I was just about to bite David on the ankle when Sarah pushed him away.
‘No.’ She wiped at her mouth as she stumbled back. Her hair was rumpled out of its usual neat ponytail, and her cheeks were flushed pink – but more with anger than with passion, I realised.
I should have had more faith in Sarah. Of course she wasn’t going to take this idiot back. Why would she? Especially now Oliver and I had shown her that she was worth so much more.
‘No? What do you mean?’ David looked completely dumbfounded by the word. His cheeks were bright red too, but I was pretty sure that was with embarrassment. Served him right.
I sat right at Sarah’s feet, stopping David from getting close enough to try again, and smirked at him.
Sarah wasn’t his any more. She was ours.
‘I mean no,’ Sarah said, her voice clear and strong. ‘I’m not going to kiss you. I don’t love you any more – in fact I’m not even sure I ever did. How could I love someone who told me I wasn’t good enough, that I was fat and useless and a waste of space?’
‘I didn’t—’ David protested.
‘Yes,’ Sarah snapped, ‘you did. I know because they’re carved in my brain and my heart. I remember every awful thing you ever said to me – and I remember them a hundred times more often than anything kind you ever said. Not that there were so many of those to remember in the first place.’
‘I was trying to help you!’
‘Help me?’ Sarah’s eyebrows shot up so high they almost disappeared into her hair. ‘How on earth was that supposed to work?’
‘Well, you know … I was giving you motivation. Trying to stir up some ambition in you. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad,’ David tried, but even I could see that this was a lost cause. Sarah wasn’t going to buy his justifications any more.
In fact, she laughed right at him. ‘Don’t you see? That only makes it worse! You thought so little of me that you could say those terrible things to me without even worrying for a moment how they would make me feel.’ She shook her head. ‘You don’t love me, David. You just hate the fact that I’ve escaped from you, that I’m here living my own life, making my own future – doing all the things you told me I never would. You hate the fact that I’m proving you wrong, every moment of every day. Just by living my life the way I choose to.’
Sarah’s face was pink with the cold – or with righteous anger, I wasn’t sure. Either way, she looked magnificent. Her pale hair shone around her face like a halo, and her eyes blazed with surety.
While David’s watery blue eyes looked more uncertain with every passing second.
‘But the card you sent …’
Sarah cut him off. ‘I sent a Christmas card to your mother because she, unlike you, has always been kind to me. I didn’t want her thinking that I’d forgotten that, just because I’d moved away. I’m not that kind of person.’
‘And you didn’t send me one because …?’ If ever there was a stupid question …
‘Because to be honest, David, I’ve hardly given you a second thought since the moment I arrived at Buckingham Palace.’
He was getting it now, that much was clear. But he couldn’t help but give it one last try. ‘Sarah, I—’
She didn’t let him get any further. ‘No. Whatever you have to say, I don’t have to listen any more. You treated me badly, and I know now that I deserve much, much better than you. And I’m going to get it. Which means that it is time for you to leave.’
If I could have cheered, I would have. As it was, I gave a happy bark and jumped to my paws.
But then I remembered Jessica’s gleeful face as she’d run back to the palace, and I realised that the job wasn’t done yet. I had something else to fix.
I persuaded Sarah to let me off my lead and back into the Palace by means of dragging her off course towards the nearest door. Shaking her head at me, she unclipped my lead and I raced inside, leaving her to show David the exit. Fast, I hoped.
I didn’t want to spend a moment longer in his company, any more than Sarah did.
Racing up the stairs, I made my way to the staff quarters. I had to find Jessica and keep her away from Oliver. I dreaded to think what she would tell Oliver. Hopefully, he was busy working and she hadn’t been able to talk to him yet.
But I was too late. I knew that the moment I entered the staff corridor and I heard her voice.
‘You should have seen them, Oliver,’ Jessica said, sounding disgusted. ‘They were kissing, right there in the Palace gardens. Making a complete show of themselves. If they’d been seen by one of the Royals …’ She shuddered.
‘I don’t need to know this, Jessica.’ Oliver’s voice was clipped.
‘Are you sure?’ Jessica asked. ‘Only, you did seem to be getting very close to our Sarah. This must be very hard for you to hear, I’m sure. But I thought it was important that you know.’
‘Why? Why on earth—?’ He leaned back against the wall, rubbing a hand over his neatly styled hair.
‘Because she was playing you, Oliver!’ Jessica sidled up to him and pressed herself to his side. ‘She let you think she was one of us, that she was going to stay and be here with you. But it was a lie. She was only ever here to make her boyfriend jealous. And now that plan has worked, she’ll be leaving to go back with him.’
‘She said that?’ Oliver asked. ‘You actually heard her say that?’
Jessica shook her head sadly. ‘Oh, Oliver, I didn’t have to. It’s blindingly obvious to everyone except you. Sarah never fitted in here – and maybe she didn’t want to. Maybe she never bothered because she knew she wouldn’t be staying. It was all just part of her plan.’
‘But she worked hard to get this job,’ Oliver said. ‘She wanted it, I know she did.’
‘Perhaps. But perhaps she never wanted it as much as a happy ever after with her boyfriend.’
Suddenly, I remembered a conversation between Sarah and Oliver. One where she’d told him all the things she’d wanted, before she came to the Palace. A home, a family, a husband, all back in her home village. I had a feeling he was remembering the same one.
He honestly believed that she’d gone back to all those old dreams, the ones she’d left behind when she applied to be a housemaid for the Queen.
And I didn’t know how to tell him that he was wrong.
‘Oliver, you know what it’s like, working here,’ Jessica said, still standing far too close to him for my liking. ‘It takes a special sort of person.’
‘I thought Sarah was that sort of person,’ Oliver said, sounding forlorn. ‘She’s … I thought she was special.’
Jessica pulled a face. Oliver didn’t see. ‘Maybe she wasn’t as fantastic as you seemed to think.’
‘Maybe.’ But Oliver still sounded doubtful. Good.
‘You need to stick with the sort of people you know you can trust. People you know belong here.’
‘People like you?’ Oliver guessed.
Jessica smiled. ‘Exactly.’
But as she leant in towards him, Oliver pushed away from the wall. ‘To be honest, Jessica, I think what we both need to do is get to work. Don’t you?’
He raised an eyebrow at her until she blushed. ‘Right. Yeah. I’ll see you later, though?’
‘I imagine so.’ He watched Jessica walk away, then looked down at where I was sitting, watching.
I barked at him, willing him to understand everything I couldn’t say.
Don’t give up on Sarah, I thought, as hard as I could.
But Oliver didn’t get the message.
He sighed. ‘Not now, Henry, okay? I’ve got a Christmas card I need to write. Now, before I lose my nerve.’