Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author

ANNE MATHER

Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the

publishing industry, having written over one hundred

and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than

forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.

This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance

for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful,

passionate writing has given.

We are sure you will love them all!

I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.

I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.

These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.

We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.

Chase a Green Shadow
Anne Mather

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

TAMSYN STANFORD cupped her chin in her hands and stared moodily through the drug-store window, completely oblivious of the smoky atmosphere and the deafening din of the record machine. Outside a steady drizzle was falling, wetting the sidewalks and causing homeward-bound shop and office workers to quicken their step. Cars swished through puddles, queues formed at bus-stops, but Tamsyn seemed lost in a depressed world of her own making.

Her companion, a rather long-haired young man of her own age, with a drooping moustache, studied her expression thoughtfully, and then said: ‘Let me get this straight. Your mother has decided to marry this professor guy she’s known for several years?’

‘That’s right,’ answered Tamsyn, nodding, without looking at him. ‘He’s a sort of friend of the family. He knows my father, too.’

‘And during the summer vac they’re going on this lecture tour of the west coast as a sort of honeymoon, right?’

‘Yes.’ Tamsyn sounded impatient. ‘I’ve told you so.’

‘I know it. But what I can’t understand is—why should you have to change your plans—our plans, in fact?’

Tamsyn turned green eyes in his direction. ‘Apparently, no matter how she’s felt about Daddy in the past, she feels I would be—well, less of an anxiety if I go and spend several weeks with him.’

The young man gave an angry exclamation. ‘But, gee, Tammy, it’s crazy! You’re almost eighteen. Surely you’re old enough to look after yourself! Besides, your father is the last person I’d have expected her to ask you to stay with.’

‘It’s not a question of looking after me!’ Tamsyn was stung to retort. ‘And don’t call me Tammy!’

‘Well, it’s stupid!’

‘I know that.’ Tamsyn heaved a sigh. ‘But you see, it’s not as straightforward as it sounds. When Daddy—well, when they split up, naturally I stayed with Mummy. But later, after the divorce, he was given authority to visit me and have me visit with him. But although he has come very occasionally, Boston isn’t exactly on his doorstep, is it?’

‘I agree. But similarly Wales isn’t on your doorstep either.’

‘No. And whenever he has suggested me visiting with him and Joanna Mummy hasn’t been very keen. But now—well, she thinks it’s the ideal opportunity!’ She bent her head. ‘I’m sorry, Gerry, but what can I do?’

Gerry Thorpe stubbed out the cigarette he had been smoking with savage movements. ‘I think your mother is a selfish—–’ He bit off an epithet. ‘Can’t you see what she’s doing, Tammy—Tamsyn? I mean, it’s obvious that until now she’s guarded you jealously, not even allowing you to spend any time with your father. But suddenly, because she wants something, she’s prepared to send you to England without a second thought—–’

‘Not to England, to Wales,’ contradicted Tamsyn shortly. ‘Oh, what’s the use of talking about it? We can’t do anything. I shall have to go. We’ll just have to cancel our plans, that’s all.’

‘You could defy her.’

Tamsyn shook her head. ‘No, I couldn’t do that. Look, do you honestly think I’m looking forward to going to—to Trefallath? I can assure you I’m not. I’ve only met Joanna once and we didn’t exactly take to one another, which is only natural, I suppose.’

‘The other woman,’ remarked Gerry dryly.

‘Yes.’ Tamsyn lifted her untouched cup of coffee and sipped it experimentally.

‘Have you ever been to Wales before?’

‘No.’ Tamsyn frowned. ‘I can hardly remember London, let alone anywhere else. I was only seven when they split up, you know, and Mummy came back to the States.’

‘Your father must be like a complete stranger to you.’

‘He is. Although on the rare occasions he’s visited Boston he’s tried to be kind. It’s rather a difficult situation for me. I can appreciate the difficulties on both sides. Not that I sympathise with what my father did, of course,’ she added hastily. ‘He made my mother terribly unhappy.’

‘Did he?’ Gerry hunched his shoulders sceptically. ‘Knowing your mother as I do I can’t somehow see her ever being at a loss.’

‘That’s not a very nice thing to say,’ exclaimed Tamsyn indignantly. ‘When has she ever been other than polite to you?’

Gerry shook his head. ‘Okay, okay, don’t bite my head off. I’m just feeling a bit fed up, that’s all.’

Tamsyn’s face softened. ‘I’m sorry, Gerry, truly I am. But I’ve got to go to Wales. Perhaps we could arrange something for the Christmas vac.’

‘Who wants to go hitching in the middle of winter?’ asked Gerry gloomily. ‘Besides, by then your mother will be good and married to this guy, and who knows, he may decide to move to the west coast if this trip appeals to him.’

Tamsyn’s dark brows drew together. ‘You don’t think he’d do that, do you?’

‘How should I know?’ retorted Gerry shortly. ‘Gee, what a day!’ He indicated the rain outside. ‘And I was going to suggest we went to the ball game tonight.’

Tamsyn smiled and her companion wondered, with a pang, however Lance Stanford would bear to let her go once she had spent some time with him. In his eyes, Tamsyn was perfect, his ideal, and not the teenage crush his mother thought she was. Tall and slender, yet warmly rounded, Tamsyn was as tall as he was, with straight corn-coloured hair that fell several inches below her shoulders. He had seldom seen her in anything other than jeans and sweaters, and the kind of loose smocks that were so popular nowadays. Yet for all that she retained a certain femininity that attracted her fellow students without any effort on her part. She was a popular girl at college, but she would be the first to admit that boys figured more largely among her friends than girls.

Now she slid off her seat, brushing back her hair with a careless hand. ‘I must go,’ she said. ‘I promised Mummy I’d be home early. Charles is coming to dinner.’

‘Charles Penman, I suppose.’

‘Correct.’ Tamsyn slid the hood of her coat over her head. ‘Will I see you tomorrow?’

‘I guess so,’ conceded Gerry, sighing. ‘Aw, heck, Tamsyn, won’t you change your mind?’

‘I can’t, Gerry.’ Tamsyn was firm. ‘Goodbye.’

‘’Bye, Tamsyn.’ Gerry gave her a swift kiss on the mouth, but before he could prevent her she had slipped away, a hand raised in farewell.

About half an hour later, Tamsyn let herself into her home in Vestry Square. It was one of those tall, narrow old Boston houses which had been successfully modernised and was now a fitting background for Laura Stanford, Tamsyn’s mother. Softly textured carpets ran into all the corners, while the elegant staircase which mounted out of the entrance hall was panelled in mellow oak.

Rebecca, Laura’s housekeeper and personal maid, encountered her employer’s daughter in the hall and gave her slow Southern smile. ‘You’re back early,’ she said in her drawling voice. ‘Your mother’s not home yet.’

Tamsyn slipped off her coat. ‘Mr. Penman’s coming to dinner, so I thought I’d give myself plenty of time to bathe and change.’ She sighed and looked thoughtfully at Rebecca’s shiny black face. ‘I suppose you’ve heard that I’m to stay with Daddy while Mummy and Charles are away.’

Rebecca nodded. ‘Yes, Miss Tamsyn. Your mother told me this morning.’ She frowned, tipping her head on one side. ‘Why? Don’t you want to go?’

‘No.’ Tamsyn tugged impatiently at a strand of hair. ‘Well, after all, it’s more than three years since I’ve seen him and then only when he visited Mummy here. I hardly know him.’

Rebecca folded her arms across her ample stomach. ‘Then perhaps it’s time you did,’ she said, with the familiarity of an old servant. ‘My, visiting England and all! You’ll likely have a wonderful time.’

‘My father lives in Wales,’ remarked Tamsyn distinctly, walking through into the comfortable lounge that overlooked the quiet square. ‘And I’m sure I shan’t enjoy it at all. Good heavens, I’ve scarcely exchanged more than two words with Joanna—she’s his second wife, you know.’

Rebecca had followed her and was standing squarely in the doorway. ‘It will do you good to get away,’ she insisted. ‘Besides, you know your mother never approved of you planning that holiday with Gerald Thorpe.’

‘I know that.’ Tamsyn flung herself moodily into an armchair. ‘Why do I have to go away, though? I could perfectly well stay here with you!’

‘I shan’t be here. I’m to visit my sister in New Orleans.’

Tamsyn pressed her lips together mutinously. ‘Then I could stay here alone.’

Rebecca was scandalised. ‘Now don’t you go upsetting your mother with talk like that. She’s only thinking of what’s best for you. Why, if I was to be offered a trip like that, I’d be thrilled!’

‘Would you, Rebecca?’ Tamsyn was doubtful. ‘I wonder. I just can’t see myself fitting in with them. My father’s a doctor, as you know, with a country practice. I’ve always lived in the city—mixing with eggheads like Mummy and Charles—not nature-lovers!’

‘Miss Tamsyn!’ Rebecca couldn’t hide her impatience. ‘Don’t you talk like that no more. Your mother’s going to be home soon, and how do you think she’d feel if she thought you were so opposed to going to England?’

‘Wales,’ said Tamsyn automatically, getting to her feet. ‘I think I’ll take my bath. Oh, don’t look so anxious, Rebecca. I shan’t say anything to spoil the idyll. I just wish sometimes I was consulted before plans were made for me.’

She was in the bath, her body concealed beneath scented soap bubbles, when her mother entered the bathroom. Laura Stanford was not much like her daughter. Although they were of a similar height and build, Laura’s hair was brown and undistinguished, and now she wore it dragged into a rather severe knot which added years to her age. She wore horn-rimmed spectacles, too, and looked every inch the university lecturer she was. Tamsyn had sometimes wondered whether it was her mother’s lack of femininity which had driven her father into the arms of a woman who hadn’t an original thought in her head. She couldn’t really understand how they had ever got married at all. They were not alike. Her mother was so much that breed of American woman who needed to feel intellectually superior to her mate and her father had obviously disliked the image. But such thoughts were faintly traitorous, Tamsyn had decided long ago, and she usually kept them at bay. However, this evening, with the prospect of spending several weeks with her father and his wife uppermost in her mind, she couldn’t help the inevitable comparison.

Laura was carrying a sheaf of papers and waved them in her daughter’s face playfully. ‘Look,’ she said. ‘I’ve got your tickets and travelling arrangements.’

Tamsyn smoothed soap over her arms. ‘When do I leave?’

Laura appeared not to notice the slightly dry note in Tamsyn’s voice and pretended to consult the documents. ‘Early on Sunday morning, darling.’ She looked at her daughter again. ‘Charles thought you would prefer to stay overnight Saturday at the hotel and make a fresh start Sunday morning.’

‘I see.’ Tamsyn played with a handful of bubbles. ‘And you leave Saturday night.’

‘That’s right, darling. On the first stage of our journey. It’s rather exciting, isn’t it?’

‘If you say so.’ Tamsyn couldn’t entirely hide her own feelings then.

Laura frowned. ‘What’s wrong? You’re not still hankering over those plans you made with Gerry, are you?’

Tamsyn sighed. ‘I saw him this afternoon. He was pretty disappointed, and so am I.’

‘But, Tamsyn, even had I not been about to take one of the most serious steps a woman can take, I should still have found the idea of you hitching about the country in the company of that young man rather hard to swallow.’

‘Why?’

‘Oh, Tamsyn, don’t be naïve! You know perfectly well what I mean.’

‘Do you think if Gerry and I wanted to do something wrong we’d need to arrange a holiday first?’ exclaimed Tamsyn scornfully. ‘Honestly, Mummy, it’s ridiculous!’

‘Very well. Perhaps it is. Perhaps I’m doing you both an injustice. And no doubt in other circumstances I would have to agree. But right now I’m just relieved that you’re going to stay with Lance. Besides, it will do you good to travel. And England is a beautiful country, no matter what it’s climate’s like.’

Tamsyn expelled her breath loudly. ‘Okay, Mummy. I won’t make a fuss.’ She forced herself to be interested. ‘Where did you say Charles was lecturing first?’

Laura regarded her intently for a moment as though realising for the first time that Tamsyn had a mind and a will of her own. Then she shrugged, as though to dispel the unease she had suddenly experienced, and began to tell her daughter the details of their schedule.

Charles arrived before Tamsyn went down to dinner, and when she entered the exquisitely appointed lounge he was standing helping himself to a drink from the cabinet. It was strange, she thought with a pang, that when she returned from visiting her father, Charles would be a permanent fixture here, sharing their lives, and sleeping in her mother’s bedroom. She would no longer be able to go into her mother’s room in the early hours of the morning and tell her all about the party she had just been to, or climb into bed with her on Sunday mornings and have Rebecca bring them breakfast together.

Charles turned when he heard her step and regarded her admiringly. He was a man in his early fifties, of medium build with a rather angular face and body. Like her mother he, too, lectured at the university, and it was their mutual interests which had brought them together. Tamsyn neither liked nor disliked him, but she could understand his appeal for her mother. Theirs was a blending of minds rather than spirits, but Tamsyn knew that that kind of a union would never do for her.

‘You’re looking charming, my dear,’ he said now, pouring her some sherry with the familiarity of long use. ‘Here you are.’

‘Thank you.’ Tamsyn took the glass and looked down into its depths without drinking the liquid. ‘Has it stopped raining yet?’

Charles finished his bourbon and poured himself a second. ‘More or less. It’s quite cool for June, don’t you think?’

Tamsyn nodded, and seated herself comfortably in an armchair, smoothing the skirt of her long amber-coloured caftan about her. ‘Mummy tells me you’re visiting Seattle first.’

‘Yes. Then we’ll drive south through California, finishing up at San Diego.’

‘A wonderful trip,’ commented Tamsyn.

‘Indeed.’ Charles looked rather smug. ‘I’m sure your mother will enjoy it.’

‘I’m sure she will,’ agreed Tamsyn amicably.

‘You’re not bitter, are you, Tamsyn?’

‘Bitter?’ Tamsyn was taken aback. ‘No. Why should I be bitter?’

‘About being sent to your father, of course. I mean—well, Laura has cared for you all these years without a break, you know. It’s time he fulfilled his commitment.’

Tamsyn was staggered. Was that what her mother had said? Had she told Charles that Lance Stanford had virtually disregarded his responsibilities? Tamsyn found this possibility vaguely distasteful. After all, her mother had never encouraged her father to keep in touch with his daughter, and Tamsyn recognised the fact that Lance Stanford must have resented this from time to time. But Tamsyn had always allied herself with her mother, never ever imagining that Laura would take it upon herself to get married again.

But just then Laura came into the room, mature and slightly intimidating in a gown of black silk. ‘Oh, good,’ she said, when she saw the glass of bourbon in Charles’s hand. ‘You’ve helped yourself. I hoped you would.’ She allowed him to kiss her cheek. ‘After all, you’ve got to get used to making yourself at home here, hasn’t he, Tamsyn?’

Tamsyn managed a faint smile, and then her mother’s voice changed: ‘Tamsyn, go and find Rebecca, darling. Ask her how long dinner will be. I’m starving.’

Tamsyn got up and went obediently out of the room, closing the door behind her. She understood her mother’s request for what it was, an attempt to get her out of the way for a few minutes, but it was not a pleasing experience being made to feel an intruder in one’s own home. Perhaps it was a good thing they were going away. By the time they came back the newness of their relationship would have been blunted and perhaps then it would not be so hard to take.

The Boeing 747 landed at London Airport in the early evening, London time. It had not been an arduous journey for Tamsyn, but the time change would take some getting used to. Dinner had been served on the flight, but she had been too strung up to eat anything, the events of the past forty-eight hours gradually taking their toll of her.

Her mother and Charles Penman had been married the previous afternoon in a civil ceremony that had lasted only a few minutes. There had been few guests, mainly members of the university fraternity, and it had all seemed rather cold and irreligious to Tamsyn. But her mother was happy, and that was all that mattered. Laura’s happiness was evident in her heightened colour, in the excitement of her voice, and in the way she behaved with an increased confidence.

After the ceremony there had been a private reception before they all left for the airport, Laura and Charles on the first stage of their journey to Seattle, and Tamsyn to stay overnight at the airport hotel to be ready for her flight the next morning.

After her mother had left, Tamsyn had sought the privacy of her room and indulged herself in a way she had not done since she was a child. But the tears had relieved her tension somewhat, and only now, with the huge jet taxiing to a halt outside the airport buildings, did a little of that tension return.

Her father was to meet her at the airport, and she wondered whether Joanna would be with him. She hoped not. She would like to have a few moments alone with her father before coming into contact with her—stepmother! It sounded unreal somehow: stepmother. How could one have a stepmother when one’s own mother was alive and well? It didn’t seem right somehow.

Her cases were cleared without incident and a porter carried them through to the reception lounge. But there was no sign of her father, and her heart sank. Surely he hadn’t forgotten she was coming. Surely he hadn’t mistaken the time of the flight. Knowing her mother as she did she felt sure all the details would have been arranged meticulously.

She sighed and glanced down at herself. Did she look all right? What would he think of her? She had been a child when last he saw her. Her mother hadn’t wanted her to travel in trousers, but in this Tamsyn had been firm. She preferred casual clothes, and besides, the dull green suede trouser suit had cost her mother over a hundred dollars and nothing so expensive could look all bad.

A breeze blew in through an open doorway, taking several strands of her hair and stroking them across her face. She was wiping the hair from her mouth when she became aware that she was being scrutinised rather closely by a man across the lounge from her.

An unaccustomed feeling of apprehension slid down her spine as for a brief moment her gaze locked with his and then she looked away, aware of a strange sense of disturbance. She had never before exchanged such a glance with a man of his age—he could be anything from thirty-five to forty-five—and she felt shaken for a moment. Not that he interested her, she told herself sharply. He was too big, too broad, too muscular, too masculine in every way, with dark skin and dark hair and sideburns that reached his jawline. He was not a handsome man by any standards, although she thought that some women might find his harshly carved features and deeply set eyes attractive; if one found such primitive strength appealing, of course.

She ventured another look at him and found to her embarrassment that he was still watching her, his expression vaguely speculative. Tamsyn turned her back on him, but she was intensely aware of his eyes boring into her shoulder blades and she wished desperately that her father would appear and rescue her from this awful situation.

When a low, deep, faintly musical voice spoke just behind her she almost jumped out of her skin. ‘As everyone else appears to have departed, you must be Tamsyn Stanford—are you?’

Tamsyn spun round and to her astonishment she found herself confronted by the man who had been staring at her for the last few minutes. ‘I—I—yes,’ she stammered. ‘I’m Tamsyn Stanford. But—but who are you?’

The man’s dark eyes were enigmatic. ‘My name is Hywel Benedict. I’m a friend of your father’s. As he couldn’t come to meet you himself, he asked me to do so.’

‘Oh!’ Tamsyn was at a loss. ‘I—I see.’

The man looked down at her two cases. ‘Is this all your luggage?’ He bent to lift them easily.

‘I—yes—but how do I know you are who you say you are?’ She flushed in embarrassment as his eyes narrowed. ‘I mean—I’ve never heard your name before.’

Hywel Benedict considered her pink face for a moment and then he frowned. ‘I suppose it never occurred to your father to imagine that a girl from your background should consider there was anything sinister about my meeting you instead of him.’

‘What do you mean—my background?’ Tamsyn was stung by his tone.

‘Why, nothing,’ he responded expressionlessly. He stood down her cases again and put his hand inside the jacket of his casual sports suit and brought out a wallet. He extracted a photograph and handed it to her silently and Tamsyn tried to concentrate on the images imprinted upon it with some degree of composure. She recognised her father at once, and the small dark woman who she guessed was Joanna, although it wasn’t a very good likeness. And standing slightly behind them two other people; a woman, and the definite likeness of the man at her side.

‘Thank you,’ she said stiffly, handing him back the photograph and feeling rather foolish. ‘Yes, this is all my luggage. Do we go?’

‘We go,’ he agreed, and strode away across the hall without waiting to see whether she was following him.

Outside it was a perfect summer evening, only a faint breeze to cool the warm atmosphere. Hywel Benedict slung her cases into the back of a rather shabby-looking station wagon and then opening the passenger side door indicated that Tamsyn should get in.

Tamsyn did so not without some reluctance. This was not the welcome she had expected to get and she was feeling decidedly tearful. Why hadn’t her father come to meet her, or even Joanna if he wasn’t able? Instead of this abrupt stranger who seemed prepared to think the worst of her without even waiting until he knew her.

The man climbed in beside her, his thigh brushing hers as he did so. He was such a big man, he succeeded in making Tamsyn, who had always found herself on eye-level terms with the young men of her acquaintance, feel quite small. He smelt of tweeds and tobacco, shaving soap and a clean male smell that made Tamsyn’s nostrils twitch a little. She wondered who he was, and what he did, and where he lived, and then chided herself for being curious about a man who was so obviously far out of her sphere of experience. He was her father’s contemporary, after all, not hers.

The station wagon responded smoothly beneath his strong-fingered hands, and he negotiated the airport traffic with only slight impatience. For a moment, Tamsyn was diverted by driving on the left-hand side of the road, and then she ventured another look at her companion.

Where his wrists left the white cuffs of his shirt she could see a thick covering of dark hair, while a gold watch glinted against his dark skin. He wore only one ring and that was on the third finger of his left hand, a gold signet ring engraved with his initials.

As though becoming aware of her scrutiny he glanced her way at that moment and encountered her startled green eyes. ‘Did you have a good trip?’

Tamsyn took an uneven breath. ‘It was all right, I suppose. I’ve not travelled a lot, so I wouldn’t really know.’ She sighed. ‘Where is my father? Why couldn’t he meet me?’

‘He’s at home—in the valley.’

‘At home?’ Tamsyn sounded indignant.

‘That’s right. Your father’s a doctor, Tamsyn Stanford. Doctors here cannot simply leave their work without good reason.’

‘And meeting me wasn’t a good reason,’ observed Tamsyn shortly.

‘It wasn’t absolutely necessary in the circumstances,’ conceded Hywel Benedict. ‘I had to come to London anyway, so I offered to meet you.’

‘I see.’ Tamsyn swallowed the retort that sprang to her lips. ‘How is he?’

‘Lance? Oh, he’s all right.’ He spoke with a faint accent which she couldn’t identify but reluctantly found attractive. His whole speaking voice was attractive and she had to force herself to think of other things. But he was the most disturbing man she had ever met.

‘Are you a doctor, too, Mr. Benedict?’

Hywel Benedict shook his head. ‘No. Healing men’s bodies is not for me.’

Tamsyn frowned. It was a strange reply to make and she was curious to know exactly what he did do, but she didn’t like to ask. Looking out on to countryside that was amazingly like the New England countryside back home, she asked: ‘Where are we?’

‘Approaching Maidenhead. Our destination, as you know, is Trefallath, but we have some distance to travel before we cross the border.’

‘The border.’ Tamsyn was intrigued. ‘The border between England and Wales, of course.’

‘Of course. Though it’s no border as you know it. Merely a continuation of the road.’ His tone was dry, and she detected it.

‘Are you a nationalist, Mr. Benedict?’

‘A nationalist?’ A slight smile lightened his dark features. ‘And what would you know of such things, Tamsyn Stanford?’

‘I read books,’ retorted Tamsyn shortly. ‘I’ve read about the Welsh people. I know of their language, and the way they’re trying to retain their individuality.’

‘Do you now?’ His mocking voice disturbed her. ‘And why would an American girl like yourself be interested in us poor barbarians?’

Tamsyn flushed. ‘You forget, Mr. Benedict. I’m half Welsh myself.’

‘Ah, yes, I had forgotten. But perhaps I can be for-given for so doing. A hybrid like yourself, reared in the artificial atmosphere of the hothouse, is hardly likely to display the characteristics of its less cultivated ancestry, is she?’

‘I think you’re being offensive, Mr. Benedict,’ said Tamsyn, unreasonably hurt by his words.

‘Offensive, is it?’ His low attractive voice mocked her. ‘And why would you think that?’

‘I get the feeling that you consider me lacking in some way,’ replied Tamsyn evenly. ‘Is it because this is the first time I’ve come to stay with my father?’

Hywel Benedict stood on his brakes as a vehicle overtook them and then cut in dangerously closely in front of them. ‘Well, you haven’t exactly taken a deal of interest in his affairs before now, have you?’

‘There were reasons.’

‘I know it. Your mother.’

‘Is that so unreasonable?’

‘Possessive woman, your mother,’ he commented dryly. ‘Until it became necessary to shift the responsibility for a period.’

Tamsyn gave him an angry stare. ‘I don’t require anyone to take responsibility for me. I’m quite capable of taking care of myself. If my father hadn’t wanted me here, he could always have refused—–’

‘Now hold it, Tamsyn Stanford. I never said that your father didn’t want you here, did I? On the contrary, I should imagine he is waiting in anticipation for you to arrive. My comments are my own.’

‘Then perhaps you should keep your comments to yourself,’ retorted Tamsyn, staring with concentration at the passing landscape in an effort to rid herself of the feeling that this man had aroused within her. A feeling of unease, and inadequacy, that did not make her feel good.

They drove on for some distance in silence, while Tamsyn endeavoured to take an interest in her surroundings. The countryside around them was gently undulating, green fields stretching away on either side, interspersed with woodland and winding streams. They passed through places with unfamiliar names like Nettlebed and Shillingford and Abingdon, and Tamsyn caught tantalising glimpses of old churches that in other circumstances she would have liked to have had identified. Had her father met her, as she had expected him to do, it would have been different, and she tried to quell a feeling of indignation which was likely to colour her judgement when she did meet him again.

Hywel Benedict seemed perfectly content to drive in silence, occasionally taking out a pipe and putting it in the corner of his mouth and lighting it absently, only to put it out again after a few inhalations. Tamsyn was tempted to say she objected to the strong aroma it emitted, but as it wouldn’t have been entirely true, she said nothing.

At last, she broke the silence by saying: ‘Do you live at Trefallath, Mr. Benedict?’

‘I live in the valley,’ he conceded slowly. ‘Trefallath you will find is little more than a cluster of houses. The real population of the valley is spread out among the farms in the area. But no doubt you’ll discover all this for yourself.’

Tamsyn sighed. ‘It sounds remote. My mother said it was once.’

‘Did she now?’ Hywel Benedict inclined his head. ‘She’s right, of course. It is remote. But we like it that way.’

Tamsyn shook her head. ‘But what do you do for entertainment?’ She coloured. ‘I mean, don’t you have any desire to be nearer London—or Cardiff, if that is the right place? Don’t you feel—well, out of touch?’

Hywel Benedict looked at her out of the corners of his eyes. ‘Out of touch with what? What do your cities have to offer us?’

Tamsyn gave an impatient exclamation. ‘Surely it’s obvious! The cultural assets one finds there! The exhibitions; theatres; concerts! Don’t you care for books, or films, or music?’

He shook his head slowly. ‘Of course we care for these things. But do you honestly suppose that they’re confined to your cities? There’s more life in the valley than ever you will find in Cardiff, or London, or Boston either, for that matter.’

Tamsyn was irritated by the way he spoke, as though he was explaining the facts of life to a recalcitrant child. What could he know about it if he had lived in Trefallath all his life? He was merely using his age and experience against her youth and immaturity. But academically speaking she should be able to annihilate him.

‘I don’t think we’re talking about the same things,’ she remarked, in a voice that was intended to sound cool and patronising.

‘I think we are,’ he contradicted her insistently. ‘You think because you’ve lived in a city all your life that you’ve become worldly, that you are necessarily more cultured’—the way he said the word was a mockery—‘that you are better educated, infinitely more intelligent; not so!’ He shook his head again. ‘You’re just a little girl copying the mannerisms of her elders!’ He gave a slight smile. ‘I guarantee you’ll learn more about life and incidentally about yourself in these few weeks in the valley than ever you learned in that cultivated cabbage patch you call home.’

Tamsyn took a deep breath. ‘You don’t like me at all, do you, Mr. Benedict?’

Hywel Benedict moved his broad shoulders lazily. ‘Now don’t be silly, Tamsyn Stanford. I don’t know you well enough yet to decide whether or not I like you. But young people today tend to imagine that they understand things a whole lot better than my generation did twenty years ago, and I find it all rather monotonous. I don’t know what that mother of yours has taught you, but I think you’d do well to remember that you aren’t old enough to act the sophisticated woman of the world even with an uncultured savage like myself.’

Tamsyn was taken aback. ‘At least in my country we treat young people as individuals with original ideas of their own!’ she replied heatedly.

‘So it’s your country now, is it?’ He smiled mockingly. ‘We’re not concerned with our Welsh ancestry any more, is that it, bach?’

Tamsyn pressed her lips together irritably. He was the most infuriating man she had ever met and completely outside her range of experience. But where had she gone wrong? What had she said to create this friction between them? She sighed. It was simply that he rubbed her up the wrong way and his calm indifference was somehow hard to take.

‘You’re deliberately trying to make me say things I’ll regret later,’ she accused. ‘Why? What have you got against me?’

Hywel Benedict’s expression hardened for a moment, and she wondered what he was thinking behind those enigmatic black eyes. It was impossible to tell, and when he said: ‘Why, nothing, bach,’ she was almost disappointed.

CHAPTER TWO

CLOUDS were rolling up from the hills ahead of them and Tamsyn shivered, although it was a warm evening. How much farther had they to travel? Would it be dark before they got there? There was something faintly menacing about the prospect of driving in the dark with Hywel Benedict.

Presently, he slowed and she saw ahead of them a small wayside public house. Its timbered facade was rather attractive, and when he turned into the parking area she glanced at him questioningly.

‘We’ll stop here for something to eat,’ he said. ‘Are you hungry?’

Tamsyn was tempted to retort that she couldn’t eat a thing, but she found she was hungry after all, and there was no point in depriving herself to irritate him, for she felt quite sure he was completely indifferent to her reply.

Nodding her acquiescence, she waited until he stopped the car and then opened her door and climbed out. A faint breeze cooled the air and she watched her companion as he slammed the car door and came round to her side. She eyed her cases on the back seat rather doubtfully, particularly as he had not locked the car, and as though sensing her indecision, he said: ‘Would you rather I put them in the boot?’

Tamsyn studied his dark features. ‘Will they be safe?’

‘Have faith,’ he remarked dryly, and walked away towards the lighted entrance.

Grimacing, Tamsyn followed him, and caught him up at the door. She was too interested in her surroundings to argue with him and she wondered in anticipation what they would have to eat. Steaks, perhaps. Or salmon salad. Her mouth watered. It would be her first taste of English cooking for ten years.

A smoky passageway led through to a bar at the back of the building. There were several people in the bar which was discreetly lit and exuded an atmosphere of tobacco and spirits. But where was the food? Tamsyn’s stomach gave a hollow little rumble and she glanced up defensively as Hywel Benedict looked down at her in amusement.

‘What do you want to drink?’ he asked. ‘I know you’re not eighteen, but no one here does, so how about a shandy?’

‘A shandy?’ Tamsyn frowned. ‘All right.’ She wasn’t quite sure what he meant. ‘But where do we eat?’

‘Here.’ He indicated the bar stools which lined the attractive little bar, and she slid on to one with some misgivings.

‘What do you mean—here?’ she whispered as he took the adjoining stool.

‘Wait and see,’ he advised, summoning the bartender without any apparent effort. ‘A shandy and a beer, please.’ He looked along the counter and Tamsyn, following his gaze, saw an assortment of bar snacks under perspex covers at the other end. There were meat pies and sandwiches, fruit tarts and cakes, and her heart sank.

‘Is this what you mean by something to eat?’ she demanded impatiently.

‘Yes, why? Did you expect a chic eating house?’

‘I thought we’d have a proper meal, yes,’ she answered shortly.

‘Why, this is a proper meal, bach! You wait until you taste those pies. Mouthwatering, they are.’

Tamsyn reserved judgement, but later, after Hywel Benedict had had the barman provide them with a selection of food from which they could take their choice, she had to admit he was right. The meat pies were thick and juicy, and washed down with the mixture of beer and lemonade which her companion had ordered for her they were satisfyingly delicious. There were hard-boiled eggs, too, and a crisp salad that the barman’s wife provided, and lots of pickled onions that Tamsyn firmly avoided.

Hywel Benedict ate heartily, talking most of the time to the barman about the state of the weather and the crops and the possibilities of a drought. He swallowed the huge glasses of beer without turning a hair, and Tamsyn, used to seeing her mother’s acquaintances tackling small glasses of bourbon or gin, was staggered at his capacity.

Once he caught her eyes on him and held her gaze for a long moment, causing the hot colour to run up her cheeks, and she was reminded once again of that moment in the airport lounge when she had encountered him scrutinising her. She bent her head in embarrassment, conscious of a prickling along her nerves and a quickening beat in her heart. It was crazy, but when he looked at her like that, something tangible semed to leap between them, and she knew that she could never be indifferent to this man, despite the disparity of their ages. She tried to think of Gerry, of his fair-skinned face and gentle brown eyes, and failed abysmally. All she could see were deep-set eyes and darkly engraved features bearing all the unconquered arrogance of his Celtic forebears.

At last, after she had refused a second slice of apple cake, he suggested they should go, and she willingly agreed. She was allowing this man too much space in her thoughts at a time when she should have been thinking of her forthcoming encounter with her father or speculating on what kind of a honeymoon her mother was having.

It was growing dark and a glance at her watch which she had changed to British time when they landed told her that it was nearing ten o’clock. She climbed into the car and when he got in beside her and reached for his pipe, she said:

‘How much longer will it be before we reach Trefallath?’

Hywel Benedict lit his pipe before answering, and then exhaling smoke, he answered: ‘Oh, perhaps another hour and a half—something like that. Why? Getting nervous?’

Tamsyn did not deign to answer that and with a shrug of the heavy shoulders he leaned forward and started the car.

Darkness brought its own uneasiness to a landscape which was fast becoming wilder and less closely populated. The lights of villages were fewer and farther between and Tamsyn gripped her seat tightly, her nerves playing tricks with her. It was all very well contemplating this visit from the calm and civilised environs of her mother’s world, and quite another encountering the stark facts of reality. Here she was, miles from anything or anyone she knew or cared about, in the company of a man who had identified himself only by means of a photograph and had since made no attempt to tell her anything about her father or even about himself.

‘Relax.’

The calm word startled her into awareness and she stole a look at his shadowy profile. ‘Do you know my father very well?’ she asked.

Hywel Benedict inclined his head slowly. ‘You might say that. We’ve known each other since we were children together, so I suppose I know him as well as any man could.’

Tamsyn nodded. ‘So you’ll know—Joanna, too.’

‘Joanna is my cousin.’

‘Oh!’ Tamsyn swallowed this information with difficulty. ‘I see.’

‘What do you see, I wonder,’ he commented wryly. ‘Very little beyond that small nose, I shouldn’t be surprised.’

Tamsyn unbuttoned and then buttoned the jacket of her suit. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘No? I would have thought a bright little mind like yours would have fastened on to the fact that if Joanna is my cousin she must have known your father a long time, too.’

‘Oh, that.’

‘Yes, that. It may interest you to know that Joanna was going to marry Lance long before he met Laura Stewart.’

Tamsyn gasped, ‘I didn’t know that.’

‘I don’t suppose you did. It’s not the sort of thing your mother would have told you, is it? I mean—well, it puts her in a different position, doesn’t it?’

‘My mother is no femme fatale, if that’s what you’re implying,’ stated Tamsyn hotly.

‘No. She was never a handsome woman, I’ll give you that,’ he remarked annoyingly. ‘But she had charm, when she chose to exert it, and I think Lance was flattered.’

‘How do you know what she was like?’ demanded Tamsyn.

‘Because I knew her, too. We were all in London at the same time. I even went to their wedding.’

Tamsyn was stunned. ‘I see,’ she said, rather uncertainly.

‘I didn’t approve of Lance marrying your mother,’ he continued complacently. ‘She wanted Lance to be something he could never be—an intellectual. He didn’t belong in London. He pined for the valley. For the simple, uncomplicated life. And eventually he gave up the struggle and went back there.’

‘And I suppose you encouraged him,’ accused Tamsyn scornfully.

Hywel shook his head slowly. ‘Oh, no, bach. It was nothing to do with me. I was in South Africa at the time, and I knew nothing about it until I came home and found Joanna and Lance together again.’

Tamsyn compressed her lips. ‘And I suppose you approved of that.’

‘Naturally. Joanna has made your father happy. Would you rather he had been miserable all his life?’

‘How dare you imply that my mother would have been responsible for his own lack of confidence?’ Tamsyn was furious.

‘Call it familiarity, Tamsyn Stanford. And don’t get so angry. You didn’t expect to hear good things of your mother in Trefallath, did you?’

‘It seems to me that my mother was justified in refusing to allow me to visit with my father before now.’

‘Why?’ Hywel shook his head. ‘There are always two sides to every question, aren’t there? Perhaps if the two had been more evenly balanced, it wouldn’t have come as such a shock to hear the other side now.’

‘You don’t imagine I believe everything you’ve said, do you?’ exclaimed Tamsyn disdainfully.

Hywel made an indifferent gesture. ‘No matter. You’ll learn, bach.’

It was nearly half past eleven when they began the descent into the valley. Tamsyn, who had not expected to feel tired yet, was beginning to sense a certain weariness in her limbs, and her head dropped several times. But she would not allow herself to fall asleep and risk waking to find herself with her head on his shoulder. Somehow she needed to avoid physical contact with Hywel Benedict.

Trefallath was, as Hywel had told her, merely a cluster of cottages, a public house, a school and a chapel. They ran through the dimly lit main street and then turned on to the rough moorland again, following a narrow road which badly needed re-surfacing. At last the station wagon slowed and turned between stone gateposts, and came to a shuddering halt before a low, stone-built house with lights shining from the lower windows.

‘Welcome to Glyn Crochan, Tamsyn Stanford,’ he remarked, almost kindly, and then slid out of the car.

As Tamsyn got out, light suddenly spilled on to her, and she realised the door of the building had opened and a man had emerged followed closely by the small figure of a woman.

The man greeted Hywel warmly, and then came round the car to Tamsyn with swift determined strides. ‘Tamsyn!’ he exclaimed, and there was a break in his voice. ‘Oh, Tamsyn, it’s good to see you!’

Tamsyn allowed her father to enfold her in his arms, but she felt nothing except a faint warming to his spontaneous affection. ‘Hello, Daddy,’ she responded, as he drew back to look into her face. ‘It’s good to see you, too.’

‘My, how you’ve grown,’ went on Lance Stanford in amazement. ‘I—I expected a child. It was foolish of me, I know, but I could only think of you that way.’ He released her shoulders but took possession of her hand. ‘Come! Come and meet Joanna again.’

He drew her firmly after him round the car to where Tamsyn’s stepmother waited. Tamsyn had been so intent on appraising her father, noticing how young and lean he looked, how his hair still sprang thickly from his well-shaped head, that she had paid little attention to anything else. But now, as she followed her father round the car, she looked towards the opened door where, in the shaft of light, Joanna Stanford was standing.

And then an almost audible gasp rose to her throat to be checked instantly. Joanna was small and dark and attractive, in a yellow silk dress that moulded her figure in the slight breeze that blew off the moors. She was also most obviously pregnant.

Tamsyn’s eyes darted swiftly to Hywel Benedict’s and she encountered his sardonic gaze resentfully. He could have told her. He could have warned her of what to expect.

And yet that was exactly what he would not do. He would make nothing easier for the daughter of Laura Stewart.

‘Joanna darling,’ her father was saying now. ‘Here she is, at last. Here’s Tamsyn! Don’t you think she’s grown into quite a young lady?’

Joanna smiled and kissed Tamsyn’s cheek, welcoming her to Trefallath. In a more receptive mood Tamsyn would have glimpsed the appeal in Joanna’s dark eyes, but right now she was too absorbed with her own emotions to make anything more than a desultory response, and avoid making any obvious remarks.

‘Come, let’s go inside,’ said her father, after these preliminary greetings. ‘Hywel, you’ll come in and have a drink with us?’

‘Thank you, no.’ Hywel plunged his hands deep into the pockets of his tweed suit. Tamsyn looked at him rather desperately. Now that he was going, now that he had unloaded her cases and placed them on the step for her father to deal with, she was loath that he should go. She scarcely knew her father, after all, and during the past five hours she had come to know Hywel Benedict disturbingly better than that.

‘Er—thank you—for bringing me here,’ she said unevenly.

Hywel looked down at her mockingly. ‘It was a pleasure, bach,’ he responded.

‘Will—will I see you again?’ Tamsyn didn’t quite know why she should have asked such a question and she was aware that her father was beginning to chafe with impatience to get her inside.

‘Without a doubt,’ said Hywel, opening the door of the station wagon. ‘Your father knows where I live. Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight.’

Lance Stanford raised his hand in farewell and the heavy vehicle turned and drove away. Tamsyn glanced back once as Joanna urged her inside, into the warmth and light of the polished hallway, and then gave her attention to her immediate surroundings.

She awoke reluctantly next morning, feeling the rays of the sun as it played upon her eyelids. She rolled on to her stomach, burying her face in the pillows, not wanting to remember where she was, or think of the prospect of the days and weeks ahead of her.

Her room was small but compact, with a single, spring-interior divan and oak furniture. Used to fitted carpets, Tamsyn had found the linoleum-covered floor rather chilling to her feet, but there was a soft rug beside her bed where she had undressed the night before.

The night before …

She sighed. She had not made a good impression and she knew it. She thought perhaps her father had been disappointed in her attitude, but she couldn’t be sure. Her own feelings were easier to assimilate. She had found her father the same gentle man he had always seemed to her, but she felt no real emotion towards him. And Joanna it was difficult to see in any other light than that of the woman who had broken up her parents’ marriage. It might be true that Laura had not been the ideal wife for a man like Lance, but nevertheless, that didn’t alter the fact that it had been her father who had left her mother, not the other way around. She had expected it to be difficult, coming here, but not half as difficult as it was going to be now that she had found that Joanna was pregnant.

She ought not to be shocked, she had told herself over and over again, but she was. And why? Her father was still a young man, after all, barely forty, and it was only natural that he and Joanna should want children. But if only they had not chosen this particular time when Tamsyn had to be there, to see it. She had made no comment about Joanna’s condition the night before, and nor had they. But sooner or later she would have to, and she dreaded it. She didn’t know much about pregnancies, but judging by Joanna’s size it could surely not be much longer before she had the child. And where would she have it? In hospital? It seemed unlikely when her father was a doctor. So she would have it here, quite possibly while Tamsyn was staying.

Tamsyn slid abruptly out of bed. Such thoughts were not conducive to a peaceful frame of mind at this hour of the day and she determinedly walked to the window and looked out on the scene that spread out before her.

The landscape was green and rolling, and somewhere she could hear the sound of running water. But what amazed her most was its emptiness, acres and acres of rolling moorland without a house or village spire to be seen. Away to the left, in a fold of the hills, she knew the village of Trefallath nestled, but here there was nothing but the tree-strewn marches populated by sheep and goats and the lonely cry of the curlew.

She drew away from the window and glanced at her watch. It was a little after eight, and she wondered what she should do. Go downstairs, she supposed. After all, she could hardly expect Joanna to run after her, and nor did she want her to. But she wondered where her father was. Where did he have his surgery? Surely not here, some distance from the village. How on earth did Joanna stand the loneliness?

She washed in the bathroom with its disturbingly noisy geyser gurgling away beside her and then dressed in jeans and a sleeveless sweater. She didn’t bother with make-up, but combed her thick hair into some kind of order before leaving her room.

As she descended the staircase she could hear Joanna singing in the kitchen, and she sighed. There was no point in maintaining a kind of armed truce with someone with whom one was going to have to spend a great deal of time, she decided reasonably, with a pang of remorse for her mother. But her mother was not here, she was, and nothing she said would alter the inevitable. With determined brightness, she turned the handle of the kitchen door and entered the room.

Joanna was at the stove, her face shiny from the heat of the pans. ‘Oh, good morning,’ she said, in surprise. ‘You’re up, then! I was going to bring your breakfast up to you.’

Tamsyn bit her lip. ‘There’s no need for that, really. I’m perfectly capable of getting up and making my own breakfast. Besides, in—in your condition, you should be resting, shouldn’t you?’

Joanna stopped what she was doing and looked squarely at her stepdaughter. ‘You noticed, then.’

Tamsyn coloured. ‘Yes. Where’s my father?’

‘He’s gone to see Mrs. Evans. She had a seizure in the night.’ Joanna frowned. ‘You didn’t say anything to your father last night.’

‘No.’ Tamsyn moved her shoulders defensively. ‘Look, Joanna, I’ll be honest with you. I didn’t want to come here, but my mother wanted me to, so I came.’ She sighed. ‘Last night I was tired. It was quite an ordeal coming here—alone. I—well, needed time to think.’

‘And now you’ve thought,’ said Joanna.

‘Yes.’

‘You didn’t think that your father might be hurt by your not mentioning it sooner?’

Tamsyn moved her head. ‘Look—it’s difficult for me, too, Joanna.’

‘And from your expression last night it wasn’t just difficult, it was unacceptable, wasn’t it?’

Tamsyn scuffed her toe, her hands tucked into the belt of her jeans. ‘I guess so.’

‘Why? What’s so unacceptable about two married people loving one another enough to want children? Wasn’t that what your mother and father did when they had you?’

‘That was different!’ Tamsyn felt uncomfortable. ‘Well, no, I guess it wasn’t. But just give me time. I—I’ll get over it.’

‘And in the meantime your father has to worry about you, eh?’ Joanna turned back to the stove.

‘It’s not like that,’ exclaimed Tamsyn indignantly. ‘Good heavens, he surely didn’t expect me to behave as though everything was as it should be! I mean—I scarcely know him! Let alone feel at home with him!’

‘Whose fault is that?’

‘Why, no one’s, I guess.’

‘You blame your father for everything, don’t you?’ Joanna ladled scrambled eggs on to a plate.

‘No—that is—no, I don’t.’ But she did, and Joanna knew it. ‘Look—can’t we start again? I know it’s difficult for you, too. But if I’m to stay here, we can’t go on like this.’

‘I agree.’ Joanna came to the scrubbed wooden table that dominated the kitchen. She rested her hands on the table and looked into Tamsyn’s flushed young face. ‘All right, Tamsyn. We’ll begin again. I won’t make things difficult for you, if you don’t make things difficult for me.’

‘What do you mean?’ Tamsyn frowned.

Joanna shook her head. ‘You really don’t know your father very well, do you? Do you honestly think that your attitude last night didn’t upset him? Don’t you realise that he thinks the world of you? He always has. He hasn’t seen much of you, but maybe that’s why he’s built you up in his mind into something—something marvellous, terrific! His daughter! His Tamsyn! That side of him hasn’t been easy to live with, believe me! And now you’re here, and if you think things can go on as before so long as you remain indifferent to him, you’re mistaken. You’ll always come first in his thoughts, I’ve known that for years, and after you’d gone to bed last night he was like a bear with a sore head, worrying about your reactions. He knew the sight of me had shocked you, and I think if he could have changed things there and then he would have done. But when we went in for this child we didn’t know we were going to have you to stay!’

‘Oh, Joanna!’ Tamsyn felt terrible. ‘I—I didn’t know—I didn’t realise.’

‘How could you? So far as you were concerned your father was the villain of the piece. Well, he isn’t, and he never was. But that’s another story.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Tamsyn didn’t know what to say.

‘That’s all right. I just wanted to get things straight between us before your father gets back.’ Joanna straightened and turned back to the stove. ‘Do you like your bacon crisp or not?’

Tamsyn moved to the table, fingering a fork absently. ‘Do you think I could just have toast? I’m not very hungry, actually.’

Joanna clicked her tongue. ‘No, I don’t think you could just have toast,’ she retorted, but there was a faint suggestion of a smile touching the corners of her mouth. ‘And there’s no point in moping about what’s been said. You’re seventeen, Tamsyn, nearly eighteen, in fact. It’s time you grew up. As you said earlier, we’ve got to live together for the next few weeks, so we might as well make the best of it.’

Tamsyn nodded. ‘All right. I’m willing.’

‘Good. Then we understand one another.’ Joanna flexed her back muscles wearily. ‘I shall be glad when these few weeks are over, and I don’t mean because of you. I feel so big and clumsy, particularly now, in comparison to you.’

Tamsyn glanced down self-consciously. ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘You’re much smaller than I am. I feel quite tall beside you.’

Joanna smiled. ‘I always wanted to be tall and slim like you. You’re lucky. You’ve inherited your height and build from your father. Do you know his hair used to be that colour once?’

‘You must tell me about him,’ suggested Tamsyn quietly. ‘I—I’d like to hear about his life before he—he married my mother.’

‘Hywel told you I knew him then, of course.’

Tamsyn felt her nerves tingle at the mention of Hywel Benedict’s name. ‘Yes,’ she said, taking a seat at the scrubbed table and resting her chin on her hands, elbows supported on the wooden surface.

Joanna scooped bacon and eggs on to a plate and put it before her. It smelt marvellous and Tamsyn realised she was hungry after all. There was crusty bread to go with it, and yellow butter that melted on the toast that followed.

Joanna joined her at the table, but she had only some toast and Tamsyn commented upon it. ‘I need to lose some weight, actually,’ confided her stepmother with a sigh. ‘We may not have much to offer here, but at least the food is good and wholesome, and I’m afraid I can’t resist hot scones with butter and lots of suety puddings.’

Tamsyn laughed. She was beginning to realise that Joanna was not at all as she had expected her to be, and she blamed herself for presupposing things she really knew nothing about.

‘Hywel Benedict is your cousin, isn’t he?’ she asked Joanna now, unable to resist the question.

‘That’s right.’ Joanna poured more coffee into Tamsyn’s cup.

Tamsyn hesitated. ‘Does he live far from here?’

Joanna looked at her squarely. ‘Not far. Why?’

Tamsyn shrugged with what she hoped was non-chalance. ‘I was curious, that’s all.’

‘You didn’t mind Hywel meeting you, did you? I mean, Lance couldn’t leave the practice without anyone to cover for him, and I was in no fit state to drive nearly two hundred miles.’

‘No. No, of course not.’ Tamsyn shook her head. ‘I guess I did at first, but then …’ She pushed her empty plate aside. ‘That was delicious. Thank you.’

‘I like cooking,’ said Joanna simply. ‘And I like to watch people enjoy their food.’

Tamsyn glanced round. ‘What can I do to help you?’

‘Do you want to help?’

‘Yes. I don’t intend to spend my days loafing around. That’s not my scene.’ Tamsyn rose from her seat and carried her dirty plates across to the sink. ‘Shall I start with these?’

Joanna rested against the table, half turned towards her. ‘If you like.’

Tamsyn nodded and filled the bowl with hot soapy water. Outside the kitchen windows she could see a vegetable garden and beyond, a path leading down through wild rose and gorse bushes to a stream, the stream which she had heard earlier. There were some hens picking about behind the back door and several outbuildings which she supposed were used to house livestock. Plunging her hands into the hot water, looking out on that rural scene, she felt a sudden sense of peace and relaxation and she sighed. Maybe it wasn’t going to be so bad after all.

Her father returned as Tamsyn and Joanna were making the beds. He came upstairs to find them and looked in surprise at the two of them, folding sheets beneath the mattress. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked, his gaze going from one to the other of them, and Tamsyn smiled.

‘Joanna’s been telling me what a terror you were when you were a teenager,’ she replied, and saw her father’s gaze go swiftly to his wife’s.

‘That’s right,’ said Joanna calmly. ‘There’s no better way of getting to know someone than by working together, don’t you agree?’

Lance looked bewildered. ‘If you say so.’ He bit his lip. ‘Well, one of you come and make me some coffee. I’m sorely in need of a stimulant. Mrs. Evans has been at her most trying.’

‘The woman with the seizure?’ asked Tamsyn.

‘Seizure!’ muttered her father grimly. ‘It was no seizure. Just the result of overeating, that’s all.’

Joanna chuckled and then she said: ‘You go with your father, Tamsyn. You know where everything is now. You make him some coffee while I finish off here and then I’ll join you.’

Tamsyn hesitated. ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like to make the coffee?’

‘Quite sure,’ answered Joanna, straightening her back with a firm hand.

Downstairs, Lance faced his daughter rather doubtfully, and Tamsyn considered for a moment, and then said: ‘It’s going to be all right, Daddy.’

Her father stared at her anxiously. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean my being here—Joanna and me! It’s going to be all right. We—we understand one another now.’ She sighed. ‘And I’m sorry I was so anti-social last night.’

Lance twisted his lips. ‘It was understandable, I suppose.’

‘You mean—because Joanna’s pregnant?’

‘Yes.’ Her father turned away. ‘I realise it’s hard for you to—–’

‘Oh, please, Daddy!’ Tamsyn didn’t want to talk about it any more. ‘Let it go, for now. How do you like your coffee? Black or white?’

Lance regarded her for a long moment and then he nodded. ‘Very well, Tamsyn. We’ll leave it. And I like my coffee black, but sweet.’

Over the aromatic beverage they discussed the details of her flight and when the conversation came round to Hywel Benedict again, she asked: ‘Does—does Mr. Benedict have a farm or something?’

Lance stared at her in surprise. ‘Hywel? Heavens, no!’

Tamsyn tipped her head on one side. ‘Then what does he do?’

‘Didn’t he tell you?’

‘No.’

Her father shook his head. ‘Ah, well, no. I suppose he wouldn’t, at that. Hywel’s a writer, cariad. Quite well known, he is. But you wouldn’t know that, living in America.’

‘A writer!’

Tamsyn was stunned. She remembered with self-loathing the way she had gone on about the cultural advantages of living in the city and of how she had chided him about art and music and books, almost setting herself up as an authority on the subject. How ridiculous she must have sounded to a man who was a writer himself. Her cheeks burned with the memory of it all, but her father seemed not to notice.

‘Yes,’ he was saying now, ‘he’s become more reserved since Maureen left.’

Tamsyn’s head jerked up. ‘Maureen? Who’s Maureen?’

‘Why, Maureen Benedict, of course, bach,’ replied her father. ‘Hywel’s wife!’

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