On Monday things were no better. The hospital visit was accomplished in the rain and Jennie, no doubt with the best of intentions, was solicitous. Haidee felt irked and loathed herself. Antonia was ‘about the same’, but the nurse, telling them this, did so with a headshake.
As they drove home the sky lightened. In Glenglass the rain had stopped and Toby was sighted in the village. Haidee pulled up and hooted. To her surprise, not only Toby’s small figure came trotting, but a taller one, one she thought had left the day before.
‘No hurry,’ Paul said vaguely as she commented on this. ‘And anyway, I was worried about you.’ He lowered his voice. ‘I think you should get out, love. Come back with me tonight. The fellow’s dangerous.’
When Haidee declined he looked unconvinced. ‘One of these days he’ll get what he’s asking for. And more power to the man who gives it to him. I mean that. I’d like to push his teeth in.’
Haidee could not help thinking that the desire had not been all that evident on Saturday night. She could still see Paul’s head as Rory had slammed the car door. It had popped back like a tortoise going into its shell.
‘Daddy doesn’t like that man,’ Toby observed unnecessarily as they drove on.
‘You shouldn’t say that, Toby. Suzanne does,’ Jennie countered also unnecessarily.
‘Do you remember those men I caught with the hares?’ was the next gambit from the back seat. ‘He was talking to one of them just now.’
‘You caught? I like that!’ Jennie expostulated. ‘I suppose Rory had nothing to do with it, or Sergeant Murphy!’
They squabbled not very seriously for the rest of the drive. But Haidee was worried. If Rory knew that Paul had not left Glenglass he would never believe that she was not still plotting to go with him, Fortunately neither Jennie nor Toby mentioned the meeting.
The evening improved. A breeze scattered the clouds and the moon shone. Rory had gone out and Toby was restless.
‘I was thinking,’ he said at last. ‘This would be a super night to go and look for that fox I told you about, the one that’s living with the badgers.’
Haidee hesitated. She was sure Rory’s answer would be to stick his son’s nose back in his books, but she had an odd feeling that this was Toby’s way of making up to her for the unhappy atmosphere since the fire. He would be disappointed if she refused.
‘All right, if we’re not too long,’ she qualified.
The woods, however, at least temporarily, had lost their magic. And Toby’s insistence on including Punch in the party doomed the expedition from the start. The puppy yapped and sat down whining when he wanted to be carried. A badger or a fox would have had to be raving mad to show itself.
‘Pity he’s kicking up that row,’ Toby conceded at last. ‘Everything should be going out hunting after the rain. An owl, maybe.’ He pointed to one of the trees. ‘There was a nest up there last March. We came out one night and sat up in another tree and the cock came along with a mouse in his beak. The nest’s still there. I’ll show you.’
He took a running jump, hooked himself on to one of the lower branches and wriggled to a, standing position. ‘Come and see. It’s still here.’
‘I’ll take your word for it,’ Haidee laughed.
‘Oh, come on, be a sport. You’re not that old,’ he yelled disarmingly. She was hesitating when he spoke again. ‘You’ve changed, haven’t you?’
‘What do you mean?’ In its own small way it was a shock. Toby was the one person with whom she had felt perfectly safe.
‘I don’t know. Jennie says people think that. Perhaps it’s because you don’t climb trees any more. You used to, didn’t you? He said once you were the best he ever knew for a girl.’ Despite its hotch-potch of grammar the sentence hit home.
‘The best he ever knew for a girl.’ Ridiculously, the biggest ache that the past two days had brought had been that stark knowledge that Suzanne, bad as she was, had been loved and Haidee, good as she’d tried to be, was detested.
‘Okay. Who says I’ve changed?’ she said provocatively, and ran for the branch.
It was not too difficult. Luckily she was wearing trousers and the past four weeks had limbered her up a bit. Toby’s helping hand was not necessary. In next to no time she was beside him standing on the branch. The nest was now within sight, almost within touch if she’d wanted to. Gallantly, Toby ducked to give her the better view. And then it happened, out of nowhere. She heard nothing, she saw nothing, till a flying shape dashed into her face.
Shock made her reel, but some strength she had not dreamed she possessed kept her clinging to the branch. Pain followed scaringly as something scored her cheek. It had come like a bat out of hell; but it wasn’t a bat. This thing had talons. It could only be the owl.
Toby did not lose his head. He shouted and she guessed he was trying to drive it away. He shouldn’t. He might get attacked himself. She thought this, but couldn’t say it. All she could do was hold on and keep her eyes closed.
‘I think it’s gone,’ Toby said shakily. ‘We’d better get down before it comes back.’
It was as well he was there. Left alone she might never have summoned the courage to scramble down, but he had had fright enough, she couldn’t add to it. For all that, even on terra firma, she couldn’t stop shivering.
Toby’s: ‘Oh, gosh! Your face is all blood,’ didn’t help.
‘It was that rotten old owl,’ he went on. ‘I didn’t think it would go for us. There are no owlets now.’
She tried to answer, but her teeth were going like castanets.
‘Johnny, are you all right?’ he asked, his voice high with fear. It roused her.
‘Yes. Get Punch.’
Another complication. The pup was not visible. Toby had just begun searching the undergrowth when they heard its excited squeals nearby.
‘Quiet. Quiet!’ a familiar voice was bidding it ill-humouredly.
To Haidee it was the one sound that could drive away fear of the owl. Other fears were greater. His finding her like this, bloodied and shocked, having made yet another fool of herself. ‘Toby, I’m going on,’ she said in a panicky tone.
It was too late. Rory’s tetchy voice came nearer. ‘Are you there, Toby? Then take this animal out of here. I’ve told you he’s too young...’
Carrying Punch, who was darting his tongue excitedly at the unresponsive chin above him, the forester stepped into the clearing and stopped. His eyes lit on Haidee’s face and changed. It was frightening to see how they changed. It made her think she must be even worse than she’d feared.
‘An owl?’ For the moment she couldn’t believe it was Rory’s voice. All the fire seemed to have flown from it. Extraordinarily, it was the last straw. As she nodded she felt her knees buckle. Punch was dropped unceremoniously and Rory strode forward. ‘Put your arms round my neck.’
‘No, please. I’m all right,’ she gasped.
‘Don’t argue. Put your arms round my neck.’
She found a strange weak gratitude in obeying. Her fingers linked on the bulk of fawn waterproof, tweed jacket and thick sweater. Rugged clothes, sometimes untidy clothes. Always no-nonsense clothes, like the man who wore them.
Silly thoughts, but then she felt silly, dazed, drowsy, not herself.
No time was wasted. Rory barked out an order and Toby scuttled on ahead to phone the doctor. ‘And don’t think you’ve heard the last of this,’ his father’s voice followed him grimly.
Haidee, in fact, had been lucky. Only two of the wounds required stitching and her eyes were unscathed. For all that the doctor’s ministrations were painful. ‘Bring her back tomorrow,’ he said to Rory. ‘She may need hospital treatment.’
It was still a bit like floating. She was involved, but too tired and muzzy to speak. ‘All right, don’t try to talk. You’ve had a shock,’ Rory said with surprising intuition as they drove back from the surgery.
‘My own fault,’ she murmured.
‘Toby’s. You weren’t to know. The
number of times I’ve warned him. Tawnies will attack you, other owls don’t. I knew a man once who lost an eye.’
But she should have known, Haidee thought heavily. She was Suzanne. Suzanne would have understood the danger.
The sedative which the doctor had given her added to natural weariness. As Rory helped her into the hall, she did not at first grasp what he had said to Jennie who was standing staring at the foot of the stairs.
‘If Suzanne wants,’ Jennie returned unenthusiastically.
‘Jen will sleep with you tonight in case you need anything,’ Rory explained.
You’d have to be under knock-out sedation not to realize that assent was being given under protest. Haidee had noticed Jennie’s eyes as Rory had guided her up the stairs. It was part of the dream that he should be so different. But it was no dream that Jennie did not like it.
Hastily and very firmly Haidee declined her company.
When first she laid her head on the pillow it started going round. The whole world in fact seemed like sinking sands. She’d wanted to do so much and she’d done—nothing. Rory would look back on her with contempt and who could blame him? ‘The best there was for a girl’ would never be said about her.
Suddenly the quicksands started to move and out of the darkness great wings flapped in her face. She tried to cover her eyes and found herself paralysed. She was there trapped, unable to stir. Caught. Finished. Ah! A-ah!
Everything round her was shifting, screaming dark. Had she died? Had she been torn to pieces?
Not quite, it seemed, for something was now happening. She was being drawn out from the horror and the screams were dying. Press on the one who held her and they died even more. Now she would as lief have stayed wherever she was, but her eyes were opening.
And it was no dream. She being held, against a broad chest.
‘ ’S’all right,’ a voice was soothing. ‘ ’S’all right, girl. You were dreaming.’ He clicked on the bed light. Incredulously she saw that he was wearing a striped robe and that the bedside chair held blankets and eiderdown. ‘You had a dream,’ he repeated as though to a small child. ‘But it’s all right now. It’s gone.’
Unfortunately for Haidee reality was almost as scaring. ‘You haven’t been sitting up with me?’
‘Yes. I thought you shouldn’t be alone.’ He looked down teasingly and no longer haggard. It quickened her heartbeat in a way too silly for words. No reason to feel hot and bothered because of a man’s face with dark sideboards or because a vee of bare chest was a mere hand’s breadth away.
Uncannily he seemed to read her thoughts. ‘I seem to be always reminding you. You are my wife.’
Her heart missed another beat as he let himself lazily on to the bed and lay on his back beside her. ‘You know, Suzanne, even with the darns in your face, you’re still my woman. My only woman, God help me.’ The dark head turned towards her.
‘You can’t mean that,’ she faltered.
‘Strangely enough, I do.’ He lay contentedly gazing at the ceiling. ‘Did I ever say that to you before?’
‘Not in so many words,’ Haidee said guardedly.
‘No. We were never honest with each other. You had your reasons. I had my pride. The next time I’ll know better.’ He paused and went on: ‘A man gets tired of being on his own. I shall find someone as unlike you as possible. That is, of course, if you’re still determined...’
It was very different from the first night when, walking home, he had kissed her like a man slaking his thirst. Tonight he had not touched her and yet words, attitude and admission had penetrated to her core. There was no part of her not included. The position was compromising—there was no doubt of that—and a little spring, his legs were bare and she could see a crinkled scar on one shin, and yet, for all of that, she knew, quite horrifyingly, that it would be nice to creep up close to him and go to sleep.
‘I suppose you are still...’ Rory hazarded boyishly.
‘Absolutely.’ What a silly word—and to have said it like that, like a bullet from a gun.
He did not move. She wondered how it was she could suddenly feel how young he was when in fact the delicate skin round his eyes was already pulling into the lines of time.
‘I’d like to stay with you tonight,’ he said simply. ‘Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m not making a pass. It would just be to see you’re all right.’
‘I don’t think so. I am all right,’ she swallowed. ‘There would be no reason, honestly.’
The eyes regarding her allowed themselves a glint of amusement.
‘Well, let us not be dishonest,’ Rory said tractably. ‘That would never do, would it, Johnny?’
He let himself off the bed and walked unwaveringly to the door.
Next day beyond a headache and a stiff side to her face that made eating difficult Haidee was almost back to normal and to her great joy hospital was ruled out. Toby, however, with all parts of the forest put out of bounds to him, was not so happy.
‘I can take Punch for his run, though?’ he appealed anxiously.
‘No,’ said Rory shortly.
‘But that’s cruel,’ Toby objected. ‘Dogs need exercise.’
‘And woods at night need care. You’ve forgotten that once too often.’
It was a severe punishment, but all wheedlings were useless—not even the last one, which seemed inspired. ‘What about the poachers? Supposing they come back. I’ve been watching for them.’
‘The same way you watched for the owl?’ Rory chipped unkindly.
‘Oh, please,’ Haidee put in as Toby flushed to the ears. ‘I’m all right. Honestly.’
It earned her a steely glance.
‘We’ll do it my way, if you don’t mind. And that includes taking things easy for the next few days. No trekking up to Dublin.’
‘What about Mother Mary?’ The intervention from Jennie’s side of the room was startling.
‘What about Mother Mary?’ Haidee echoed.
‘You’ve never been to see her. Are you going to?’ If Rory’s eyes had been steel, Jennie’s were dark pools. The more beautiful, the more opaque. They gave not an iota away.
Haidee, setting out for the village with her shopping basket, sent a fearful glance at the grey pile of the convent. The shape of destiny—and suitable perhaps that it should be walled and prisonlike, the complete opposite of the forest.
She had always felt that Glenglass Forest could have been a Cinerama location. This morning, humming with life, it was no less so. An empty lorry going up for its load of poles passed her and the driver waved. An orange tractor was stationary with its engine running. Taking a short cut to the road, she saw the blaze of Rory’s bill hook on the trees marked down for felling. It was a brilliant morning and colour swam out of the mist, a red sweater, a bed of gold beech leaves, a scimitar of puce mountain glistening against the blue. A Cinerama setting indeed, but her days in it were numbered.
‘And where would the pretty maid be going?’ She had walked quite blindly into Paul’s teasing arms.
‘To inquire for you, of course,’ he explained when she returned the question. ‘I know grapes are traditional, but this is the best I could do.’
The size of the box of chocolates was embarrassing. She felt a complete fraud and said so. Paul waved this aside. ‘It was no sleigh ride, love, and I feel partly responsible.’
It seemed like the prelude to another session of persuasion.
‘Don’t let’s start that again,’ she said gently. ‘It’s nice of you to worry, but I want to see it out if I can.’
‘Oh yes,’ he agreed surprisingly. ‘I know when I’m beaten. I might say it’s the first time I’ve lost out to trees and deer.’
‘Not deer, I’m afraid,’ she corrected. ‘There are some I believe on forest land, but I haven’t seen any. They’re very hard to find.’
‘Would you like to?’
She had wanted to for so long that frankly she had given up hope. She said so without rancour. You had to live
under Rory’s roof to appreciate how busy he was. It was no wonder he had never implemented those half promises to turn up some deer for her. Old Willie Byrne of whom the forestry workers had spoken remained a possible source of inquiry, but he lived several miles away.
Paul listened attentively. This was how he had been the first time she’d met him, so good about adjusting the blind in the railway carriage, so comfortingly knowledgeable about where they were going.
‘I’ll tell you what,’ he said now. ‘I’m leaving tonight. This time I mean it. I can’t rout out the deer for you, but I could rout out old Willie. What say we go and see him this afternoon?’
She hesitated, not liking to dampen his enthusiasm. To know the herd’s whereabouts was one thing, to track than down unaided quite another. If staying in Glenglass had done nothing else it had knocked some of her fairy-tale expectations. And there was another point, one which had just occurred to her. Willie could be as big a danger as Mother Mary. He must have known Suzanne, perhaps he had taken her deer-stalking. How to get round that one?
‘Nothing simpler. Just be yourself,’ Paul prescribed. ‘Haidee Brown. Wear your glasses,’ he added as an afterthought.
‘Oh, honestly!’ Suddenly it was quite distasteful. ‘It’s very complicated. Sometimes I’m Haidee, sometimes I’m Suzanne, sometimes I’m Johnny.’
‘Forget it, then,’ Paul conceded equably. ‘I was only trying to help.’
It made her feel ungrateful. And to make matters worse a van passing at that moment pulled up and Rory let down the window.
‘Going or coming?’ he inquired pointedly of Haidee. ‘Can I give you a lift?’
A child caught jam stealing could not have felt more guilty. He would conclude she had met Paul by arrangement and if he made a scene as he had done on Saturday she didn’t think she could stand it. She gave her explanation quickly and jerkily, her eyes like pennies.
Astonishingly, the storm did not materialize. Instead Rory swung the van door open. ‘Okay, so you want a lift. Hop in. What about you?’ he called goodhumouredly to Paul.
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