For Better For Worse by Pam Weaver Page A

secretary?’
    Sarah hesitated. It would be so much easier to have one job rather than racing about from one thing to another. Men always got far more money than women, she knew that, but she thought Peter would give her a fair wage. It would most likely be enough to cover the cost of living, but would it be enough to pay the rent? And what would she do with Lu-Lu? Jenny would be at school, but she knew without asking that Vera wouldn’t have her. Besides, she’d have to get her all the way over to Lancing and then fetch her after work if she did. If she had to fork out on bus fares, she’d probably end up back where she’d started.
    ‘If you’re worried about the little one,’ he said, pre-empting her protest, ‘I know a really good woman who would look after her.’
    Sarah frowned. A stranger looking after her baby all day? She wasn’t sure about that … but perhaps …
    ‘Tell you what,’ said Peter, ‘think about it. I don’t need an answer straight away.’
    Sarah watched him as he went back to the counter to buy mugs of tea for them both, an ice cream for the girls and to pay for their meal. He was such a kind man. A lump formed in her throat. Oh Henry … why? Why?
    *
    ‘We’ll have to put in place a few ground rules about this.’
    Malcolm Mitchell had gathered his wife and daughter in the sitting room of his comfortable home near the Thomas A Becket public house, about two miles from the centre of Worthing. He was anxious to regain control of a tricky situation. His good name was at stake. As a member of Worthing Borough Council, his reputation had to be squeaky clean, and as a Freemason even more so. They had let Annie sleep late as usual and now that breakfast was over and the maid was in the kitchen, where she could no longer eavesdrop on the conversation, he was anxious to decide on their next move. ‘Your mother will arrange a place for your confinement and for the adoption society to take the baby as soon as it’s born. You must stay indoors until the trial comes up. We don’t want the neighbours or the gutter press making your predicament into a public spectacle. I think if you keep a low profile, there’s no reason why you can’t pick up the threads of your life again once the birth is over.’
    Neither woman spoke. Annie sat on the edge of the sofa staring at her hands, while her mother sat in the armchair gazing somewhere into the middle distance. Her father stood by the fireplace.
    ‘Of course,’ said her father, slipping his thumbs either side of his waistcoat and thrusting out his generous stomach, ‘if you had listened to me in the first place, you wouldn’t have found yourself in this situation.’
    Annie’s face flamed. He just couldn’t resist, could he? He had to keep reminding her that it was her own headstrong actions that had brought all this to pass.
    ‘You seem to forget,’ Annie mumbled, ‘that I didn’t know he was already married.’
    ‘That’s as maybe,’ said her father, ‘but
I
knew he was a thief and I’m going to make damn sure he pays for his crimes.’
    Annie’s head jerked up. ‘You knew? But you never said anything!’
    ‘I was trying to protect you,’ said Malcolm. Already the atmosphere between them was heating up. ‘He and I had words when that brooch went missing. Of course he denied it, but I knew it was him.’
    So it was the brooch that had brought them to the police station, not his own daughter’s desperate need. She’d been too miserable to ask why they were there. DS Hacker had said the brooch was stolen, but Annie didn’t think for one minute that it had come from her father’s shop. ‘You should have said something in the first place,’ she said.
    ‘And would you have listened?’ he challenged. ‘No. You were too besotted with him to take any notice of anything I said. Well, from now on, my girl, things will have to change around here. If you are going to live under my roof,’ he was wagging his finger now, ‘I want you