please …’ Lesley felt she couldn’t go through all that again. ‘Carne doesn’t want him. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to ask him. Not after all this time.’
‘Why not? Jeremy’s his son, too.’
‘I know, but—well, Jeremy would be unhappy.’
‘Why should he be? With animals to care for and all those acres to run free across! My God, it’s any boy’s dream, Lesley. He’d soon adapt, you’d see.’
‘No.’
‘What do you mean—no?’ Lance stared at her consideringly for several unnerving seconds, then he uttered an astonished laugh. ‘Dammit, you’re scared!’ he exclaimed. ‘You don’t want to ask Radley because you’re afraid the boy will enjoy himself.’
‘Oh, don’t talk such nonsense!’ exclaimed Lesley, forgetting for the moment to whom she was speaking. Then: ‘I’m sorry, but—please, Lance, this is my affair. Let me handle it my way.’
Lance gave a disgruntled snort. ‘You’re getting possessive, do you know that?’ he told her provokingly. ‘If you’re not careful, you’ll turn into one of those jealous old women who cling to their sons like leeches, and try to pretend they don’t need a husband!’
Lesley gasped. ‘What a rotten thing to suggest!’
‘But apt, wouldn’t you say?’ he countered, rocking backwards and forwards on his heels and toes.
‘I’m twenty-eight, Lance. Not exactly in my dotage yet, you know.’
‘And Jeremy’s seven—I know. But in thirty years’ time, you mark my words …’
Nodding annoyingly to himself, he went into his office and closed the door, and Lesley applied herself with unnecessary aggression to her typing. But her fingers kept hitting the wrong keys, and she was glad when Elizabeth came round with the tea-trolley and she could give herself a break before continuing.
There was a production meeting at eleven, and as Lance’s secretary she was expected to take notes, so that filled the rest of the morning in. Then, in the afternoon, Lance gave her some dictation, and finished by apologising for criticising her that morning.
‘It’s all right,’ insisted Lesley stiffly, but Lance was determined to make amends.
‘It’s not all right,’ he argued. ‘I don’t have any children, so how the hell can I pass judgment on anyone who has. Look, if it’s any help, you could bring him into the office a couple of days every week. So long as he sat quietly while you were working—he could bring books and crayoning pencils, couldn’t he? I guess you’re not working all the time, and maybe it would be possible for you to take an extra day off here and there …’
‘Oh, Lance!’ His unexpected understanding was disarming. ‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘Don’t say anything,’ he advised gruffly. ‘I’ll probably regret it bitterly. Now, will you get Manders on the phone? I want to know why The Mike Harris Show has dropped out of the top ten ratings.’
For once there were no last-minute problems to attend to and when Lance came into her office at four o’clock it was to tell her that she could go and see about getting her car fixed, if she liked.
‘Go to Henleys and mention my name,’ he said. ‘Tell them you need it urgently. And I’m not joking. I expect you to be at your desk on time in the morning, car or no car.’
‘Yes, Mr Petrie.’ Lesley hid her smile, but for all that, she knew he meant it. Punctuality was one thing he demanded.
Outside, the pavements were bathed in bright sunshine. Carrying her jacket, she got into the Mini and drove to the garage Lance had suggested. It wasn’t far from the studios, and the owner knew her employer very well. They were old drinking cronies, and a calculated examination of her car solicited the information that he could have it ready for the following afternoon.
‘Will it be very expensive?’ asked Lesley anxiously, recalling her mounting insurance premium, but the man shook his head.
‘Tell your boss I’ll make up the difference on that old banger of his next time he brings it in for a service,’ he retorted with a grin, but Lesley doubted Lance would appreciate such humour when it was directed towards the vintage Rolls-Royce he had rescued from the scrap heap. Still, she returned the man’s smile and thanked him for his help and then hurried away to Baker Street station to take the underground to Russell Square.
It was still barely five o’clock when she turned into St Anne’s Gate and saw the soaring block of apartments where her mother had chosen to move six years ago. Once her daughter was comfortably married, Mrs Matthews had seen no reason to keep on the small house in Hampstead, or at least that was her story. Lesley knew that she had been finding it hard to make ends meet, and the sum the sale of the house had raised had given her a nice little nest-egg. The pension she received was not large, but that together with the interest from her capital had ensured she would not starve. What she had not bargained for was that Lesley might return home only two years after she had moved into the flat bringing with her a lively two-year-old who had been used to the kind of freedom a city flat could not provide.
Lesley sighed. Perhaps she should have found her own place, maintained the independence she had guarded so jealously. But when she left Carne she had needed some place to hide, and her mother had seemed the most natural person to turn to. And indeed, Mrs Matthews had been very tolerant, she conceded, taking Jeremy to and from his nursery school, babysitting when Lesley had had to work late or at weekends. But they were all growing older, and as her mother had less patience, Jeremy demanded more.
A dust-smeared Citroën station wagon was parked out front of the apartments and Lesley’s eyes flickered over it speculatively. Someone cared about their car even less than she did, she thought with satisfaction, noticing the clutter of maps and old cartons in the back, the magazines strewn haphazardly across the rear seat. Farming magazines they were, she saw in passing. She mounted the steps to the swing doors and smiled as the hall porter came to open the door for her.
‘How are you, Mr Peel?’ she asked, with genuine interest, and his monologue concerning their Sandra’s grumbling appendix carried her into the lift.
But as the metal casing hummed easily up to the fourth floor, her thoughts returned irresistibly to the station wagon outside. It was such a coincidence that it should be there today when every free moment seemed to have been filled with thoughts of Carne, and Jeremy, and the life she had run away from. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, refusing to admit that Lance’s accusation had scraped a nerve. She wasn’t afraid of Jeremy’s reactions to his father. Good heavens, he scarcely remembered him after all this time. They would have nothing in common—just as she and Carne had had nothing in common …
The lift whispered to a halt and the doors slid open. Pushing her weight away from the wall of the lift, she stepped out into the corridor, smelling the familiar, if not particularly agreeable, smell of pine disinfectant. The flat she shared with her mother was several yards down and she sauntered towards it slowly, her brows drawn together in a frown. Why should she be letting Lance’s words disturb her like this? After all, Carne had stopped seeing his son, not the other way about. Why should she blame herself if he chose to ignore their existence, and most particularly, why should she feel any guilt because Jeremy was growing up knowing nothing of the land that was his heritage?
