David sat in Edyth’s sitting room and picked at the bacon, eggs, mushrooms, and sausages she had put in front of him. Harry sat across the table, watching him eat while the food grew cold on his own plate.
‘So, no matter what anyone says you intend to carry on working for Aled James as a bookie’s runner?’ Harry challenged, braving the silence that had fallen after he had brought up the subject.
‘It’s good money and a lot more than I ever earned working on the farm.’
‘The farm is yours –’
‘Was mine, Harry,’ David corrected strongly. ‘Now I’ve left, I want no part of it.’
‘You do realise that you could end up in gaol?’
‘Aiden Collins told me that he and Mr James will look after me. Aiden even gave me his card. He’s an attorney, look.’ David handed Harry the card.
Harry read it, then tossed it down on the tablecloth in disgust. ‘I doubt very much if Mr Aiden Collins is an attorney at law, but even if he is, his qualifications wouldn’t be recognised in this country. We have solicitors and barristers in Britain, not attorneys. And if you do get picked up by the police for running a book, I rather suspect Mr Aiden Collins and Mr Aled James will be nowhere to be seen.’
‘You don’t know them like I do, Harry.’ Ignoring the tight knot that had formed in his stomach, David forked two mushrooms and half a sausage into his mouth.
Harry dropped his napkin beside his plate, rose from the table, and went to the window. He looked back at David. ‘You really think Aled James will look after you?’
‘Yes, I do,’ David asserted.
‘I assure you, the only person Aled James will look after is himself. And that’s coming from his half-brother.’ Edyth glanced from Harry to David. She left her chair and picked up the teapot. ‘This is cold, I’ll make fresh.’
‘You don’t have to leave,’ Harry said.
Edyth recalled what Helga had said about having to live with David after Micah had lectured him. ‘This is between you two, not me.’ She turned and looked back at David. ‘No matter what happens, you are always most welcome here, David, you know that.’
David dropped his knife and fork on to his plate.
‘Thank you.’
She left and closed the door behind her.
‘You and Aled James are half-brothers? I know you look alike …’
‘My real father, as opposed to my stepfather, wasn’t averse to fathering bastards. And he didn’t care what happened to them,’ Harry said crudely, tired of making excuses for a father he had never known.
David turned bright red, not at the thought of Harry’s father fathering bastards but at what he had been doing with Gertie. Now he had got to know her better, he didn’t even like her. And the idea of her having his child, and bringing it up in Anna’s house, horrified him.
‘I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.’ Harry returned to his chair and sat down.
‘You didn’t. It’s just that …’ David had always found it easy to talk to Harry, even about personal matters, when they had both been living on the farm. But much as he wanted to discuss his mixed feelings about Gertie with someone, he felt that Harry wouldn’t understand, not after all the warnings he had given him about loose women. And a confession about Gertie would only give Harry one more reason to be angry with him.
‘What?’ Harry asked eagerly.
‘Nothing,’ David mumbled, shame-faced.
‘There’s absolutely no point in my trying to talk to you, is there?’ Harry asked irritably. ‘You’re not going to change your mind about working for Aled James.’
‘Not until I find another job,’ David agreed.
‘And you won’t be coming back to the farm.’ It was a statement, not a question.
‘No, I won’t.’ David was surprised that Harry knew and accepted the fact. ‘Does Mary know?’ David picked up a piece of bread so he didn’t have to look Harry in the eye.
‘No.’
‘She’ll accept it, given time.’
‘All of us can get used to almost anything given time,’ Harry said finally. ‘I did what I set out to do. I came down here and tried to talk sense to you. If you refuse to listen to me I can’t make you.’
‘I’m old enough –’
‘To go to the devil in your own way, David. Yes, you are.’
‘You’ve been talking to Micah Holsten, haven’t you?’
‘You saw us together last night, so of course we’ve been talking to one another,’ Harry replied caustically.
‘About me?’
Harry sighed. ‘He told me that he’d had no luck in persuading you to stop working as a bookie’s runner either.’
‘And that’s all he said?’
‘You want more?’ Harry’s temper rose at David’s selfish attitude and his lack of consideration for the feelings of his brothers and sisters. ‘No matter what you think, the entire population of the world doesn’t spend all its time talking about David Ellis.’
‘I never thought it did.’ David carried on buttering a piece of bread.
‘And that’s all you can say?’
David looked up and finally met Harry’s steely gaze. ‘What else do you want me to say, Harry?’
‘Nothing.’ Harry left his chair. ‘I’m going to see if Edyth’s made that tea.’
‘Harry, if I could find another job that paid decent wages, I would take it,’ David conceded.
‘You could work in Gwilym James, here in Cardiff –’
‘No family handouts,’ David cut in, repeating what he’d said to Edyth. ‘Besides, can you see me bowing and scraping and sir -ing and madam-ing customers?’
‘No. But I can imagine you unloading stock.’
‘You’ve given me and my family enough. I want to make my own way, Harry.’
‘If one more person says that to me, I’ll scream.’ Harry opened the door.
David lifted the empty sugar bowl and waved it at Harry. ‘Tell Edyth we need more sugar, will you, please, Harry?’
Harry hesitated for a fraction of a second and David wondered if he’d pushed his brother-in-law too far. But Harry returned and snatched the sugar bowl.
‘If you hadn’t said please then, I would have smashed this over your head. You do know that?’
‘I do now,’ David said quietly.
‘Oh, David, I want that blue dog. Please, it’s absolutely darling …’
‘It’s also half a crown and it’s not worth tuppence,’ David said crossly. Bored and restless after leaving Edyth’s, he had returned to Helga’s to find everyone out. There was a note on the table asking him to join Helga and his fellow lodgers at the mission. Instead he had locked all his money except for a pound in silver in his suitcase and visited Gertie. After half an hour in her bed, she had persuaded him to take her on the short train journey to Barry Island so they could walk along the beach and visit the funfair.
‘But it’s adorable and it would look so-o-o good with all my other little kitties and doggies …’
‘I’m not buying it for you, Gertie, so you can shut up about it.’ Angry with himself for not parting on better terms with Harry; furious with Gertie for coming out with him dressed in the hallmark clothes and make-up of her profession; and irritated by her pleading to buy her every worthless knick-knack in sight, he was very close to losing his temper.
‘This has been a horrible trip,’ she snapped. ‘The tide’s in so there’s no sand to sit on. The fairground is packed. There are queues at every ride worth going on and the fish and chips you bought me were cold.’
‘They were hot when I gave them to you.’
‘Then you put too much vinegar on them and that cooled them down.’ She beamed at a couple of soldiers in uniform who were eyeing her. ‘Hello, Tommies.’
‘And hello to you, little lady,’ one of them answered.
‘If you want to go to work, go to work,’ David snarled. ‘You don’t need me along.’
‘A girl has to make a living.’
‘I’m not stopping you from making it.’
‘There are times when I think you don’t care this much,’ she clicked her fingers in the air, ‘for me.’
‘How can I care for someone who sees me as a money machine? Every time you take me up to your room you hold out your hand for half-a-crown.’
‘Why, you …’ She slapped David soundly across the face.
‘Trouble, little lady?’ One of the soldiers wrapped his arm around Gertie’s waist.
‘How can it be trouble for her when she hit me?’ David demanded rationally.
‘Seems to me that a lady wouldn’t hit a gentleman for no reason.’ The soldier smiled at Gertie.
‘Take the lady with my compliments, but I hope for your sake that you have deep pockets,’ David said.
‘I’ll get you for that, damn you, David Ellis,’ Gertie yelled at him as he walked away. ‘You wait and see. I’ll get you for that …’
With Gertie’s threats ringing in his ears, David walked straight to the railway station. When he reached the ticket office, he reached for his wallet in his inside pocket. It wasn’t there. He felt every pocket in his suit to no avail.
Cursing, because the wallet had been a present from Harry’s parents, he searched his shirt pocket. He found sixpence. He looked up and down the road. There was nothing for it except to start walking.
‘I’ve been conducting guests up to Mr James’s suite all morning.’ The porter straightened his sleeves when the lift reached the third floor of the Windsor Hotel and stepped back to allow Judy to precede him. Once they were out of earshot of the lift boy he started talking non stop. ‘You’re the fifth person I’ve taken up in the last hour, madam. Mr Lennie Lane was the first to arrive. I saw him – and you, madam – in Peter Pan. You were both really good and it was a marvellous show. My little sisters couldn’t stop clapping their hands to make fairies come alive for days. Mr Lane’s a real card. He had the lift boy in stitches on the way up with his impressions of an angry train.’
‘An angry train?’ Judy repeated. Lennie had told her many jokes, but she had no recollection of an angry train. The porter made a series of hooting noises. Judy listened politely although she didn’t find them remotely amusing.
‘Of course, it goes without saying that I’m not as good as Mr Lane.’ He paused, obviously expecting a reply.
‘Few people could be.’
‘Everyone on the Bay is talking about your performance in the Tiger Ragtime on Saturday night. I heard that you’re better than Bessie Smith –’
‘I don’t think so,’ Judy interrupted, blushing at the comparison to the famous American Blues singer.
‘That’s what my brother said. And he should know. He’s working in the Ragtime as a barman. He said the place is bigger than most palaces, and you could have heard a pin drop there when you were singing. And once the applause started there was no stopping it. He said that he and the other workers expected the roof to blow off.’
‘Your brother works in the Tiger Ragtime?’ After only a month ‘on-stage’ Judy was finding it easier to deal with criticism than praise and she was anxious to change the subject.
‘Thanks to Mr James. He’s made a real difference to me and my family – and not only in the tips he gives me here for the errands I run for him. We got to talking a couple of weeks back. I told him that my father had died at sea two years ago and my mother was finding it hard to make ends meet with seven of us at home and only me in work, so he told me to send my eldest brother, Neil, to see Mr Aiden Collins. I did, and that’s how our Neil got to be working in the Tiger Ragtime. Now there are two of us bringing home wages, the family’s not doing too badly. My mother’s even scraped together enough to get my eldest sister apprenticed to a tailor.’
‘Who else have you taken up to Mr James’s suite this morning?’ Judy asked, curious as to the identity of Aled’s other lunch guests.
‘As I said, Mr Lane, and there was the estate agent, Mr Arnold, the builder, Mr Powell, Mr Peterson, the theatrical impresario – but as he stays here so often he’s practically one of us – I mean the regular guests, not the staff. And,’ he lowered his voice, ‘a man from the BBC. The receptionist told me who he was. She said he compères the Monday night music show on the wireless. And now you, madam. You’re the last one I was asked to look out for. But you’ve spent so much time here with Mr James, the staff regard you as a regular as well.’
As Judy continued to follow the porter down the corridor to Aled’s suite she wondered how she could have allowed herself to feel intimidated by the staff in the Windsor the night Aled had invited her and her family to dinner. The porter was so eager to please, that apart from the occasional ‘madam’, he reminded her of her young cousins when they were trying to coax pennies out of her to buy sweets. Recalling his mention of the tips Aled had given him, she debated whether or not to give him sixpence.
It hadn’t occurred to her to give any of the staff money before. Whenever she had gone anywhere it would have been appropriate to tip, she’d been with Aled, and he had put his hand in his pocket. Then she remembered her uncles and their families, and decided that if she had any pennies to spare, they should go in their direction.
The porter knocked on the door of Aled’s suite and showed her in. A waiter was serving drinks, but Aled rose to his feet as soon as she entered.
‘Judy, looking lovely as always.’ Aled took the fur cape he had insisted she wear and handed it to the waiter who carried it into the bedroom. ‘Gentlemen, I think after Saturday night you all remember Miss Judy King.’
Stan Peterson was the first to grab her hand. Instead of shaking it, he kissed it. ‘I hear you were a great success on Saturday. I’m only sorry I wasn’t able to see your debut, but it was the opening night of The Student Prince in the New Theatre and as the producer I had to be there.’
‘Was the show a success?’ Judy asked.
‘Not as much of one as Peter Pan,’ Stan admitted ruefully, ‘and we’ve nowhere near the same number of advance bookings. We’ll be lucky if it runs two weeks and covers the cost of the scenery. Old Heidelberg doesn’t come cheap.’
Aled moved Judy on. ‘Mr Raymond Smith, the radio producer.’
‘Everyone calls me Ray, Judy, and I was at the club on Saturday night. That’s quite a talent you have there. I’m sure our listeners will go for it. I was just telling Aled that you must come down to our London studio. If you travel on Sunday, we can rehearse on Monday, transmit Monday night and you can travel back on Tuesday in time to play the Ragtime on Tuesday night.’
‘I didn’t know it was settled,’ Judy said to Aled.
‘It isn’t – yet.’ Aled signalled to the waiter to refill everyone’s glasses. ‘The final decision rests with you.’
‘But before you make it, please consider, no matter how large an audience you have in the club, if you broadcast you will be reaching at least a thousand times that number and probably more, Miss King,’ Ray said earnestly.
‘I don’t need any persuading on that score. Radio is every performer’s dream booking,’ Judy smiled.
‘It is,’ Lennie agreed, ‘which is why I need you to persuade Ray that we come as a package, Judy. Beauty and the Beast.’
‘More like Snow White and the smallest dwarf,’ Stan broke in. Judy thought the reference to Lennie’s height cruel, but Lennie was the first one in the room to laugh.
‘Miss King,’ George Powell shook her hand, ‘it’s a pleasure to meet you after seeing you on stage on Saturday. I thought Mr James too exacting over the specifications of the club until I saw you perform. Then I realised he wanted everything to be perfect to do justice to you.’
‘If the club is perfect, Mr Powell, that has to be down to your efforts.’
‘And the men who work for me,’ he said, knowing that three of Judy’s uncles had been part of the building team.
Aled moved her on. ‘You must know Mr Arnold?’
Judy knew of Geoff Arnold, as did everyone on Tiger Bay, but the estate agent hardly moved in the same circles she did. She shook his hand.
‘And me, darling, we may have already spoken but I insist on being in the receiving line.’ Lennie held out his arms and tried to sweep Judy off her feet, as much as anyone six inches shorter than she was could have. When he failed, he stood on tiptoe and kissed her cheek instead. ‘Now, come and sit next to me.’ He dropped on to the sofa and patted the cushion beside him. ‘We’ll both have a nice large,’ he eyed the waiter, ‘glass of the Windsor’s excellent sherry as an aperitif and I’ll try out all the new jokes I’ve written on you.’
‘Knowing you, Lennie, on all of us.’ Aled watched the waiter serve Judy a sherry and the rest of the guests another round of drinks.
There was a knock at the door and two waiters entered to put the finishing touches to a circular table that had been set up in front of the window.
‘So what does it feel like to be an overnight success, Judy?’ Ray asked.
‘Like most overnight successes, Judy has been working very hard to achieve that end for some time.’ Aled looked at her. ‘Am I right?’
‘I’ve been singing with my uncles’ band, the Bute Street Blues, for the last four years.’ She sat next to Lennie to stop him patting the cushion and looking at her with imploring eyes.
‘How old were you when you started?’ Ray took the chair opposite them.
‘Fifteen, but I was singing before then, in school and church concerts.’
‘And how old were you when you cracked your first joke, Lennie?’ Stan asked.
‘The minute I was born. My mother took one look at me and didn’t stop laughing for a week. Apparently I looked exactly like my father. For years afterwards she said her only consolation was that I’d been born a boy.’ Lennie pulled down a lock of his bright red hair and squinted up at it. ‘She said she had nightmares for years at the thought of a fat round female dwarf with carrotcoloured plaits.’
One of the waiters coughed discreetly. ‘Lunch is served, Mr James.’
Aled took charge. ‘Judy, you sit next to Ray. Lennie, you’ll never allow anyone to talk serious business anywhere near you, so you may as well sit on Judy’s left. Gentlemen, shall we start?’
The men waited for Judy to sit before taking their seats.
‘Knights of the round table, I give you Guinevere.’ Lennie raised his glass to Judy and all the men toasted with him.
‘I suppose that makes Aled King Arthur,’ Stan leered suggestively, to Aled and Judy’s annoyance.’
‘Hardly, they’re not married, so he can’t be Arthur.’ Lennie looked at the first course the waiter was serving. ‘Salmon mayonnaise, how yummy. I l-o-v-e pink food. Of choice that’s all I would eat.’
‘You’d starve,’ Judy said, grateful to Lennie for switching the conversation from her and Aled.
Lennie considered for a moment. ‘As well as salmon, prawns, and shrimps, I could eat blancmange, rare beef and lamb, and raspberries.’
‘All together in the same sandwich, no doubt,’ Aled chipped in facetiously.
‘No – well, not unless it was sandwiched together with the pink bits of a Battenberg cake and raspberry jam. Want me to make one for you?’ Lennie pursed his mouth and rolled his eyes upwards.
‘No thank you. And unless you want someone to be ill, I suggest you drop this conversation.’ Aled passed the salt down the tables.
‘To go back to the Round Table theme, Lennie, who do you see yourself as?’ Ray asked.
‘That’s easy.’ Lennie reached for Judy’s hand and kissed the back of it. ‘Lancelot, I couldn’t possibly be anyone else. My great good looks wouldn’t allow it. Besides, he’s by far and away the one with the happiest ending. He outlived Arthur and got the love of Guinevere –’ The end of his sentence was drowned by laughter. ‘Lancelot could have been small,’ Lennie said with mock seriousness.
‘Did you take lessons from Little Tich?’ Ray asked. ‘He’s the only other comedian I’ve heard of who made capital from his lack of height.’
‘I saw him on stage once when I was even shorter than I am now. Knee high to a footlight, as it were,’ Lennie answered. ‘But to go back to serious matters. You need me on your wireless show, Ray?’
‘Why?’
‘As a foil to Judy’s glorious voice. First rule of show business: the crass always alternates with the divine. You can’t give an audience too much of a good thing. They’ll go on expecting it, and then where will you be? Set an impossibly high standard and you’ll soon be stuck for acts. You’ll be spending the next ten years scouring the countryside for more Judys, and take my word for it,’ he added conspiratorially, ‘without success. Our Judy is one of a kind.’
‘That I believe.’ Ray looked at Judy.
She shivered at the thought of the power Ray wielded. He seemed a nice, ordinary man. She found it most peculiar to think that her voice could be beamed into every home in the country that possessed a wireless, on his say-so.
Lennie’s non-stop banter continued throughout the second course of roast chicken, bread sauce, asparagus in cream sauce, and potato chips. Aled sent frequent signals to the wine waiter who had remained to replenish their glasses with iced champagne, hock, and, when they insisted on it, water. And by the time they began eating the final course of cherry flan and cream, Lennie wasn’t the only animated person at the table.
‘All right, Mr Lane, I admit defeat, you’re a natural and I’m impressed.’ Ray pushed his empty dessert plate aside. ‘You’re welcome to accompany Miss King to London.’
‘As her squire, boot boy, footman, or bodyguard?’ Lennie demanded.
‘All four if it makes you happy,’ Ray answered.
‘And when we get to the studio?’
‘I’ll give you two two-minute compère slots.’
‘How much air time is Judy getting?’ Lennie looked enquiringly at Ray.
‘Four four-minute song slots.’
‘I know my place.’ Lennie rubbed his hands together in a Uriah Heep impression. ‘She’s the star and I’m the lowly link. But I know how to be grateful for small mercies – and cheques.’
‘I’ll make it my business to see that you get exactly one quarter of what we pay Miss King,’ Ray assured him.
‘And all expenses paid to London? That includes a first-class ticket on the train and a room in the same hotel as Judy. Make it a good one. I want to be on the same floor as her, not packed off into the attic or the cellar just because I’m small.’ He shed a few of the crocodile tears that he had honed during the Peter Pan run when Jeremy’s Captain Hook had bullied Smee.
‘I’ll tell the hotel: no cellars or attics,’ Ray said seriously. Judy found Ray and Lennie’s banter amusing, but she couldn’t help noticing that Aled, Geoff Arnold, and George Powell had been engrossed in a private conversation throughout most of the lunch and she wondered what they had found to talk about now that the club was built.
The waiters cleared and removed the table after dessert and coffee. The wine waiter offered petits fours, more coffee and brandy in the sitting area, but Ray was already looking for his hat. He retrieved it from Aled’s bedroom, glanced at his watch and made his apologies.
‘I’m sorry, Aled, but I have to get back to London. I’ve fixed a tentative date with Judy and Lennie for the middle of next month. I’ll get my secretary to confirm it in writing when I return to the office. You’ll be travelling up with Miss King and Mr Lane?’
‘That depends on pressure of business.’ Aled opened the door for the waiters who were carrying out the last of the glasses, plates and empty bottles.
‘I hope you can come, but I’ll understand if you can’t. Dinner in Claridge’s, on me, if you can make it?’
‘That bribe is enough to make me try very hard to clear my diary.’ Aled shook hands with him.
‘Goodbye, everyone,’ Ray called out and left.
Geoff Arnold, George Powell, and Stan Peterson took the producer’s departure as their cue to leave and, as Lennie had already wangled an invitation from Stan to go backstage to the New Theatre to see an old friend who was playing Kathie in The Student Prince, the four men left together. Aled shut the door on them and looked at Judy.
‘And then there were two,’ he said lightly.
‘There’ll soon be one, because it’s time I was going too.’ She looked around for her handbag.
‘Because you have something to do this afternoon or because your uncles warned you never to be alone with me in my suite.’
‘How did you know …?’ Her voice trailed in embarrassment.
‘Because it’s what I’d say to my daughter if I had one. I would never allow a girl of mine to remain alone in a hotel room with an unscrupulous scoundrel – or, in Tiger Bay terms, a wide boy like me. Do you have something arranged for this afternoon?’ he reiterated.
‘No, but I’ve a rehearsal booked with the orchestra for tomorrow morning to see if we can iron out some of the problems you listed on Saturday, so thought I’d go through my song scores this afternoon.’
‘The problems aren’t with you, they’re with the orchestra. It was the musicians who were hitting the wrong notes.’ He poured himself another brandy and held the bottle up to her.
‘No, thank you.’
‘Sherry?’
‘I’m not used to drinking alcohol, especially in the middle of the day.’
‘I’m glad to hear it. Stan Peterson told me that there’s nothing like drink to ruin a singer’s voice, and given the number of people he’s worked with, he should know.’ He sat next to her on the sofa. ‘I think that lunch went well. Ray was keen on getting you on to his variety show. I’m not sure he was as keen on hiring Lennie but I knew that once Lennie met him, Ray wouldn’t stand a chance. Lennie’s an expert at wangling himself jobs.’
‘It was good of you to introduce us to Ray, Aled. After all, there’s nothing in it for you.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong. When you get to know me better you’ll realise that I never do something for nothing. It’s not in my mercenary nature. You will be introduced on air as the headliner from the Tiger Ragtime in Butetown and Lennie as the compère. That should boost attendance at the club.’
‘How much do you want to boost it?’ she asked. ‘The place was bursting at the seams on Saturday.’
‘Only because I gave out two hundred free invitations to the crache. The Ragtime needs more publicity if it is to become the “must be seen at” place in south Wales. And if you’d read your contract properly you’d know that I get ten per cent of any fees you’re paid for outside performances – and that includes wireless.’
‘I know, but I doubt ten per cent of my fee would pay for one of the evening gowns you bought for me.’
‘It would pay for two actually, but who’s counting.’ Aled propped his legs on the coffee table in front of him.
She looked at him, sensed what was about to happen between them but felt powerless to prevent it. He leaned towards her and kissed her. She was aware of the sensation of his lips, warm and tender on hers, his hands cupping her face, his thumbs caressing the soft sensitive skin beneath her ears.
Thoughts whirled around her head without coherency, pattern or reason. Aled was everything she had ever dreamed of in a man: handsome, wealthy, not that she had ever thought that much about riches until she had seen first-hand the lifestyle it could buy. Rooms in the best hotels, fine clothes, service and deference, which after her experience in the first store she and Aled had tried to shop in she had learned to value.
Aled was well travelled, commanded respect from everyone he came into contact with – she tried to forget the existence of Aiden and Freddie. He was worldly, sophisticated, knew how to get the best from people, and yet had none of the airs and graces she associated with the Welsh crache. And because he, too, had grown up in Tiger Bay he understood her and seemed to know instinctively how she felt and what she was thinking.
‘That was you kissing me back?’ he checked when he finally released her.
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
He looked into her eyes. ‘I don’t want you to climb into my bed out of a misplaced sense of gratitude. I meant every word I’ve ever said to you. What I’ve done for you I’ve done for myself and my club, not you. But,’ he touched her lips with his fingertips, ‘you’re very beautiful and beautiful young girls always have had an overwhelming effect on me.’
She continued to look into his eyes. The moment was so unlike any she had imagined, she didn’t know what to say. Whenever she had thought about making love for the first time, she had imagined being swept up in a moment of wild unrestrained passion, not sitting calmly discussing the situation with the object of her desire in a suite in the Windsor Hotel.
His eyes, deep blue and teasing, gazed relentlessly into hers. Before she had time to think of a reply, he kissed her again, and that time his hands roamed over her body, evoking strange new sensations that sent the blood coursing headily around her veins.
The palms of his hands burned her skin through the thin silk of her dress. He caressed her back, her breasts, and she wasn’t even aware that he had unbuttoned her bodice until her dress fell open to her waist. Her cheeks burned when he slipped down the sleeves and the thin straps of her petticoat, exposing her breasts.
‘Perfect.’ He thumbed her nipples and kissed each in turn. ‘Shall we continue this in the bedroom?’ he whispered huskily. Without waiting for her to reply he lifted her in his arms, carried her through to the bedroom and dropped her on to the bed. He locked the door behind them.
He undressed her slowly, sensuously, his hands lingering over her naked thighs and breasts. And when he had finished he turned back the bedclothes and laid her in the centre of the bed, watching her, while he stripped off his own clothes. He continued to look into her eyes, when he lay beside her.
He caressed her again, slowly, tenderly until the moment her passion rose to meet his. Then he lifted her on top of him. She cried out.
‘I’m sorry … I should have been gentler … you’re a virgin …’
Tears lay wet on her cheeks. His face was blurred but she could see that his eyes were still focused on her. ‘It’s all right, Aled. It really is. I love you.’
‘Darling little Judy.’
It wasn’t until afterwards, when they were lying, spent, side by side in the bed, that she realised that he hadn’t spoken one single word of love to her. Or if he had, he had whispered it too softly for her to hear.