and caught her lip between her teeth. “That was wrong of him, of course,” she said in a shaking voice. “Very naughty.”
“Then you can be the one to tell him so.”
“I’m sure you’ve already told him.”
“But he needs to hear it from you, since you seem to be his partner in crime,” Giles said grimly.
“David!” She’d spied him lurking in the hall, and called to him. He came nearer, watching her closely, as though waiting for the storm. “Come here, you wretch,” she said cheerfully. “Now see what you’ve done to me.”
“But you said—”
“I did it to a boy in school who’d been bullying people. He was a fair target. Brenda isn’t. It wasn’t kind of you to make her life hard. Come on, let’s go and tell her you’re sorry.”
“But I’m not sorry,” he said innocently.
“Then fake it,” she told him, leading him away with a hand on his shoulder.
Brenda greeted them frostily but received David’s mumbled apology in astonishment. “And I’m sorry, too,” Melanie said before the housekeeper could recover. “I put the idea into his head, but I didn’t mean to. I’ll be more careful in the future.”
They came out of the kitchen to find Giles in the hall. “I only came home to get my things,” he explained. “I have to fly to New York. The plane leaves in a couple of hours.” He was shrugging on his coat as he spoke, and Melanie saw his bags standing by the front door. “It’s lucky you’re here or I’d have had a problem about leaving.”
“Will you be away for long?” she asked.
“I’ve no idea, but it’ll give you a chance to get to know David. You’re in sole charge.” He turned to David. “I’ve got to go now, son. You’ll behave yourself, won’t you? Don’t give Miss Haynes any trouble. I shall expect good reports of you when I return.”
To hell with good reports, Melanie thought crossly. Tell him you’ll miss him.
David hadn’t spoken. He stood next to Melanie in silence, but as Giles headed for the door he suddenly dashed forward and clasped his father, hiding his face against him. Melanie tensed, ready to hate Giles if he pushed his son away, but he didn’t. To her surprise he dropped onto one knee and put an arm around David. “Hey, come on now,” he said in a rallying voice. “It’s not for long.” David didn’t answer in words but his arms went around his father’s neck. “It’s all right, son,” Giles said in a softer voice than Melanie had heard him use before. “I’m coming back.”
Then he enfolded David in a fierce hug, burying his face in the child’s soft fair hair. When he emerged, his voice was a little husky, but that might have been the effect of being half strangled. “Goodbye,” he said quickly, and went away, leaving Melanie wondering just what sort of a man he really was.
Giles was away for a week, and it was a happier week than Melanie had known for a long time. She was in David’s company every day. It was she who took him to school, collected him, had tea with him, put him to bed. It was what she’d dreamed of for years, and at first it was enough.
She was free to slip into his room at night and watch him sleeping, hugging her joy to herself like a miser brooding over rediscovered gold. She’d often wondered how the reunion would be. Would her heart still recognize him as her son?
But all was well. On her side the bond held, true and strong, and along it streamed love as fierce and protective as the love he’d once drunk in with her milk. She instinctively knew that this was the child she’d held in her arms so long ago. When he wasn’t looking her way, she would watch him in secret, inwardly whispering words of wonder, “My son. My son.”
But as the days slipped past she knew that she hadn’t made the breakthrough she wanted. David spoke to her politely enough, but he didn’t give her the eager confidence she longed for, and she could sense that he was still wary of her. She was inching her way along, always alert to seize the moment that might bring them closer, but such moments were painfully slow in coming.
One morning she heard Brenda grumbling inside David’s room. “…think I’ve got nothing better to do than change sheets every day.”
“Is anything the matter?” Melanie asked, entering.
“He’s done it again,” Brenda declared bitterly. “Look at that!” She held up a sheet with a large damp place. “It’s time he pulled himself together instead of acting like a baby.”
David’s face was scarlet and he was fighting back the tears. Melanie put a hand on his shoulder. “Go down to the garden,” she suggested gently. “And don’t worry. It’s not important.”
She shut the door behind him and faced Brenda. “From now on if David is unlucky enough to wet his bed, you tell me and no one else. I won’t have him made to feel bad about it.”
Brenda was up in arms, her heavy face mottled with anger. “He’s not the only one who feels bad. It’s me who has to do the extra washing.”
“Aided by a state-of-the-art washing machine,” Melanie said, her temper rising. “If putting a few sheets in it is too much for you, I’ll do it. But the important thing is that you are to say nothing to David. Do you understand?”
Brenda seemed, about to argue but then fell silent, alarmed by a fierce gleam in Melanie’s eyes. She wasn’t to know that she was dealing with a tigress defending her cub. She only knew that something in the other woman’s look quelled her. She sniffed and hurried out of the room.
Melanie joined David in the garden and said, “Don’t worry about Brenda. She won’t bother you anymore.”
“I’m not a baby,” David said quickly.
“Of course you’re not.”
“But Daddy says I am,” he told her in a wobbly voice.
She put a hand on his shoulder. “You leave Daddy to me.”
He looked at her in awe. Then a smile of gratitude and trust came over his face.
“Come on,” she said. “What are we going to do today?”
He slipped a hand in hers. “I’ve got a new computer game,” he said eagerly.
“Come on, then. Teach me.”
They spent the day cheerfully zapping each other on the screen. Like many children of his generation, David was at ease with computers and instructed Melanie with careful courtesy. One moment he was like a little old-fashioned gentleman, the next he was doubled up with excitement and laughter. But then he would grow suddenly quiet, as though all the computer games in the world couldn’t ease the crushing burden on his heart.
Late that evening the telephone rang. Melanie lifted the receiver in her bedroom and found herself talking to Giles.
“Is everything all right?” he said. “Is David behaving himself?”
“Perfectly. He’ll be
