ‘Oh, it’s not as bad as all that, and I like walking here with Bobo. I must go.’

      She smiled at him from her pretty, sopping-wet face. ‘Goodbye, Mr Pitt-Colwyn.’

      ‘Tot ziens, Miss Francesca Haley.’

      She bent to pat Brontes. ‘I wonder why he has only one eye?’ she said to herself more than to him, and then walked briskly away, with Bobo walking backwards in an effort to return to his friend. Hurrying now, because she would be late back, she wondered what he had said instead of goodbye—something foreign and, now she came to think of it, he had a funny name too; it had sounded like Rainer, but she wasn’t sure any more.

      It took her quite a while to dry Bobo when they got back, and Ethel, on the point of carrying Lady Mortimor’s tray upstairs, looked at the kitchen clock in triumph.

      Francesca saw the look. ‘Tell Lady Mortimor that I’m late back, by all means,’ she said in a cool voice. ‘You can tell her too that we stayed out for exactly the right time but, unless she wishes Bobo to spoil everything in her bedroom, he needs to be thoroughly dried. It is raining hard.’

      Ethel sent her a look of dislike and Cook, watching from her stove, said comfortably, ‘There’s a nice hot cup of tea for you, Miss Haley; you drink it up before you go to your breakfast. I’m sure none of us wants to go out in such weather.’

      Ethel flounced away, Bobo at her heels, and Francesca drank her tea while Cook repeated all the more lurid news from the more sensational Press. ‘Don’t you take any notice of that Ethel, likes upsetting people, she does.’

      Francesca finished her tea. ‘Well, she doesn’t need to think she’ll bother me, Cook, and thanks for the tea, it was lovely.’

      Lucy would be home at midday since it was Saturday, and they made the shopping list together since she was the one who had to do it.

      ‘Did you see him again?’ asked Lucy.

      ‘Who?’ Francesca was counting out the housekeeping money. ‘The man and his great dog? Yes, but just to say good morning.’ She glanced up at her sister. ‘Do you suppose I should go another way round the park? I mean, it might look as though I was wanting to meet him.’

      ‘Well don’t you?’

      ‘He laughs at me—oh, not out loud, but behind his face.’

      ‘I shall come with you tomorrow and see him for myself.’

      On Sundays Francesca took Bobo for his morning run before being allowed the rest of the day free. ‘He’s not likely to be there so early on a Sunday …’

      ‘All the same, I’ll come. What shall we do tomorrow? Could we go to Regent Street and look at the shops? And have something at McDonald’s?’

      ‘All right, love. You need a winter coat …’

      ‘So do you. Perhaps we’ll find a diamond ring or a string of pearls and get a reward.’

      Francesca laughed. ‘The moon could turn to cheese. My coat is good for another winter—I’ve stopped growing but you haven’t. We’ll have a good look around and when I’ve saved enough we’ll buy you a coat.’

      Lady Mortimor had friends to lunch which meant that Francesca had to do the flowers again and then hover discreetly in case her employer needed anything.

      ‘You may pour the drinks,’ said Lady Mortimor graciously, when the guests had settled themselves in the drawing-room, and then in a sharp aside, ‘And make sure that everyone gets what she wants.’

      So Francesca went to and fro with sherry and gin and tonic and, for two of the ladies, whisky. Cool and polite, aware of being watched by critical eyes, and disliking Lady Mortimor very much for making her do something which Crow the butler should be doing. Her employer had insisted that when she had guests for lunch it should be Francesca who saw to the drinks; it was one of the spiteful gestures she made from time to time in order, Francesca guessed, to keep her in her place. Fortunately Crow was nice about it; he had a poor opinion of his mistress, the widow of a wholesale textile manufacturer who had given away enough money to be knighted, and he knew a lady born and bred when he saw Francesca, as he informed Cook.

      When the guests had gone, Lady Mortimor went out herself. ‘Be sure and have those letters ready for me—I shall be back in time to dress,’ she told Francesca. ‘And be sure and make a note in the diary—Dr Kennedy is bringing a specialist to see me on Tuesday morning at ten o’clock. You will stay with me of course—I shall probably feel poorly.’

      Francesca thought that would be very likely. Eating too much rich food and drinking a little too much as well … She hoped the specialist would prescribe a strict diet, although on second thoughts that might not do—Lady Mortimor’s uncertain temper might become even more uncertain.

      Sundays were wonderful days; once Bobo had been taken for his walk she was free, and even the walk was fun for Lucy went with her and they could talk. The little dog handed over to a grumpy Ethel, they had their breakfast and went out, to spend the rest of the morning and a good deal of the afternoon looking at the shops, choosing what they would buy if they had the money, eating sparingly at McDonald’s and walking back in the late afternoon to tea in the little sitting-room and an evening by the gas fire with the cat and kittens in their box between them.

      Monday always came too soon and this time there was no Brontes to be seen, although the morning was fine. Francesca went back to the house to find Lady Mortimor in a bad temper so that by the end of the day she wanted above all things to rush out of the house and never go back again. Her ears rang with her employer’s orders for the next day. She was to be earlier than usual—if Lady Mortimor was to be ready to be seen by the specialist then she would need to get up earlier than usual, which meant that the entire household would have to get up earlier too. Francesca, getting sleepily from her bed, wished the man to Jericho.

      Lady Mortimor set the scene with all the expertise of a stage manager; she had been dressed in a velvet housecoat over gossamer undies, Ethel had arranged her hair in artless curls and tied a ribbon in them, and she had made up carefully with a pale foundation. She had decided against being examined in her bedroom; the chaise-longue in the dressing-room adjoining would be both appropriate and convenient. By half-past nine she was lying, swathed in shawls, in an attitude of resigned long-suffering.

      There was no question of morning coffee, of course, and that meant that Francesca didn’t get any either. She was kept busy fetching the aids Lady Mortimor considered vital to an invalid’s comfort: eau-de-Cologne, smelling salts, a glass of water …

      ‘Mind you pay attention,’ said that lady. ‘I shall need assistance from time to time and probably the specialist will require things held or fetched.’

      Francesca occupied herself wondering what these things might be. Lady Mortimor kept talking about a specialist, but a specialist in what? She СКАЧАТЬ