Vivienne turned to rest her smiling eyes on him. ‘A present? For me?’
He shrugged with a grin, ‘You threatened to go threadbare on us, remember. I thought for everyone’s peace of mind we’d better do something about that one and only swimsuit.’
Vivienne’s lips twitched. She remembered the fight she had had with Trent over her bikini. It seemed a long way in the past now. They hadn’t had a skirmish for some time. She lowered her lashes and said demurely, ‘Well, thank you.’
The wheelchair was returning, and waving excitedly but with some little frustration, Robert called, ‘Hey, you should see the birds back there in the woods behind the rocks! It’s like a zoo aviary. And what prize nit forgot to pack his field glasses!’
‘Relax,’ said Trent, rising to his feet. ‘I brought them. They’re in the house.’
Vivienne went back with Robert to bird-watch where the pines grew down to the rocky edge across on the far side of the beach, so that it was sunset before she was able to open the parcel in her room. She found a couple of expensive swimsuits patterned in exotic Indian designs, a striped shorts-and-bra beach outfit and two embroidered shortie caftans. They were lovely garments and Trent must have a trained eye for measurements, where she was concerned at any rate, for every one fitted perfectly. When they were refolded again on the bed, these bright new assets to her wardrobe, she looked at them and suddenly felt the glisten of tears in her eyes. Which was foolish indeed, she told herself.
They dined informally on the spacious patio with the glass screens drawn back and the waves washing restfully over the rocks almost at their feet. The scent of juniper, tamarisk and pine mingled with the strong, warm odour of the sea and the night was black beyond the windows with nothing to remind them of the civilisation that lay behind them on the mainland.
Robert had stayed up to have dinner with them, and Vivienne was touched by the sight of him, his blue eyes, so like Trent’s, aglow with the novelty of the adventure, his flaxen hair tousled and smelling of the sea. He was talkative too and while he raided away to Trent about what they had seen during the afternoon she thought, more than a little pleased with herself, that the break from Koudia had truly given him something new to think about.
Haroun came to wheel him away to his room just after nine. Vivienne sat on one of the settees in the comfortable lounge and flicked through a magazine. Trent, in an armchair across from her, seemed absorbed in the book he had chosen for himself from the packed shelves. She thought he would have gone off to change for the casino before this. They were only fifteen minutes by boat away from the mainland and barely the same again by car from the city.
Around ten he closed the book and said with a wry smile, ‘I’ve a nasty suspicion that all Tom Harris’s novels are whodunnits.’
Turning the pages of her magazine, Vivienne joked, ‘Perhaps he thinks the island is the ideal setting for that kind of reading.’
‘It’s also a good spot to get lost in a rip-roaring saga of the sea, if I could find one,’ said Trent, eyeing the bookshelves but making little effort to rise.
Vivienne asked then, ‘Aren’t you going to the Cafe Anglais?’
His answer was to relax back further into his chair. Then he replied, ‘I’ve left Raymond in charge of the gaming tables. And Abdul knows the office routine. He’ll be making the nightly trip in my place.’
Vivienne looked at the glossy photographs and-news items before her without seeing them. She became acutely conscious of the quiet of the house and the fitful sigh of the sea breezes gently buffeting the windows. She thought Trent might have offered her a cigarette, she could have done with something just then, but he sat, or so it seemed to her, looking down at his shoes. She turned the pages of her magazine, conscious of their dry crackle as the silence stretched between them, then Trent said, ‘Like to go for a walk on the beach?’
She rose with him and said brightly, ‘That would be nice.’
It was just light enough to see the path by the blaze of stars. The sea spilled in from the darkness leaving frills of foam at their feet. They walked along its edge, neither saying a word as their shoes crunched in slow rhythm over the sand, as the wind sighed softly out at sea.
They walked the entire stretch round the projection of beach, then they said goodnight and went to their rooms.
The days that followed at the island retreat had a magic holiday flavour. They borrowed a small boat and Trent carried his brother aboard piggy-back style amidst joking comments, and took them on picturesque excursions round the island alongside rock pools and bird sanctuaries. They swam in the sea-water pool, a charming hideaway at the side of the house screened by palms and cascading greenery and dotted with giant make-believe waterlilies. And not content with this, Robert swam in the sea too, ducking Vivienne and punching a ball to Trent, and dragging himself out mainly by his hands when he felt like it to flop out laughingly on the beach.
Lying alongside him in the hot sun, Vivienne would try not to notice his dwindling frame, or if she did she would tell herself, with a tightness in her throat, that at least he was getting the utmost out of the days that were left to him. He made the trip to the hospital in his usual unfussy way, insisting that he needed no one except Abdul to accompany him. Vivienne took advantage of his absence to wash the salt water out of her hair and later stretched out on a sun bed where the shade of pines softened the view of beach and sky. Trent flicked through the daily newspaper nearby.
They all grew very brown with the open air life they were leading, the ruggedness of sea and sand landscape contrasting considerably with the formal luxury of Koudia. Trent developed a weathered look, his hair sandy and windblown as he helped Robert to cast a fishing line, his teeth strong and white against the ruddy glow of his face as he shipped the boat in at sunset.
Vivienne found herself wishing that life could stay suspended like this, for Robert too; that they could all three go on just as they were with no interference from the outside world. With the long summer days and nights when the sky was jewelled with stars it certainly seemed that nothing could break the spell.
She spoke her thoughts to Trent one evening when the beauty of the night awoke in her a sudden rush of words. They were standing looking at the moonlit sea from the front steps of the house and it had grown very late. ‘It’s all so perfect,’ Vivienne rested back against a vine and sighed. ‘It doesn’t seem possible that there could be anything to mar such contentment.’ But there was. They both knew there was.
She didn’t know why she should feel so strongly about it just then.
She supposed it was pure anguish and frustration that made her whirl to him and say from the depths of her heart, ‘I wish there was something I could do, Trent.’
He eyed her lingeringly where they stood in the shadows and remarked slowly, ‘You’re a strange girl, as I’ve said before.’
‘Why?’ she flashed a tear-bright gaze at him. ‘Because I don’t want Robert to die?’
‘No. That’s natural.’ He shrugged this off, a mask over his own feelings and continued with a watchful smile, ‘Half the time you fuss around Rob like an affectionate younger sister, but looking like you do now I could almost believe that he means everything to you.’
She lowered her gaze swiftly, deciding it was better to make no comment on this. Partly because she was emotionally cut-up and partly because she wanted to change the subject she said with a gesture of helplessness, ‘Talking is so ineffective. If only there was something we could do! Robert is a sweet and sensitive person. He doesn’t deserve to have his life cut short like this.’
Trent said with a grim look, ‘It’s a good job he’s not here now to hear you talking like this.’
‘Oh, it’s all right for you men,’ she flung at him impatiently, ‘keeping everything bottled up inside. We’re not like that. Sometimes it helps to have a good feminine bawl.’
‘You can cry if you want to, but it won’t cure Rob.’ Trent spoke with steely self-control and Vivienn
e hated herself then. Knowing that he felt more deeply than she ever could, she slumped against him and cried into his chest, ‘Oh, Trent! I do so want everything to go on being so wonderful for Robert. It’s all been like some fabulous dream since we came to Tahad Island. I can’t bear to think of anything spoiling it. I want it to go on and on.’
‘Maybe it will,’ Trent said gently. ‘Maybe it will.’ He stroked her hair, then looked down at her with his old grin. ‘You wanted to try taking the boat to the cypress lagoon on the west side.’
She looked up expectantly. ‘Can we?’
He nodded. ‘I’ve made enquiries, and it’s quite safe. According to the speed launch skipper there’s mackerel and red snapper, bream and jew-fish there. But we’ll have to be up at first light to appreciate the peace of the place.’ He propelled her purposefully indoors and as she left him to go to her room she said with a sleepy smile, ‘Robert will be thrilled.’
Though the days drifted pleasantly by both she and Trent knew it couldn’t last. But what happened to bring an abrupt end to the idyllic island life was something neither of them had expected.
It was one afternoon when she had gone to the wood round the curve of the beach with Robert to see what birds they could find. They had spotted partridges and snipe and several colourful birds they didn’t know the names of, and altogether the excursion had been highly successful. When they grew tired of looking at nature they turned their gazes towards the sea and sat and listened to the restful sound of the waves lapping over the rocks.
The path led straight up a gradual incline from the beach and Vivienne had often pushed Robert’s wheelchair this far without any trouble. She usually perched on a rock somewhere near him and this afternoon she had chosen a smooth jutting section, just below his footrest. Robert was in a mellow mood as he often was these days, being so close to nature. ‘You know,’ he said, his crinkled blue gaze trained towards the far horizon, ‘I never thought I’d see so much sea.
Living with it on your doorstep like this, and having it all around you, makes you realise what tiny beings we are.’
‘It does have a sort of whittling down effect,’ Vivienne agreed. She added laughingly, ‘Now you know what it feels like living on a speck in the ocean.’
He nodded, taking in the views around him, then he said feelingly, ‘You found me an island, Viv. I’ll always be grateful to you for that.’
Always. How long was that in Robert’s reckoning? A week? Two weeks? Steeling herself not to show any brightness in her eyes, she said gaily, ‘I mustn’t take all the credit. Trent was the one who badgered the owner to let us have this place.’
Robert smiled. He said thoughtfully, ‘You two get along better these days.’
‘Trent and I have always been friends,’ she lied. And with light-hearted flattery, ‘Who couldn’t get along with a brother of yours?’
‘You’re easy to like yourself.’ His gaze turned molten as he looked at her. ‘You know I couldn’t get along without you, Viv.’
Afraid that he was going to become over-emotional she said flippantly, ‘Well, for the next half hour or so, you’re going to have to try. Maurice has promised to show me the secret of his apple soufflé.
And incidentally,’ she looked at the sun lowering towards the sea, ‘we ought to be getting back. We won’t be able to take the short cut through the trees to the house if it gets too-gloomy.’
‘I suppose you’re right.’ He sighed, humorously resigned.
They were preparing to move off, and disaster in that peaceful spot was the furthest thing from their minds. Vivienne started to get lazily to her feet, then everything seemed to happen at once. She hadn’t realised that the smoothness of the rock she had been sitting on would offer so dangerous a foothold. Not until the underside of her sandal came into contact, then it was too late. Skidding giddily, she could find no way of saving herself. She thought that Robert thrust a hand out to steady her, or she grabbed at the arm of his chair.
Whatever, the next thing she knew was that she was splayed out where she had slipped and the wheelchair with Robert in it had gone hurtling down on to the rocks below.
It was only a drop of three or four feet and there were sand pockets out of reach of the sea. But when Vivienne picked herself up and saw the empty wheelchair and Robert crumpled on the rocks she almost fainted with fright. Her screams brought Trent and Haroun and the whole household.
By this time Robert had managed to pull himself into a sitting position. He saw the faces of those above him and said with a grin, ‘Don’t look so worried, everybody. I’m all right.’ But his arm was twisted in a strange way and his face was ashen.
Trent had a doctor brought out from the mainland and for a while there was much commotion around the house, ft was dark before things finally quietened down and Trent went to the boat to see the doctor off. Vivienne was waiting near the doorway when he returned, where they often stood to watch the moon playing on the sea through the pines. She turned dejectedly at the sound of his footsteps and asked in dull tones, ‘How is he?’
‘Better than we expected.’ Trent spoke cheerfully, though she suspected this was mainly for her benefit. ‘Rob’s broken his wrist and picked up a few bruises. He’s been given a sedative. He’ll sleep till morning.’
‘It was my fault, you know.’ Vivienne flashed a tear-bright gaze at him.
Trent looked weary, but he spoke gently. ‘Rob told me what happened. You slipped and he tried to save you. You don’t have to blame yourself.’
‘But I do!’ The tears were more in evidence as she paced. ‘I stupidly picked an unsafe place to sit and I hadn’t the sense to see that the wheelchair was too close to the edge. And Robert ‘ she whirled on Trent. ‘All he’s had to go through and he had to go crashing down helplessly on to the rocks.’ She wrung her hands and cried to the stars, ‘Why couldn’t it have been me!’
‘You would have come off a lot worse,’ Trent said in clipped tones.
‘Rob was a rugby player, remember. He knew how to fall.’ He reached an arm out to steady her, his voice considerably softer. ‘Take a hold on yourself, Vivienne. Accidents happen.’
‘But we’ll have to go back?’ Her eyes searched his face questioningly.
‘I’m afraid so,’ Trent nodded. ‘Rob will have to have his wrist set, and in his condition it wouldn’t be wise for him to remain on the island.
But there’s no reason why life should be any less attractive at the villa … is there?’ He was watching her closely.
‘No … of course not.’ She tried to sound cheerfully resigned. She led the way indoors to start packing, a pulse hammering in her throat.
They were going back to Koudia and she couldn’t tell Trent why she was afraid.
CHAPTER EIGHT
ROBERT suffered considerable pain with his wrist and for a day or two after their return to, Koudia he was compelled to take things quietly. The fall had shaken him more than he cared to admit and though his grin was very much in evidence he looked weak and ill from the shock. Vivienne read to him, mainly poetry from his favourite volumes, in the shade of the trees near the pool. She wished she could have pleased him more by speaking the words as he liked to hear them. Sometimes he read to her to give her some idea how a poem should go, and she was inwardly moved then by the depth of feeling in his voice.
He retired to his rooms early in the afternoons and she was left with long hours to fill in the evenings, once Trent had left for the casino.
She spent the time browsing round the books in the library and even playing an occasional record in modulated tones. She had developed a strong reluctance to going to her room until the last possible moment before bed. One night she had gone up rather late and was on the point of running a tepid bath before slipping between the sheets when the sight of a shadowy figure out on the balcony brought her heart into her throat. Gary drifted up to the open doorway and looked around the luxuriously furnished room with a surly smile on his lips.
‘You
do all right for yourself, don’t you, playing sweethearts with the brother of a rich casino owner.’
Vivienne hurried across to the door with a chalk-white -face and gasped, ‘Gary! You shouldn’t have come!’ She looked around wildly and took him by the arm. ‘We can’t talk here.’
‘Oh, I don’t know.’ He lingered mulishly, his glance taking in the tastefully lit interior, the damask-draped bed. ‘It looks the ideal place for a chat to me. Cosy … comfortable…’
‘The minzah,’ Vivienne was tugging him cajolingly. ‘You know we’ll be much safer there.’
As though he knew she was talking sense he moved at last with her down the steps, but in such a stubborn, oddly smiling way that her nerves screamed at the risk they were taking. It seemed an age before they were stumbling into the doorway of the minzah, Vivienne having half tugged, half pulled him along the route through the mimosa thicket. She thought her heart would burst from the effort and the choking anxiety, but Gary had no intention of giving her breathing space. He pulled her to him as soon as they were in the ruined pavilion and said with a sulky gleam, ‘You didn’t tell me you were going away. I suppose you thought it was one big joke, me coming up here and finding the place all closed up?’
‘There wasn’t time.’ Vivienne winced a little at his roughness. ‘It was all decided on the spur of the moment. I couldn’t possibly have got word to you.’
His smile sloped cruelly for a moment, then his grip on her eased and he spoke in more agreeable tones. ‘Well, it was damned inconvenient you disappearing like that, but you’re back now, so what does it matter?’ He put his arms about her and let his mouth travel over her throat, asking, ‘Did you miss me?’
‘Well … I didn’t have time to think much.’ Forcing a smile, she drew away from him slightly. ‘Things were -rather hectic, and Robert had an accident. That’s why we had to come home.’
‘What kind of an accident? He’s all right, isn’t he?’
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