Lifelong Affair. Кэрол Мортимер

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СКАЧАТЬ right?’ Jerry was helping her wash her face in cold water when Sam came back into the room.

      ‘Better,’ she nodded, swallowing the nausea down. She had to pull herself together, had to be strong for her parents’ sake, her strong attorney father, her homemaking mother. They were going to be devastated. ‘I’ll have to pick up some things from my apartment,’ she told Sam as he drove her.

      ‘Sure,’ he agreed easily, not intruding on her private thoughts as she lapsed into silence.

      Strangely her apartment still looked the same as when she had left it early this morning, the same casual untidiness that she liked, the galley kitchen, scatter cushions placed on her corner unit in the lounge, a cup still standing on the dining-room table from where she had had breakfast, plants arranged about the whole apartment, one of her weaknesses, her other one being the Walt Disney posters in her bedroom. She knew that the general public, after her portrayal of Mary-Beth, would never believe her liking for all things Disney, but it had remained with her from a trip to Disneyland when she was a child. A trip both she and Glenna had loved. Oh God, Glenna …!

      All this was a terrible dream, one that she couldn’t believe until someone could tell her it was true, someone who really knew. After all, the news item could have been wrong; maybe Glenna and Mark hadn’t been on that flight, maybe they should have been but something had prevented them making it, maybe—–

      The telephone at her bedside began ringing, and she snatched up the receiver, feeling her heart plummet at the sound of her mother’s voice, a strangely strong voice, her mother seeming filled with a determination that wasn’t a normal facet of her nature, their father the strong one.

      ‘You’ve heard, Morgan?’ she asked briskly.

      ‘Yes,’ her voice caught huskily. ‘It was on the television just now.’

      Her mother sighed. ‘I wonder if they realise how cruel they can be,’ she said waspishly, a small black-haired woman of fifty, filled with a restless energy that put younger women to shame. ‘Alex Hammond called us a short time ago, so at least we didn’t hear that way.’

      Alex Hammond. A picture of a tall dark-haired man with a remote manner, autocratic features; piercing grey eyes, aquiline nose, thinned lips, determined jaw, and a lithe athletic body came to mind. Mark’s brother, the elder by eight years at thirty-eight, he ran the family business like a well-oiled cog, had little time for the rest of the human race, having no wife and apparently no steady woman in his life either. Morgan had met him only once, at the wedding two years ago, and she hadn’t liked him, not his arrogance or his haughtiness.

      ‘I would have telephoned you at the studio,’ her mother continued, her voice showing some sign of strain now. ‘But I’ve been busy with—Your father collapsed, Morgan,’ her voice broke, still a little trembly as she continued. ‘He answered the telephone to Mr Hammond, and he seemed all right at the time. Then he just—he’s had a heart attack!’

      This was worse than a nightmare, the whole world was going crazy! ‘I—Is he—–’

      ‘He’s in hospital, but his condition has stabilised,’ her mother hastily assured her. ‘The doctors are sure he’s going to be all right.’

      ‘I’m coming home—–’

      ‘No! Morgan, I told Alex Hammond we would be coming to you—that was before your father collapsed, of course. He said he would get in touch again when he knew anything more than that Glenna and Mark were on the plane.’ The line went silent for several minutes, as her mother fought for control. ‘He was expecting to know more later today.’

      Alex Hammond would be the type of man who demanded, not asked for, that information. And he had such a presence of authority that he would get the answers too!

      ‘I’d rather come home. Mr Hammond will realise I’m there when he gets no answer here.’

      ‘I’m not at home, Morgan,’ her mother told her softly. ‘I’m going to stay at the hospital with your father tonight.’

      ‘Are you sure there’s no danger?’ Morgan asked sharply, wondering if her mother was telling her everything.

      ‘The doctors assure me there isn’t,’ she was hastily assured. ‘But I’d rather be with him tonight. Please stay in Los Angeles and wait for Mr Hammond to contact you. I’d hate for us to miss his call.’

      Her mother was right, she knew she was, and yet she felt she should go to her father. But if Alex Hammond should telephone while she was in transit …! ‘I’ll wait, Mom,’ she said softly. ‘And I’ll call you at the hospital as soon as I know anything.’ There was only one hospital in the small California town her parents lived in. ‘Give Dad my love.’

      ‘I will, dear. And don’t worry, things could still be all right with Glenna and Mark.’

      She couldn’t move after putting down the receiver. Her mother was being optimistic, and they both knew it. Glenna was going to be dead, Mark too, and their poor little baby that hadn’t even begun to live. And no matter how light her mother made of the heart attack she knew her father was gravely ill.

      ‘I thought I heard the telephone—–’

      With a strangled cry she turned and flung herself into Sam’s waiting arms, a dam seeming to burst as she sobbed it all out to him, finding comfort in his lean strength as he led her back to the lounge, holding her close against his chest as she sat close beside him on the corner unit.

      ‘She was so beautiful, Sam,’ she choked, her tears having wet his shirt front. ‘I can’t believe she’s dead—and in that way. No wonder Dad took it so hard,’ she shuddered.

      ‘I know, honey. I know,’ he soothed, smoothing back her hair with a gentle hand, surprisingly so considering their size and strength. Tall and slender as she was, Sam made her feel cherished and cared for, his manners were always without fault, never too forward, but always friendly.

      ‘You never met Glenna, did you?’ she mumbled into his shirt.

      ‘I’ve seen her in the movies. She was beautiful,’ he acknowledged. ‘Very like you.’

      Again they were talking in the past tense, and it was with a sense of deep pain that she realised she would probably never see her sister again. Of a similar age, the two of them had always been very close, had shared friends and clothes during their teenage years, continuing to keep those same friends as the years passed. Everyone was going to be heartbroken when they learnt the fiery-haired Glenna was no longer with them.

      ‘Everyone loved her, Sam,’ she continued huskily. ‘She was so much fun, so—so full of life!’ Her voice broke over the last.

      Everyone had loved Glenna—except the Hammonds. Glenna and Mark had a private wing in the Hammond house, the widowed Rita Hammond and her bachelor son occupying the other wing, while the married daughter Janet lived several miles away with her husband and two daughters. Rita Hammond and her daughter Janet had shown their disapproval of Mark marrying an American actress from the first; the formidable Alex Hammond had been indifferent. Mark was a charming rogue, very dark and handsome, but he was no match for the rest of his family, resisting all Glenna’s efforts to persuade him to move to America, claiming that he had to stay in England to work in the family firm, and also claiming it was unnecessary to have a house of their own when the family house was so big.

      Living СКАЧАТЬ