“I d-don’t know. I’ve never done this before,” she said, trying weakly to make a joke of it.
“You’d better have,” he said grimly. He tested everything for strength then made her ready.
“All right?”
“I think so.”
“Good girl. All right, hoist away,” he shouted to those above. “Now, away you go. If you swing into the rock wall, push yourself off it with your feet. Don’t panic, you’ll be up in a jiffy.”
Terrified, she felt him push her firmly off the ledge. She was swinging now, above the darkly luminous water. Fatal to look down. Look up, at the faces coming nearer. Fend yourself off the rock wall. Oh, God, that was a bat, there are hundreds of them, hanging upside down like bunches of herbs drying. Up in a jiffy? It was taking hours...
Then Mark’s blessed voice, his hands under her arms, hauling at her.
“I’ve got you, Chloe. God, what a fright you gave us. Up ... you ... come. That’s the girl. There you are, all safe and sound.”
She was sitting on the ground, laughing weakly. Du Plessis was holding out a silver flask he had pulled from his pocket.
“Take a spot of this, Miss Linden. Good South African brandy, overproof. Guaranteed to kill that chill.”
“Thank you.”
She gulped some, and it flowed down like fire. It warmed her way down inside.
She handed it back with a grateful smile.
“I’d like some, too. Good for shock, isn’t it?” Louise’s voice, the voice that had said, “I know about the step. It’s the fourth one.” She had known all the time it was the fifth, or how had she got down there safely herself? Chloe couldn’t bear to look at her when she asked, with false concern, “How do you feel, pet?”
“All right, thanks.”
“Goodness, what a scare. You nearly gave us heart attacks. Didn’t you know which step, silly? And why go down there, anyway?”
If I said now, it was your fault, you tried to kill me, would any single one of them believe me? Chloe asked herself. Wouldn’t they at once assume I was light-headed from shock, and rush me off home to bed, and get the doctor to come, and give me tranquillizers or something? Of course Louise knows that. She knows I can’t accuse her of attempted murder in front of them all. She knows she’ll get away with it. I’m no match for her, never have been.
But I’m alive. In that way I’ve won, and she’s lost. What must she be feeling?
Whatever Louise was feeling, she didn’t show it as she talked away, between drinks of brandy, to Toby and Mark and Du Plessis and the others of the team. They were all there now, helping to pull Dominic up.
Now Dominic himself was standing dripping in the center of the group, taking a hearty swig from Du Plessis’s flask.
“Years since I went up the mast in a bosun’s chair,” he said cheerfully, and everybody laughed more heartily than the quip warranted, out of sheer relief that nobody had been hurt or lost.
“Now, what about a change of clothing for you both?” suggested Walter Fiennes, the married one of the team. “Toby’s for Miss Linden, I should think. They’re about of a height, though she’ll need to take a lot in at the waist. Mine for you, Dominic, I think they’ll fit. I’ll organize some dry towels, so you both can get dry. And Du Plessis can brew some tea and lace it with his overproof liquor, eh, Hendrik?”
“Yeah, man.”
It was Toby who led Chloe tenderly to his tent. Dominic hadn’t said anything to her since he came up. Was he angry? Would he, if she told him the truth when he asked her again what the devil she was doing down there, believe her? Could she ever bring herself to tell him?
“Here you are, Chloe. Towel, hot water, shirt, shorts, belt. Have a good rub.”
“Thanks, Toby.”
When he had gone she stripped off her sodden shirt, slacks and underwear and wrung them out as well as she could into Toby’s canvas bucket. She took up the rough towel and plied it vigorously till her skin reddened. Then she got into Toby’s shirt and shorts, pleated the huge waist around her, belted it in. She had peeled off her torn nylons, and would have to go barefoot. She didn’t suppose any of the team took her size in shoes.
Vigorously she toweled her wet hair. It clustered in curling tendrils around her face, drying quickly. She needed powder and lipstick, she thought, looking at her pale face in Toby’s scrap of shaving mirror. Her handbag was in the place of the oracle, she supposed. She put her head out of the tent and called to Toby to get it for her.
Dominic came out of another tent, also wearing borrowed plumage.
“It fits you better than mine does,” she said, trying a smile on him. But he didn’t smile back. He was angry—though he’d been kind in the water, and when they were climbing the staircase. When he said, “Do I qualify?” it had simply been a sarcastic quip. No use building anything on that, Chloe Linden.
“As soon as we’ve drunk this tea we’ll get back to Santa Clara,” he said brusquely. “I should think you’d better take a hot bath, then get to bed.”
“Oh, but...”
She didn’t go on because his look, his implacable look that she knew from that first day, quelled her; also, she was conscious of a coldness, deep inside her, that the brandy had helped but not defeated.
The tea, hot and sweet and laced and wonderful though it was, didn’t defeat it either. Had she caught a chill? Not surprising, if she had—but what a nuisance, what a bore.
“Finished? I’ll drive you,” Dominic said.
“I’ll come with you, darling,” cooed Louise, jumping up.
“No, come with Mark, he’ll bring Chloe’s car in.”
“But I’d prefer...”
Dominic ignored her and walked over to his car.
“Come on, Chloe.”
Chloe picked up her handbag, thanked Toby and the others warmly and moved after Dominic. He had taken a blanket out of the trunk and tucked it around her.
“Still cold?”
“A little, sort of inside me. Are you?”
“I’m all right. We’ll get Galea in to see you.”
“Oh, that won’t be necessary, I shouldn’t think.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
If I haven’t caught a chill already, I’ll get one, if you speak to me in that icy voice, she thought wryly.
They started off.
“Perhaps you’ll admit now that women do make trouble on a dig,” he said after a while.
“You said emotional trouble.”
“Emotional or not—trouble. Just exactly what were you doing, running down those steps?”
Now for it.
“I thought someone shouted for help ... Louise...”
“But Louise was asleep on the grass outside.”
She had been right. Nobody would credit the story.
But Dominic had shot one penetrating look at her, and was now very thoughtful. After a while he said, “All right, Chloe. Let’s forget it.”
“I’m sorry if I gave you—everybody—a fright.”
“That, my dear Chloe, is putting it mildly.”
“And I haven’t thanked you for rescuing me. I know it sounds corny to say it—but you did save my life, didn’t you?”
He turned to grin down at her.
“You should add in thrilling tones, My hero. Lucky for us we’d had a look at that cave already, wasn’t it?”
“I remember now—I had a feeling then, that day. Pauli crossed himself, and suddenly I shivered and couldn’t stop. Not with cold. A sort of premonition. As if I knew even then that something bad was going to happen to me in that cave.”
“Was it very bad?”
“I was terrified. That awful drop, the plunge into that icy water, the thought of things reaching up at me from below...”
“Poor Chloe!”
“And you—you deliberately jumped down into it.”
“As I said, My hero. You forget I knew the place. I knew there was plenty of water under me.”
She said obstinately,
“All the same, you came and saved me. I was wondering if perhaps nobody had heard me scream, if I would be dead of cold and fright before anyone found me.”
She shivered again, and Dominic said, “Stop thinking about it, Chloe. What you want is a hot toddy, hot bath, hot water bottle and a good long sleep.”
“I’ll be drunk, all that brandy.”
“Help you to drop off.”
They crossed the drawbridge without her noticing and were pulling up outside the gates of Santa Clara. How fast he must have driven.
The gates opened, he drove in and stopped. He came quickly around to her door to open it and help her out.
“Upstairs with you,” he said. “I’ll send Lotta to you, she’ll look after you. Warmer now?”
“A little.” But there was still that core of coldness inside her.
She looked up and said, “You’re not still angry with me, Dominic?”
He gave her a long, speculative look.
“Not angry. Just interested to know what really happened to make you do that fool thing. Maybe I’ll ask Louise if she can tell me.”
“Oh—please don’t do that.”
“No? Why? She was around...”
“Please don’t ask her.” She was his cousin’s wife, had once been his own love. She had failed in her intention. Best leave it at that. “What’s the use? I did a foolish thing and gave a lot of trouble, and I’m sorry. You said yourself let’s forget it. Can’t we, please, Dominic?”
His nod of ironic agreement made her wonder again if he knew—or at least suspected. She said quickly, “Thank you. I promise I’ll never go near those steps again,” smiled fleetingly and sped away to her room.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Dr. Galea came to see Chloe later in the day, and diagnosed shock and a severe chill.
“Bed for a few days, young lady,” he said, and was unimpressed when she protested that she couldn’t spare the time, must get up and go on with her work.
“Nonsense, nonsense. Dominic will understand, when I tell him what your temperature is, that you can’t possibly get up. He won’t expect it. It was he who insisted on my seeing you. Now lie down and cover up.”
He was writing a prescription, in his illegible doctor’s scribble. How did druggists ever know what the spidery marks meant?
“Here, Lotta. Run around to the drugstore.” He meant the tiny one in the alley next to the hotel. This shop, a grocery in a recess in the ramparts, an English tea room, a newspaper kiosk and a studio where they painted and gilded saintly images and picture frames, comprised the sum of Mdina’s commercial life.
Lotta snatched the paper and ran off with commendable eagerness. She had been told not to speak of the signorina’s illness to the contessa, but of course she would have to tell her sooner or later. All the servants knew already, and were wondering about the reception—would it have to be put off? That would be a bitter disappointment—they were all keyed up to enjoy it; and besides, they liked the young lady, didn’t want her to suffer.
So Lotta ran to the drugstore and arrived there panting. Within a few minutes she was back again with Chloe’s medicine, measuring out a dose.
After that Chloe slept and slept. Feverish dreams haunted her. Bats flew into her hair, long octopus arms stretched up and twined themselves around her limbs, when she tried to pull herself out of the water onto the rocks they clung to her and wouldn’t let go, and Louise stood there laughing and wouldn’t help.
Then Dominic came and said, “What the devil are you doing down there?” and watched her struggles; then he and Louise went up in a bosun’s chair together and left her alone, and Pauli crossed himself and began thrashing the water with his oars, and beating the air with them as the boats sailed past.
People visited her now and then—Lotta often, Louise, Mark, Dominic, even the contessa. But she was too hot and uncomfortable to want to talk to them. She burned with heat, though an icy stream now and then seemed to run down her spine.
On the third day the fever broke and she woke up to find herself wet with sweat, her nightgown sticking to her drenched body, but her head clear, the sickness gone from her.
She rang her bell and Lotta came running, and said, “Blessed Mary, the signorina is better.”
“Yes, I am. But soaking wet. Bring a towel and fresh clothes, Lotta.”
Lotta was a splendid nurse—she had had years of tending the contessa. When she had her signorina sitting propped against her pillows, in fresh sheets and nightgown, she exclaimed, “Now I must go and tell the contessa. She has been worrying.”
The contessa herself came in soon after, leaning on Lotta’s arm and her own ivory stick, and was installed in the big chair by Chloe’s bed.
“I’m so thankful that you are better, dear child.”
“So am I, contessa. All this wasted time...”
The contessa took her hand and stroked it fondly. “Always so zealous about your work. When you are married to Dominic, I hope you will learn to be a little lazy, as I am.”
Chloe evaded that.
“And you? How are you? Still getting stronger?” she asked.
“Every day a little better. You know, there have been so many messages, letters, callers. Louise has been a great help—I’m not quite up to receiving callers yet. She is competent socially. She has charm, admittedly. I am trying very hard to like her, Chloe.”
“I’m glad she was there to help you, since I’ve failed you,” Chloe murmured, thankful that the contessa didn’t know the truth about her nephew’s wife.
“You must get well quickly now. Perhaps we need not postpone the reception?”
“Of course not, contessa. There’s still nearly a week, isn’t there? I feel wonderful, cool, no headache, just a little bit weak, that’s all. I expect I’ll be up tomorrow.”
“Only if Camillo allows you. He is an excellent doctor— you must do exactly as he says, Chloe, dear.”
“Of course, contessa.”
Lotta came back to take the contessa back to her room, and when presently Doctor Galea called, he beamed approvingly.
“Ah, the fever is all gone. That is good.”
“I can get up tomorrow?”
“For a little. The legs will be weak. But very soon you will be as good as new.”
He gave her hand a fatherly pat, wrote out another prescription and left her.
Later on she tried a little walk to the window, and stood there for a few minutes, entranced anew with the wide, shimmering view.
The window was open, and the air flowing into the room was deliciously soft and warm. The island, spread below, was a patchwork of flower colors and green. A string of laden donkeys pattered along a rough track at the foot of the ramparts, carrying their laden panniers easily, tripping on neat small feet.
As Chloe watched, a jet plane came screaming over the citadel of Mdina and landed on the runway near by. It tore along the ground so fast she feared it wouldn’t stop, would dash right off the runway and be wrecked. But it pulled up in time, taxied noisily and came to rest.
How incongruous, she thought, in this mediaeval island with its little forts, its ramparts and crumbling fortifications belonging to the age of chivalry.
At which point Lotta came in with the new medicine and caught her. With a shriek of, “Madonna mia,” she bundled her back into bed. Chloe wasn’t sorry to go—as Dr. Galea had predicted, the legs were weak. She settled down comfortably, swallowed her medicine and turned over the pages of a fashion magazine someone had put by the bedside. Louise? Probably. Louise would be taking the line that nothing was changed, Chloe had had an unfortunate accident, due to her own carelessness, but she was getting better and the plans for the party would go on, unchanged. Kind Louise would have left the magazine to amuse her...
How can I bear to see her again, talk to her as if we were still friendly, cousins-to-be, Chloe wondered, and hoped Louise would have the decency to keep away.
But Louise came in gaily with Mark that evening, ins
isting that Chloe drink a martini. “Puts you right faster than anything I know, sweetie,” she said, and talked on about the growing list of acceptances for the party and the flower pieces she was going to do for the many rooms that were to be in use.
With her third martini she offered advice to Chloe about what she should wear for the occasion. Nothing sophisticated—it wouldn’t fit the part. Something about halfway between virginal and smart. She had the very thing—would lend it if Chloe liked. Chloe thanked her politely and said she had already decided what to wear. Oh, very well, Louise shrugged, and sprayed herself lavishly behind the ears with Chloe’s L’Heure Bleu.
Mark, knowing nothing, listened and occasionally joined in with his usual cheerful gusto, which being in love with Chloe didn’t seem to diminish except when he allowed himself to ponder on how unworthy of her he was—no looks, no money, no distinction...
He did, however, notice when she began to tire, and removed Louise with surprising firmness. They were going somewhere after dinner, a party on a destroyer, Louise said over her shoulder. “Too bad you can’t come too, poor pet.”
Chloe’s head was spinning; she sank back on her pillows and closed her eyes. Louise would always get the better of her...
A knock roused her.
“Come in.” Dominic. Her heart leaped wildly.
“Oh, hello.”
“I hear you’re better.” His eyes fell on the empty glasses. “Had visitors?”
“Mark. And Louise.”
He gave her a long, speculative look and said casually, “I fancy our Louise will be leaving us soon.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
“Dick was flown into London yesterday. I managed to have a few words with him on the telephone. I was pretty frank with him, and he saw my point. He’s coming out here as soon as he’s coped with all the publicity hounds, attended to his affairs and so forth.”
“Oh, how wonderful!”
She caught the gleam of humor in his eyes and said defensively, “I mean it.” She wondered if he knew how fervently she meant it!
“I’m sure you do. Dick’s a good fellow. A trifle easygoing—or was. Easily led. But this show in the Antarctic seems to have toughened his outlook. Or so I gathered from our brief talk.”
Summer Lightning Page 18