Dorothy Eden by Never Call It Loving Page B

half-laughing, ruefully, as she lifted his long legs on to the couch and settled his head on a cushion. Even then his eyelids remained firmly closed.
    Such a seduction scene, she thought, as she hurried upstairs to get rugs.
    But her amusement and regret left her and she could only stand looking down at him tenderly and lovingly after she had covered him warmly against the cold night. His cheekbones were too sharp, with hollows beneath them. The bones showed in the fine rounded prominence of his temple. He had extraordinarily long dark lashes, like a woman’s. She wanted to touch them. But his face, for all its pleasing shape, looked empty and extinguished with the dark eloquent eyes closed. It looked far away, remote, unreachable, as if infinitely more than the Irish Sea were between them. She found that she was shivering slightly, then realised it was only because the fire had gone down and the room was growing chilly.
    She banked it up again, intending to wake and come down every hour or so to replenish it.
    But in the end she slept, and opened her eyes only to find an excited Norah and Carmen peering into her face, willing her to wake.
    “Mamma! What do you think? Mr. Parnell is asleep on the couch in the sitting room! In all his clothes! Miss Glennister is scandalised.” Norah began giggling wildly and Carmen, her faithful imitator, immediately followed suit.
    “But it would be more dreadful if he were in his nightshirt,” Carmen said, and they were off on another wild attack of giggles.
    “It’s not dreadful at all,” Katharine said, sitting up. “Mr. Parnell arrived late and was very tired and fell asleep by the fire, and I know all about it. Pass me my dressing gown, and then go down and tell Ellen to prepare a large nourishing breakfast.”
    “Why, is Mr. Parnell starving, too?” Norah asked.
    “Of course he isn’t, but in this cold weather we all need to eat nourishing food. And Mr. Parnell has a train to catch so tell Ellen not to dawdle.”
    She dressed hastily and went downstairs to find Charles laughing merrily with the children.
    He looked up when she came in and gave his peculiarly radiant smile.
    “Good morning, Mrs. O’Shea. I had a capital night on your couch. I didn’t stir until these two young ladies came in. I couldn’t think for a minute where I was. You were exceedingly good to a wayfarer last night.”
    That last sentence was for the benefit of Miss Glennister who stood primly in the background, her eyes bright with suspicion. Bother her, now Willie will have to be told. But what was there to tell? She had given food and shelter to the Irish leader. Would it have been less reprehensible to turn him away?
    “Come, children, off to your lessons,” she said briskly. “Mr. Parnell, there is a train to Charing Cross at nine thirty-five. You have ample time for breakfast. I’ll walk across the park with you on the way to my aunt. It’s stopped snowing, thank goodness, but it’s bitterly cold. I hope the House is adequately heated.”
    “I hope so, too, since we’re assured of a very long sitting today. Perhaps you may come up to hear a little of it, Mrs. O’Shea. It will be interesting, I promise you. Mr. Biggar has some fireworks, and so have I. I can’t be sure we’ll get to bed tonight at all.”
    At least in the park, with the wind like ice on their faces, and a glitter of frost on the dun-coloured grass, they were alone.
    “What am I to tell Willie?”
    “Simply that I took him at his word and came down to my headquarters. Surely he isn’t going to mind that?”
    “I wouldn’t tell him at all if it wasn’t for Miss Glennister. But she will. The children will, too. It’s nothing, Charles. Only that I don’t want any silly servants’ gossip to spoil our friendship. We’ll tell what we have to, and be silent about what we don’t.”
    “Sensible Kate.” He seemed to be in fine spirits this morning. “Will you be up this afternoon?”
    “If I can.”
    “If the