A Man Most Worthy. Ruth Axtell Morren

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СКАЧАТЬ she aimed it at his partner, Lucy. The girl didn’t move from her position, merely raised her arm halfway in a vain attempt to reach the ball.

      Alice blew her bangs off her forehead in frustration. “Lucy, it went right to you!”

      Lucy made a face at her and let Victor fetch the ball. “You’re not playing fairly, Alice. You know you mustn’t make me reach for it.”

      What a bore it was to play with these three. She glanced over at her own partner, a neighbor’s son, also home for the holidays. He was looking away from the court, leaning on his racket. Oh, to be paired with someone who showed a little spirit!

      She lunged to the right, almost missing the ball Victor served back to her. Despite his indolence in the drawing room, once she taunted him, he was roused to make some effort. Thunk! Her racket connected with the ball and it went whizzing back to him.

      A tall figure coming around the corner of the high yew hedge caught her attention.

      She recognized the new secretary immediately. She hadn’t seen him at all again yesterday, and wondered if he was forced to take his meals with the servants or all by himself in his little office off Father’s library.

      In the time it took for the ball to return over the net, Alice made up her mind. She knocked the ball at the wrong angle, so that it missed the net altogether and bounced sidelong into the shorter trimmed hedge on her side of the court.

      “Alice! What are you doing?” Victor’s voice was filled with disgust. With a shrug and shamefaced smile his way, she skipped toward the hedge. She stooped to retrieve the ball where it had landed in the soil beneath the hedge and stood in time to meet the young secretary coming along the path.

      “Hello, Mr. Tennent.”

      He looked different in the bright sun. Hatless, his short ebony curls gleamed. His face was slim, the cheekbones rather prominent, but his eyes were as dark and intense as the day before.

      They widened slightly as if surprised that she’d remembered his name. “Hello, Miss Shepard.”

      She thought of him confined to that tiny office. “Would you like to join in the match?” With his tall, lean build, he would probably prove a swift player.

      His gaze flickered over the court then returned to her. “No, thank you.” His tone sounded more formal than yesterday.

      “We’re having ever so much fun.”

      He looked away from her. “I have no time for sports.”

      She fingered the edge of her racket, refusing to give up so easily. “I should think playing a hard game of tennis would help you in your work.”

      A slight crease formed between his dark brows. “I fail to see how swinging at a ball on a grassy lawn would aid me in figuring the financial assets of a company.”

      “Exercising your body will keep your mind sharp.”

      Amusement began to dislodge the severity of his expression. She leaned forward, pressing home her point. “It’s been scientifically proven. You are breathing more deeply of oxygen, for one thing. More than in that airless cubbyhole my father has you closeted in.”

      Before he could say anything, Victor shouted from the court, “Are you going to join the game or remain talking to a clerk all day?” Laughter from the others drifted over to them.

      She turned back to the court, ashamed of her friends in that moment. She remembered the secretary’s question of the day before. These “friends” were mere acquaintances, offspring of her parents’ friends, forced on her during the holidays to keep her company.

      Mr. Tennent’s face remained expressionless. “If you’ll excuse me—”

      “Wait.” She stopped, casting about for another way to lengthen their exchange, not quite sure why. “Why don’t you join me for a game tomorrow—” her mind ran on, thinking of possibilities “—before breakfast, before you begin working.”

      He looked away from her. “I know nothing of the game.” The words came out stiffly as if forced out of him.

      She laughed, relieved. For a moment she’d thought perhaps it was her company he didn’t want. “That’s all right. I can teach you.”

      His eyes widened slightly before resuming their formality. “I have no time for games. Good morning.” Before she could draw breath to argue, he hurried off.

      She looked at his receding back, frowning at the rebuff.

      “Come on, Alice, or you shall have to forfeit the game.”

      With a sigh of frustration, she hurried back to her place, prepared to meet Victor’s serve.

      Lucy gave a disbelieving laugh across the court. “Goodness, Alice, are you so bored you’re forced to seek out your father’s employees?”

      “Why shouldn’t I be nice to Father’s employees? Maybe he’ll prove a better tennis player than all of you!” More determined than ever to get the serious young man out on the tennis court, she whacked the ball that came flying toward her.

      Nick shook his head over the report. The mining company had already had one shaft collapse in the last year. Another was hardly producing. If he were a partner, he’d recommend to Mr. Shepard that he sell his shares of the company.

      He gathered up the papers and prepared to go to the larger office adjoining his “airless cubbyhole,” as the young Miss Shepard had put it. He paused, considering once again the girl’s invitation to a game of tennis. To lessons, no less! He told himself once again, as he had all the rest of the afternoon, that it was nonsense. No matter that no one of her class had ever bothered to notice someone as lowly as a clerk, let alone issue such a friendly invitation….

      The girl was no more than fifteen if she was a day. She was his employer’s daughter. He had no business daydreaming of her, lovely creature or not.

      He stopped at Mr. Shepard’s door, hearing a female voice. Nick paused, his hand on the knob, his breath held.

      “But Papa, why can’t you go rowing with us? The day is glorious and we shall have such a grand time on the water.”

      “You know I must return to town tomorrow, and I have work this afternoon. Now, you have your friends here you must amuse.” Shepard’s voice was firm.

      “You’re forever working. It’s a holiday.”

      Something in the plaintive feminine tones caught at Nick’s heart, and he eased open the door a crack.

      Miss Shepard stood with her back to him, in a maroon dress with a large bow at the back where the ruffled material was gathered. Its mid-calf length and her long hair worn down with a matching ribbon told him more clearly than anything else that she was still a schoolgirl.

      “You’ll just have to content yourself with seeing me at dinner this evening.” Mr. Shepard stood and indicated the meeting was over.

      “Very well, Father.” She turned around, her chest heaving in a sigh.

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