Penny Jordan's Crighton Family Series. PENNY JORDAN

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ ‘Don’t bother with any supper for me. I’ll eat with Tiggy.’

      ‘Mum … where’s Dad?’

      Hastily Jenny tried to regain control of her chaotic thoughts as Louise came into the kitchen.

      ‘He’s gone to see your Aunt Tiggy. She needs his help with something. Finish setting the table, will you please, Louise? It’s almost time for supper.’

      ‘Again,’ Louise grumbled as she picked up the plates. ‘He’s always over there. In fact, he might as well move in with her, then at least she wouldn’t be ringing him up all the time.’

      ‘This is a very difficult time for her, Louise,’ Jenny responded quietly.

      ‘It’s a very difficult time for all of us,’ Louise countered feelingly, ‘especially Dad.’

      ‘Yes, well, Olivia’s offered to come home and help your father out at the practice.’

      ‘Has she? I bet Caspar won’t like that. Still … I expect Hillary will do her best to comfort him. Are she and Saul going to get a divorce?’

      ‘Louise!’ Jenny warned. It was quite frightening at times to realise how much modern teenagers absorbed and how aware they were of adult concerns and personal problems, far more surely than when she had been a girl.

      ‘I like Saul. I think he’s very, very sexy,’ Louise pronounced, ignoring her. ‘I don’t suppose it will take him long to find someone else. It’s a pity that …’

      ‘That what?’ Jenny asked with maternal suspicion, but typically Louise refused to be drawn, simply shaking her head.

      Really, in far too many ways, Louise was more adult, more knowing, than she sometimes was herself, Jenny reflected wryly. But for once her mind wasn’t fully on the potential problems Louise, far too swift and determined to emerge into womanhood, was likely to cause. Other more immediate concerns about the recent scene with Jon had left her shaken and dismayed.

      She squeezed her eyes tightly closed against the threatening onslaught of tears. She dared not let Louise or anyone else see her crying. But, she wondered in silent anguish, whose shoulder was she supposed to cry on? Whose arms were supposed to hold her? Who was supposed to listen and sympathise with her pain and fears whilst her husband did all those things for someone else?

      It had shocked her to hear Jon speaking so bitterly about Max. She had always felt guilty about the fact that Max and Jon weren’t closer; that Max had always instinctively turned to David. Nature perhaps wasn’t always wise in the way she passed on family traits and characteristics. She herself had always been wary of making too much of Max’s startling psychological resemblance to David rather than to Jon; she had assumed that, like her, Jon believed it was a subject best left alone.

      It had disturbed her to hear the resentment in Jon’s voice and to see the accusation in his eyes. And more than that, it hurt her deeply, knowing that he had deliberately walked away without allowing her to defend herself or tell him that, given the choice, she would rather her son had inherited his virtues and his strengths rather than David’s weaknesses.

       9

      Jon paused uneasily as he got out of his car. There were lights shining from the upstairs window, which he knew belonged to David and Tiggy’s large bedroom—only Tiggy’s bedroom now and for some time to come if, as the specialist warned, David was going to have to remain in hospital for the present.

      ‘I thought the idea these days was to get the patient back on his or her feet and home as quickly as possible after a heart attack,’ Jon had commented when the specialist had taken him through his proposals for David’s treatment.

      ‘There are heart attacks and heart attacks,’ Mr Hayes had responded enigmatically, ‘and there are patients and patients.’

      Olivia’s car was parked outside and Jon’s heart sank slightly as she opened the door to his knock.

      ‘Tiggy’s upstairs,’ she told him and took him through into the small sitting room that he always associated with David’s wife.

      Like her, it was delicate and feminine and somehow always seemed to smell of her perfume. David had his own study on the other side of the hall, which reminded him …

      ‘I’d like to have a word with you before Tiggy comes down,’ Olivia told him as she handed him the glass of dry sherry she had poured him.

      Jon’s heart sank a little further. He had no need to ask her what she wanted to talk to him about.

      ‘I know that nothing will ever persuade Gramps, and to some extent Dad, too, since he always tends to fall in line with Gramps’s views that a woman, any woman, but most especially a Crighton woman, is capable of being a competent lawyer, but I thought that you were different, Uncle Jon. I am qualified, you know, and … But from the look on your face when I offered to stand in for Dad until he’s fit enough to return to work—’

      ‘Olivia, I know how well qualified you are,’ Jon interrupted her dryly, ‘and as for your competence …’ He gave her a wry look. ‘We both know that you are far, far more than merely competent, but—’

      ‘But you still don’t want me working here in the practice.’

      ‘It isn’t a matter of what I may or may not want,’ Jon hedged. ‘You know—’

      ‘What? That Gramps doesn’t approve? You can’t run the practice on your own. It’s obvious from what Mr Hayes has told me that at least part of the cause of Dad’s heart attack was the stress he was under at work. You don’t have time to advertise and interview and—’

      ‘There are agencies that supply temporary cover,’ Jon started to point out, but Olivia overruled him, shaking her head, her chin firmly, stubbornly, set.

      ‘Yes, I know, but …’ She stopped speaking and walked impatiently over to the fireplace before turning round and demanding, ‘If I were male … if I were Max, for instance, you wouldn’t think twice about accepting my offer, and—’

      ‘Olivia, I promise you, any reluctance you might imagine there is on my part to take you on has nothing to do with your sex.’

      ‘Hasn’t it? Then prove it,’ Olivia challenged him.

      Jon closed his eyes tiredly; there was no point in continuing to oppose her. He couldn’t carry the workload of the practice without help. He hadn’t had a chance to go through David’s desk or files yet, but if the backlog of work there was as large as he suspected … How could he explain to Olivia that the reason for his reluctance to accept her offer was because he … If only he had had more time. If only he had had some warning, he might have been able to …

      ‘It isn’t that I don’t appreciate your offer, Olivia,’ he told her quietly.

      ‘Good,’ she returned firmly. ‘Then that’s settled. I’ll start tomorrow morning.’

      ‘What’s settled?’ Tiggy demanded as she walked into the room. She was wearing some kind of housecoat-type garment, Jon noticed, a floaty, chiffony affair in soft pastels that reflected the delicate СКАЧАТЬ