Penny Plain, page 16
him for keeps. Well, I'm not giving you that small satisfaction. I'm having him put down.'
'Very well,' said Emma, aware that she was shaking so much now that any minute her teeth might chatter, 'if you won't give Flight a chance, then I must warn you I shall go. That, I imagine, is hardly a threat that will carry much ice, but I will add, as a word of warning, that you won't find me easy to replace — not because I have any exalted opinion of my own qualifications on account of my father's reputation, but because the way you run your kennel is not going to attract the right sort of experienced staff.'
She finished on a rather breathless note as she realised her own temerity in speaking so bluntly to an employer, who, however tiresome, was still the provider of her bread-and-butter, and was astonished to see Marian's face begin to crumble like a child suddenly stripped of its self-conceit.
'How can you, Emma, when all my hopes are in ruins, thanks to your mismanagement and the — the jealousy of other exhibitors ... ? Haven't I the right to dispose of my own possessions as I think fit? Haven't I the right to call the tune when it's I who pay the piper? First Max speaking his mind, now you ... You wouldn't really leave me just when the luck's turned against me and I need a friend.'
'That's up to you,' Emma replied politely, marvelling as always at such a staggering preoccupation with self. Marian surveyed Emma now with a look halfway between hesitancy and calculation as if she was weighing up her advantages, but perhaps it was the steady regard of those disconcertingly truthful eyes which made her decide against the temptation to satisfy her sense of injury by taking it out on another.
'Well, you'd better come and see me in the office when you've cooled down,' she said with a very pass-
able imitation of a displeased employer willing to overlook shortcomings if proper humility was shown, and Emma, despite her misery, could not entirely suppress the grin which had deflated Marian's ego before now.
'You'll smile the other side of your face when Grainger comes for your precious Flight!' Marian said nastily, and flounced across the lawn to the house.
Emma turned back to the kennels, her heart sick within her. Max had refused to execute the order, but he was coming in a few days. Had not Marian already intimated that his partners would change his mind for him rather than lose a valuable client to a rival practice? But Max was proof, she thought, reverting to that unexplained word which seemed to describe him for her. He would not be swayed if his convictions were challenged ... hadn't he long ago stood out against his father ... even against the girl he had hoped to marry? But Max Grainger was unpredictable ... or was it just she who had found him so because his moods were unexpected and his intentions so painfully obscure ... ?
The evening was less awkward than she had anticipated. Marian had evidently decided to ignore the whole business for the present and chattered away with her usual inconsequence, but her eyes were suspiciously puffy and she cast sulky looks at her father every so often. No reference was made to Flight by either of them, but when they left the dining-room Marian said:
'I'm going to put through a call to Frank now. I want him to get that young dog of old Hollis's for me. He has a very good chance of the ticket at Chode, I'm told, now Flight's out of the running.'
She went off to the office where she liked to conduct
her business calls in the approved executive style, and Emma stared unhappily at Mr. Mills.
'She doesn't even care that Flight is out of it. All she minds about is having something she can boast about because she's shot a line to the press and a party's laid on, and whatever else happens she must carry on the honours at Chode because she's the local celebrity as regards kennels,' she said bitterly, and the old man pushed her unceremoniously into his study and shut the door.
'Sit down and don't talk so daft,' he ordered, pushing her back into her chair. 'I've had enough of this dog nonsense from Marian without having to put up with it from you. Now, give over, and remember what I said. Things have a trick of working out if you only let them be, and that don't apply only to dogs where you're concerned, young woman, so hold your horses.'
She might have asked for elucidation of this last observation if Marian had not chosen that moment to interrupt. Her call to Dawson had evidently proved satisfactory.
'He's going to tackle the old girl at once, and is coming down tomorrow,' she announced and, catching Emma's rather dazed expression, added brightly: 'Don't look so stunned, Emma. Frank was suitably sympathetic over this shattering end to Flight's career, but he quite agreed that there were other fish in the sea if we looked for them.'
Dawson arrived in time for lunch the next day, but Emma made excuses for herself and picnicked in the dog-kitchen, unwilling to be drawn into arguments and future unpalatable plans. She had got over her old reluctance to meet him, but he was too sharp a business man to have sentimental thoughts about an animal stripped of any commercial value, so she was not best pleased when he wandered down to the
kennels alone later in the afternoon and asked to see Flight.
She brought the dog on to the lawn and reluctantly complied with the request to move him round. Dawson watched attentively, his knowledgeable eye missing very little, ran expert fingers down the damaged foreleg and grimaced ruefully when the dog shied away from him.
`Pity,' he said. 'He's got it all if it wasn't for that injury and a faulty temperament.'
'The temperament could be got right with patience,' Emma said stonily.
`But not the leg, unfortunately. I've seen the plates and there's no doubt about the injury being permanent. Rotten bad luck, but that's the way it goes.'
The next day started badly with Ireen late for work and having forgotten some errand she would have executed in the village for Marian. She was duly sent to the office and hauled over the coals, whereupon she had apparently lost her head, been insolent and unrepentant and, having succeeded in getting herself dismissed on the spot, had spoken her mind with appalling freedom.
`Well, that's it! I'm fired and I couldn't care less,' she announced with unaccustomed glee to Emma, returning from her interview still filled with the glory of rebellion. 'But I've given her something to think about. "You're a bitch," I told her, "a scheming bitch, no better than a murderess, killing dumb animals what have never done you harm just for meanness.... All you ever think about is what's best for the spoilt Miss Mills," I said. "You took poor old Corrie from me, and now you're going to take Flight from Miss Clay after you'd gived him, only of course you'd never meant it in the first place.... You ought to have the R.S.P.C.A. down on you for cruelty," I said, "and
you'll never make a go of this game in a month of Sundays the way you carry on," I said.'
Ireen paused for sheer want of breath, and Emma, still young enough to be impressed by such reckless courage, prompted eagerly:
'And what happened then?'
'Oh, then that Mr. Dawson came in and told me to shut up, but I think he was trying not to laugh. Miss Mills she burst into tears at sight of him and asked him to protect her, and he said "Hop it," so I hopped it, and I expect he's drying her eyes and stroking her down the right way at this minute. Coo, you should of heard us! I haven't felt so funny in the head since I took the measles and talked silly, my mum says.'
It was a relief to be able to laugh until the tears came, Emma thought, wiping her eyes. She shouldn't be laughing at all, she supposed, since the matter had its serious side, and wondering if her pent-up emotions had made her a little hysterical.
'Mind you, I'll be sorry to leave you, miss,' Ireen added soberly. 'You've been real good to me and covered up for me too. I told the young madam that, too, after the way she tried putting the blame on you, the other day.'
'Well, never mind now,' said Emma. 'Now we'd better get some work done or we'll both be in trouble if we're found gossiping over cups of tea.'
But no one came to inspect the kennels, and for once she felt thankful for Dawson's presence. He would at least keep Marian out of the way and he was well equipped to supply soothing doses of flattery and consolation when he chose. He would be leaving that evening, so Emma again made her excuses and stayed in the kennels for lunch. Ireen who, strictly speaking, should have taken herself off promptly on instant dismissal, had gone up to the house for her usual hot
midday meal in the kitchen, and Emma, with Flight lying beside her, began to ponder seriously on her own situation.
She must have sat ruminating longer than she supposed while she waited for Ireen to return from lunch, for it was nearly half past two and Ireen had planned on catching the three o'clock bus, and she came bursting into the dog kitchen as Emma started washing up, clearly big with fresh news.
`You'll never guess!' she babbled, her pudding-face moist with excitement. 'Mr. Grainger is here — came to lunch, and what a carry-on!'
Emma dropped a plate and turned slowly round from the sink. If Max was here it could be only for one reason.
`He's come for Flight,' she said dully.
`Well, whatever he's come for, he ain't agreed to her instructions,' Ireen retorted. 'She'd taken him to the office after lunch and the door was ajar, so I sneaked along the kitchen passage to listen. She must have been on at him about taking Flight away, for he was saying, ever so icy, "I'm not obliged to carry out instructions that conflict with my own standards. There is no just reason for this decision and I refuse to be a party to it." She says, all silky-like, "If you're squeamish, Max, then turn it over to your partners — they know which side their bread's buttered." He says, haughty-like, "My partners are in agreement with me; we don't deprive animals of life when there's a perfectly good chance of them finding another home." Then she says, really nasty, "There are other vets who aren't so bloody-minded, but if I go to one of them they'll have my custom in future, so you'd better think again! " Then Mr. Grainger fair tears a strip off her. "Do you think we give a damn for your patronage, Marian?" he says, all fiery, but cool with it, too. I couldn't wait for any
more, and I'd better get cracking now, miss, if I'm going to catch that bus. So long, and keep your pecker up – Mr. Grainger ain't going to take your precious boy into custody today.'
But he did. Long after Ireen had gone running for the bus, Emma saw Max walking slowly across the lawn. So certain was she, now, that he had only come with the kindly intention of reassuring her before he left that she welcomed him joyfully.
'Hi, Max Things seem to have been happening around here! Do you want to see Flight?'
'I've come for him,' he replied, and she stood stock-still, puzzled but not yet alarmed by his ambiguous answer.
'But you won't need to take him away, now,' she said, and he answered with what, to Emma, seemed like a clumsy attempt at humour.
'I've had my orders.'
'Your orders? But I understood—'
'Dear Emma Penelope, don't look at me like that! I assure you I intend no violation to your tender susceptibilities. If you would trust me instead of getting ready to mount that high horse of yours, we would both be very much more comfortable.'
He stood there looking at her, tall and dark and a stranger again, his black eyebrows lifted in a quizzical suggestion of faint reproof, his hands thrust indolently into his trouser pockets, and rebellion and a bitter disillusionment welled up so suddenly in Emma that she was hardly conscious of what she was saying.
`So you couldn't stand out after all!' she flung at him. 'The Mills contract is too good a connection to be thrown aside for the sake of one dog's unimportant life ... who's to quarrel with the ethics of it, anyway, when an animal is painlessly destroyed in the kindest, most scientific manner? Oh, you make me sick! You
don't care for the injustice of a perfectly legal action any more than Marian does, when it becomes a question of politics!'
`Have you quite finished?' The words dropped so icily into the already icy little silence which had fallen when she stopped speaking that she was shocked into a more sober frame of mind. He was looking at her now as he had looked at her in the car coming back from Wilchester, with the same barely controlled anger and something more besides. If it had not been for the arrogant set of his jaw and the telltale whiteness which appeared either side of his nostrils she could almost imagine that for an instant there had been the bitterness of pain in his eyes.
`Max—' she began, not at all sure how she meant to go on, but he gave her no opportunity.
`Let's not prolong the agony. If you're too squeamish to hand over your charge, I'll go and collect him myself. You, meantime, can shut yourself in the dog-kitchen and have a good old-fashioned cry,' he said so sarcastically that she felt herself flushing.
`No, I'll fetch him,' she said, and went into the tack-room to get a lead. She brought the dog out of his run and handed the lead to Max.
`Are you going straight back to Chode?' she asked, and it was as near as she could bring herself to seek for more specific information.
`Yes, I'm taking evening surgery for White.'
'I see. Well, goodbye, you silly old sausage, be a good boy,' she said, giving the dog a careless pat, then watched them both walk away. Flight looked back once and gave a little puzzled whine when she did not follow, but he was fond of Max and, receiving an encouraging caress behind the ears, went with him cheerfully. Emma watched them out of sight, heard the car start up, then the note of the engine dying away down
the drive, and only then turned back and locked and bolted the empty kennel.
She wept, not only for Flight who had stolen her heart, but for Max who had stolen it too but, unlike the dog, had successfully retained his own. Flight she would never see again and must mourn because she had no choice, but for Max she would not mourn. She would chalk it up to experience as other girls had to, and find another job far away from the scene of her childhood which had lured her back so disastrously....
When at the end of the day she could no longer avoid meeting Marian, Dawson had already left, and Marian was mixing cocktails in the drawing-room.
Mr. Mills joined them shortly and although the conversation skirted round the day's events, Flight, to Emma's relief, was not mentioned. Marian, however, relieved her own mind with some acid remarks about vets who aired their views indiscriminately and grew too big for their boots.
'You look tired, Emma,' she went on with an unusual flash of solicitude. 'I hope that frightful girl's departure isn't going to put too much work on you.'
Had she forgotten, Emma wondered, on what terms a continuance of the job had depended?
'I think I should tell you definitely, Marian, that I won't be stopping on,' she said a little nervously. 'I naturally wouldn't leave you in the lurch until you've found someone else, but I'd like to go as soon as possible.'
She had expected protests, even indignant accusations of ingratitude, but Marian merely looked a little smug and not very surprised.
'Well, of course, we were rather expecting this, weren't we, Dad?' she said. 'We'll be sorry to lose you, of course, but as things seem to be working out, I will probably be making some changes, anyway.'
'Oh!' said Emma a little blankly, then hastened to add: 'Well, I'm glad my going won't inconvenience you.'
'You sound a little narked,' Marian said with a hint of her old waspishness. 'Did you think you were indispensable?'
`No — no, of course not.'
'Now, lass, don't fly up in the boughs!' Mr. Mills said pacifically. 'We've had enough upsets for one day, lord knows, let's not stir up more trouble.'
'I wasn't trying to stir up anything,' Marian said, sticking out her under lip and looking injured. 'I only thought Emma didn't seem very pleased at the way things had shaped.'
'Pleased! You expected me to be pleased?' Emma exclaimed, her good resolutions evaporating at such a monstrous conception.
Mr. Mills cleared his throat suggestively.
'Didn't you talk to Grainger when he came for Flight?' he asked, mentioning the dog with rather unnecessary tactlessness in the circumstances, Emma thought, since they had all been at such pains to ignore the subject.
'Of course. But it was scarcely a very social chat once he had made his mission plain,' she said, and he gave a gusty sigh.
'In fact you quarrelled,' he said impatiently. 'Hardly that! But it wasn't an occasion for a cosy get-together, either.'
'Oh, aye.... Well, Marian, the lass can't be blamed for feeling as she does, so let be. Reckon it's time we packed up arguing and let things work out the way they will. Isn't it time we ate?'
'They'll ring the gong when it's ready,' Marian answered absently, then looked at Emma a little roguishly. 'Dear Emma you're so hasty with your
judgments, aren't you? Dad and I are going to London tomorrow, incidentally, and will be staying the night, so you can have the place to yourself and brood to your heart's content.'
It seemed strange in the kennels without Ireen, and stranger still in the empty house. Marian and her father had left early after breakfast.
She wrote a long letter to old Holly after tea and took it to the nearest post-box at the cross-roads above Plovers Farm. She resisted the temptation on the way back to keep straight on down the hill, but when she had climbed the stile to take the short cut back across the fields, she sat down in the stubble to rest. She would not come this way much longer, she thought, sitting in the stubble and absently rubbing her arm to relieve the irritation, trying to resist the desire to scratch, and out of the tail of her eye saw Max swinging a leg over the stile.
She watched him walking leisurely towards her and despite the bitterness she had felt for him yesterday, knew a treacherous little stab of pain and longing.
'Hullo ...' she said a little blankly as he came to a halt and stood looking down at her.
`That arm is overdue for attention. You'd better let me whip those stitches out or they'll be causing trouble,' he observed casually, and she replied with the first idiotic thing that came into her head:
