It Is Love Page 3

  “He did bring me to Paris last night, so that I could find someone else. But so far I have been unlucky.”

  “Well, I would be very delighted to drive your car to Calais and since I am also going to England, I can come further with you.”

  “Thank you very much, sir. I am so grateful.”

  A thought seemed to strike her.

  “Perhaps we should introduce ourselves. I am Lady Verna Langham, eldest daughter of Lord Challoner.”

  The name Challoner was familiar to Michael.

  The family lived a few miles from Belmont Park, but his father had said they were not worth knowing. This suggested a falling out, which did not surprise him as his testy father fell out with many people.

  He might well have met this delightful young lady years ago, instead of only now. How different would that have made things?

  “And my name is Michael Payne,” he said, giving his mother’s maiden name.

  It would be a mistake, he considered, to say his real name and to let her know that he was now the Earl. There would be explanations enough later.

  “Do you think we could leave quickly?” she asked.

  “Yes, I – I must return to my hotel first.”

  “Let me drive you there.”

  “No thank you,” he said with a horrified picture of her face if she should see the wretched hole he was staying in. “I will return in an hour. Where is your luggage?”

  “It’s here in this hotel, where I stayed last night.”

  “Then we should be able to make a quick start as soon as I return. Goodbye until then – ”

  As he hurried back to his hotel, Michael’s brain was working furiously. By the time he arrived he had made a desperate decision.

  He was going to escape without paying his bill!

  It was shocking, something that Society would call deeply dishonourable, but Society would not know about it and he would send the money as soon as he was in England and had assumed his inheritance.

  ‘I couldn’t pay it anyway,’ he reasoned to himself. ‘I just don’t have enough money. But if I can sell my good evening clothes, I may just have enough to survive on the journey.’

  He managed to get to his room without being seen and hastily packed a small suitcase with his evening wear. This was all he dared to take with him.

  Slowly he opened his door and looked out into the corridor. When he saw that nobody was about, he crept out and closed the door very quietly behind him.

  He held his breath. If anyone saw him they would know that he was fleeing, as he was carrying his suitcase.

  He reached the top of the stairs.

  One step, then another, and a few more brought him to where he could see the hall.

  To his immense relief it was empty. He descended the last steps quickly and hurried out of the door. All the time he expected to hear someone call out “arretez-vous!”

  But nobody did and he escaped.

  As he hurried down the street, he realised that the die was cast. He had done a terrible thing. He was almost a criminal.

  Now there was no going back.

  He ran on to the local pawnshop and the man at the counter grinned when he saw him.

  “What is it this time, monsieur?” he asked.

  Michael laid out the suit on the counter.

  “I want to sell it outright. How much?”

  There followed some hard bargaining. In the end he had to settle for less than he needed, but he knew it was all he was going to receive.

  As he hurried to the Hotel Belle Epoque, he had a terrible fear that Lady Verna would not be there. Perhaps it had all be a wild crazy dream!

  But when he entered the lobby of the hotel, he saw her immediately. She was sitting with Winifred and they seemed to be having an argument.

  Suddenly Verna looked up and saw him. Her face brightened in a smile.

  “At last,” she called out. “Winifred, this is Michael Payne, the man who has come to save us.”

  Winifred glared, looking him up and down in a way that showed that she had noticed the shabbiness of his suit.

  “How do you do,” Michael bowed his head, leaning down to her with his most charming smile.

  “Hrrmph!” was her only reply.

  “Perhaps we should be on our way,” he suggested. “Is this your luggage? Let me take it.”

  As he began to carry things out to the car, he heard the argument resumed behind him.

  “You can’t entrust yourself to that man,” Winifred practically hissed. “You know nothing about him, except that he’s a reprobate.”

  “He’s not a reprobate – ”

  “Well, he certainly looks like one. Where does he come from? Who is he? No respectable gentleman would simply pop up from nowhere looking for a cheap journey.”

  He drew a sharp breath, reflecting that Winifred’s judgement was too acute to be comfortable.

  He loaded the car as quickly as possible, anxious to be off before Lady Verna allowed herself to be persuaded against him.

  Finally they emerged, Winifred still scowling and clearly thinking the worst.

  She made one last attempt to take charge.

  “I think you should sit in the back, my Lady,” she proposed. “And I will sit beside the driver. That will be more proper.”

  Quick as a flash, Michael handed Verna up into the front passenger seat, leaving Winifred fuming.

  Then he held out his right hand to Winifred with an elegant flourish.

  “Allow me to assist you, ma’am.”

  Not every gentleman behaved so politely to a mere companion, and even the formidable Winifred, that pillar of severe rectitude, was not immune to the courtesy or to Michael’s charm, which he turned on in full measure.

  She merely said, “Hmm!” glaring more fiercely, so that he should not suspect that she was softening, then took his hand and allowed him to help her up into the vehicle.

  At last they were on their way, heading North out of Paris. Michael was glad to be leaving the City behind.

  He had a vision of the manager of his hotel chasing after him, crying to the world that he had not paid his bill.

  “How long did it take you to drive from Calais to Paris?” he asked Verna.

  “Two days. We had to stay overnight in a little village. Unfortunately it isn’t possible to make the journey in one day, not even by going very fast indeed.”

  “Did your driver go as fast as you wanted him to?” Michael enquired with a grin.

  “No, he was very poor-spirited. He refused to go faster than ten miles an hour even on a clear country road.”

  “What a coward!” Michael exclaimed with feeling.

  “That’s what I thought. What’s the point of having a car that can do a whole fifteen miles an hour if you don’t take advantage of it?”

  “Have you ever driven at such a speed?” he asked, growing more amused by the minute.

  “No,” she sighed with disappointment. “The most I have ever done is eight. But I was with Papa when he did ten. It was very exciting because he was stopped by the Police for speeding!”

  “Good Heavens!”

  “We were perfectly safe because there was nothing else on the road, but we were still technically within the town boundary, so the speed limit was two miles an hour.

  “He was halted by an aggressive policeman who said he would not tolerate people who behaved like mad hooligans. Papa claimed that he was not a hooligan and the policeman said the Magistrates would decide that. Then Papa took off his goggles and the policeman recognised him as Lord Challoner.

  “The man was horrified, but he stuck with his duty. He insisted that the law was the same for everyone. So Papa appeared in the Magistrates’ Court and was fined for speeding. Now he has a criminal record and he is really proud of it. He keeps the paper framed on his wall and shows it to all his visitors!”

  Michael roared with laughter.

  “I think that he has missed the point,” he spluttered when he could s
peak again. “You’re not supposed to be proud of a criminal record!”

  “No, but if you’re Lord Challoner, you can afford to ignore convention,” countered Verna. “That is – I didn’t mean that to sound the way it did.”

  “How did it sound?” Michael asked puzzled.

  He had just been thinking that his father had always adopted a similar attitude and when he himself assumed the title, he would probably do the same.

  “I am afraid that people who boast a title tend to assume they are rather superior to others,” she explained carefully. “Of course it isn’t true, but we do it too easily.”

  “Are you trying to console me for my lack of a title?”

  “Not exactly, I just didn’t want you to think – that is – ”

  “That you are a superior female who looks down on untitled men? Don’t worry, I didn’t think that.”

  He was fighting the temptation to tell her who he really was. In fact, he supposed it was his duty to abandon his deception, however innocently it had started.

  But she was revealing a side of her nature that he found delightful and if she knew the truth, he would see it no more.

  Just a little longer, he promised himself and then he would tell her the truth and never deceive her again as long as they lived.

  With a shock he realised the way his thoughts had strayed. He had known her only a few hours yet already he was thinking of a life together.

  But how could he help it?

  What man could resist her?

  Certainly he could not.

  Now they were out in the country, driving through beautiful scenery, and Michael was aware of a feeling of blissful contentment.

  Partly it was the sheer pleasure of handling such a modern motor car.

  But partly it was the awareness of this heavenly girl beside him and the overwhelming sensation that a new and wonderful phase of his life was opening to him.

  ‘The sooner I get home the better,’ he thought to himself. ‘There will be a great deal to do now I have to take Papa’s place.’

  Even to think about what lay ahead of him when he returned home made him long to cover the ground as fast as possible.

  He drove on in silence for a while, concentrating on absorbing the feel of this marvellous machine.

  But then Verna’s soft voice interrupted his reverie,

  “Do tell me what you have been doing in France.”

  With a major effort he pulled himself back to the present.

  “Excuse me, I was thinking. What did you say?”

  “I asked what you have been doing in France.”

  “Just – looking around Paris. What about you?”

  “I came to visit my brother, as I told you. It’s only since I have been here that I have realised how ignorant I am about France.”

  She gave a delightful laugh, adding,

  “I suppose I know so very little about any European country except my own. When I get home I will have to make myself learn very much more.”

  “You will find it fascinating, but after you have stayed in every country you will realise that home is best.”

  Verna laughed.

  “I think that’s what every Englishman feels.”

  “It’s how I feel when I am at home in England. But there are plenty of interesting things to see in France and beautiful women to dance with and talk to.”

  “And doubtless, like so many Englishmen, you find French women irresistible,” she teased.

  Michael knew this to be true.

  He had found many French women irresistible and they had felt the same about him, but it was not something he could say to this girl, so he made a non-committal reply and fell silent.

  But she was not prepared to let the subject drop.

  “Do you find French women more attractive than the English?” she asked him casually.

  He tried to think of a suitable answer for her. He knew that many women were inclined to ask this kind of question and it made a man’s life somewhat difficult.

  If he were truthful, he would venture that he found French women much easier to flirt with than the average Englishwoman, who usually tried to run away.

  But perhaps he should not say such a thing to a well-bred girl? Especially this girl who had captivated him. Besides, when she knew who he really was, she might gossip about him.

  He therefore ventured cautiously,

  “I enjoy seeing other countries besides my own and I have travelled quite a lot. In some countries a stranger is very welcome, but in others they are suspicious, especially of the English.”

  “That’s very true,” she responded thoughtfully.

  “I always feel they are being careful when they talk to me, not only about my country but about theirs.”

  Michael laughed as he added,

  “Perhaps you should stay in England and let people come to you rather than you going to them.”

  “That is more or less what my brother said to me. All the same he is now determined to enjoy himself with the Italians.”

  “Italian girls are very pretty,” Michael commented solemnly. “Although not as pretty as the French.”

  She considered this broad statement for a moment, before enquiring in an impish voice,

  “So you think French girls are prettier than those of any other country?”

  Time to be cautious again, he mused.

  Why ever did women insist on attempting to trap a man into an unwary statement?

  At the same time he felt a sense of delight at her teasing and there was no doubt that she was very charming.

  “When I am in France, I think the French girls are the prettiest in the world,” he added tactfully. “And when in England I think the English girls are beyond compare!”

  They both laughed and he exclaimed,

  “You see what a diplomat I am!”

  “Not at all. You have just insulted me.”

  “I have?”

  “We are still in France, so obviously you think that French girls are prettier than I am.”

  “Ah, but we’ll soon be in England,” he came back quickly. “So I’m safe.”

  “Pardon me, sir. You will be safe when we reach England. Until then, I shall have to think of some suitable revenge!”

  How enchanting she was, he thought, so lovely, so quick-witted.

  “I will go in fear and trembling of your revenge,” he riposted. “And I will say that I think someone as pretty and as young as you should never have been left alone in France – even though you were quite prepared to delegate the wheel to a mere male in order to return to England!”

  There was silence for a moment before Verna said,

  “I must admit that if I had not found you, I don’t know what I would have done.”

  Then she burst into laughter.

  “And you will never know what that admission has cost me!”

  He joined in her laughter, thinking how natural it was to laugh with her. She would fill his world with joy, he was certain.

  “I think I can imagine what it cost you and I greatly appreciate your generosity. Now, why don’t you tell me about yourself and why your brother has abandoned you in what I consider a rather unkind way, to say the least of it.”

  “He didn’t consider it unkind. He never thinks of anything when he has an idea in his head. So he simply rushed off. I am afraid brothers are often like that.”

  Michael chuckled.

  “I know just what you are saying. My sisters are always complaining about my selfishness.”

  “You have sisters?” Verna echoed eagerly. “Do tell me about them.”

  Cursing himself for this slip of the tongue, Michael continued,

  “There is nothing to tell. I very rarely see them.”

  “Which accounts for them misunderstanding your character. For you are not selfish surely?”

  A rare moment of shame held him silent.

  “I am afraid I am – ” he admitted at last.

  “How c
an you be when you are so kind to me?”

  “But I am gaining much from this myself – passage home and a chance to drive this wonderful car. I only hope I live up to your expectations.”

  “I think that you drive extremely well. This car is moving quicker and smoother than it did when my father was driving. Not that I would let him hear me say so.”

  “I will promise never to tell him that you were so uncomplimentary about his driving. That is – if I ever meet him,” he amended hastily. “You must tell me where you live, so that I can drive you there.”

  “I think if you are kind enough to take me to my own country, I should then be able to drive myself home, if you have to go to London or somewhere else.”

  “I will take you home first,” insisted Michael.

  He was thinking he would have to be home in time for his father’s funeral, but he could not simply abandon this delightful girl.

  He would either have to find someone else to drive Lady Verna home or she would have to wait till the funeral was over.

  But there was no point in saying all this just yet.

  As he had no intention of talking about himself, he turned to Verna,

  “Tell me some more about your brother. Why did he rush off to Italy like that?”

  Verna gave a giggle.

  “It is rather a strange story, but I expect, because you are a man, you will understand. My brother has been a huge success with a family of Italians who are very rich, who have – according to him – the most magnificent castle and some outstanding horses.

  “They have invited him to stay on several occasions but he was unable to go. When they learned he was in France, they were so insistent and made their invitation so fascinating that my brother simply couldn’t refuse.”

  “But surely he wanted you to go with him?”

  There was silence for a moment as if she felt the question was rather embarrassing.

  “I have never met the friends he is with. Although he suggested I might go with him, I think he really wanted to go alone.”

  Michael laughed.

  “I think you spoil your brother.”

  “I am afraid we all do. He is very good-looking, charming and can be extremely amusing. In fact there are always women running after him. I knew if I did go with him, I should feel rather unnecessary.”