Free Hostile engagement by Jessica Steele Page B

brother-as she had told Jud earlier that evening, Rupert was twenty-five and well able to make his own decisions, but that didn't stop her worrying about him. He had been shaken to the core when he had discovered the lands he had hoped one day would be his had been gambled away from him, and she could understand in part why he should feel 'to hell with everything' and go wild for a time, especially since he had worked so hard to learn everything there was to know about looking after his inheritance. Poor Rupert, there was no longer an estate for him to manage.
    Her thoughts see-sawed backwards and forwards between Jud Hemming and her brother, and she fell asleep at last wondering what on earth had possessed Rupert to tell the bank manager she was engaged to Jud.
    Lucy felt much better about everything when she got up the next morning. Everything had seemed to have taken on nightmare proportions last night. She still didn't want to spend the weekend at Mrs Hemming's house, and had to keep taking a look at her ring every now and then to prevent herself from taking out her writing case and penning a regretful note to her saying she couldn't go. But as Jud had reminded her last night, the only lies she had told had been by implication only—that still didn't make them any less lies, in her view, but there was small consolation in that, and she did so want to keep her ring. Its monetary value
     
    was incidental, she loved it because it had belonged to her mother and would have loved it equally had it been worth only a few pounds.
    She was still preoccupied with her thoughts after lunch when Rupert returned. There was no doubting he was in high spirits as he came whistling into the kitchen where Lucy was putting a sponge cake in the oven.
    `Made a killing at the races yesterday,' he said excitedly after the briefest of greetings. 'Old Archie put me on to a couple of good nags ...' He then went on to explain the intricacies of doubling one's bet by letting all the money won on the first horse ride on the second, and then on to more involved procedure that seemed highly complicated to Lucy. With a sinking heart she listened to him enthuse about 'good old Archie', and wanted to beg him to have nothing more to do with him. She had a question she wanted to ask her brother and it had nothing at all to do with horses, but she held back until eventually Rupert came to the end of his tale; he still had the light of success in his eyes and she didn't want to take that look away—he'd had very little to get excited about lately—but her question couldn't wait any longer, and with the openness of the relationship she had had with him since childhood, she a sked her question straight out
    `Why did you think it necessary to tell Charles Arbuthnot that I was engaged to Jud Hemming, Rupe?'
    Expecting him to at least have the grace to look ashamed of himself, Lucy was shaken to see Rupert greet her question with no sign of looking abashed, though he did think to say he hadn't thought old man Arbuthnot would spread it around.
    `I hadn't meant to tell him,' he admitted, not at all put out that his sister sho uld take him to task about it. B ut he was treating me like a school-kid—you know the sort of thing I mean.' Lucy said nothing and waited to hear him out as he mimicked Charles Arbuthnot's tones and man-
     
    nerisms. 'He reminded me, as if I needed any reminding, that "your family have always been well respected, Rupert. I know you have had to take a nasty blow, but unless you do something about clearing your overdraft I shall be forced to take steps to ensure that the bank has its money".' Lucy didn't know how Mr Arbuthnot proposed the overdraft be cleared, and privately she thought he was being a little high-handed about an amount which at the most couldn't be more than a couple of hundred pounds, but she bit her lip worriedly as Rupert went on. 'Old Arbuthnot carried on in the same vein for what seemed an hour—though I was only with