Pray For Love Read online

  And then everyone would be disappointed.

  ‘I will tell her all about it when I reach home,’ he decided.

  He was anxious now that everything had turned out so brilliantly to return to England as soon as possible.

  However, he had to stay a little longer in New York just to make Mr. Wilbur happy – he was just so excited at having a titled partner he was growing very fond of.

  Georgie therefore felt he must do what he wanted and stay a few days longer.

  The day after they returned to New York, they were walking slowly down Fifth Avenue to attend an invitation to luncheon with one of Mr. Wilbur’s friends.

  Suddenly a very pretty girl stepped out of a carriage and cried,

  “Georgie! It cannot be you!”

  Georgie turned round.

  He saw someone running towards him and he held out his arms.

  “Monica!” he exclaimed.

  “What can you be doing in New York?” she asked excitedly.

  Nearly three years ago he had been very attracted to Monica, the daughter of a distinguished diplomat.

  They had spent a great deal of time together one summer – and he had fallen in love with her.

  But he was already well aware that things were so bad financially that it would be quite impossible for him to marry anyone.

  He kissed Monica after a party where they had sat together at dinner and he had danced nearly every dance with her.

  He had, when he went home, turned over and over in his mind whether he would ask her to share his poverty with him.

  Then he knew it would not work.

  No woman would ever want to live in an enormous house in the country with no servants.

  When he returned to London, Monica had left and he learned later that her father, Sir Desmond Wilcourt, had been sent as British Consul to New York.

  He longed to write to her, but thought it a mistake.

  He knew now, as he took her hand in his, she was even lovelier than she had been when he last saw her.

  “I cannot believe it is you, Monica. I’ve wondered if I would ever see you again. Are you coming back to England?”

  Monica nodded.

  “Papa has finished his time here and we hope that he may be offered a senior position at the Foreign Office in London.”

  Then Georgie realised that Mr. Wilbur was beside them.

  “Forgive me,” he apologised, “for not introducing you to my host, Mr. Clint Wilbur.”

  Monica held out her hand.

  “I have indeed heard of you, Mr. Wilbur, and the success you have had in discovering oil in Pennsylvania.”

  “I’ve been extremely lucky,” he replied, “but now I have a partner I will be luckier still!”

  Monica did not understand and Georgie explained,

  “You have to congratulate me, Monica. Mr. Wilbur has been kind enough to make me his partner and it is the most fantastic thing that has ever happened to me.”

  “But of course it is, and I know that Papa will want to hear all about it. So both of you, please come to dinner tonight. I know we are at home for once.”

  Georgie looked at Mr. Wilbur.

  “We are delighted to accept,” he answered and they arranged a time.

  Then Monica waved at them and disappeared into a shop, while they walked on to their luncheon appointment.

  “She’s a very pretty girl,” commented Mr. Wilbur.

  “I have always thought so, but she has become even prettier since she has been in America.”

  That evening they dined at the Consulate with Sir Desmond. There were two other diplomats present, one of whom had a rather attractive wife.

  It was a party Mr. Wilbur enjoyed whilst Georgie was very conscious of Monica.

  After dinner the men played bridge, as Monica took Georgie on a tour of the Consulate.

  It was an interesting building and flew a vast Union Jack to impress the Americans.

  Monica took Georgie into the conservatory to show him the orchids her father was cultivating.

  He closed the door behind them.

  “I have missed you, Monica, more than I can tell you, since you left England.”

  “And I have missed you,” she whispered.

  They looked at each other and then Georgie said,

  “You know I had nothing to offer you at the time.”

  She nodded.

  “I did realise that, but I cried into my pillow every night while I was crossing the Atlantic.”

  Georgie pulled her into his arms.

  “I love you, Monica. I have always loved you and now everything is very different. So different I can hardly appreciate it myself.”

  “You mean because that rich Mr. Wilbur has made you his partner? I think he is a very nice man.”

  “He is wonderful, marvellous and the kindest man on earth, especially as now I can do what I want to do.”

  He pulled Monica even closer to him and then he was kissing her.

  Kissing her wildly, demandingly, passionately, as if, having lost her, he was determined never to lose her again.

  “I love you, Georgie,” murmured Monica. “I love you and there has never been anyone else.”

  “And I have never loved anyone but you. We will be married as soon as you return to England.”

  She looked up at him and the radiant expression on her face told him without words what she was feeling.

  Then he was kissing her again – kissing her until they were both breathless.

  The conservatory was a Paradise because they had found each other again and there would be no more parting in the future.

  The following day Georgie sent a large bouquet of orchids to Monica – he had to borrow the money from Mr. Wilbur to buy them.

  When he had told him that he was penniless, Mr. Wilbur had laughed.

  “More foolish of you for not telling me earlier! But I presume you’d have spent most of your money crossing the Atlantic in comfort.”

  “I should have travelled Third Class,” he admitted, “but some instinct or my Guardian Angel told me that you would be aboard and that is how it all started.”

  Mr. Wilbur chuckled.

  “It started for me too. Now, what I am going to do is to pay a decent amount into your bank in London from my bank here. We will settle it up when the dollars start flowing in from our oil well and our other investments.”

  Georgie could only thank him.

  When he learnt how much Mr. Wilbur had paid into his bank account, he found it difficult to believe it was true.

  He was sensible enough to realise that Mr. Wilbur possessed a very shrewd brain and there was no doubt that the many different projects in which they were investing as partners would turn out to be successes.

  He was quite certain too, when he saw it, that even the typewriter would eventually ‘catch on’, as Mr. Wilbur put it so succinctly, in every office and shop.

  As to the telephone, Mr. Wilbur made Georgie use the one he possessed and again he thought it was the most enthralling thing he had ever done.

  He talked to one of Mr. Wilbur’s friends and learnt that Mr. Wilbur was having a telephone installed in his oil field, so that he would be able to talk daily to the men who were working there.

  ‘There are endless possibilities for the telephone,’ Georgie thought.

  He told himself once again how lucky he was.

  When finally the time arrived for him to return to London, Mr. Wilbur had already booked for him the most comfortable First Class cabin aboard the steamship he was to travel in.

  He was bowed aboard almost as if he was Royalty.

  He felt, as he observed the respect with which everyone in New York treated Mr. Wilbur, that he was really the Royalty of America because he was so rich.

  ‘Men like him have the world at their feet,’ Georgie thought. ‘And please God there is now a big chance I will be one of them.’

  Before he left he visited a jeweller’s shop with Mr. Wilbur and bought a v
ery attractive bracelet for Galina.

  “She has been wonderful to me while we have been struggling so hard to keep our heads above water,” Georgie told Mr. Wilbur.

  “You take your sister that,” he said, “and I’ll bring the necklace to match it when I come over.”

  “You are spoiling us.” Georgie protested.

  Mr. Wilbur put his hand on his shoulder.

  “I’ve no wife, no children and very few relatives, so I’ve got to spoil someone and that, my dear boy, is you.”

  As the steamship sailed out of New York harbour, Georgie waved goodbye.

  He thought Mr. Wilbur looked somehow pathetic standing alone on the quay.

  ‘I will make it up to him some way or another,’ he vowed to himself.

  He knew that, like Mr. Farlow, his new partner would be thrilled and delighted with his house in Park Lane. When he had made his country house more habitable with the proceeds from his new well, Mr. Wilbur would enjoy that too.

  When he retired that night, he thought that when he had his own children, and that was just what he did want, Mr. Wilbur would almost feel as if they were his family too.

  Of course he would be asked to be the Godfather of each one of them.

  ‘The way I can really pay him back,’ he murmured to himself, ‘is by giving him the love and affection he has always missed because he has been on his own.’

  Then his thoughts turned to Galina and how brave and supporting she had always been to him.

  ‘It is love that we all pray for, and however much money one has, it is not the same as having those you love put their arms around you.’

  The steamship was one of the fastest and he was fortunate that the sea was calm.

  Because he was travelling under his own name, he was seated at the Captain’s table for every meal and was treated respectfully by everyone aboard.

  They were, however, not a particularly interesting collection and so Georgie spent most of his time reading in the library.

  Fortunately the books were mostly about America.

  ‘It is now my country as I own so much in it,’ he reflected, ‘so I must learn all about it. I cannot expect Mr. Wilbur to tell me everything I need to know.’

  He had sent a telegram to Galina to tell her when he was arriving and informing her that he would go straight from Liverpool to London by train.

  He thought with satisfaction how thrilling it would be when she learnt that he had been successful in America.

  Now at last they could get down to saving Ranmore Park and make it as habitable as it was in his grandfather’s time.

  Then he pondered about Monica and how happy he would be there with her.

  At the same time he was a little apprehensive just in case she and Galina did not get on together.

  He had never mentioned Monica to his sister.

  As there was no chance of being able to marry her, he had been trying not to think about her or how much she meant to him.

  Now he could recall all too vividly how unhappy he had been when she had left England and he had believed he would not see her again.

  He had always been a little shy about expressing his feelings like most Englishmen and he confided in no one.

  Nevertheless it had often been hard to sleep at night when he thought about Monica.

  ‘I love her and she loves me and it does not matter to her whether I am rich or poor.’

  Yet it would make life much easier in the future as he would be so rich.

  It was tremendously satisfying to know that Monica had loved him for himself when he was poor.

  Georgie was certain that Sir Desmond, who was an extremely clever, man would have known when he saw the London house closed and Ranmore Park dilapidated what the position was.

  Now everything had changed.

  ‘Just how can I have been so incredibly fortunate?’ he asked himself again and again before he fell asleep.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  On Sunday night at Sandringham there were only two neighbours invited to dinner as it was a quiet evening.

  The Prince, as he did not gamble on a Sunday, said, when he joined the ladies, that he would play bridge.

  The Princess then countered with her own idea.

  “I thought out a new way of playing hide-and-seek. One of the ladies will hide and the others will look for her. When each person finds her, they will stay with her until the whole party has found her. There will be a prize for the first person and a consolation for the last.”

  They all laughed at her idea and agreed it would be fun to play it.

  “I am going to ask Miss Ellie-May to be the first to hide, because she will not know the house as well as some of you – and that will mean that she will doubtless find an original place which none of us have thought of before.”

  “Oh, I do hope I can do that,” cried Ellie-May, “and it’s such a lovely idea.”

  Galina realised that she was thrilled at the prospect of exploring Sandringham.

  “We will give you exactly ten minutes from now,” said the Princess, “then we will come to search for you.”

  Ellie-May gave a jump of delight and hurried away.

  The others continued to talk about Bramton Priory and how thrilled they were with their tour of the house.

  “I just cannot believe,” the Princess enthused, “that anyone could own so many marvellous collections.”

  “I am very proud of it,” replied Lord Bramton, “and as you can understand, ma’am, I don’t want to lose it.”

  “Of course not. We will all think of ways it can be saved.”

  Galina was thinking that she would tell him on their way home of her idea of opening the Priory to the public.

  However, she could not help but think there would have to be an enormous number of visitors to provide the amount of money he needed.

  The Princess kept her eye on the clock.

  “Now. It is ten minutes to ten and we can all go to hunt for Miss Ellie-May.”

  Galina had a vague idea of where she might go.

  When they had been shown around the house, she had been very interested in a small but well furnished room – in it there was a heavy velvet curtain that could be pulled across the centre of the room.

  “Why do you think it is there?” she had asked.

  “I cannot imagine, unless His Royal Highness has secret conversations in this room with someone who does not wish to be seen and identified.”

  She had said that just to be amusing, but Ellie-May had thought it an intriguing idea.

  “I have always thought,” she sighed, “that spies are very brave. After all, it must be terrifying to think at any moment you might be recognised and exposed.”

  Galina was aware that Ellie-May enjoyed reading detective stories and therefore agreed with her.

  ‘I am quite sure that is where she will go,’ she told herself as they all left the drawing room.

  She walked along the twisting corridors and there were a great number until she found the right room.

  When she opened the door, the room was in total darkness and she thought she must have been mistaken.

  Then as she stood there hesitating, she heard Ellie-May whisper,

  “Is that you, Galina?”

  “Oh, I have found you!” exclaimed Galina. She went into the room and closed the door.

  “Where are you?”

  “By the window.”

  Galina groped her way across the room. When she reached the window, she found that Ellie-May had pulled back the curtain so that the moonlight was streaming through.

  She was sitting by the window and the moonlight haloed her.

  She was well hidden behind the velvet curtains and she had pulled them halfway across the room.

  “I think you are cheating to hide so cleverly!”

  “I was quite certain they would not find me in here, but I guessed you might remember just how intrigued I had been with the ‘spy room’ as I called it.”

 
Galina sat down beside her.

  “I think perhaps we are both cheating because I was more or less reading your thoughts. What I will do is to go back and join the others and then find you later.”

  “I think that’s sensible. We don’t want Her Royal Highness to think we are thwarting her game.”

  “No, of course not.”

  Galina pulled the curtain open a little bit further and peeped out of the window.

  “It is so beautiful out there,” she said. “I do feel we should be playing in the moonlight.”

  Ellie-May laughed.

  “That would be easier.”

  “I suppose so,” Galina sighed a little wistfully.

  She left Ellie-May and went back into the other part of the house where she could see everyone looking behind sofas, curtains and into cupboards.

  But no one had any idea where Ellie-May might be.

  Then, as she was going up the stairs to the first floor, she met Sir Christopher coming down.

  “I can see you have not found Ellie-May,” he said.

  Galina, not wishing to tell a lie, just smiled at him.

  “I have to find her, Galina. Do have you any idea where she is likely to be, because her father wants to speak to her?”

  She hesitated for a moment.

  “I don’t want to spoil Her Royal Highness’s new game of hide-and-seek, but if you look in the room with the velvet curtains across it without being observed, you will be able to tell Ellie-May that she is wanted.”

  Sir Christopher smiled at her.

  “Thank you. It is most kind of you.”

  He hurried off as someone was now coming up the stairs.

  After a while Galina went downstairs and thought she would go to the conservatory, as she wanted to have a last look at the flowers before she returned to London.

  On the way she passed the library and noticed that the door was ajar.

  She knew that there was a better collection of books here than in any of the other houses she had visited.

  On the Princess’s orders every room was either in darkness or left with only two or three candles for lighting.

  In the library there were just the three candles on the mantelpiece and Galina thought she would take one so that she could read the titles of some of the many books.