in her ignorance and innocence Kate had recognised the powerful sexual aura of the man, and a curious, twisting sensation curled through her body, making her eyes widen and her lips part as she stared down into his face like someone possessed. Her heartbeat quickened, her whole body pulsing with a deep, aching sensation hard to define. As she watched, transfixed, the hard male mouth twisted, the golden eyes narrowing, hardening, disengaging from her own with cool indifference making her uncomfortably aware of the long schoolgirlish plait of her hair, and the little girlish cotton nightdress she was wearing. No doubt his women wore silks and satins to bed; their appearance as sophisticated as his own. As she stumbled back to the bedroom she had a momentary and tormenting mental picture of his naked body, tanned and hard; very sure and knowing as it reached out to claim the filmy image of a woman, in the act of love.
Her skin hot with shame, Kate dived into bed and curled up beneath the bedclothes. There must be something wrong with her, thinking like that about a complete stranger. There was something wrong with her, she decided distractedly minutes later as an uncomfortable heat pervaded her body, followed by a tight, coiling tension. She could hear the two men moving about in the adjacent bedroom. The door opened and closed, she heard footsteps along the landing and then her door opened and Ricky came in.
She knew better now than to make any approach to him. He undressed quickly, throwing his clothes on to the floor before heading for their bathroom. He was gone for over half an hour, but when he returned Kate was still awake. She felt the bed depress as he got in beside her, turning his back on her. She closed her eyes, but it was not her husband’s image that danced tormentingly behind her shuttered lids. It was Dominic Harland’s.
And that was how it had begun, Kate thought wryly, shaking herself free of the past and opening her eyes, knowing that she did not have the courage to take herself back through that entire weekend. God, the humiliation of what had heppened! It scorched and burned her even now, far, far more than any rejection she had endured at Ricky’s hands. Of course, it had all been her own fault. She ought to have realised the moment she set eyes on him what manner of man he was. Certainly not the type who could ever be interested in a shy, naïve girl such as she had been. But she had been so desperate then to prove that she was a woman that she had not seen that. She had only seen that he was a man who aroused within her desire and in whose arms she could wipe out the humiliation of her husband’s lack of interest in her.
She laughed bitterly. Heavens, how stupid she had been! But that was all in the past now. The grandfather clock struck four, and she remembered that she had promised to telephone Harry and give him her decision about going into partnership with him.
It was only this afternoon talking to Sue that she had realised what she intended to do. Squaring her shoulders slightly, she went downstairs. It was time she made a fresh start, put the past behind her once and for all and what better way could there be to do that than to embark on a new career?
As she dialled the number of Harry’s workshop, she smiled slightly to herself. It was almost two years since they had first met now. She had gone to London on business to see Ricky’s solicitor. Following her husband’s death she had discovered that he had considerable debts outstanding to various gambling establishments, and although the solicitor had advised her that she was under no legal obligation to clear them, she had insisted that she wanted to do so. With the sale of what had been her father’s land, she had been able to clear the last of these outstanding amounts, and it had been that that took her to London.
With a free afternoon at her disposal she had wandered through Covent Garden, pausing to study the goods on sale on the wide variety of stalls, and it was there that her interest in stained glass had been rekindled when she spotted an attractive selection of window ornaments on sale on one of the stalls.
Seeing her interest, the girl who ran the stall had told her about the artisans’ workshop which had recently been established in London’s dockland to give craftsmen an opportunity to develop their work, and she had gone on to invite Kate to go back there with her to see the workshops for herself.
Normally very reticent about involving herself with strangers, on impulse Kate had accepted her invitation, and it had been at the workshop that she first met Harry. Harry was their mentor and teacher; Lucy, the girl who had invited Kate back with her, explained that it was Harry who taught them the intricacies and skills of working in stained glass, and on hearing his name, the tall, bearded man had ambled over to introduce himself and to chat to Kate.
Other craftsmen besides the glass workers shared the same premises, and Harry had elected to take Kate on a brief tour. She had watched fascinated as she saw her contemporaries engrossed in such traditional skills as gilding, marbling, marquetry and a wide variety of other crafts, but it was the glass work that fired her imagination.
What she had intended to be a brief courtesy visit in response to Lucy’s invitation lasted well into the late afternoon. They were a very friendly crowd, most of them around her own age or younger, with a smattering of much older tutors, who like Harry were keen to pass on their own skills to a younger generation.
‘It’s their interpretation of the skills we teach them that we find so stimulating,’ Harry told her enthusiastically. ‘They’re young and their ideas are fresh. It’s fascinating, and an education for us to see what they can do.’
While he was talking Kate was absorbed in watching a young man deftly shaping the lead to hold the glass he was working on, and seeing her, Harry smiled, touching her arm to say disarmingly, ‘You’re dying to try it for yourself, aren’t you?’
‘It fascinates me,’ she admitted. ‘We touched on the subject very briefly on the arts course I took, but I hadn’t thought of it as having any modern application.’
‘Mmm … you thought of it as being applicable only to church windows, that sort of thing. Well, it’s a common enough mistake, although nowadays many young architects and designers are becoming far more aware of its possibilities. Only the other week young Rob over there finished a commission for a renovated Victorian conservatory. It really was beautiful, a trail of climbing roses all along one glass wall. The small bits and pieces, the window hangings, plant containers, that sort of thing, they’re the bread and butter, but the jam is in the new commissions we’re getting, and we’re getting more and more all the time.’ He paused and looked at her consideringly. ‘If you’re really interested, why don’t you come to my classes?’
Kate had shaken her head, instinctively retreating from the suggestion in the way that she retreated from everything. Her life with Ricky had left painful scars, and the loneliness of her life which Sue saw as a handicap she saw as protection, but less than a week later she found herself on the London train once more with the intention of taking Harry up on his offer.
Since then, her friendship with Harry, and to some lesser extent with some other members of the workshop, had grown, and six months ago her first commission was accepted—a feature window panel for the new, prestigious office block of a three times winner of the Queen’s Award to Industry, whose go-ahead young architect wanted a modern design to include both these and some indication of the company’s business. Since this was the rapid transportation of parcels and goods, Kate had chosen a bird motif, the swift, and when Harry told her that her design had been accepted she had been almost speechless with delight.
Quite early on in their relationship she had discovered that Harry lived only twenty miles away from her. She had met his wife and two grown-up daughters and their children and now felt quite comfortable in the small family circle.
Harry’s suggestion that they set up in business together had come entirely out of the blue. It would be a challenge for both of them to move outside the protective security of the craft centre, but it was a challenge that suddenly she was eager to accept.
Harry
