Barbara Cartland - Running Away to Love

She was suddenly still.

“I have just thought,” she said in a different tone. “Mrs. Hill said that they had asked for a man. But, as they have been unsuccessful in finding one so far, they – might well give me – a chance.”

It was obvious now that Mrs. Hill had been almost positive that she would be refused the position.

As if Nanny knew what she was thinking, she observed,

“There’s no harm in tryin’ and, if they sends you away, we’ll just have to try another Agency. You can’t expect to land on your feet the first time you takes a jump!”

It was so like Nanny to say something like that that Ivana laughed.

“How do we get to the War Office?” she asked.

“We takes a Hackney carriage, that’s how,” Nanny said, “and no nonsense about it. If we hangs about too long, if I knows anythin’ about those office people, they’ll all be goin’ home and the place’ll be locked up.”

Ivana knew that this was sensible of Nanny. At the same time she could not help feeling that it was rather extravagant to hire a Hackney carriage to take them to the War Office.

Nanny, however, insisted and they found a Hackney carriage waiting at the end of the street.

When they told the driver where to go, he seemed impressed. He whipped up his tired old horse and they set off at a quick pace into Berkeley Square.

Nanny was looking out of the window to see where they were going.

Ivana, however, was holding the card that Mrs. Hill had given her tightly in her hand and praying.

‘Please, God,’ she prayed, ‘please let them employ me. I would do anything – anything rather than have to do what my stepfather – wants of me and go – away with that – wicked and cruel old man.’

Even to think of Lord Hanford now made her tremble again.

Nanny put her hand over hers.

“It’s goin’ to be all right, dearie,” she said, “I feels it in my bones and if the worse comes to the worst, we’ll run away together and scrub doorsteps. It’s somethin’ I’ve done before when I was somewhat younger and I suspects that I can do it again.”

Ivana laughed as Nanny had meant her to do.

“I am sure your doorsteps will be much cleaner than mine, Nanny,” she replied.

The Hackney carriage finally stopped outside a large impressive-looking building.

For the first time Ivana looked nervous and was feeling nervous.

“Come with me, Nanny,” she begged her.

Nanny shook her head.

“No, dearie,” she said. “That would be a mistake. Secretaries don’t have chaperones with them. I’ll wait out here. We’ll be ever so extravagant and keep the cab.”

Slowly Ivana descended the steps of the carriage and then walked in through the door of the War Office.

A soldier in very smart uniform with highly polished brass buttons was standing beside a desk.

Ivana realised that he was waiting for her to explain why she was there. She held out the card that Mrs. Hill had given her.

He looked at it and, because he was reading it slowly, it seemed as if minutes passed before he said,

“I’ll have you taken to his Lordship.”

He snapped his fingers and another soldier, who looked very young, almost a pageboy, rose from where he was sitting in the background.

“Take this applicant to the Earl of Lorimer,” the first soldier said sharply.

The boy took the card from him and started to walk ahead, obviously expecting Ivana to follow him.

They walked for what seemed to her for miles along corridors, up staircases and along more corridors.

Then they went down some stairs again before they came to what she thought must be the more important rooms on the ground floor.

She was sure of it when she saw two soldiers obviously on duty in the next corridor that they approached.

They walked past them and then, almost at the end of this particular corridor, the soldier who was guiding her stopped.

He knocked on a door and a deep voice called out,

“Come in.”

The soldier went in by himself and Ivana realised that she was not to follow him.

He half-closed the door, leaving it open just enough so that she could hear what went on inside.

She heard him click his heels and she thought that he must have saluted.

The same deep voice that had said ‘come in’ then asked the soldier,

“What is it?”

“An applicant from the Agency, my Lord,” the soldier replied.

He must have handed over the card because there was silence for a moment.

Then the deep voice ordered,

“Send him in.”

Ivana realised at once that he was expecting a man and her heart sank.

As Mrs. Hill had said, the request had been for a man and she was sure that as a woman she would be rejected before any interview could even start.

The soldier came back to the door and opened it and then Ivana’s chin went up and she walked into the room.

The soldier went out, closing the door behind him and she stood just inside the doorway, not certain whether she should wait or go forward.

The room was small and well-furnished with several comfortable chairs clustered round an empty fireplace

The Earl was sitting at a very large desk, piled high with copious papers.

When Ivana looked at him, she was surprised.

She had somehow expected him to be an old man with perhaps grey or white hair.

She had the idea that anyone in the War Office would be old because the young men would all have gone to fight the War.

But the Earl of Lorimer looked about thirty and was extremely handsome with dark hair brushed back from a square forehead.

As he went on writing, she could look at him without embarrassment. She thought at once that he had a hard face.

There was a squareness about his jaw and a firmness to his lips that told her he would be intent on getting his own way and his orders must be obeyed instantly. He would certainly fight to the end for anything he desired.

It seemed to her to be a long time before the Earl looked up and turned towards Ivana.

“Come and sit down,” he said, indicating a chair on the other side of his desk.

He spoke sharply as if he was giving an order.

Then, when he saw to whom he was speaking, there was an astonished look in his eyes.

“I understand,” he said after a moment, “that you have come here from the Agency.”

“That is right,” Ivana agreed. “Mrs. Hill sent me ‒ to you.”

She had reached the desk by this time and, as she was feeling shy, she sat down quickly on the chair as if she needed its support.

The Earl was still staring at her.

“Is this some sort of joke?” he asked and now his voice was hard, as if he thought that she was an intrusion on his space.

“No, no, of course not,” Ivana replied quickly. “I came in response to your request for someone ‒ who could speak French.”

She then saw what she thought was an unbelieving look in the Earl’s eyes.

Then, with hardly a pause, he started to speak to her very rapidly in French.

He asked her where she came from and how, when she was obviously English, she had learned to speak such good French.

Then he said he thought that she must be under a misapprehension regarding the whole matter. He spoke very fluently, but with just a trace of an English accent.

As soon as he had finished speaking, Ivana replied in what she knew was perfect Parisian French.

She told him, as she had told Mrs. Hill, that she had been brought up with some French children and she said that she had spoken French almost as soon as she could speak English.

She could read French and write in French and, if necessary, think in French.

“That was the sole reason,” she explained, “why, since Mrs. Hill could not find a man for the position, she had come to see him.”