The Monte Carlo Proposal

‘Here’s your passport and your wages, plus a bonus that I think you’ll find generous.’

I checked the passport and was relieved to see that it was actually mine.

‘I brought your bags too,’ Vanner said. ‘I left them on deck.’

He turned his frayed smile on Jack. ‘Mr Bullen—’

‘Get out,’ Jack said.

‘I just hoped that—now things are sorted out—you and I could—’

Jack spoke in a voice of steel. ‘I said, get out. Are you deaf?’

Vanner drew a sharp breath, and again there was that withered look on his face, as though he were suddenly filled with fear. But then fear was driven out by the spoilt petulance of a thwarted child.

‘I see,’ he snapped, glaring at me. ‘In that case, now I’ve returned your property, I’ll have mine!’

He pointed at the silver dress. I backed away from him and put out my hand.

‘It’s mine,’ he bellowed. ‘I paid for it.’

‘Oh, give it to him,’ Jack said in disgust. ‘Don’t let him have any excuse to make more trouble.’

He picked up the towelling robe again, and shooed me into the bathroom. Once in there I stripped off and put on the robe, which almost swallowed me up. When I returned Vanner had resumed arguing in a way that he probably thought was persuasive. Phrases reached me’

‘Understand these things—men of the world—lot in common—’

‘Not that much in common,’ I heard Jack say in a bored tone. ‘No young lady has ever felt she needed to risk her life to escape me.’

I tossed the dress at Vanner. I couldn’t bear to get any closer to him.

‘The steward will see you off the boat,’ Jack said.

‘No, I’ll do it,’ said the young man he’d addressed as Charles. ‘It’ll be a pleasure.’

He and the girl followed Vanner up to the deck, leaving me below with Jack and Grace, and someone else who had appeared. She was about my age, and beautiful in a chilly way. She was one of the women I’d seen looking down at me a few minutes earlier, and I didn’t need a crystal ball to tell me this was Selina.

She looked me up and down, then down and up, and I could tell what she thought about the robe, which was too big everywhere, so that I had to clutch it around me. I hoped someone would bring my clothes down soon.

‘I think I’ll have a bath,’ I said, with as much dignity as I could muster.

I turned back to the bathroom, but before I could go in there was a commotion from above—shouting, then the sound of something landing in the water. A moment later Charles came running back.