She took a deep breath and remembered her manners. ‘Mark, this is my sister, Dee. Dee, this is Mark.’
Now Dee could look at him properly and her head swam. He was too good-looking to be true. It didn’t happen outside the cinema. She held out her hand and from a distance heard him saying that Sylvia had told him all about her.
‘Nothing bad, I hope,’ she said mechanically and immediately cursed herself for talking nonsense. But it was as much as she could do to talk at all.
A moment ago she’d been content with life trundling along in the same old way. Now it was as though a thunderbolt had struck her.
‘Let’s get inside,’ Sylvia said. ‘It’s freezing out here.’
Joe and Helen had come to the door to see what all the commotion was about. The sight of Mark wheeling his motorbike brought Joe hurrying down the path of the tiny front garden.
‘That’s yours?’ he asked with a hint of awe.
‘Yes. Is there somewhere I can put it?’
‘In my garage next door. I’ll show you the way.’
When the two men had vanished, Helen said, ‘Well! So that’s him! Noisy young fellow, isn’t he?’
‘He likes people to know he’s there,’ Sylvia said.
‘Hmm! Not the retiring type, obviously.’
‘Nobody could call Mark the retiring type,’ Sylvia agreed, following her mother into the house.
In the better light Helen could see her daughter properly and was horrified.
‘What are you wearing?’ she demanded. ‘What’s that-thing in your hands?’
‘I wear it on my head, and these are goggles to protect my eyes.’
‘What do you want to go gadding around on that contraption, dressed like that for? To suit him?’
It was clear that Mark had got off on the wrong foot with Helen. With Joe, however, he had better luck. The motorbike had made an excellent impression and, as Dee watched them returning to the house, she could see that they were already in perfect accord.
‘So now your dad’s found someone to talk nuts and bolts with, he’s happy,’ Helen observed. ‘I reckon that lad’s got the job already.’
Then it happened. Mark threw back his head and roared with laughter, a rich, vibrant sound that streamed up to the heavens. It seemed to invade Dee through and through, filling her with helpless delight. All of life was in that sound; everything good and hopeful, all that was promising for the future. How could anything possibly go wrong with the world when a young man could laugh like that?
But then, mysteriously, she knew a flicker of alarm, as though a hidden danger was approaching her behind a smiling front. But it passed and she chided herself for being fanciful. Sylvia had found herself a pleasant young man. Surely all was well?
‘Are you two coming in for your tea?’ Helen called, and the two men obediently returned to the house.
Some instinct seemed to warn Mark that he was doing badly with Helen. He behaved charmingly, thanking her for allowing him to stay for Christmas.
‘Any friend of Sylvia’s is a friend of ours,’ Helen said politely, and Dee might have imagined that she slightly emphasised ‘friend’. ‘Joe needs a good mechanic, so I hope things work out.’
‘He is a good mechanic, Mum,’ Sylvia said eagerly. ‘The best.’
‘Well, we’ll see. It’s almost teatime and I expect you’re starving, Mr Sellon.’
‘Please, call me Mark. And yes, I’m starving.’
‘Come upstairs and unpack first,’ Sylvia suggested. ‘Where’s he sleeping, Mum?’
‘In Dee’s room,’ Helen said. ‘She’ll be in with you.’
‘I thought Dee was going to sleep on the sofa down here,’ Sylvia protested. ‘That’s what you said this morning.’
Helen dropped her voice to say, ‘I’ve changed my mind. Now, get going and tea will be ready in a few minutes.’
At that moment Joe Parsons signalled for Mark to join him in the sitting room. Sylvia went too and, when they were safely out of earshot, Helen said, ‘If she thinks I’m letting her be alone in that room while he’s here-well! That’s all I can say.’
There was no need for her to say more. Her suspicions stood out brilliantly.
‘You think he’d-you know-?’
‘Not now, he won’t,’ Helen said with grim satisfaction.
‘He’s very good-looking, isn’t he?’ Dee ventured.
‘Hmm. Handsome is as handsome does.’
‘Mum! It’s not his fault he’s handsome.’
‘Did I say it was? But they’re the ones you have to watch, that’s all. Now, go and lay the table.’
Over tea, Mark told them about himself. He was twenty-three and lived on the other side of London in a hostel for respectable young men. His father had died when he was six and he’d been reared by his mother alone.
‘She had no family, and my father’s family had disapproved of their marriage, so I don’t think they helped her much. She died a couple of years ago.’
‘So you’ve got nobody?’ Helen asked with a touch of sympathy.
‘Not really. I trained as a mechanic because my father was one. Luckily, I took to it and now I’m only happy with a spanner in my hand. I had a good job in a garage. At least I thought it was a good job, but the owner lost all his money, the garage was sold to someone who brought his own workforce in, and I was fired.’
‘How did you get that motorbike?’ Joe asked in a voice full of envy. ‘Don’t they cost a fortune?’
‘Yes, they do,’ Mark agreed, ‘so I had to use rather unusual methods. It belonged to the son of the man buying the garage. He wanted to sell it because he was getting a new one. I couldn’t afford even the second-hand price, so I bet him he couldn’t beat me at cards.’ The gleam in his eyes had a touch of charming wickedness. ‘And he couldn’t.’
‘No,’ Joe breathed in awe. ‘You’re a bit of a devil, aren’t you?’
‘I hope so,’ Mark said, sounding comically shocked. ‘What’s the point otherwise?’
‘Hmm!’ Helen said disapprovingly.
‘I didn’t cheat, Mrs Parsons,’ Mark assured her. ‘I just-tempted him a bit further than he’d meant to go.’
‘That’s what the devil does,’ Dee said triumphantly, and was rewarded with his blazing grin that seemed to fill the room.
Helen frowned, disapproving. Sylvia looked as though she was struggling to keep up.
Afterwards, the men retired to the garage while the girls helped their mother in the kitchen.
‘If you ask me, he’s a bad lad,’ Helen said.
‘Why, Mum, whatever do you mean?’ Sylvia asked.
‘I mean he’s the sort who goes around telling the world he’s there all the time, like he did tonight. You watch out, my girl. Don’t you go getting yourself into trouble.’
‘Mum,’ Dee protested, ‘that’s not fair. Sylvia’s a good girl.’
Sylvia said nothing.
‘Maybe she is, maybe she isn’t,’ Helen said. ‘I’m taking no chances, not with him looking like he came off a cinema screen.’
‘He is handsome, isn’t he?’ Sylvia said eagerly.
‘Yes, he is-too handsome for his good or yours. That’s why Dee’s going to be with you in your room tonight. I don’t want any of your nonsense.’
‘Why, Mum, I don’t know what you mean,’ Sylvia said, earnestly enough to fool anyone who didn’t know her.
‘You know exactly what I mean, young lady. You behave yourself.’
Behind her mother’s back, Sylvia made a face, but gave up arguing. Nobody won against Helen and they all knew it. When it was time to go to bed, she drew Mark aside in the hall, signalling for Deirdre to go on ahead.
Dee hesitated, mindful of her mother’s orders to keep a strict eye on them. But Helen herself was only a few feet away in the kitchen and surely one little goodnight kiss couldn’t do any harm?
‘Go on,’ Sylvia said urgently, jerking her head to the stairs and at last Dee obeyed, trying to sort out her thoughts.
There was another reason for her reluctance to leave them alone; one she couldn’t admit to herself because she didn’t fully understand it. It made no sense. After all, Mark was Sylvia’s property.