to Cait, ‘Well, I’ve never been abroad but I understand it’s not at all easy to telephone back home. Maybe Mrs Thomas has tried but couldn’t get a connection.’
She smiled. ‘Yes, that’s most likely the reason. My mother will have her hands full, though, as my father is not a well man and needs a lot of looking after. They’ve gone to a warmer country at this time of year, in the hope it would do him some good.’
So Nerys had married again. Seemed a bit of a coincidence, though, to Glen that the man she had married just happened to have the same surname as Nerys’s maiden one. He smiled at Cait. ‘Hopefully it will.’ He looked thoughtful. ‘When the union reps insisted you step aside for someone more capable of overseeing the company, they weren’t meaning you should go to the lengths of employing someone new. You could just appoint someone already employed by the company as caretaker till your mother’s return.’
Cait eyed him sharply and told him with conviction, ‘Mr Trainer, I may be young and naive but I did manage to work that out for myself. I asked you if you’d take on the job after finding out that you had the relevant experience, but when you made it clear you weren’t interested I asked Miss Trucker for her advice on who else she thought might fit the bill out of the current employees. It was her opinion that there wasn’t anyone. I didn’t know what else to do but look outside for the right person, in order to honour my agreement with the union.’
Glen inwardly smiled to himself. It was readily apparent that Caitlyn Thomas had been true to her word and had worked hard to change herself into a much more affable person, but he was glad to see that in the process she had not lost her spirit and did after all seem to have more than empty space in her head. He felt that with the right guidance and training, she showed the potential of being capable of running a business such as Rose’s. When he had owned the firm, like his father before him, he had always kept an eye on the younger members of staff and if any showed signs of possessing the ability to further themselves, he would encourage them to do so. Some had gone on to manage other firms, a couple even ran their own businesses. He wondered why Nerys hadn’t already begun the process with her daughter, starting her at the business and allowing her to work from the bottom up as his own father had done with him. Nerys must have had her reasons, he supposed.
Sensitive to her own behaviour nowadays, Cait was feeling mortified about the way she had just spoken. She had slipped back into her old haughty ways. She blurted out, ‘I’m sorry, Mr Trainer, I didn’t mean to speak so rudely to you.’
He smiled at her. ‘You didn’t. You were under the impression I wasn’t giving you credit for having any intelligence, you were insulted and decided to put me right. You did so very eloquently, without any show of your old attitude at all. You were obviously serious about changing your attitude and have worked hard on yourself to make that happen. To have come so far in such a short space of time, you deserve a pat on the back. Anyway, it should be me apologising to you for not giving you the credit you deserve for thinking of advertising the job when there was no one suitable to fill it in the company. It’s very commendable you wish to honour your agreement with the union.’
She sensed from his tone that, regardless, he did have an alternative suggestion. ‘I get the feeling that you think there is another choice, Mr Trainer? If I’m correct, I’d like to hear it, please.’
So she was astute as well, it seemed. She had been hiding all these good qualities in herself under a misguided display of superiority to others, but at least they were surfacing now. To Glen’s way of thinking it was better late than never. He hadn’t at all liked this young woman when he had first met her but found he was quite warming to her now. ‘You’re right, I do have another suggestion. Just carry on as you are until Mrs Thomas comes back. Now that you have started to work with the staff and not against them, the