A Secret, A Safari, A Second Chance. Liz Fielding

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СКАЧАТЬ Merchant welcome them and introduce the auction.

      She had the same colouring as Kit, Eve thought; the same sun-streaked hair, the same vivid blue eyes. Lost in memories of that night, she heard little of her introduction to the cause for which the auction was being held.

      ‘Let’s go and check out the trips,’ Martha said, when she was done.

      Monitors showed film of the trips on offer at Merchant resorts and some of their partners, in fabulous locations.

      There was whale watching off the west coast, trips to Europe—vineyards in France, culture in Italy, golfing and fishing in Scotland—but it was the last one, the wildlife safari, that brought a gasp to Eve’s lips.

      The Nymba Safari Lodge had been built high amongst the trees with viewing platforms where you could watch animals in a landscape that was painfully familiar. There was a glimpse of a giraffe at sunset, forelegs spreadeagled as it drank at the oxbow lake. There was the dusty green bark of fever trees, a family of warthogs snuffling through the grass.

      ‘Eve?’

      ‘Nymba... It was our home,’ she said. ‘It’s where we lived...’

      The cover of the brochure for the safari trip had a photograph of a mama elephant, trunk curled protectively around her calf, and Eve picked it up, instinctively hugging it to her.

      Nymba...

      It was what her mother had called their boma. The word meant home and for just a moment she could hear her mother’s voice as she’d given her a hug before putting a small grey velvet elephant in her arms and sending her off to school.

       ‘This little elephant’s trunk is my arm, Evie. Hold onto it when you’re lost...put it around you when you need a hug...’

      She wished she could wind the clock back to those last few weeks with her.

      ‘Excuse me? Can I get in there?’

      The woman waited for her to move and Eve stepped back, forcing a smile as she turned to Martha.

      ‘There are some really exciting trips on offer. Have you seen anything you like?’ she asked.

      ‘I was hoping for something a little more relaxing than zip-lining through a rainforest,’ she said, ‘but this one could have been made for you. Your grandmother left you some money and you could do with a break.’

      ‘That’s rainy-day money and, anyway, Hannah is too young to come with me.’

      ‘The rule with an inheritance is to give ten per cent, save ten per cent and spend the rest,’ Martha said. ‘Serendipitously, if you were to make a winning bid for the safari, you’d be economising by giving and spending at the same time.’

      Eve laughed at her logic but shook her head. ‘Good try, but I couldn’t leave Hannah.’

      ‘It’s only for ten days. I don’t imagine you took her to lectures with you when she was a baby? Teaching practice?’

      ‘Well, no. Obviously. She is in a wonderful day nursery, but I’ve never left her at night. She’d miss me.’ And she knew everything there was to know about missing your mother.

      ‘Mary would love to have her stay and Hannah would have a great time with her cousins.’

      ‘You’re very free with your daughter’s hospitality.’

      But Eve knew her godmother was right.

      Mary was one of those women who wrapped you up in a hug and instantly made the world seem a better place. Older, she’d been married and living in New York when Eve’s mother had died, or things might have been very different.

      Now she and her husband were back on the island with their three children and a menagerie of pets, and Hannah adored, and was adored by, all of them. Every sentence seemed to begin with Cara and Jason and Lacey...

      ‘Okay,’ she admitted. ‘I’d miss her.’ Putting an end to the discussion, she turned to a rail journey across the US. ‘This hits the less strenuous requirement,’ she said. ‘Or how about this camel trek across the desert? Camping out under the stars. You might meet a dark-eyed sheikh. Very romantic.’

      ‘There is nothing in the least bit romantic about camels, Eve. They spit.’

      ‘Okay... Is there anything here that you do fancy?’

      ‘I’m rather taken with the idea of sailing down the Adriatic from Venice to the Greek islands in that classic nineteenth-century sailing yacht, and if Kit Merchant happened to be at the helm there would always be something attractive to look at.’

      Eve felt her cheeks heat at the mention of his name. ‘Isn’t he estranged from his family?’

      ‘There was a big row three or four years ago. Christopher didn’t want him to take part in the round-the-world race. He said it was time to stop playing and concentrate on the business.’

      ‘Sailing is his life.’

      ‘The resort is his father’s.’

      Eve had to clear her throat, stop herself from looking around, although she suddenly felt as if she had a great big sign on her back saying ‘HERE’ before she could manage a bright, ‘Maybe a brush with death will soften his father’s attitude.’

      ‘Maybe. Ah, now this is the one I’ve been looking for.’ Martha picked up a pen, wrote her name and a substantial bid for a vacation at the Merchant Spa in Phuket. Then she held out the pen. ‘Your turn.’

      Eve looked back at the African trip.

      ‘Just to show my support,’ she said, raising a fairly modest bid that someone had already made.

      She had only just put down the pen when a man picked it up and outbid her.

      Martha had met someone she knew and, while she was talking, Eve checked by how much she’d been outbid. Five hundred dollars... It was still ridiculously cheap, and she placed another bid.

      Just to help push up the price.

      She straightened to find Martha, thoughtful, watching and guiltily put down the pen. ‘It’s going to go much higher.’

      ‘They’re starting to serve dinner,’ she said. ‘We should go back to our table.’

      As they moved away someone else stepped up to make another bid. As Eve smothered a squeak of protest, Martha took her arm.

      ‘Leave it until after dinner when we know what we’re up against.’

      ‘Yes... No!’ Realising how quickly she’d been sucked in, she said, ‘Wow, that’s dangerous.’

      ‘The trick is to decide on your top bid and not to get carried away. Well, not too much,’ Martha added, smiling.

      ‘Oh, no, I’m done,’ Eve declared, but she couldn’t stop herself from looking back, fingers twitching.

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