BooksBarbecue
Back One Enchanted Evening Save as PDF
Chapters (50)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Prologue
  4. The Grand Masquerade Ball
  5. Five Months Earlier . . .
  6. Chapter One
  7. Chapter Two
  8. Chapter Three
  9. September 1936
  10. Chapter Four
  11. Chapter Five
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Chapter Eight
  15. Chapter Nine
  16. Chapter Ten
  17. Chapter Eleven
  18. Chapter Twelve
  19. Chapter Thirteen
  20. Chapter Fourteen
  21. Chapter Fifteen
  22. Chapter Sixteen
  23. Chapter Seventeen
  24. Chapter Eighteen
  25. October 1936
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-one
  29. November 1936
  30. Chapter Twenty-two
  31. December 1936
  32. Chapter Twenty-three
  33. Chapter Twenty-four
  34. Chapter Twenty-five
  35. Chapter Twenty-six
  36. Chapter Twenty-seven
  37. Chapter Twenty-eight
  38. Chapter Twenty-nine
  39. Chapter Thirty
  40. Chapter Thirty-one
  41. Chapter Thirty-two
  42. Chapter Thirty-three
  43. Chapter Thirty-four
  44. Chapter Thirty-five
  45. Epilogue
  46. A New Year
  47. Extract from Anton Du Beke’s next novel’
  48. Acknowledgements
  49. About the Author
  50. Letter from Author

Nancy whispered, ‘She knows it was me. She’s not going to let me forget it. And she spotted my leg too.’

So that was it, thought Raymond. Vivienne Edgerton, spreading her maliciousness again. Every time he saw a chink of light in her, every time he spotted a vulnerability, she pulled herself together and returned to her usual business: condescension and cruelty, entitlement and envy. He delved his fingers into his pockets and fished out the crumpled shreds of letter he had crammed there.

‘You mustn’t listen to her, Nancy,’ he said, dropping the pieces into the waste basket dangling from the end of Nancy’s trolley. ‘She’s a bored and entitled little girl. It isn’t her fault. She’s been in this hotel a year and a day and all she’s been is trouble – there, I said it. I’ll get hung, drawn and quartered were anyone to find out, so my life is in your hands.’ He stopped and smiled, for an idea was forming. ‘I could show you some steps, if you liked. Nobody else would have to know. Because nothing – nothing, Nancy – should stop you dancing, if that’s what you want to do.’

‘I’m a chambermaid, Mr de Guise. Have you forgotten?’

‘And I’m a dancer.’ He pivoted on his heel, spinning on the spot – and was relieved when he saw Nancy’s face break into a grin. If she hadn’t smiled, all you’d have been is a twirling fool. Raymond de Guise, what’s become of you?

Nancy was silent. Where her thoughts had taken her, Raymond could not say – but when, at last, she said, ‘I should like that very much, Mr de Guise. You have my thanks’, he could not mask his smile. There was something about Nancy Nettleton, some indefinable quality that made him wonder what she would really be like on the dance floor. Her eyes were luminous. They looked directly into Raymond’s own. It took all sorts of qualities to dance well, thought Raymond. It took rhythm and elegance, poise and self-assurance. But it took intelligence too – the emotion and foresight to understand your partner, to know which way the dance was going. And, stubborn leg or not, Raymond de Guise was certain Nancy Nettleton epitomised this quality most of all.

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Fifteen

image

PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER, NANCY NETTLETON. After a morning changing bed sheets, sweeping floors, and trying hard not to make eye contact with any one of the hundred guests you’ve shuffled past, why wouldn’t you want to do something for yourself? Isn’t this one of the things you came to London for?