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‘To hell with Eloise,’ he snarled.

‘My sentiments exactly,’ she retorted. ‘My, you have a fine command of words.’

‘Katie Russel, sometimes you make me so—’ He turned so that she could only see his back. His hands were clenching and unclenching at his sides, and he was muttering under his breath. And then he turned round again.

‘Hello, Katie,’ he said calmly. ‘How’s your foot? Are you enjoying the air out here?’

‘Okay,’ she replied. ‘Now I’ll help you. You do need help, don’t you?’

‘Lord, yes,’ he groaned. ‘I’ve got papers piled up two miles high. Do you really know about that sort of thing? You will help?’

‘I said it. I always keep my word.’

‘Katie, that’s wonderful—I think. C’mon.’ This time she followed him, guiding her chair carefully down the ramp, through a pair of double doors, and into an air-conditioned workshop. It stretched almost the entire length of the house. Just as Mary had said, tables along the walls were filled with operating model trains, both steam and diesel. They were all busily going somewhere, between carefully modelled towns and mills and deserts.

‘I wish I were a boy,’ Katie marvelled. ‘What a beautiful set of toys.’

‘Now you’re being insulting,’ he complained. ‘Those are definitely not toys. You are looking at an HO gauge model railroad. Everything is built to scale, and copied from real equipment. I’ve got one hundred and fifty model-miles of track there.’

‘And you’re playing with them?’

‘Not a bit,’ he laughed. ‘Well, not at this moment. My computer is running them. We’re testing this little thing.’ He held up a little black box with an antenna on it. ‘Most trains are controlled by running signals along the tracks,’ he explained. ‘In our case, every one of those engines is separately controlled by radio.’

‘That’s nice, but not new,’ she lectured him. ‘My brothers fly radio-controlled aeroplanes all the time!’

‘Yes, but. . .’ he said, ‘but I can run each engine from this little box—sixteen of them at the same time—and each engine sends back information about where it is and what’s around it. Oh, and on a clear day I can take this little box sixty miles away and continue to control them.’

‘Complicated,’ she snapped, ‘but still a toy.’

‘You think so, do you? Suppose we put this same control in a low-level missile and went hunting enemy ships?’

‘You mean . . .’

‘I mean, my dear little girl, that you shouldn’t take everything you see at face Value around here. This is part of a contract I’m working on for the Defense Department. And in the meantime it helps me with my trains. Which I do play with from time to time! Come on, the office is over here.’

She followed him again, shaking her head. Keep your mouth shut, she told herself. It will get sore if you keep jamming your foot in it. Don’t take everything you see at face value around here. Especially not him. Lord, I wish I could understand him. I need to talk to Grandmother about this man. Or somebody who knows a little more about men than I do. And that person shouldn’t be hard to find—except around this loony bin!

He pulled open the door to a glass-walled cubicle, snapped on a light, and stepped out of her way. Directly in front of her was an eight-foot table, serving as a desk. Papers were stacked helter-skelter across it in depths of up to a foot in some places. Across the top of everything was a faint film of dust.

‘And that,’ he sighed, ‘is my problem. When you need me, call.’ He started back out of the door.

‘Hey, wait a minute,’ she yelled after him. ‘I don’t have the slightest idea what’s in this—or what to do about it.’

‘Neither do I,’ he yelled back at her. ‘Let me know when you think of something.’

She spent the next five minutes repeating out loud all the words her father had promised would get her mouth washed out with soap. Then she spent another fifteen minutes searching for a duster and, finally, a full hour re-arranging the dust within the office. She was still mumbling to herself as she inspected the practically new IBM typewriter, the desk calculator, the data terminal, and the curious object that turned out to be a copying machine. She was still grumbling when Mary came down to call her to supper.

There were only three adults at the supper table. ‘It’s Friday night,’ Aunt Grace explained. ‘Harry and Eloise have flown down to Atlanta. They usually do, you know.’

The soup was excellent. Katie spooned it up without enthusiasm, trying to keep the others from discovering that it tasted like dishwater. The fried chicken was for finger-eating. Aunt Grace managed three pieces. Mary did away with four. Katie barely managed to swallow two bites from the tiny leg before her. Her mind was back on the roller-coaster. He’s gone to Atlanta. With Eloise. Purely platonic, of course. Huh! You’re better off without him, Katie Russel. Sure you are. Say it over a hundred times,
he means nothing to me.
Keep repeating it. They go to Atlanta almost every weekend. No wonder he’s not the marrying kind. Why buy a cow when milk is so cheap! Damn!

Making a conscious effort to hide her emotions, she teased Jon as she spoon-fed him his mushed vegetables and his pears. Even the baby was being uncooperative, and by the time dessert came round a dismal silence reigned at the table. Kate pushed her dish away, and realised that her foot was aching.

‘I’ll give Jon a wash in my bathroom,’ she announced.

‘No need to bother,’ Aunt Grace said. ‘You look worn out, my dear. Mary will take care of Jon. You just crawl into bed and rest. After all, this is your first week out of the hospital, and you’ve worked hard all day!’

‘If I did I don’t know it,’ she said soberly. ‘But I am tired. Are you sure you can handle the baby, Mary?’

‘I’m sure. You go motor along to bed. Mr Harry rigged up a non-skid stool in your shower, and left something to cover your cast. Try it out. I’ll be in yelling distance in case you slip.’

Despite the fact that she felt dirty all over, Katie took one look at the shower arrangements and decided to make do with a sponge bath instead. It took twenty minutes to undress and crawl into bed. The moment her eyes closed something else flashed in front of her eyes, bringing with it a massive headache. What else had he said a week ago? He had finally settled Eloise’s problem, and given her a large cheque to buy her trousseau with? Oh Lord, she sighed. In the middle of all my daydreams I had forgotten. The auction is over, the bidding is closed, and Harry King belongs to somebody else. Lock, stock, and barrel. So what’s the damned use! I’ll stay just long enough to get his paperwork in order, and then I’ll split. Marion’s wedding is just over two weeks away. I’ll be there. Damn the man!

Sunday was no better. Aunt Grace and Mary went off to church, with Jon in attendance. Katie wheeled herself down to the office again, and dived into the mass of papers. She scarcely came up for air until Wednesday noon, when Aunt Grace tracked her down.

‘This won’t do at all,’ the older woman said sternly. ‘The plan was to get Harry and yourself together. Instead, you’re locked up down here and he’s off every day with Eloise.’

‘It’s not my fault,’ Katie mumbled. ‘He knows all about our so-called plot, you know. He needs help down here, but can’t you see he’s laughing at us? We’re too late. Did you know that Eloise was shopping for her trousseau—on Harry’s money?’

‘Sour grapes,’ Aunt Grace responded. ‘There’s many a slip ’twixt cup and lip. And like that. His boils are all cured. Did you know that? Your potion was pretty good.’

‘It didn’t even inspire a thank you from him,’ Katie answered mournfully. ‘I think I’ll quit. Or commit suicide, or something. Do you think that might teach him a lesson? If I jumped out my bedroom window and lay dead at his feet?’

‘I hardly think so,’ the aunt said a little nervously. ‘It’s only two feet down from the bottom of your window to the ground. I wish—’

‘Aha!’ The voice from the door was filled with laughter, and perhaps just a touch of triumph. ‘I’ve caught you both at it, have I? Having a council of war?’

‘Oh my! You startled me, Harry,’ his aunt returned. ‘I’ve told you hundreds of times that you—’

‘Thousands of times!’ He strolled over to the table to examine Katie’s progress. What had been total disorder had now been reduced to three separate piles of papers, stacked with some neatness.

‘I just remembered an errand,’ Aunt Grace said, and made for the door.

‘I’ll bet you did,’ Harry responded. ‘Going to consult your occult books?’ The words sounded cruel, but the look of affection that he gave her smoothed the path. Katie was startled by the thought. This big, brilliant man loved and respected his aunt totally. And they understood each other!

‘I wish I did,’ Katie mumbled under her breath.

‘You wish you did what?’ He walked over and sat himself down on the cleared corner of the table.

‘I wish I had remembered an errand I had to do,’ she replied nervously. What I really wish is that he would stop bothering me, she told herself. All he has to do is stand there and it bothers me. Why? It’s obvious that all his intentions are bad. Why do I bother?

‘What I wish,’ he said, ‘is that you would stop squirming around so I could kiss you.’ He took the two necessary steps to bring him over to her, and knelt down beside her chair. One of his arms slipped between her chair and her back, and squeezed gently on her shoulder. She watched, hypnotised, as his head filled up all her view, and his tender lips gently caressed hers.

It isn’t fair, she screamed at herself. He has all the advantages. He’s a domineering, arrogant—whatever. And he belongs to Eloise, you fool! The thought was enough to goad her into action. She stiffened in his arms, brought both her hands up in front of her and pushed against his strength. It had little effect. She turned her head, desperately trying to evade his questing mouth— and somehow the message got through to him. He slacked off his grip, backed an inch or two away from her, and studied her face.

‘Catching cold?’ he asked, amused at her futile struggles. ‘Don’t tell me you weren’t joking about the inoculations?’

‘Let me loose,’ she snapped back at him. ‘I told you before. I know what you want, and I don’t want any of it. I’m not that kind of girl.’ No, I’m not, she re-assured herself. He’s passing the time of day with me. Eloise must have given him an hour off the leash. There’s a big sign right between his eyes. It says, ‘Taken!’

‘Ah, we do have a problem. ’ He sighed, but it was too exaggerated to be real. ‘In that case, let’s get down to business.’

She caught herself staring at him, and forced her eyes to break contact. How about that! Switching from sex to business as if nothing had happened. How can he do this to me? She clenched her lips, and drove her chair back to the table. He came around behind her, and stood disturbingly close, with one hand on her shoulder. She could not resist a glance at those long tactile fingers.

‘This pile is the easiest.’ She pulled the first and smallest stack over in front of him. ‘These people are paying you for past services. There’s a total of—’ She turned to consult the calculator, ‘—fourteen thousand, six hundred and fifty dollars in cheques among them all.’

He chuckled as he picked up the pile and leafed through it. ‘I knew we were short of money somehow. Send all the cheques to the bank. Eloise will be happy to take them in. The deposit slips are in the file cabinet behind you. Then send a note to each of these people. Say “Thank you”.’

‘Nothing else?’

‘Nothing else. Just “Thank you”.’

She shrugged her shoulders and turned to look at him. He was smiling broadly, almost grinning. ‘This next pile is social.’ She handed him the biggest of the remaining piles. ‘It includes twenty-two invitations to dances, sixteen invitations to speak at universities, and one invitation to the Governor’s Ball.’

‘The Governor’s Ball. You might enjoy that, Katie.’

‘I doubt it,’ she gloomed. ‘If this calendar is right, it was last Wednesday.’

‘Ah. A tinge of sarcasm going there, have we?’

‘What should I do with them all?’

‘This.’ He took the entire stack from her and dropped it into the capacious wastepaper basket under the table. ‘Those who really mean it will write again. Next?’

‘This last stack—’ she stopped in mid-sentence. ‘Why did you try to kiss me, Harry?’ She tilted her head up to watch his eyes.

‘Why? Well, let me see. I could say because you’re the only lovely female within reach. Or perhaps I just like to kiss you. Or would you rather hear me say that I love you, Katie?’

She snapped her head round, away from the strange look in his eyes. ‘I could believe the first one, even if I’m not lovely,’ she said bitterly. ‘The other two are impossible. I think you do it because you know it disconcerts me. And I know you don’t love me. You’re engaged to Eloise!’

‘That’s what she says,’ he retorted. ‘Who would you rather believe?’

‘I don’t know what to believe!’ She banged her fists impotently on the arms of the wheel-chair, staring straight ahead to avoid looking at him. ‘I don’t know what to believe,’ she repeated in a half-whisper. Both his hands came to rest on her shoulders. They moved inward, so his thumbs could gently massage her neck. The gradual comforting circlings relaxed her, released her tense muscles, so that she slumped down in the chair with a sigh.

‘Some day soon I’ll tell you,’ he said in his deepest bass voice. ‘I have promises to keep, and there are other people involved. When it’s all settled, I’ll tell you which one to believe. In the meantime, why don’t you accept the idea that perhaps all three are true?’

‘Oh, dear God,’ she moaned, covering her face with her hands. But before she could think of a way to continue the conversation he had picked up the remaining stack of papers and was leafing through them.

‘All these require answers,’ he commented. ‘Are you ready?’

She picked up a notepad, flexed her fingers, and nodded.

In a little under an hour they had completed the lot. In each case he gave her the name and address of the correspondent, scanned the letter in his hand, told her to write either ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to each one, and dropped it on to the table.