Singing in the Wilderness Read Online Free PDF Page B

seasonings. You see, he has written all the quantities you will need down the side. Good fortune when you make it for yourself and the gentleman!’
    ‘Oh! I don’t know that Mr. Ruddock—’
    ‘I shall expect it to taste just like this,’ Cas cut her off lazily, and he turned and thanked the waiter, putting a couple of bank notes into his hand for himself and the chef.
    ‘You shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble,’ Stephanie reproved him.
    ‘Why not? I’d go to just as much trouble to understand the advantages of digital coding and how it works, I assure you.’
    ‘But that’s your work! Cooking is just a hobby with me!’
    He grinned. ‘Is it? I’ll believe that when I see you looking equally enthusiastic over typing one of my reports,’ he said.
    ‘I don’t often understand them,’ she said on a sigh. She blinked, hiding her eyes behind her lashes. ‘I’m not looking forward to tomorrow,’ she confided. ‘I’m afraid you’ll expect too much.’
    ‘Don’t think about it,’ he advised. ‘I’ll give you a fair trial—I can’t say fairer than that, can I ? ’
    ‘No,’ she admitted. ‘Only I don’t want to get all hurt and upset, and I know I will if I can’t do what you ask!’
    He smiled across the table at her. ‘Women! They always take everything so darned personally. You’ll have to learn to separate your work from your personal life, honey. We all have to, sooner or later.’
    ‘But what if I can’t ? ’
    ‘We’ll have to think of something else for you to do.’ He put his hand over hers. ‘Don’t look like that, my dear. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t manage very well, is there? You must have learned something, working for your father, and I’m told I’m fairly easy to work for.’
    ‘I hope so,’ she said.
    ‘Does it matter so much to you ? ’
    She nodded. ‘I expect it seems silly to you, but working for one’s father isn’t much of a test of what one can really do. I mean, he would never have told me to go—he’d more likely have got in someone to help me. I want to be a success in my own right.’
    ‘That’s up to you, my sweet. If you want it enough, I daresay you’ll make your mark. But you’ll have to do it on your own. I can’t help you. I shall expect exactly the same from you as I would from any other girl I had working for me. It doesn’t do to play favourites in an office.’
    ‘I wouldn’t ask you to,’ she replied proudly. ‘That’s the last thing I ’ d ask! I want to do it all on my own. Father made enough of a mess without my adding to things.’ She hesitated, beginning to worry again. ‘It wasn’t his fault! The equipment he was expecting didn’t arrive and the men began to take advantage. The spring was late in coming this year and one of the teams ran into a pack of wolves. They kept one man up a post for days, threatening him every time he made to come down, and everybody thought Father should have done something about that too. But what could he have done?’
    Cas didn’t answer directly. ‘He’ll be happier back in England,’ he said.
    ‘Will he?’ She was remembering her father’s dejected frame as he had departed up the steps into the aeroplane. ‘He won’t know what to do with himself unless they find him a proper job to do, and it’s so long since he had to tackle anything by himself.’
    ‘He has your mother to support him,’ Cas pointed out with a cheerfulness that Stephanie thought was quite uncalled for. ‘He doesn’t need you to hold his hand as well.’ He gave her hand a sharp tap before taking back his own. ‘You have your own problems to worry about! When you’ve finished your coffee, we’ll go for a stroll down by the river and look at the bridges I’ve heard so much about. You’ll have your hands more than full to keep me from kissing you in the moonlight beside the Khajou Bridge, if it’s as romantic as it looks in the picture in my bedroom.’
    She looked down her nose and