Tabitha in Moonlight by Betty Neels Page B

limited to asking her who she was and then expressing surprise at her answer. They danced badly, something which she did very well, so that when she saw a young man in a plum-coloured velvet suit and a pink frilled shirt making his way towards her she slipped away using the bulky frames of the doctor and his wife as a shield, and went outside on the balcony. It was a glorious night, with the last brightness of the sun still lingering over the distant headlands of Torbay. She wandered away from the drawing room, so that the music and noise was dimmed a little and leaned over the balustrade to sniff at the roses below. It was then that she became aware of Lilith’s voice, very gay and excited. She must have left the drawing room too, although she would of course have a partner. Tabitha straightened up; if she walked on quickly, Lilith wouldn’t see her. But it was too late, for several paces away, Lilith cried:
    â€˜Tabitha? All alone? Have you run out of partners already?’ She gave a tinkle of laughter. ‘We should have got some older men for you.’
    Tabitha turned round. She began quietly: ‘That would have been a good…’ Her voice faltered into silence, for the man with Lilith was Mr van Beek.
    Her first reaction was one of deep regret that she wasn’t wearing the new dress, the second that his elegance, in contrast to his appearance when they had first met, was striking. She thanked heaven silently for the kindly moonlight and said in a voice from which she had carefully sponged all surprise: ‘Good evening, Mr van Beek.’
    Lilith looked surprised, frowned and then said incredulously: ‘You know each other?’
    Mr van Beek smiled charmingly at her. ‘Indeed we do.’ He turned the same smile on Tabitha, who didn’t smile back.
    â€˜How very delightful to meet you here, Miss Crawley, and how providential, for one or two matters of importance have cropped up—perhaps if Lilith would forgive me, we might settle them now.’
    â€˜Settle what?’ Lilith wanted to know.
    â€˜Oh, some very dull matters concerning patients,’ he answered easily. ‘Nothing you would want to bother your pretty head about.Go back and dance with as many of your young men as you can in ten minutes, then you will have all the more time for me.’
    Lilith smiled, looking up at him through her long curling lashes.
    â€˜All right, Marius, you shall have your ten minutes, though it all sounds very dull.’ She didn’t bother to look at Tabitha but danced off, the picture of prettiness, to disappear into the drawing room.
    Tabitha had stood quietly while they had been talking, and now that Lilith had gone she still made no move. It was Mr van Beek who spoke first. He said, to astonish her: ‘Tabitha in moonlight—how charming you look.’
    â€˜There’s no need,’ began Tabitha firmly, ‘to flatter me just because you’ve discovered that I’m Lilith’s stepsister.’
    His brows lifted. ‘That seems a most peculiar reason for flattery, which, by the way, isn’t flattery. I did know that you were stepsisters. You do look charming—you’ve done your hair differently too.’
    He smiled at her so kindly that she burst out: ‘Moonlight’s kind. Wait until you see me indoors, I’m as plain as ever I was.’
    He came and leant on the balustrade beside her. ‘I’m sure your mother and father never told you that you were plain.’
    â€˜Of course they didn’t.’
    â€˜Then why do you think you are?’
    She looked at him in astonishment. ‘I grew up knowing it,’ she frowned. ‘At least, I guessed I would be.’ She fumbled for words. ‘I—I knew, that is, before I was told.’
    â€˜And who told you?’
    Tabitha had a sudden vivid memory of standing before the mirror in the hall, doing something to her hair. It had been soon after her father had