how to answer him. The discovery that Mr Hastings had been leading a double life was embarrassing, no doubt, and Mrs Hastings couldn’t avoid being the brunt of some gossip in the cloistered environs of Sutton Magna.
Robert was unsympathetic. ‘Why feel sorry for her?’ he demanded unfeelingly, revealing a side of his character Fliss had been totally unaware of until recently. ‘If it weren’t for her, the old man wouldn’t have looked elsewhere for his pleasures. She’s a cold fish, my mother. Or hadn’t you noticed?’
In actual fact, Fliss had noticed. Her own dealings with Robert’s mother had never been exactly friendly. Amanda Hastings didn’t encourage any kind of closeness between the girl her only son was going to marry and herself, and although Fliss was a frequent visitor to the house she didn’t feel at home there.
Nevertheless …
‘Imagine,’ Robert went on in the same bitter vein, ‘having a Chinese mistress! God, do you suppose she’ll bring a whole gaggle of orientals with her? The Chinese are big on family ties, aren’t they? Dammit, Fliss, how could the old bastard do this to us?’
Fliss tried to be practical. ‘Mr Davis didn’t say anything about the girl’s having a family,’ she pointed out, but Robert wasn’t convinced.
‘Huh, Davis,’ he grunted. ‘What does he know? Where’s the girl’s mother? That’s what I’d like to know. Is she expecting a share of this, as well as her daughter?’
‘So far as we know there only is—Rose Chen? Is that right?’ replied Fliss, more calmly than she felt. ‘The girl’s probably an orphan. That’s why your father felt some responsibility for her.’
‘But what about us?’ protested Robert. ‘Liz and Dody and me? You don’t seem to realise, Fliss, my father has left her half of everything. The trading company; the shops; even this house! What if she wants to sell it? Where are we going to live?’
Fliss could see it was a problem, though for herself she wouldn’t be sorry if she and Robert didn’t have to live at the house after they were married. Sutton Grange, as it was rather pretentiously called, was not an attractive example of Victorian architecture, and she much preferred the old vicarage, where she and her father lived.
Not that she and Robert could move in there, she conceded, in a momentary digression. Although Robert and the Reverend Matthew Hayton tolerated one another’s company, she couldn’t deny they had little in common. Since her mother had died some years ago her father had developed an interest in local history, and every moment he had free from his duties as the village clergyman he spent researching the parish records. He had no interest in sailing, or horse-racing, or playing golf. Or in fine arts either, Fliss conceded.
As far as Fliss was concerned, her mother’s death, while she was still at university actually, had left a void in both their lives no one else could fill. And because her father obviously needed someone, not just to take over his wife’s role in the community, but also to act as his secretary, she had found herself accepting that position, and abandoning any ambitions she had had to have a career of her own.
She had never really regretted it, even though the life she led in this Buckinghamshire backwater was vastly different from the life led by most young women of her age. At twenty-six she enjoyed an almost bucolic existence, and only since her engagement to Robert Hastings had she had the kind of social life he had always taken for granted.
Which was why, she supposed, Mrs Hastings had not been exactly enthusiastic about the match. Robert’s mother had no doubt expected him to marry someone from a similar background to their own; someone whose father was fairly wealthy, or whose family had a title. A daughter-in-law she could present to the world, a daughter-in-law she could be proud of.
Fliss knew she was none of those things. Vicars’ daughters were not titled, and they were not wealthy, and as for Mrs Hastings being proud of her, well … She shrugged her slim shoulders. She had often wondered what Robert saw in her, what had possibly persuaded him to ask her out?
They had met at the village fair last autumn. Fliss had been in charge of the book stall as usual, spending at least part of the time examining the merchandise, indulging herself shamelessly in any and every volume. Books were Fliss’s one weakness, and she invariably bought the books herself if no one else was interested.
Why Robert had been there at all, she couldn’t imagine. The noise and bustle of a village fair didn’t seem his scene at all. Though he had been interested in the bric-a-brac stall, she remembered. Probably in the hope of snaring a bargain. Mr Hastings owned several fine art shops, and, although no one could confuse Mrs Darcy’s pot dogs and stuffed owls with fine art, just occasionally a piece of crystal or a chipped Crown Derby plate found its way on to the stall.
She had been admiring an old copy of poems by Lord Tennyson when Robert had stopped at her stall. His appearance had surprised her, but Fliss seldom got flustered. Indeed, she was of the opinion that she was one of those people who didn’t have it in them to feel any uncontrollable surge of excitement, and although her golden eyes widened she was perfectly composed.
And, unaware as she was of it, it was that air of cool untouchability that caught and held Robert Hastings’ interest. That, and the fact that she was tall—taller than average—and unfashionably curvaceous, with full, rounded breasts, and long, shapely legs. She also had a mass of sun-streaked brown hair, that hung quite untidily about her shoulders. In short, she was an extremely feminine example of her breed, and if her nose was too long, and her mouth too wide, the overall impression was delightful.
So much so that Robert, a fairly discerning connoisseur of her sex, was instantly attracted, and showed it. Much to her father’s dismay, she was sure, he had spent the remainder of the afternoon hanging round her stall, and when the fair was over he’d spirited her off to the pub for a drink.
Fliss, who seldom drank anything stronger than the communion wine, found herself with a cocktail glass on one hand and an ardent suitor on the other, and for once she was glad she wasn’t easily excited. Another girl might have been bowled over by the fact that probably the most eligible bachelor for miles around was giving her his undivided attention. As it was, Fliss found it all rather amusing, and not at all worrying as her father seemed to think.
And, although Robert might have expected a different response from a young woman without any obvious advantages, he had soon had to accept that, if he wanted to get anywhere with Fliss, he would have to be a lot less arrogant, and a lot more patient. And he had been. To her immense surprise and amazement, he admitted to having fallen in love with her, and, as an abortive affair when she was in college was all Fliss had to compare her own affection for him with, she had come to the eventual conclusion that she must love him too. Certainly she liked being with him. He was warm and affectionate, and he made her feel good.
And, after a winter in which Robert had sustained his assault on her emotions, she had finally agreed to his announcing their engagement. The only disadvantage she had found since that event was Robert was now twice as eager to consummate—as he put it—their relationship; only consummation, as a vicar’s daughter, meant something rather different to Fliss …
‘I should think,’ she said carefully now, desperate to escape the implications of that particular thought for the present, and returning to the subject of the house, ‘that your mother might welcome the opportunity to find somewhere smaller.’ Knowing Mrs Hastings as she did, she doubted this was really true, but she pressed on anyway. ‘I mean, now that your father’s—dead——’ she licked her upper lip delicately ‘—she won’t have to host all those country weekends and dinner parties that Mr Hastings wished upon her.’
Robert stared at her impatiently. ‘You’re not serious.’
Fliss smoothed slender fingers over a bare shoulder, exposed by the bootlace straps of her sundress, and gave a little shrug. ‘Why not?’
‘Why not?’ Robert was briefly diverted by the unknowing sensuality of her action, but he eventually shook his head as if to clear it, and exclaimed irritably, ‘As I shall be running the company from now on, this should