He grimaced. ‘So are you hoping for some kind of a settlement from this—this man?’
‘No.’ She tilted her chin. ‘If he doesn’t want anything more to do with me, I certainly don’t want his charity. But if he has no good reason other than he’s a—a cad and a bounder,’ sudden tears shone in her eyes, ‘who goes around preying on girls, I want to be able to tell him he’s a—he’s a—’
‘An utter bastard?’ he supplied.
She nodded then moved her hands expressively. ‘Not only that. I need, even if he doesn’t want anything to do with us, him to agree to having his name on the baby’s birth certificate. I feel I owe the baby nothing less—to at least know who its father is—wouldn’t you?’
He didn’t comment on that directly. He said instead, ‘You’ve obviously given it a lot of thought.’
‘I’ve had several increasingly miserable months to think of nothing else.’ She wiped her eyes impatiently at the same time as she added an admonition to herself in an undertone, ‘No more tears, Maisie!’
Then she was struck by another thought. ‘But now I haven’t even got a name—unless there is another man with the same name out there!’
Rafe Sanderson watched her and thought his own thoughts. Was she a superb actress he wondered.
Had she hit on an original twist for an old and sorry story? Such as finding herself pregnant and abandoned and deciding to make the best of it? Such as picking his name at random, well, from amongst the suitably well heeled, and concocting a likely tale along the lines of—he said he was you and I really believed him.
His eyes narrowed as he followed the thought. It would have taken a bit of planning. First of all, she’d have had to come up with an uncommon name—she’d probably have had to check that out in Queensland at least—and his did fit the bill. But if so, and the rest of it was a pack of lies, what had she been hoping for?
That he’d be so touched by her plight and her pluck, he’d hand over some cash to help her out?
He smiled a grim, austere little smile then looked across at her to find her studying him intently.
‘You’re not believing me again,’ she said huskily.
‘Maisie,’ he gestured, ‘whatever, and I’m sorry for anyone in this position, but it’s not my affair.’
‘Did you ever live at a place called Karoo Downs?’ she queried. ‘A sheep station out west somewhere?’
He frowned. ‘How did you know that?’
‘As a matter of fact, it’s common knowledge if you’d like to look it up on the internet. Apparently there was a South African connection in the Dixon family in the early days and Karoo comes from the Great Karoo in South Africa, also sheep country.’
‘You’ve done your research well,’ he said flatly.
‘Oh, I knew about Karoo Downs before I started searching,’ she said. ‘R…he told me about it. He also told me about his two favourite dogs, Graaff and Reinet.’
Rafe Sanderson suddenly drummed his fingers on the table.
‘I asked about the names,’ Maisie continued. ‘He said Graaff-Reinet is the main town in the Karoo and these two dogs were ridgebacks, a South African breed originally, and that’s why he chose the names.’
This time Rafe Sanderson swore. ‘Who the bloody hell have you been talking to, Maisie?’
‘No one. No one else. Oh, a Dixon who shut the door in my face, only two days ago as it happens.’
‘You must have been. Family, staff.’ He narrowed his eyes on her. ‘Listen, Maisie, I want the truth and now,’ he said through his teeth.
‘The truth?’ She stared at him with her lips parted and her eyes widening. ‘There must be some man out there going around impersonating you…’
He banged his fist on the table and made the coffee mugs jump. ‘Now I’ve heard it all.’
‘But for a few minutes I thought you were him,’ she protested. ‘I mean, now I’m quite sure you’re not and if you hadn’t been dripping wet and so angry I might have realised sooner…’ She stopped bewilderedly. ‘But I did think so at first.’
He opened his mouth to retort but the VHF radio above the charting desk came alive and intervened. ‘Mary-Lue, Mary-Lue—Lotus Lady, six seven,’ a deep, disembodied voice said.
Rafe shut his mouth with a click then got up to answer the call. ‘Lotus Lady—Mary-Lue, six nine.’ And he changed channels.
‘Rafe—Dan here; we’ll be over in about twenty minutes. Melissa wants to know if there’s anything you need—and we’ll pick up Eddie and Martha on the way.’
Rafe Sanderson hesitated and glanced darkly at Maisie. Then he depressed his PTT button and said into the mike, ‘Don’t need anything, thanks, mate. See you soon.’ He hung up the mike and came back to the table.
Maisie swallowed and suddenly looked desperately tired and uneasy. ‘How are you going to explain me to your friends?’
He took in her wan complexion. ‘I’m not. Are you sure you’re feeling all right?’
‘I’m fine but tired, that’s all. I—I didn’t sleep last night and I probably only had an hour here before you came on board. I also—sometimes I just feel like a cat who needs to curl up and go to sleep.’
‘Then go to bed, kid,’ he said, not unkindly. ‘Use the aft berth. With a bit of luck no one will even know you’re here. We can get down to brass tacks again,’ he looked impatient for a moment, ‘later.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ Maisie said with real gratitude.
‘Just one thing.’
She looked a query at him.
‘I need you to promise me you won’t try to drown yourself again, you won’t try to drown me or do anything else outrageous.’
Maisie had to laugh. ‘I promise,’ she said, ‘unless, that is, your behaviour is outrageous, Mr Sanderson.’
He studied her with a faint frown in his eyes, as if he didn’t quite know what to make of her. Then he shrugged and got up.
Maisie fell asleep with no difficulty.
She tried not to. She told herself there was too much to think about, too much to attempt to clarify, not least her reaction to a man she’d only just met, but nothing could keep at bay the tide of weariness that overcame her.
She didn’t hear the lunch party come aboard, she didn’t hear anything until she woke a couple of hours later.
She stretched, yawned and looked around with no idea where she was until the toffee and peppermint décor struck a chord.
She sat up abruptly in time to hear a female voice above deck, saying,
‘Why, Rafe, you’ve got a girl in your cabin!’
Maisie froze, and realised that it must have been the opening, or more likely the closing, of the cabin door that had woken her.
‘Melissa,’ Rafe’s voice sounding irritable, ‘hasn’t anyone told you to wait for an invitation before you nose about?’
A tinkle of laughter, then, ‘Darling, life’s too short to wait for invitations. And, unless I’m very much mistaken, she’s a redhead.’
Maisie waited with bated breath.
‘She’s also a stowaway I’d never laid eyes on until she made her presence known and nearly drowned me,’ Rafe replied coolly. ‘What’s more she’s going back from whence she came, wherever the hell