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Suzanne, to the races.'
Noelle wished at once that she hadn't asked, certain that the reason for her
sudden silence would be obvious to the man.
She tried to disguise her pain with inconsequential chatter about the
weather, the lush, fertile state of the countryside through which they passed.
For a while she was able to dull the edges of her hurt in Bridie O'Rourke's
relieved welcome, her demand to know everything Noelle had seen and
done during her brief absence.
'Everything's settled,' Noelle told her. 'Except for the occasional business
trip to London, I'm here permanently.' Unless, to herself she added the rider,
unless Fergus were to marry Suzanne, in which case he would be well able
to buy Noelle out. But she preferred not to dwell on that possibility, which
would mean the loss of everything she now held dear and the Hall was
now the least of her concerns.
However, she was to be reminded of the subject when Fergus, returning
from the Curragh, brought Suzanne to see Miss O'Rourke, both of them with
glowing reports of their day out, and the other girl was invited to stay and
share their evening meal.
'He's been out with Suzanne once or twice while you've been away,' Bridie
O'Rourke told Noelle later, when they were alone. She sounded concerned,
Noelle thought. 'I had hoped that you and Fergus would fall in love. It would
have been so suitable and very convenient for everyone. But if you don't. ..'
Her worried frown deepened and she left her sentence unfinished, so that
Noelle wondered if this last stroke had left her great-aunt a little
absent-minded.
She had looked forward so much to coming back to Claddagh Hall, to seeing
Fergus again, that it came as an unpleasant surprise to find that he too
intended going away, for at least a week.
'I can leave with a clear conscience now you're here to look after Aunt
Bridie,' he told her.
'You, of course, sat with her all day, every day while I was away?' she said
sarcastically, but to her chagrin, she could not annoy him in the way he
could so easily annoy her.
'No,' he replied equably, 'I don't think you'll find that's necessary. Aunt
Bridie will probably encourage you, as she did me, to get out and about.'
'And you certainly took her at her word!'
His response was a mocking smile and the question, 'Shall you miss me,
while I'm away, Noelle?'
'Did you miss me?' she returned, evading the issue.
'The house was certainly more peaceful.' He could be evasive too.
'Well, that's how it'll be when you're gone,' she wasted no time in informing
him, adding, though it was far from what she felt, 'so don't hurry back!'
'Oh, we won't,' he assured her. 'I don't believe I mentioned it, but Suzanne is
coming with me, and since she's never been to England we'll probably fit in
a little sightseeing.'
CHAPTER SEVEN
IT lessened Noelle's shock a little when she found that both Terence and
Maeve Fahey would also be going on the trip to England, but even so, the
whole notion lent so much credence to the idea of an understanding between
Fergus and Suzanne that this fact wasn't much comfort.
Despite Noelle's insinuation that Fergus wouldn't be missed, he was, very
much so, both by her and by her great-aunt. Although Miss O'Rourke,
perhaps a little frailer than of yore, was much recovered, there was a
restlessness, an uneasiness about her that Noelle seemed not to remember.
Of course, being in her eighties, this most recent reminder of her own
mortality must have been very alarming, yet to Noelle, questioning her in a
roundabout way, she professed not to fear death. So what was worrying
Bridie O'Rourke?
Noelle, meanwhile, busied herself with the redecoration of the Hall, and
with her facility for draping material to good effect upon living models she
discovered an equal talent for re-upholstery, so that the ground floor at least
was beginning to look more cared-for, more homelike.
But even Noelle had her limitations where a capacity for sheer hard work
was involved, and one morning, feeling sorely in need of relaxation, she
wandered down towards the lough. It was safe enough to take that direction
today. Patrick was away too, visiting relations of his late mother. Although
firmly fixed in her determination that Patrick was entitled to recognition and
civility from the 'big house', as he mockingly called it, Noelle wasn't anxious
to encourage a repetition of his attentions towards herself.
En route to the lough, she found herself being shadowed by Caesar and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]