Lessons In Loving (23 page)

The thought of Laetitia triggered a cramp of disgust in Tom's gut. How could he have been so one-eyed? She and her poncy father, with his sugarplum accent, had seen him as an opportunity. Tom had been the big fish that took the bait and swallowed it, hook, line and sinker. He blushed at his blindness. He'd been taken in by a skin-deep layer of beauty that hid a selfish, greedy heart. That, and the trappings—the airs and graces and blue blood—that his homesick mother had told him times without number made a good wife. Then his mother had died.

Years of living a solitary life in remote Kenilworth had set Tom up to fall for the first attractive woman to show a smidgeon of interest in him. Then, at a minute to midnight, he'd discovered the cold truth about Laetitia. Her interest focused on just two things—his money and his naivety.

When did school end for the day? He'd walk by and ask. He returned to the school at half past three, as the woman in the headmaster's office had suggested. And she had told him that Miss Courtney taught in Room 4.

***

A few minutes before half past three, Tom headed for Room 4. He'd spent much of the morning bathing, shaving, buying new clothes, and finally, the biggest bunch of roses the remote town's florist could pull together for the small fortune Tom offered. Now, as he walked the dusty paths round the school buildings, he carried that bouquet. He ordered himself to walk confidently, not like a man heading for the gallows. The bell rang to signal the end of the school day. Pupils flowed from the classrooms, along the paths, down to the school's front entrance—for the moment, a river in flood. As they hurried by, some pupils fired curious glances at the man carrying the gigantic bunch of flowers.

Tom reached a door bearing the number 4, and locked his eyes onto it. He stood outside and waited. The door didn't open. After a few minutes, the flood of noisy home-bound pupils ebbed. Kate's classroom door stayed closed. Had she left early? Was she sick, at home? Had her class been transferred to another room, and the woman at the headmaster's office not been advised? His eyes stayed glued to the handpainted number. He waited for a few more tortured minutes, pacing, worrying. Then something inside him snapped. He couldn't abide the tension a moment longer.

Heart thudding, he grabbed the doorknob and turned it quietly. Nerves fizzing like a bundle of fireworks, he pushed the door open. There, beside a table at the front of the room, all schoolma'am glasses and wavy dark hair, staring down at a pile of notes, stood Kate. The pupils focused on their teacher.

‘Tell me, someone,' she said, eyes still fixed on her notes. ‘What do you think might have been engaging Julius Caesar's mind when Brutus stabbed him?'

As Tom closed the open door, the latch clicked. Loudly. Every pupil turned at the sound. Every eye locked onto him. Except Kate's. She was too absorbed in her notes to have heard the click.

The huge bunch of flowers transmitted the obvious message to the pupils. A girl giggled. At last, Kate looked up. He watched as her jaw fell open.

‘Tom.' The word drifted from her lips like a floating thistledown—a slow, barely audible whisper. She stood statue-still, eyes wide behind her glasses.

The stares of every last pupil drilled into him.

Slowly, slowly, Kate's lips curved into a smile. A gentle, surprised smile. Her mind must be taking in the reality that stood before her. That smile came from her heart.

Tom's heart jumped. He felt his lips flick into the biggest smile he'd ever made. So she remembered him, liked him. He was too happy to speak. Then he knew he must take charge.

‘Excuse me, everyone,' he said, clearing his throat. ‘I came to see Miss Courtney. I waited till the bell rang, but—'

‘Class dismissed.' Kate's voice told him she'd transmuted back into her teacherly self. ‘I'm sorry I kept you after the bell rang, class. Please read the rest of Act One for next Tuesday.'

‘Are you sure you'll be here next Tuesday, Miss Courtney?' a girl asked, her voice theatrical. Every pupil in the room took in the joke, laughed. The arrival of a stranger carrying a huge bunch of frighteningly expensive roses, shipped all the way from Perth, could mean only one thing to their adorable, smiling teacher. Still giggling, the pupils gathered their books, grinning and staring at Tom as they shuffled through the door. The room was empty but for Tom and Kate. A silence, that could only be described as expectant, descended.

CHAPTER 18

As Tom tiptoed towards Kate, his face as radiant as the desert's midday sun, she took a long, steadying breath. Thank goodness she'd had the discipline to dismiss her class properly, more or less. The second she'd spotted Tom standing in the doorway, clutching the enormous bunch of roses, her heart had begun to pound like a miner's jackhammer.

Could she believe what she saw? On so many nights, her dreams had been invaded by Tom magically reappearing in her life. Sometimes she'd spot him in the grocer's shop, paying for his supplies. Or he might walk towards her along a deserted beach … She'd dreamed dreams like that far too often. Each time she woke from one of these realistic trances, she mentally smacked herself. Months before, she'd put herself under orders to forget Tom. Those ridiculously real dreams hadn't helped. Now he'd walked into her classroom. Was he real, or had her brain confused reality with imagination? She cleared her throat, awkwardly, noisily. Talking to the handsome, smiling apparition might help her sort things out.

‘Why did you come here, Tom?' She couldn't shift her eyes from his face. For a long time he stood silent, a granite statue.

‘Er …' he whispered, voice croaking. It seemed to her that quite literally, he couldn't get another word out.

‘So how's Laetitia?' Kate offered. To her surprise, she could actually talk. Her words sounded intelligible, more or less. She wished the jackhammer driving her heart would slow. ‘I guess you're married now.'

‘No.' She watched as Tom struggled to speak, and couldn't. He cleared his throat, slowly, uncomfortably. ‘We didn't marry.' His paralysis thawed. ‘We were wrong for each other. Absolutely wrong.'

‘But I thought you two were in love. All those goings-on at Blackheath. The “languidly amorous” moment. They were—'

‘All window dressing.' Tom cleared his throat. ‘She fooled me too. But then I was anyone's fool. A fool with a bit of money in the bank. Fresh off the turnips. Ready and waiting to be taken for a ride.'

‘I can't believe this.' Kate whispered, her voice husky, hesitant,

‘It's true, Kate.' She watched him take in the confusion in her eyes. ‘Very well. Let me start from the beginning.'

‘Is this going to take a little time?' Kate said. At last her heart had begun to behave itself. ‘Perhaps we should sit somewhere?'

Tom eased himself onto the nearest desk. To give herself the time and space she desperately needed, Kate walked slowly to her table, took the chair, and placed it beside Tom. As she smiled up at him, he cleared his throat.

‘If you can remember a time somewhat far back in history, Miss Governess, you'll recall that I hired you to coach me to woo Laetitia.'

‘Yes, I remember,' Kate said. She cleared her throat again, took a long breath. She must make her voice behave itself, make it sound calm, reasoned. Tom mustn't read her utterly ecstatic, utterly overwhelming confusion.

Kate knew that Tom was a man of few words. But today, he'd started his story slowly, painfully. His voice, his hesitancy, reminded her of the slow, struggling trains that sometimes held her up at the railway crossing as she walked to Granite Ridge School. The locomotive hauled a long train of wagons from a standing start down to the crushing plant at South Bramford, twenty miles away. It took several minutes of slow, painful chuff-chuffing before that train picked up speed.

Now Tom's locomotive seemed to gain traction. Kate sensed that, as with the locomotive, there'd be no stopping him until he arrived at his destination.

‘The first day I met Laetitia, I was a foolish, too-innocent boy from the colonies, wet behind the ears.' He grinned at Kate—a shy grin that told her all must now be revealed, however much it might hurt him. ‘Very likely, my stupid innocence encouraged Laetitia to play her tricks on me all the harder,' he continued. ‘I put up with it for too long.' His voice had turned hoarse. He cleared his throat, smiled directly at Kate.

‘Eventually Laetitia came to Kenilworth with her parents. To dip her toe in the water, she said. And she hated it. Then one night, the penny dropped for me. I saw that Laetitia and her father had plotted to winkle a sackful of money from me. I'd heard whispers that their estate was just a few pounds away from bankruptcy. It seemed that before I walked onto the scene, they decided they needed a fool—a rich fool—to save them from the bankers. Then, Presto! Idiot me walked through the front door of Barrington Hall at precisely the right moment.' He stopped for breath. ‘You can guess the rest?'

‘Pray, continue,' Kate breathed. ‘Remember Prudence, Laetitia's secretary? We exchange occasional letters. She told me about the Barrington-Smythes' bankruptcy. Prudence lost her position because of it. But never a word about Laetitia. But do continue.'

‘To cut a long story short, some weeks ago Laetitia and I had a most explosive falling-out. Within the hour, I'd booked the family's passage on a steamer bound for England.' Tom's face eased into a smile. ‘She's probably poncing round Europe now, searching for another idiot. Sporting her Establishment bloodlines as she looks under likely rocks for another stupid frog.'

‘But your mother, Tom,' Kate asked, puzzled. ‘What would she have thought when you sent Laetitia away?'

‘I already said it once,' Tom said. ‘To Laetitia. Now I must say it to you. My mother was a romantic. She struggled to be happy on a wild property on the other side of the world from the tidy, embroidered life she was born to. Kenilworth was a lonely place. Often, she didn't see another person for weeks. She wasn't happy in her marriage. Her husband thought it was more important to make a few more thousand pounds, perhaps spend a few more nights with bad women, than to be with his lonely, homesick wife. So she gave all her love to her only child. A poor confused little boy, who swallowed everything she fed him like mother's milk.'

Tom stopped. Kate knew well enough that he was hurting. It was vital that he finish what he'd started. She could wait. Especially as she saw that Tom's inner locomotive now raced along with a full head of steam.

‘And so I grew up thinking that my mother was wonderful, perfect,' he continued. That she was always right. That I must always please her. I know she'd have wanted me to marry Laetitia, have children with her. Laetitia's ancestral home was just ten miles from the mansion my mother was born into. The two families were neighbours. Probably had been for hundreds of years. Then one night, I saw that not everything my mother wanted was right for me. She could never have known I'd meet a conniving, evil she-wolf, dressed in the prettiest of sheep's clothing.'

He stopped, eased back in his chair, took a long breath. Then his eyes fixed on Kate's.

‘Tom.' She looked hard at him. ‘You haven't answered my first question. The one I asked you when you first barged in on my Julius Caesar lesson. Why are you here?'

‘Can't you guess, Kate?'

Now it was Kate's turn to fall into an ocean of embarrassment.

‘Because—.' She couldn't say the words that burned inside her. The silence set like mortar.

‘Because I love you, Kate.'

Tears seeped down her cheeks. He reached for her hand, took it. Then after a long pause, he kissed it. Slowly, slowly, he closed on her. They stood still, arms enfolding each other, for a long minute. Then the hugs, the sobs, and eventually, the kiss.

After a long time, he broke the kiss.

‘This isn't the best place to talk,' he said. ‘We should go somewhere a mite more pleasant. There are more things I'd like to discuss.'

‘Oh Tom.' Kate felt herself shivering all over. She couldn't trust herself to speak.

‘Do you know of somewhere pleasant?'

‘There's my cottage.'

‘Is it close?'

‘Yes.'

‘Good.'

They climbed into his waiting cab, and Kate directed the cabby across the dusty plain to her cottage. As he drove away she led Tom inside, stood in the hallway, looked up into his eyes. A warm, misty silence gelled round them. He took her in his arms again. She knew that they had so much to say, so many emotions to share. Where to begin?

He kissed her again. That kiss told her more of his aching neediness than a string of trite words. After all, he'd starved for that kiss for five whole minutes. She felt the same. She led him to the sitting room.

It was dark when Kate finally eased herself away from the warm, masculine body she'd lusted over too many times. For the moment, she must be satisfied with the tempting taste she'd allowed herself.

‘Dinner?' His husky voice stopped her.

‘Don't tell me you want to make dinner?' she whispered. ‘Now? After such a long, busy day.' He laughed at her joke.

‘I have just enough energy to open my wallet. I trust you can arrange for a cab to take us to a suitable restaurant, Miss Teacher.'

‘At this time of night, there's often a cab waiting outside the local hotel. Ten minutes' walk from here.'

***

The wedding took place as soon as Kate's mother made the voyage from Sydney and the local parson told the engaged couple that the requisite paperwork was in order. During a long, loving Sunday in bed during their Perth honeymoon, Kate chose to confess.

‘There's something I should tell you, Tom,' Kate whispered into the warmth of his shoulder.

‘What's that?'

‘You probably won't remember the day.'