Instant Father Read online

  “That’s because you’re generous. But I had to think of it. After all, I can afford it more easily than you can.”

  “Yes, you can, can’t you?” he said with an effort. He felt sick, stunned. He’d galloped like a knight errant to her rescue, and her response was to offer him money. Did she think he cared about the money? Didn’t she know he’d have gladly impoverished himself for her sake? To have his gesture ruined was almost more than he could bear. Everything he’d hoped to win tonight now seemed like a fool’s delusion.

  He pulled himself together. “Thank you,” he said. “There was no need to rush to repay me tonight.”

  “But I wanted to. I didn’t like to think of you going to bed worrying. Not when I owe you so much.”

  The truth, of course, he realized bitterly, was that she didn’t want to be in his debt a moment longer than she had to be. Well, there was a way he could relieve her of that burden. “How conscientious of you,” he said, with a blank smile. “And it’s nonsense to suggest that you owe me anything. I did it all for Peter. I know that will please you.”

  He was too preoccupied with his own suffering to notice the light fade from her eyes. “Of course, it pleases me,” she said. “It means you’re gaining some understanding of him, and that’s the most important thing of all.”

  “It is, isn’t it? You’d never believe how close he and I managed to become last night.”

  “I’d love to hear about it, but not just now. Suddenly I’ve got a splitting headache.”

  “You must be very tired,” he said quickly. “I’ll go now and let you get some rest. Good night, Norah.”

  “Good night,” she said quietly.

  He left her room quickly and stood breathing a sigh of relief. For a moment he’d almost revealed his innermost feelings, but he’d avoided disaster just in time.

  As for the pain in his heart-well, that was another matter.

  Chapter Twelve

  Gavin was on the phone when Norah’s shadow darkened the doorway. He finished the conversation quickly and glanced up, no longer trying to hide from himself the pleasure he gained from the sight of her. But she didn’t look pleased. She was frowning. “It wasn’t very courteous of you not to tell me you’d invited your father to stay,” she said.

  “My father? Of course I haven’t. Whatever put that idea into your head?”

  “He did. He’s just arrived.”

  “What?” Gavin’s astonishment propelled him out of the chair and halfway across the room. “He can’t have done.”

  “An ambulance drew up outside and he was lifted out in a wheelchair. He’s got a male nurse who’s also arrived to stay.”

  “Norah, I swear to you I knew nothing about this. You’ve got to believe me.”

  “All right,” she said, her face relaxing. “I just thought for a moment that you’d summoned reinforcements.”

  “Reinforcements against what? I thought we had a truce-maybe even a friendship?” He said the last words with uncharacteristic hesitancy. He never knew where he was with her.

  To his astonishment, she replied, “Perhaps we do. The thing is, I never know where I am with you. Now, why are you looking all struck of a heap?”

  “I-nothing. I’d better go and see my father.”

  “Try and look pleased to see him,” she said shrewdly.

  “Of course I’m pleased to see him-heaven help me!”

  Norah chuckled and he forced a smile onto his face before going out into the hall. “Father, what a delightful surprise!”

  William glared at him balefully from his wheelchair. He was a small, wizened man with brilliant eyes. “Surprise is right,” he snapped. “Knowing how I feel about this house, a good son would have invited me weeks ago.”

  “I always meant to, but I wasn’t sure if you were strong enough. Besides, things have been in such turmoil recently-”

  “Because of that woman, you mean?”

  Gavin glanced at the open door and swiftly wheeled his father away into the living room. “If you mean Miss Ackroyd, she and I have learned to come to terms with each other.”

  “Don’t give me that mealymouthed stuff,” William growled. “When enemies ‘come to terms’ it means that one of them has given in. And since she’s still here, it means you’ve given in. Why haven’t you got her out of here?”

  Gavin briefly considered trying to explain his new feeling that Norah had as much right to be here as he did, perhaps more, but he gave it up at once. William would think he was crazy. He settled for the only explanation his father would understand. “I can’t get her out. She owns half the place.”

  “Poppcock! A legal fiction to deceive you.”

  “Her father bought Liz’s share-for cash,” Gavin said. He added the price and had the satisfaction of seeing William’s eyes open wide in surprise. If there was one thing his father understood it was hard cash.

  But the next moment William had returned to the attack. “So buy her out. Sell some of our assets. We’ve got plenty.”

  “The property market isn’t what it was,” Gavin said carefully. “Raising that kind of money now would be-complicated.” It would be impossible, but he couldn’t tell William that. “Besides, she doesn’t want to sell.”

  “Pooh! So what? There are ways of persuading people.”

  “Don’t let’s spoil your visit with a fight, Father,” Gavin said, striving to keep the smile on his face.

  “Won’t spoil it at all. I enjoy a fight. Where’s my grandson?”

  “I’ll fetch him in a moment,” Gavin said, “but before you see him, there’s something you must understand. Peter’s had a very bad time recently and he’s withdrawn into himself. He doesn’t speak.”

  “Doesn’t speak? What d’you mean? You mean he can’t speak?”

  “He can, but he doesn’t. He’s happier in his own world. He’ll come out of it when he’s ready.”

  “Stuff and nonsense! It does no good to humor tantrums.”

  “I don’t consider it a tantrum,” Gavin said, trying to keep the anger out of his voice. “I don’t push him about this, and I won’t allow you to push him. If I don’t have your word not to try to bully him, I’ll keep him away from you.”

  “Bully him. Bully him? I’m the mildest man on earth. If I ever thought to see my own son giving in to such namby-pamby-all right, all right. I won’t say a word.”

  “Your promise?”

  “Yes, yes. Get on with it.”

  Peter was fetched and introduced to his grandfather. To Gavin’s pleasure he showed no shrinking, stepping forward calmly to shake hands, but he remained silent when William spoke to him. In a sense the old man kept his word and let the matter go without comment, but his restraint had a quality of disgust that Gavin recognized from his own childhood. He felt a remembering shiver go through him.

  Mrs. Stone announced that William’s room was ready, and the nurse took him to it. They saw no more of him until the evening meal, by which time William was fully rested and raring to go. Gavin faced the evening with dread.

  Throughout the meal William studiously ignored Peter. He did more than ignore him. He showed no awareness of his presence, talking rudely across him as though he were an empty space. Gavin felt his soul shrivel with sympathy for his son. He would have liked to remonstrate with the old man, but could think of nothing he could do that wouldn’t make matters worse. He glanced at Peter and saw that his son was regarding William with curiosity. He didn’t seem hurt, merely interested. Then he saw Gavin’s encouraging look, glanced back at William, and lifted his shoulders a fraction. There was a slight smile on his face as if he were saying, “Don’t worry. This doesn’t trouble me.”

  With astonishment Gavin realized that Peter had got William’s measure. He’d seen right through the old man to the petty spite that lay behind his behavior. Having assessed it, he could deal with it. For a boy of ten it was a sophisticated response, Gavin realized, and one that suggested an inner security. In fact, it was more sophisti
cated and secure than Gavin’s own reaction to his father.

  But, then, he had a history of being at a disadvantage with William. His heart sank at the thought of having his father here for a long visit, upsetting everything, just when things were going so well.

  And then he wondered at himself. His firm was still in a mess. He was no nearer recovering either Peter or Strand House. So why did he feel things were going well?

  He saw Norah looking across at him, a gentle, quizzical smile on her face, and he was swept by a feeling that as long as she smiled at him nothing could possibly go badly. He looked away, suddenly self-conscious.

  Afterward, when Peter had gone to bed, Gavin, Norah and William shared a drink in the living room. William kept glaring at Norah, evidently considering her an interloper, until at last she took pity on Gavin and announced her intention of taking a last look at the sanctuary.

  “Do you allow her to come in here?” William demanded when she had gone.

  “Father, don’t you understand? This is her house, too. She goes where she wants.”

  “Then do something about it. Did I raise a spineless milksop?”

  “Probably,” Gavin was goaded to retort. “I certainly haven’t the nerve to tell Norah where she can and can’t go in her own house.”

  “Then it’s time you-what the devil is that noise?” A mad rapping sound was coming from the door. Gavin went across impatiently and opened it. At once Osbert waddled in, honking with irritation at being kept waiting. “Get that creature out of here,” William yelled.

  “It’s only Osbert,” Gavin said.

  “It has a name?” William enquired with awful sarcasm.

  “They all have names. It sounds a little odd at first, but you soon get used to it.”

  “I have no intention of getting used to it. Not here. Do you know what Strand House used to be?”

  “Of course, I do. You’ve told me often enough.”

  “A place of beauty and gracious living. You’ve let them turn it into a zoo.”

  “It’s not a zoo, it’s a sanctuary-a place of healing and peace.”

  “Sentimental poppycock! Get that bird away from me.”

  “Don’t wave your stick at him like that,” Gavin said sharply. “You’ll scare him.”

  The warning came too late. William swung his stick wildly at Osbert, missing the bird’s beak by half an inch. Osbert danced with rage and gathered himself for an attack. Quickly Gavin intervened, grabbing the furious bird around the body, but Osbert twisted his neck back far enough to bite him. He yelled and strode to the door, pushing Osbert out and slamming it shut behind him.

  “That creature ought to be put down,” William shouted. “He’s vicious.”

  “He’s not vicious,” Gavin growled, rubbing his arm. “He just doesn’t like being attacked. It’ll be all right as long as you don’t do it again.”

  “I? Are you daring to blame me?”

  Gavin sighed. “This is Osbert’s home,” he declared, knowing how he must sound to the man who had raised him to believe only in the tangible signs of success.

  “They’ve addled your brains,” William snapped. “You’d never have said such a daft thing at one time.”

  “No,” Gavin said, in wonder at himself. “I wouldn’t, would I?”

  “So you admit it? It’s a relief that you can see the truth.”

  “Just what truth do you have in mind, Father? I’m beginning to wonder if your truth and mine are the same. Maybe they haven’t been for a long time.”

  William ignored this. “You admit that this place and the people in it are rotting your brains. Think what they’re doing to your son. You must get him away from here while there’s time to save him.”

  “I don’t think he needs saving from anyone or anything here,” Gavin said deliberately. “I’m perfectly happy with what he’s learning.”

  “Stuff and nonsense. He’s growing up. He’s got to learn to be a man, and it’s your duty to move him out of here and see that he does.”

  “It’s not that simple. I explained in my letter that he’s legally under the care of the Local Authority and I can’t move him without their permission.”

  “Local Authority be damned! I’ve been dealing with them all my life, and I’ve never let them get the better of me yet.”

  “Yes, I’m familiar with your ways with planning departments. This is a little different.”

  “Determination and a refusal to be bullied will work with any department. I taught you that long ago, and until now I thought you’d learned the lesson. I was proud of you. Now I’m beginning to think there’s a weakness in you. Stop pussyfooting around and take possession of your own son.”

  “I don’t like the expression ‘take possession of,’” Gavin said firmly. “My son isn’t a possession. He’s a person with ideas of his own.”

  “Nonsense,” William snapped. “Children are what you make them. Look what I made of you.”

  Gavin swung around on him. “Yes, look what you made of me,” he said bitterly. “A man whom nobody loves.”

  He strode from the room, feeling he couldn’t bear any more. In the hall he found Norah, and from her face he knew at once that she’d overheard the whole exchange. “You were right,” he said. “A man nobody loves.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I was wrong. I was so wrong.”

  There was a new light on her face. Before he knew what she meant to do she had reached up and laid her lips gently against his. The next moment they heard William banging on the door with his stick, shouting, ready to continue the argument. Norah sighed and hurried away. Gavin turned to confront his father. And neither of them saw Peter peering through the banisters.

  He was back in the misery and despair that had haunted his nights for weeks, plunged into a darkness in which he screamed and screamed, but there was no sound.

  But suddenly the suffocating silence was broken by the most beautiful, gentle voice he’d ever heard. Hands held him and he awoke to find himself staring, wild-eyed, into Norah’s face, clutching her as if she were his lifeline. And she was. He saw it now. He could see everything now.

  “Gavin,” she said, shaking him to make him awaken properly. “Gavin, it’s all right. I’m here.” Then, as he continued to stare at her with a ghastly face, she pulled him against her and enfolded him in her arms, stroking his tousled hair and laying her cheek against him. “It’s all right,” she whispered. “I’m here.”

  “Thank God you are,” he said hoarsely. His face was pressed against her bare skin and he could breathe in the scent of feminine warmth and sweetness. Yet he was hardly aware of sexual provocation, only the ineffable bliss of being comforted.

  “It must have been a terrible dream,” she murmured, “and you seem to have it so often.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I hear you. You cry out in your sleep almost every night. Tonight it was louder than usual. That’s why I came in.”

  Once it would have appalled him to know she’d heard him crying out in his sleep. Now he only felt relief that she understood without explanations. “What was the dream about?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. I wake up in a terrible state, full of fear and dread, and not knowing why.”

  “If you could only remember, we might fight it together,” she sighed.

  He grew still, trying to absorb this novel idea. Fighting was something he’d always done alone. His idea of “together” had been with Liz or Peter, two people he’d wanted to protect. The ideas of enlisting them on his side in the fight had simply never occurred to him. Now it seemed so obvious; as obvious as the fact that there was no one he wanted fighting for him more than Norah. “Together,” he murmured longingly. “If only we could.”

  “We can. It’s not so hard.”

  “It is for me,” he said with difficulty.

  “Yes. For you. But we could still manage it, if we knew what you were afraid of.”

  It was on the tip of his tongue to say the ol
d instinctive words, that he wasn’t afraid of anything. But that wouldn’t do, not here and now, now with this deeply honest woman. “I don’t know what I’m afraid of,” he said at last. “I’ve hidden it too deep. I’m-afraid to find it.”

  “Why?” she probed gently. “Why are you afraid to find it?”

  “Because it might be more than I could bear.” A shudder went through him. “Unless-unless you were there.”

  “I’m here,” she said softly, stroking his hair. “I’ll always be here.”

  As she spoke, he had a sudden brief vision of another nightmare-the nightmare of losing her, as though the things they would say now would lead irresistibly to their separation. “It’s all right,” he said. “It’s over now. The dream’s gone. We can’t drag it back, and we don’t need to.”

  The words were hollow and false to his own ears, and he could only guess how they seemed to her. She didn’t answer, but drew back and looked him full in the face. Her eyes were kind, but full of disappointment, as though she’d found him a coward. “It’s all right,” he said desperately.

  “If you say so.”

  He held her tightly, as if to stop her going, while his thoughts whirled in torment. At last he asked, “Could you ever make out what I said?”

  “Not in the past. It was just indistinct shouting. But tonight you were clearly saying, ‘I don’t want to go. I don’t want to go.’ You kept shouting it over and over again. Does it mean anything?”

  He told himself it didn’t mean a thing, but the wall of denial was starting to crumble, and through the cracks he could see the thing he’d hidden from all these years. He could see a little boy, just six years old, dragged screaming from his mother. The child’s sobs and cries tore into Gavin, and his desperate pleading to stay with the only person he loved made him cover his ears. But nothing could shut out the terrible sound because it was inside him, in the childhood self that still inhabited his man’s body. It had always been there, and it always would be.

  “Yes,” he said at last. “It means something. When my mother left my father, she took me with her. We were happy. I loved her and she-she loved me. But my father persuaded the court that she was an unfit mother and he came after us armed with an order. He made me go with him. I didn’t want to. I begged and pleaded to stay with my mother, but he dragged me away by force-”