Acting like he Owned the place. Offering me a drink!’
Helen smoothed the pad of her thumb round the rim of her glass. ‘Well, this is his home, too,’ she observed reasonably, and her fiancé gave her an impatient look.
‘It’s not his home. His home is in Nrubi, wherever that might be. It’s a pity he didn’t stay there.’
Helen sighed, and then Susan Fox erupted into the room with her transistor, slim and attractive in purple pants and an embroidered smock. ‘Hi, Helen,’ she greeted her brother’s fiancée lightly over the din of the pop programme being broadcast, and then went to join her father and Morgan by the bar. ‘Can I have a Martini?’ they heard her asking, before Morgan said something in response that made them all laugh.
Beside Helen, Barry stiffened, and she felt a reluctant sense of sympathy for him. He was jealous, she realised regretfully. For so long he had commanded Mr Fox’s undivided attention that he had come to regard it as his right. Morgan’s blood relationship to his stepfather was a thorn in his side, but it was only a temporary thing. Why couldn’t he see that? wondered Helen uneasily, herself aware that Morgan Fox was not a man one could ignore.
She was seated beside Morgan at dinner. In the spacious dining room they were seated at the square mahogany table which Mrs Parsons had decorated with slender silver rose holders, and the candles in the silver candelabrum gave off a delicate perfume as they ate. There was minestrone and roast beef, accompanied by real Yorkshire pudding, and a steamed pudding to follow.
‘Real north country fare,’ said Mr Fox with satisfaction, as Mrs Parsons brought in the apple dumpling, and Morgan gave him a wry smile.
‘You’re making me wish I’d never left home,’ he remarked, wiping his mouth with his napkin, and Mrs Fox regarded him reprovingly.
‘You look as though you could do with some home cooking,’ she commented with characteristic candour. ‘Look at your father and Barry. They must be at least half a stone heavier than you!’
Morgan accepted his generous portion of apple dumpling without comment, but glancing sideways at him, Helen caught the mocking gleam in his eye.
‘Do I look so undernourished?’ he asked in an undertone, and she had to school her features to prevent herself from giggling.
‘Not to me,’ she answered in a low voice, and this time he looked directly at her.
It was a devastating experience. This close she could see the silvery tips of his lashes, short thick lashes that just missed being feminine. But there was nothing feminine about his face, with its gaunt cheekbones and deeply set eyes. It was aggressively masculine, and possessed that doubtful distinction—sexuality. Returning his gaze was like looking into a deep pool, that invited as well as repelled.
The sure awareness that Barry was watching them brought her eyes back sharply to her plate, but when she ventured to lift her lids her fiancé was still looking at her. She arched her brows in silent, if not very convincing, interrogation, but Barry just continued looking at her, his eyes cold and lacking in sympathy.
The remainder of the meal passed, for Helen, in discomfited silence, and she was glad when Mrs Fox suggested they had coffee in the drawing room and she could escape from Barry’s inimical stare.
Susan joined her as they crossed the hall, whispering insinuatively: ‘Just six more days, Helen! Just imagine—a week tonight you’ll be in Alcudia.’
‘Yes.’ Helen sounded distracted and Susan gave her a second look.
‘What’s wrong? Getting cold feet?’
‘No—–’
Helen was impatient, but Susan overrode her denial insisting: ‘I know. It’s Morgan, isn’t it? I saw the way you were looking at him at dinner. Are you thinking he’s more of a man than Barry will ever be?’
‘Susan!’
Helen was angry now, but Susan was unrepentant. ‘You can’t fool me,’ she insisted. ‘I can see how attractive he is. I could even be attracted to him myself.’
‘Susan!’
‘Oh, don’t worry, I’m not quite that stupid. But if I was only his stepsister…’
Mrs Fox’s hand on Helen’s arm-made her start violently, and the older woman looked at her strangely as she said: ‘Pour the coffee, will you, Helen? I want to help Mrs Parsons clear the table and then she can load the machine while I relax.’
‘Yes, Mrs Fox.’ Helen swallowed her embarrassment, and seated herself beside the low table where Mrs Parsons had already placed the tray, just as Barry and his stepfather came into the room. Barry came straight across to her, seating himself beside her, and she gave him rather a nervous look before asking Mr Fox how he would like his coffee.
‘Oh, black, please,’ declared the older man, slipping his arm about his daughter’s waist as she came to stand beside him. Then he bestowed a teasing look upon her. ‘I suppose you’ll be next,’ he remarked, squeezing her affectionately. ‘I wonder who the lucky man will be?’
‘Don’t you mean the unlucky man?’ remarked Barry sarcastically, and Susan pulled a face at him.
‘Well, when I do choose to get married, it won’t be to some stuffy civil servant!’ she retorted. ‘Why—why, Morgan’s got more guts in his little finger than you’ve got in your whole body!’
Her words were intended to be jibing. Barry and Susan often indulged in this harmless kind of baiting, and neither of them took it seriously. But tonight Helen sensed an underlying note of bitterness, and she guessed Susan’s admiration for her half-brother had added fuel to Barry’s already smouldering resentment. It was perhaps fortunate that Morgan was not around to hear his stepbrother’s savage indictment of doctors who allowed this country to pay for their training and then took themselves off to some more lucrative practice overseas.
‘I hardly think Osweba qualifies in that category,’ Mr Fox interposed quietly, at this unwarranted criticism of his son, and Helen hastily handed Barry his coffee before he could say anything more.
It was with mixed feelings that she saw Morgan coming into the room just then, but as Helen’s hands were occupied with her own coffee, Susan took the opportunity to pour Morgan’s coffee herself.
Barry replaced his empty cup on the tray with a decisive clatter, and then said shortly: ‘Well?’
Helen, who had been expecting this, made no attempt to evade the question. ‘If you mean what I think you mean, then aren’t you being a little small-minded?’
‘Is it small-minded to object if my fiancée makes eyes at my stepbrother?’ he snapped, and Helen gasped.
‘I—I didn’t!’
‘What would you call it, then?’
‘I—we—we spoke half a dozen words together, that’s all.’
‘I’m not objecting to what you said!’
‘Oh, Barry…’ Helen replaced her own cup now, glancing about them uncomfortably. But fortunately no one seemed to be
