by Iris Danbury
Jacynth decided that at midnight she would creep away as unobtrusively as possible to her bedroom. No one would notice her comings and goings. She felt a stab of pain at the thought that all during dinner and since, Mallory had not even glanced her way, let alone spoken to her. If he were ashamed of that little waif who was his secretary, why then had he insisted on bringing her to Hermione’s villa?
She rose, picked up her evening bag, then saw a shadowy figure in a white dinner jacket approach the small table.
“So this is where you’re hiding?” Mallory accused. His sudden appearance at the moment she was chafing at his apparent neglect caused her legs to tremble and she sank into the chair she had just vacated.
“I was just going to my room,” she managed to gasp, for her throat felt dry.
“Then if you’re tired, I mustn’t keep you.” His voice was cool and since she could not see the expression on his face, she was uncertain of his mood. She wanted to assure him that she would gladly sit up all night if she could sit with him and talk.
“No, no, I’m not really tired,” she murmured. “I was—er—just enjoying sitting here.” But that was a clumsy thing to say if he were quick enough to retort that he was sorry to disturb her.
Fortunately he said nothing, but sat opposite her and leaned his elbows on the table.
“Have you enjoyed this week-end?” he asked after a long pause.
“Very much indeed,” she replied, wondering where this coolly polite exchange was intended to lead.
There was no time to wonder for long. A young footman, if that was his designation, came along the terrace, apologised for intruding and spoke to Mallory. Jacynth understood the gist of the message—that Mallory was wanted on the telephone, a call from New York, from Mr. Perandopoulos, Hermione’s father.
With an “Excuse me” Mallory followed the young man and Jacynth was alone again. After a moment or two, she rose and walked the few steps towards a door leading into the villa, but before she reached there, Hermione came towards her in the glowing amber dress.
“Oh, Miss—er—I do apologise for not remembering your name—”
“Rowan. Jacynth Rowan,” Jacynth answered stonily.
“Of course. I’ve been looking for you during the evening, but perhaps you found the society of my friends rather overwhelming.”
“I’m not used to a wealthy environment, if that is your meaning.”
“Exactly. And it must be very clear to you that you would not fit into Mallory’s world.”
“Was there any question of my fitting into Mr. Brendon’s world?” Jacynth queried. “I’m his secretary, that’s all.”
“That’s all?” echoed Hermione sarcastically. “But you’d give a great deal to be something more than that. Admit the truth.”
“I consider that any ambitions I may have are my own concern.” Jacynth did not intend to be bullied into any such admission.
Hermione laughed softly. “Your answer gives you away, but I must warn you that any favours Mallory shows you mean absolutely nothing. Where women are concerned, he is quite unyielding, although he’s accustomed to many girls trying to break down his defences. That girl—your predecessor, I believe she was—she tried very hard, but of course she couldn’t possibly succeed. In any case, she did not know that Mallory’s affections are already engaged elsewhere.”
“By ‘elsewhere’, you mean in your direction?” Jacynth queried.
“It must be obvious, I think, even to you, blinded as you may be by believing that you’re in love with him, that there is only one woman who really counts in his life.”
“Yourself.”
“Naturally. We have been friends for a long time and—I must speak plainly—I intend to marry him.”
“Then what makes you suspect that you have anything to fear from me?” With a supreme effort Jacynth kept her voice steady and controlled.
“Oh, I’m not in the least concerned with any opposition from you. As it happens, I like you. In fact, I like you better than any of the other innumerable girls and women who have tried to force their way into Mallory’s life. And it’s because I admire you that I don’t want to see you hurt. You’re young and vulnerable, and it would be a pity if—”
“Thank you for your concern, Miss Perandopoulos,” Jacynth interrupted, “but I think I’m quite capable of managing my own affairs.”
“ ‘Affairs’ is an unfortunate word to use,” Hermione said smoothly, “for these brief encounters leave no lasting impression on Mallory. They merely mean heartache for the girl.”
Jacynth tried to make a move to leave her hostess, but Hermione stood resolutely in front of her. “If you’ll take my advice, Miss—er—Rowland—you’ll do your best to find a reason for returning to England as quickly as possible. Perhaps you have a relative who might be ill? Your mother? Or father?”
“My parents are dead and I couldn’t rely on other members of my family to time their ill-health so accurately. But I’ll bear your warning in mind and I do assure you that I have no wish to compete with you.”
She felt Hermione’s bristling anger. “You’re extremely insolent. There’s no question of competition.”
“I apologise for my rudeness. I probably spoke too bluntly, but—”
She broke off as footsteps sounded close by and Mallory appeared.
Hermione turned swiftly towards him. “Your secretary and I have had a most friendly chat. Did you speak to my father on the telephone?”
“No. Something went haywire with the line and I couldn’t make any kind of contact. He’ll probably ring tomorrow if there’s anything important.”
So now Jacynth knew that the supposed telephone call was a fake, a ruse on Hermione’s part to entice Mallory out of the way.
Now Hermione linked her arm in Mallory’s and drew him away along the terrace. As soon as the way was clear, Jacynth went into the house and up to her room. For some time she relaxed in an armchair, pondering the events of the day, a day of which Mallory had spent a large part in her company. This morning’s visit to the acropolis in Lindos, then this afternoon he had come down to the beach. She would not flatter herself by believing that he had actually come in search of her, but at least he had stayed with her a long time when he could have gone elsewhere.
His absence from the villa had obviously been noted by Hermione who had decided to lose no further time, but warn off a possible rival.
Jacynth laughed softly. A ludicrous situation! Did Hermione Perandopoulos, an exceedingly wealthy heiress, young and supremely beautiful, sincerely imagine that she was menaced by an insignificant secretary? It dawned on Jacynth that perhaps she should be flattered indeed that Hermione thought it necessary or advisable to give her a rap on the knuckles. A thrill of exultation ran through Jacynth, but she quickly suppressed it with cold reasoning. She must try to put this disturbing man out of her thoughts altogether. What had possessed her to fall in love with a man like Mallory? Was she so impressionable that she was over-ready to give her heart to any attractive man who came within her orbit? Vague memories of David came into her mind. She had believed herself completely heartbroken when Sara had disclosed her engagement to David, but now she, Jacynth, could dismiss that affection as a transient attraction. Certainly a separation of some couple of thousand miles had helped to dull the grief, if only to land her in yet another situation of the same kind.
But now her thoughts came up sharply against the realisation that the love she felt for Mallory could not be compared with any other emotion in her life. Perhaps it would be wise to adopt Hermione’s suggestion and leave Mallory’s employ and the island of Rhodes at the earliest opportunity.
Ironically, it occurred to her that she still did not know if he intended to keep her here or ship her back to England. That latter alternative might, indeed, prove a solution to her present misery.
On the way back to the Villa Kalakos next morning, Jacynth would really have preferred to sit in the back of the car instead of so close t
o Mallory in front. No amount of warning, advice or admonition from Hermione could suppress the throbbing excitement that Jacynth experienced with Mallory at her elbow. In vain she tried to calm herself, but in the end, yielded to the intoxication of the moment while it lasted.
At the Villa Kalakos a letter awaited her. Sara, her cousin, had written saying that she and David would be spending part of their honeymoon in Greece. “Would it be possible to come and see you?” Sara wrote. “I feel rather responsible about you and think I ought to make sure that you’re working for a respectable man and living in comfortable conditions. If you’d rather not meet David just yet, I won’t bring him along when we meet. I don’t want you to be distressed, although probably by now you’ve got over some of your disappointment. We expect to be in Rhodes about the middle of May, so let me know where we can meet...”
Jacynth smiled as she read the letter. Dear, tactful Sara, who would leave her newly-acquired husband waiting in a cafe rather than inflict further unhappiness on a foolish girl who had extricated herself from one tangle only to fall headlong into another.
Sara would indeed laugh if Jacynth revealed the truth. Would Mallory Brendon pass Sara’s test of respectability? That query was unlikely to arise, for Jacynth had no right to invite her friends to the villa. She would have to meet Sara elsewhere.
Now that Mallory was back in his own house, Jacynth noticed a complete change from his relaxed, more casual and friendly attitude during the week-end at Lindos. He was cool and detached, gave her an enormous amount of work to do and was frequently out of the house for long periods. On these occasions he left no address or telephone number where he could be contacted and Jacynth was forced to answer enquirers with vague promises of ringing back when he was available.
One day a call came from Hermione Perandopoulos, who became irritated when Jacynth gave her the usual stock answer.
“Oh, please don’t try to be so important,” snapped Hermione. “Surely a good secretary knows where she can contact her employer? I have something urgent to discuss with him.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Perandopoulos, but I assure you I really don’t know where Mr. Brendon is or when he’ll return here.”
“Then what do you do if some urgent matter arises?” demanded Hermione.
“I have to say exactly what I’m saying now,” returned Jacynth, careful to keep her voice smooth and polite. Then, in a genuine desire to assist Hermione, she added, “Perhaps you would know better than I where Mr. Brendon is likely to be spending his time.”
But that innocent remark served only to increase Hermione’s fury. “Naturally I know most of Mallory’s friends,” she asserted, “but I’ve been brought up by my father not to mix business and pleasure, so I don’t wish to ring his friends.”
“Then I’m sorry I can’t help you any further,” said Jacynth.
“I don’t know whether you’re being unhelpful, extremely rude or exceptionally discreet. Please tell Mr. Brendon that I called and ask him to ring me at the Summer Palace hotel.”
“Certainly, Miss Perandopoulos, I’ll do that.”
Jacynth let out a great sigh as she put down the phone. A fantastic notion now occurred to her that Hermione perhaps suspected that Mallory was spending part of his time with another woman and she wanted to check up on him.
The notion made Jacynth smile. If that were the case, Hermione was showing signs of jealousy and that might indicate that either she loved Mallory or was anxious not to allow him to slip from her grasp.
Dutifully Jacynth wrote down on the desk-pad, “4.0 p.m. Miss Perandopoulos. Ring Summer Palace.” When she went into Mallory’s study next morning, the pad with its messages was exactly as she had left it. Either he had not returned home the previous night or he had ignored all his callers, including Hermione.
At lunch Jacynth made discreet enquiries of Caterina, who disclosed that the master had returned in the early hours of the morning and left again at six.
“Sometimes he spends evenings with friends and then he gets up early to go fishing,” said Caterina.
Jacynth could not believe that she understood the Greek words. “Fishing?”
Caterina indicated agreement.
Jacynth asked no further questions, but when the housekeeper had cleared away, the girl laughed. “Fishing!” she muttered to herself. “A fine tale!” All the same, she wondered what Mallory Brendon was up to—if, that is, he was up to anything at all.
Then one day a week or so later when business routine had settled into its more normal groove, he came into her office and demanded answers to a whole string of questions. At first she had assumed he was contrite about his aloofness and was trying to establish a more cordial atmosphere, but as be delved more and more into what she regarded as her own private life, she became puzzled and slightly irritated.
He had already asked about her parents and how long since they had died. “So you’ve been on your own for more than two years, since your mother died?”
“I shared a flat in London with a distant cousin.” It occurred to her now that she might mention Sara’s probable visit. “She’s coming here soon—on her honeymoon—so perhaps she could call here one day?”
“By all means,” he answered casually. Then he was back at his questioning, asking how she filled in her spare time. What were her chief interests? Dancing? Discotheques?
“Dancing, of course,” she replied. “But I’m not fond of discos. I prefer concerts or theatres when possible and during last winter I went to French conversation classes.”
He raised his eyebrows at that and gave her that slightly sardonic smile that had such a devastating effect on her.
“And now you’re adding Greek to your linguistic abilities.” Jacynth was tempted to ask him how he enjoyed his early morning fishing and what other pursuits he might have, but she bit back the impulsive words, remembering that he was still her employer, with power to fire her or continue to hire her.
Then, after it seemed he had investigated her background and she had imagined it was because of his genuine interest in her, he exploded her rosy fancies with a laconic, “I shall need your passport tomorrow. I have to apply for a work-permit for you.”
He went out of the room before she could recover her wits enough to say anything, either in gratitude because he evidently intended to keep her in Rhodes, or to verify that at last she had worked satisfactorily.
In fact, she hardly knew whether to be grateful or not for his decision. In a sense, she had been half hoping that he might send her home on the grounds of inefficiency. That would have been an ignominious dismissal, but perhaps easier to bear than the constant anguish of loving him in the knowledge that he would never return that affection, that he would never gaze at her with love in his eyes.
When she handed him her passport next day, she said tentatively, “So I’m to be allowed to stay a little longer?”
He was sitting at his desk in the study and now ran his fingers through his thick, dark hair in a gesture she had come to recognise as one he used when he wanted to avoid an immediate reply.
“It seems I have little choice. If I send you home, heaven knows what sort of substitute I might get as a replacement, and in the meantime, the work piles up.”
“I’m sorry if I haven’t given you much satisfaction,” she said demurely.
His reaction was startling. “Satisfaction!” He roared the word at her. “What the blazes do you mean by that?”
Jacynth took a step backwards away from the desk. “Only that—that my work hasn’t been always what you wanted, but I’ve done my best.”
“Yes, you have done your best,” he muttered savagely. “Done your best to ruin—” he broke off, as though only now aware that she was standing only a few feet away. “Leave me and get on with whatever job you’re doing.”
Thoroughly alarmed, she scuttled out of the room as fast as possible. In her office she stared at her typewriter. What did he mean?—“done your best to ruin—”? What had sh
e ruined for him? Surely not even Hermione could accuse her of ruining the relationship between the Greek girl and Mallory.
On the other hand, it was Mallory who had ruined Jacynth’s peace of mind. Never again, she thought—at least for a long time to come—would she know contentment. Perhaps her best course now would be to go back to his study and snatch away the passport which he needed for application for her work-permit. She had only to walk out of her office, along the corridor and into his study, but her body refused to act; she stood up and walked towards the door, but, knowing she was a coward, retraced her steps and sat down. Tears blurred the words of the document she was trying to copy and she brushed them away angrily.
There were times when she hated Mallory with every ounce of resentment she could muster. His cold moods, his brusque treatment of her even though she slaved all hours, his reluctance ever to praise ox encourage her over the work. So what was left that was, in Diana’s words, “irresistible?” Only physical attraction. That was the plain answer, and Jacynth reckoned that she ought to be old enough now to realise how little the magnet of masculine virility was worth unless it was accompanied by a good deal more. Understanding, respect, minds that could travel on the same wavelength—these were some of the essential qualities necessary for a happy marriage.
Suddenly she pulled herself together. What was she dreaming of, drivelling on like this about problematic marriages? From now on for the length of her stay in Rhodes she must steel herself to work like an automaton, impervious to her employer’s taunts or moods and even more armoured against the rare smile or compliment that came her way.
When Mallory announced two days later that he was flying to Crete and would be away for at least four days, she heaved a sigh of relief, but suppressed it almost immediately. She was not quick enough, for he said, “Does that sigh indicate your pleasure in being rid of me?”