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hurting Susan. Please ' she repeated. 'I'll put an end
to our friendship, I promise you. But let me do it gradu-
ally, so she won't be hurt. At least let me do that for
her '
NEVER COUNT TOMORROW 163
There was a frown in his eyes, but he seemed to consider
what she had said, and finally he gave her a curt nod. 'All
right, do it your way.' Then he added abruptly, 'You're
genuinely fond of her, aren't you?'
`Yes,' she said simply. 'Thank you.'
They moved away from the table, and a couple of
students looking for a table, with a tray holding yoghurt
and fruit juices, asked Soren, 'You finished?'
He said, 'Yes,' and as they looked enquiringly at the un-
touched food and cold coffee on the table, he added curtly,
`You're welcome to it.'
`Well, at least you've brightened somebody's day,' Lin
told him as they emerged into the street. Someone jostled
her and apologised, and Soren took her arm to move her
over near a shop doorway, out of the traffic. She said, 'I
won't thank you for the lunch, because I didn't have any,
but it's the thought that counts, isn't it?'
She was babbling and she knew it, and she was glad when
he stopped her with a quietly forceful, 'Shut up !'
`Sorry,' she said. 'I suppose I sound like Rhoda.' Well,
there were worse things. At least Rhoda wasn't a scarlet
woman, like Melinda Blake. 'You could do worse than
marry Rhoda, you know,' she said aloud.
Savagely, he repeated, 'I said, shut up.'
But she couldn't, because if she did she was going to
burst into tears right here in the middle of the lunchtime
rush hour, and worse, in front of him. She gave him a pro-
vocative smile instead, and said, 'You'll have to change your
technique, though. I'm not surprised you scare her.'
Soren made a sound of suppressed fury and then, push-
ing her impatiently further into the doorway, he gripped
her shoulders in his hands and muttered between his teeth,
again, 'Shut up!'
She thought he was going to shake her, but right in the
middle of the lunchtime rush, he kissed her, in the most
NEVER COUNT TOMORROW
164
extraordinary way, hard, hungry and hurtful.
Someone going by laughed, and Soren let her go rather
suddenly. Lin almost fell against the shop window behind
her, and she put up a hand, and felt the knuckles bang
against the glass.
She straightened herself with an effort and said,
Wouldn't it be better if we just said goodbye like two
civilised people? This isn't exactly the place for a big fare-
well scene, is it? I did try to avoid having one remember?'
`I remember,' he said. He was breathing hard, and there
was a faint line of dark colour along his cheekbones. She
was suddenly shaken with compassion and helpless love for
him, and her heart cried out against what they were doing
to each other.
`I must go,' she said. 'I'll be late back at work. Don't
come with me. Please, don't '
And then she fled into the crowds on the footpath and
didn't look back until she had passed the corner of the
street. Soren wasn't in sight, and if he had followed her he
would not have been far behind. They hadn't even said
goodbye, she thought foolishly. Her foot turned on an un-
even patch of the footpath, and she stumbled. A man
reached out a hand to steady her, and saw the quick tears
that had come into her eyes. He peered at her and said
with concern, 'Are you all right?'
She could have said, I think I'm dying, I feel as though
I'm dying inside. But she gave the man an unsteady smile
and told him she was fine. She had ricked her ankle and it
hurt a bit, that was all. He stayed by her a few paces and
saw that she was walking without a limp, then he smiled
and went on his way. That was kind of him, she thought
with detachment. When Soren had caught her that first
time they met, he hadn't stayed around to see if she was all
right.
NEVER COUNT TOMORROW 165
But Soren would have married her, even though she was
another man's mistress.
Or would he? He had asked her what she would say if
he proposed, and she had said the answer would have to be
no. She would never know if he would seriously have asked
her to marry him. And suddenly that seemed worse than
all the rest the fact that she never would know.
CHAPTER TEN
LIN had a phone call later in the week from Susan, and
arranged to meet her the following Saturday evening to go
to a film. Lin asked if Rhoda might like to come, and was
relieved when Susan said the other girl had a date already.
Lin liked Rhoda, but she could never see her without re-
membering how wistfully she had looked at Soren the night
of Lin's birthday party, and that memory brought others
flooding back that at the moment she felt much to raw to
cope with.
She couldn't help asking Susan casually, when she met
her, if Rhoda's date was anyone she knew. If it was Soren
she was inviting further pain, but the aching need to know
what he was doing, who he was seeing, was overwhelm-
ing. It was another good reason to stop seeing Susan as
soon as possible, of course. The wound was never going to
heal if she kept on deliberately probing it like this.
But Susan said gaily, 'Oh, it's that advertising guy who
was at the party remember, he's got a curly beard and he
had an orange tie.'
He sounded distinctive enough, and she should have re-
membered him, obviously, but Lin could recall very little
of the party except that Soren had been there. She smiled
vaguely and said, 'Oh, yes,' then led the way into the
theatre.
When she dropped Susan off the younger girl asked,
`How about lunch on Monday?' Then she took a deep
breath and said,
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