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next to the post office. ‘Goodbye,’ she said. ‘I can’t leave Sandy for too long.’
    He probably knew that she had recognised him as a potential enemy because she had ranged herself on the side of his former wife, but he no longer barred her way and she passed him without further explanation. She saw him loitering on the pavement outside the bow-fronted window of the confectioner’s with its pebble-glass panes and the jangling bell which heralded her approach to the counter, and the sharp ping of the bell seemed to echo too loudly in the silence as she waited.
    ‘Can I help you?’
    She was jolted back to the present by the question to find herself confronted by the shopkeeper.
    ‘Yes. Yes, thank you.’ She cast an apprehensive glance at the waiting figure on the pavement outside. ‘Is there another way out?’ she found herself asking.
    ‘There’s the tea-room.’ The woman behind the counter looked surprised by her question. ‘You could go through there and out into Beck Street.’
    Hastily Katherine purchased some home-made candy, going quickly through the door which led to the tiny tearoom with a definite fear in her heart and running most of the way back to the cottage in the lane. Supposing something had happened to Sandy in her absence? Supposing he had been spirited away? Kidnapped had been the ugly word Coralie had used. ‘His father is trying to kidnap him,’ she had said with conviction. He would be ready to go to any length to recover his son, and that was the undoubted impression Katherine had formed during the past ten minutes as she had faced Charles Moreton across the cobbled pavement of the village street. He was a man who would offer no quarter once he had established the fact that she was in the plot to frustrate his immediate plans to take possession of his child.
    Her heart sank as she thought about him, of the way she had reacted to his obvious charm on so short an acquaintance and the unexpected kiss which had shaken her to the foundations of her being. He had been playing on her susceptibility, flagrantly planning to use her for his own ends for as long as he could. Coralie had said that he would be ready to go to any lengths to recapture his son.
    Sympathy vibrated in her for a moment as she realised how much he probably loved his child, but he had broken the law—or was about to break it—by snatching Sandy away.
    Why? Because he was determined to get his hands on a great deal of money, Coralie had declared; because Sandy was a considerable heir under his uncle’s will.
    If the accusation was difficult to believe that was just another proof of her own gullibility, she told herself, running towards Beck Cottage with the bag of candy in her hand. She had told herself a hundred times not to accept people at face value, and it was a kind of madness to think that Charles Moreton might have been different.
    Beck Cottage bore the same deserted look, but she drew a deep breath of relief at the sight of Sandy riding astride the neighbour’s gate with the ducks in attendance.
    ‘You get right down from there!’ she admonished, her voice sharp with relief. ‘We’re leaving right away.’ She moved towards her parked car. ‘You can say goodbye to the ducks.’
    ‘Did you get the sweets?’ Sandy came obediently towards her.
    ‘Yes. Get in.’ She put the striped candy bag into his hand. ‘We’ll say goodbye to Mrs. Yates and be on our way.’
    Trying to find some trace of Charles in Sandy’s bright little face, she drove back down the lane towards the road, but the child was too like Coralie with his fair, curling hair and sweeping dark lashes half veiling the incredibly blue eyes to bear comparison with anyone else. There was nothing in Sandy’s features to suggest that Charles might be his father, but resemblances were not always easy to establish and Charles had acted out the part of her pursuer. Even now, he might still be waiting for her outside the confectioner’s