Switching off the engine, he removed the key from the ignition, then turned to her. 'Are you serious? Do you really think that's why I wanted to see you again?'
She shrugged, too confused to play games.
He reached out towards her, running a finger slowly down the side of her face. 'So what about you? What's your excuse for being here?'
She bore the sweet torture of his touch without flinching. It was years of practice before the cameras that made it easy to wipe all emotion from her face. 'Perhaps I was just carried away by the romance of the place yesterday,' she told him expressionlessly. 'Merrie England, lord of the manor. It's so feudal. I half expect to find myself in a rose-coloured gown at the top of a tower, with a white knight serenading me from the back of a caparisoned charger.'
'I see.' He gave a lop-sided smile. 'I've never seen myself as living history before. Let's go and eat.' Before she could amend what she had said he had swung down, slammed his door, and was locking it before she could move. She struggled with the catch and jumped down just as he came round to help.
'They do quite decent grub here on a Sunday,' he told her in a brisk manner that gave her no chance to speak first, and then with a curt nod he was striding off across the gravel to the entrance. Annoyed at being expected to follow, and confused by the speed with which they had somehow got on to the wrong foot, she made her way slowly after him, making him wait with the door open as she picked her way around the puddles in her silver-heeled boots.
'You need a pair of good green wellingtons,' he observed when she at last drew level.
'No way.' She lifted her chin as she swept past. 'This is my style and I'm sticking to it.'
They were sitting down on opposite sides of a dark oak table in a secluded corner lit by red-shaded wall-lights when he gave another of those lop-sided smiles and said, 'We couldn't be more different, could we?'
Goldie wanted to scream at him to stop saying it. She knew it. Wasn't it obvious? But why did he have to harp on it? The thought was like a knife in her heart. Yet he admitted he found her attractive. Of course, she should take that in the spirit in which it was intended, as just an example of his old-world gallantry.
She blurted something about opposites sometimes being attracted.
'Attracted, yes.' He reached for her hand across the table. 'At least we're not so deeply involved that it'll be painful to stop. Listen,' he said, changing the subject completely, 'if you would like to stay on a few days, I can drive you down to London to catch your flight. I have to go to a sale at Sotheby's the day after tomorrow. You might even come with me. It's great fun. Not unlike horse-racing.'
She smiled. 'Horse-racing?'
'It's a gamble, isn't it?' His eyes sparked. 'One never knows whether one's going to hit the jackpot and come away with something really rather special, or,' he added meaningfully, 'do a nosedive and pay over the odds for something worthless.'
'I am sorry about yesterday,' she told him.
'I've torn yesterday from my diary,' he told her, his smile fading.
She closed her eyes. There he goes again, she thought. It was their meeting he was tearing from his diary. Can I take much more of this? she asked herself.
She tried to pull herself together. 'It would be fun to do London. I came straight through from Heathrow to King's Cross, and didn't see it this time. It must be two years since I was last there,' she told him brightly.
'I'm going down on Tuesday,' he told her. 'Early start.'
It seemed settled. They ordered then, Lucas suggesting she have the game pie, and while they waited for everything to arrive she asked him about the Army. 'How long were you in?' she asked.
Taking her by surprise, he replied, 'Eight years.'
'But that must mean you've just come out?'
He shook his head. 'I've been out two years now.' And seeing her puzzled expression, he added, 'I ran away from school in the traditional manner and joined up at sixteen.' He smiled.
She did a rapid calculation and realised that he must have joined up that summer in which he had played the faithful servant to Ravella.
'I took the precaution of joining the family regiment,' he went on, oblivious to the line her thoughts had taken. 'It took some of the heat out of the situation as far as Dad was concerned. But after a few years it didn't seem very interesting, so I joined the special service. That was quite interesting for a time.' His eyes crinkled as he observed her surprise. 'You see,' he told her, 'I have been to the end of the lane and back.' He gazed off into the distance. 'Not many places I haven't been to, come to think of it. On balance, things are somewhat more peaceful here. Eventually I decided life was worth living after all, so it seemed a good idea to get back into civilian life.' He shrugged. 'There you are, my life on the back of a postage stamp.'
'I'm sure there's more to it than that.' All kinds of questions filled her imagination. Not least the one about the impulse that had led him to run away from school and join up. It must have been something pretty powerful. Like a broken heart, perhaps? It was hardly the sort of question she could ask without risking embarrassment, humiliation, ridicule, or all three.
'I'm glad you now think life's worth living,' she said in a small voice.
'It's very much worth living,' he said with obvious relish, the sensual lips parting to reveal a gash of white teeth. But he added enigmatically, 'Despite the sense of duty that sets one's limits.'
'You mean your inheritance?' she asked. 'Does that really limit you?'
He nodded. 'I've already told you about that.' She got the feeling he meant more than the financial limitations he had mentioned last night, but the waitress brought their order then, and by the time she had moved away the conversation had turned to something else.
'So we must have been in Hong Kong at about the same time?' he remarked after she'd given him as brief an outline of her career to date as he had with his. 'We've both done a bit of globe-trotting between us,' he concluded.
At least it was something in common, but Goldie couldn't help saying, 'I've done as much as I want for a while. I'd just like to stay one year in a place, so I could see it during the different seasons. I seem to have lived in a perpetual summer for the last ten years. What is winter like?'
'You'll find out if you stick around here.'
She shivered. Maybe it was the impending flight back to the States, the inevitable leave-taking ahead of her, but she felt nervy, chilled somehow. It would be winter in several senses if she stayed on—it was early days yet, but she sensed it would be a kind of winter of the heart to live here yet to be locked out of his life. He noticed her shiver and leaned forward to touch her arm.
'You're frozen. You should have known what to expect.'
With her mind on the hopelessness of her feelings for him, she could only think in double-meanings. 'How could I have known what to expect?' she murmured, looking directly into his eyes.
He registered her words with a raising of his eyebrows, and she was gratified to see that he was sensitive enough to have caught her meaning, but his words dashed her hopes when he said, 'Life isn't always predictable or fair. When it is, on those rare, wonderful occasions when everything seems to go just right, we should give thanks. The rest of the time there's no choice but to put on a brave face.'
She nodded, trying to bring a sophisticated smile to her lips to show that she, too, knew life was like that. Hollow laughter rose up, but she stifled it and said quite brightly, 'I think I might hire a car and drive up to the moors. I might even go to the coast. We used to have picnics on the beach at Bridlington. I wonder if it's changed much?'
'Don't hire a car, idiot. I'll take you.' He cut off her protests. 'I thought we had a pact? You haven't started boring me with Hollywood gossip yet, but you did promise.'
'At least you're wearing your nasty country tweeds,' she came back, 'so I suppose if you're determined to keep your side of the bargain, I'd better keep my side of it, too.'
For the rest of the meal they vied t
o tell each other the most abstruse stories they could find, Goldie scraping up every bit of scandal about the most outrageous stars she could think of, Lucas going into intricate detail on the joys of pheasant rearing. It was deliberately hilarious, and Goldie finished by accusing him of cheating.
'You're not supposed to be making it interesting,' she criticised.
'Nor are you.'
'You couldn't enjoy that film-set gossip,' she accused. 'It's just too trivial.'
'Trivial, but salacious,' he said in his most pompous voice. 'I can't wait to hear what happened to the one who took all her clothes off before she went in for the audition.'
'She got the job, of course. The only trouble was, she couldn't act anyway, so that was the last time she was contracted.' She grinned.
'Goldie,' he looked suddenly serious, 'you've never had to do anything like that, have you?'
'Honestly, Lucas, do you seriously think I would? Actually,' she went on before he could answer, 'I've been pushed into acting. It was when they were looking for a thirteen-year-old to play a bit part in one of Mother's films. I was hanging around, so it was natural they should test me. I happened to show up well on the screen test, and the, rest, as they say, is history. I didn't have to do a thing. Work just kept coming in. I would never have done it if it hadn't been handed to me on a plate.'
'What would you have done?'
She laughed, but her eyes were sombre. 'I don't know. That's why I'm taking four months off to try and find out. Lucas,' she leaned earnestly across the table, 'the awful thing is, I just don't know who I am. I feel --' she shrugged helplessly '—I feel lost sometimes, as if everything that's happened has been really meant for someone else. It's like being in a dream. One day I'll wake up and find it was all a mistake.' She gave him a wide-eyed look, halving her apparent age in an instant and making him go still.
When he spoke, he said, 'Life hasn't treated us so differently in some respects. At least you can get out of your life and start again.' He gave her a bleak smile.
Goldie wasn't surprised that Lucas had been a professional Army man, for there was something about the way he moved that suggested he would handle himself well in any situation. She watched him now as he strode to the next outcrop and stood looking out across the broad brown sweep of the moors towards the sea. He looked utterly at one with the landscape. The tough, clean outdoors look of him expressing the rock-safe and enduring person she felt he was inside.
It would be a lucky woman, she couldn't stop herself thinking, who had his shoulder to lean on for the rest of her life. She turned away. It was unlike her to be all emotional. She'd always prided herself on her independence.
Who needed men, anyway? she argued as she watched him climbing up the next bluff. They were ten a penny, weren't they? She had had no end of suitors in California. Bronzed, muscular beach boys, slim, talented screenwriters, affluent, worldly, sharp producers. There were men, men, men, wherever she went. The problem was keeping them at bay—convincing them that, no, she wasn't interested in whatever it was they were proposing.
She had often wondered who or what she was saving herself for, and now, having found out—she glanced across as Lucas called to her—she saw the irony of the situation.
'You're looking very thoughtful.' He came up beside her, handsome with wind-whipped cheeks, hair falling over his brow in a dark quiff. He wrapped his arms round her in a bear-hug, smoothing her spiky hair flat in a way he had already learned made her cross. 'Cold, isn't it? Do you want to go back?' he murmured against the side of her face.
She shivered in his arms, colder than he guessed in the silk shift, and trembling, too, to feel his arms round her—even though it seemed to be no more than a brotherly hug. She felt his face, ice-cold, press against her own.
'Roast chestnuts round a log fire would be wonderful,' he murmured. 'Unfortunately, it won't be this evening.' He stepped back, holding her with both arms pinned to her sides. 'I could ravish you here and now, Goldie. Let's go before I do something outrageous.'
'It's too cold to be outrageous,' she came back, trying to blink the water out of her eyes before he noticed it.
'You want a bet?'
She shook her head, smiling falsely and swivelling on her heel to walk off down the track between banks of heather before he could take her up on it. He caught her up and put his arm around her waist. 'I've got all kinds of family business to attend to,' he told her; 'Not least this evening.'
'Sunday?'
'Semi-social,' he replied briefly. 'But in the time we've still got, we must meet as much as we can. I'm afraid you haven't bored me nearly as much as I hoped! I trust I've been doing well enough?'
'Not really,' she admitted, trying to match the lightness of his tone. 'But I expect if you show me this horse of yours I shall start to yawn a little.'
'I doubt that; she's beautiful,' he laughed.
She expected him to offer to show her round the stables. It would be good to ride out into the countryside together. That, at least, was something they could share, for she was a good rider and would be able to keep up with him, but he didn't say anything and there was an uncomfortable silence. When they drove back he pulled into the drive at the Woollards' and kept the engine running while she got out.
'Tomorrow,' he said, leaning towards the open passenger door, 'walk across when you've had breakfast, if you like, and I'll run you into town to pick up some warm clothes.'
He drove off then, and she saw him park the Land Rover beneath the trees across the road. The millhouse was almost invisible from where she stood. Only the outer wall on the riverside could be seen, with a gable or two, and the curve of the drive before it vanished behind the trees. She remembered it from long ago as a dark, secret sort of place, but put that down to the fact that as children it had been forbidden to them. Now, she realised, it had been forbidden ground for another reason, for if Ravella had been having an affair with Brendan Halliwell, one of the de Maines, the last person she would have wanted on the scene was her own daughter. Sighing, Goldie made her way indoors. She felt that there was more to the brief hints about the past than met the eye, though what the secret could be, she couldn't imagine.
That evening was spent much as the previous one had been, with the addition of a little television and a visit from Hetty's son and daughter-in-law for an hour or two. Talk centred on the doings of the various members of the family, once interest in Goldie's unexpected presence was satisfied. After they had gone she went up to her room and wondered if there would be another awakening like the one on the previous night, but the clock in the hall downstairs struck twelve before she gave up on that hope.
Unable to sleep, she got up and padded across the landing to the bathroom to get herself a drink of water. Lights across the road made her pause before switching on the one in the bathroom. A car was revving up and there was the sound of laughter. Unable to help herself, she went to the window and stood on tiptoe to peer out through the unfrosted top half of the glass.
It was too dark to make anything out, but, headlamps blazing, a car came purring down the drive, followed closely by a second. Visitors, she guessed.
She got her drink in the dark and went back to bed. He was free to have guests to dinner. Family business, he had told her. It had been a girl's laugh, high and flirtatious, a little drunk. Well, why not? Lucas had his life to lead. She herself was just passing through.
It was nearly half-past ten by the time she found herself walking up the drive the next morning between dark, overreaching conifers. She rang the bell and waited. Almost at once the door flew open. 'You get up late? Or did you imagine I meant lunchtime?' He was smiling, his hair gleaming darkly in the splintered light that came in from outside, and in an open-necked checked shirt and a pair of chestnut-brown corduroys he looked more informal, but as endearing as ever.
'I thought you might be still sleeping off the effects of your business meeting last night,' she replied, somewhat stiffly.
His eyes danc
ed. 'Would that I were!' came the cryptic response. 'It's all part and parcel of being a de Maine, there can be an awful lot of social responsibilities.'
She didn't know whether he meant he wished he was sleeping it off with whoever his guest had been, or something else, so she merely gave him a non-committal smile and went inside as he held the door. When it closed she looked round with interest. It was the sort of place she liked, but not the sort she often found herself in.
Everything was old and well-worn, with the patina of age and much loving care on it. There was a faint smell of lavender wax and the musk of wood-smoke in the air, and, she detected a minute later, freshly ground coffee, too.
'It's good timing,' he confirmed. 'I'm just making coffee, having given you up.'
He led the way into a large, comfortable kitchen while she wondered if he would have bothered to come over to find her if she hadn't made a move. There was a big pine table, well-scored with years of use, and half a dozen comfortable matching chairs with flowered cushions in russet tones to match the curtains. A black and White dog was lying in a basket with its head on its paws, and as soon as Goldie came in it leaped up and came over to her, sniffing suspiciously, and backing off, wagging its tail when Lucas murmured something.
'What's he called?' Goldie bent to pet the dog, but Lucas shook his head. 'I wouldn't do that. He's a gun dog, and not used to being treated like a pet.'
Rebuked, Goldie wandered over to the window and looked out. Damn his dog, she thought. Her high heels had made a silly tapping sound as she crossed the stone-flagged kitchen floor, and she was suddenly overwhelmed by the feeling of being out of place again. The funny thing was, she could almost forget it. It just took a stray remark from Lucas to remind her. It was as well. Obviously he never forgot for a minute that she didn't belong in his milieu.
He was putting two mugs on the table when she turned round, then, apparently thinking better of it, went back to the Welsh dresser and took down two red and white French coffee-cups with saucers. She didn't comment, even when he glanced at her to see if she'd noticed.
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