Eden's Law Read online

  Meredith shook off her annoyance and smiled ruefully at her parents. 'All right, I shouldn't have let Joss Hamblyn get under my skin.'

  'No, you shouldn't.'

  Lesson one, she thought, don't criticise the new partner. He was obviously a favourite. If she wanted to settle back here she would have to feel her way carefully for a while, learn how things had gone during her absence. She'd known it wouldn't be easy. The original break had been too traumatic.

  'Joss is a fine man,' said Howard, 'and his sister is the sweetest little creature, your mother'll tell you. She's been like another daughter to her. They fitted in here straight away, as if they belonged, and I'm very lucky to have such a competent partner. He's only thirty-two, but he's had a lot of experience and was very highly recommended.' He paused and looked at his wife, as if seeking assurance before going on. She gave an almost imperceptible nod. 'But there's one thing it's only fair to tell you straight away, Meredith. It may shed light on why Joss was a bit offhand with you.'

  'Don't tell me ... he resents having the boss's daughter foisted on him. He practically said as much.'

  'No, I don't think it has anything to do with that.' Her father cleared his throat. 'I'm not his boss. Joss is very independent and extremely well qualified. What you probably don't know is that he handled the divorce case for Mac Loring's second wife, Corinne, and accredited himself very well indeed.'

  So that was it! The treacherous swine! He'd wormed his way in with that ace up his sleeve, knowing the Paxtons were suckers for anyone who supported their anti-Loring policies. And he had had the effrontery to condemn her on principle for her connection with the Lorings. Meredith felt sick. Oh, she remembered Corinne Loring, a very beautiful fortune-hunter who thought she could twist Piers's father round her little finger, but he had been more than a match for her.

  She was breathing too quickly. Before answering she had to calm down and choose her words carefully, or the situation would be little better than it had been on the day she left. She felt as if she had come into a wasps nest.

  'All I needed was a stick to fan the flames,' she said at last. 'Thanks for the warning.'

  It was a round table, but it seemed to Meredith that her parents sat close together and she was still on probation, in spite of their enthusiastic welcome. They looked at each other and there was worry in their eyes.

  'Meredith, there's no point in avoiding talk of Piers,' said Howard. 'Much better to clear the air once and for all. Your mother and I were very sorry indeed about what happened, not only because it meant you were hurt, but because it was a tragic waste of a young, gifted life. We may not have approved of him, but we would never have wished him ill, as well you know. He was showing himself to be rather more than the brash young man we assumed him to be from his parentage, and we regret the pride that kept us from admitting it when he was alive. Will you let us try to make amends?'

  'What amends?' she asked. 'If you're still as bitter towards Mac then I can't begin to forget. I'm fond of him. And you may as well know, if you hadn't guessed before, that I was in love with Piers. I loved him when I went away to work with him. Do you think I would have let any other reason split our family the way it did?'

  'Oh, Meredith,' her mother sighed, 'what a sorry mess! Darling, let's not spoil your homecoming when we've longed for it so much. We understand how you felt about Piers and we'll say nothing to upset you. Talk about him if you need to, but please, respect our feelings for ... well, for the rest of his family.'

  'Don't worry, Mummy, my grief has been a very private matter, and it'll stay that way. Now, what's to be done about my car up on the hill?'

  The evening had been something of an ordeal and she was glad when it was over, but she was happy the way things were turning out. It hadn't been nearly such a difficult homecoming as she had feared. If it wasn't for that abominable man Hamblyn being around she could have said she was looking forward to a more peaceful life, but she could imagine fireworks when their paths next crossed. She'd face that problem when she came to it, but it wasn't a pleasant prospect.

  Her bedroom was rather special. She had chosen the decor herself before she left home, and seeing everything unchanged gave her a feeling of security. The walls were a dusty pink, with cushions and curtains of palest green and pink to tone, with a darker pink bedcover. Even the house plants she had grouped in a dark corner flourished more luxuriously than before, their dark shiny leaves thriving better there than they would have done in direct sunlight. The colour scheme complemented the cane furniture and did away with any Victorian stuffiness which still lingered in some parts of the house.

  Though it was still only May the weather was mild and daylight was reluctant to fade completely. There was a cherry tree outside her window which tapped the glass if the wind was high, but tonight the leaves were motionless and only an occasional petal from the faded blossom floated down to the lawn beneath like a snowflake. Meredith opened the window and caught one in her hand, then leaned with her elbows on the sill.

  Her room was at the back of the old Victorian house with its ivy-covered walls, and the garden stretched down almost as far as the eye could see to the stables where she had once kept a pony. It was too dark to see them now, but she visualised the old stone, building which had been like a sanctuary when she needed one. Her father had threatened to pull down the stables and get planning permission for a couple of houses. Not that he would have been likely to get it, because there was no access other than by a footpath which led up to the moors, but he enjoyed teasing her. Tomorrow she would go and see if the stables still held the same magic.

  Before going to bed she decided to empty her case and hang up her things, but when she lifted the lid and saw the state of the clothes that Joss Hamblyn had squashed in, a fresh wave of annoyance caught up with her.

  'Ohhh! You hateful man!' she exclaimed, out loud, clenching her fists with a desire to strike him. Good job he wasn't around!

  She . started folding everything, making neat piles ready to be transferred to the drawers, but it would be impossible to wear any of the pastel silk underwear until it had been ironed, and in a rare fit of frustration she picked up a stack of it and flung it across the room, watching it cascade down like silk from a magician's hat. It was a pointless thing to do, but it made her feel better.

  Midway down the case was a photograph of Piers in an embossed silver frame which she had wrapped in a cashmere sweater for safe keeping. It was a press photo, enlarged from a newspaper picture, and was the best likeness of him she had seen. The cameraman had caught him as he was talking, his expression animated, every line of him vibrating with that restless energy that had been so characteristic. Piers had never been still for a minute. Every kiss had been a fleeting rapture with the promise of endless time ahead in which to linger over love.

  Meredith had loved him from the moment they met. Piers had been reading Mathematics and his future was mapped out for him. Armed with a degree, he was to go into commerce, but the prospect appalled him, and when Meredith was introduced to him at a party he was already planning his business empire. He had a brilliant mind, but within the first hour of knowing him she could tell he would never be happy in some static job, closed in by four walls. He was too vital. From the moment he started dating her she had difficulty keeping up with him. His ideas sent him off investigating avenues of the rag trade she had never heard of, and she found if she went along she always needed a pad and pencil to make notes. The next step was a borrowed typewriter in her room in the evenings, and her own studies suffered, but at least she was with Piers.

  'I know he's gorgeous,' one of her friends said, 'but how do you put up with him? He's obsessed with becoming a tycoon before he's twenty-five and never talks of anything else.'

  'It's different when we're alone,' she explained. But she was kidding herself as well. For a while he might kiss her, even fondle her experimentally, but he was too preoccupied for romance and reverted to trade and markets at the first opportuni
ty. The only figures which really interested him were the ones on paper that he could calculate methodically. But he succeeded in infecting her with his enthusiasm.

  'Meredith, you're a cinch for big business,' he had said, late one evening. 'I've never met a girl who could follow my way of thinking the way you do. I never want to lose you.'

  Her heart had leapt. He was going to say he loved her, and all the waiting and perseverance with financial matters had paid off.

  'Why should you even think of losing me?'

  He took her in his arms. 'I was hoping you'd say that. You see, I'm giving up university at the end of term and I'm ready to start out on my own. But I need you with me. Are you willing to sacrifice your chance of a degree to come in with me?'

  'Oh, Piers, you know I am!' Her heart was beating crazily.

  'Then I'll work on my old man and the bank, and if you can manage to chip in with a bit of cash all the better. We'll need every penny we can get. We'll be supplying our first store within a couple of months. I couldn't do it without you, Meredith. You'll have to be personal secretary, assistant, adviser, the lot, until we get into the big time.'

  She was hooked. Too late to back down and say she wanted marriage. Piers didn't have time for marriage, and if he returned her love it was in his own way, with praise and acknowledgement of her help. Her reward was the mushroom growth of the Piers Loring Group. She had met, and liked, his father, mixed well with his few close friends, and smiled at the glamorous females who flitted in and out of his working life, secure in the knowledge that she was the only girl who really mattered to him. But loving him was like chasing sunbeams. Just when she had thought perfect happiness was within her grasp another cloud would come and dash it away. Perhaps it Would always have been like that.

  She put the photograph on her dressing table and finished unpacking. The drawers, which had been plenty big enough for her things before she went away, were now overflowing, and she dreaded to think where she was going to find room for the rest of her stuff when it came. She would have to buy another wardrobe.

  When she had unknotted her hair and brushed it down, she took stock of herself in the mirror. Her mother was right; she looked decidedly peaky, and for the first time she admitted to herself that it would be nice not to have to keep up the phenomenal pressure that success demanded. But she was glad, too, that there was a job for her. After working fiat out for nine and ten hours a day, idleness was unthinkable, and she didn't want to have too much time to spare to become maudlin over Piers.

  The weekend passed smoothly. If there was any jarring note at all it was the continual singing of Ellen Munro's praises. It seemed as if her mother couldn't stop talking about her, and after a while it became irritating, though Meredith tried not to show it. The poor girl would probably have been very embarrassed if she had known how she was held up as a paragon of all the virtues. There had to be a flaw in her somewhere, or she wouldn't be human.

  'You haven't said if you like the new decor in the lounge,' Julia said, on the Saturday morning.

  Meredith looked round the room with fresh eyes. 'You've got new curtains,' she said, admiring the off-white linen that brightened the place considerably. Embroidered cushions she hadn't seen before brought colour to the old leather chesterfield, and the wing chairs had been covered in an attractive chintz.

  'I'm glad you like them. They were Ellen's choice and she helped me to make them.'

  'Ellen!' That accounted for the taste in chintz which was similar to the design she had seen so recently at Eden Farm. 'Did she make the cushion covers, too?'

  'Oh, no. There was a handicraft sale in the village and I bought them there. Ellen organised the sale, though. It was in aid of handicapped children. She's a marvellous girl, Meredith.'

  Meredith agreed wholeheartedly, but that was only the beginning. After several more references to her mother's fondness for Ellen, she found herself experiencing a completely new pain, quite unlike the physical ache in her ankle which was gradually easing away, and different from anything she had known before. It attacked her so unexpectedly she didn't recognise it at first, but after a few minutes she knew it could only be attributed to jealousy. In a way it was her own fault she had been usurped in her mother's affections. She hadn't been around to show her the love she needed and when Ellen came along with a similar need and like interests it was only natural that the two should take to each other. She ought to be glad, because she had forfeited the right to her mother's exclusive love when she made the decision to put Piers first. It was a fact she had to accept, but it didn't lessen the hurt brought on by the discovery.

  'I often mind the children for her,' Julia Paxton said. 'They really are very sweet.'

  'You mind them!' Meredith couldn't believe it. Her mother was unstinting in her social work for the community, but had always drawn the line at being involved with other people's children, declaring she hadn't enough patience and dreaded sticky fingers over everything. 'Surely you don't have those two rough little boys up here as well? What on earth made her take up fostering? She must be mad!'

  'They're nice children really. A bit rough, as you say, but it's only to be expected. They come from broken homes in the East End of London, and they hadn't even seen a green field until they came here. They're quite well behaved on the whole.'

  'They must be for you to say so, Mummy. I bet they're too scared of you to say anything!'

  Julia laughed. 'Well, I make them toe the line. Ellen does, too. It's her ambition to start a holiday centre for deprived children, and I know she would make a splendid job of it.'

  'And what about Joss Hamblyn?' asked Meredith. 'Doesn't he mind having his house filled with hordes of children?'

  She couldn't keep the malice out of her voice.

  'Joss is quite extraordinary with them,' said Julia, with a gentle smile. 'The more he shouts, the more they love it,-and they follow him everywhere. I laughed at him the other day and said he couldn't have had a more suitable name. He's like the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Children have an instinct for these things.. And, of course, Ellen works so hard. I don't suppose Joss knows the children are there half the time.'

  That was when Meredith's patience wore so thin she felt compelled to raise an objection.

  'Honestly, Mummy, you'd think no one else ever did as much as Ellen Munro! All she does is run a house and look after a family. It's what most women do, and it's the natural thing. I've been working pretty hard, myself, and believe me, there's a lot of strain goes into building up a business like ...' she hesitated before mentioning Piers, then decided his name must be used in conversation naturally right from the start, '... like the one Piers created. Some nights I felt too exhausted to sleep. My brain was far too active.'

  They were sorting out the store cupboard, making room for Julia's jampots and putting anything surplus in a box ready for the local scouts jumble sale, but she put down the jar she had been holding and held out her arms to her daughter.

  'My poor darling,' she said, unexpectedly smothering Meredith in maternal love, 'I have been going on a bit, haven't I? And I can't begin to tell you how happy I am to have you back with us. No one could ever take your place.' Then she held her away from her with a sly smile. 'But one day, my girl, you'll learn it isn't all honey looking after children.'

  Meredith grinned in reply. 'Not me,' she said. 'I intend to be a dedicated career woman.'

  By Monday morning her ankle had almost returned to normal, apart from being coloured a startling blue and yellow. To disguise it she wore navy-blue tights with flat shoes which looked good with a pleated blue skirt. She was tempted to leave her long hair loose, but she needed all the dignity she could muster to face Joss Hamblyn, so she coiled it swiftly and anchored it with more pins than usual, shaking her head to make sure it was firm.

  Her father took her down early to the village and dropped her at the garage to collect her car. The Stag was ready for her and already being admired by a group of boys on their way to school. She
patted it lovingly and went to thank the mechanic.

  'My pleasure, Miss Paxton,' he said. 'Nice to see you home. Sure is a super car you got now. What happened to the old banger you used to bring in here regular, like?'

  She laughed, a glow of pleased surprise lighting her face. 'Oh, Ted, fancy you remembering! Do you know, it nearly broke my heart to part with it, but the poor old thing couldn't cope with London traffic.'

  'Well, this little beauty complements the owner, if I may say so. You're looking prettier than ever. A bit pale, mind, but that's only to be expected after the bad time you had. We was all mighty sorry. Still, a few sunny days down here'll soon put the colour back in your cheeks.'

  Meredith actually blushed at the flattery. She'd forgotten how friendly and nice village people were.

  'Better take it for a spin round the block to make sure everything's okay,' Ted advised. 'If not I'll have another look at it. Can't have you walking miles and spraining the other ankle.'

  Gosh, how news got around! 'I'm sure it'll be just fine,' said Meredith.

  She drove through the main street, feeling as if all eyes were on her. She's back, then, she imagined everyone saying. The Paxton girl's back. Sad she ran out of luck! No, that was what Joss Hamblyn had said, and he hadn't meant it kindly. Surely the people of this lovely Devon village wouldn't be any less sympathetic than Ted at the garage had been. It was just as well she hadn't come home straight after Piers's death. Sympathy then would have been too hard to take.

  The office hadn't changed at all. It was in a row of Georgian houses which had once been private dwellings, but they had all been converted into shops or offices and formed a picturesque part of the main road through Edencombe. Bow-fronted windows looked out on a wide grass verge that sloped down to the road, and the original oak door of number five closed behind her with a resounding thud as she went inside, sending a shiver of apprehension down her spine. She stood a moment in the hall, the musty smell which had been synonymous with the place for as long as she could remember seeming stronger than ever.