was the hold-up?’ she wanted to know. Oh, crumbs. Leyne glanced at her raven-haired niece, but before she could make any reply, Pip, taking a deep breath, was plunging on, ‘Was it something to do with my father?’
‘Oh, darling,’ Leyne cried. That direct look was there in Pip’s eyes again. How could she lie to her? ‘I’ve—been making enquiries,’ she answered.
‘And?’
As she should have known, Pip would not leave it there. ‘And I’m sorry, love, it’s still going to take some while.’
‘But you’re a bit further forward?’
‘Um—yes,’ Leyne had to admit, and felt as guilty as the devil when a beaming smile broke over her niece’s earnest expression.
‘When you do find out who my father is, will you arrange for me to meet him?’ she asked—and Leyne’s heart sank.
She had no idea how long Pip had been nurturing a need to not only know who her father was but, as Pip’s grandmother had said, would want to meet him too. But it seemed to Leyne then that the least she could do would be to prepare her for the fact that her father was trying to deny that he was her father.
Leyne pulled her to her and gave her a hug. ‘You have to be prepared for disappointment, darling,’ she said gently.
‘How?’ Pip looked puzzled, clearly not understanding.
‘Beautiful though you are, sweetheart, he—um—may not want to meet you.’
Pip’s answer was to break out into a huge grin. ‘He will,’ she said confidently. ‘I know he will. I feel it. I—just—feel it.’ Another huge grin, and, ‘Would you like me to make you some coffee?’
Oh, heavens. Leyne wondered how the child could be so sure, feel so sure her father would want to meet her, when she had attained the age of eleven and he had never bothered to look her up. Pip was not to know that Jack Dangerfield had not—up until today—even known he had fathered a daughter, much less that he was denying even knowing her mother.
Not for the first time Leyne wished that her sister was home, so Max could make the delicate decisions that had to be made.
But, as though conjuring her up, Max rang that night. Though Leyne did not get to know it had been Max until it was too late.
Leyne was in the study at work, intent with complicated matter on her computer, when the phone rang. Absently she reached for it and then heard Pip call, ‘I’ll get it.’ Leyne smiled. Her niece, on her way to bed, may have said ‘bye’ to her friend Alice only an hour ago, but they still had lots to say to each other.
Unusually, Pip was not on the phone for very long, but only a few minutes later came into the study. ‘That was Mummy,’ she said happily. And, as Leyne instinctively reached for the phone extension, ‘She’s gone,’ Pip informed her. ‘Mum said she was in a great hurry, so it was just a snatched call from the nearest landline before they went off again, and goodness knows when she will be able to ring again. She said sorry not to have rung before, but she couldn’t ring us on her mobile because she lost it in the river. She said to give you her love and a hug and to tell you that the beast’—that would be Ben Turnbull, Leyne guessed— ‘has mellowed a bit, though wasn’t too chuffed when she dropped some of his stuff in the river too.’
There was so much Leyne wanted to ask her sister, but it was too late now. ‘Happy, chick?’ she asked softly.
Pip nodded. ‘I wanted to ask Mum about my father—but I couldn’t,’ she confessed. ‘And then Mum said she had to charge off, and something about tribes and the Amazon, but that she just wanted to hear my lovely voice before she and her knight in tarnished armour tried to catch up on a slipped timetable.’
Pip went to bed elated that her mother had made contact, blissfully unaware of the agitation of her aunt’s thoughts.
While Leyne realised that her sister’s lost telephone explained why her phone had been unanswered each time she had tried to contact her, Leyne could not help but wish that Max had rung ten minutes later than she had. If she’d done that then Pip would have been in bed and Leyne would have been able to have some kind of a private conversation with her. A conversation where she could have asked her what she wanted her to do with regard to Pip wanting to know, and meet, her father.
Leyne realised that it was because Max had wanted a few snatched words with Pip before her daughter went to bed that she had rung at the time she had. And, recalling Pip’s overjoyed face, Leyne felt mean that she would have preferred in this particular instance if Max had phoned at some other time. As it was, heaven alone knew when she would ring again.
Leyne’s thoughts drifted to the man who, it was becoming more and more evident, had not been informed that he was a father. What had gone wrong between her sister and Jack Dangerfield Leyne had no clue, but perhaps he was lying. Remembering his astonishment, somehow Leyne did not think he was. Up until today he’d had absolutely no idea that his time with Max had resulted in a daughter.
A daughter he was trying to deny. Well, tough! It was about time he faced up to his responsibilities. The fact that, as chairman of J. Dangerfield, Engineers, he must be a very responsible person had nothing to do with it. Responsible in business he might be; the same could not be said for his private life!
Dianne Gardner was called away again early the next morning, and said she was likely to be away for a couple of days. She was worried because her ex-husband was too committed to have Alice with him, but Leyne assured her there was no need to worry and that she would be pleased to have Alice stay with them. Dropping the girls off at school on Tuesday, Leyne drove on to her office and delivered the work she had finished the previous evening. Explaining that she needed to work from home, she stuffed her briefcase with enough work to keep her busy for the next two days.
As it happened, it suited her very well to work from home. Should Jack Dangerfield’s PA ring, she would be there to take the call.
That call did not come, and by Thursday Leyne had formed the opinion that this had gone on long enough! Only last evening she had glanced up and found Pip’s eyes on her, silently asking the question, Is there any news yet?
Feeling uptight herself as she drove to her office, Leyne could only imagine how much worse it must be for her young niece. That being so, the minute she had the office to herself, she rang the offices of J. Dangerfield, Engineers, and went through the same procedure as before.
This time, though, when she heard voice number three, she changed it slightly. ‘My name is Leyne Rowberry,’ she said firmly. ‘I would like to speak with Mr Dangerfield.’
‘Just one moment, Miss Rowberry. I’ll see if he’s available,’ the efficient-sounding voice answered to her surprise.
Leyne waited, fully expecting to be told that Mr Dangerfield was in Timbuktu, or somewhere equally unlikely, when, to her further surprise, the next voice she heard—was his!
‘Miss Rowberry,’ he said.
‘Mr Dangerfield,’ she replied, and was stumped for the moment by the realisation that she must have previously been talking to his PA, who must know something of her to have let her through her screening position.
‘You rang me?’ he reminded her when she had nothing to add.
‘You
