Never Look Back

by Denise Robins

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

When Brett Morgan walks out on her, Penny Winn feels her broken heart will never recover. But the Second World War takes her to the Mediterranean where she meets Wing-Commander Timothy Curtis and becomes his wife. Everyone believes Tim Curtis is on his death-bed, but he unexpectedly recovers. Then Penny's old flame Brett Morgan reappears in her life. Isn't that always typical of men? Penny must face her dilemma: stay faithful to her invalid husband, or return to her true love?

Release date: February 27, 2014

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 400

Sample

“I’m in an awful flap!” said Penny Winn (officially known in the W.A.A.F. as 219015 – A.C.W.2). She was kneeling in front of the chest ransacking every drawer. “I can’t find a clean shirt.”

Her friend Sarah Doble, sitting on the end of the bed polishing a pair of shoes, cast an amused eye upon Penelope Winn. She was still in a state of undress, having got no further than a pink slip and Air Force blue skirt which was a little tight but showed her beautiful slimness. The slender arms and pretty neck and shoulders were a faint golden tan from the summer sun. The curly head bent over the open drawer was as brown as beech leaves. Sarah said:

“Goodness, Penny, all this because you’re meeting the boy friend?”

Penny’s answer came decisively; and with a deep note of happiness in it.

“Yes, and what’s more I shall have a ring on my finger – in theory if not in fact – when I come back tonight. I shall be engaged to the most wonderful man in the world and a newly engaged girl MUST have a clean shirt.”

The happy voice ended in an infectious laugh. Penny Winn turned and showed her friend her charming sun-browned little face which was heart-shaped with a firm chin and wide-set eyes, unusually light grey eyes fringed by the longest and blackest lashes Sarah had ever seen.

The two girls had been billeted in this small house in Gerrards Cross for the last three months. Their camp was only half a mile away so they journeyed to and from it on their bicycles.

They had shared not only their lives in the camp and in this house, but their joys and sorrows. The sorrows were few. They were both healthy, happy girls who had joined the W.A.A.F. for the duration of the war and were ready to take what was coming to them. The jobs were many. They worked hard – general duties – had good times, too. They were both pretty – Sarah less strikingly so than Penny – and they both had their followers. Of late, Sarah had been a little troubled about Penny. She had changed so since she had met Brett Morgan. He was not an airman … (Sarah was conservative and believed in keeping to her own lot) … Penny had met Brett outside the R.A.F. He was a subaltern in the Army and ever since their first meeting at a local dance two months ago, Penny had spent every available spare moment with him.

“You’ll have to lend me one of your shirts, ducks,” said Penny’s gay voice. “Hurry and find me one while I clean my buttons.”

Sarah gave her the shirt. In no time Penny had cleaned the buttons on her tunic and soon was standing before the mirror giving a last critical look at herself – trim and complete in the uniform which suited her remarkably well. As she leaned nearer the glass to put another touch of lipstick on the wide sweet mouth that was usually laughing, she said:

“Will I do? If you were a man, would you propose to me, Sarah?”

“Every day until you accepted me, I’m sure,” Sarah laughed back. Then added in a more serious voice, “But are you so sure this is coming off?”

The laughter sped from Penny’s luminous grey eyes. A solemn almost ecstatic look replaced it. She said:

“Absolutely. Last night … oh, Sarah, last night he was marvellous. I’m crazy about him and he is about me. We knew from the moment we met that we were just made for each other. You know I’ve had boy friends before … there was Jimmy … but he didn’t really count. It was just fun and he knew it. But this isn’t. This is in dead earnest. It means everything in my life.”

“And does it mean everything to Brett Morgan?”

Sarah was not cynical but she was a little older, a little slower in brain and purpose than Penny … more ordinary too (she knew that), for there was something about Penny that swept people off their feet – men and women alike. Penny was enormously popular in the mess. She seemed to exude gaiety and charm. There was so much sweetness in her, as well as kindness of heart. She could not bear to see anyone in trouble, man, woman or child. And Sarah, who had grown particularly fond of Penny, felt that she could not bear it if ever any man were to let Penny down.

Penny was living in the clouds at the moment … way, way up in those rosy clouds of romance which had enveloped her ever since Brett Morgan had first taken her in his arms. It frightened Sarah to think that she loved the man so much. Sarah had never loved anyone like that – never would. She was neither as romantic nor highly strung as Penny.

Penny said:

“You’ve got a funny look in your eye, Sarah. What’s up? You aren’t worried about Brett and me, are you?”

“Oh, no!” lied Sarah.

Penny put her hat on her head, careful not to put it at too rakish an angle. Under the severe peak her heart-shaped face was enchanting. She smiled at her reflection in the mirror and murmured:

“You needn’t be. I know just how Brett feels about me. We talked and talked last night. We have the same ideas about everything. We both want a little home together … and children … when this war is over. We both like reading and crossword puzzles and toasting marshmallows in front of the fire and listening to the radio … we dance together divinely. We want to have a fast car and to tour the Continent. We want … oh, so many things. Brett is twenty-five. I’m twenty-one. He hasn’t got any parents. Neither have I. We are both little orphans of the storm. We neither of us care much for the aunts and uncles who brought us up, They didn’t really want us. But now we’ve found each other, and nothing can make us unhappy again or come between us … nothing.”

Sarah Doble listened to this long speech, almost with reverence, gave a little sigh, put down her shoes and smiled affectionately at her friend.

“My, oh my! You have got it badly, Penny my lamb. Well, it’s O.K. by me. Run along and get tied up to your Brett. I’ll kiss you both when you come back.”

Penny slung her respirator over her shoulder and drew on a pair of brown kid gloves. She was shining and beautiful in her blue uniform. Love radiated from her. Outside, the sun was shining too. It was a heavenly day and Brett was waiting for her at the Boar’s Head. They were going to have a whole afternoon and evening together … his afternoon off as well as hers.

“I couldn’t be happier, Sarah,” she said, “and, oh, Sarah, you do like Brett, don’t you?”

“Nobody could help it,” said Sarah candidly.

That was true. Any girl who knew Brett Morgan had to like him. He was so good-looking. More than that. He had a touch of the devil in him and there isn’t a girl who doesn’t like that. Just a touch of the rake, with his black hair and his lean brown face and narrow handsome eyes … his long well-built body which was strong and graceful at the same time … the merest touch of bitterness about his mouth … the way he had of drawling: “You’re telling me!” or of saying “Cheers” just before he lifted a glass to his lips, then grinned at you over the rim of it.

Penny knew all these things to her cost. But to fall badly and hopelessly in love with a man wasn’t too heavy a price to pay since he seemed to love her too. It was no price at all. It was just heaven.

It had been heaven last night, she thought, as she cycled along the sunlit road to the crossroads. Sheer heaven when he had stopped his car outside her billet and suddenly, in the darkness, pulled her into his arms and kissed her mouth with slow deep kisses that had taken the very soul out of her body. He had murmured:

“Penny, you’re too sweet. You go to my head. I’ve never seen a pair of eyes so grey or so beguiling. Little Penny, I love you madly. …”

And she, delirious with happiness, had answered his kisses and his words:

“I love you, Brett,” she had confirmed. “I always will. …”

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he had said and his voice had sounded strange and husky; “tomorrow – we must talk – I’ve got so much to tell you.”

She had hardly been able to do her work properly this morning for thinking of those kisses, those words and all the other things he had ever said to her, and it was obvious to her that, feeling as they did, this could only end in marriage for them both.

How much did she know about this man who only two months ago had been a total stranger to her? Little beyond the fact that his parents had died in West Africa of sleepy sickness and that he, then a tiny boy, had been sent home and brought up by an elderly uncle and aunt in Winchester, neither of whom had particularly wanted him nor been very sympathetic with him once he was old enough to develop a mind and a will of his own. But they had done their duty and educated him well. He had taken a degree in civil engineering and before the war had been in a job with a big firm in Barrow from which he had only been released a year ago because of his insistence that he must join the Army.

That was all that she knew about Brett. If he came through this war he could go back to his engineering and when his uncle died he would have just a little money of his own. That was all she knew about Brett. But she wouldn’t have minded if he had had nothing … been nothing … so long as he was still Brett, and she could still believe him when he said he had never loved any girl in the world except herself … only had minor affairs which had meant nothing.

Well, she had had minor affairs too. She had told Brett all about Jimmy and he had smiled and touched one of her cheeks with his finger, which was a habit of his … (there was a dimple in that cheek) … and said:

“You’re such an enchanting person, Penny, I wouldn’t be surprised if every fellow in the camp was mad about you.”

It was funny, thought Penny as she cycled to her tryst, how a girl can change once she really falls in love. She used to be just as fond as Sarah of parties and fun and admiration from the boys and now she wanted nothing, nobody but Brett. Everything fell flat without him. It was almost frightening to be so much in love. At the mere thought of life without Brett her heart failed her and she could hardly draw breath. In a war anything could happen. But as far as she knew Brett was to be stationed here for some time and although her name was down for a commission she was not likely to leave Gerrards Cross until the end of the year.

Penny enjoyed her present life in the W.A.A.F. and she did not particularly want a commission. But she knew that Aunt Nora would be disappointed if she didn’t get one. Aunt Nora was a spinster of some fifty years who had lived most of her life in a small house in Golders Green. Raids on London had not driven her away, and there she remained to this day. Penny, who had never had anything in common with her aunt, could not fail to admire her spirit, but her childhood under Aunt Nora’s supervision … she was a religious bigot, narrow-minded and unsympathetic with young girls … held few happy memories for Penny. Lack of means had driven her to leave school at an early age and attend a secretarial college and at seventeen to start life as a typist with a firm of lawyers in Moorgate. But neither Aunt Nora nor the dullness or confinement of her existence had been able to quench Penny’s natural sense of fun, or her thirst for romance. And with the outbreak of war had come freedom for her in a sense; the chance to join up and get away from Aunt Nora’s tyranny – and Golders Green – and express her own individuality.

It was to Aunt Nora that her thoughts were winging now as she neared the well-known, creeper-clad building outside which hung the painting of a boar’s head. During her last leave Aunt Nora had said:

“One thing I sincerely pray, my dear Penelope” (she would only call her Penny in rare moments of affection), “is that you may meet a nice young man of good birth and position, and get respectably married in this war.”

It had made Penny laugh for it wasn’t that Aunt Nora believed in war marriages or had any interest for romance. But she was mean … had always been hatefully mean … and begrudged the home she had been forced to give her brother’s only child when the early deaths of both parents had left little Penelope alone in the world, so Aunt Nora wanted to get her off … quickly free herself of any further financial responsibility toward Penny. That was it.

Penny laughed to herself.

Poor old Auntie Nora! What a lot she had missed in life – never loving or being loved. Well, it would be fun if she could write tonight and tell her that her niece was engaged to the most wonderful man in the world.

Five minutes later Penny walked out of the sunshine into the cool, dark, panelled hall of the Boar’s Head, taking off her hat as she did so, shaking back her brown curls, cheeks flushed and hot after the exertion of her ride.

For a moment she blinked as she looked eagerly around. Then she saw the tall well-beloved figure of Brett. He was just inside the little bar parlour which was usually empty at this hour of day. One arm rested against the mantelpiece. He had a pipe in his hand. Her heart leaped at her first glimpse of the attractive profile, the beautifully poised head. He was not in uniform this afternoon. That was unusual. He wore grey flannels and she thought how well they suited him.

Dear, darling Brett!

She walked lightly into the small dark room, closing the door behind her, and held out both hands.

“Brett!” She spoke his name with a lilt in her voice.

Brett Morgan swung round and faced her. For a moment he looked at the radiance on the small face, at the trim blue-uniformed figure. But there was no answering light in his own eyes. Only regret, a deep, secret purpose; a tightening of the muscles about his jaw. Slowly he put his pipe in his pocket. Slowly he said:

“Oh, hello, Penny.”

For an instant she stood irresolute, uncertain of herself, because she had been so sure he would take her straight in his arms. Then she drew nearer him, until her small head was on a level with his shoulder. Her heart raced madly as she looked up at him. She smiled. All his life Brett Morgan remembered that smile because it was so intensely sweet. It was Penny’s sweetness that he loved most. There was something very young and simple and unaffected about her. It went to a man’s heart as surely as her physical beauty. He knew that she was thoroughly good. That marked her out amongst a lot of other girls in his life who hadn’t been quite so good … who smoked a little too much … drank too many cocktails … kissed too many men. He loved Penny. But he did not dare take her into his arms because of what he had resolved to do. And what smote him like a blast in this moment was the knowledge that he could not tell her of that resolution, or of the long battle he had had with himself all night instead of going to sleep. He must just hurt her … and himself. Silly perhaps, and yet a man must do what he thinks best, live up to his principles and take the hard way or have no confidence in or respect for himself.

And having decided to take the hard way, the sooner it was done the better, because he could not face a scene (not that he thought Penny would make one).

He said:

“I’m terribly sorry – I’d have phoned you if I could have done – but we won’t be able to spend this afternoon and evening together.”

That was the first blow. Penny took it with a sense of shock, which showed only in the deep crimson that sprang to her face and the slim brown throat, just where it showed above the rim of the fresh blue collar which Sarah had lent her.

“Oh!” she said.

Disappointment was written so frankly in every line of her young face that it made the man wince. He wished that she was a little less transparent … a little harder … and much less easy to hurt, and yet lord knew those were the things he adored in her.

He went on with some difficulty:

“I could have written or even wired, but I thought by the time the wire got you you might already have started out. But I … I don’t think I can even stay and give you tea. As a matter of fact I’m leaving Gerrards Cross this evening.”

“Leaving?” she repeated.

The little parlour was cool and dark. But through the dusty window panes the sun was still sparkling, the trees were very green and the sky very blue … as blue as Brett’s handsome eyes between their thick dark lashes.

Penny felt suddenly very cold and she shivered as though an icy hand had clutched her.

“Oh!” she said.

And it didn’t seem that she could say any more – only utter that brief ejaculation.

Brett looked over her head. His voice went on inexorably:

“I don’t know what you’re going to think of me, my dear, and I owe you all sorts of apologies, but I’ve been a cad to let things go as far as they have … I mean … there’s no question of us getting married or anything like that … and … I reckon it’s just as well I’m going away. We oughtn’t to go on meeting.”

There! It was out. There were beads of moisture on Brett’s forehead. He pulled out a handkerchief and wiped them away. He looked suddenly ghastly pale but Penny did not notice it, nor did she realise how pinched and white her own small face had grown under the tan. She was conscious only of the most hideous pain in her heart. Every word that Brett had just said had put a knife in that heart. She was trying to realise what it meant. He was going away … tonight. There was to be no question of marriage and he was apologising because things had gone as far as they had.

(“Oh, dear God, don’t let this be true. Don’t let this be true,” the silent voice of her heart cried out.)

But aloud Penny’s voice said very clearly:

“You don’t have to apologise, Brett. Things haven’t gone very far, have they …” (laugh) … “I mean … we’ve kissed each other and that sort of thing, but that doesn’t count much these days, does it?” (another laugh) … “and I quite understand that you are going away … that you won’t be able to see me any more …”

His hands clenched at his sides. It was harder than he had expected. He wished that those big grey eyes of hers did not look so mortally wounded … it was as though he had done the child to death … enough to make any man swerve from his purpose and wonder whether … but no! He hadn’t fought that battle last night just to lose it now because Penny was so sweet and so desperately vulnerable.

He said: “Lord knows I’m sorry, Penny. I didn’t mean … I oughtn’t to have …”

“Oh, please, don’t say any more,” broke in Penny. “I think I understand.” (She didn’t, but what did it matter now?) “You’re just not interested in me any more. I thought we were friends … more than friends … but we must both have made a mistake. It’s all right, Brett … only somehow I wish you had sent that telegram. It would have saved my bicycle tyres …” she giggled helplessly praying to God she would get out of this room, out of the Boar’s Head before she made an exhibition of herself and burst into tears.

“Penny, we were friends, perhaps we could go on being …”

“Oh, no, please! Much better to cut it completely, surely?” broke in Penny again, with a last frenzied effort at a laugh.

She picked up the gas mask which she had dropped in a little heap at her feet, put on her cap, turned and ran out of the bar parlour. Long afterwards she remembered the musty smell of cigarettes and beer which had lingered there … and long, long afterwards she felt sick if ever she went into a hotel or public room and caught that queer individual smell again. It was linked up with the memory of Brett’s handsome face and the stiffness of his shoulders as he had stood there delivering his apology … could bring back the intolerable pain … the end of her one and only serious dream of love.

Brett Morgan let her go. Through the casement windows he watched the small figure in blue. . .