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Mrs Doulton considered her for a moment, then went on: 'I took to Baba on sight; she's a delightful girl, very sweet and warm, but…' She stopped, and Judith frowned, wondering what she had been about to say. Mrs Doulton shrugged, staring towards the window. 'Well, she's what Luke wants and I want him to be happy, one can never guess what goes on inside someone else even when it is your own son.' She turned back to Judith. 'Is Baba what she seems?'
The question was so sudden and so direct that Judith did not answer for a beat of time, she stared, open-eyed, then she smiled. 'Baba is one hundred per cent genuine, believe me. Ruth and I used to wish she wasn't quite so nice, in fact. We were rather jealous of her when she was younger; she was so staggeringly beautiful people used to stare when she went past. We would have liked her to be spiteful or mean, but she never was, she's pure gold all the way through.'
Mrs Doulton listened, watching her, nodding. 'I'm glad I wasn't wrong about her. I'd have been furious if she'd taken me in... ' Her eyes were self-deriding. 'Isn't it odd how much we dislike being fooled by someone?'
'Not odd at all: who enjoys being made a fool of?'
'Has anyone ever made a fool of you, Judith?'
'Probably, but I can't remember it now—self-protection. I suppose. '
They both laughed, then Mrs Doulton asked: 'How did you get into banking?' and for the next few minutes they talked about more general subjects. Judith found it stimulating and enjoyable; she soon realised that Mrs Doulton had a brain like a knife and an encyclopaedic knowledge of international finance. When Luke came back and told them that lunch was now ready Judith was quite reluctant to stop talking to his mother, she couldn't remember when she had met anyone so interesting or so amusing; Mrs Doulton seemed to have met everyone who mattered in that world of money and her judgments on them were usually coolly accurate without being unkind.
'Come up and see me before you leave, Judith,' Mrs Doulton told her as she followed Luke out of the room, and she looked back, smiling, to nod.
'She likes you,' Luke said drily; she wondered if he was disappointed.
'I hope she does—I liked her a lot.' Judith wondered if she had been through a test which all his personal assistants had to pass. Did he use his mother as litmus paper? An acid test which he regarded as a final judgment?
'A pity I was told to get out, I have a suspicion you didn't show my mother the claws you keep using on me.’ he commented, opening a door from the hall and standing back to let her enter the room into which it led, a sunny dining-room with oak-panelled walls whose golden wood gleamed in the light and reflected the bowls of flowers which stood everywhere and filled the air with spring fragrance.
Judith didn't rise to that remark, and as they began eating the delicious lunch which Fanny served them a few moments later, Luke said: 'What do I have to say to make you accept that I wasn't cheating on Baba last night?'
Judith took a mouthful of home-made celery soup, swallowed it while she thought about the question, then looked up and said: 'I'm surprised you take my opinion so seriously; does it matter what I think?'
'I've been asking myself that ever since last night,' he said wryly. 'I don't know why it should, but it does— yes. It may be childish of me, but I have an irrational dislike of being found guilty when I'm innocent.'
'For once?' Judith mocked, laughing at him, and suddenly realising that she actually believed hi
m now; perhaps because of his insistence of innocence and perhaps because she had somehow got to know him much better over the last twenty-four hours.
'Okay, for once,' he said with rueful amusement. 'I've no intention of starting off my marriage by cheating, and it wouldn't be with Caroline, if I was going to stray.'
'No?' Judith queried, still amused. 'Who, then?'
He poured some of the cool golden Muscadet into her glass, his hand steady. 'You, maybe.'
Judith stiffened. 'Don't start flirting with me, Mr Doulton. That's not my scene, I don't steal men from my friends and, even if I did, you're the last man I'd pick. We don't live in the same world.'
'Funny, I'd have said that that was exactly what we did—not many women can talk as shrewdly and intelligently about money as you, and if they can they rarely have a sense of fun or eyes that laugh when they're looking down—or didn't you think I'd noticed that you look down to laugh from time to time?'
Judith flushed, looking down now, not to laugh, but to hide the disturbed expression of her eyes. 'Are you sure you're serious about Baba?' she asked with biting emphasis.
He didn't answer, and they were silent as Fanny removed their soup plates and served the lamb and new potatoes and peas with mint sauce. She talked to Luke scoldingly about his mother as she moved around the table and Luke listened and nodded; patience in his face. He gave her more respect than he ever gave Judith; had she been his nanny? Judith wondered. She behaved like some member of the family.
When they were drinking their coffee later, Luke asked: 'Do you play croquet?' and Judith shook her head, her face surprised.
'I'll teach you, then; there's an old croquet set in the garden shed. I enjoy a game on a fine afternoon; there's something relaxing about it. When my mother first moved here and I unearthed the croquet mallets I hunted out a book on the rules; all I could remember of them was that Alice played it in Wonderland with flamingoes for mallets.'
'I hated Alice when I was a child; I thought it was weird and boring.'
'I enjoyed it very much the last time I read it; maybe it isn't a children's book at all. Maybe you have to be grown-up to read it.'
'I haven't read it since I was ten,' Judith confessed.
'You ought to take another look at it; it may surprise you. Coming out to play croquet?'
She got up. 'If you like.' She didn't expect to enjoy herself, but to her surprise she did; they laughed a lot and Luke cheated abominably, quite openly, admitting he liked to win no matter how he bent the rules.
