A Mother's Duty by June Francis

so.’ His eyes teased her.
    She found herself blushing.
At my age
, she thought, and said hurriedly, ‘I wish Jimmy’d had as much sense as you.’
    ‘Ach, you make her sound like the whole German army. I’d left home and seen death when I was twenty-one. I’m sure he can cope with one woman if he’s any kind of man.’
    ‘He’s over thirty but that doesn’t mean anything with some men,’ said Kitty, cutting the remains of a sponge cake into three before calling Annie.
    Her cousin entered the kitchen. ‘That there doorknob’s worked loose again, Kit.’
    Kitty pulled a face and resting an elbow on the table she looked at John with a question in her eyes. ‘Please?’
    ‘I’m no expert at doorknobs,’ he said woodenly. ‘But if it’s only a loose screw I’m sure I can manage.’
    She smiled as she filled his cup almost to the brim and murmured, ‘A whole herring for you, Mr McLeod. But first that trunk. After you’ve drunk your tea of course.’
    The trunk stood in a corner of the bedroom, large and imposing. John took a grip on a handle and lifted one side before lowering it carefully. ‘I’ll need help if it’s downstairs you want it.’
    ‘Along the passage will do,’ said Kitty, thinking he really was strong. She had tried to lift one end of it before and had been unable to shift it. ‘There’s a small room I never use unless we’re absolutely full, and we haven’t been that for ages, since the last Grand National.’ She
rat-a-tatted
on the trunk with her fist. ‘I wonder what’s really inside? Mr Potter had to be lying about props.’
    ‘Have a look.’ John leaned against the wall, his tongue in his cheek. ‘Perhaps there’s a body in it?’
    ‘You think so?’ She was half inclined to take him seriously as she slowly turned the key in the lock before lifting the lid. Her heart seemed to miss a beat as she gazed inside. ‘Ohhh!’ she exclaimed.
    ‘What is it?’ He moved hurriedly and lowered his head as she lifted hers. Their heads bumped and she winced. He took her arm and led her over to the bed. ‘You sit there. I’ll deal with this.’
    She rubbed her head and watched him go back to the trunk, glad to leave it to him. As he looked inside she said, ‘My eyes didn’t deceive me, did they?’
    ‘What do you think you saw?’ he said carefully.
    ‘A body as you said.’ The words came out in a whisper.
    He reached inside the trunk. ‘Don’t!’ she cried, jumping to her feet.
    He surprised her by grinning and producing a ventriloquist’s dummy.
    She laughed. ‘I’ve never liked those things.’
    ‘It was lying on what looks like a hundredweight of bricks,’ he murmured. ‘It’s crazy the lengths some people’ll go to con others.’ He dropped the dummy on the floor. ‘Where d’you want the bricks?’
    ‘The back yard. Perhaps we can build something with them?’ She was so relieved, so pleased with him that she added, ‘For the extra work you can have a bed for the night. A comfortable bed, better than you’d get at the Sally Army.’
    There was a silence and their eyes met. ‘You’re taking a risk, aren’t you, Mrs Ryan?’ he drawled. ‘You don’t know me from Adam.’
    ‘I don’t know the majority of my guests from Adam,’ she countered.
    ‘Of course you don’t! Stupid me!’ He sounded vexed. ‘Thanks but no thanks. I could get too comfortable here and besides I’m not staying at the Sally Army but with friends.’
    ‘Those at the pet shop?’ she murmured and then could have bitten off her tongue.
    He said seriously, ‘That would be the last thing I’d do. What do you want doing with this dummy?’
    ‘Sling it in the yard.’ She decided it was time for her to go. Time perhaps to stop being so friendly. She did not want him to feel hunted. She nodded regally and allowed her skirts to brush his leg as she left the bedroom.
    By the time John had cleared the bricks, moved the trunk and fixed the doorknob, the soup was ready. Watching him eat,