Sweet Sanctuary (11 page)

"I don't like the sound of this! I have a shrewd suspicion that it's me who'll be doing the weeding around here!"

"Put the kettle on, Nick," Kate told him. "Shall we feed the kittens, Mrs. Butler? They look as though they could do with a saucer or two of milk."

"Why don't you call me Aunt Elaine?" came the plaintive reply. "I keep asking you to call me that."

"She's shy," Nick said tolerantly, smiling at Kate's pink-cheeked confusion.

"Have you put the kettle on yet?" Kate demanded crossly.

He laughed. "What a monstrous regiment of women I'm surrounded by! Why do I put up with it?"

"You like it," said his aunt softly, her smile secret.

Sylvia lounged on a rough garden seat, her sinuous body sheathed in silver-blue silk jersey pants and shirt. The loose mass of her hair fell into a perfect frame around her face as she tilted her head to smile at Nick.

"You will be at my party next week, won't you? You won't let business interfere with that? If it's fine I planned to have a barbecue in the field next door to our garden—if it rains, we can eat indoors."

"I can't see why anything should interfere," he said vaguely, looking across the garden as the dogs came into sight.

Patch and Poppy snuffled up to him, tails wagging, eyes bright and hopeful. Nick, grinning, patted them, and they became ecstatic. When their enthusiasm took them too close to her, Sylvia's red mouth tightened. The green eyes were frozen with distaste.

"Keep them off me, Nick!"

He looked at her in frowning silence, surprised by the sudden sharpness of her tone.

Unaware for once of his reaction, she went on irritably, "They shower my clothes with hairs. This material picks up everything, and it takes hours to brush it off later,"

"Down!" Nick spoke firmly to the dogs. Taking hold of their collars, he pulled them back. They sat, reluctantly, tongues wagging.

Sylvia, engrossed in the inspection of her pants for signs of the attentions which the dogs had given her, did not even notice Nick's grim silence or the long, cool look he was giving her.

Kate suddenly ran from the house, flushed and excited. "Nick! Nick! The vet just rang! Punch can come home!"

His face lit up. "That's wonderful news!" He smiled at her. "Calm down, Kate! What have you been doing this morning?"

"Grooming the donkeys." She laughed, her brown eyes warm with amusement. "When I could get them to stand still! Their coats are improving, you know. I've noticed a change even in the short time I've been here. All the rest and good food is working wonders."

Sylvia lifted her head. The green eyes flicked over Kate. "Still wearing those filthy old jeans, I see! Some people are incorrigible." Her disdainful drawl brought Nick's eyes to her again.

She did not notice him, her attention concentrated on Kate. The other girl was automatically fondling the dogs, her slim hands gently rubbing their ears and throats.

"Don't let those animals go—I don't want them near me!" Sylvia forgot to hide her shrill dislike.

"I'll take them into the house," Kate said quietly, turning to go.

"Good," Sylvia snapped. "And bring us a jug of lemonade out here—I'm parched! Plenty of ice, too."

"She isn't a servant," Nick said curtly.

Sylvia was suddenly still, the blonde head swinging towards him, the green eyes narrowed in thought.

"She does work here, doesn't she?" The tone was gentle and innocent.

He was dark red. "As a secretary, not a domestic servant! And anyway, this is Saturday. She's allowed some time off to enjoy herself."

Sylvia watched him, glittering and beautiful in her silver-blue clothes, as tensed as an animal scenting danger, her eyes fixed on his face in wary contemplation.

"That reminds me," she murmured. "Kate, Jimmy Whitney sent you a message—he wants to take you out tonight. Will you ring him if you can't come? Otherwise he'll be here at seven o'clock and wants you to wear your prettiest dress."

Kate looked sideways at Nick. His grey eyes met hers in a savage stab. Flushing, she moved away, her head bent. He stared angrily at the pale curve of her neck, where the heavy, bobbed brown hair fell away.

Sylvia watched them both, eyes narrowed. She had her face under control now. Any trace of rage had been carefully erased from her features, and when Nick turned back to her she was smiling sweetly.

"I must drive over to fetch Punch home. You might as well come with me." His voice was hardly eager.

Sylvia uncoiled herself and followed him into the house, Nick ran upstairs to find his car keys. Mrs. Butler, mincing meat on the kitchen table, threw Sylvia a hostile glance. The dogs lay under the table beside the basket of kittens.

Sylvia waited impatiently, ignoring Mrs. Butler in her turn. The two women were accustomed to this silent warfare.

One of the dogs ran up to greet Sylvia. She pushed him away, and when he came back undeterred, gave him a kick.

"Don't kick my dogs!" Mrs. Butler went white with rage.

"Keep them away from me, then! I don't see why I should be forced to put up with your animals every time I come here."

"You have an alternative!"

"Oh, yes, you would like me to stay away from this house, wouldn't you? It would just suit your book. Well, I won't be driven away by your dirty animals."

"Dirty? My dogs are not dirty!"

"All dogs are unhygienic," Sylvia snapped. "I think it's disgusting, having all these animals in the kitchen, infecting the food you eat. Those kittens probably have fleas, and I'm sure these dogs have them. Look at the way they're always scratching!" She watched with cold amusement as the other woman grew rigid with pure hatred.

"You ... you ..." Mrs. Butler was incoherent with rage.

"I'm not surprised somebody poisoned one of them," Sylvia added sweetly. "I've often wanted to poison one of them myself."

She heard Nick on the stairs. With a last triumphant smile she walked out of the kitchen, leaving Mrs. Butler engulfed in vast and bitter fury.

"One day I'll kill that girl!" she told the dogs on a gasp. They looked sympathetic, but their brown eyes were more interested in the meat she was preparing than in the little scene which had just passed.

When Nick returned with Punch he was looking grim. Aunt Elaine glanced past him.

"Where's Sylvia?"

"I dropped her at her home." His tone was not encouraging, and his aunt did not probe further, but a twinkle of satisfaction came into her bright blue eyes.

Kate, carefully mixing a salad dressing, watched sympathetically as Mrs. Butler welcomed Punch home. It was hard to tell who was the more excited of the two—the dog was breathless with delight, his tail rotating violently, and the woman was flushed and joyful.

Punch came to lay his head on Kate's knee. She washed her hands and knelt to make a fuss of him.

"You two are ruining him, you know that, don't you?" Nick was gruff, but beneath the roughness lay a warm, tender amusement.

"So you're going out with Jimmy tonight?" Nick picked up a piece of cucumber and nibbled it, watching her.

Mrs. Butler looked at them both with great interest. "Kate? Are you?"

Kate nodded, very pink. "Unless you need me here?" Her tone was half hopeful. She would have been glad of an excuse for ringing Jimmy to refuse his invitation. Pride made it impossible for her to refuse without a good reason. She would not have Nick dictating to her.

Mrs. Butler shook her head. "Certainly not—go out and enjoy yourself. Young girls should get out now and then…" Her blue eyes flickered over Nicholas, gently malicious.

"I'm sure Nick doesn't mind," she said.

Kate stared at the bowl of salad. She waited, her head bent, wondering what he would say.

He said nothing. After a pause made more obvious by his tense attitude, he walked out of the kitchen.

"Well," murmured his aunt in a voice choked with laughter, "Nick is in a funny mood tonight! I think he quarrelled with Sylvia over something."

Over me? thought Kate guiltily. She remembered the hostility she had noticed earlier, in the garden. Nicholas had looked at Sylvia in such an odd way. He had resented Sylvia's manner towards herself— Nick had a strong sense of fair play, and he saw Sylvia's haughty behaviour towards an employee in a very poor light.

She spent some time later in getting ready for her evening with Jimmy. When he arrived, only Nicholas and his aunt were in the kitchen, playing dominoes in a humorous atmosphere of mock hostility.

"Cheat!" Nick glared at his aunt. "Why must you always cheat?"

"I was not cheating," she said placidly. "I'm merely very absent-minded. I forgot I'd declared no two earlier."

"How could you declare it when you had a two? Cheat!"

"I overlooked this one," she said, giving him a winning smile.

Nick groaned. "Overlooked it! Do you expect me to believe that?"

Her husky voice warmed. "My dear boy, I can't help getting old and stupid, can I?"

He smiled his disbelief.

Jimmy coughed and they looked around, surprised find him standing in the kitchen door.

"I did knock, but you didn't hear me!"

Mrs. Butler grinned at him. "Goodness, you do look distinguished, Jimmy!"

Elegant in a frilled white shirt and dark lounge suit, he grinned back. "Thanks!"

Nick surveyed him without speaking, and Jimmy threw him an impudent smile. "Hi, Nick. How are you?"

"Don't forget what I said to you," Nick said menacingly. He stalked to the door and went out.

"What was all that about?" Mrs. Butler looked at the door with wide, amused eyes.

Jimmy shrugged. "Nick appears to be turning into Mr. Barratt of Wimpole Street—he talks as though Kate were his daughter, and a very young one at that. I'm hardly Attila the Hun. I've had some odd looks from fathers before now, but I've never been threatened by an employer before!"

Mrs. Butler laughed. "Nick is concerned for Kate. She's very young, after all, and has had a sheltered upbringing."

"I'm taking her out to dinner, not kidnapping her," Jimmy said. "Nick came over to the farm this morning and breathed hell fire and damnation all over me. I resent it. My intentions are purely honourable." He grinned. "Well, more or less."

"Nick came to see you today?" Mrs. Butler stared at him in astonishment.

"You didn't know?"

"He hasn't said a word." She leaned back in her chair, blandly smiling, looking, for all her age, very regal, with her silky white coronet above those astonishingly youthful eyes.

"Nick playing the squire, perhaps?" Jimmy raised one eyebrow curiously.

"It doesn't sound like Nick, does it?"

Jimmy shrugged. "Influenced by dear Sylvia, perhaps? She certainly has a fixation about Nick being the lord of the manor."

"Nick has never shared it." Mrs. Butler was firm.

"No, I'll grant that. All the same, he did come over to see me, breathing fire, and offering to slit my throat if I harmed Kate." Jimmy laughed. "I felt quite wicked and abandoned when he'd gone—sort of rake's progress feeling. I'd never seen myself in that light before. It was faintly entrancing."

"Jimmy, you're showing off," said Mrs. Butler gently.