by Anne Weale
“Not quite. There’s one thing I should have said a long time ago. Look at me, Andrea.”
Something in his voice compelled her to obey, and for the first time she saw how much older he looked.
“I love you,” he said quietly. “I married you because I loved you.”
She stared at him in stunned silence.
“I was a fool,” he went on. “I wanted you so much that I took a crazy gamble, telling myself that I could make you love me. I knew that sooner or later you would need more than material benefit. I hoped that, when you discovered that, we would be close enough for me to tell you the truth, but it didn’t work out the way I’d planned. Life generally doesn’t.”
There was a long silence.
“Why are you saying this now?” she asked at last.
“Partly because of something that Leonie told me and that I hope may be true, but mainly because we had come to the point when it had to be said. I intended to tell you the night you left London.”
“What did Leonie tell you?” she asked, very low.
“That you were very unhappy, and she thought it was because I had failed to give you the one thing you needed.” He took a step forward. “Is it true?”
Her heart was beating like a wild thing.
“Are you saying this because you think it’s the only way to make me come back with you?”
In one stride he was beside her, his hands on her shoulders.
“My God!” he said hoarsely. “Did it ever occur to you that the only reason I kept up that farce was because I loved you, because I couldn’t bring myself to touch you unless you wished it? If you knew what it did to me when you disappeared! I was half out of my mind with worry until Leonie told me you were here.”
His grip on her shoulders tightened, but she felt no pain, only the gradual welling up of a joy so exquisite that it made her weak and dizzy.
“Oh, Justin, if only you had said this before,” she whispered.
“Then it’s true! You do care a little?”
“A little!” She made a sound between laughter and tears. “More than I ever dreamed.”
The next moment she was locked in his arms, her face pressed against his shoulder, and he was murmuring all the tender endearments that she had never hoped to hear him say. Even now, held in a crushing embrace with his lips against her hair, she could scarcely believe that it was true, that in a matter of minutes all the misunderstandings and invisible barriers had been swept clean aside and the future was a bright vista of happiness.
At last his clasp slackened a little.
“Forty-eight hours ago I wouldn’t have believed this was possible,” he said softly. “When I read your letter I thought I’d lost you for good. You’ll never know how often I wanted to seize you and hold you like this, to know that you were really mine. Every time I was on the point of telling you the truth, something went wrong and you seemed to draw even farther away. There were times when the whole situation seemed hopeless. Then, the day after that scene with Brennan and what followed, I knew it had reached a crisis. I spent hours walking up and down Kensington Gardens, making up my mind to tell you. When I got back to the house you’d gone.”
“That was the day I realized I couldn’t go on living with you unless you loved me,” she said, with a shiver of remembrance. “I wanted to stay terribly, but I couldn’t bear the thought of having you make love to me unless you really meant it. Say it again, Justin.”
“What? I love you? I can tell you much better like this.” Gently he raised her face and smoothed a loose strand of hair from her forehead. Then his mouth was on hers, softly at first and then with increasing urgency. She had dreamed of his kisses, but she had never imagined the intensity of emotion that the passionate demand of his lips would arouse in her. It was like waking out of sleep, being touched by magic, discovering paradise.
When at last he let her go her face was radiant.
“Do you want to stay here?” he asked huskily.
She looked around the little room, at the chair where she had sat in listless contemplation of the empty future, at the pillows that had been wet with her tears.
“Could we go somewhere new? Somewhere where we haven’t been unhappy?” she asked shyly.
“There’s a plane leaving for the south in a few hours. We could be at the Villa des Fleurs by breakfast time.”
“The House of Flowers,” she whispered. “Oh, yes. That would be wonderful. Justin, poor Monsieur Bollet was asleep in the hall when I came up. I think he was waiting for me. We must tell him everything’s all right now.”
“Right. I’ll go down. I’ll also call Leonie and tell her the good news. She won’t mind being woken up for this. Are you still angry with her for telling me you were here?”
“You know I’m not. I’ll always be grateful to her.”
He lifted her hands to his lips. “So will I. Now, if you’ll pack your things I’ll get the rest organized. Are you sure you can stand the journey? You must be very tired, my darling.”
She smiled. “I ought to be, but I’ve never felt less tired in my life. You won’t be long, will you?”
“Only a few minutes, and then I won’t let you out of my sight again for a very long time.”
It was a brilliant Mediterranean morning when they landed at Nice and hired a car to take them along the winding coast road to the Villa des Fleurs. Andrea had slept a little during the flight, her hand in Justin’s. Now, refreshed and glowing with happiness, she leaned back in the circle of his arm as the car sped through the magnificent scenery.
The villa stood on a headland above the shimmering blue gold sea. It was screened from the road by a high white wall, and as they swung through the gate and up the driveway Andrea gasped at the profusion of vivid flowers everywhere. Not only were the gardens ablaze with color, but the walls of the houses were bright with blossoming vines and creepers.
Justin had telephoned the caretaker that they were arriving, and they were met at the door by his wife, a swarthy little woman named Bernadine, who explained that Georges was in the village buying supplies. He would be back shortly, but meanwhile all was in readiness for them, including breakfast on the terrace. But no doubt madame would wish to bath and change her clothes after the journey.
“Don’t be long,” Justin said, smiling. “Madeline usually leaves some beach clothes here. I’ll tell Bernadine to hunt them out. There ought to be something to fit you for the time being.”
Andrea followed the housekeeper upstairs and was shown into a spacious bedroom with a balcony overlooking the sea. While she was undressing, Bernadine bustled away to find some suitable clothes. She returned in a few minutes with a pile of gaily colored swimsuits and playsuits.
Twenty minutes later Andrea ran downstairs in a yellow shirt, brief white shorts and scarlet espadrilles. She found Justin on the terrace. He, too, had changed into a shirt and shorts and was leaning against the stone balustrade watching the sea. The rope soles of her espadrilles made no sound on the polished tiles, and she crept up behind him and slipped her arms around his waist.
He turned at once and kissed her upturned lips.
“Do you like it here?”
“How could anyone not? It’s a perfect place for—”
“For a honeymoon.”
A delicate color tinged her cheeks.
“I believe you’re shy,” he said, looking down at her with great tenderness.
Her mouth curved. “I’m hungry. The coffee smells delicious.”
“First things first. Come here.” He drew her against him and kissed her. “I didn’t bring you here to watch you eat.”
She laughed at him. “Why, then?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Tell me.”
“Later,” he said softly. “When the moon is up. When everyone else is asleep. Now eat your breakfast, baggage, and then we’ll go down to the beach.”
They ate the crisp milk rolls and farm butter that Bernadine had set out, and An
drea tasted her first freshly picked orange. Then Justin led her down the steep cliff path to the beach and they swam in the warm blue water that was so calm that one could see the shells on the sandy bed. Afterward they lay under an enormous striped umbrella and watched the sea foam gently onto the shore.
“Tell me,” Justin said, “when did our marriage stop being a business arrangement for you?”
“I’m not sure. I think I was in love with you a long time ago, but I didn’t recognize it. I was afraid to admit it, even to myself. Justin, did you really love me before we married?”
He was silent for a moment, and then he said, “The first time I saw you I thought you were the most beautiful girl I had ever seen, and I had seen dozens of lovely women. When we met on the moors the next morning I knew I hadn’t imagined it. Physically, you were everything a man could want. The way you moved, your voice, your hands—you were perfect. But there was something else that fascinated me more than your looks. It isn’t easy to describe, but I suppose one could call it an untouched look. I guessed that no man had ever meant anything to you, but that underneath that veneer of coolness and poise there was a fire waiting to be lighted. I wanted to be the one to light it. After we’d met in London a few times I knew I was head over heels in love with you.”
“But I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell me?” she said perplexedly.
“Because at that stage, sweetheart, I knew you better than you did yourself. Long before you told me about your background I had guessed the gist of it.”
He reached for his shirt and took his cigarette case from the breast pocket, lighting two and giving one of them to her. He had made her oil her arms and legs for fear the fierce heat of the noonday sun would burn her, but his own skin was naturally brown, and she guessed that in a day or two he would be as dark as a Gypsy. Sitting beside her in a faded pair of swimming trunks with sand on his long legs and his hair tousled from a brisk toweling, he looked very different from the stern-faced immaculately dressed man whom she had known in London. Now when he looked at her there was no chilling remoteness in his gaze, but an ardor that made her pulses race, her heartbeat quicken.
“I was convinced that you were not fundamentally mercenary,” he said. “I concluded that the insecurity of your childhood had made you put a false value on material things, and that once you were safe from worry about the future you’d begin to wake up emotionally. If I’d told you how I really felt you would never have married me, would you?”
She shook her head. “It wouldn’t have been fair. I’d have felt I was taking advantage of you. As it was I had pangs of conscience.”
He buried his half-finished cigarette in the sand and sprang up, holding out his hands to pull her to her feet. With his arm around her shoulders they strolled down to the water’s edge.
“But, Justin, you said last night that you hoped to make me love you. Yet after we were married you were so aloof, so terribly self-contained. Instead of growing closer we seemed to be drifting farther and farther apart.”
His fingers caressed the smooth curve of her shoulder.
“I know,” he said soberly. “That was the devil of it. I was afraid of rushing you, but it was all I could do not to make violent love to you every time we were alone.”
“No one would ever have guessed it,” she said dryly, remembering his distant behavior during the first weeks of their marriage.
“On the contrary, several people did guess. Leonie knew how I felt about you, and so did Aunt Laura.”
“You mean she knew that you loved me but I didn’t love you?”
“Yes, from the first. She’s a shrewd old darling.”
“But didn’t she try to dissuade you from marrying me? She can’t have approved of it,” Andrea protested.
“That’s what I thought, but apparently she has an old-fashioned theory about men being instinctive hunters and women their willing prey. When you disappeared, I went down to Berkshire thinking you might have taken refuge there. Laura soon wormed the facts and gave me a sound talking to because in her view I’d made a hopeless mess of the situation. According to her you’d been on the brink of love for weeks and I’d been a blind fool not to see it. I didn’t believe her then, but when Leonie telephoned to say she’d found you in Paris I knew I couldn’t let you go without a fight. My darling, you’re crying. What is it?”
Andrea blinked back the tears that sparkled on her lashes.
“I was wondering what I would have done if you hadn’t come,” she said shakily. “I tried so hard not to think of you, but I just couldn’t stop. Every time I saw a tall dark man in the street it was agony. Oh, Justin, never, never let me go!”
He caught her to him and kissed the tears from her eyes.
“My dear love, need you ask that?” he murmured against her lips. “Can’t we forget the past? The future is all that matters now. Kiss me, Andrea. I’ve wanted you for so long.”
From high above them there came the tinkle of a bell.
“That’s Bernadine summoning us to lunch,” Justin said huskily.
Hand in hand they climbed the rocky steps, and at the top Andrea paused to catch her breath and look out over the glittering ocean. The scents of a thousand flowers wafted across the gardens to mingle with the salt tang of sea and a butterfly fluttered across the terrace like a living jewel in the golden light. The future could never be certain, and the years ahead might bring trouble and sorrow, but here for a little while, in this perfect setting, the rapture of love was hers.
She turned to her husband and together for as long as life should last they went into the house.