Roberta Leigh - Too Young To Love

by Roberta Leigh

  Helen looked exactly as Sara had remembered her, and she wondered if her stepmother recalled all she had said on the morning after the ball.

  "So little Sara has grown up!" Helen's hard bright eyes stared at her candidly. "You've turned out even better than I expected. You were always a pretty girl, but now you're stunning."

  Sara tensed at the compliments flowing her way. Helen was not the sort of person to flatter another woman unless she had good reason.

  "You said you wanted to talk to me," she said flatly.

  "It can wait a moment. Sit down and tell me how you've been since we met."

  "I'm sure my welfare is of no interest to you."

  Helen's thin mouth grew thinner. "It isn't only your appearance that has changed. I can remember when you were far more polite to me."

  "Times have changed, Helen. I'm not straight out of the schoolroom now and you aren't Father's - " Sara stopped, and Helen smiled.

  "I'm glad you didn't finish that sentence, because I still am your father's wife - whether you like it or not. And that's why I'm here - to ask you to help me." A thin hand was outstretched, the nails like long scarlet talons. "It isn't easy for me to plead with you. The only reason I'm doing it is because I know your father will listen to you. And we weren't enemies in the past, Sara. You mightn't have been pleased that your father married me, but we did have some sort of relationship."

  "Not that I'm aware of," Sara said coldly. "Or have you forgotten that the last time we met you deliberately allowed me to believe you and Gavin were…" She could not bring herself to continue and she swung round to the window and stared out at the shimmering sea.

  "Gavin?" Helen echoed his name. "Don't tell me you're still carrying a torch for him?"

  "I'm going to marry him," Sara said sharply, and was lorry she had spoken when she saw the look of astonishment on Helen's face.

  "Marry Gavin! Your father never told me."

  "Perhaps he no longer considered it your business!"

  Two patches of colour blazed in Helen's thin face. "What are you doing out here, then?"

  "Gavin is here."

  Helen gave a sharp laugh. "We really are turning back the clock, aren't we!"

  Sara ignored this. "Could you please tell me why you want to see me?"

  "I've told you why. I want to go back to your father. I should never have left him."

  "You didn't love him," Sara said bluntly. "Leaving him was the most honest thing you did."

  "Don't judge me!" Helen cried, and then caught herself up, as if remembering she was here to ask Sara a favour. "I don't expect you to understand why I left your father - any more than I expect you to understand why I married him."

  "You married him for money and position," Sara said coldly. "You made that quite plain. But I don't blame you for it. I only blame you for going with other men when you were his wife."

  "He never knew," Helen said quickly, and then caught herself up. "Anyway, I've changed. Being on my own for two years has made me realise what a fool I was. I want to go back to him, Sara, and you can help me."

  Astonishment kept Sara silent and Helen misinterpreted it by pressing home her previous statement. "Your father adores you, and if he believed you wanted us to get back together again - "

  "But I don't," Sara intervened. "The best thing that ever happened to Father was you leaving him."

  Beneath Helen's vivid make-up a more vivid colour glowed, giving an unbecoming flush to the narrow cheeks and a hard glint to eyes which, even at their friendliest, held no softness. "You're on Grace's side, aren't you?" she sneered.

  "My father loves her," Sara said quietly. "And if you won't do the decent thing and agree to an amicable divorce, then he'll have to wait until he can apply for one on his own."

  "And what happens to me?"

  "I'm sure Father has provided for you."

  "It isn't just money. I want a place in life."

  "You had a place, but you threw it away!"

  "You're a hard girl, Sara."

  The anger went from Helen, leaving her curiously deflated. There were fine lines around her eyes that had not been there four years ago and hard lines on either side of her mouth. They weren't so much the lines of age as of character, and looking at her Sara could see what an old and ugly woman she would become. Yet she felt no pity. How could she for a woman whose lies had parted her for four years from Gavin?

  "Did you honestly believe I would help you after the way you lied to me about Gavin?" Sara asked.

  For several seconds Helen was silent. "Is that what he told you?" she said finally, her voice dull, as if she no longer cared to maintain her pride. "Don't tell me he's fooled you all over again?"

  "He never fooled me." Sara strove to keep her voice firm, but was dismayed to find that it wobbled. "You were the one who did that, Helen, and I won't let you do it again."

  "I don't need to. Gavin's doing quite well on his own." Helen's laugh was genuinely amused. "I must say he deserves to marry you. I've never known anyone work harder for his own betterment. Still, my affair with him is over, and if you can forget it, then - "

  "You never had an affair with him!" Sara cried. "It was with Mike."

  "It was Mike and Gavin," Helen shrugged.

  "No!"

  "Yes, Sara. It was Mike first, but once I met Gavin I didn't want anyone else. I only said I would show Mike's letter to Jane in order to bring Gavin to heel. I was tired of watching him make a play for you when I knew that all he wanted was your money and your father's position to help him get to the top."

  "You're lying!" Sara cried.

  "Why should I?"

  "Out of spite, because I won't help you with my father."

  "If you don't believe me," Helen retorted, "ask Gavin yourself. Let him deny that it's true. If you're foolish enough to believe him, then you'll probably be happy with him."

  Blindly Sara turned to the door, and only then did she see the tall figure of a black-haired man on the threshold. "Gavin!" She took a step forward, but he looked past her to Helen.

  "My A.D.C. informed me you arrived here this morning."

  "Yes, I did." Helen advanced towards him. "How lovely to see you! I didn't know I was so famous that you would be notified of my arrival."

  "You're still Sir William's wife. The airport notified us."

  "And you rushed round to see me? That's what I call thoughtful. Sara and I we're just talking about you."

  "I thought you might be," he said grimly. "That's why I came over."

  "How clever you are, Gavin. Which reminds me, I must congratulate you on your engagement. I'm glad you finally achieved what you wanted."

  "With no thanks to you," he said calmly, and added: "Why are you here?"

  "I came to enlist Sara's help. Unfortunately she doesn't see fit to give it to me."

  "Helen wants to return to my father." Sara spoke for the first time. "I told her that he's going to marry Grace as soon as he's free."

  "Which leaves me out on a limb," Helen said, and her hard brown eyes moved over Gavin's tall frame. "I'm glad you were able to convince Sara that we weren't lovers. But then you always did have an amazing ability to fool us poor women."

  Gavin threw her a look of such anger that had it been charged with equal energy, it would have razed her to the ground. "I see you're still intent on destroying other people's happiness if you can't find a way of getting your own?"

  "I was just putting Sara right about the facts, darling," Helen drawled. "But you have nothing to worry about. She still dotes on you."

  Unable to bear any more, Sara groped for the door.

  "Sara, wait!" Gavin said behind her.

  "I can't bear to stay here," she gasped, and stumbled down the corridor, intent on putting as much distance between herself and Helen as possible. But distance could not dim the words Helen had uttered and they reverberated through her with every beat of her heart.

  "Sara!" Gavin was striding after her, his steps heavy on the polished
floor. "I want to talk to you."

  She looked at him with blank eyes. Gavin stared intently into her face and swore beneath his breath."That damned woman! I knew something like this would happen. That's why I came here as quickly as I could."

  "You know what she would say?" Sara whispered.

  "I knew she'd try to make mischief again." He gripped her arm. "We can't talk here. Let's go home."

  "No. Let's go to my car. It's parked by the cliff."

  His hand came out to grip her elbow and silently he led her out of the hotel to the car park. The quick tropical dusk was already beginning to fall and the sky was tinged with purple.

  "Shall we sit in your car or mine?" he asked.

  "Neither," she said, and moved over to the wooden rail that separated the car park from the springy turf that led to the cliff's edge. She knew Gavin was waiting for her to speak, but she did not know what to say or where to begin, and, as if realising it, he spoke first.

  "Why exactly did Helen come to the island?"

  "She wanted me to persuade Father to take her back. Apparently she doesn't like her freedom. She's decided she wants to have position too."

  "I take it you refused to help her?"

  "Yes."

  "And that's when she turned nasty?"

  Sara moved her head, unwilling to answer in words. She wanted to turn and face Gavin, but her feet seemed rooted to the spot and she clenched her hands on the rail and went on staring out to sea.

  "It isn't true, is it?" she said shakily. "Tell me it isn't true."

  There was silence, and when she could bear it no longer she abruptly swung round. His eyes were focused on the horizon and his profile was as firm as though carved from stone.

  "Tell me," she whispered.

  Slowly he turned in her direction. "Tell you what?"

  "That it isn't true. That Helen didn't have you and Mike as lovers."

  He went on looking at her, his eyes narrowed by the dark brows that lowered over them. "If I tell you today that Helen is lying, will it stop you from doubting me again tomorrow?"

  "Of course it will."

  "I don't think so," he said quietly. "I think you'll always doubt me. I think that whenever you see me with another woman you'll wonder if I've been unfaithful to you."

  "Don't be silly, Gavin. You know that isn't true."

  "You've just shown me that it's very true."

  "You can't blame me for asking you the question. If you tell me Helen is lying…" Her voice wobbled and she lapsed into silence.

  "I have no intention of discussing Helen with you." Gavin spoke in a clear, firm tone. "You must believe what you will."

  "Is it so hard for you to say 'I'm innocent'?" she cried.

  "I can never have the innocence that you're looking for," he said bleakly. "You need a young man whom you can never suspect; whose innocence you will never doubt."

  "I don't know why you're talking like this, Gavin. All I'm asking you is to tell me that Helen was lying."

  "I have nothing more to say on the subject. Think what you will." He turned on his heel and strode to his car.

  "Gavin, wait!" She ran after him. "You can't go like this."

  "Why not?" He looked at her, but his eyes were filled with inner storms and did not see her. "I told you before that I would never run after you twice."

  "You never even came once!"

  "I tried to see you when you left Paris," he reminded her. "You can't blame me because you wouldn't read my letters or take my calls."

  "We only met now because I came to the island 1" she cried. "If I hadn't, you would have been happy to live your life without me. You wouldn't have given one single damn!"

  "If that's what you think," he shrugged, and turned away again.

  "It's true!" she cried, and angrily put her hand on his arm. "We would never have met if I hadn't come to Balinda."

  "Then it's a pity that you did."

  Sara blinked. "You can't mean that."

  "I don't know any more what I mean," he said bleakly. Disengaging her hand from his arm, he opened the car door and slid behind the wheel. The engine purred and only then did she run forward and put her hand on the door.

  "If you leave me like this," she said breathlessly, "I'll never see you again!"

  "You never have seen me," he replied and, letting in the clutch, drove swiftly away.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  "I don't blame Gavin one bit," was Grace Rickard's comment when Sara - in a tightly controlled manner - told her the entire story, including the whole sordid Paris episode.

  "I can see why you believed Helen four years ago - you were young and unsure of yourself and you didn't believe you were capable of holding a man of Gavin's temperament - but I can't understand why you believe her now. Anyway, what does it matter? It's all over and done with."

  "You haven't found it easy to forget the past," Sara retorted. "You still blame Father for behaving like a fool and marrying Helen."

  "Only because I was already in his life when he fell in love with her. But Gavin was having an affair with her long before he met you - if in fact he was having an affair."

  "Helen said he only stopped because I was a better catch."

  "And Helen wouldn't lie, of course!"

  "If she was, why did he rush round to see her the minute he discovered she was on the island? It could only have been because he was afraid of what she might tell me. You should have seen his face when he came in and saw I was already there. It was as if he knew what she'd said to me.

  "He probably did. Helen has never been difficult to read. But that doesn't mean that what you read is the truth. You refused to help her get your father back, so she tried to break you and Gavin up again, the way she did in Paris."

  "Then why didn't Gavin say so?"

  "He's given you the answer to that. He's already explained himself twice and he refuses to do it a third time. He feels that if you still haven't any faith in him, then it's best that you part. And personally, I think he's right."

  "If Helen was lying, he should have said so," Sara repeated stubbornly. "The only reason he didn't is because it was true."

  Grace made a gesture tantamount to throwing her hands up in the air. "Then you and I don't have the same opinion of Gavin's character. I've always considered him a man of integrity and sensitivity."

  "Not so sensitive that he couldn't drive away and leave me, knowing how upset I was," Sara said bitterly.

  "He was upset too."

  "You can't imagine how awful it was to live in Paris with Helen and Father," Sara went on as if she had not heard Grace's comment. "It was like sitting on a volcano. And then there was Gavin. I loved him, yet I felt there was a barrier between us. I couldn't understand it and he never explained it to me."

  "He said he thought you were too young."

  "That's what he says now," Sara replied fiercely, "but it doesn't mean it was what he felt at the time."

  "Gavin's right about you." Grace put down the petit point she was working on. "You don't love him enough. Maybe you've been in love with the memory of first love. Perhaps now that you've seen him again you'll be able to forget him."

  "Do you honestly think that?"

  "It's your only hope. Gavin is an exceptionally attractive man and women will always run after him. If you doubt him before you're his wife, you're well advised not to marry him."

  The words lingered long in Sara's mind, but each time the telephone rang she knew a sense of desolation that it wasn't Gavin. When two days had gone by and there was still no word from him, Sara accepted the fact that he was not going to contact her. He had meant it when he had said that if she doubted him, he wanted nothing more to do with her. Yet she could not go to him and aver a faith she did not feel, for he was perceptive enough to see the truth. Besides, as Grace had said, marriage to a man like Gavin would bring sufficient problems without her starting with an initial lack of trust.

  On the third day after her quarrel with him, Grace persuade
d her to go shopping in Pango, and though Sara was totally uninterested in acquiring any of the handmade crafts available, she forced herself to do as she was told.

  It was noon when they had completed their tour of the local shops and Grace suggested they take a drink at one of the hotels.

  "Not the Coral Creek," Sara said. "I couldn't face going there."

  For this reason they went to the Graham Hotel and were sitting on the terrace when Andy came over to them.

  "I thought I recognised you," he smiled at Sara. "No one else has caramel-coloured hair!" He bent towards her as Grace went over to speak to some friends of hers who had just come on to the terrace. "How is it you haven't answered any of my calls these last few weeks?"

  "I warned you I wouldn't have much free time," she explained.

  "You're free now. How about lunch?"

  Sara was in the act of shaking her head when Grace rejoined them to say her friends wanted them to go aboard their yacht for lunch. The thought of making conversation with strangers was more than Sara could bear, and she shook her head and said it would suit her fine if Grace went alone, since this would leave her free to have lunch with Andy.

  "Good," Grace said at once. "So long as you won't be alone."

  "I'll see her safely home-too," Andy smiled, and promptly took Grace Rickards' vacant chair. "Is it all right if we lunch here?" he enquired after he had ordered fresh drinks.

  "I couldn't care less," she confessed.

  "Finish the sentence."

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "You should end it by saying 'as long as I'm with you'."

  For an instant she stared at him blankly and then forced herself to smile. "I'm rather slow this morning, Andy. I didn't sleep well and I've a slight headache."

  "Then let's have lunch right away. A good meal should revive you."

  During lunch she forced herself to respond to his raillery and gradually found herself relaxing. She was chuckling at something he had said when she suddenly saw Gavin come into the restaurant. Even at a distance it was impossible to mistake his jet black hair and erect carriage, nor could she mistake the vivacious girl by his side. Though she made no sound, her expression must have given her away, for Andy glanced over his shoulder to see who had caught her attention.