Cap Flamingo

by Violet Winspear

  Bryony and her son were thrilled by the idea of taking a cruise on a luxury liner which would stop off at various places of interest along the shores of the Mediterranean. Fern on the other hand was dubious of the plan in so far as it involved herself, but Bryony wanted her company and Rick had business commitments which made it impossible for him to suddenly down tools and go off on a cruise.

  "Be a sport and come, Fern," her sister urged. "A cruise and seeing new places will make a heavenly change for all three of us."

  So Fern finally agreed to go.

  She thought of writing to Ross to acquaint him with the news, then decided against it. Why fool herself into thinking he'd be interested? Why hurt herself more than was necessary by writing him a letter which he might never answer? She gallantly made up her mind to

  make the best of a situation that often kept her awake at night with tears on her cheeks. Frankie and his mother needed this holiday and no inner despondency on her part must be allowed to spoil it.

  The next two weeks were a whirl of shopping, packing and getting everything in order for the cruise, and no matter how bleak were Fern's secret thoughts, she never allowed them to show in her eyes or her manner.

  Bryony said to Rick in the privacy of their bedroom one night: "I'm a bit surprised Fern is taking the breakup of her marriage so casually. She's really a much deeper person than Aster or me, and I could have sworn from the tone of her letters from America that she was head over heels in love with her husband. Why, he's fabulously good-looking. D'you remember those honeymoon snaps she sent us?"

  Rick was a little more discerning than his wife. He had an idea Fern was still very much in love with Ross Kingdom and that she was fretting inwardly over the break-up of her marriage. But he didn't say as much to Bryony. Fern must be allowed to work out such a personal problem in her own way and Bryony would fuss if she knew her sister's cheerfulness was just a gallant piece of acting.

  Rick steered his wife on to the subject of coloured snaps and the best way to take them, for she had bought rolls of film to use on this exciting cruising holiday with Frankie and Fern.

  The day of departure arrived and Rick drove the holiday-makers to Southampton, where their liner was berthed. Fern was looking deceptively bright and gay and Bryony couldn't stop giggling when a couple of youthful ship's officers smiled and saluted her beautiful sister. "They think you're a film star in that fabulous leopard coat," Bryony laughed.

  The girls located their adjoining cabins and right away Frankie was bouncing on the beds and nearly tumbling out of a porthole. Fern grabbed him and stuffed a pear in his mouth, while Rick told his wife to en-ioy herself, not to worry, and ... well, a kiss said the rest.

  At last all visitors had gone ashore. The passengers were lining the rails of the ship, waving frantically to those below on the dock. Waving, calling out goodbye, until the smoke of the tugs came between like a screen and the gigantic ship was beginning to plough foamy furrows through the steel-grey waters.

  In less than no time Frankie was enjoying himself immensely. The two ship's officers who had saluted Fern that first day had quickly made friends with the child. As one of them wisely said : "The way to a woman's heart is through her offspring," and so they gained the companionship of his pretty mother and stunning young aunt. They were light-hearted, harmless young men, and Fern had to agree with Bryony that it was rather pleasant to have so attentive a pair of cavaliers who, when they were off duty, didn't mind in the least showing Frankie over the big ship and playing deck games with him. He was now looking much better and beginning to get a good, healthy colour in his cheeks.

  The ship approached Madeira through clear, sunny waters, and Fern gazed with delight at the island's terraced hills where little tinted houses nestled. Then the ship nosed into Funchal harbour, and after the usual noisy circus of throwing coins to Portuguese fishermen as they dived from cockleshell boats, Fern, Bryony and the boy went ashore with a party of fellow passengers.

  To amuse Frankie the two girls took an ox-cart ride through the cobbled streets into the hills, and every few yards Frankie wanted to throw pennies to the persistent children who ran along beside the cart. They ate a delicious fruit tea at a little inn perched on a hillside, rode back to town to do some memento-buying, and finally embarked for their ship in a bejewelled twilight.

  Now the days grew long and warm. The ship halted at various colourful ports. Games were played on deck. Parties were held in the dancing saloon. Lazy hours were idled away in steamer-chairs, and all too soon, as far as Bryony was concerned, they were on their way home.

  Their homeward route took in a couple of Riviera ports, and it was at L'Esterel, while Fern and her sister

  were eating ices with Frankie at a boulevard table, that Bryony suddenly leaned across the table to whisper excitedly : "Don't look now, Fern, but the most sensational young Viking is gazing your way."

  Though told not to look, Fern did just that, and gasped aloud.

  The tall, eager-eyed man was clad in a smart yachting outfit and he was now threading his way between the tables.

  "Do you know him?" Bryony demanded.

  "Yes." Fern's smile was faintly rueful. "His name is Curtis Wayne and I met him in California."

  Deep, smiling lines slashed his tanned cheeks as he came to their table. "What are you doing in L'Esterel?" he gaily asked Fern. "Are you stopping at Cannes, maybe?"

  She explained about the cruise and introduced him to her sister. He smiled hullo, then hooked forward a chair from one of the other tables, sat down and invited them to join him in a drink. He grinned at Frankie, who was sporting a chocolate ice-cream moustache. "I guess my pal here could find room for another ice-cream, huh?"

  Frankie could indeed. "Are you a sailor?" he enquired.

  "I've got a boat, sonny." Curtis beckoned a waiter to the table. "At the moment she's over at Cannes undergoing a minor repair, so I'm footloose for the day.

  "Waiter!" He turned to the white-coated figure at his elbow and ordered the drinks the girls fancied, along with another ice-cream. He then extended his platinum cigarette-case, and Bryony accepted an expensively branded cigarette with the reflection that Fern was a bit of a dark horse. She had obviously mixed with a very smart set out in Cap Flamingo and was more than passingly acquainted with this wealthy yachtsman.

  He leant forward with a fight for Fern's cigarette, and as he smiled into her eyes, it came to Bryony that he was keen on her.

  Bryony wasn't displeased by the reflection; she had

  decided to dislike Ross Kingdom for not wanting her lovely, warm-hearted sister, and this charming, blond young man was gazing at her as though he thought her angelic, eatable and adorable all at the same time.

  They were chatting over their drinks when Curtis suggested they all spend the afternoon together. He'd show them some of the local beauty spots and ensure they got back to their ship on time.

  "Look, take Fern," Bryony said on impulse. "I really feel like lazing on the beach and letting Frankie play sand pies, and I'm sure you both have lots to talk about."

  Bryony could see from Curtis Wayne's eyes that he liked the idea of being alone with Fern for a few hours, and though Fern hesitated for a minute or so, she gave in when Frankie, having heard the word 'sand', clambered down from his chair and informed his mother that he was ready to go to the beach right away.

  Fern laughed at him, then after arranging to meet her sister on the jetty at six o'clock, she strolled away with Curtis. Some time later they were admiring the wonderful rock scenery of Ravin d'Uzel when Curtis asked her outright if she had left her husband.

  "Yes," she replied, without looking at him.

  He was watching her, watching the way a warm breeze flirted with the ends of her hair and moulded her dress to the graceful curves of her figure. His breath caught in his throat and he hardly knew how he kept from touching her. From the first moment they had met he had wanted her. She was like no other girl he had ever known—haunting, capa
ble of intense emotion and surely even lovelier at this moment than she had been that afternoon on his yacht, when he had proposed to her.

  Her glowing skin beckoned the hand to it. Her mouth, though unpainted, seemed to retain the bloom and flame of passionate kisses. Her body was lovely, yet somehow poignant, as though it wished to hide. He knew this when, noticing his eyes upon her, she caped her shoulders and chest in the cashmere cardigan she had been carrying.

  "I don't know how Kingdom could bear to let you go!" The words broke from Curtis and his hands bunched in the pockets of his yachting jacket. "What went wrong, Fern?"

  She grew suddenly very pale beneath her suntan and he knew his question had re-opened a deep wound inside her.

  "There are some people," she said shakily, "who can only love once. I believe Ross is one of them."

  Curtis's blond brows rushed together in a frown. "You mean—but it doesn't make sense! If he still loves Laraine he had no right marrying elsewhere. Is he made of granite? Didn't it ever occur to him that you might get hurt—you?" Now Curtis closed his hands upon Fern's slim arms and after a moment she let him take her against his breast. She felt his lips touch her hair. "I'd never hurt you," he huskily whispered. "Oh, Fern, won't you give me a chance to make you happy? I believe I could, my dear. I'm no longer just that fun-chasing guy you used to know. I haven't looked at another girl since you walked into my life."

  She liked the comfort of his arms and was not unmoved by his plea, but she had long since surrendered every piece of her heart to Ross and while she lived there could be no one, now, but him. Never again could she give herself to any man as she had given herself to her husband; completely, as though the world might end before morning came.

  She closed her eyes, there against the shoulder of another man, and remembered Ross at Monterey. The night he had stood like a god in the moonlight while a Spanish guitar told the tale of a red rose, a lacy mantilla and a love that never died. During the music Ross had slipped an arm about her waist and she had known her love would never die.

  "Fern," Curtis implored, "you can't mean to spend your life alone?"

  "I shan't be alone, Curtis."

  She didn't go on to explain what she meant, but he might suddenly have entertained a suspicion, for when

  they started the climb down to ground level he assisted her with extra care, and during the drive to the harbour in a horse-drawn gig he hid behind a smiling mask the pain of knowing that to a man who no longer wanted her she had given all that a woman can give, while he was never to receive more than her friendship.

  They said goodbye on the jetty, and Bryony failed to notice the look of cynicism in Curtis's eyes when she gaily told him that he was to be sure to pay them a visit any time he was in England.

  "Of course you must," Fern echoed her sister.

  "You're both very kind." He ruffled Frankie's blond hair, which was full of sand after his afternoon on the beach, then Fern and her sister were walking up the ship's gangway with the boy between them. Curtis didn't take his eyes off the slim figure in cream, his yachting cap pushed to the back of his head and the platinum watch glinting on his wrist as he returned the trio's farewell hand-waves.

  All too soon for Curtis the remaining passengers were aboard. The gangplank was lifted. The graceful ship steamed out to sea and in a while was just a glimmer of lights in the Mediterranean twilight.

  Bryony enthused about Curtis while she and Fern sat over a sherry and a cigarette in the smoking-lounge that evening. "He's terribly nice and you'll be a fool, sweede, if you don't latch on to him after—well, after your final separation from your husband."

  Fern moved sharply, spilling ash from her cigarette on to her dress. She brushed it away quickly. "Curtis is nice," she agreed. "Too nice to be palmed off with a second-hand love."

  "Ferny, be reasonable," her sister implored. " You got over Ken McVicar, and that husband of yours has hurt you far more than Ken ever did. You must forget you ever made such an unsuccessful marriage and start afresh as soon as you can."

  "I'm afraid I can't altogether forget my marriage." Fern broke into a slight smile and relaxed into the

  padded embrace of her armchair. "You see, I'm having a baby."

  "No!"

  "Yes."

  Bryony looked dumbfounded for a moment longer, then she leaned forward and kissed Fern's cheek. Tears came into her blue eyes. "You must tell Ross," she whispered. "A baby has helped before now to mend a broken marriage."

  But Fern shook her head. "I can't force his hand, Bry. I need to be wanted by him, utterly, completely, without any reservations. I want to be needed by him, for my own sake."

  "But he's entitled to be told," Bryony argued.

  "I know that, but I—I shan't tell him."

  "In that case it's a shame it had to happen."

  Fern regarded the cigarette in her hand and her lips were suddenly full and soft, as they might be under a kiss. "On the contrary, I'm glad," she murmured. "I wanted Ross's child almost as much as I wanted his love. My baby is my consolation prize."

  "You're at the very beginning, aren't you, Fern? I mean, you still look as slender as a wand."

  Fern laughed a little. "I'm almost two months pregnant."

  "Y-you're absolutely sure?"

  "Utterly sure. Weren't you about Frankie?"

  "Yes." Bryony blushed slightly. She knew what Fern meant. She had felt Frankie in her veins long before physical evidence had substantiated his living presence within her body. Then as she did a little mental arithmetic she grew affronted. "You must have conceived just a couple of weeks before you left America, Fern!"

  "So I must." Fern smiled a little.

  "Oh, how could he! Hampering you with a child when he—he didn't really love you! How horribly selfish he must be."

  "You're quite wrong, Bry." Fern lost her smile at this accusation. "Ross isn't at all selfish."

  "Naturally you'd say that, you never run anyone

  down. But I thought he looked arrogant and overriding in those snaps you sent us. He knows he's good-looking and he trades on the fact."

  "That isn't true!" Fern jumped to her feet and her eyes were suddenly furious. "How dare you say such a thing! How dare you!"

  Bryony shrank back, as though she thought for a moment that her sister was going to strike her, something she had never done in all her life. Then Fern hurried out of the smoking-lounge and up the adjacent stairway to the deck, where she stood alone at the ship's rail, still trembling and furious. To hear Ross run down, even by her beloved sister, was indescribable torture.

  Bryony's agitated footsteps pattered the deck boards behind her and she swung round, the moonlight on her beautiful, tormented face. "Leave me alone," she said. "Go to your cabin. I-I'll be down shortly."

  "I'm sorry for what I said—"

  "No. You feel yourself justified, but I know Ross. He never meant me to be hurt in any way, but our very human natures have a way of upsetting our plans when we least expect it. Ross married me to stop both of us from getting involved in a nasty, unearned scandal. I knew he didn't love me, and he tried hard to keep our marriage impersonal, but he happens to be a man in every meaning of the word. There had to come a moment when we were both undermined by the fact that he is a man, and when it came I surrendered to him body and soul. I wanted to. And it was heaven."

  Fern threw back her head and her silvery hair glistened in the moonlight, shedding a kind of radiance on to the lovely planes of her face. Her eyes were shining and in her midnight-blue gown she looked wonderful . . . exciting . . . someone Bryony had never seen before.

  "I love Ross," she said. "I shall always love him, and if I bear him a son, I hope he grows in every way to resemble his father, even to the pride in him that won't bend, like steel."

  Bryony went down to her cabin after that, upset at having hurt Fern and stunned by her discovery that her

  sister had been hiding so much intense feeling beneath an air of smiling serenity during these w
eeks at sea. Bryony almost understood how much courage it had taken for Fern to suppress her true feelings, and realizing her own good fortune in having Rick waiting at home for her, she cried in bed for Fern that night. Darling Fern! So beautiful that it had always seemed a foregone conclusion she would marry some wonderful and adoring man. Instead she had been deeply hurt by both the men she had chosen to love.

  A blustery wind was blowing when the luxury liner docked at Southampton.

  Goodbyes were exchanged, promises to write and keep in touch were really meant in these last sentimental moments of taking leave of shipboard acquaintances, then the suntanned passengers, muffled up now in their winter clothing, were disembarking into the eager arms of husbands, wives and friends.

  Bryony and Rick clung closely for several moments, then he swung his son to his shoulder, pressed Fern's hand with warmth, and the four of them became involved in the mad scramble of going through the Customs and getting their baggage to the car.

  All the way home Bryony and Frankie regaled Rick with details of the places they had seen, the people they had met, and the fun they had enjoyed. Fern watched the three of them from the back seat of the car, smiling to herself when Rick broke into happy bursts of laughter and skimmed a kiss across his wife's cheek when they halted at some traffic signals.

  Nice to be missed, Fern thought. Wonderful to be welcomed home by a loving husband.

  And it was then that Fern decided not to stay on in Maidenhead. She knew Bryony and Rick didn't mind having her as a guest, but a home wasn't meant to be shared with an outsider.

  She began to make mental calculations. Ross was providing her with a very generous allowance and it would enable her to rent a small house or cottage out Berkshire

  way, with plenty left over for her and the baby to live on. The thought of her initial loneliness didn't depress her now, as it might once have done. She would knit and sew for the baby, read a little, take quiet country walks and gradually accustom herself to life without Ross. She even had the consolation of knowing the child would provide an occasional link with him in the future, for there was bound to come a time when he learned he had fathered one. But never again would she live with him on their old terms; such an arrangement would not be fair to either of them.