Tabitha in Moonlight by Betty Neels Page A

all what I wear.’ And then because she was so angry, she added: ‘Would you rather I didn’t come?’
    Her stepmother looked genuinely shocked. ‘Not come? Of course you must come—what would everyone say?’
    Tabitha smiled; her stepmother saw it and frowned angrily as she turned to leave. ‘Dinner’s at eight,’ she said shortly. ‘You know everyone who’s coming. We’ll give Lilith her presents while we’re having drinks. Everyone else will come about nine or thereabouts.’
    After she had gone Tabitha sat down on the bed and cried. She cried for her new dress and for the birthday parties she hadn’t had for the last five years, and for the bedroom which had always been hers and wasn’t any longer, and because she was lonely. And underneath all these, only half realizing it, she cried for Mr van Beek.
    Presently she blew her nose, wiped her eyes and set about repairing the damage—something that she did so well that by half past seven she was dressed in the grey and white stripes, her face nicely made up and her hair piled in intricate little puffs on top of her head,showing off a surprisingly pretty neck. She had pinned a pink velvet bow in front of her coiffure, and after a final appraising look in her mirror she went downstairs, her head held defiantly high, to meet her stepmother and Lilith once more before greeting their dinner guests. Half of their number were friends of Lilith’s own age, but the remainder were older people, who had known her parents and herself from a baby, and as she was seated between the vicar, who had christened her, and the doctor who had attended her birth, she enjoyed her dinner. The doctor was long past retiring age, although he still worked on with a young assistant to do the more arduous work. Neither of them had seen her for some time and had a great many questions to ask her which she answered as lightheartedly as possible. Nevertheless, towards the end of the meal the doctor leaned a little nearer and said quietly:
    â€˜Tabby, we’ve worried about you a little. When your father died did he leave provision for you? This may seem like an impertinence, but we have your well-being at heart, my dear.’
    Tabitha gave him a warm smile. ‘Yes, I know, and thank you. Father didn’t leave me anything; you see, he hadn’t made a will since Mother died. He kept meaning to…I had some trinkets of Mother’s and some of the silver. There was an understanding that…’ She paused, not liking to say what was in her mind. ‘I believe my stepmother misunderstood,’ she finished lamely.
    â€˜Quite so,’ said her companion, ‘but I suppose the house will revert to you eventually?’
    Tabitha shook her head. ‘No—I’ve been told that it’s to be Lilith’s.’
    The vicar, listening from the other side, looked astounded. ‘But she has no connection—Chidlake has been in your family for years—your father must have meant you to have it so that it would pass to your children.’
    â€˜Well, I don’t see much chance of marrying,’ said Tabitha prosaically, ‘but I think that’s what he intended, because he used to say so when I was a little girl. Still, I have a good job, you know,’ she smiled reassuringly at their worried old faces. ‘Next time you’re out our way, you must come and see the ward.’
    The dinner party broke up shortly afterwards and everyone went to the drawing room to await the arrival of the other guests, who presently came in a never-ending stream, laughing and talking and handing a radiant Lilith her presents, and when the small band struckup, taking to the floor in the pleasantly full room. Tabitha danced in turn with the doctor, the vicar and several friends of her parents and once or twice with young men who were Lilith’s friends and strangers to the village. Their conversation was