Free Next Door to Romance by Margaret Malcolm Page B

casual kiss lovemaking. Yes, perhaps she had been unwise, but she was too much her father's daughter to refuse a challenge.
    'I was going to say that, after all, you and I have been good friends for so long that surely it's only natural for me to be concerned with your—well-being!' she told him with a gravity that brought a twitch of amusement to Mark's mouth.
    'That's good of you, Evadne,' he replied with deceptive softness. 'But believe me, you've no cause for concern on my behalf. I really am old enough to make my own decisions and I've every intention of doing so. And that being the case—' his tone changed abruptly to one of blunt, even brutal frankness— 'I'll be glad if you'll stop behaving as if you're a Victorian school-marm, and I'm the naughty boy of your class. It's really too absurd and not very nattering to either of us!'
    'I'm not trying to flatter you,' Evadne told him as bluntly. 'I'm trying to make you see sense because, adult though you are, you're being a fool if you think seriously about that girl—'
    'That girl, as you very rudely call her, is an extremely sweet, lovable person who hasn't got a single unpleasant thought in her mind—'
    'No? Oh, don't be absurd!' Evadne retorted scornfully. 'Why, she's made a dead set at you from the moment she first met you!'
    'That's just where you're wrong,' Mark told her coolly. 'It's been the other way round. I've made a dead set at her! And I mean to go on doing just that!'
    'But, Mark, that's crazy! Evadne's voice rose sharply. His admission was the last straw. She'd got to make him see that he simply couldn't afford— 'What good's a girl like that to you? For heaven's sake, be realistic! You've every intention of going up in the world—and you can do it. But you'll need a wife who can keep up with you and help you, not a—'
    'Thank you, I'll choose the sort of wife I want,' Mark said uncompromisingly. 'And that's all there is to be said about it!'
    'Oh no, it isn't,' Evadne contradicted significantly.
    'You owe everything you've got to Father. What's he going to say if you wreck your whole life by marrying a little simpleton who would be no more good to you than my mother has been to him? Well, if you don't know, you'll soon find out, because I intend—'
    'You intend to go to him and tell him that since you can't persuade me to change my mind, he's got to?' Mark suggested scornfully. 'Well, if you don't mind making an admission of that sort, I suppose it's your own business, but before you do, I'd like you to listen to me for a moment or two.'
    'Well?' she said shortly.
    'While I was in America, I had several flattering offers of first-class jobs with excellent prospects. Oh yes, I did!' seeing the disbelief in her eyes. 'However I turned them all down, partly because I don't want to live in America and partly for some other personal reasons. But mainly, believe it or not, out of loyalty to your father. I do know how much he's done for me, though I also know that his motives weren't exactly disinterested. He believed I'd got qualities that, developed by him, could be of great use to him—and to me! So get this clearly in your mind, Evadne. I admit that I'm in his debt, but there may come a time when he's in mine—and he knows it. He's getting on and the time will come when he wants to ease out of the strenuous life he's led so far. And if you don't believe that, ask yourself why he's bought the Manor! Isn't it obvious? He's looking ahead to when his business concerns don't take up so much of his time and he's preparing another interest for himself, wise man! So, before you go tittle-tattling to your father, just think over what I've said and I'm pretty sure you'll realize that I'm right—'
    Evadne stared at him, white-faced. Never in all her life had anyone spoken to her like this or made her face up to disagreeable facts. And the most disagreeable of them all was one which both of them knew lay behind what Mark had actually put into words.
    Each knew