by Margaret Way
Lights seemed to be sparkling inside her head, brilliant lights, a myriad sensations that fused the two of them together. It might have been a fantastic dream, only these insistent demands were very real. Now when Ingo’s hand touched her burning skin, closing over the tilted curve of her breast, resistance was beyond her, unreachable, unthinkable when this convulsive ecstasy was leaving her strangely urging him to take her.
All her life, it seemed to her, this was what she had been searching for. All she had ever been or would ever be was Ingo’s.
The rather high-pitched little moan was her own, and her heart beat with a wild abandon. She didn’t want him to stop even when she felt she could bear it no longer. All a young girl’s secret dreads were lost in desire, pleasure so piercing it mounted to torment. It was intolerable to go this far and not be engulfedshe wanted to find him, find him in the place where he lived all alone. She loved him and denied him any solitary corner of his soul.
Words seemed to jangle in Genny’s head. A voice…
From delirium she was brought back to a confusing, swirling present. Ingo still held her, one hand shaping the back of her head to keep her face turned into his chest, but it was Aunt Evelyn who was speaking, her thin, handsome face immeasurably startled.
‘I did knock, but no one seemed to hear me. What’s happening here, Ingo? I saw the light.’
‘What does it lookk like, Evvy?’ Ingo said with his habitual mocking arrogance.
‘In my day it was known as seduction.’
‘I have to admit it was getting to that stage. What a good thing you arrived. ‘
‘Genny?’ Aunt Evelyn’s voice trembled.
Genny didn’t move, still brushed with the most exquisite violence.
‘Don’t worry, Ev,’ Ingo said, ‘she’s all right, even if you’ve blasted all our dreams.’
‘Dear child, shouldn’t you come up with me now?’
‘I‘m trying to tell you, Ev, she’s all right. ‘
‘Shouldn’t she be allowed a say?’ Aunt Evelyn asked, mildly for her.
‘She’s trembling so much I don’t think she can find her voice. Genny belongs to me, Ev. You know that.’
‘Then I insist you marry her. ‘ Genny could feel the dark laughter start in him.
‘I might love her above all else, but do you really think marriage, Ev?’
Something twisted near Genny’s heart, like a sharp little knife. She put a hand up to her tumbled hair and Ingo looked at her, faintly smiling as she slipped the strap of her dress back on her shoulder. ‘I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man in the world. ‘ she said emotionally.
‘Oh? I didn’t think you’d go in for an open arrangement either. You know I like to put my brand on everything, Genny. Maybe you could change your name to Faulkner by deed poll!’ She tried to pull away from him, but he pinned her wrists. ‘You’re beautiful, Genny. There’s not another woman in the world I could look at after you.’
‘Genny dear,’ Aunt Evelyn said from the remote distance, ‘let me take you back to your room. I’m surprised you didn’t think to defend your honour, dears’
‘Aren’t you listening, Ev? She never lost it.’
‘You stop laughing.’ snapped Genny, fighting onehand free and making a swing at him.
‘That’s my girl.‘ he said, catching her hand and carrying it to his lips. ‘I knew you hadn’t forgotten how to retaliate.’
‘Why did you ever come down, my dear?’ Aunt Evelyn was asking worriedly. ‘We all thought you’d gone to bed. Ingo wouldn’t let me go to you.’
‘I had a headache. ‘ Genny said, looking so fragile and crushable and so wildly beautiful with her dark eyes enormous that Ingo suddenly swung up to his feet and cradled her like a ten-year-old. His dark face was curiously vivid, unpressured, almost carefree.
‘All right, Evvy, seeing you’ve cast yourself in the role of duenna, lead the way, I’ll put Genny in her own little bed and she can lock the door after me.’
‘And that’s just as it should be!’ Aunt Evelyn said sternly. ‘Really, the dresses you young girls wear.
You do invite trouble. Shall I turn the light off here?’
‘Please do.’
Evelyn turned and walked on ahead, thin and straight-shouldered, almost with a military bearing, lifting her magnificent Oriental robe as they went up the staircase. In Genny’s bedroom Ingo put her down on the bed, and leaned over her to say with mock intensity ‘Sleep well, baby. You love me, I know. ‘
‘Don’t remind me.‘ She lay on her back, staring up at him.
‘I‘m never going to let you forget. But for dear old Evvy here, you’d have yielded entirely.’
‘And you’re going to hold that over me?’
‘You seem to forget I never let you go. It was Ev who spoilt everything. Never mind, cherub. One of these days I’ll get you all to myself, with no one to save you. Mine for the keeping.’
‘Providing you don’t have to marry me?’ she queried.
‘If we’re going to consider the children, we just might have to.‘ he teased.
‘Go away.‘ she said, covered in heat.
‘If you two are really going to say goodnight, I think I’ll go,’ Aunt Evelyn said, an odd smile dispersing the clouds on her face. ‘I’m feeling remarkably superfluous. Such a disturbing night all round. ‘
‘What’s so deadly about a fate worse than death, Ev? Genny isn’t really cut out to be a spectator. She’s a flame. Anyway, it was mutual and really an intensely private affair. You just happened to come along at the right time. I hardly touched her, when she literally sends me crazy. ‘
‘In that case, Ingo dear, if you’re to do this thing properly, offer the child nothing less than marriage. I know how you feel about Genny. I’ve always known.’
Genny sat up on the bed, the soft light that streamed around her deepening the colour of her eyes and her smoky blue dress, lightening her skin and her hair. ‘I can’t accept that I’m the only simpleton around here. I’ve always thought Ingo acted like a perfect demon towards me.’
Aunt Evelyn smiled. ‘Really, dear! Do demons indulge small girls endlessly? I think he’s been remarkably tolerant when you’ve delighted in being hurtful for years.’
‘Thanks, Ev! ‘ Ingo said carelessly. ‘God knows you’re the only one who defends me.’
‘I love you, that’s why, and so does Genny. Humour me and cut your goodnights to five minutes. I think I might sleep better now. You’ll have to help me, Genny, with all the wedding arrangements. Felicity is worse than useless, but she’ll never be able to walk down the aisle without the two of us.’
‘Goodnight, Aunt Evelyn,’ Genny said gratefully.
‘Goodnight, my dear. You know, you’ve really taken a great deal off my mind!’ At the door she turned and smiled at her nephew. ‘You know, Ingo, I feel I have to tell you that you badly need to be loved by a woman like Genny.’
‘But does she?’ he inquired.
‘It seems very much like it from where I was standing. I’m surprised you even asked.’
There was silence in the room for a moment after she had gone, then Ingo smiled with a shade of selfmockery. ‘At this point I’m going to join you or move!’
She looked away from his handsome dark face. ‘I thought you were supposed to do what Aunt Evelyn said?’
‘I can’t for the life of me see why I should!’ His brilliant gaze was slipping over her, the slender, singing line of her body, drawing her to him without even making a move.
She gave a little bewildered exclamation. ‘You never say exactly what you mean, do you?’
‘I‘ll tell you this much, I can’t stand much more of this!’ He leant over and dropped a quick, hard kiss on her mouth. ‘Sleep well. I’m not likely to. ‘
‘I love you,’ she said as he walked away from her. ‘I mean, I really love you.’
He smiled. ‘Do you think I don’t know that?’
‘I want to hear you say you love me too.’
‘Correction, baby, it’s time you went to sleep.’ He moved the door and when he turned around his expression was impossible to read. ‘Take it easy with Flick tomorrow. She can’t cope with too much serious mindedness. I think she’ll settle down with Dan. It will be difficult for her not to. He’s not exactly what she thinks he is. In fact, when all the intoxicating excitement has worn off, Flick will find she’s delivered herself to a real man!’
‘May I invite Trish and Ian?’ asked Genny.
‘What an agreeable child you are! If you like, I don’t have any real objections. Trish may have learnt a lesson. I doubt it, but at least she’ll have the sense to behave.’
‘I have this ridiculous idea she’ll never like me.’ Genny said, looking up at the domed canopy.
‘Then you’ll just have to understand.’
‘It’s not Trish I’m worried about. It’s you I keep turning over and over in my mind. Maybe Evvy was deliverance at that!’
‘Tell me about it one long dark night!’ he returned neatly, smiling at her with his hard, mocking charm.
‘That’s more than you could ever dare to hope, Ingo Faulkner!’ she said distractedly, becoming hopelessly confused about what he really intended to do with her.
‘What a shame, when I’ve set my heart on it!’ He was watching her with considerable deliberation, a very dominant man and a man who wielded too much power.
‘You know, Ingo,’ she said, flushing under that penetrating gaze, ‘you’re something of a villain. Don’t think I don’t know the difference between love and passion.’
‘You can’t have one without the other.’
‘And you can’t have me without marriage.’
‘Why can’t I?’ he asked, his silver eyes sparkling.
‘I‘d die first. How does that affect you?’
His grin faded. ‘Little idiot, you look hurt. Cut to the quick. When you’re being so very serious, lost in that great bed, it’s difficult not to give you an equally idiotic answer. Of course I’ll get married, and when I’m ready to, I’ll tell you.’
‘Send me a telegram,’ she retorted, ‘I‘m leaving as soon as Flick is married.’
‘Good ideal’ he said briefly. ‘It will be a struggle keeping my hands off you otherwise. ‘
‘If I were older...’
‘I could talk to you,’ he cut in. ‘As it is we keep getting caught in total obscurities.’
His voice was so dryly ironic that she moved suddenly off the bed, driven by some uncontrollable force.
‘Don’t go.’
He wheeled about, his silvery eyes flashing in his dark, forceful face. ‘Can you see now why I don’t let you make up your own mind?’
She stood there, her eyes clinging to him as if he were her only support. ‘What’s happening to me?’
‘That’s easy, but I can’t do a thing about it at the moment. Go to bed, cherub, you looked played out on your feet!’
‘I never meant to feel this way about you.‘ She put her hands to her temples, visibly trembling, and burningly aware of him.
‘You’d better do as I say,’ he said in such an unsettling kind of voice that she had to fight out of her moment of crisis.
‘Goodnight, Ingo.‘ she said like a weary, obedient child.
‘It’s all rather cruel, but necessary, baby. Goodnight.’
The brief ceremony was over and everyone, representing a wide cross-section of Faulkner relations and friends, seemed to be having quite a time for themselves with a free run of the house and the magnificent gardens. Dress was formal and all the women had been asked to wear flowers in their hair, so that the garden looked like a spring renaissance, with dresses of every colour and all the soft, summery materials. After a hectic and often onerous year in his legal office, Ian decided he wouldn’t have missed it for the world : the pageant of beauty, the laughter and the conversation drifting thickly through the air, the atmosphere that belonged uniquely to Tandarro. He lifted his glass and emptied it, pleasure enveloping him and soothing his senses.
Flick was moving in and out among the guests, a dream in heavenly blue chiffon with a large picture hat weighed down with hand-made roses, while the whole scene was recorded for ever with a film load that seemed to Ian to go on for ever. Her new husband, Dan Howell, having survived the ceremony, was now laughing heartily and accepting congratulation and the accompanying slaps on the back. A fine-looking man, well over six feet, Ian supposed, he was thus able to take it.
There wasn’t a man there who looked happier, and Ian decided maybe Felicity would find happiness and security after all. He sincerely hoped so, for he had always liked Genny’s mother. She was really a fantastic looking woman, seemingly ageless, with a double string of the most impeccable pearls, that she kept fingering sweetly, falling to her breast, with the beautiful diamond clasp turned sideways to be seen and not hidden beneath the filmy blue brim of her picture hat. They were Faulkner pearls, Trish had complained to him Ingo’s wedding present to his cousin. The diamond earrings and a ring big enough to trip over were the groom’s very convincing declaration of love.
The children, dressed in brand new outfits, were mirroring their excitement, and had started to shout and run about the garden; so Trish had gone off to check them. He and Trish had arrived the previous day by taxi plane and the first critical moments were over. As soon as Trish could stop feeling jealous of Genny and taking little swipes at her in private, the happier Ian would be. He had always considered Genny a knockout, but maybe her kind of beauty didn’t improve her relations with other women. Ian, who saw trouble every day in his profession, knew all about jealousy and its tiresome and often disastrous effects.
His eyes followed his wife with a mixture of censure and approval. She looked beautiful in a three-tiered ruffled dress in a Florentine gold, her long black hair very fancifully coiffured, trailing a spray of tiny gold flowers down the back. She was acting as near to relaxed as he had seen her these past few weeks.
Unwillingly his mind was drawn to his mother-in-law. Poor Marianne.She was dying a little every day, consumed with the need to make her peace with her son. The tragedy of the whole business Ian had seen repeated many times in the divorce courts. He saw both sides; Marianne’s and Ingo’s, whom he admired tremendously. There was only one person who could ever get Ingo to change his mind, and Ian decided there and then that he wasn’t going to listen to another word of criticism about her. Even Trish had been forced to admit that it had probably been Genny who had talked Ingo into letting them come. Whoever it was, and Ian was certain it had been Genny, he was very grateful. Tandarro was a miracle so far as he was concerned, a throwback to the romantic Colonial days, with the house so grand and the vast gardens. A kind of Outback Tara. An irresistible kind of place, and he surrendered himself to it every time.
The brilliant sunset was fading, a sensuous, spectacular affair that had bathed all their faces and garments in rose. Very soon the happy couple were expected to leave on the first leg of their trip back to America, stopping overnight in Adelaide before picking up their next flight the following day. Flick’s fourth wedding it might have been, but no one seemed battle-hardened. Quite a few of the women guests had shed tears, including Trish, to Ian’s surprise. Genny, in a heavy white silk with a white full-blown rose behind one ear, was trying valiantly not to show her finely wrought nerves.
Her beauty seemed heightened, if anything, by her undoubted heartache. She too was wearing some of the Faulkner jewellery, Trish had hissed at Ian: necklace and earrings in diamonds and Columbian emeralds, part of a four-piece set that had belonged to their great grandmother, and if he didn’t believe her he could go take a look at the portrait in the long gallery. Ian didn’t consider that necessary. In fact he was familiar with the portrait and the necklace because he was an intensely observant man. It suited Genny beautifully, glowing and flashing against her golden-tanned skin and the low halter neckline.
Trish in her quiet fury had evidently forgotten
that Ingo had given her some beautiful pieces of family jewellery when they were married. If she rarely wore them, she did have them, and no cause for complaint. Ingo, in his complexity, had actually been very good to his mother and sister, but he was a man of strong feelings and his mother might as well reach for the moon as reach for him. Anyway, Ian had told Trish in the privacy of their bedroom, at the first sign of a tantrum from her he would get them all home and forgo his holiday altogether. It seemed to have had a most beneficial effect on her until she had seen the emeralds on Genny. After all, Genny wasn’t getting married, she had whispered sotto voce, and Ingo spoilt her rotten.
By the time Felicity came downstairs in her going away outfit, her face aglow with a fresh influx of youth, those who were able all grouped about the base of the stairway, spilling over into the entrance hall and the main drawing room. Felicity’s sky-blue eyes focused on her daughter’s face and she threw her bouquet with careful aim. Genny, feeling intensely off-balance, couldn’t seem to seize the initiative, and it was left to Ingo, who stood directly behind her, to catch it and put the small, exquisite bouquet in her nerveless hands, more aware than anyone of Genny’s total vulnerability.
Everyone laughed and clapped and succumbed to the usual comments; everyone except Genny who looked so beautiful and so untouchable, her huge dark eyes gazing at everyone without seeing them at all. In plain view of everyone, Ingo’s hand came up to caress -her nape, easing the tension out of her as though it little mattered to him if everyone had to make a bewildering adjustment in all their old thinking patterns and the relationship that existed between him and his young cousin.
The sheer intensity of his feelings seemed to be flashing out of his brilliant eyes. Ian, who was gauging them very well, caught the stunned disbelief in Sally’s bright face. Poor Sally! She had never even flickered on the edge of Ingo’s consciousness, and even now she didn’t seem able to pull her gaze away from him. If Felicity’s life was to be completely changed so too were a lot of people’s. Ian, glancing down at his wife’s smooth face, saw no trace of surprise on it; in fact she lifted her head and directed a very keen glance at him that reminded Ian irresistibly of Ingo. He smiled at her and after a minute she smiled back.