James paused and Evelyn frowned. She knew she should feel for him, appreciate his lack of confidence, and be kind. But this was the wrong moment for that. “And what resolution do you want to make?”
James looked a little surprised at her direct questions, yet it also seemed to make it easier for him. “Evelyn, I think you’re wonderful, you must know it. I’ve never met a girl like you in London. My resolution, if you will have me, is that I would like to marry you. Will you marry me, Evelyn?”
Evelyn stared. She had expected something along these lines from James, but not a proposal, not so suddenly and without any warning.
“But we’ve not even been for that walk you invited me on. Or to the pictures,” she protested weakly, not sure what else she was supposed to say.
“We can do all of those things. It can be a long engagement, if that’s what you would like, but I can’t think of anyone else I would want to marry. I think I love you, Evelyn.”
Evelyn raised her eyebrows. She almost wanted to laugh at James, though she was too aware of the gravity of the situation to do so. The idea of marrying James was ridiculous, particularly when he could only declare that he thought he loved her. He was watching her reaction.
“I know this is coming out all wrong,” he said. “I didn’t mean to ask you right away. I wanted to wait until this evening, perhaps, and work out what I would say. But the moment just seemed right. Maybe if you’ll just consider it. I think you feel the same way.”
His presumption sent Evelyn over the line from stunned ridicule to anger. Now he reached for her hand and tried to draw her closer. Still contemplating her response, she let him. But when, encouraged, he leaned towards her with his lips pursed for a kiss, she could not help herself. She pushed him back, rather more violently than she had planned.
“No, James!” she said, loudly, the emotions of the day affecting her tone. “I don’t feel the same way at all.”
James looked shocked but not prepared to accept her words. “I know you’re not used to this sort of thing, Evelyn. I’m sorry if it’s a bit sudden. But you must feel something, or else why would you have agreed to come out with me?”
Evelyn stared at him in horror, totally unsure what to say. “It is sudden, James, but that’s not why I’m saying no. And I’ve not said so, but I was engaged once before, in Devon, so I am used to this. I didn’t want to marry him and I don’t want to marry you. I’m sorry.”
James’s disappointment turned to anger. “You were engaged before? So you ran away to London to get away from a marriage you didn’t want to go through with?”
“No, that’s not right at all,” Evelyn said. “I came to London to look for a new life. My engagement was just one of the the things I left behind.”
“You used our brother’s letter to get here, to convince us to give you refuge, just so you could get away from a commitment you’d made?”
“You’re not listening, James, which makes me even less likely to look favourably on you. I’m sorry you see it that way, but it’s not true. After what happened to my brother in the war, I’d never do what you’ve just said.”
“So why is it that you won’t marry me, then? Give me a good reason.” There was a challenge in James’s eyes now, which frightened her a little.
“I don’t love you, James.”
“You could grow to.”
“That’s not how I believe a marriage should work.” In desperation, she added, “Besides, there’s someone else who I think I love.”
“Who?” James demanded.
“It is none of your business.” Anger flashed in Evelyn’s heart, partly because she wanted very badly to tell him who she loved and yet she could not. She heard movement at the top of the stairs and suspected Lilian was listening. She did not care. “I don’t have to tell you anything, especially not about who I love.”
James responded to that anger with a pale-faced fury. “In that case you can get out of my house,” he snapped.
Without another word, Evelyn took her coat from the hook in the hallway and did just as he asked. It was not until she had slammed the door behind her and was out in the street that she realised what she had done. All of her belongings and money were in that house. The house was her only place to stay in London. Lilian and James had been her first friends here. Without Jos, it was possible she had no friends here at all. For the first time since she had alighted the train at Paddington, London was huge and terrifying again, and she was alone.
There was only one course of action she could think of, and that was to do what she had planned to do anyway, to find Jos. There was even more at stake now. Surely Jos would put her fears aside to help Evelyn, even if she would not relent over their relationship. But if she could be persuaded that it was safe to love Evelyn, perhaps all was not lost after all. Jos was really all that mattered now.
She retraced her steps to Jos’s flat, horribly aware of how much had changed since she had made this journey the previous day. Since then she’d been the happiest, angriest, and most desperate she’d ever been. Now, she could not wait to get to the door, to tell Jos what had happened, to bring about that the happy reunion she had been imagining.
She reached Jos’s now familiar door and rang the bell. There was no answer. She rang the
