She printed the five pages of typed document and handed them to him with a blankly polite expression.
The cold blue eyes skimmed over them, then he read them more slowly. Checking for errors, she thought. No doubt hoping for them. If any existed he could go back to her father with a rueful shake of his head and say, in all truth, that she just had not got the necessary skills to work for him, but that he would keep his ear to the ground as a favour to him.
Maybe, she thought suddenly, I should have inserted enough mistakes to have guaranteed that rueful shake of the head. But her only thought at the time had been to show the damned man that she wasn’t the completely frivolous nitwit that he obviously thought she was. Shame. The best ideas, like the best retorts, always came to mind after the event.
‘Not bad.’ He deposited the sheets of typed paper next to him and walked across to the door, expecting her to follow, which she did, brushing past him then following him towards the office where she had sat for forty minutes earlier.
His own office was through the connecting door. It was huge, with two desks, one of which was his, the other housing a computer terminal and printer. Extending along one side of the room was a floor-to-ceiling bookcase, handmade in the same rich dark wood as the rest of the furniture, with rows of books on electronics.
Kemp International had cornered the market in sophisticated electronic equipment, and had always managed to stay one step ahead of its rivals.
Francesca eyed the books and wondered whether this was Oliver Kemp’s personal taste in literature as well. Was he one of those men who ate, slept and dreamt work?
‘I would expect you to be au fait,’ he said, following the direction of her eyes, ‘with the contents of most of the books on those shelves. Working for me isn’t simply a question of being an adequate typist.’
‘So you’ve decided that I’m good enough for the job, Mr Kemp?’ she asked, with an expression of surprise. She didn’t know whether to be astounded or dismayed by this. ‘Does this mean that you don’t think my father’s verbal curriculum vitae was based entirely on paternal pride?’
He sat back in his swivel chair and linked his fingers together. ‘Sarcasm is not a trait I admire in a secretary,’ he drawled.
Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear, Francesca felt like saying; then we might as well call this a day, mightn’t we? But she swallowed down the rejoinder. Her father would be elated that she had taken him up on his suggestion, that she had landed this job through her own skills in the end, and she dearly loved him.
‘I do apologise,’ she murmured, and he frowned at her.
‘You’ve proved,’ he said, giving her reply the benefit of the doubt, ‘that you can type.’
‘And that I can read,’ she pointed out. ‘I shall consume the contents of those books avidly.’
His eyebrows flew up at that, and she hurriedly began stammering out a suitable apology.
He waited patiently until her voice had fizzled out into a series of fairly inaudible noises.
‘Good. Because when clients call with queries you will have to respond to them in a coherent, knowledgeable fashion.’
He paused, and she said into the silence, ‘What happened to your last secretary?’
‘My last secretary,’ he said lazily, ‘emigrated to Australia to live with her daughter three years ago. Since then I’ve been subjected to a string of women ranging from the downright dim to the misplaced intellectual.’
So you wouldn’t describe yourself as fussy? Francesca wanted to ask. ‘I see,’ she said, only, in fact, seeing a series of hopeless confrontations ahead of her.
‘You, at least, have started off in vaguely the right direction. You can spell at any rate.’ He looked at her through his lashes, his face expressionless. ‘Which brings me to the obvious question. Why are you here?’
‘I thought you knew why I was here,’ she answered, bewildered by the question. ‘I’m a spoiled brat who—’
‘Why are you really here?’ he interrupted impatiently. ‘What are you doing here when you could have got yourself a job at any number of companies if you’d wanted. Your father informed me that you had excellent A level results. Why didn’t you go to university?’
Francesca looked at him resentfully, not liking the way he was manoeuvring her into a position of self-defence.
‘Your father wanted you to go to university.’
‘He did,’ she agreed.
‘He wanted you to study economics, I believe.’
‘Did you talk about anything at this lunch of yours apart from me?’ she asked with irritation. ‘I suppose you also know what dress size I am, and what my favourite colour is as well?’
She hadn’t expected a response to that, but he looked at her very carefully, his eyes roaming over her body and sending a reeling sensation of alarm through her. Men had looked at her before—in fact she was quite used to interested stares—but she had never felt this nervous prickle down her spine.
‘Size eight, and, with your hair, probably green—dark green.’
‘I didn’t go to university,’ she said hurriedly, flushing, ‘because I wanted a break from studying.’
‘A break to do what?’
‘To enjoy myself,’ she muttered feebly, feeling like a cornered rat.
‘Ah, now we’re getting to the heart of the matter, aren’t we?’
‘Are we?’ she asked, already feeling her hackles beginning to rise.
‘You may have all the qualifications for this job, and God only knows I’ve seen more than enough internal applications by way of comparison, but don’t for a minute imagine that I shall tolerate your personal life spilling over into your professional one. Working for me isn’t going to be a game to be endured simply to humour your father. I don’t want to see you enter this office either late or the worse for all-night partying. Do I make myself clear?’
‘As a bell,’ she said coldly.
‘Nor do I expect you to spend your time rushing through your work so that you can get on the telephone to your numerous admirers.’
‘I don’t have numerous admirers, Mr Kemp,’ she snapped. ‘And I can’t believe that Dad would have told you that I did.’
He shrugged. ‘He mentioned some playboy who was always in tow, and playboys tend to travel in packs, don’t they? They don’t feel complete unless they’re enjoying their wild times in the company of like-minded individuals.’ There was contempt on his face.
‘You don’t approve of me, do you, Mr Kemp?’ she asked stiffly.
‘No, I don’t.’ His words were blunt. He was not the sort of man to beat about the bush, nor was he the sort to parcel up unflattering thoughts underneath pretty wrapping.
‘I grew up poor, Miss Wade, and I made it on my own. I don’t approve of playboys who can’t see further than having a good time. Nor do I approve of women like you, who were raised in the lap of luxury and swan through life thinking that hard work is something best left alone. You obviously have the brains to do something for yourself, but that doesn’t appeal, does it? Hard work is rarely glamorous to those who don’t have to do it.’
That stung. She felt angry hurt prick the back of her eyes but she didn’t say anything. She could hardly deny that she had been indulged all her life, could she? By the time she had been born, late in her parents’ lives, her father had already made his first million and had been well on his way to making several more.
Would things have been