Max's Proposal. Jane Donnelly

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СКАЧАТЬ off it,’ Carl said huffily. He knew what he’d heard, what he’d seen. ‘You were getting on with Vella like a house on fire, never mind a bonfire. And then you went off upstairs with him, just the two of you.’

      ‘He was showing me round the house. I’ve never seen round it before.’

      Carl hooted. ‘Ha! All those rooms with fourposter beds in them.’ Bedrooms had just been part of the guided tour like other rooms, but everywhere they had gone she had been conscious of the dynamic force of the man beside her.

      ‘You went up the stairs,’ Carl was declaring as if this was his proof positive. ‘But nobody saw you come down again.’

      ‘There’s more than one staircase in that house,’ Sara said scathingly.

      Carl grinned. ‘A backstairs way out? What time did you leave?’

      ‘Before you did,’ she said, and she didn’t want any more of this. ‘Get any good pictures?’ she asked.

      ‘I missed the best,’ Carl had to admit. ‘You barefoot and him carrying you into the courtyard.’

      She couldn’t explain that either, and the editor spoke up. ‘Max Vella? We are talking about Vella?’ And Sara nodded. ‘Doesn’t sound like him,’ the editor mused.

      ‘I wouldn’t know,’ Sara said wearily. ‘I’ll ask him when I see him again. He’s giving me an interview at twelve o’clock.’

      The next half-hour she spent with the editor, planning the interview. The Chronicle was a longestablished county newspaper that rarely had anything very exciting to publish. Jim Kelly had been in this job for twenty-odd years. He was delighted that one of his staff would be interviewing the local tycoon who had never given an interview before.

      ‘Get some human interest,’ Sara was instructed. ‘Where he came from, what local plans he’s got.’

      Like the dodgy deal I overheard, Sara might have said, when there were no names mentioned and nothing to tie it in with anything. ‘Human interest,’ she repeated, and Jim Kelly chuckled.

      ‘Some say Vella isn’t human but you seem to have surprised them all last night.’

      ‘Last night was pretty surprising all round,’ Sara muttered.

      Afterwards she wrote captions for the pictures Carl had taken, and an account of the ball, the charity getting the proceeds, and a list of local bigwigs who had attended. She made no mention of course of herself, although she was going to be a main topic in any discussion of last night at the Moated House.

      She was beginning to regret all of it. This morning she would have given a lot to put back the clock and keep out of the darkened room so that she never came up against Max Vella or anything that happened afterwards. Watching the office clock edging round to midday, her tension was building up by the minute, and when there was a phone call for her she hoped it was Vella’s office, postponing their meeting.

      It was Beth. ‘Are you all right?’ Beth wanted to know. Assured that Sara was fine, she went on apologetically, ‘I’m going to have to talk to Jeremy. He’s at home and I’ve got to find out, well, how bad things are. Well I have, haven’t I?’

      Sara was resigned to this; it was the way it always happened. ‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Get the figure and we’ll talk about it.’

      One thing that never surprised Sara was her brother-in-law. Jeremy Bolton was a problem and always had been. Two nights ago Beth had phoned Sara’s flat in tears. ‘It’s happening again, he’s been betting on the horses again. He’s lost, of course, he always loses, but he never seems to learn. He promised me, and now—Oh, I’ve got to get away, I’ve got to get the twins out of here. I can’t think straight; I don’t know what to do. We can’t go to mother’s; you know how she is when she’s upset. She can’t listen, she can’t take it in. Sar, will you fetch us?’

      Since then her sister and the twins had been staying with Sara, and now Beth was on her way to a tearful reunion when Jeremy would promise everything and Beth would believe him.

      Tonight Sara would be drawn into that, but first she had a confrontation with Max Vella and it was a toss-up which meeting she was dreading more. Her sister’s husband was a never-ending drain on Sara’s finances and energy. He depressed her, but she knew what she was dealing with with Jeremy. No surprises there.

      But Max Vella was as menacing as walking into an uncharted minefield. He was always civil with the press, open-handed to charities. Sara had heard it said, ‘He’ll be Sir Max before he’s forty, if he isn’t in jail.’ But she had never heard of him giving any journalist a face-to-face interview before.

      She had amused him last night. He did have a cruel sense of humour. He had made her squirm with the hit man joke, scared her silly. He could be making a fool of her with this interview. She could imagine him sitting behind a huge desk, dominant and arrogant, while she perched on the edge of a small chair, stuttering her questions. He could imply as he had last night that she wasn’t much of a journalist if she blew it and ended up getting no story at all.

      But she was good at her job, and she had to stop undermining her self-confidence by wondering why he had agreed to talk to her. The only important fact was that he had, and there was no reason why he should scare her. Well not scare her exactly but make her apprehensive, because he was the kind of man who overawed most people, and Sara couldn’t know what mood he would be in when she was shown into his office.

      She arrived dead on time. She didn’t want to hang around and she was not keeping him waiting. So it was five minutes to twelve when she walked through the revolving doors into the office block and was taken to the top floor by a young man in a smart suit and what could be an old school tie.

      Young men usually tried to chat up Sara. This one eyed her appreciatively but said nothing as they travelled up in the smooth, fast-moving lift. The lift doors opened onto an area of ash-panelled walls and thick grey carpeting. A door was open. Sara’s guide said, ‘Miss Solway, sir,’ and Sara thought, Into the lion’s den, and then, Well he can’t eat me, and went in with her long-legged stride.

      Her next thought, as Vella rose from his chair behind the desk, was that he seemed even taller and broader-shouldered today. But he seemed welcoming. She was seated, offered tea or coffee, and started to say, ‘No, thank you,’ when she changed her mind. The headache she had woken with was still lurking. Even an affable Max Vella would be stressful and a tea or coffee might steady her. ‘I would like a coffee,’ she said.

      Coffee for two was brought in by an elegant blonde. Max Vella took his black; Sara doubted if he went for sweetness in anything. She had sugar in hers but it was scalding when she took a sip, and that showed the state she was in because any fool could see it was steaming hot. It brought tears to her eyes as she gulped it down instead of spluttering it out, only thankful that she hadn’t dropped the cup.

      After a few seconds she managed to say, ‘Thank you for seeing me. My editor was very pleased.’

      ‘We aim to please,’ said Vella.

      She hoped, but from what she knew the one he aimed to please was usually himself. She took her pocket recorder out of her handbag and put it on the desk, switching it on and asking, ‘Do you mind?’

      ‘You don’t think you’re going to hear anything interesting enough to remember?’

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