Lady of Hay by Barbara Erskine (reading an ebook TXT) 📕

Griffiths was flustered. "It's the wine, see. I sent my Doreen up the road to get you some from the Swan, but I don't know if it's any good. My late husband, he knew about wine, but I don't like the stuff myself!" She thrust the bottle at Nick shyly and then handed him the corkscrew.

Nick looked gravely at the label. "That's very nice, thank you. Will you thank your daughter for going to so much trouble, " he said to her with a smile.

He grinned at Jo as their hostess withdrew. "Chambre it certainly is, after its voyage back from the Swan, wherever that is. The label says it was a good wine once. But it has been shaken to the point of shall we say sparkling, if not actually frothing. "

Jo managed to laugh. "The way I feel now, I don't care how it comes as long as it's wet and alcoholic. " She watched him draw the cork and gingerly sniff the neck of the bottle. "The food looks lovely, " she said soberly after a minute.

"And so is the wine, in spite of its adventures. Here's to the intrepid Margiad—isn't that a lovely name?" Nick took a large mouthful. "And here's to you, Jo. " He met her eye, suddenly sobering.

Jo sat back in her chair. "There was a phone message waiting for me to call Bet Gunning this evening, " she said.

Her gray-green eyes studied his face gravely. "I spoke to her just now. "

"Oh?" Nick picked up his knife and fork.

"She said she had lunch with you last week. "

"Nick smiled. "Is that why she called? To tell you what happened?"

"What did happen, Nick?"

"She told me to keep away from you. She said I was ruining your career prospects and spoiling your literary style. She then offered herself to me as compensation. When I declined her kind suggestion she was a little upset. Though not enough, I should have thought, to report back to you. What was her version?"

Jo gave a small smile. "Much the same. Bet is nothing if not honest. Perhaps she wouldn't have been if you had accepted her offer. " She took a tentative mouthful of lamb. "She also told me she thought you hated me. " She did not look up.

Nick said nothing for a moment.

"Hated me enough to want to kill me, " she went on, so quietly he thought for a moment he had not heard aright.

"Jo. " He reached across the table and took her hand. "Bet is a self-confessed troublemaker and bitch. She also had a vivid imagination. For God's sake—" His expression turned to one of incredulity. "You don't believe her?"

She shook off his fingers and put down her knife and fork. "No, of course not. "

She reached for the wine bottle and poured some more into her glass. "But you have been rather odd, Nick. You admitted it yourself. " Her hand was shaking as she looked up at him. She forced herself to smile.

He frowned. Then abruptly he stood up, pushing his chair back, his food hardly touched.

"Jo, we've got to have this out. I love you—" He gave her an embarrassed grin. "Not an easy thing for an Englishman to say in broad daylight, but, there, I've said it. I think I've loved you ever since I first met you. "

There was a moment's tense silence as they both considered suddenly the deeper implications of what he had said. With a shiver Jo looked down at her plate. Her throat had constricted so tightly she could barely breathe.

"Then why did you go to Judy?" she whispered at last.

He groaned. "God knows! Because you told me to go to hell, I suppose. " He paused. "Because sometimes you make me so angry—"

"Angry enough to want to hurt me—" She looked up at him.

"No!" he replied explosively. "It is as if—" He paused in midsentence, staring out of the window. "It is as if there is something in my mind that closes down like a shutter. When it happens I don't know what I'm doing for a while. That's not an excuse, Jo. There is no excuse for what I did to you. It's perhaps all the more frightening because it's like that. I don't understand it. " He frowned. "But it will not—cannot happen again. "

Jo ached suddenly to stand up with him and take him in her arms, but resolutely she sat still, staring down at her plate again. "Sit down, Nick, and eat your supper. Mrs. Griffiths will be so hurt if we don't at least make the effort, " she said quietly. "I expect you've been overworking, what with the worry about Desco and everything, " she added, as matter-of-factly as she could. "That might explain it all. "

He sat down heavily opposite her. "It might, I suppose. " He gave a weary smile.

"Why did you come here, Nick?"

"To Wales?" He paused. "To see you. To be with you. "

"But why?" She clenched her fists in her lap, waiting for his reply.

"Because I was worried about you, I suppose, " he replied after a moment.

"I see. " She bit her lip. "And you're still going back tomorrow?"

"I have to. I'm due to fly to New York on Wednesday and I've got an awful lot to do first. But I'll wait and see how you are before I go. It worries me the way you are having these regressions spontaneously. Supposing there had been no one there. Supposing it had happened to you in the street, or driving, for God's sake!"

"There is no reason it should happen again, Nick. " Jo gave up her attempt to eat and laid down her knife and fork. "I don't think what I had today was a regression anyway. I just fainted—like I did at Ceecliff's. As I told you, the doctor said it was probably something to do with the thunder we've been having so much. It happened before in a storm, remember?