Four Roads to Windrush Read online

  "Sit down," he said almost irritably, "and remember it's an unwise thing to start an argument on an empty stomach."

  "The empty stomach is your fault," she accused him, "because I know how much you hate being kept waiting and that you expect everyone you employ to behave as if they were machines—even to cramming their dinner down their throats in order to rush up here and receive nothing but criticism from you!"

  He had started to pace up and down in front of her, but at this accusation he suddenly paused and, to her complete amazement, smiled, for the first time since she had known him, with a genuine amusement.

  "As much a martinet as all that, am I?" he demanded, his eyes glinting with laughter.

  Lindsay choked a little, and turned away from him.

  "I'm perfectly serious about giving notice," she informed him, in a stiffer voice than she had ever used to anyone about anything.

  "And I'll try and persuade my aunt to move elsewhere. Then you'll be rid of us both, and you can do what you like about the flat! You'll almost certainly be able to make a great deal more money out of it than you're doing at the present time!"

  "Almost certainly," he agreed with annoying complacency, while a good deal of the amusement remained in his eyes. "And now I suggest you go downstairs and do something about your dinner. If the chef says it's too late, tell him they're my orders that something is found for you."

  Lindsay reached the door and got it open before she answered him. Then she ground out, almost fiercely, between her small white teeth:

  "I'd starve first!"

  It was almost midnight when Lindsay stepped out of the lift and walked along the thickly carpeted corridor to the door of her aunt's flat. It was rather like a penthouse, and in daylight there was a wonderful view over the surrounding moorland from the small windows, but at night the sloping ceiling and the diminutive size of the rooms, which had once been servants' quarters, were more noticeable, although skilful lighting, fitted carpets and attractive decor did much to create an extremely pleasing impression.

  Aunt Grace was lying comfortably back on the sofa, reading. She wore a velvet housecoat of a rich, dark crimson and against it her complexion—in spite of the fact that she was approaching fifty— was like the smooth skin of a peach. Her eyes were as blue as Lindsay's and with her beautifully-dressed grey hair and her perfect make-up, she looked like all the Carteret women in the family, portraits, high-bred, patrician and very much aware of the fact.

  "You're late tonight, darling," she said languidly as her niece dropped into a chair. "I can't think what on earth you find to do with yourself down there behind the reception desk all evening. You can't be making out people's bills all the time."

  Lindsay had given up trying to explain to her aunt the multitudinous things she had to do when she was on duty in the evenings that were not directly concerned with making out customers' bills.

  Aunt Grace said even more languidly, having tossed aside her magazine:

  "There's some coffee, if you'd like to heat it up, darling. I could do with another cup myself." Then as her niece rose to her feet she looked at her more closely: "You're looking a bit peaked and pale. Did you have to rush dinner, or something?"

  "No; I didn't have any dinner at all."

  "Well, really!" Aunt Grace exclaimed, and then spread her well-manicured hands. "But that's what I complain of in this place, and particularly when you unfortunately have to work in it. That man Summers has no consideration—he's just a boor. I don't know anything at all about his background, but he certainly isn't my idea of a gentleman. Did he decide to dictate letters to you when you should have been having your dinner?"

  "No." But Lindsay was not in a mood for explanations just then. She rose with something of an effort and moved towards the door of the tiny kitchenette. "I'll see to the coffee," she said.

  She made the coffee and returned to the sitting-room with the tray.

  Aunt Grace, still lying on the settee, accepted her cup with a smile, then immediately went on to announce an item of news.

  "Guess what," she said.

  Lindsay looked blank, and Aunt Grace went on:

  "You remember Nina Carlisle? She and I were at the same finishing-school in Paris together, and she came here to stay with us once when you were home for one of your school holidays. Well, she recently married again, a man called Frank Barrington, and he farms in Spain—oranges or something of the sort. I had a letter from Nina this morning and she wants me to go out and stay with them. Isn't it marvellous? I've been getting so deadly bored, and this tiny flat is beginning to stifle me. The very idea of a Carteret being shut up in the attics is ridiculous, and I ought to have had more sense than to decide to stay on here when I sold the place However, when I get back from Spain—and I can assure you I shan't hurry back—I shall tell your detestable Mr. Summers that he can do what he likes with the flat, and take something more bearable in London."

  Lindsay set down her empty coffee-cup carefully and looked at her aunt almost hopefully.

  "You mean that you're going to accept the invitation? And that you won't come back here?"

  "That, darling, is precisely what I do mean. And if you take my advice you won't stay here, either. A girl like you could get a job in London tomorrow. Modelling perhaps, or as a secretary to someone far more important than Philip Summers."

  "Mr. Summers is head of a chain of hotels," Lindsay reminded her.

  Miss Carteret shrugged her shoulders.

  "So? He may have money, but his ideas on spending it are not my ideas. He even neglects his own comfort in order that the guests shall have the best of everything."

  And remembering Philip Summers's room, and the air of Spartan austerity which seemed to cling to him, Lindsay had to agree with her. The only personal weakness Philip Summers had, which she had been able to observe herself, was his obvious love of a first-class tailor—but maybe he considered his well-dressed appearance essential to the successful running of his hotels.

  "When are you going?" Lindsay asked calmly. She and her aunt had never been in the least dear to each other, and it was only since she left school that Lindsay had got to know her at all well. Aunt Grace had been her guardian, ever since her parents had been killed in a car crash when Lindsay was only ten—and her idea of bringing up a niece was to send her to a good boarding school, and leave her there even during school holidays if it pleased her to accept an invitation abroad. The only highlights Lindsay had known during those years were the one or two school vacations when the door of Windrush House—as it then was—had been open to her, and her great love for the house as a house had started to send out roots.

  Aunt Grace had not found the sale of the house at all a painful business, for it meant that her bank-balance was more satisfactory than it had been for some time. But Lindsay had at first been terrified that they would have to leave it altogether, until dear old Mr. Martingale had thought of converting the flat for them. Then he had offered her a job in the hotel itself—a job for which she had taken a six-month commercial course in Barrowgate, their nearest town—and for three years she had been happy. Not wildly happy, for she had never known anything to make her wildly happy, but at least content…

  But now everything was different. She felt she was giving little real satisfaction to her new employer, almost certainly because his standards were far higher than anything she could attain to. In addition, she was sentimental—it was not in her nature to hurt anyone or anything—and he probably looked upon sentiment only as something that impeded the wheels of big business. And was she really fitted to cope with big business?

  Perhaps, after all, her aunt's suggestion about London was the right one. Perhaps she ought to give the question serious thoughts and get away from Windrush for good and all.

  "I shall leave here in about a couple of weeks," Aunt Grace told her. "I have decided to put up at a small London hotel for a few days after that, where I can get together a suitable wardrobe…"

  "Wel
l, it will be a change for you," Lindsay murmured mechanically, for she was very, very tired.

  "I'm sorry I can't take you with me," Aunt Grace told her, thinking as she glanced at her that it really was a pity the girl couldn't get away and have a little fun—she ought to be meeting lots of men at her age. And even if a suitable man arrived at the Windrush Hotel she would have little time to devote to him— Philip Summers would see to that…

  But a few mornings later a man whom Aunt Grace would have considered highly attractive, arrived at the Windrush Hotel. He drove up in a sleek cream car with a couple of pigskin suitcases in the boot and asked if he could have a room for a fortnight.

  Lindsay was not on duty behind the reception desk, but she was arranging an enormous bowl of daffodils and white narcissi on the other side of the hall. Elise, the under-receptionist, with the man watching her, was not certain about being able to accommodate him for a fortnight, and it was while she was bending frowning brows over the rooms chart that he noticed Lindsay.

  She was wearing a pearl-grey dress with white collar and cuffs and her hair was a paler gold than the trumpets of the daffodils. As she felt his eyes on her she turned her head, and he had a quick impression of larkspur blue eyes, fringed by thick dark lashes. She had, he thought, the flawless look of something protected and cherished…

  "Good morning," she said, moving towards him. She looked at Elise. "Can I help, Elise?"

  Elise explained the difficulty. They hadn't a room they could allocate for a whole fortnight, but if the gentleman wouldn't mind being shifted.

  "I don't care what you do with me," he told her lazily, "so long as you take me in." But, although he addressed Elise, his eyes remained on Lindsay's face.

  He was an undeniably attractive man. His hair was a very dark gold, faintly burnished in places, and his eyes a striking ice-blue. He was very spare and tall and wore beautifully cut tweeds but Lindsay thought he looked a little pale—perhaps, she decided, he hadn't been very well recently; and when he reached out for the pen to sign the register she noticed, too, that he had beautiful hands, with long, slim fingers.

  "Room Twenty-two?" He looked at Elise for confirmation. "And how long do I remain undisturbed there?"

  "For a week, at least." She smiled at him.

  "Well, that's something, I suppose. I've driven all the way from London because I liked the sound of this place, and it would have been a pity if you'd had to turn me away altogether."

  Lindsay, who was still standing beside him, put in in her soft voice:

  "We're rather full just now, because it's so near to Easter."

  "Yes." He looked down at her and smiled. "I hope you'll forgive me for expressing something that struck me rather forcibly just now, but when you were arranging those flowers, you looked like the spirit of spring and Easter yourself. My father was a clergyman, and when I was a boy I used to watch my mother decorating the church for Easter Sunday with daffodils and lilies, and so forth, and she always brought the same thought into my mind."

  "Oh!" Lindsay exclaimed, and felt suddenly a little confused.

  He continued to smile at her.

  "There are some things one never forgets—and some impressions are more vivid than others, aren't they? "

  Lindsay became aware that her employer had moved noiselessly across the hall and was at her elbow, and as she turned she heard him greet the newcomer in his usual quiet manner. She heard them exchange a few remarks about the weather and the roads, then Philip Summers stood back so that Elise, followed by a pageboy with the cases, could escort the newcomer to the lift.

  When the lift had whirred upwards out of sight, he examined the register, deciphering the signature aloud.

  "Dane Temsen, Harley Street, London." He looked sideways at Lindsay, one eyebrow partly raised. "Would you say he looked like a doctor?"

  "I don't know. I noticed he had beautiful hands."

  "Did you?" His eyes seemed to mock her for a moment. "You're very observant, aren't you? But he might be a surgeon." Then, as she was moving away, he called her back. "Isn't this your afternoon off?"

  "Yes," she admitted.

  "What do you propose to do with it?"

  "I'm going out to get a little fresh air."

  "That's a splendid idea," he approved. But she realised that in place of the mockery there was criticism in his eyes. "You look too pale to be a really good advertisement for a healthy spot like this at the spring of the year."

  And she felt for a moment that she almost hated him and his complete lack of humanity.

  But that afternoon, when she was out of doors, she forgot everything except the pure delight of being in the open air.

  She walked quickly once she had left Windrush, for she felt the urgent need for exercise. Thick carpets and a centrally heated atmosphere were no substitute for green, springing turf and a warm wind m her face.

  She listened to the cries of the moorland birds, the bubbling note of the curlew, the clear call of the plover. As she listened she forgot about Aunt Grace. Philip Summers and everything connected with the running of the Windrush Hotel.

  She was standing, admiring the view when a call that had nothing to do with the call of a bird caused her to turn and look back. A tall man was striding along after her, and when he saw her pause he waved.

  "Upon my word," Dane Temsen exclaimed when he came up with her, "you walk as if you have wings on your feet! Were you by any chance running away from anything?"

  "No." She smiled up into his face. "I was delighting in being free."

  "Then being free has an intoxicating effect on you?"

  "Yes."

  They looked at each other for several seconds; then, recognising the open admiration in his eyes, she glanced away.

  It seemed to her that his breathing was a little laboured and she said suddenly:

  "I know I You've been ill, haven't you? That's why you're on holiday."

  "Right first time," he told her. There was a grassy hillock behind them and he suggested they sat down. "I've had a most unpleasant form of illness which was entirely my own fault It started with a poisoned hand, and then it tried to do the job thoroughly and finish me off. But I was too tough for it."

  He looked down at her and smiled, then, producing a silver cigarette case from his pocket, offered her a cigarette. When she refused, he looked surprised.

  "You don't smoke? Then you are really rare."

  She didn't quite know how to answer that, so she said sympathetically:

  "I'm sorry about your hand. Mr. Summers thought that you might possibly be a surgeon. Was he right?"

  "Perfectly right And a surgeon without a useful right hand is not very much good until the hand decides to serve him again, and in any case I badly needed a change."

  "Do you feel you've found one here?"

  "I'm quite certain of it. The house is delightful, the service appears to be excellent, the surroundings are attractive and what's more I've been able to meet the most beautiful girl I've ever seen in my life."

  For a few seconds Lindsay was not quite sure that she had heard aright, and she looked into his face for signs of obvious flattery. But his expression was quite serious. The colour rose a little in her cheeks.

  "We do try to make the hotel as attractive as possible for our guests." She did her best to speak lightly. "It ensures their return, you know."

  "We?"

  "Mr. Summers and I—my—my employer."

  "Oh, the manager. Or does he happen to be the owner?"

  Lindsay admitted that Philip Summers was the owner.

  Dane Temsen threw away his cigarette and looked around him at the hazy distance; the little moorland pools sparkling in the sunlight, the endless rippling movement of the curls of new green bracken. And then he sighed.

  "He's lucky," he remarked. "I wouldn't mind owning a place like the Windrush Hotel in a spot like this. It must give one a feeling of great tranquility."

  "Except that there's never much tranquility ab
out running an hotel. It's all either anxiety or hard work."

  He looked at her with interest, but she stood up suddenly.

  "I'm sorry, but I must go back now. I'm on duty at half-past five, and I don't want to be late."

  "And when will you be off duty again?"

  She hesitated for a moment.

  "Tomorrow evening I'll be free."

  "Excellent!" he exclaimed, and rose and stood beside her. "Then say you'll have dinner with me somewhere."

  "Oh, but—"

  "Unless, of course, you've already fixed up to do something."

  "No—no, I haven't—"

  "Then tell me where we can go. It wouldn't be a change for you to dine in the hotel, and you know this part of the world far better than I do. And in case you feel tempted to search for an excuse, remember that I'm going through that dangerous stage of convalescence when a little human sympathy and understanding are worth far more than anything else, and I'd be really grateful if you'd take pity on me."

  When they got back to Windrush, Lindsay was glad that he allowed her to go in without him, but as she hastened across the hall to the lift she had the feeling that Philip Summers, emerging from one of the lounges, realised that she had run it rather fine and was in a hurry, and that he was watching her because it was not like her to do that And when she got upstairs to the flat, Aunt Grace, surrounded by paper patterns and some exquisite silk which she was making into a cocktail dress, looked up as if she had been waiting to impart some intelligence to her and to extract some at the same time.

  "By the way, my dear," she said, "there was a new man in the dining-room at lunch time. He strikes me as being interesting— and terribly good-looking. I don't know whether you booked him in, but if you did you probably know how long he's going to stay? "

  "I think you mean Mr. Temsen," Lindsay replied, throwing off the jacket of her suit while she made for her bedroom and the neat grey dress which had to be donned before the clock struck the half-hour. "He's staying a fortnight, so far as I know."

  "Then, my dear, you ought to get to know him," Aunt Grace recommended. "He looks charming. Where does he come from?"