‘I’m under orders to rest. Which, as you can see, I’m doing to the best of my ability.’
After glancing around them, he drew closer. ‘Is it the baby?’ he asked, his voice lower than ever.
She nodded.
‘Does anyone else know?’
‘Just Dr Garland and Romily. For now. She’s been very good about it.’
‘She’s good about most things, in my experience. Is there anything I can do?’
‘Yes caro,’ Allegra said, leaning forward. ‘Accept my apology for the way we parted on Sunday. My words came out all wrong. I didn’t mean to sound the way I did.’
‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘I was at fault too. But I do understand, you have your reputation to consider.’
She shook her head and rested a hand across her abdomen. ‘I think it’s a little late for me to be concerned about that, don’t you?’
‘To hell with anyone who criticises you,’ he said vehemently, leaning in closer still.
Smiling, she said, ‘I wish you could sit and chat with me.’
He glanced up at the house behind them, as if checking for anyone watching them. ‘Best not,’ he said, ‘as much as I’d like to.’
A sadness came over her. ‘I wish things were different.’
‘In what way?’
‘That we were children again. Life was so much more simple then. Although I didn’t think so at the time. I couldn’t wait to be grown up; I thought things would be easier when I could make my own decisions and be in control of my destiny. I’ve proved not to be very good at doing that,’ she said with a rueful sigh.
‘We can’t turn back the clock,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘We are where we are.’ He cast another glance over his shoulder, then looked back at her. ‘If you’re well enough in the next day or so, would you like to go for a walk sometime? That’s if you’re happy to be seen with me.’
‘I’d like that very much,’ she said with a smile. ‘And to hell with what anyone else thinks! But what about you signing up? When will you do that?’
‘Soon,’ he said. ‘I’ve told Mrs Devereux-Temple that I’ll be going.’
‘I wish you weren’t so keen to put yourself in danger. You won’t disappear without saying goodbye, will you?’
‘That rather depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On whether you’ll still be here when I leave. I expect you’ll go before me. Your week here will soon be up and you’ll be off to London, won’t you, or somewhere else?’
She shrugged. It was as much as she could manage to think as far as the next hour, never mind tomorrow or the day after. ‘I haven’t got very far with planning what happens next,’ she said.
‘Just don’t do anything hasty,’ he said. ‘Not when you have the baby to consider.’
‘That’s exactly what Romily said.’
He smiled. ‘Then you’d best do as she says. And I’d better get on and do what I’m paid to do.’
Disappointed that he couldn’t stay and keep her company, Allegra watched him push the wheelbarrow across the lawn towards the kitchen garden. How pathetic it now seemed to her that she had been concerned what people would think of her staying the night at Clover End Cottage. Since when had she cared about such things?
Sadly, though, she suspected that Elijah did, for there was no mistaking the fact that he regarded her as a Devereux. Which was nonsense. Had they met in Italy when she’d been in the orphanage, they would have been on an equal footing; there would have been no question of them being of a different social class. But because by a fluke of birth Jack Devereux was her uncle, their roles had been defined accordingly.
As there often was, there was a queue outside the baker’s shop, but Florence didn’t mind; she was quite happy to take her turn in the warm sunshine. It also gave her the opportunity to watch Billy through the window as he helped his mother serve the queue of customers. Mrs Partridge had said she’d phone the bread order through and have Billy deliver it, but Florence had seized her opportunity and offered to fetch it herself. ‘And no guesses why that would be,’ Mrs Partridge had said, causing Florence’s cheeks to flame.
But then what did she expect when nothing was secret round here, not with Mrs Bunch in the village? There didn’t seem to be anything she didn’t know. For instance, she knew that Allegra had been seen leaving Elijah’s cottage early Sunday morning. ‘Sweet as a pair of cooing turtle doves, they be,’ claimed Mrs Bunch with a smug smile. ‘Though what will come of it is anybody’s guess.’
