Once a Land Girl Read Online Free PDF

of how she had felt after that other, wartime, dance, with the other Barry, the proper one.
    The Larches, as Barry’s house was called, stood very upright in a wide street on the outskirts of the city. It had been built in the era when builders aspired to
fashionable mock-Tudor, and its neighbours were similar in appearance. The Daimler swooshed into a drive of deep gravel. The light in the porch was a lantern of stained glass. The front-door
knocker was a brass lion’s head.
    ‘I was dazzled even before I got out of the car,’ Prue wrote later to both Stella and Ag, ‘but also a little uneasy. I had no experience of rich men’s houses.’
    Barry led her through a thickly carpeted hall to what he called the front room. It was all he had promised. Three-piece leather suite, low velvet armchairs, indistinct pictures, a very grand
mirror over the fireplace – a dark room, but when your eyes grew accustomed to its umber light it was possible to see that someone with an eye for rich colours had been in charge of the
decorating. Prue was intrigued by the fire – gas, she thought, though it was hard to tell, so skilfully depicted were the imitation logs piled into a neat mound. Imitation flames flickered
against the iron back, not quite the random colours of real flames but pretty good.
    ‘What a clever fire,’ she said at last.
    Barry shrugged. ‘Like it all, do you?’
    ‘It’s amazing. Beautiful.’
    ‘You wait till you see the rest.’
    On a low table by the fire there was a plate of sandwiches and two fragile glasses. Prue wondered if Barry had arranged all this himself – he didn’t strike her as a sandwich-making
man. Perhaps there was some invisible servant who lived in the back of the house. The centre of each sandwich was decorated with a minute sprig of parsley. Surely Barry . . .
    ‘Shall we celebrate with some bubbly?’ he asked.
    ‘Celebrate what?’ The question had sprung from her inadvertently. ‘I mean—’
    ‘Celebrate the fact you’re here at last, sweetheart,’ Barry said. ‘I’ll just fetch it. Won’t be a mo.’
    Alone in the room, Prue was able to observe that every piece of furniture, every ornament, the carpets, the tall silk curtains, must have cost unimaginable amounts of money. Barry Morton was
obviously a very rich man indeed. Prue sighed.
    In front of the fire that never died down, they drank the first bottle of champagne, and a second. They ate the fish-paste sandwiches. Prue longed for a bowl of soup, fish and chips, anything to
calm her swirling head, but no suggestions of proper dinner were forthcoming. Was Barry Morton up to something? Prue giggled. ‘Are you up to something?’ she asked.
    ‘Up to something? What do you have in mind?’
    ‘Well, I don’t know. It’s all so surprising, this.’
    ‘There are more surprises.’ Barry walked over to Prue, put his muff-hand round her wrist, pulled her up. They stood facing each other, very close. Prue would have moved away had not
her legs felt so unsteady. Her eyes had become a little out of focus, but she was able to see the piercing intent in his.
    ‘Now, my sweet Prue, I’ve something to tell you. I’ve been thinking about it very hard these months we’ve known each other, and I’ve made up my mind. I want you to
be my wife. How about that?’
    Prue fell backwards onto a chair. One leg tipped up, knocking the low table. Two champagne bottles, two glasses and the empty plate fell to the floor, silenced by the carpet. Her cheeks blazed.
Behind Barry’s patient smile she saw a ghostly look of annoyance.
    ‘I’m so sorry.’
    ‘Don’t worry.’ In a trice Barry had picked up the fallen things and returned them to the table. He could see that this small, irritating accident had taken the edge off
Prue’s answer, but he was a patient man. He wouldn’t alarm her by pressing her. He could wait. ‘I think you should see the rest of the house.’
    ‘Right.’
    They went side by side up the staircase,