Mistress of Brown Furrows

by Susan Barrie

  her ears.

  “Meg looking out for a cottage!... But—but why...?”

  Timothy shrugged slightly, watching the moonlight gilding the canal.

  “Possibly she feels that she would like a home of her own. I don’t know....”

  “But I do! ” Carol spoke slowly, thoughtfully. “It's because of me, isn't it, Timothy?” She looked at him, and he turned and met her eyes. “It’s because she feels that I—that I won’t want to return home while she's there—that I don't like her being there! That I never did like her being there! ”

  “Well, even if you don't, it's quite understandable, isn't it?” Timothy remarked, in a voice which gave away no clue to his own feelings. “After all, it's your house, your home, and you should be mistress there. Aunt Harry feels that strongly, as we both know. You yourself have always been a little inclined to resent Meg...”

  But Carol shook her head.

  “It was Meg who resented me. She resented me—right from the beginning.”

  Timothy was silent for perhaps half a minute, and then he rose and took a turn or two up and down the balcony. He looked very tall and very dark in that purifying light, and his sleek dark hair was perfectly brushed, and his lean jaw jutted against his white shirt front. Looking up at him, Carol thought his eyes looked strange and remote, and withdrawn somehow from herself, as if he was striving to be quite impartial, and to review the matter without allowing himself to be affected by either the natural affection he had for his sister or the consideration he felt to be due to his wife. And at last he said:

  “As a matter of fact I had already made up my mind that I could not ask you to return to Brown Furrows while Meg was still there, and it was not easy for me to ask Meg to get out of the place without giving her a reasonable amount of time to find herself a new home. So I proposed taking you, when we left here, on a trip to East Africa, where you might have found it pleasant to spend a few months on my fruit farm, and where we might even have settled for a time. But now that Meg has stated very clearly in her letter that she is going to buy a cottage for herself—and she is financially quite independent, so she can do as she pleases—the whole thing has simplified itself—and we can go home as soon as you are well enough, or at least as soon as it begins to get too hot out here.”

  Carol in turn, was silent, and he paused in front of her.

  “Well? I take it that you do want to return home some time? You haven’t conceived an incurable dislike for Brown Furrows—as well as Meg?”

  “Of course not.” But she looked up at him anxiously. “It isn’t true that I’ ve taken a dislike to Meg—I never did dislike Meg— but she—she—” She got up and wandered to the balcony rail, and she looked very young and slim and concerned in her filmy frock, with her too slender throat and shoulders revealed by its low neckline. “Honestly, Timothy, I did try to like Meg, and I loved Brown Furrows, but it wasn’ t my home—it was Meg’ s. And I wouldn’t have minded that if Meg had shown some signs of making a place for me—of wanting me. But she didn’t...” Timothy came and stood close beside her, and he looked down at her gravely.

  “Did it never occur to you that she might be—jealous?”

  “But, why—why?” She flung out a small hand in bewilderment. “It wasn’ t even as if I was a—a proper wife—” She colored furiously. “I mean, there was no question of your thinking any less of her, of my taking her place. I was never likely to do that, and she was secure—much more secure than I was...”

  “Why do you say that?” he asked, almost sharply.

  “Oh, I don’t know.” She turned rather wearily and grasped the balcony rail. “Because it’s true, I suppose. After all, you did marry me because you were sorry for me, didn’ t you? There was no other reason...?”

  Suddenly she felt her arm caught in a grip of iron, and his fingers bruised her flesh.

  “Carol,” he told her, in a fierce, concentrated voice which was utterly strange to her, “if anything had happened to you after your accident I would never have forgiven Meg. Even as it was I was prepared never to forgive her—and it’s hard even now, when I think of all you’ve gone through—and all I’ve gone through! ”

  “You?” she whispered, looking up at him with large eyes.

  “Yes, me! ” he almost snapped, looking down at her in the white light. “What sort of stuff do you think I’ m made of, I wonder? Possibly you think I’ m quite inhuman and insensible—even when I do happen to possess a wife who looks at this particular moment like a white flower on a slender

  stem—a lovely, fragile, pathetic white flower ill fitted to stand up to the winds of adversity, which I’ve been endeavoring to protect you from! Perhaps I’ ve tried to protect you too much! Perhaps I haven t considered myself enough...”

  His fingers were bruising their way into the soft flesh or her arm, and she winced a little, so that he released her at once. Then, white-faced and almost hostile-eyed, he continued to gaze at her.

  Carol’ s heart was suddenly thundering and working overtime like a mill-race, and her grey eyes were beginning to glow as if they were lighted from behind by a secret electric bulb. Her lips fell slightly apart and her breath came unevenly.

  “But, Timothy,” she whispered, “Timothy, you don’t mean—?”

  He put out his hands on her shoulders and peered with intensity into her eyes.

  “Is it true,” he demanded, “what Aunt Harry says, that I do mean something to you—?”

  “Oh, Timothy!” she got out flutteringly, and seemed to sway towards him.

  His arms went round her, caught her, held her so close that she could feel the wild beating of his heart against her own. His lips came down upon hers, and she yielded her own so willingly and so rapturously that the kiss was prolonged beyond all thought or count of time, and they lost all consciousness of place or anything else until he let her go. And then she was shaking like an aspen, and so pale, with little dark circles under her eyes, that he was instantly conscience-stricken because she was still such a very long way from being completely fit, with no reserves of strength to meet the overwhelming demands of passion when it came upon her unexpectedly.

  “My darling,” he exclaimed, “I’m a brute! I forgot—you’re not fit—”

  “Nonsense!” she exclaimed very softly, an oddly mature and quite radiant expression in her eyes as she gazed up at him. She put up her hands and caught hold of the lapels of his dinner-jacket and leaned against him. “Oh, Timothy,” she murmured, “I do love you so very, very much, and I’ve loved you for such a long time!”

  His lips caressed her pale gold hair.

  “And I never dreamed—I didn’ t even dare to hope—”

  “Why not?” she asked. “Oh, Timothy, you treated me too

  much as if I was a child! ”

  “And you're only nineteen now! ” His brooding gaze lingered on her pale, fair cheek, and on the exquisite, tempting outline of her mouth so near his own.

  “What of it?” she demanded, sliding an arm around his neck. ‘Timothy, you haven't even told me yet that you—love me,” she whispered, shyly but anxiously, into his neck.

  “Do you doubt it?” he asked. His fingers touched the little blue smudges under her eyes. “Sweetheart, I’ve got to be sensible for your sake, and I’m going to ring for Francesca and tell her to put you to bed, and you're going to be very good and go to sleep at once, because it's late—much too late for interesting convalescents to be enacting Juliet scenes on balconies. I ought to have insisted that you went to bed before.”

  She gazed upwards at the moon, no longer shedding its full light into the canal, but dipping behind the fairy-tale-like palaces on the farther bank, and her expression grew dreamy.

  “I'd like to stay here all night—with you! ”

  “And I certainly wouldn't dream of allowing you to stay here all night! ” He picked her up with one swift, easy movement and carried her into the salon behind them, where the lights glowed softly, and where, earlier i
n the evening, they had dined alone together, as they had dined alone together for nearly a week. He did not, however, pause there, but went on into her bedroom, where he deposited her lightly on her bed. “Shall I ring for Francesca, or will you?”

  Carol watched him, a vague sensation of disappointment at her heart.

  “I will, of course.”

  He stooped and kissed her lightly on the top of her head.

  “Good night, my sweet! Pleasant dreams,” he said, using the very words he had used to her once, weeks ago, at Brown Furrows.

  Carol reached up and touched him, gently, caressingly, on his lean cheek.

  “Good night, Timothy—darling! ” she added, almost in a whisper, and almost to herself.

  He smiled at her.

  “No lying awake and thinking about anything—anything at all!”

  Carol was silent. Did he honestly think she could sleep— calmly, contentedly—after those few minutes out there on the balcony with him? Those minutes which had brought to an end an evening which had been pleasant enough, passed out there alone with him, but a little strained until—until that moment when he swept her into his arms!

  Carol watched him wistfully as he disappeared through the doorway, and the door closed quietly after him. Why did he persist in treating her as if she was still an invalid? —She was, up to a point, but not so much of an invalid as all that, and happiness was one of the greatest factors In restoring health and strength. Perhaps he didn’t know that, or perhaps he didn’t believe it.

  At the moment she was conscious of a feeling of frustration and a sense of disappointment, and her mind had been thrown into a turmoil of excitement by those moments on the balcony. She could scarcely believe them—yet. And she could scarcely believe that Timothy was quite as much in love with her as she was with him. Women loved so wholeheartedly and so all-absorbingly, even when they were only nineteen. And at nineteen they were extra-sensitive, they needed the comfort and the consolation of complete understanding and complete reciprocation in the beings they loved, otherwise they were inclined to doubt....

  Carol did not ring for Francesca, but undressed herself and got into bed and lay for hours thinking of Timothy, and wondering whether he was asleep in the next room, separated only by a bathroom. And when she did finally fall asleep she was still thinking of Timothy, and there was a little half satisfied smile on her lips, for he was only in the next room, separated by a bathroom!

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  AT eleven o’ clock the next morning Carol was lying on a sun-warmed Lido and watching the line of sparkling water through lazy, half-shut eyes, while Timothy indulged in an energetic swim. Carol had been watching him for some time, and admiring the straight, bronzed figure he made, in his workmanlike trunks, and with his dark hair agleam in the sunshine, but now she was almost dozing off to sleep, conscious of the warm kiss of the sun on her own bare arms and shoulders, and the exquisite half breeze which was lifting her fair hair from her brow. Perhaps the fact that she had slept badly the night before had something to do with it, but when she did open her eyes Timothy had had enough of swimming and was sitting beside her, quietly enjoying a cigarette.

  Carol lay perfectly still for a few moments and studied him, taking the utmost pleasure in tracing the dark, firm outline of his jaw, and the softer line of his lips—intensely masculine lips, but with a sweetness lurking at the corners, a suggestion of inexhaustible depths of tenderness. His brows were very level, and very dark, and his eyelashes were so thick and dark that she wanted to put out a finger and run it along them and feel the feathery caress of them on her hand.

  He must have sensed that she was awake, for he turned suddenly and looked down at her, and smiled at her on the instant.

  She looked flushed and warm and contented, and her grey eyes were very betraying. She moved a hand until it was covering one of his.

  “I think you’ve had enough of sun-bathing for one day,” he said. “What about a little dip? Feeling strong enough?”

  “Of course I’m strong enough!” She was beginning to get a little impatient of his endless care of her, and his assumption that she was still too frail to indulge in much activity. She got to her feet with a swift and graceful movement, before he could even attempt to help her, and stood looking down at him with a rather childish smile of triumph, and an unconscious challenge besides in her eyes.

  “Anyone would think I was going to be a kind of permanent invalid,” she said, “and I’m already almost back to normal. Who wouldn’t be with all the fuss you make over me?”

  “It’ s inadvisable to run before you are quite sure you can walk,” he remarked rather enigmatically. “But if you really do feel up to it—well, here goes! ”

  They waded out side by side into the water that felt so light and warm and exciting around them. Carol was an average swimmer, but she was content to play about on the fringe until she had got her full strength back, and Timothy did not leave her side. She wore a blue costume and a blue helmet, and she was already getting lightly tanned, so that she looked sufficiently attractive to make it easy for anyone to understand her escort’s determined watchfulness, and his refusal to turn his back on her for more than a moment.

  They were returning to change when Carol thought she recognized a young woman who rose up out of the sea almost immediately in their path, and who looked at them with laughing eyes, while she shook the water from her like a seal. She wore a white swim-suit and a white, close-fitting helmet, and her face was a perfect oval, and deliciously, creamily brown. Her eyes were large and brown like pansies, and she smiled at them under sweeping black lashes.

  “Well, well! ” she said. “And I hope you find yourself already much restored in health, Mrs. Carrington?”

  “Viola! ” Timothy exclaimed. “What in the world are you doing here? Recuperating after the winter?”

  “And a filthy winter it was! ” she remarked, without answering him. “Snow, and sleet, and everything I hate! You were lucky to spend half of it in bed, Carol, my dear, believe me! ”

  “Was she, do you think?” Timothy was smiling at her a little oddly. “Where are you staying, Viola? And for how long do you propose to honor the Venetian coast? If the Marchesa knew you were here she would be pressing you to accept some of her hospitality.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t dream of troubling her,” Viola declared while Carol stood silent and unaware that for some reason she had become suddenly tongue-tied. “I flew here actually for a few days, that’ s all, with my cousin Brian. I went across to Paris to spend a week-end with him, and we decided to come on here. He’s about somewhere...” She shielded her eyes and looked out to sea, and a tall swimmer, who had been doing a magnificent crab-stroke, suddenly stood up and strode towards them, and Carol became instantly engulfed in embarrassment because of the way he looked at her and seized her hands and displayed so much obvious anxiety as to the state of her health at the moment.

  “Carol!” he said. “You poor kid!... What a time you must have had! ” For a moment his feeling was undisguised, and then he looked up at her husband almost defiantly. “But you’ve brought her to the right spot,’’ he conceded. “She’ll get fit enough here. It’s a grand spot, this Lido...”

  “I’ m relieved to know that you approve, anyway,” Timothy remarked, and Carol flushed uncomfortably and remembered that Brian had sent her a letter giving her precise details as to where she could always find him if she ever became unhappy enough to make up her mind to leave her husband!

  Why, oh why, should he imagine that she would ever leave Timothy...?

  “We’re going to have a drink at Bugatti’s as soon as we’re

  dressed, so you’ ll join us, won’ t you?” Viola invited.

  “And I think you’d better come back with us to lunch,” Timothy capped her invitation. “The Marchesa would never forgive me if she knew you were in Venice and I didn’t even make the suggestion to you, for you know she likes nothing better than entertaining in that Do
ge’s palace of hers, and she’s so delighted to be back that it will give her an excuse for a celebration. ”

  “But I’ m afraid there are rather more of us than just Brian and myself,” Viola explained. “We made up a little party to come here—three more friends who are up at the hotel. Do you mind if I bring them along, too?”

  “Not at all,” Timothy assured her. “In the name of my godmother I bid you all welcome.”

  But Carol’s heart sank. Aunt Harry, she knew, would be delighted to throw open her huge imposing dining salon, and there would be no difficulty about food—not with her wonderful Venetian cook. And it was so long since she had displayed all the splendors of her glass and china, and acted the gracious hostess in her old home, that she would be almost childishly pleased. But Carol as if a big black cloud had settled on her immediate horizon as she accompanied the party to Bugatti’ s—popular resort of all visitors to Venice—and there made the acquaintance of Nona and Gary Milbanke and a weedy young man known as Tiger, for some extraordinary reason, who appeared to have an over-large bank-balance— which was no doubt one reason why Viola had included him in her party.

  At lunch Aunt Harry was the perfect hostess, charmed, as her godson had surmised, to have an opportunity to bedazzle with her cherished treasures. She even wanted to open up a suite of rooms for the convenience of the visitors, but Viola declined this hospitality.

  After lunch Carol was more or less ordered upstairs to her room by both Aunt Harry and her husband, but instead of resting dutifully on her bed until tea-time she lay back in a chaise-longue on the balcony and wondered why she was feeling so suddenly depressed and almost unhappy as a result of Viola Featherstone’ s appearance, accompanied by Brian and her friends.

  Viola, she had always known, was no real friend to her, and Carol was not so simple that she had not immediately guessed the name of the young woman who had been so ready to marry Timothy if the opportunity had come her way. Viola might not be exactly in love with Timothy—not as she, Carol, understood love—but she would have married him, and would marry him now if he were not already married and could be prevailed upon to ask her!