Moment of Love

by Denise Robins

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

She was just his private secretary - would he ever know how mach she loved him? Christa might have thought herself lucky. She spent every working day with Stephen Harrimay - the brilliant young executive - the man she adored. But Christa was only his private secretary. Each evening he left her behind for society's most glamorous women - fast, beautiful wealthy womaen - who could challenge his brilliance, and further his career. Christa watched as he led his whirlwind life with the beautiful and the rich, knowing that all she could offer was her calm, deep love. She could only watch, wait and hope for the moment Stephen would stop, and really see her for the first time... A captivating love story from the 100-million-copy bestselling Queen of Romance, first published in 1964, and available now for the first time in eBook.

Release date: July 24, 2014

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 400

Sample

GOLLING & Nash had closed down for the night.

The big departmental store in Oxford Street had suddenly become a great silent monument to all the good things of life that can be bought or sold. The long counters were shrouded; dust sheets flung over the dress models on their stands; lights extinguished; lifts ‘grounded’. Night-watchmen came on duty. Hundreds of employees, chattering, scurrying to get home, had left by the staff entrance. The huge glass doors all along the front of the block were locked. Nothing of the day’s clamour remained. Nothing but the brilliant, still-lighted windows displaying new summer dresses, coats and gay hats; gloves and stockings, bags and costume jewellery; linen; and all the variety of household furnishings.

What of the girls who worked in that vast establishment—the clerks, the shop assistants, the models, the buyers, the juniors, the dozen and one members of the staff? What of their personal lives, now that they had been released from the bondage of the long tiring day; from the necessity to serve the public, to be polite and patient in the face of continual frustration. Those who all day continue to smile and assist, no matter how weary or bored, can relax now and become individualists again. They can think of themselves—instead of customers. Their personal lives and joys and sorrows can once more become of paramount importance. Golling & Nash—the great gilded monster-god that devoured them all day, demanding perpetual sacrifice—can be abandoned.

Christa Coombe and Barbara Lane, friends from their schooldays, were both employed by Messrs. Golling & Nash. Christa as a typist in the cashier’s office on the top floor; Barbara in the hat department where she did a certain amount of modelling. She was a particularly beautiful girl with a warm white skin, brown lustrous eyes and dark auburn hair which she wore long as a rule, but which today was brushed high up on her head. She was slim and graceful. She had a good following of admirers among the male members of the staff.

Christa was one of her most loyal friends and generous admirers—without a trace of jealousy. She, herself, was a Devon girl, whose father had been a not very successful farmer and whose mother had had Scandinavian blood in her veins. Christa was on the small, thin side, with too high a forehead, and too wide a mouth. If she had any beauty it lay in her dazzlingly fair hair—thick and wavy, and eyes which were of a light fascinating grey with big black pupils. They held a soft, melting expression. Barbara often teased her friend about her ‘softness’. She was very sentimental.

“You’re a romantic little soul—you’ll have to be careful or one day you’ll get badly hurt,” Barbara would warn her.

Barbara was a vain, pleasure-loving, rather greedy girl. There was nothing soft about her. She was as calculating as Christa was the reverse. She even had a cruel streak that she concealed, and a quick, passionate temper. Men were carried away by her physical perfection. They were the opposite of one another. Nevertheless they got on well, mainly because the gentle, reserved Christa adored and admired her flamboyant friend.

On this warm summer evening as the girls walked arm-in-arm down Oxford Street, they both felt on top of the world. They were facing an exciting holiday; going abroad next week.

“I’m getting so thrilled, I can’t bear it,” Barbara announced, looking slantways, provocatively into the eyes of a boy who almost stopped in his tracks and turned to gaze longingly after the brilliantly beautiful girl. “Tomorrow—then Sunday—then over to the other side of the Channel. To my beloved, divine Paris!”

Christa smiled. Barby called it ‘her Paris’. She seemed to think of the French capital as hers. But she had never been there. It figured only in her dreams and imagination. Neither girl had so far set foot on the Continent. Their holidays, shared or apart, were usually spent in rather dull coastal resorts—in England (often with Barbara’s mother). In such places, a cheap boarding-house and more often than not, poor weather, spoiled any chance of a ‘wonderful time.’ But during this year, the two girls had been saving rigorously. Now at last they could afford to go abroad. They had bought their tickets from a Sloane Street Travel Agency. They had their passports. They were going across from Newhaven to Dieppe—the cheapest route.

What fun it had been planning it all, Christa thought, as she waited with Barby at the bus stop for the one that would take them both to Wood Green.

Barbara lived with her widowed mother. Christa had a ‘bedsit’ in a house in the same road. But since she had lost her aunt and only relatives in Devon, five years ago, she spent most of her time in the Lanes’ home, and ate with them during the week-ends. Mrs. Lane was like a mother to her—Barby, a sister. They had as good as ‘adopted her’. Without that small, shabby but comfortable little house where there was always a meal and a welcome, Christa would have been very lonely and miserable.

She felt that she owed the Lanes everything; there was nothing too much she could do for them in return. She loved Mrs. Lane who was a kindly, simple woman in her early fifties. Barby, beautiful Barby, with all her ‘boy-friends’, her party evenings, was often out. Christa felt such affection for her that she prayed quite passionately that she would one day find the right man and settle down. Her passionate nature and lack of stability frightened Christa. Barby was so restless and discontented. Some of the girls in the shop called her spoiled. Christa knew that she was selfish, even to her own mother, and often traded on Christa’s adoration. But Christa forgave her as her mother did, and bore her no ill-will.

Christa rarely went out to parties. She was painfully shy. She suffered from an inferiority complex, possibly because she was too much with Barbara. She was certain that she would never make the grade with the boys and would be an ‘old maid,’ although Mrs. Lane never stopped telling her that she was sweet and charming and would one day find some man to appreciate her.

Christa wanted desperately to be loved … and to fall in love. She had a store of deep sympathetic feeling … a great deal to give. Once when Barbara was modelling new hats, Christa watched her and said:

“You look terrific, Barby—you always do! But at least I’ll know that if any man falls for me, it won’t be for my glamour. It’ll be for myself alone!”

Barby raised a cynical eyebrow and grinned.

“Or for your pay-packet, honey-chile—men generally want something in return.”

Christa sighed and smiled.

In the bus going to Wood Green this evening, she clutched her bag tightly between her hands. She said breathlessly:

“My eyes are like X-rays—I can see straight through the plastic to my Traveller’s Cheques.”

Barbara smothered a giggle.

“And I can see my little packet of French currency. Oh, lord, I wish I had your head for figures! I can’t count. It’s about thirteen new francs to the pound, isn’t it? I must try to remember. Ten bob is roughly six and a half francs.”

“That’s right,” said Christa.

“You know that boy who works in the Men’s Ties and Socks—the tall fair one—”

“Yes?”

“He was in France in April. He says everything’s crashingly expensive.”

“Oh, well, we’ve got enough for our fortnight.”

“And the hotel these agents booked us into is comparatively cheap, they say.”

“Oh, I want to see Notre Dame and the Louvre and the bridges over the Seine,” said Christa.

“You’re too intellectual for me, duckie. I just want the shops in the Rue de la Paix and the Eiffel Tower!”

“I want to see them, too, of course.”

“We must both buy a hat—you can’t leave Paris without buying a hat,” said Barbara, her large eyes shining greedily.

“Okay by me,” said Christa.

A well-dressed business man, carrying a brief-case sitting opposite the two girls got off the bus. As he passed he glanced down at them. The romantically-minded, humble Christa thought:

“He’s looking at Barby—everyone does.”

She might have been surprised if she had known what the man with the brief-case was thinking. He had noticed the tall dark-eyed, auburn-haired girl, judging her to be a model. Then he saw the small slight one with the fair hair and serious face. He thought:

“Auburn-hair’s a beautiful girl. Yet I prefer the little fair-head. The other might be difficult. Damned conceited, too. Knows just how attractive she is. The small one has a very sweet smile. H’m!”

But he departed—never to see either of the girls again.

In the Lane household at Wood Green that evening, Christa and Barby were busy pressing, folding and packing. Barbara’s mother—a thin, tall woman with greying hair, sat with one eye on the girls, the other on television, and a cigarette between her lips. She was an inveterate smoker. She fanned herself with a paper. It was a close night and the little house was stuffy.

“You both look very pleased with yourselves,” she teased them. “I wish in a way you’d gone on one of those conducted tours. I don’t altogether like the idea of two attractive girls like you, who don’t speak one word of French, being alone in Paris.”

“Oh, we’ll be all right, Aunty Cath,” said Christa.

“Don’t be so old fashioned, Mum,” said Barbara impatiently. “Are you picturing us being robbed and left for dead in a back alley? I assure you we can take care of ourselves.”

“We can take care of each other!” added Christa, vigorously pressing a blue and white linen suit (three years old). It had creased a bit since she had last worn it.

“We’ll call in Maigret if we get into trouble,” added Barbara, borrowed her mother’s box of matches, lit a cigarette and flung herself into a chair. “Finish my dress for me, Chris, you’re so much better at ironing than I am.”

Catherine Lane, who had never been out of England in her life (Barbara’s father had been a typically insular Englishman, preferring his regular annual holiday in Bournemouth or Brighton), sighed, then shrugged her shoulders. No use counselling the young today. They were too independent, and they were sure they knew everything. However, she was glad her ‘adopted daughter’ was going with Barby. Barby was so excitable and wilful. Christa was much more reliable, the mother had to admit that. Dear little Christa looked quite pretty tonight, if she but knew it, her cheeks flushed from the heat and exertion of ironing; her naturally wavy hair tossed back from her forehead. A pity she was so thin—so pale, as a rule. Rather insignificant perhaps compared with Barby. But she was a sweetie and most unselfish.

“I hope you’ll have a glorious time, my dear,” the older woman sighed. “If I were ten years younger I’d come with you.”

“Are you threatening us?” her daughter grimaced at her.

But Christa, always terrified of hurting anybody’s feelings, quickly added:

“I wish you could come, Aunty Cath.”

Barbara certainly did not wish anything of the kind. She loved her mother, but she loved herself more. She didn’t want the maternal eye upon her or anybody with her in Paris except Christa, the adopted sister and friend who was always ready to say ‘yes’ to any of her propositions.

On the Saturday morning before Golling & Nash closed down for the week-end, the two girls were given a ‘send-off’ by their friends, all wishing them “happy holiday” and teasing them.

“I bet you two’ll get into some sort of scrape.”

“Wait and hear what the Monsieurs say when they see our Barbara strolling down the Boulevards.”

“Gosh, don’t I envy you going to Paris!” exclaimed one girl who worked in the Hat Department. “Chapeau shops in the Rue de Rivoli. Think of it!”

It was exactly what Barbara was thinking about when at last she and Christa leaned over the rails of the Cross Channel steamer on their way to Dieppe. It was a French boat. The chatter of the French staff made the girls feel that their holiday had already started. It looked like being a perfect crossing. The June morning was cloudless. The sea was calm. The boat was crowded.

The girls were immensely thrilled. Christa wore a pale blue thin wool suit with a white sleeveless blouse. Barbara was in a delicate shade of yellow linen with a wide belt and carried a white jacket. Tall and graceful, as usual attracting a great deal of attention.

They were to be ten days in Paris and the last three were to be spent in Dieppe where they had booked a double room in a small hotel. Both wanted sea air and swimming as the finale to their holiday.

They went down below to eat lunch. They could hear the French language being spoken on all sides. Now and then Christa felt uneasy.

“Shall we ever manage—not knowing a word,” she murmured.

“Of course. Everyone seems to speak English over there.”

All the same, even Barbara privately wished that one of them was a bit more travelled and competent to deal with a crisis, if one should arise.

It was in the dining salon that they first noticed HIM; the tall, dark-haired young man who sat alone, eating his meal. He spoke to nobody. He had segregated himself. While he ate, he wrote busily on a sheet of foolscap and kept examining papers which he extracted from an attaché case.

His appearance attracted Barbara. She whispered to her friend:

“Isn’t he gorgeous? … that figure … those strong features … those marvellous eyes? He’s a film star.”

“He’s certainly very handsome,” said Christa.

“I wish he’d look at us.”

“Oh, Barby, you are awful—” began Christa.

Then the handsome young man actually turned his head and glanced in their direction but immediately looked down at his work again. The girls grimaced at each other.

“The woman-hater, huh?” muttered Barbara.

“No—just reserved, I’d think. Shy, like me,” Christa bit her lip and smiled. “He’s rather dignified,” she added.

“Wonder what he does …”

They ruminated. He was a diplomat … he was in the Secret Service … he was going to Paris on important business … he was wealthy and successful, of course. Look at his well-cut light grey suit … his pale yellow and white silk tie. He was a baronet, perhaps an earl, or even a duke. He spoke to the waiter in perfect French, adding a few words in English. He was definitely an Englishman. The ‘old school tie’ … and now the two girls, fascinated, watched him draw an English passport from his attaché case.

“I’m mad about him—” Barbara rolled her eyes heavenwards, lit a cigarette, and smoked it dreamily.

Christa smoked but was less of an addict than her friend. She sipped her coffee and with her soft eyes watched the handsome stranger. The stories they were weaving around him were probably the absolute opposite of the true facts. But it was during the few seconds in which he had glanced toward them that she had noted how blue his eyes were, and how tanned his face—a curiously attractive face with high cheek-bones. And she liked his well-bred hands … noted the signet ring, on his little finger. He was the kind of man a girl could fall very much in love with, she thought. And there followed the sadder thought that never would such a man look at Christa Coombe.

Suddenly Barbara smothered a laugh.

“I’ve made up my mind what he is,” she whispered. “He’s married and running away from his wife and children. I saw him start like anything just now when a woman appeared with two little girls in the doorway. All hope is lost, Christa, let’s turn our attention elsewhere.”

She laughed at her nonsense, but Christa continued to think about the sun-tanned stranger with the wonderful eyes and the aloof personality. Somehow she did not want him to be a married man.

AT last they were in Dieppe. As they stepped on to French soil, the girls broke into mutual sighs of rapture.

“We’ve made it!” sighed Barbara, “I can smell France. Garlic, and coffee, and quite a different brand of cigarettes.”

Christa nodded. She stared excitedly around her. Jostled by the crowd as they stepped off the boat into the Customs shed, she began to wish again that she had gone to night classes at the Polytechnic and learned to speak French. It seemed to her that now she and Barbara were separated from everything and everyone English. It was a French world that screamed and gesticulated about them. They passed through the Customs easily, but while still in the Customs shed (the Paris train was waiting for them on the track), they were confronted by a blue-bloused man with a peaked cap who smilingly seized their two suitcases.

“Wait!” began Christa.

“Hi!” said Barbara, “we can carry those ourselves …”

The man disappeared. So did their suitcases. Other porters were trundling piled-up trolleys towards the train. Barbara said in a slightly doubting voice:

“Everyone’s doing it. I suppose we’ll see the stuff again on the train itself. I’m jolly glad we labelled everything.”

But once they reached the train, the girls searched up and down the corridor and saw no sign of the smiling porter or their luggage.

Christa began to feel anxious. Every porter they spoke to answered by shrugging a shoulder and letting loose a flood of rapid French. It was a warm day—warmer here than across the Channel. Tendrils of hair clung damply to Christa’s forehead. Even the impeccable Barbara looked hot and bothered.

“This is a nice start,” she said in a grumbling voice. “Our luggage has been nicked. That fellow wasn’t a porter at all.”

Then suddenly she turned. There stood The Man … the dark-haired, blue-eyed ‘ambassador’ (or whatever he was). Barbara seized her opportunity.

“Oh, please can you help us,” she began.

He looked politely at the tall beautiful girl in yellow.

“Of course, what can I do?” Christa thought his voice as attractive as his face. She plucked up courage and put in her say.

“A porter seized our suitcases and we just can’t find him.”

“Did you take his number?”

Barbara shrugged. Christa felt ashamed and small.

“No, we didn’t,” she admitted.

The Man’s expression suggested disdain and an ineffable air of boredom.

“He thinks us idiots, so we are,” thought Christa.

But Barbara had decided to make the usual attack with her beauty and charm. He listened to her explanations, then went off. He returned with the porter and the suitcases. The fellow, it appeared, had been looking for les deux jeunes dames. They followed him towards a second-class carriage.

“Thanks terribly—” Barbara began, flashing her big brown eyes at their rescuer.

“Not at all,” he said in his cool voice, turned and jumped into a first-class carriage near by.

The girls, laughing a little, seated themselves in their own carriage which was already half full.

“There you are,” whispered Barbara, “He is married and too terrified to stay talking to us. Can’t you tell.”

“He was very nice,” said Christa.

And that was the beginning of the adventure and of a train journey which was to end in tragedy. Until they reached the outskirts of Paris all went well. Christa and Barby had tea on the train, and an early dinner washed down by a cheap bottle of vin du pays. They enjoyed every minute of it. They found the unfamiliar countryside vastly interesting. England … Wood Green … dear Mum and the house in Nightingale Avenue … all seemed so far, far away.

Then came the accident. Suddenly the Dieppe-Paris express began to sway and lurch. There was a screeching of brakes, the whining of broken metal, the splintering of wood. The dangerous swaying and rattling brought the two girls on their feet, white-faced and terrified. The other occupants of the carriage shouted and grabbed at seats or luggage-racks. Then they were all hurled together in a sobbing, screaming tangle of bodies, legs and arms, as the Paris express met an out-going suburban train moving at full speed.

For months afterwards, Christa remembered that dreadful moment. It was as though she had been hurled from a pleasant gentle dream into a ghastly nightmare. She heard her own voice screaming and Barbara calling:

“Christa! … Mum! …”

After that, silence and darkness. Christa’s forehead had hit the window-ledge, viol. . .