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‘Your mother,’ her grandmother told her quietly. ‘Painted just before her eighteenth birthday. It wasn’t long afterwards that she… she left us. Come and sit down. I want to hear all about you.’ She saw the concern and apprehension cloud the hazel eyes which were so like her own late husband’s, and said gently, ‘Sara, something’s wrong. What is it?’
How quickly and easily it all tumbled out! Her father, Cressy… and Tom. Most of all, Tom… Her love for him, and also her fear.
She badly wanted to cry, but she was so used to controlling her feelings for the benefit of others that she wouldn’t allow tears to fall.
‘Cressy is right,’ her grandmother said when she had finished. ‘You had to come here. And I’m so pleased that you have.’
Later, she would try to find out why this grandchild of hers had never responded to her constant pleas that she at least agree to see her… Her late son-in-law had a good deal to answer for, she suspected. She had never liked him, never considered him good enough for her daughter. But selfishness was not something that was restricted to other people’s families, as she had good cause to know. For now, it was enough that Sara had come home. And home was where she was going to stay.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_7335dbe5-e888-571a-98f9-eefa1d00ddb1)
SHE TOLD SARA as much over dinner, and was shocked by the look of agonised relief in her granddaughter’s eyes. Alice Fitton had spent many long hours wondering about this grandchild of hers, trying to understand why it was that she had rejected their every overture of love and regret.
She had thought that Sara must be like her father: strong-willed, self-centred, uncaring of the emotional needs of others through a lack of ever having experienced them for herself. But less than half an hour in Sara’s company had been enough to show her how wrong she was.
The other girl, now—Cressida… But Cressida was no concern of hers, other than that Sara seemed to be overly concerned about her welfare. Sara was speaking to her now.
‘Cressy, why don’t you stay the night?’ she urged her stepsister. ‘Gran is right. It’s a long journey back at this time of the evening. And, besides, if you stay, it will help Tom to feel a little more settled.’
It was the wrong thing to say. Cressy frowned, an acid sharpening of her eyes and mouth dimming her normal prettiness.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, stop fussing, Sara. Tom will be perfectly all right. Anyway, I have to leave. I have an appointment first thing in the morning, and then there’s an audition for a day-time soap.’
Cressy had quickly realised that there was no way she would ever be able to charm Alice Fitton. The older woman had seen right through her, but Luke…
She smiled secretly to herself.
‘I could always drive up at the weekend,’ she offered tentatively.
‘Oh, yes…’
Sighing faintly to herself, Alice said nothing. Perhaps she was being very uncharitable, but there was something about Cressy that she just didn’t like or trust. But Sara, her heart full of happiness and relief, could only remember that if it hadn’t been for Cressy’s insistence she would not be here. And Cressy had been right to urge her to come; her grandmother had made her welcome. Already there was a rapport between them that Sara had never known with anyone else. Already she felt at home in a way she had never experienced before. Unlike her father, her grandmother did not despise her.
‘After we’ve finished eating, I’ll take you and Tom upstairs, and you can choose your own bedrooms. Luke will be pleased when he knows you’re going to stay. He’s always telling me I’m too old to be on my own.’ The way she smiled robbed the words of any unkind intent, but Sara could not help feeling resentful on behalf of her grandmother. Who was this Luke to dare to tell her what she should and should not do?
‘What’s the matter?’ her grandmother asked perceptively.
‘Who exactly is Luke?’ Sara asked her uncertainly.
‘Of course, how could you know? Silly of me! It’s just that he’s been a part of the family for so long now that I forgot that you wouldn’t realise. Luke Gallagher was married to your cousin Louise.’
Her cousin? Of course, Luke was the widowed husband of the cousin Cressy had told her about.
‘He has very many business interests, both here and in Australia, which keep him very busy,’ her grandmother sighed. ‘Too busy, I sometimes think.’
It was becoming increasingly plain to Sara that her grandmother held this Luke in the greatest affection, and she was equally sure, from that one hard, encompassing look he had given her, that Luke was not going to be inclined to favour her arrival.
What her grandmother chose to do was no concern of Luke’s, Sara told herself staunchly, and yet she was left with the lowering feeling that, if Luke chose to do so, he could make her life acutely uncomfortable for her. But why should he? He probably only visited her grandmother at irregular intervals, when he was in the country.
Sara didn’t care for all this talk about Luke. It was making her feel acutely edgy. She didn’t know why the very thought of the man had such an unwarranted effect on her; she was normally the calmest of creatures. Men had never figured very largely in her life. At twenty-three, her experience of them was limited to the odd date, mainly with sons of friends of her father’s, young men she had always felt uncomfortably sure had been dragooned into taking her out, and for that reason she had usually ended up tongue-tied and awkward in their company, knowing that given the choice they must surely have preferred to take out someone like her stepsister.
It wasn’t that she didn’t like the opposite sex, it was simply that there had never been much time for her to get to know any of them on her own terms.
‘Well, my dear, if you really do want to leave this evening, we mustn’t delay you.’
She realised that her grandmother was inviting Cressy to leave. She and Tom went out to the car with her. Even though she and Cressy did not always see eye-to-eye, she was reluctant to see her go.
Harrison, her grandmother’s chauffeur-cum-handyman, had already removed their luggage from the car.
‘Well, with a bit of luck I’ll see you both next weekend.’
Sara stepped forward to hug her, but Cressy moved back, grimacing faintly.
Unlike her, she had always been sparing with her gestures of affection, especially to Tom and herself, Sara acknowledged a little unhappily.
‘I thought you were going to be busy getting ready for your trip to America,’ she reminded Cressy, a tiny frown puckering her forehead as she remembered her stepsister’s glib explanation for the unseemly haste with which she had insisted they all come up here.
Tom had moved away from them and they were virtually standing alone. Sara felt her skin burn as Cressy taunted unkindly, ‘What’s wrong? Would you prefer to have Luke all to yourself, is that it?’ She had driven off before Sara could make any response. She didn’t usually let Cressy’s bitterness upset her so much, but for some reason her final comment had made her eyes sting with hot tears.
‘Come inside. It’s getting quite cool. I think we’ll get Harrison to light the sitting-room fire.’
There was a firm dependability about her grandmother, Sara recognised, and a gentleness that made her aware of all that she had missed in not knowing her while she was growing up. It would have meant so much to her to have this woman, this house, as a bolt-hole during the often turbulent and uncomfortable days of her teens; days when she had felt so at odds with her father and his values; days when she had felt so alone and unloved.
She knew instinctively that here she would not have experienced those feelings, and that she and her grandmother would have been attuned to one another.
‘Sara, you are so different from what I’d imagined,’ her grandmother commented as she led her upstairs. ‘When you never replied to any of our letters—’
Sara stopped and stared at her.
‘There were no letters,’ she told her, shocked into unguarded speech.
‘But, my dear, there were… Every birthday, every Christmas, at holiday time… Up until the day you were eighteen. They were sent to your father, of course.’ She paused diplomatically, while Sara clung to the polished wood of the banister, trying to take in what she had just heard.
‘You wrote? But…’
‘But your father never told you!’ Alice Fitton guessed intuitively. ‘Well, perhaps he had his reasons. I must confess that there was a good deal of bitterness between him and my husband, especially when he refused to allow your mother to come home to have you… We knew how fragile she was, you see, but he insisted on taking her to Italy with him.’
‘He was in the middle of his first book,’ Sara whispered, her eyes dark with shock.
She had heard the story so often. How her father had been working on his first book, how he had needed to do research in Italy, and how she had been born there. She had never once heard him say that her mother had been invited to stay with her parents. Quite the contrary. Without saying so in as many words, he had nevertheless implied that his in-laws had cruelly refused to have anything to do with their daughter, even when they knew she was carrying their grandchild.
She looked into her grandmother’s eyes, and knew that she was telling her the truth.
‘But why?’ she asked painfully. ‘Why not tell me?’
‘Perhaps partially to punish your grandfather and I, my dear. You see, I don’t think your father ever really forgave us for not considering him the right husband for our daughter.’ There was sorrow and pain in her voice, and Sara couldn’t help thinking her father’s resentment must surely have been fuelled by the knowledge that they were probably right. No one liked to admit that their judgement was surpassed by some other’s, especially not a man like her father. But even understanding what had motivated him did not make it entirely easy for her to forgive him. It would have meant so little to him, and so much to her. She thought of all the holidays she had spent, either alone, or farmed out with friends, because her father had better things to do than to entertain a small child.
It was those memories of pain that made her so protective of Tom, she acknowledged, glancing at her half-brother now.
‘Yes, he looks tired,’ her grandmother agreed.
‘It was for his sake that I allowed Cressy to persuade me to come here,’ Sara told her. ‘He suffers from an asthmatic condition that makes a quiet country life-style imperative.’
‘Don’t worry, Sara. This house is more than big enough to accommodate one extra child. I’m sure we shall hardly notice that Tom is here. My dear, did you really think for a moment that you would be turned away? Oh, Sara! How guilty you make me feel that we didn’t try harder to make contact with you.’
Tom chose a small room with a dormer window and a sloping roof. The window looked out on to a patchwork of fields, stretching away into the purple distance of the hills.
Already he seemed happier, more relaxed, more the way a boy his age should look, thought Sara, watching him covertly.
She elected to have the room next to Tom’s.
‘This is mine,’ her grandmother told her, indicating a further door. ‘And this one is Luke’s. He insists on sleeping close at hand, in case I need anything during the night.’ She pulled a wry but indulgent face. ‘I keep telling him that I’m far from that decrepit yet.’ And then her smile faded as she turned and caught Sara’s rebellious expression.
‘What is it, Sara?’ she asked gently. ‘Every time I mention Luke’s name, you almost flinch.’
‘I didn’t realise he actually lived here.’ Sara bit her lip, aware of how breathless and nervy her voice sounded. ‘I suppose it’s just that I’m not used to such overpoweringly male men,’ she added in a brief attempt at humor, trying to cover her obvious dismay. She didn’t want to upset her grandmother by seeming to dislike a man she clearly held in high esteem.
‘Yes, Luke is very male, which makes it all the more surprising…’ Her grandmother broke off and grimaced faintly. ‘Well, I can tell you, Sara. After all, you are my granddaughter. I’m worried about Luke. He should marry again…’
‘Perhaps he prefers not to put someone else in his first wife’s place,’ Sara suggested gently, and earned herself a rather odd look from her grandmother. At first she thought the old lady was going to say something else, but obviously she had changed her mind, because she gave a small shrug and turned back to return downstairs.
Privately, Sara suspected there would be any number of women only too willing to fill the empty place left in Luke’s life by the death of his wife, with or without a wedding ring.
Of course, she herself was immune to his brand of raw sexuality.
‘Luke might be a very wealthy, very intelligent man, but he’s still human, and still vulnerable,’ her grandmother told her, shrewdly reading her mind. ‘Let’s go downstairs and have some coffee. Anna normally brings me a tray about this time.’
Anna was her grandmother’s housekeeper and cook, a pretty, plump woman in her late forties.
Anna and Harrison both apparently had their own flats in the converted mews building over what had once been the stables and were now garages.
‘When Luke comes back, he can show you the grounds properly. I don’t walk as much these days as I used to.’
‘Tell me about the house,’ Sara asked impulsively when they were sitting down. Instinctively, her glance went to the portrait of her mother above the mantelpiece. Seeing it, her grandmother said gently, ‘Another day, perhaps, when I can show you round, and then you’ll find it more interesting. After all,’ she teased, ‘it’s been here for close on four hundred years—it isn’t going to disappear overnight!’
‘I don’t know,’ Sara laughed. ‘It even looks like something out of a fairy-tale to me. I had no idea…’
‘There have been Fittons in this part of the country for many, many years. Shakespeare even wrote about one.’
‘Mary Fitton, of course,’ Sara supplied, remembering the tragic story of Shakespeare’s dark lady of the sonnets.
‘Why don’t I tell you about your mother, instead?’
‘Well, if you’re sure you won’t find it painful…’
Her grandmother shook her head.
‘No, my dear. After all, I’ve had over twenty-three years in which to accustom myself to the loss of your mother. Sometimes, not often, but sometimes, in my darkest moments, I wonder if it’s true that the Fitton name is cursed—there have been so many small tragedies. But then your grandfather would remind me that in any family with a history stretching a long way into the past there are similar sorrows and worse.
‘Your mother was a delightful child—headstrong, pretty, very like you, physically.’ And although she didn’t say it, she acknowledged that her daughter had had an inner light, a brightness that had either been quenched in her granddaughter or never allowed to be lit.
Now that she had the full story of the tragedy that had struck the small family, she was doubly appalled at her son-in-law’s selfishness. To have made no provision for his family, especially when it contained such a young and physically vulnerable child…
‘It’s time I was in bed,’ she told Sara with a smile. ‘It’s been a very exciting day for me. Don’t worry about getting up in the morning.’
‘You mustn’t spoil me,’ Sara protested. ‘I ought to be thinking about what I’m going to do with the rest of my life. I should try and find out about some sort of training. I’ve got my secretarial qualifications. Do you think I might be able to find a job in Chester?’
‘That’s something we can talk about later,’ she was told firmly. ‘For the moment, you need to rest and relax. Goodnight, my dear.’
She had been so lucky, Sara marvelled as she prepared for bed; so much, much more lucky than she had ever dreamed she might be. That her grandmother should have welcomed both her and Tom so generously; that she should be so prepared to take them in and love them… She could hardly believe it was true.
There was only one thing to mar her happiness. Or, rather, one person.
Luke!
She shivered slightly beneath the fine linen sheets, reliving the sensation of his hands on her skin as he supported her. That he had been totally unaware of her as a woman she didn’t need telling. It had been there in the brief, dismissive glance he gave her before turning his attention to Cressy.
But then that indifference had changed to a fierce, biting contempt that had blasted her fragile self-confidence, leaving her acutely vulnerable to the dislike she had felt emanating from him.
Was it just because Cressy had misrepresented her to him? She told herself that a man who could be so easily deceived by her stepsister’s pretty face wasn’t worth bothering about, but she couldn’t dismiss him so easily.
If she stayed here, he was going to be part of the fabric of her life. Her grandmother plainly adored him. Sara was dangerously tempted to leave, but how could she? She had Tom to think about. Tom, who already seemed to have settled into his new environment.
At least Luke wasn’t there all the time, if he constantly came and went on business. And if he really disliked her as much as she believed, he would be as anxious to avoid her as she was to avoid him.
So why did she feel this nagging sense of danger? Why did she find herself thinking of him as the serpent in her new-found Eden?
Although she hadn’t intended to, she did oversleep. Tom woke her up, announcing that he had had his breakfast and that he was ready to explore.
‘Harrison is going to show me everything,’ he told her importantly.
Did Harrison know not to take him near anything furred or feathered? Anxiously, Sara got up, instructing him to stay inside until she was ready to go out with him.
She donned her usual uniform of jeans and sweater, pausing only for a moment to admire the view from her bedroom window.
Her grandmother, she learned from Anna, always had breakfast in her own room.
‘It’s her heart,’ the housekeeper told her. ‘She must rest as much as she can, but she does not always do so. Although Luke does what he can to remove most of the burden from her shoulders, there is still much work involved in organising the maintenance and running of a house such as this one.’
Listening to her, Sara made a vow there and then that she would do as much as she could to remove that burden from her grandmother’s shoulders.
After breakfast, Harrison showed them round the gardens. How easy it would be to allow oneself to slip back in time here, if only in the imagination, Sara thought, marvelling at the intricacy and cleverness of a cleverly fashioned knot garden.
There was an avenue of clipped yews and quiet, shadowed pathways that led to small, secret, enclosed gardens with old-fashioned, wrought-iron benches. In one was a sundial, engraved with quotations from Shakespeare’s sonnets, and in another a white-painted summer-house, shaped like a small pavilion.
How could her mother have endured to leave all this? Sara could only marvel at the power of human emotions. Had she been brought up here, could she have turned her back on it and the love of her parents to go off with a man like her father?
Perhaps it was the insecurity of her own childhood from which had grown this deep-rooted need for security. Her mother, the child of such security, might not have experienced its need quite so sharply. It was true that familiarity could breed contempt.
