Deception (18 page)

Last night, as he had
threatened, he remained in her room until she had washed and got into bed.
There had been nothing for it but to discard her dressing-gown in front of him
and pretend her slim, bare legs were invisible under the lacy hem of her short
cotton nightdress. Her arms and a lot of her shoulders had been bare, too, as
she had only brought things which took up little space in her rucksack. Logan
hadn't appeared to notice. He had been so matter-of-fact, he might have been
her grandmother. Only momentarily did an expression flick through his dark
eyes which hadn't been grandmotherish at all.

He and Jamie brought
her a bowl of soup and an omelette. Jamie had hugged her again and told her she
looked pretty, something she had found difficult to believe with the
bruise over her eye beginning to show and her long hair hanging damp and
straight. He had looked happier, though, especially when Logan smiled at her.
He was convinced that his father had forgiven Thea for damaging the Land Rover.
He hadn't known that that wasn't the cause of what was wrong. Jamie's pleasure
in her recovery had'been so moving, she didn't have the heart to tell him about
that. She would still have to go, even if Logan had temporarily decided he had
nothing to lose by being kind to her.

This morning she was
still haunted by the confession she ought to have made, about being here as a
child and not being penniless, but suddenly there didn't seem much point any
more. It could make no difference to her ultimate departure and might only
serve to embarrass Logan further. If he knew he might feel forced to ask her to
stay and it might make him even angrier than he was now. Whichever way she
looked at it, it might be wiser to stay silent.

Logan went to meet his
mother at Fort William as she was coming by train from Edinburgh. He took an
excited Jamie with him and while they were gone Thea got busy. She was amazed
that she felt surprisingly well. Her brow was a little sore and discoloured,
her left elbow and arm slightly stiff where she had fallen on them, but all her
other aches had disappeared.
 
      

'Youth,'
Logan had explained sardonically, when she
had remarked on it. 'At your age a bump or two seldom
has any lasting effect.'
                       
,

She had felt too raw,,
over what seemed a deliberate dig over her lack of years, to respond very
gracefully as he "made her sit down at the kitchen table and drink the cup
of tea he poured out for her.

His face had been as
expressionless as it usually was, unless he was angry, when it was sometimes
even more so, but he did seem to realise she had age on her mind. Before he
left for the station, while Jamie was climbing into the car, he came back to
the hall to speak to her.

'When my mother asks
how old you are, as she will do, I should tell her the truth, if I were you.
She won't be as willing to be deceived as I was.'

What had Logan meant
by that? There was no time to do more than wonder briefly. She had a lot to do
and no energy to spare for anything but work. Once she was properly on her feet
she found the accident had shaken her more than she liked to admit.

Despite this
continuing lassitude, she had everything under control, even the dining-room
table elegantly laid before Logan returned with his mother. He was back! She
heard car doors slam, breaking the cold, rather eerie silence of midday.
Jamie's voice came, still excited, then a woman's, then Logan's deep one,
answering.

Thea, crossing the
hall to see if any help was needed, felt strung up with high tension. Her heart
was thumping with nervousness; she hadn't thought this moment would mean so
much to her. She was anxious to see if she remembered Mrs Murray, but even
more anxious to discover if Mrs Murray should remember her. The latter
being much the more likely, Thea couldn't bring herself to wait to find out.
She might feel like a prisoner hurrying to their own execution, but she
couldn't stop herself.

Mrs
 
Murray
 
came
 
through
 
the
 
door
 
before
 
Thea
reached it. 'Logan?' Mrs Murray was beginning,
when she
caught sight of Thea. Her
face blank with surprise, she
paused
when confronted by a slender young girl, quite lovely with her fair hair and
grey eyes, for all the huge
apron
which covered the greater part of her soft blue dress.
'Good heavens!' she exclaimed involuntarily,
almost
exactly as her daughter-in-law
had done. 'This can't be ...
Is this ...? Logan, are you ...?'

With
a completely expressionless face, Logan cut off
the half-finished sentences. 'This is
Thea Andrews,
Mother.' As he looked at
Thea, catching the extreme
anguish in her dilated eyes, he frowned.

He hadn't introduced
her as his housekeeper, but it
was obvious
that he had explained who she was before
they arrived. Thea murmured 'good morning' and, be
cause she was so terribly shaken, did her best to
copy
Logan's deadpan expression. She didn't hold out her
hand. Half extended, she withdrew it, fearing to
give the impression of that of a hostess welcoming a guest.

Anxiously,
while Mrs Murray appeared to be searching
for her voice, Thea
stared at her. All morning she had
waited to see the woman
who had been so kind to her mother, but now she was here she didn't even
recognise
her. Mrs Logan's face was kind, her skin still smooth if
slightly lined. Her eyes weren't lacking in humour even
if, at the moment, it wasn't too obvious. They were the
same
colour as Logan's, but never so cold, and like him
she
had a kind of presence which wasn't usually forgotten.
Yet
there was not one feature that Thea could recollect.

Mrs
Logan, seldom having been beaten by silence in
her life, managed
to reply normally to Thea's tentative
greetings, and the
occasion was saved by old Martha's
hobbling appearance in
the kitchen doorway. At least, Thea
thought it was saved until Martha spoke.

'Hello,
Miss Sarah. What do you think of Mr Logan's
new housekeeper? I knew
you'd be taken aback.'
      

A guilty flush
staining her cheeks, Thea dropped her burnished head. She had wanted Mrs Murray
to like her, but Martha's perky query would put an end to any such possibility.

Surprise made her
glance up quickly as Mrs Murray
smiled
warmly and began walking towards the old woman.
'How are you, Martha?'
she asked—only that. No comment on her remark about Thea. Thea felt
oddly ashamed that she had decided Mrs Murray would judge her on Martha's word
alone.

Whatever Mrs Murray's
private thoughts on the matter she was apparently keeping them to herself, for
the time being, anyway. She was a woman, Thea was soon to realise, who never
jumped to too hasty conclusions, although she set great store by the
fitness of things. If she privately considered Thea too young to be Logan's
housekeeper, she wasn't small-minded enough to condemn her on everything
else. Quite openly she praised the lunch Thea had prepared with such care. She
was as generous over that as she was about the freshness of her bedroom and the
comfort of the drawing-room.

'You've made quite a
difference, my dear,' she said, when Thea brought in coffee.

Logan stretched his
long legs as he lay back-in one of the deep chairs and didn't take his eyes
from Thea's face. He's wondering what I'm going to say to that, she thought,
suddenly angry. His grim surveillance was
becoming some
thing difficult to endure as there was no kindness in
his prolonged scrutiny.

Thea, turning her
straight back on Urn, haltingly explained to his mother how she had tried
moving some
x>f
the furniture around a bit. Duncan had helped her carry a
few comfortable chairs from a room at the end of the passage, which no one
seemed to use. 'I hope you don't mind?' she finished diffidendy.

*No, my dear child. Of
course not—why should I?' Mrs Murray sighed heavily, though Thea thought
not bitterly. 'It's not my business what happens any more at Drumlarig,
but it must have made a lot of work for you.'

No, it's been fun,'
she tried but failed to keep the eagerness from her voice. 'I like Drumlarig.'
She didn't look at Logan but could almost feel the speculation in his eyes.

Jamie said, before his
grandmother could reply. 'Thea and I are going to decorate the tree this
afternoon. That is if Father says she's able to.'

'Oh, yes,' Mrs Murray
was contrite, 'my son's just been telling me about your unfortunate accident,
Miss Andrews. You've quite recovered, I hope? Ian McLean is pleasant enough,
but he always did drive too fast.'

The telephone rang.
Logan went out to answer it. When he came back, he said, 'That was McLean, with
more apologies. He wanted to speak to you, Thea, but I refused, on your
behalf.'

Feeling an indignant
flush rising to her cheeks at such high-handedness, Thea exclaimed, 'I wouldn't
have minded speaking to him, Logan! I—er—I mean Mr Murray,'
she trailed off miserably. It had been a mistake to use his christian name in
his mother's presence. She saw Mrs Murray glance at her sharply before looking
at Logan.

Thea tried to hide her
mounting confusion with further argument. Staring at Logan, she began, 'If he
wanted to apologise personally, then I think you should have let him. I wish
...'

'Your wishes, in this
case, couldn't be considered,' Logan returned flatly. 'You must allow me to
know best.'

'I don't see ...'

'Thea!'

His eyes held hers
until she began to tremble. Mutinously silent, she turned away, furious with
him, yet having no particular desire to speak to Ian McLean. It must be the
strange antagonism she felt towards Logan which
made her long to defy him in some way. Which was foolish,
when
she would be leaving Drumlarig after Christmas.

Logan's brother didn't
come, after all. When Mrs Murray came to the kitchen for a cup of tea,
which she had insisted she would have there instead of in the drawing-room, she
said she had just had a call from him. He had decided to go abroad, at the last
minute. She didn't say she was disappointed, but Thea noticed the strain on her
face. Quietly she poured Mrs Murray a cup of tea, adding a good spoonful of
sugar before placing it beside her as the woman sat down rather heavily at the
table. Her silent gesture seemed to forge a link of sympathy and from that
moment on the two of them were friends.
      
^l

Thea learnt that, in
Edinburgh, Mrs Murray looked after her sister who was more or less bedridden.
As they
were both widows this usually
worked out fairly well, but it
presented problems when Mrs Murray had to
go away.
She had only managed a break this
Christmas because some
of her sister's husband's relations had agreed to
come and stay with her.

'I was longing to see
Jamie,' Mrs Murray told Thea. 'My greatest sorrow is that I can't see him as
often as I would like.'

'It's only natural,'
Martha broke in. 'You've always been fond of children. Remember that young
woman you once took in? You wouldn't hear of turning her out, not even when you
knew she was expecting. And when the baby came, you gave it all the love you
gave your own.'

As Thea dived to hide
her paling face by filling up the teapot again, Mrs Murray smiled sadly. 'She
was such an adorable baby, and I loved her. More so, I think, because I
was never blessed with a daughter of my own.'

'How she used to trail
after Mr Logan!'

'Well, he had a lot of
patience with her,' Mrs Murray paused reflectively. 'It used to surprise me a
lot as he's never been what I call a terribly patient person, but he always had
a lot with children and small animals. Small, helpless things.' Unconsciously
her eyes went to Thea, who didn't see her quick glance. 'I don't think he's
changed as much as we've thought, Martha.'

Christmas Day passed
so smoothly that Thea couldn't quite believe it. Everyone .helped, with Mrs
Murray insisting on taking charge in the kitchen and relegating Thea
firmly to the role of assistant. Thea didn't mind. After her first surprise,
she found she actually enjoyed having the responsibility of such an important
occasion taken out of her hands. She was learning, and fast, but it was nice to
be able to relax. Sometimes, for all she was astonished at the pleasure she
found in her work, her lack of experience could make her feel oddly tense.

After breakfast she
went to her room and brought down her load of presents, trying to do this as
unobtrusively as possible. Mrs Logan had already given Jamie her present so
Thea didn't feel she would be stealing anyone's limelight.

Jamie, predictably,
was delighted with the radio and train set which Thea had bought for him and
couldn't decide which to concentrate on first. His excitement was such that she
resolved to remind him, at the first opportunity, not to forget the less
exciting books and puzzles his grandmother had produced.