‘Ah, there you are,’ her father greeted her as she walked into his office. ‘You haven’t forgotten about tonight, have you?’
‘Tonight?’
‘Yes, the dinner dance at the golf club. I told you about it,’ he reminded her. ‘I’ve invited Ben Frobisher, the man who bought the house in the High Street.’
‘The computer man?’ Miranda asked grimly. ‘Oh, you know how I feel about what’s happening to the town … to its buildings. I walked past there this morning. Ralph Charlesworth’s got the contract for the work.’ Her face hardened a little. ‘That building ought to have been listed. We’ve been in touch with the Georgian Society and they confirmed—’
‘Look, Miranda, I know how you feel,’ her father interrupted her patiently, ‘but this man’s an important client. He’ll have employees who will be wanting to relocate in the area. He himself is looking for a house. He’s renting the Elshaw place at the moment.’
‘If he’s as high-profile as you say, I can’t understand why he should want to attend the annual golf club hop,’ Miranda told her father drily.
‘I expect he wants to get to know people. After all, he is going to be a part of the community.’
‘Is he? From what I’ve seen, most of the people who’ve moved down here seem to prefer to form their own small smart cliques rather than try to integrate with the locals. Look at what’s happened at the tennis club.
‘This time last year we had four tatty courts that were only used in the summer and a club-house that was falling down; now, thanks to a small high-pressure group of London wives, we’ve got a building fund going and ambitious plans to build two indoor courts, plus all the facilities of an expensive London gym, complete with swimming pool, bar, and everything that goes with it.’
‘So? What’s wrong with that?’
‘Dad, don’t you see? It’s spoiling the character of the place. Another few years and we’ll just be another dormitory town. The locals won’t be able to afford to live here any more, and during the week it will be a town of too rich, too bored women vying with one another.
‘There won’t be any real life to the town; it will be completely sanitised. There’ll be no children—they’ll all be away at boarding school. There won’t be any old people—they’ll all be packed off to exclusive residential homes.’
‘If that means that we’ll no longer have a dozen or more surly-looking youths hanging round the town square all night, then personally I think it would be a good thing.’
‘But, Dad, those kids belong here, and they’re not surly. They’re just … just young,’ Miranda told him helplessly. One of her extramural activities which gave her the most satisfaction was her work with a local youth club. ‘They need an outlet for their energy, that’s all,’ she told her father. ‘And they won’t find it in some expensive exclusive tennis club.’
He laughed, shook his head and smiled ruefully at her.
‘I think you’re over-reacting a little, Miranda. Don’t forget that people like Ben Frobisher are bringing new life to the area, new jobs … new opportunities.’
‘New architecture,’ Miranda murmured under her breath, unable to resist.
Her father looked at her. ‘You don’t know what he intends to do with that house. He struck me as an eminently sensible man. I’m sure that he—’
‘Sensible? And yet he still employed Ralph Charlesworth?’
Her father sighed. ‘All right. I know you don’t like Ralph Charlesworth; admittedly he isn’t the most prepossessing of men, but he does have a good reputation as a builder. He’s tough and he sticks to his contracts.’
Miranda shook her head, knowing that this was a subject on which she and her father would never agree That was what made her job so enjoyable, though: the fact that they were so different … had views which were sometimes so conflicting. Her father admitted that since she had joined the firm their business had improved dramatically, and equally she was the first to concede that without her father’s experience, his ‘know-how’, his tolerance, she would never have been able to branch out into testing ideas which were innovative and new.
They made a good team, she recognised as she smiled at him.
‘Don’t forget,’ he warned her, ‘about tonight; I’ve arranged for Frobisher to meet us at home, and we’ll all set off from there. It will make things easier.’
‘What time do you want me there?’ Miranda asked him, giving in. She didn’t live with her father, but had her own small cottage several miles outside the town.
‘Half-past seven,’ he told her. ‘Helen is arriving at seven.’
Helen Johnson was a widow some five years younger than her father. They had become engaged at Christmas … and were getting married at the end of the month. They were then going on a month’s cruise, leaving Miranda in sole charge of the business.
She liked Helen and was pleased that her father was remarrying. Her mother had always had a weak heart, and after a long period of illness had died several days after Miranda’s twelfth birthday.
Miranda had missed her desperately; had gone through anguish, anger, fear and despair, had hated both her mother for leaving her and her father for letting her, but eventually she had begun to recover, and by the time she was in her late teens had become mature enough to understand that if she missed her mother so desperately then her father must feel even more alone.
She had been twenty-one when her father had offered her her partnership in the business, and it was then that she had decided to find her own home, as much for her father’s sake as her own. He was an attractive man, still only in his mid fifties, and, although he never seemed to be interested in any of the women who pursued him, Miranda had felt that it was only fair to him not to burden him with a live-in grown-up daughter.
He had met Helen three years ago, when she had come into their offices to ask their advice on selling her large house following the death of her husband. What she wanted was to stay in the area, but in something rather smaller, she had told them.
It had originally been Miranda who had dealt with her, and who had convinced her to buy a very pretty Georgian house on the outskirts of the town, convenient for everything, and yet still quiet, with a pleasant garden and pretty views over the river and the surrounding countryside.
Now she and Miranda’s father were getting married and Miranda was delighted for both of them.
What did not delight her quite so much was the fact that Ralph Charlesworth’s wife was Helen’s niece.
Not that she had anything against Susan Charlesworth. In fact she considered her a very pleasant, if somewhat introverted woman. What she did not like was the fact that as Helen’s niece she would be attending the wedding. Which meant that her husband would also be attending the wedding … which meant that she, Miranda, would be forced to endure his company for a number of hours and to be pleasant to him in the interests of family harmony, and yet at the same time reinforce to him her complete rejection of him as a man.
She had no idea why he had decided to make her the object of his pursuit. She had certainly given him no encouragement to do so. She found him detestable and felt thoroughly sorry for Susan Charlesworth. The next time she found herself going all maternal and gooey-eyed over someone’s baby, she might try reminding herself of how much she would loathe being married to a man like Ralph Charlesworth, she told herself wryly as she settled down to work.
She worked steadily all afternoon, reflecting that the influx of people into the area had certainly brought a dramatic increase in the firm’s business, and that if things kept on the way they were going her father would have to consider taking on another partner.
At half-past five her father himself rapped on her office door and