Sara Craven - Summer of the Raven

by Summer of the Raven (lit)

  'Of course I will,’ she said gently, her fingers pressing Sybilla's. 'Don't worry about a thing, and you'll be home before you know it.'

  Sybilla's eyes were heavy, but she managed a smile 'Such a kind child-and such a foolish one. But you'll learn, my dear. You'l learn.'

  Then Sister was moving forward authoritatively, saying Miss Maitland must be allowed to rest now, and talking about visiting hours and arrangements for clean laundry. Rowan hoped that Carne was taking in all these essential tails, because her mind felt suddenly heavy and thick, and she couldn't think dearly any more.

  It was better when they got outside the nursing home. The storm had cleared the air, and racing clouds obscured the stars.

  'But they're there all the same. It's just that I can't always see them,' she thought, and didn't realise she was speaking aloud.

  'What are?' Carne's voice sounded unusually close, and she turned in surprise to find him bending over her, his eyes searching her face.

  'Why, the stars,' she said stupidly, and a thousand more of them burst and glittered in front of her as, worn out by the conflicts and alarms of the past hours, she began to cry.

  Somewhere, she thought she heard Carne swear softly, then his arms went round her and she let herself relax limply against him as deep rasping sobs tore at her throat under the hagridden sky.

  As she began to regain some of her self-control, she realised that somehow he had got her into the car, away, she supposed, from the interested gaze of anyone who happened to be looking out of the nursing home windows. Her wet face was pressed against the silkiness of his shirt, and his hand was stroking her hair as the sobs died away into hiccuping gulps. For a moment it was agonising pleas­ure to stay where she was, to allow the featherlight caresses continue, but at last she made herself sit up and move away from him, using her knuckles to wipe away the last tears clinging to her lashes like the child he thought her.

  'I'm sorry,' she said in a small voice.

  'For what?' He produced a handkerchief and passed it to her. It smelt of his cologne, his warmth, and she touched her mouth with it.

  'For crying all over you. Men hate that.'

  'This man would be very ungrateful to resent any of your tears, Rowan. I think you're entitled to them,' he said quietly.

  'I must look like a freak,' she muttered.

  'On the contrary, you look like the surrounding land­scape--as if you'd been washed by rain,' he sounded faintly amused. 'But this car isn't the right setting. You should be in some forest glade, a dryad, peeping through leaves with a sprig of rowan berries in your hair. I'd like to paint you like that.' His hand reached out, smoothing her hair back from her face, touching the curve of her cheek.

  Her mouth was dry, and breathing was difficult. A crazy impulse to snatch his hand, to drag it to her lips, to her breast, was threatening to overwhelm her, and stonily a voice inside her head was reminding her of the last time that she had so disastrously allowed herself to yield to his attraction. It means nothing, she thought. He's just being kind. He's trying to comfort me because I've been upset. But nothing-nothing has changed. And I must never let myself forget that--or hope for anything else.

  She moved restlessly, a slight turn of the head but enough to indicate that she found his touch unacceptable, and after a second his hand fell away.

  She said, trying to keep her voice relatively light, 'I don't think I want to be painted. Don't you have to keep awfully still? Besides, dryads don't bite their nails, do they?'

  There was a long silence, then Carne said too evenly, 'Probably not. Then I'll have to look for a different model. Any suggestions?'

  She said woodenly, 'I wouldn't imagine there would be any shortage of applicants.'

  'How true,' he said. mockingly. 'And some of them actually want their portraits painted as well.'

  The implication in his words had the power to hurt her, and that was another thing she had to hide.

  After a moment she asked, 'Are--are you going to start painting again?’

  'It seems so,' he said wryly. 'I thought I'd given it up, but it hasn't let go of me. My bid for ultimate respectability will have to be deferred yet again.'

  He pressed the ignition and the car purred into life, making its way slowly down the steep curving drive of the nursing home, and out on to the road.

  Rowan stirred in her seat. She asked bewilderedly, 'Where are we going?'

  'Home, of course.' Carne's hands looked relaxed on the steering wheel, but she was conscious of some tension in him which extended to her. Perhaps he too was re­membering that morning in the garden when she had thrown herself at him, and was regretting creating a further opportunity for physical contact between them. She shrank farther into her corner of the car.

  It began to rain again, and he switched on the wind­screen wipers and turned on the heater. The swish of the wipers and the hum of the engine had a comfortingly soporific effect, and Rowan felt her eyes becoming drowsy as she huddled in her seat. A series of curious meaningless images began to pass through her mind-images of trees, bright with scarlet berries, their branches moving in a breeze which seemed to hold the echo of laughter, and a girl with brown hair who bent to scan her reflection in a pool of water--only it was a mirror, and the face which looked back at her was not her own, but Antonia's, her mouth curving in a smile of triumph and possession, and even the mirror wasn't the same, but a painting in an ornate gilded frame.

  She awoke with a start and a little muffled cry to find the car had stopped, and Carne's voice was saying, 'Calm down, girl. We're home.'

  She fumbled with the catch on the passenger door, but it swung open and he was there, his arms reaching in for her, and lifting her out.

  'What are you doing?' Rowan began to struggle. 'Carrying you,' he replied briefly. 'And don't try to tell me you're perfectly capable of walking, because it isn't true.'

  He was right, but she went 'On struggling, because it would be better to crawl up the steps on her hands and knees than be carried in his arms, her body crushed against his.

  She gasped, 'Put me down!'

  'When I'm good and ready,' he said coolly. 'This is my house, and I give the orders-remember?'

  'I'm not likely to forget,' she retorted rebelliously, and heard him laugh softly. They had reached the front door, and surely he would have to put her down now, she thought wildly. The door was big and heavy, and the handle was stiff, but it swung open without the slightest protest and they were in the hall. Carne was still carrying her, moving with a long, swift stride towards the spiral staircase, and she didn't want to struggle any more--be­cause he had brought her home, and she knew that any­where he was, her home would be, and that what she felt for him was deeper, far, far deeper than any physical at­traction, so deep that she was almost frightened by it. Her arms slid up round his neck, and his stride checked and he looked down at her. There was no amusement in his face, no mockery, only a questioning which stripped away all the pretence, all the defence. Rowan stared back at him mutely, her face naked and vulnerable under his insistent scrutiny.

  Somewhere there was a noise--a door opening-and then Antonia's voice, drawling and rather higher pitched than usual. 'Cradle-snatching, darling? Your-appetites must be jaded these days!'

  The dream, the spell, whatever it had been was shat­tered. Rowan saw Carne's face change, tauten as he turned to look at her.

  He said pleasantly, 'Hardly snatching, my sweet, re­storing her to. her cradle. Rowan's had although evening.'

  'And I, of course, have had a wonderful time. That bloody storm, a power cut in the restaurant, and then back here to chaos,' Antonia said petulantly. 'For goodness' sake put her down, Carne. She's not a baby, after all, and I presume you don't want to become the centre of some adolescent fantasy.'

  'Oh, I don't know.' His own voice lengthened to a drawl. 'It might be rather a novelty-for a while.'

  For a moment Antonia stared at him incredulously, then she turned on her heel and stormed back into t
he room she had left, slamming the door behind her. He stood looking after her for the space of a few heartbeats, then as if nothing had happened, he started up the staircase with Rowan, stunned and silent, in his arms.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HE did not speak or look at her as he carried her along the passage, and shouldered his way into her room. Three long strides took him across it to the bed, and he was lowering her on to it and sinking down beside her, his hands pinning her to the pillow like a butterfly on a cork as she tried vainly to twist away from him.

  He said softly, 'You're home, Rowan,’ and she found herself realising that it was the third time he had used the word 'home' and that three was the magic number in all the fairy tales. Only, suddenly, this was no fairy tale. This was stark reality, and she was frightened alone with him in this room, on this bed. Nor was this her home. It was her cage which she had to share with him-a man who had never lived his life by conventional standards.

  She said, 'No!' on a little gasp, and saw his brows lift as he bent towards her.

  'You don't mean that.' His breath was warm on her face and the silver eyes seemed to glitter as he stared down at her. 'You mean yes. Don't pretend any more, Rowan. Don't pretend about anything. Like the song says 'But for now, love, let's be real.' Be real for me.'

  Long fingers captured her chin, held it still preventing her frenzied twisting on the pillow.

  'Let go of me!' The room was dark, but the plea came from a deeper darkness somewhere inside her. 'You-you don't mean this, Carne. Aren't you afraid I'll make you the centre of an adolescent fantasy?' Antonia's words still stung in the repetition.

  He smiled. 'Women have fantasies too. Wouldn't you like to discover how they differ?' He touched his mouth delicately to the corners of her mouth and the pulse in her throat, and every nerve in her body sang a song she had never heard before, a song she must make sure she never heard again.

  'No.' She closed her eyes against the almost hypnotic effect his gaze was having on her. 'Nor do I want to be the focus for anyone's-jaded appetites.'

  She felt his body tense, his hands tighten painfully on her flesh.

  'Is that a fact?' he said eventually, and his voice was too pleasant. 'Then that's your misfortune, my little nymph.' He began to kiss her, slowly and languorously, parting her lips with insistent sensuousnes, while his hands moved on her, unfastening the buttons of her shirt.

  She said against his mouth, 'Carne--please!' but it sounded like a moan.

  He lifted his head slightly and looked down at her. Tp.ere were little devils dancing in his eyes, and the scar beside his mouth emphasised its cynical twist, He said softly, 'I have every intention of pleasing you, darling, and teaching you to please me too. I'll make you drown in pleasure. Like this.'

  His questing fingers had already found and dealt with the small clip which fastened her bra in the hollow between her breasts, and now his mouth followed the sensual, teas­ing path of his hands. His tongue made little circles on her skin, and her breath choked in her throat as she fought to retain even a semblance of control while his lips tormented the rosy tauteried peaks of her aroused womanhood.

  Her hands reached up involuntarily, spreading across his back, drawing him down to her, and he muttered huskily, 'For God's sake, Rowan, touch me, not my clothes.' She obeyed, her fingers fumbling with the buttons on his shirt, partly because she was shy, and partly because her whole body was trembling with the desire he had created in her. The warmth of his skin beneath the ten­tative exploration of her hands was a reassurance in some strange way, so that when his mouth returned to claim hers once more, her response was unguarded and innocently passionate. There was a new urgency in his caresses, a new demand in his touch which she answered willingly. Even when his fingers released the button on the waistband of her jeans and began to slide down the zip, she had no thought of protest, only an acquiescence which seemed to melt her bones.

  Somewhere, she was dimly conscious of an alien sound, hut it did not really impinge on her awareness until Carne thrust himself away from her with a muffled curse, looking over his shoulder at the door. And then she realised what the sound had been. There was someone at the door­-someone knocking, who could only be Antonia. At any ­moment she might walk in and see them there together. With a little incoherent cry she sat up, dragging the edges of her shirt across her body.

  'Carne? Are you there?' Antonia's voice sounded sweet and a little plaintive. It's the telephone, darling. I couldn't quite make it out, but I think it could be the nursing home.'

  Carne muttered with a groan, 'Sybilla--oh, my God!' He almost flung himself off the bed, thrusting his shirt back into the waistband of his pants as he went. Rowan heard the door open, and his voice sharp with enquiry, then there was silence. She lay alone in the darkness feeling dizzy and a little sick. One minute she had been half way to some kind of seventh heaven, and now she was back on earth with a vengeance.

  She swung her feet to the floor and stood up gingerly, wondering whether her legs would support her and rather surprised when they did. She took off the rest of her clothes and put on her nightdress, then went across to the dressing chest to brush her hair.

  Her own eyes, wide and shadowed, looked back at her, and not a stranger's, and she knew she had to be glad of that. She still belonged to herself. But for the interruption she would have given herself to Carne without a second thought, and lived to regret it for the rest of her life. Be­cause although she loved him, she would not have woken in his arms the following day to find herself beloved in return. To him, she was simply a novelty-and even that was provided by her innocence. But once she was innocent no longer, she would not even have that attraction for him.

  She put the brush down with a little inward shiver. All the time she was listening for the sound of someone coming. If something had happened to Sybilla, surely one of them would tell her. The thought of having to make herself go downstairs and face Antonia was a distasteful one, yet she could not sit in her room for the rest of the night and not know what had happened.

  She put on her dressing gown and belted it tightly around her, and slid her feet into slippers. Then she made her way downstairs. Halfway down the spiral staircase she paused, puzzled. The sitting room door stood ajar, and there was the sound of music coming from the lighted interior. Rowan went across the hall and pushed the door open fully. Antonia was sitting with her feet up on the sofa, smoking' a cigarette. She looked towards the door a Rowan came in, and smiled, a small, triumphant smile.

  'If you're looking for Carne, darling, then he's not here.

  His-caller had rung off by the time he got downstairs, so he's gone chasing off to the nursing home to see what's happened.' She smiled again. 'You know, if Sybilla was­-say, forty years younger, I could be quite jealous. Well, don't stand there hovering like a ghost! Come in, sit down and we'll have a cosy little mother and daughter chat. I'm sorry I had to curtail your romantic little interlude, but I thought it had probably gone far enough.'

  'You mean-you don't care that Carne made love to me?'

  Antonia looked at her with a kind of amused tolerance. 'Oh, I don't think it got that far-certainly not in so short a time. Carne has far too much finesse for that. Don't forget how well I know him.' She stretched languidly, her arms above her head, her full breasts straining against her thin sweater. 'He was ripe for a little--mischief. 1 sensed that when we were together earlier, and 1 knew I'd have to be careful. I'm having the devil's own job to keep him out of my bed as it is.'

  Rowan said quietly, 'I don't think 1 want to hear about your relationship with Carne, Antonia.'

  Antonia shrugged. 'I just don't want you to get ideas above your station, my sweet. I thought it would be quite interesting if Carne--amused himself with you for a while. I decided I'd call a halt at an appropriate moment, always supposing your naturally virginal qualms hadn't already done so. For all his experience, I doubt if virgins are alto­gether to his taste.'

  'You are quite vile,' Rowan
said very clearly and distinctly. 'And the phone call?'

  'Quite bogus, darling, as you've guessed. All a terrible mistake on my part when he returns. He won't be in the best of tempers, of course, but then what man would be? I had to fight him off earlier, and now you've been snatched away almost at the moment of truth.' She gave a little yawn. 'I'm so glad I'm not a man. Such basic creatures! A little healthy frustration will bring most of them to heel.'

  'And you think playing a kind of sexual Grandmother's Footsteps with Carne will make him propose marriage eventually?' Rowan couldn't conceal the scorn in her voice.

  Antonia's eyes widened. 'Oh, I think so, darling. After all, he's proposed everything else. Where are you going?' 'To bed,' Rowan retorted bitterly.

  'Very wise,' Antonia approved. 'But just one thing, sweetie, don't lie awake hoping. Driving to Heatonbank and back will have cooled Carne's ardour, I imagine. But even if it hasn't, surely you don't really want to be second best?'

  From the door, Rowan said wearily, 'At this moment, I don't even want to be first.'

  But it was a long time before she could get to sleep, lying alone in the darkness, and telling herself over and over again that she was glad to be alone.

  She managed to slip out of the house without meeting anyone the following morning, and reported for work as usual. Grace commented immediately on her wan appear­ance and demanded to know if she was sickening for something.

  Rowan said she didn't think so, and wondered privately what Grace would say if she told her she was sick at heart.

  Fortunately two coach parties arrived almost within minutes of each other, and Rowan was kept too busy find­ing wrapping paper and suitable boxes for the customers to bear their spoils away in to worry about her own problems. It was lunchtime before she had any time to herself. Grace and Clive were both busily absorbed in the pottery itself, so she carried her mug of homemade soup and cheese and apple sandwiches into the showroom and ate them by herself. She was sitting staring rather drearily through the window waiting for the next influx of visitors when David came into the shop.