‘Good,’ Nicky said. briskly, although she knew. this as well as Milly. And Roz and Milly exchanged rueful glances.
They didn’t complete as game, however, before Nicky threw her racquet away and sat down suddenly on the court with her head in her hands. Roz came round the net, picked up Nicky’s racquet, found herself wondering if Milly was still home to help her with this crisis, but Milly had gone to visit friends in Nerang…
‘Nicky,’ she said quietly, ‘come inside. We can talk more comfortably there.’
Nicky’s shoulders shook and for a time she ignored Roz, then she stumbled up, and Roz took her hand.
In the den, Roz dimmed the lights and said, ‘Now tell me. It’s Richard, isn’t it‘?’
‘Yes,’ Nicky wept. ‘But how did you know?’
‘I saw you the night before last. I wasn’t spying on you, but I couldn’t sleep and l was standing at the window, that’s all.’
‘And you never said a word!’ Nicky marvelled bitterly, looking up and displaying a tear-streaked, dirty, woebegone face.
‘I thought … if you wanted to tell me you would. Nicky, does everyone else know‘?
‘Of course they know,’ Nicky said even more bitterly. ‘If you know a way of keeping a secret from this damn family of ours, I wish you’d tell me what it is!’
‘But—does, that mean, you haven’t confided in anyone?’
‘I haven’t had to. And nobody’s come out and admitted they know, but I keep getting these well-meaning remarks from everyone on the dangers of marrying young, the dangers of marrying cousins—although he’s not really a cousin—how I should get my degree first and sample life a bit more—that really riled me, Roz, because if I did go out and sample life they’d be the first to be filled with horror, I bet you! I even had a lecture from Mum about how notoriously unreliable one’s first love generally turned out to be. And yet when I was little she used to boast about Dad being the first and only love of her live, and she got married when she was eighteen!’
Roz grimaced inwardly, ‘Is Richard your first love, Nicky?’
‘Yes. Oh, I’ve had some boyfriends, but I never got serious with any of them. You know how it is, you go out with a boy and then when he tries anything, you just know it’s not on. But with Richard it’s different, it’s as simple as that.’
‘Nicky, you asked me the other day whether Adam was my first love and I told you …’
‘l know,’ Nicky interrupted. ‘But one shouldn’t generalise! I mean, there are no hard and fast rules, are there?’
‘No,’ Roz admitted, ‘but l think there’s probably a … a sort of dangerous age when you feel competent to make these decisions and only realise later that you weren’t—Nicky…’
‘Roz, although it wasn’t the first time for you, you weren’t any older than I am when you fell in love with Adam.’
‘But Adam was a lot older than Richard,’ Roz reminded her, yet she thought, oh hell, I’m trying to give advice from a horribly false position.
‘Perhaps, but how long did it take you to make up your mind about Adam?’ queried Nicky.
Five minutes—no, at least half an hour, Roz reflected, and was silent for a time. ‘I suppose,’ she said at last, ‘what I’m trying to say is that in the end you have to make up your own mind but it’s not wise to rush into it, Nicky, and I think that probably applies to any age.’
Nicky glanced at her miserably. ‘Would you …could I ask you a favour, Roz? Would you sort of bring the subject up with Adam? I know it’s a lot to ask, but at least if I knew he wasn’t worried about us being second cousins—well, then I wouldn’t care what the rest of them thought.’
‘I’m sure you could talk to Adam about it yourself, Nicky.’
‘I don’t know why, but l just can’t seem to pluck up the courage,’ Nicky admitted. ‘And I’ve thought he’s been rather—I don’t know—preoccupied lately, which is probably why he hasn’t found out. He and Lucia are the only two who don’t know now, but I think everyone’s been working hard to keep it from her, because she’d have a fit. Nothing short of a title would satisfy her social climbing aspirations these days, although where on earth she expects me to find that, I can’t imagine.’
Roz smiled mechanically because she was thinking how odd it was that Nicky should have noticed that Adam was preoccupied when she hadn’t. How wrapped up in myself I must have been, she thought.