grinned. ‘Right—though you won’t thank me for waking you up in the small hours. I’ll ring in the morning. Always supposing the new arrival’s made it by that time.’
‘Heavens, I hope so,’ said Kate with feeling. ‘For everyone’s sake.’
He eyed her curiously. ‘You’re very young to be a teacher, Miss Dysart. Is this your first year in the job?’
She chuckled. ‘No, indeed. Not by a long way.’
‘Then you must be older than you look.’ He cast a glance at the small face pressed to a window, watching them. ‘Time to go. Goodnight. And thank you again.’
Kate went back in the house in a thoughtful mood. Abby’s ‘Uncle Jack’ might not fit her preconceived idea of him exactly; he was older by far for a start. But he looked capable of carrying hods and laying bricks with the best of them.
The phone rang yet again later, when Kate was getting ready for bed, and she snatched it up eagerly. ‘Oh—it’s you, Alasdair.’
‘Sorry to disappoint you,’ he said wryly. ‘You were obviously expecting someone else.’
‘I was.’
‘Has your little visitor gone now?’
‘Collected by her uncle an hour ago. I was just on my way to bed.’
‘Already?’
‘I had a busy day, as we teachers do, followed by an evening trying to entertain a little girl desperately anxious about her mother.’ She made no attempt to smother a yawn.
‘I’m obviously keeping you, so I’ll make it brief. What should I buy young Dysart for a christening present?’
‘You don’t have to buy anything. I’m sure Adam doesn’t expect it.’
‘You’re to be godmother, he tells me. So what have you bought?’
‘I’ve asked Adam to keep his eye out for a claret jug.’ Kate waited, sure that Alasdair had quite different reasons for the phone call.
‘It struck me afterwards,’ he went on, ‘that I could have doubled back to see you later this evening when you were free.’
Did it really? ‘It wouldn’t have been convenient, Alasdair. Besides,’ she added frostily, ‘I’m told I’ll be seeing you on Sunday anyway.’
‘Ah. You don’t approve.’ The deep voice, with it’s hint of Edinburgh accent, was timber-dry.
‘It’s nothing to do with me.’
‘But if you don’t want me there, Kate—’
‘Why on earth shouldn’t I? We can have a nice chat about old times,’ she said sweetly.
‘I’d hoped to do that tonight.’ He paused. ‘I’m back in the UK for good, by the way. Promotion.’
Kate digested this in silence for a moment, then shrugged, unseen. Whether Alasdair lived in Britain, America, or on the moon, made no difference to her any more.
‘Congratulations,’ she said eventually. ‘Discovered a new wonder drug?’
‘Something like that. I’ll fill you in when we meet.’
‘Alasdair, I should have asked this sooner. Whose funeral was it?’
‘My grandmother’s.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Thank you. I’ll miss her.’ He paused. ‘Kate, can we meet tomorrow?’
‘No can do. I’m driving home after lunch. Goodnight, Alasdair, I’ll see you on Sunday—’
‘Don’t ring off,’ he said, in a tone which put her on her guard. ‘If I wait until Sunday I probably won’t get you alone. And after seeing you again, Kate I’m more determined than ever to solve the mystery.’
‘What mystery?’ Though she knew well enough.
‘Oh, come on—you know what I’m getting at. You were the most brilliant physics student of your year at Cambridge, Katherine Dysart. What in hell happened to make you waste your talents on a village school in the back of beyond?’
CHAPTER TWO
KATE held on to her temper with difficulty. ‘Look, Alasdair, we went through this last time we met, and the answer’s still the same. I don’t consider it a waste. I’m a good teacher, and I get damned good results with my pupils. Nor,’ she added fiercely, ‘do I look on Foychurch as the back of beyond. It’s a friendly, thriving village community. Which suits me down to the ground. I’m a country girl born and bred, remember?’
‘I do remember. But that doesn’t answer my question, Kate. It was common knowledge that your tutor thought he had another Madame Curie in the making,’ Alasdair reminded her.
‘Then he was sadly mistaken,’ she snapped. ‘And now we’ve cleared that up, I’ll say goodnight.’
‘Kate, listen—’
‘Alasdair, I don’t want to listen. I’m tired. Goodnight.’
Kate liked to sleep with the curtains drawn back, and, in bed at last, she stared for a long time at the dense blackness of the country night sky, restless and wakeful after Alasdair Drummond’s probing.
Her older sisters, Leonie and Jess, had early possessed the self-confidence that matched their looks. So had Adam, their brother. But Kate, younger by several years and far less extrovert, had compensated for lack of confidence with a highly developed work ethos, coupled with a brain that had won her a place at Trinity College, Cambridge, to read Physics.
And there she had met Alasdair Drummond, a veteran of four years at Edinburgh University, and a year at Harvard, and, by the time she’d met him, engaged in research at Trinity. To her incredulous delight, after running into her on her first day Alasdair had taken Kate under his wing, a process which had boosted both her self-confidence and her appearance so rapidly she’d soon been besieged by so many of her male peers she’d been dumbfounded by all the attention. And hadn’t cared a bit for any of it, because she’d fallen hopelessly in love with Alasdair Drummond the moment they’d met.
Kate, too intelligent to deceive herself, had known from the start that the passion was one-sided. Alasdair, five years older in age and a lot more than that in experience, had made it plain he was fond of her, and had taken it on himself to protect her from male predators. But she’d had no illusions about his feelings for her. He had treated her like a kid sister, never as a potential lover. Trying hard to be content with the relationship, she’d cheered him on at rugby matches, felt passionately grateful when he’d taken her with him for a drink afterwards, and preened in secret because it had been taken for granted that they were a couple. But the nearest thing to physical contact with Alasdair had been an occasional—and brotherly—peck on the cheek.
Madly in love for the first time, Kate had eventually grown so frustrated her work had inevitably
