Cinderella in the Surgeon's Castle
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Annie Claydon
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15
CHAPTER ONE
THERE WAS JUST one thing to keep in mind while negotiating a path through one of the main London stations late on a Friday afternoon. Watch your ankles.
Grace Chapman had arrived just in time to get some coffee from one of the stands at Paddington Station, before catching her train. This was the first surge of the evening—people who’d left work a little early to miss the rush hour, and get a head start on wherever they were going for the weekend. She’d paused, studying the departures board, and someone had rammed an overnight case into her left ankle.
‘Sorry.’ The word floated back at her over the woman’s shoulder. No time to stop when you were hurrying to meet whatever delights the weekend might hold.
‘That’s...’ Grace shrugged. Clearly it didn’t much matter to the woman whether it was all right or not.
Perhaps she really was becoming invisible. Lost amongst the ranks of an army of carers, who didn’t have too much time for social engagements, and so were tactfully left out when friends made their plans for the weekend. It felt sometimes as if she was fading in front of everyone’s eyes.
Grace sighed, rubbing her ankle. This was what she’d decided to do. What she wanted to do. She’d stood too long now in front of the board, looking at the names of towns and cities that she wouldn’t be going to, and there was no time for coffee.
There would be plenty of opportunity to grab a drink and let her mind wander when she was on the train. Grace started forward, weaving through a stream of people coming the other way, and made her way along the platform to the correct carriage for the seat she’d reserved.
This week the train wasn’t too crowded, and the group of four seats had just one man sitting in the window seat opposite to Grace’s. She gave him a brief smile as she sat down, stowing her bag into the overhead rack, and caught the fleeting impression of a pair of bright blue eyes before she looked away again.
It was tempting to take a second, much longer look. But this was her time. The next five hours down to Cornwall was when no one else needed her attention and Grace was alone with her thoughts. She pulled a journal from the outside pocket of her handbag and opened it, in the universal traveller’s signal that she wanted to be left alone. The train jolted slightly as it began to pull from the station, gathering speed as it started its journey out of London.
‘Page twenty-seven.’ The voice had a touch of warm humour about it that made it impossible to ignore. The man’s hand lay on an open magazine in front of him, and reading upside down made it clear to Grace that he was perusing the same medical journal that she’d just taken from her bag.
‘Good article?’
He smiled, and she felt a sudden flush of something she’d left behind a long time ago. Something she had no time, or inclination to rekindle.
‘It’s interesting.’
‘Thanks. I’ll check it out.’
The man opposite her nodded, picking up his copy of the journal and flipping through the pages. It appeared that was the sum total of any effort he was going to make towards a conversation, and that suited Grace just fine. Only...
There was something about him. Something in that smile that made her want to talk. The first thing she’d noticed about him—those jewel-like iridescent blue eyes—seemed to sparkle with humour. His short corn-blonde hair might have put him amongst the surfers who spent their weekends in Cornwall at this time of the year, but there was something about the set of his jaw that indicated purpose rather than sunshine.
He caught her looking at him, over the top of her journal. Time to look away again, but a different and stronger instinct compelled her to meet his gaze. When a smile began to play recklessly with his lips, she couldn’t quell the desire to return it.
‘I’m thinking...orthopaedic consultant?’
‘Right in one. Reasons?’
‘You have a subscription to an orthopaedics journal...’ She nodded towards the cover of his copy of the journal, which had a bar-coded sticker in the corner, the same as hers. ‘And you’re wearing a suit.’
A very good suit. The hand-stitching on the lapels, and the way it fitted his broad shoulders made that clear. That put him somewhere around the level of a consultant, despite the youthful ebullience of his smile.
‘I could be on my way somewhere that demands a suit.’ He was teasing now, and Grace felt a thrill of excitement run up her spine. She moved, trying to disguise the forbidden frisson, laying her journal down on the small table that divided them.
‘On a train that arrives at nine o’clock in the evening? You’d be late. And you have a slight crease.’ Grace nodded towards his right elbow, starting to like this game very much.
He chuckled suddenly. ‘Fair enough, an all-day suit and an orthopaedics journal. Although I’ve been in surgery today, which you couldn’t have been expected to know.’
She might have, if she’d dared look at his hands before now. Perfectly clipped nails and the look of softness that came from frequent moisturising. The patch of dry skin on the side of one of his fingers, no doubt the result of scrubbing, put the seal on the deduction.
He was looking at her now, with an assessing gaze. Grace resisted the impulse to pick up her journal and hide behind it, wondering if he’d felt quite as naked as she did now.
‘Orthopaedics, naturally.’ He smiled down at the journal in front of her. ‘I’d say rehab, because of the article you’ve just been reading. And your shoes tell me that you’re on your feet most of the day...’ He frowned, clearly working his way through all of the options in his head.
He’d noticed the comfortable fabric-topped trainers, then. Since her feet were hidden under the table now, he must have been watching as she’d made her way to her seat, and somehow the thought made Grace feel even more naked. Gloriously, refreshingly naked, as if she’d thrown off her clothes to bask in the sunshine.
‘I’m going to take a wild guess and say physiotherapist.’
There was a hint of something deliciously wild in his smile. Along with something that stepped back and observed carefully before getting his guesses exactly right. If she’d met him in another life...
This life was what Grace had. This moment, and this train.
‘Good guess.’
‘And you’re on your way back home. Visiting someone?’ He shot her an apologetic look when she raised her eyebrows, as if he knew that maybe he’d gone a little too far. ‘There’s some Cornish in your accent.’
She’d started this game, and she could hardly object to his having picked up the trace of Cornwall in her tones, that ten years living in London hadn’t yet been able to quash. All the same, it took a practised ear to notice it, which meant he was probably from Cornwall as well, even if there was no hint of that in his speech.
‘I’m going to see my grandmother. She’s getting a little frail now and needs someone to keep an eye on her, so my sister and cousins take care of her during the week and I visit at weekends.’
If she said it like that, the schedule seemed less punishing. More like weekends away instead of the increasingly hard work in making sure that Gran was well cared for. But it didn’t look as if he was falling for that, because his mouth twisted, his gaze softening into a look that somehow indicated he understood just how difficult this was.
‘You’re Cornish too?’ With any luck, he’d pull out his phone and show her pictures of the wife and gorgeous family that were waiting for him there. That would fix the fantasies that were beginning to form in her head, and they could spend the rest of the journey in pleasant conversation. Or silence. Whatever worked.
‘Well spotted. I didn’t think my accent resurfaced until after Exeter.’
His smile contained a hint of self-effacing humour. His phone was concealed on the small table under his copy of the journal, and he picked it up, seeming to scroll through pictures to find his favourite one. Here it came...
‘Here’s my reason for being on the train.’
He handed her the phone and Grace felt her eyebrows shoot up. No sunshine or happy smiles, just a stone building that looked like a converted barn, surrounded by trees. There were cars and vans parked outside and it had the air of a place of business.
‘What’s this?’ Grace narrowed her eyes, trying to read the sign that stretched over the top of the glazing on one side of the building.
‘Swipe right.’
Didn’t that mean you were about to fall in love? The twitch of his lips indicated that the implications of his comment hadn’t escaped him, and his shrug disclaimed the nod to online dating. Grace couldn’t resist swiping to the next picture.
‘Oh! That’s beautiful!’
He smiled. ‘There are a few more...’
She wanted to linger over the picture. The glass vase, covered in swirling shades of blue, gave the impression that the sea had somehow risen up and was in the process of forming a perfect spherical structure. Grace swiped back to the picture of the building, enlarging it so that she could read the sign.
‘You’re a surgeon who moonlights at a glass factory?’
He laughed, nodding. ‘Improbable as that might sound, yes. It’s actually my father’s glassworks. He died a year ago and I’m doing my best to keep it afloat.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. That your father died, I mean...’
‘Thank you.’ He pressed his lips together for a moment, the shadow of grief darkening his face. But it seemed he didn’t want to dwell on the hard things in life any more than she did. ‘Take a look at what we do...’
Grace flipped through the pictures, one by one. Everything and anything you could make from glass was represented, all imbued with a liquid motion that made the pieces seem alive. Light and colour, fashioned into something that you could reach out and touch.
‘These are amazing.’ Words didn’t really cover it, but perhaps her expression did, because he returned a gratified smile. ‘Your father made these?’
‘He established the style and brought craftsmen together who could make it a reality. We’re carrying on that tradition. All of the pieces that you see there have been made in the last year.’
‘They’re beautiful. I can see why you want to keep things going.’
He nodded. ‘We have artists who have worked there for twenty years. My father died suddenly, and they thought that the best thing they could hope for was that I’d sell the place to someone who might have some intention of keeping some of them employed. I wanted something a bit better than that, for them and for my father.’
‘And so you’ve taken over the running of the place?’ It seemed like a huge task—the kind of thing that would split someone in two. In comparison, looking after her grandmother at weekends sounded like a relatively simple proposition.
‘For a while. We’re working towards making it a place that’s run by the people who work there, but that takes time. We have to develop management skills and decision-making processes if it’s not all going to fall apart as soon as I walk away.’
‘That sounds really hard.’
‘Most things that are worth it come with their share of difficulties.’ He shrugged. ‘Would you like something to drink from the buffet car?’
Grace did want some coffee, even if it was tempting to take a little longer looking over the photographs. She laid the phone down, reaching for her bag to find her purse, and he shook his head and got to his feet.
‘Stay here and keep an eye on my things. I’ll go...’
Penn McIntyre hadn’t got any further than the titles of the articles on the pages in front of him, the words swimming in front of his eyes in a mess of fatigue. He’d had a couple of patients cancel their appointments this afternoon, and got an earlier train, which meant that he’d be down in Cornwall before midnight. He was so hungry for a good night’s sleep.
And then... Then an angel had dumped her bag in the rack above his head and squeezed into the confined space. He’d caught a brief glimpse of light blonde curls and green eyes, before good manners had made him look away.
But the woman really must be an angel, because she came with small miracles. It was impossible not to notice that she was reading the same orthopaedics journal that he was. And since this edition had only come out today, she probably hadn’t got to page twenty-seven yet. When he’d caught her looking at him over the top of the pages, he’d taken a chance...
Suddenly, he was wide awake, as if her mere presence had just effected that good night’s sleep that he so craved. Another miracle. Then she’d bettered it, when she smiled back at him and replied.
She looked tired, too. Not that Friday evening, long week kind of tired, but the kind of fatigue that grew over months. Penn reckoned that the weekends away that she dismissed as little more than visits to her grandmother, were more draining than she let on. He hadn’t experienced the demands of caring for an elderly relative, but he was quite aware of what they were.
He didn’t have the time or the inclination to add another relationship fiasco to the succession of disasters that he’d already managed to chalk up against his name. But this, he could do. A train journey had a beginning and an end. It was an interval in time that didn’t leak out into the rest of his existence. And the wish to spend that time with her was impossibly tempting.
As he queued for coffee, he realised that he didn’t even know her name. That had seemed unnecessary, because there was the kind of intimacy between them that only came from chatting with a stranger. She must know how it felt, to tend to a patient and hear them confide their most private fears. To give a small part of yourself, supplying comfort and a way forward, and then bid a smiling goodbye at the end of a consultation. Couldn’t they take a little of that kind of comfort for themselves, before they reached Cornwall and went their separate ways?
He picked up a couple of packets of sandwiches before ordering coffee and walked back between the rows of seats, balancing the two large cardboard cups carefully. Not daring to look at her until he reached the bubble of the seats that faced each other across the small table. When he did, the warmth of her smile hit him anew and he almost collapsed back into his seat.
She peeled the plastic top from one of the cups, and let out a sigh of pleasure. ‘Chocolate sprinkles. I forgot to ask for them, thank you...’
Penn nodded an acknowledgement. He’d played it safe, and the other cappuccino didn’t have chocolate sprinkles, so he could give her a choice. He opened the bag he’d brought.
‘Sandwich?’
She hesitated, obviously as hungry as he was. ‘I haven’t eaten... Which one’s yours?’
‘Either one. You choose.’
She chose the ham and cheese, then dipped her hand into the bag on the seat next to her and produced her purse. Penn shook his head, and she ignored him, glancing at the price sticker on the sandwich packet, and sliding a ten-pound note across the table towards him. Penn felt in his pocket for some change and when he put the coins into her hand, she shot him a reproving look, clearly knowing that he’d given her too much.
‘I don’t know your name.’ She asked the obvious question, and Penn felt his heart sink as a little bit of the everyday intruded.
‘Penn.’ Maybe first names only would be enough of an answer for her.
‘Short for...’ She stopped, giving him a querying look as he held up his hand.
Most people he met didn’t assume that Penn would be short for Penrose, even if there weren’t too many likely alternatives. But the old Cornish name would be more obvious to someone from Cornwall.
‘Yeah. It’s a family name.’
‘And kids can be cruel?’ She twisted her lips in an expression of regret.
He supposed that it wasn’t so difficult to work out. Only the long-held trauma of childhood bullying could make someone stop another person short before they got a chance to say their full name.
‘Yeah. I’ve heard every creative alternative there is.’
‘I think it’s a great name. Penn is even better.’ She smiled, holding out her hand. ‘Hi, Penn. I’m Grace.’
The train seemed to be travelling twice as fast as it normally did. One cup of coffee and a sandwich, and London was a distant memory as they sped through the countryside, stopping only at the major stations along the way.
A lot had happened in those few short hours. Penn was a rare creature. Someone who listened carefully and thoughtfully, but who seemed unafraid in speaking his mind and including his own experiences. They’d talked about growing up in Cornwall. He was an only child with divorced parents who had largely remained on amicable terms, and his time had been split between running barefoot on the beach while in the care of his father and wearing shoes in the company of his mother.
‘She has a love of the arts and a very full social calendar. And an inability to sit still for very long...’ He smiled, clearly remembering the round of galleries and interesting places that he’d described with a great deal of affection.
Grace allowed herself to venture back into her childhood in rather more detail than usual. Her story of the picture-perfect village became a little closer to reality, fleshed out with real people and situations that weren’t always flawlessly perfect.
‘My mother has ME, and there were times when she wasn’t well and just getting out of bed was an impossible effort for her. I was the eldest and I learned how to cook and shop and look after my little brother and sister.’
Penn nodded. ‘You were the helpful child of the family?’
Grace hadn’t thought of it quite like that before, but he was right. She’d been proud of the way that she had helped her mother, and felt very grown up when she walked down to the village shop after school, with her purse and shopping bag.
‘Gran did a lot too, and my dad would take over when he got home from work. And people in the village used to keep an eye on us. They all knew that there were times when Mum wasn’t well.’
‘But you came up to London to study?’
‘Yes, my brother and sister were older and could fend for themselves by then. I was thinking about staying at home, but I got an offer from a good university in London, and Mum and Dad encouraged me to spread my wings a bit. It was Gran who finally persuaded me, though.’
‘She sounds like an important person in your life.’
‘Gran was the one who always had time for me. When I was little, she used to take me out every Saturday afternoon and we’d have the best adventures together, then go back to her cottage. In the summer, we’d have sandwiches for tea in the garden, and in the winter, we’d toast muffins by the fire.’
‘And she gave good advice?’
So many people failed to see that Gran hadn’t always been old, and that she’d once been a force to be reckoned with. Penn made that leap smilingly and with no apparent effort.
‘Excellent advice. She told me that I might fall in love with London, or not. And it didn’t matter either way. If I could honestly say that I’d never regret not giving it a go, then I should stay put.’
Penn chuckled. ‘So of course you took up the place.’
Grace shrugged. ‘What else was I supposed to do? I thought that London would be all bright lights and interesting places, but I was really miserable at first, living in cramped, noisy student accommodation and not knowing anyone. Then in my second term, I discovered that I was starting to really like it.’
‘There’s something about the anonymity, isn’t there? Feeling at home amongst strangers.’
‘You like that?’ Grace wondered why he’d wanted to be anonymous, when all she’d really wanted was to be seen and accepted for herself. Maybe Penn’s seemingly throwaway comment about the helpful child wasn’t too wide of the mark, and London had been the escape from the universal success and approbation she’d found in being the one who’d helped her mother so much.
He waved his hand, as if trying to dismiss his own feelings. ‘I guess I’m just spending a bit too much time trying to be visible at the moment. Taking over the glassworks, talking to everyone in an effort to find a way forward...’
That felt like the truth, but not all of it. Grace let it go. They were virtual strangers, only bound together by opposite seats on a train. Finding that they had some things in common didn’t mean that they felt the same about everything.
‘You’re a surgeon who doesn’t like talking to people?’
He laughed suddenly. ‘No, I do as much talking as I can with my patients. I’m a lot more comfortable with that, though. Medicine was what I always wanted to do.’
‘I’m happy with what I do too. I never get two days that are quite the same, and every patient’s different as well.’
‘I’ll take that as a recommendation. You must be good at your job.’
It was a nice compliment, and Penn seemed to really mean it as well. He asked about her work and Grace described the clinic in Camden Town, where she worked with people who’d suffered injuries and illnesses, anything from sore muscles to road accidents and strokes. He listened carefully, asking questions and seeming to store her answers away for future reference.
In answer to Grace’s question, he told her that he split his time, three days a week at a central London private hospital, and two days a week at the hospital where he’d trained as a surgeon.
‘It’s a good balance.’ He must have seen her raise her eyebrows in surprise. ‘I learn a lot from each.’
His appetite for learning seemed unquenchable. Penn seemed to want to know and understand everything, and she felt her own curiosity growing. He was accomplished, good-looking, and he had a kind of magnetism that made conversation with him so very easy. Why would someone like him value invisibility?
He lived alone, in a part of London that screamed understated wealth, telling her that he considered himself lucky when Grace mentioned that Holland Park was a very nice area, and leaving her to guess that there must be money somewhere in his family. Then he adroitly managed to ask, without really asking at all, about her living arrangements.
‘I was in a relationship, but it broke up a year ago. My partner said he was happy with my going down to Cornwall at the weekends, but it turned out to be more difficult than we thought.’
That was the sanitised version. Jeremy’s unspoken proviso was that if she was away at weekends, every moment of her time during the week should be spent on him. He’d even pressured her to stay home a few times, when it was far too late for Grace to make alternative arrangements for Gran’s care. The most hurtful thing was the jibe he’d thrown when she’d apologetically told him that she had to go. He earned more than her and surely her time was bought and paid for already.
‘I’m sorry to hear that. That must have been a painful time for you.’
‘I just wish I’d known where we stood, right from the beginning. Then it wouldn’t have felt quite so much like a balancing act.’
He nodded. ‘I know what you mean—about the balancing act. I think there has to be at least one thing in your life where you stand your own ground. One thing that’s yours and you don’t compromise on.’
That sounded like something to think about. Maybe not now, because she wanted to savour Penn’s company. ‘How about another cup of coffee? I don’t compromise on that.’
He laughed suddenly, clearly realising that she was intent on lightening the mood. ‘Good choice. I don’t either.’
‘We’ve time for a second cup before we get to Newquay.’ She got to her feet, taking her purse from her bag before he got a chance to move.
If you only had one more minute, what would you say?
They seemed to be hurtling towards Newquay at the speed of light. At this rate, the one minute would have passed in silence, while Grace was still working out what would or wouldn’t be appropriate.
Then Penn took the matter out of her hands. As the train slowed before pulling into the station, he gathered his belongings, turning to take the booking card from the back of his own seat. He glanced at it quickly and then put it into his jacket pocket.
‘You’re on this train every Friday evening?’
Grace nodded, feeling her heart thump in her chest.
‘Me too. I’ll book this seat again next week.’
Before she could say anything, he’d walked away, between the rows of seats towards the queue that was already forming to get off the train. The doors swished open and Grace craned to see him step down from the train and walk away.
No goodbyes on the platform, then. No trying to put into words what this journey had meant, and probably embarrassing herself in the process. No turning to leave, wondering if he was watching her go.
Grace reached for the booking card at the back of her own seat, and stowed it carefully away in her bag.
