Page 77 of Rivals at Ashmore Castle

Now he let her go, and stepped back politely, and she stooped to pay attention to Dolly, which usefully hid her face for a moment. ‘She’s getting fat,’ she said.

‘Not fat. She’s had a lot of pups. Spoils your figure.’

She stood up, and they looked at each other for a long moment, out of words. She noticed the gleam of golden hairs on his cheeks and chin. He only shaved every other day, unless he was going somewhere special. It gave her a strange, hollow feeling to know that about him. His hair was wind-ruffled, the sunshine picking out the russet in it, soft-looking. At the banquet it had been oiled down, smooth and dark gold. She liked it better like this.

He was studying her in the same detail. ‘I hear your sister’s young man’s visiting,’ he said.

She didn’t ask how he knew. ‘Yes. His father died and he came into the title and a fortune, so they can get married now.’

‘When’s that going to be?’

‘The beginning of October.’ She searched for something more to tell him. ‘I’m going to be her bridesmaid.’

‘New dress for that, for sure?’

‘Something fancy, I expect. Not me at all.’

‘You’d look good in anything,’ he said tenderly, and she wanted to cry.

‘You looked good in your new suit, at the celebration banquet,’ she said.

He made a restless movement of his head. ‘Lot o’ nonsense.’

‘I’ve been thinking about that time recently, about the train crash.’

He looked at her seriously. ‘Don’t say I’m a hero. I only did what anyone would do.’

She shook her head. ‘I think you’ve got it the wrong way round. You’re not a hero because of what you did. You did what you did because you’re a hero.’

He had nothing to say to that. It would take some thinking about.

She went on, smiling faintly, ‘And you have to let people admire you if they want to. It’s just good manners.’

That made him smile too. ‘If you say so.’

‘You’re not wearing your medal.’

‘That’s for high days and holidays,’ he said. Then he was grave. ‘Thinking about the train crash,’ he began quietly, ‘is that what makes you look…like a lost soul?’

He had noticed, she thought. Only him – no-one at home. ‘It’s not that.’

‘What then?’

She felt a burning of tears and forced them back ‘Someone in London – a man – deceived me. I…I was foolish, believed everything he said, and it turned out that it was only…’ She stopped.

‘Did he hurt you?’ Axe said, with grim concern.

‘My feelings. My pride. Not…any other way.’

He was silent a moment, and she thought there was some struggle going on inside – perhaps to find the right words. ‘Not all men are like that,’ he said roughly. ‘You’ll get over him. Find someone else. Give it time.’

It was more complicated than that, and of course she hadn’t told him enough for him to understand. She desperately wanted to explain to him, to tell him everything. She wanted him to understand – him, of all people. Him alone – she would never tell anyone else what a fool she had been, how nearly she had been a worse one.

‘I wish I could talk to you,’ she said.

‘You can tell me anything,’ he said.

‘I know,’ she said. That was not the problem, and they both knew it. ‘If we could just be friends…’