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Possessed of a sunny, happy temperament with little inclination to brood or go looking for trouble and a logical way of reasoning things, it simply hadn’t occurred to Joss that his parents might not view with equanimity the discovery that his ‘friend’ and their guest at the party was not another ten-year-old boy but, in fact, a twenty-six-year-old woman.
It had occurred to Bobbie, though, as she ruefully admitted during the course of her telephone call home, surreptitiously timed so that she could speak to her sister when no one else was about to overhear them.
‘It’s the perfect access to the family and right into the heart of it, Sam,’ Bobbie admitted a little reluctantly. ‘I couldn’t believe it when he introduced himself to me as Joss Crighton.’
‘And how old did you say this kid was?’ Samantha Miller demanded of her sister.
‘I’m not sure, somewhere around ten or maybe eleven. He’s a real cutie, huge brown eyes and thick hair.’
‘Sounds great,’ Samantha commented enthusiastically.
Bobbie laughed. ‘Oh, he is!’
‘And you say he’s asked you to his sisters’ eighteenth birthday party?’
‘Mmm...’
‘What else did you find out? Did you—’
‘No, not yet,’ Bobbie interrupted her sister quickly. ‘We were a bit public for me to cross-question him too deeply and we might have been overheard. I don’t want anyone getting suspicious of either of us.’
‘Cross-question, I like that,’ Samantha told her grimly.
‘How are things at home?’ Bobbie asked, her voice suddenly becoming slightly tense and anxious. ‘How is Mom?’
‘She doesn’t have a clue,’ Samantha assured her, ‘although even if I say so myself I am doing rather a good job of running interference for you. The first couple of days you were gone she was going crazy, asking me if I knew where you were, if there was some man... Poor Mom, she’s just so desperate to get at least one of us married off.’
‘What did you tell her?’ Bobbie asked.
‘I said you’d mentioned something about needing to get away now that you aren’t seeing Nat any more.’
‘Oh thanks. So now she’ll be thinking I’m suffering from a broken heart,’ Bobbie told her sister indignantly.
‘Having her thinking that is better than having her guess the truth. When is this party by the way? We don’t have a lot of time, not if...’
‘No, I know. It’s on Saturday, at the Grosvenor in Chester where, as good luck has it, I’m staying. It will be the perfect opportunity, not just for me to find out as much as I can from Joss, but also to study the family in general.’
‘Do you think you-know-who will be there?’ Samantha asked, her voice suddenly tensing and becoming brittle with hostility and anger.
‘I don’t know.’
‘When I think of what they’ve done, the unhappiness they’ve caused...’
‘I know, I know....’ Bobbie paused, then said, ‘Look, Sam, I’d better go. I’ll ring you after the party and tell you what I’ve managed to find out.’
She was just about to replace the receiver when she remembered something she had omitted to tell her sister.
‘I nearly forgot,’ she hastened to add. ‘You’ll never guess what...’ Laughing ruefully, she proceeded to tell Samanatha about Joss’s descriptions of, and revelations about, his Chester cousins.
‘What? Cousin Luke sounds like a real ape,’ came Samantha’s immediate and gutsy response, ‘the type that goes for cutesy, brain-dead little blonde bimbos he can wear like a Band-Aid on his pathetic inadequacies. Personally, I’ve always preferred to judge a man by the size and warmth of his heart, not—’
‘Sam...’ Bobbie warned her sister, laughing.
‘What? Oh! What a thing to suggest. I meant size as in height and not...’ Samantha began in wounded dignity, only to break down in a fit of giggles. ‘Well, good luck with Cousin Luke,’ she teased her sister before ringing off. ‘He sounds the perfect match for you, Bobbie, everything you’ve always wanted in a man.’
‘Doesn’t he just,’ Bobbie agreed with heavy irony.
After she had replaced the receiver, she walked over to her window and stared unseeing through the glass. It was no mere whim or casual impulse that had brought her to England, to Chester, to Haslewich, but rather a quest that had been a part of both her and her twin sister’s lives for as long as they had been old enough to understand the story of their mother’s life.
Sombrely Bobbie walked back towards the bed. She supposed she would have to find something suitable to wear for this party. It had been difficult enough getting away without her mother asking what she was up to and without worrying about packing any kind of formal evening wear; as she knew, to her cost, when you were six foot plus, buying off the peg wasn’t always an option.
In the small New England town where Bobbie and her sister had grown up, people were accustomed to their height; after all, it was a family trait. Dad was nearly six-five and his parents were tall, as well, and so were all their paternal kith and kin who were scattered around the area.
Stephen Miller’s family could trace their ancestors right back to one of the founding Pilgrim families and it had not been easy for their mother to gain their acceptance in view of her own family background or rather... Fiercely Bobbie checked her thoughts. As Sam had told her before she left the States, it was high time that justice was done, the tables turned, and a certain person made to see just what they had lost through their pride and cruelty, and her own niggling sense of reluctance and unease had to be severely restrained.
CHAPTER TWO
‘JENNY dear, I’m awfully sorry but I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to make it on Saturday after all.’
‘Oh, Aunt Ruth,’ Jenny protested into the telephone receiver. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ Ruth assured her niece by marriage firmly. ‘It’s just that Olivia and Caspar’s babysitter has let them down at the last minute and so I’ve offered to babysit Amelia for them instead. I don’t think they’ve had a single night out since Amelia arrived eight months ago.’
‘No, they haven’t,’ Jenny agreed. ‘Jon tried to persuade Olivia not to rush back to work, but you know how conscientious she is, she insisted. At least during the summer holiday, Caspar has been at home to look after her.’
‘Mmm... I know she’s beginning to get a bit anxious because they haven’t managed to find another suitable nanny as yet.’
‘Poor girl, it must be so hard for her. I know how much she loves her work but I’d have hated to have to let someone else bring up my children especially when they were babies. When you read these stories of mothers giving up their babies, I often wonder... I know it’s something that I could never bring myself to do. Ruth, are you still there?’ she asked anxiously into the silent receiver.
‘Yes, I’m still here,’ Ruth answered crisply, adding, ‘What you say is all very well, Jenny, but some women just don’t have any option.’
‘No, I realise that,’ Jenny agreed sombrely, catching the faint note of criticism in Ruth’s voice.
She had been lucky both in her marriage and more importantly in her husband, Jenny acknowledged as she replaced the receiver, very lucky.
‘You’re looking very pensive,’ Jon commented as he came into the bedroom where Jenny had just been finishing packing their overnight cases when the phone rang. ‘Not more problems?’
‘Not exactly. Ruth just rang. She isn’t going to be able to make it. She’s offered to babysit for Olivia and Caspar. Apparently their original babysitter has let them down. I rather annoyed her, I think.’
‘You?’ Jon gave his wife an affectionate look as he took her in his arms. ‘I doubt that, my love. You’re far too kind-natured to annoy anyone.’
‘Mmm... I did make rather a sweeping generalisation, I suppose,’ she told him, explaining what had happened.
‘Ah well, you know how hard Aunt Ruth has campaigned to raise funds for the t
own’s special new mother and baby home.’
‘Yes,’ Jenny agreed. ‘It’s a very innovative idea. Ruth is determined that it won’t be anything like the old unmarried mother and baby homes where girls used to be banished in disgrace if they were pregnant, and where the staff tried to persuade them to give their babies up for adoption.’
‘To be fair, in those days it was generally believed that such children were better off being adopted,’ Jon reminded her fair-mindedly.
‘Mmm ... I realise that. I suppose I just can’t help thinking that if you hadn’t married me when you did...’
