“But you-”
“Norah, you will call this place Norah’s Ark, and that’s an end of the matter.”
She gritted her teeth. “Yes, Hunter,” she said in exasperation.
He left the office abruptly and strode towards the house, but as he reached it he heard her running after him. “By the way,” she said as they went inside, “there’s been a delivery for you. Several boxes of files.” She indicated a huge pile of boxes standing in the hall. “They were delivered by a Miss Fuller.”
“She’s my secretary and personal assistant,” Gavin said. “Where is she now?”
“She’s gone.”
“What do you mean, gone?”
“I mean gone, as in ‘gone away,’ ‘left the premises,’ departed in her big, shiny car without a backward glance at us dumb yokels.”
“But why? She was supposed to move in here, to work with me.” His eyes narrowed as the asperity in her last remark got through to him. “Did you make her leave? Because if you did, let me tell you that I consider that an unpardonable intrusion into my-”
“It had nothing to do with me,” Norah interrupted. “From the way she looked around, I think she’s a city lady who considers this the back of beyond. Anyway, she must have made her decision before she came here, because she had this all ready for you.”
She handed him a sealed envelope. Gavin tore open the letter and discovered a neat, impersonal communication from the efficient Miss Fuller, in which she informed him that she’d found another job and was leaving immediately.
Something clutched Gavin’s stomach as he read it. He had no particular fondness of Miss Fuller, but he knew she had an admirable nose where the financial markets were concerned. Her departure at this moment meant only one thing. She didn’t believe he was going to pull Hunter and Son out of its present mess, and she was voting with her feet. It was a sharp reminder that he had other problems in addition to Peter, problems he’d been neglecting lately.
“Trouble?” Norah asked in a sympathetic tone.
“None that I can’t cope with,” he said cheerfully, slipping the polished mask into place as so often before. “As you guessed, she likes the bright lights. This wouldn’t suit her at all. But I can manage without her for a while.”
She looked at him. “Are you sure that’s all it is?”
“Perfectly sure,” he said in a tone that snubbed her. “Now, I have to find somewhere to work. I seem to remember there’s a desk available in the office.”
“Well, yes, but-” it was clear she didn’t want him in what had been her father’s office.
“There’s an extra telephone plug in there for a fax machine,” he pointed out. “I saw it. Also plenty of outlets and shelves. It’s the logical place.”
“True, but-”
“And since you work there as well, we can answer the phone for each other,” he finished smoothly.
“Hmm! I wonder who’ll end up taking the most messages for whom?” she asked shrewdly.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning that you’ll try to use me as an unpaid secretary.”
“I can’t think why you say that-”
“Because I see right through you, Hunter. I know the kind of man you are. A user. All right, you can move into the office, but you make your own coffee, answer your own phone and do your own filing.”
“I’m innocence personified,” he assured her.
“Hmm!”
He’d believed his own declaration of innocence at the moment he made it, but he hadn’t realized how used he was to having Miss Fuller as backup. It was natural to him to say, “Put that file away for me,” or “Get me so-and-so on the phone,” and he went on doing it. But only for a while. Norah would invariably remember something she had to do outside, and he would find himself talking to thin air.
Sometimes the phone would ring and he would snatch it up, growling “Hunter,” only to find himself talking to someone who wanted Norah. Then he would have to drop his own work and go in search of her, which was exasperating. To cap it all, when challenged, Norah seemed incapable of understanding that it was an intolerable intrusion for a busy man like himself.
“This is the last time I’m doing this,” he said when he’d hunted her down in the sanctuary and thrust a message into her hand. “I had to waste valuable time placating that man because you’d said you’d call him back and then you didn’t.”
Norah glanced at the name on the paper. “I didn’t call him back because you were hogging the phone yesterday,” she said crossly. “You might have noticed-except that you never notice anyone else’s concerns-that I kept looking in hopefully, but you never once let go of the receiver. That’s why I didn’t call him back, and if you had to calm him down you got your just deserts. That’s all I have to say.”
“If only it were. The phone is part of my business-”
“Then get one of your own and stop hogging mine. I have business to deal with, too, and you’re holding it up.”
“Oh, come on,” he scoffed.
“And what does ‘come on’ mean?” she asked dangerously.
“It means there’s business and business. There’s my business-property-”
“And money,” she reminded him ironically. “Don’t forget money.”
“And money,” he agreed. “Money and property. Things that are real. Surely you don’t expect me to believe that a few donkeys matter in comparison?”
For a moment he thought she would explode, she was so angry. But she calmed down enough to say, “You don’t deal in things that are real, Hunter. You deal with lights on a computer. Turn a switch and the whole lot disappears. There’s no reality in that. Try cleaning out a pen when an animal’s living in it. That’s reality, and no convenient switch to make it vanish.”
“That’s hardly-”
“Be quiet, I haven’t finished. You say, what do a few donkeys matter? Ask your son if they matter, if he’ll answer you. They matter to him, because he’s unhappy and they’re keeping him sane. They’re his lifeline-and mine. Put your arms around an animal, feel its warmth, and feel your own warmth flowing in response. That’s not only reality, it’s healing. Warmth and love are the most healing things ever created, and nobody ever healed anything by signing checks.”
He opened his mouth, but she charged on over him. “Do you know who this man is?” she asked. “He runs a school for damaged children. Some of them are physically disabled, and some are sick in their hearts and minds. I’ve promised him he can bring a group of them here, and I’ve been trying to call him to fix the date. Now I’m going to call him back and apologize for keeping him waiting, but your bricks and mortar, your bits of paper and your computer lights are more important than his sick children. Would that be putting it fairly, do you think?”
“I think it’s damned
“Well, I have to keep my wits about me with you,” she flashed back.
“I don’t know why you’re so ill tempered, just because I came to give you a message,” Gavin said, retreating into dignity.
Norah didn’t know, either. The strength that had sustained her in the early days after the tragedy seemed to be seeping away now. At the same time her burdens grew heavier and every day seemed filled with clouds, even when the sun was out. It took only a small thing to make her fly off the handle, as she’d just done.
“You didn’t just come to give me a message,” she said. “You came to complain about
She headed back to the house, leaving Gavin watching her and reflecting what an impossible woman she was.
His activities grew more frantic as the skies over Hunter & Son darkened. It was madness to remain here. He should be in London, wheeling and dealing, challenging rivals to see who would blink first. But now there were
