No More Lonely Nights

Her stupefaction made him laugh, brushing his long brown hair back from his thin face.

'All of them, I'm afraid. Whenever I get five minutes to myself, I open my sketchpad.'

'Cass only told me you cooked!'

Danny roared. 'Isn't that typical? He's a materialist, our Cass—just interested in the body, not the soul. Isn't that so, Cass?'

'Let's say the pleasures of the body are easier to get hold of!'

Sian laughed, then met his eyes and flushed, the mockery in his glance reminding her of her own covert assessment of him in the car not long ago.

'But isn't jazz soul music?' Cass asked Danny lightly. 'You know I love jazz. Doesn't that qualify?'

'OK, I take it back—you do have some unmaterialistic tendencies,' Danny agreed, grinning. 'But not many. Nobody who has made as much money as you have can be anything but materialistic.'

'What's wrong with a little ambition? Sian, you're ambitious, aren't you?'

'To be a good journalist, yes,' she agreed.

'To be a success,' Cass insisted, and she had to admit he was right.

'Just as Danny once dreamt of being a great jazzman,' Cass drawled, grinning, and Danny made a face at him.

'You wouldn't have minded that yourself!' he teased, and Cass laughed.

'Really? You wanted to play jazz?' asked Sian, eyes widening in disbelief.

'He certainly did, once upon a time, before the business bug hit him,' Danny told her, an eye on Cass, who was looking wryly amused.

'What did you play?' asked Sian. Then grinning, she added, 'Don't tell me—your own trumpet!'

Danny roared and Cass pretended to punch her. 'Very funny, but it was clarinet, actually, and a little bit of sax.'

'Did you say sex?' asked Danny innocently, and Cass pulled a face at him.

'She knows I meant saxophone, so don't try that old chestnut on her, or I won't send a man down to mend your computer next time it breaks down.'

'Talking about that…' Danny began, and Cass interrupted quickly.

'Not on your life! I'm not looking at it now. I'm hungry and it's Sunday and I want my lunch.' He finished his drink and stood up. 'Come on, Sian, let's get out into the garden before he drags me off to his den.'

The garden was lovely: a small, isolated part of the public gardens, walled off and secret, with rambling roses spilling torrents of red and gold flowers down the walls, lavender scenting the air, a sycamore giving shade and a table and chairs placed on a little patio for them to eat under a yellow umbrella.

'How long have you known Danny?' Sian asked at one point, and Cass shrugged.

'Years now. I was twenty, so was he. He was playing jazz up at Cambridge while I was in college there; he was a student too that year, but he got sent down because he never did a stroke of work. Just made music in the local pubs and clubs. I thought his was a great life for a while. I sat in on some of their sessions in my spare time but, unlike Danny, I did work. My family expected it, and I didn't have either the courage or the motivation to take Danny's route. So I stayed and went into business, and Danny dropped out. He did OK. He's got this place and a lot of friends. He still plays jazz when he feels like it, and we've always kept in touch. He's a nice guy.'

Sian nodded, agreeing, but as she watched the river flowing under the slanting green willows, she thought that Cass was quite a nice guy, too, and full of surprises. She would never have suspected him of wanting to be a jazz musician.

'Why electronics?' she asked him idly, and he answered the sam

e way, in between eating the duck which was their second course.

'Who knows why? As Danny says, I got the bug. Computers came along while I was still young enough to get obsessed with them the way Danny was about jazz. I'm one of those lucky people, in fact, whose hobby is their way of earning a living.' He smiled at her across the table, sunlight turning his grey eyes silver. 'Like yourself!'

Her heart gave a funny little sideways kick and she flushed, as if he might be able to tell what his smile had done to her heartbeat. Her eyes fled and hunted across the garden, but she felt Cass watching her—but thinking what?

'You were right, this food is marvellous,' she said huskily, although she hadn't really thought about what she was eating and couldn't quite remember the first course. Had it been a tossed salad with croutons and hot cheese? Or hadn't it? She hadn't tasted a thing or looked properly. She had been looking at Cass and watching dappled sunlight playing over his face and hair.