Tainted Love

Louise nodded. ‘Fen was disraught. He didn’t trust Diana to take care of him properly and immediately filed for custody. Diana countered by whisking Mikes away abroad.’

‘To America?’ Clare recalled Miles saying he’d lived in L.A.

‘Via Australia and South America,’ Louise recounted. ‘Diana spent six months country-hopping, with Miles as excess baggage, while Fen desperately tried to locate them long enough to get a court order implemented, forcing her to return the boy to the UK.’

Once more Clare was surprised. From their brief encounter, she’d thought Fen Marchand almost indifferent to his son.

Louise read her mind, and claimed, ‘They’d been so close, Miles and his father, but their years apart have done untold damage. Miles feel his father let him down, and, I suspect, Fen feels the same. He wants to make it up to him, but doesn’t want to spoil him in the process... Which sort of brings me to the point of my visit,’ Louise concluded finally. ‘As Miles plainly loathes the idea of boarding-school, Fen asked him what would make him happy? And you’ll never guess what he said!’

While Louise paused for effect, Clare guessed the truth. She just didn’t believe it.

‘Well...’ Louise could hardly contain her satisfaction ‘...it seems Miles took a real shine to you, Clare, and he’s promised that if you were to come and housekeep for them he’d be on his absolutely best behaviour. Can you credit it?’ The older woman smiled as if something miraculous had occurred.

Clare didn’t see it that way. If she held some appeal for the boy, it was a momentary thing and based on all the wrong reasons. He saw her as a fellow traveller, at odds with the rest of the world. She wouldn’t dispute that—but it hardly made her a candidate for the role of Mary Poppins.

‘How did the professor react?’ she asked point-blank.

‘Well...he was taken aback,’ Louise admitted carefully, and Clare’s lips spread in a thin smile as she imagined how taken aback Marchand would have been. ‘However,’ Louise added quickly, ‘he’s come round to the idea now.’

‘The idea?’

‘Of your being housekeeper.’

Clare still couldn’t take it in. Marchand was willing to give her the job to please his son?

‘He feels he may not have been very fair to you on the day of the interview,’ Louise relayed, ‘and he’s prepared to give you a month’s trial. What do you think?’

The older woman’s smile said she expected Clare to be grateful for the opportunity.

Because she liked Louise Carlton, Clare forced a smile in return. But inside she wondered how the other woman had managed to reach the age of fifty-odd and remain one of life’s innocents. Didn’t she realise that this was just a way of Marchand hiring her until the boy got over his ‘fancy’ for her? When that happened, she’d be out the door quicker than she could say ‘month’s trial’.

‘You’ll have your own little flat in the house,’ Louise went on persuasively, ‘with shower, kitchenette and television, and a salary of eight thousand pounds plus keep.’

‘Eight thousand pounds?’ Clare was shocked by the amount.

Louise misunderstood. ‘Yes, it didn’t seem much to me, either, but at least you wouldn’t have living expenses,’ she pointed out.

‘It’s fine,’ Clare assured her quickly. ‘In fact, it’s much more than I expected, with my not having any real experience.’

‘Well, don’t worry.’ Louise smiled again. ‘Fen can afford it. He has a considerable private income as well as his professor’s salary.’

‘Really?’ Clare wasn’t altogether surprised at this. Although the house was not ostentatiously large, the sheer understated elegance of Woodside Hall whispered money. Old money, if Clare wasn’t very much mistaken.

‘When does he want me to start?’ she asked Louise.

‘Oh, as soon as you can,’ Louise said with obvious relief. ‘I’m holding the fort at present, but I just have to return to London this week. There are so many things I should have done, only I was ill.’

‘You work too hard.’ Clare had some idea of Louise’s busy timetable of voluntary work from their conversations in prison.

Clare remembered how she herself had been unenthusiastic about her visits at first, but had come to like and respect Louise Carlton. She realised that it had been an act of faith for Louise to suggest her for this job.

‘I can start immediately,’ she declared resolutely, and drew a beaming smile in response. ‘I’ll just pack.’

‘Are you sure?’ Louise protested for form’s sake. ‘I’ll drive you up with your cases.’

‘It’s all right,’ Clare replied. ‘I only have the one. I can go by train.’

‘One case?’ Louise watched with concern as the younger woman packed all her worldly possessions into a single battered suitcase. ‘My dear girl, you’re going to need some more clothes. We’ll shop on the way.’

Clare shook her head, saying simply, ‘I have no money.’

‘Never mind. My treat!’ Louise announced with her usual generosity.

Clare shook her head again. ‘Thanks very much, but I’ll wait till I get my wages and buy something.’

‘Clare,’ the older woman pursued, ‘please let me get you something. I can easily afford it and I’d enjoy having someone young and pretty to dress for a change.’

‘It’s very kind of you, but I’d really prefer not. The only thing I might need is an apron or overall, for the housekeeping, and there’s probably one at the house.’

‘Possibly, but, going on Fen’s previous choices of housekeeper, any garment will go round you twice.’ Louise frowned a little as she assessed Clare’s extremely slim figure.

Clare shrugged in response. She knew how she looked—thin to the point of skinniness, shaped more like a boy than a woman. Once she would have cared. Once she’d been like any teenage girl, preening herself in the mirror, dressing to attract the boys—or at least one particular boy. And where had it led, all that wishing and hoping, believing her looks could get her anything?

Clare’s face hardened, reflecting her thoughts, and Louise added softly, ‘I wish you’d let me help...really help.’

‘You have. You’ve got me this job.’

‘I didn’t mean that. I wish you’d open up a little, tell me about yourself.’

Louise reached out a hand to touch her arm. It was plainly a gesture of compassion and understanding, but it took an effort on Clare’s part not to shrug off the gentle hand. She didn’t want to open up. She wanted to stay as she was, locked up tight, safe from thought or feeling.

‘You know why I was in prison,’ she responded evenly as she returned to her packing.

Louise Carlton dropped her hand away, recognising rejection, but persevered. ‘Yes, I know. I just find it impossible to believe you did such a thing. That’s why I haven’t told Fen yet...’ she finished in gentle warning.

‘But what if he asks me?’ Clare worried. ‘He’s bound to want to know why I was in prison.’

‘Yes, well...I did say you’d been convicted of stealing,’ Louise admitted, ‘but that was all. I feel we should wait to tell him the rest.’

‘If you think so.’ Clare left the decision to Louise, seeing no alternative. They both knew full well that, if the brother were to find out the truth, Clare would be shown the door.

As it was, she travelled up to Oxford with Louise Carlton that afternoon, almost positive that her stay at Woodside Hall would be brief and fraught enough, without the added complication of true confessions.

‘Fen is going to be surprised when he sees you,’ Louise said, when they finally drew up outside the Georgian manor house.

The big oak door opened just as they climbed out of the car. Fen Marchand stood on the threshold, ignoring Louise’s smile of greeting, looking past her to Clare.

To say he was surprised was an understatement. Shocked or, possibly, horrified was nearer the mark, Clare thought.