of one who was used to rejection. âYes, of course,â he shrugged. âBut donât feel that you have to bring her if you donât want to,â he added with a grin, reaching out a hand to touch Davidâs sleeve.
âOh, thereâs the Vicar,â David said quickly.
Robin Westâs head swivelled to the direction David was looking, and at the same moment Father Keble Smythe saw them. He was leading a small, fair woman towards the church, gesticulating and talking, but when he spotted the two men at the kerb he changed course and started in their direction, saying something to the woman as they approached.
âItâs her ,â the sacristan hissed. âHeâs actually had the nerve to bring that woman here! If he thinks Iâm going to stand round and be civil to her, heâs got another think coming!â And with that announcement he disappeared in the opposite direction.
In his astonishment, David had time for little more than a quick impression of the woman before they reached him. The dog collar on her light blue blouse confirmed her identity as the hated and feared Rachel Nightingale, but she wasnât what heâd expected. In the split second that he had to think about it, David realised that he wasnât sure what heâd been expecting her to look like â large and looming and hirsute, with feminist slogans tattooed on her forearms, or vampish and red-fingernailed? â but certainly not this. Rachel Nightingale was so slight that she seemed scarcely more than a child, though David knew that she must be approaching thirty-five. Her fine fair hair curled loosely around a china-doll face, a face without real beauty but possessed of character and great sweetness. With a small shock he recognised what it was that gave her face such character: a long, thin scar bisected her rosy cheek, running from the outside corner of her left eyebrow to her chin, the legacy and continual reminder of the accident that had robbed her of her husband and child.
âThis is Mr Middleton-Brown, who is doing some legal work for us,â the Vicar told her, looking perplexedly in the direction in which his sacristan had disappeared.
She extended her small hand for a surprisingly firm handshake. âHello.â She smiled up at David, and her smile was friendly without being in the least bit coy. âIâm Rachel Nightingale, the new curate.â
The Venerable Gabriel Neville, Archdeacon of Kensington, sat at his desk that Thursday morning, frowning at the telephone. A moment earlier heâd needed to place a call, but when heâd picked up the receiver he had realised that his wife was on the kitchen extension. Impatiently he tapped his pen on the foolscap sheet on which he was drafting some notes for a series of Lenten addresses which he had been asked to deliver at a prestigious Knightsbridge church. They hadnât made it clear whether there would be six addresses or seven, and he needed to know.
Gabriel Neville, at forty-one, was young for an archdeacon. He was also far better-looking than the average archdeacon, tall and slender with arresting sapphire-blue eyes and a full head of rich auburn hair. His blessings didnât stop with the purely physical, either: Gabriel was accomplished as a preacher, intellectually gifted, and possessed of a wife who adored him and who had borne him two â on the whole â delightful children. He had risen to his present eminent position largely due to his superior abilities and on the strength of his conscientious performance during ten years as the Vicar of St Anneâs Church, Kensington Gardens, from which he had been promoted something over a year previously. In his more analytical moments, Gabriel realised that his wife, so very suitable, and his well-behaved and attractive children had done him no harm either when it came to promotion: a family man always makes a good impression on the powers-that-be.
At
âOh, thereâs the Vicar,â David said quickly.
Robin Westâs head swivelled to the direction David was looking, and at the same moment Father Keble Smythe saw them. He was leading a small, fair woman towards the church, gesticulating and talking, but when he spotted the two men at the kerb he changed course and started in their direction, saying something to the woman as they approached.
âItâs her ,â the sacristan hissed. âHeâs actually had the nerve to bring that woman here! If he thinks Iâm going to stand round and be civil to her, heâs got another think coming!â And with that announcement he disappeared in the opposite direction.
In his astonishment, David had time for little more than a quick impression of the woman before they reached him. The dog collar on her light blue blouse confirmed her identity as the hated and feared Rachel Nightingale, but she wasnât what heâd expected. In the split second that he had to think about it, David realised that he wasnât sure what heâd been expecting her to look like â large and looming and hirsute, with feminist slogans tattooed on her forearms, or vampish and red-fingernailed? â but certainly not this. Rachel Nightingale was so slight that she seemed scarcely more than a child, though David knew that she must be approaching thirty-five. Her fine fair hair curled loosely around a china-doll face, a face without real beauty but possessed of character and great sweetness. With a small shock he recognised what it was that gave her face such character: a long, thin scar bisected her rosy cheek, running from the outside corner of her left eyebrow to her chin, the legacy and continual reminder of the accident that had robbed her of her husband and child.
âThis is Mr Middleton-Brown, who is doing some legal work for us,â the Vicar told her, looking perplexedly in the direction in which his sacristan had disappeared.
She extended her small hand for a surprisingly firm handshake. âHello.â She smiled up at David, and her smile was friendly without being in the least bit coy. âIâm Rachel Nightingale, the new curate.â
The Venerable Gabriel Neville, Archdeacon of Kensington, sat at his desk that Thursday morning, frowning at the telephone. A moment earlier heâd needed to place a call, but when heâd picked up the receiver he had realised that his wife was on the kitchen extension. Impatiently he tapped his pen on the foolscap sheet on which he was drafting some notes for a series of Lenten addresses which he had been asked to deliver at a prestigious Knightsbridge church. They hadnât made it clear whether there would be six addresses or seven, and he needed to know.
Gabriel Neville, at forty-one, was young for an archdeacon. He was also far better-looking than the average archdeacon, tall and slender with arresting sapphire-blue eyes and a full head of rich auburn hair. His blessings didnât stop with the purely physical, either: Gabriel was accomplished as a preacher, intellectually gifted, and possessed of a wife who adored him and who had borne him two â on the whole â delightful children. He had risen to his present eminent position largely due to his superior abilities and on the strength of his conscientious performance during ten years as the Vicar of St Anneâs Church, Kensington Gardens, from which he had been promoted something over a year previously. In his more analytical moments, Gabriel realised that his wife, so very suitable, and his well-behaved and attractive children had done him no harm either when it came to promotion: a family man always makes a good impression on the powers-that-be.
At
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