Hidden Rapture

by Lane, Roumelia

  She thought there was a sharpness in Gary’s tones.

  ‘He broke his wrist,’ she explained. ‘He was shaken up, that’s all, but it didn’t help his condition.’

  ‘No, well, it wouldn’t, would it?’ Gary said almost jokingly. His embrace tightened and he added thickly, ‘Anyway, that’s enough talk about junior for the time being. You and I have got quite a bit of ground to make up.’ He planted his mouth on hers and explored her lips with a kind of brutal satisfaction, then lifting his head briefly he muttered, ‘I can’t think why you dragged us away from your room.

  We could have made a night of it there with the curtains drawn.’

  Vivienne found herself straining away from him and saying rather shakily, ‘Really, Gary! I don’t know how you can suggest such a thing, knowing there’s a young invalid in the house.’

  ‘You always were a bit of a prude, if I remember rightly,’ he smiled sensuously. ‘But you’re older now, and older girls change.’

  His hands were clumsily roaming her body and with a feeling of revulsion she pushed him away and snapped, ‘I haven’t changed that much!’ Some distance apart from him in the darkness she told him quiveringly, ‘I don’t know what you expected coming here at this hour of the night, but if it’s what I think, then the sooner you leave, the better!’

  She saw the glint of Gary’s eyes in the gloom. That smile, a little vicious now, was still on his lips. ‘Our eager little Vivienne has cooled all of a sudden, hasn’t she?’ he murmured. ‘You searched me out, remember? Turned the city upside down, so you told me. You were all over me with your sob story of the kid in the wheelchair, now it seems you’d prefer to forget our little meetings and the fact that you and I were once—shall we say—romantically attached. I wonder why?’

  This was something that Vivienne had asked herself often during the past days, but this was no time for self-analysis.

  ‘You can talk!’ she retorted smoothly. ‘That night when I first saw you at the chemin-de-fer table in the casino, you weren’t in too big a hurry to drag yourself away from the game, as I remember it.’

  ‘Of course not, my sweet. You don’t think you were the main attraction for all this cloak and dagger stuff? Do you imagine I’ve been taking care to mix openly with Colby’s friends at the casino and biding my time as a forgotten Romeo because of fond memories of you}’

  ‘I think you’d better explain what you mean by that.’ Vivienne spoke calmly, though a horrible fear was beginning to make itself felt in the pit of her stomach.

  ‘Gladly.’ Gary’s face and eyes hardened around his smile. ‘I lack the means to live on a grand scale. There are hundreds like me in Tangier. We rub along, scraping a living where we can, waiting for that one-off chance that will bring in the big money. Well, I’ve found mine.’

  Vivienne’s voice was faint, but she managed to say clearly, ‘I don’t understand any of this talk, Gary. And I’d rather not hear any more.

  Perhaps you should go now.’

  ‘All right,’ he shrugged, and moved towards the opening. ‘But I can’t promise that your precious Robert won’t have his dreams disturbed.’

  Vivienne felt a stab of apprehension. She asked swiftly, ‘What has Robert got to do with it?’

  ‘Everything, darling.’ Gary turned, sure of himself, and faced her.

  ‘That’s why you’d better not be in too big a hurry to get rid of me.

  You see, my sweet, I’ve got a plan. And my plan is this. Colby has pots of money; I haven’t a bean. He wouldn’t like his invalid brother to know what’s going on, so in exchange we’re going to relieve him of a little of that disgusting wealth.’

  Vivienne’s blood froze. She said in a shaky voice, ‘What makes you think I’d be a party to anything dishonest?’

  ‘The fact that I’m prepared to go to Robert and explain the whole story of you standing in for this Lucy what’s-her-name,’ Gary said blithely.

  Vivienne swayed. She reached out for support and gasped, ‘You couldn’t! It would kill him!’

  ‘I know, my love. That’s why I think you’re going to do as I say. Now listen.’ Gary’s tones became harsh and businesslike. ‘I’ve wasted enough time waiting for you to show up, and I’m not prepared to put this thing off any longer. Here’s what you do. You’re well known at the casino and you know Trent’s habits. I’ve watched him myself and discovered that he leaves his office round about midnight and spends much of the time after that in the gaming rooms. Right. Tomorrow night you and I are going to find some excuse to go to his office after midnight. We shouldn’t be disturbed while we’re cleaning him out of the casino takings.’

  Vivienne stared, horrified. ‘You’re mad if you think you can get away with anything like that,’ she gasped. ‘The money’s in a safe and only Trent has the key. Also he always locks the office door when he goes into the gaming rooms.’

  ‘Well, that will be up to you, darling,’ Gary said breezily. ‘Likely as not there’ll be two sets of keys—he’ll have to relegate responsibility some time. And living in the same house you’ll know where his rooms are. I’m sure you’ll manage somehow!’

  Vivienne blanched in the darkness. ‘Do you actually think I would go searching for safe keys in Trent’s room?’ she asked quiveringly.

  ‘I don’t think, I know, poppet,’ Gary said with a thin smile. ‘You’re too fond of Robert to see him get hurt. Now don’t let’s waste any more time. I’ve got to be going, and you ought to get back to your room in case you’re missed. I’ll see you tomorrow night at the casino at about eleven-thirty. And if you’re entertaining any ideas of not turning up, forget it. It will be the worse for the wheelchair kid if you do.’

  Vivienne stood riveted in the darkness. He turned in the opening and she could see his smile faintly as he touched his brow in mock salute.

  ‘So long, Viv, my sweet. Pleasant dreams.’ Then he was gone.

  How she got back to her room she never remembered. Sick with fear and disgust, she clung to the bed drapes, the lights spinning as she tried to think clearly. Wasn’t it all some horrible nightmare? Wouldn’t she wake in a moment and find herself breathing a sigh of relief? If only she could!

  She clutched limply for a chair unable to believe what had just happened. Gary, the man she had once thought she was in love with—oh yes, she knew that now—cheerfully stooping to this level!

  Right back to that first meeting at the casino she hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself, but she knew he had changed. Always a little rakish, he had become more dissipated than ever, yet she had foolishly clung to a dream; the dream of herself as she had been at nineteen, believing what she had felt then had been love.

  While other teenage girls passed painlessly through the growing pains of romance, she had held fast stubbornly, because her pride had been hurt no doubt, to something that had been no more than a holiday infatuation. How clearly she saw it all now. Or to come nearer the truth, hadn’t she known it from that first moment in the casino gardens when Gary had taken her in his arms?

  She shook herself, a wave of panic seizing her, and moved agitatedly about the room. What good would it do going into all that now? She had become hopelessly entangled with Gary. She had trusted him by telling him of the role she was playing at Koudia. Now he threatened to go to Robert with the truth. Would he do it? She pressed her hands to her mouth in an agony of picturing the scene. He would. She knew him to have a ruthless streak. She thought of Robert. He loved her, believing her to be Lucy, the writer of all those letters. How would he stand up now to being told that she, Vivienne, was an impostor; someone who had agreed to stand in to keep him happy because Lucy considered herself too plain? He wouldn’t. It would break him in every way. Her face was a ghastly white as she sat down icily calm now.- Whatever else Robert must never know.

  After a sleepless night she rose and dressed shakily and went down to breakfast. Luckily it was Robert’s day for the hospital, so she had only to get through the meal with a bright smile pas
ted on her lips.

  She managed because she told herself that Gary’s plan to ransack the casino safe seemed hopelessly bizarre and fantastic by the light of day.

  But later on when she was drifting towards the pool, the full force of what he expected her to do hit her in such a way that she almost sank to her knees before she reached her chair. Trent, making for the table with his briefcase under his arm, gripped her as she stumbled and demanded, his probing gaze raking her drained features, ‘What’s wrong? You didn’t have two words to say at the breakfast table.’

  ‘A touch of the sun, I suppose.’ She tried to sound cheerful, but her voice came out horribly cracked and shaky. ‘I’ll just lie down for a while. I’m sure it will pass.’

  Trent pulled a lounger into the shade of the sun umbrella and she sank down feeling so sick with nerves it was something of a shock to look up and see his blue eyes and to hear him ask, ‘That better?’

  Vivienne nodded, unable to speak, but in that moment she would have given anything for the comfort of his touch. His touch. She thought of that night in his office at the casino when he had crouched to rub balm over the bruise on her shin, and of the time on Tahad island when he had smoothed her hair against his chest. And there was comfort just in remembering. She couldn’t recall a time when she hadn’t known a kind of vague contentment at Trent’s nearness. She had wanted it to go on. She had even devised the plan of an enforced holiday to cheat a little. It was only now when that contentment was threatened, when something too awful to think about was going to shatter it completely, that the truth dawned. As the mists of her past and her entanglement with Gary receded, blown away for ever by the overwhelming clarity of this new emotion, the hidden rapture came to light and she knew that no man would ever mean as much to her as Trent did. What she had felt for Gary seemed puny indeed compared to the overwhelming force of her love for the man beside her; like a flickering spark against a strong and everlasting flame.

  All this came to her in a flash as often infinite wisdom will, and she realised that her gaze was still locked with Trent’s above her. From where her head lay on the flowered cushion she was stricken with an urge to tell him the whole crazy story. And as he looked down at her she felt that he was waiting in some way for whatever she had to say.

  She clung for a moment to what was offered there, then her lashes flickered down and she said, putting on a careless air, ‘Don’t let me upset things. I’ll just keep quiet here in the shade.’

  Inwardly wretched, she knew she had no choice but to do as Gary said. Trent wouldn’t miss the money in his safe and Lucy’s secret would remain intact.

  From beneath her lowered lashes she sensed that Trent had moved away and taken his chair at the table. She lay sinkingly, her mind in a turmoil. Fortunately Robert was safe at the hospital. But the thought of having to lay her hands on the key to the safe before tonight put her in a cold sweat.

  By lunch time she felt limp with anxiety and nerves, yet she dare not let Trent think that she was ill. She went through the courses at the table with him making the usual small talk, hardly knowing what she ate as her mind wrestled with the problem of the key. Somehow she had to find a way of making a search of Trent’s room when he was otherwise occupied. But how? How?

  She couldn’t still the trembling of her hands and occasionally she was clumsy with her knife and fork. At one time she almost knocked over her water glass.

  Trent, watching her, remarked tersely, ‘It might be a good idea to rest in your room this afternoon, with the blinds drawn. It looks like more than a touch of sun to me.’

  ‘I’m perfectly all right now.’ Vivienne’s glance flew to his. She had to get to the casino tonight.

  ‘Just the same, you’d better do as I say,’ he replied firmly.

  She didn’t want to cross him in any way, so going all out to appear agreeable she said lightly, ‘I did have a bit of a head this morning. I suppose an hour or two would sort of … refresh me for the evening.’

  It didn’t help to find herself swaying as she stood up after the meal.

  Trent offered her a steadying hand and escorted her to the door. It was then that a heaven-sent opportunity dropped into her lap.

  The Berber foreman who managed the fruit orchards was waiting outside in the hall. He usually came to the house to report about once a week and this involved a long session with Trent in the library going through the accounts. This would give her time to search for the keys she had to find. Abdul had gone to eat in the servants’

  quarters. She would have the house to herself.’

  Faint with apprehension at what she was about to attempt, she fought back the nausea and made her way across the hall. She felt that Trent’s glance followed her thoughtfully as she went up the stairs.

  She stayed in her room only a few minutes, then quietly went out of the door again. Along one of the corridors upstairs she could get into the left wing, where Trent had his rooms on the floor below Robert’s.

  It took her several minutes to find her way, but she knew that door facing the left wing staircase. She had passed it often when going up to Robert’s rooms, and occasionally she had seen Abdul leaving with items of clothing of Trent’s over his arm, destined for the cleaners.

  Swiftly she turned the knob and slipped inside.

  She didn’t allow herself the luxury of lingering in a room so personal to Trent, though she was tempted to run her fingers lovingly over an.

  odd tie thrown over a chair; over the books on a low wall shelf beside the bed. If fright hadn’t been dogging at her heels she would have seen far more to interest her in Trent’s apartment; as it was most of it reeled before her eyes as she tried to think, think.’

  Undoubtedly he would be carrying the keys of the casino on his person, but it was fairly certain that there would be a spare set. The problem was where to look. Vivienne fumbled, panic in her throat, among the pockets of his suits in the wall wardrobe, flicked through a chest of drawers which contained his shirts; tried the bedside locker, and the drawer of a rather beautiful carved table near the window.

  Then the idea hit her: the desk which she could just see in the other room. She stumbled through and across the carpet towards it, praying that the drawers would not be locked. She was careful not to disturb the papers there. Every drawer contained nothing but papers, papers.

  And then in a tiny drawer to the left she experienced the horrible flush of success. There, nestling beside a business diary and an Arab dictionary, was a key ring holding, three or four small keys.

  They felt icy cold in her grasp, though it was a hot afternoon. She felt the same kind of cold feathering the back of her neck and the dew on her temples as she stole back towards the door. A last look round to see that she had disturbed nothing and then she was outside. .

  Barely had she turned from the door than her heart flew into her mouth, for there, coming up round the curve of the staircase, was Trent. Every vestige of colour drained from her face as she asked herself frantically, had he seen her coming out of his room? Or had she been just a second ahead of him? There was nothing she could do but hope for the best. She thought he was eyeing her rather sharply and to smooth over a horrible moment she said glibly, ‘I’ve just been up to Robert’s room to see if I could find his bird book. There’s a lovely green bird in the tree outside my room and I wanted to find out its name.’

  ‘A bee-eater, probably,’ Trent said. And still eyeing her he added, ‘I thought you were going to have a lie down.’

  ‘I was actually … but this bird …’ she finished lamely, her voice giving way. She wished in that moment that she could be spirited to the other side of the world. But magically the danger passed and Trent was saying, ‘I told you to draw the blinds. You won’t get any rest staring at the outside glare. Try it. It’s good for the nerves.’

  Had he noticed that she was shaking like a leaf? Perhaps not. ‘Yes, Trent.’ Meekly she turned and went back in the. direction of her own room.

 
; Once inside she collapsed on the bed, the keys biting into the palm of her hand where she had gripped them. Never, never would she want to go through that again. As it turned out, she did spend the whole afternoon lying down. There was no question of her legs supporting her for some time after that ordeal. Nor had she any strength to face the evening to come. But face it she must.

  She didn’t go downstairs until it was time for dinner. She was terrified that Trent would notice her ghostly paleness. He told her over the meal that his brother had come home weary from the hospital and gone straight to bed. This at least was a crumb of comfort to her, just knowing that Robert was safe in his room.

  She wanted to give the impression of having a healthy appetite and ate though the food choked her. And blithely, though a little shakily, she said when they were approaching the coffee stage, ‘I think I’ll drop in at the casino this evening. I feel like a change of air.’

  Trent, whose glance had never been far from her since she had joined him at the table, commented on a harsh note, ‘I’d forget that if I were you. You don’t look capable of making two steps beyond the outside door.’

  ‘Oh, but I am!’ Her pleading gaze lifted swiftly to his and it was all she could do to keep the tears of stress from brimming there.

  She heard his heavy exhalation of breath. His expression was speculative again, although he conceded easily enough, ‘Okay, if that’s what you want. I’ll tell Abdul that he’s to drive you down at whatever time you like.’

  Relief flooded over her that he hadn’t offered to take her with him himself, but she tried to sound offhand. ‘Oh, it will probably be only for an hour, later on. Just for something to do.’

  She didn’t linger once the meal was over. She mumbled some excuse about having things to do in her room and left Trent to smoke his cigarette on his own.

  It seemed an age before she heard his car leave for the casino. She waited, pacing, her heartbeats counting the seconds, until at last it was eleven and time to go downstairs. Abdul was on hand and somehow Vivienne made it to the car, though her knees were shaking badly.