Warren knew the answer, but he did not reply. Instead he led his mother across the room and Nadia followed them.
She was very pale and her heart was beating frantically with the same fear that had been her constant companion for nearly three years.
Now she told herself that there was no escape from it, not even in England.
*
She did not see Warren until dinnertime.
When Lady John had gone to rest, Nadia had gone to her own room, having been urged to rest also.
Instead she could only lie on the comfortable bed, watching through the open window the sun sinking behind the trees and hearing the rooks making their usual noise as they went to roost.
‘How can this have happened?’ she kept asking herself.
She knew if Bertha’s death had not warned them, she undoubtedly would have died, and perhaps Warren as well if, as he had intended, he had eaten one of the chocolates after dinner.
The whole idea was so terrifying that, even though it was very hot outside, she felt herself shivering beneath the sheet that covered her.
It was so unexpected after she had begun to feel relaxed and happy for the first time with somebody as kind and sweet as Lady John, who reminded her of her mother.
Warren had also given her a wonderful feeling of security every moment she was with him.
Poisoned chocolates! How could it be possible? How could anybody think of doing anything so diabolical, except those who had haunted her thoughts and dreams for so long?
Because she was so frightened, Nadia prayed,
‘Please, God, do not let me die like that! Please let me live a little longer.’
Then, as she felt her prayer winging up into the sky, she thought it strange how only a few days ago she had longed to die and now she wanted to live.
She knew it was because Warren had saved her and brought her away from a world in which everything was ugly, sordid and painful to a place where everything was beautiful and until this moment she had thought peaceful and normal.
Now she was aware that it was very different and she felt an irrepressible fear.
She might so easily have put one of the chocolates in her own mouth, just because she thought it would please Warren that she was eating.
The colour had left her face and her eyes were dark and troubled when, after her maid had helped her dress, she had gone downstairs to dinner.
She had wanted to say goodnight to Lady John, but her lady’s maid had told her she was already half-asleep and it would be a mistake to disturb her.
‘Supposing she had died?’ Nadia asked herself. ‘It would have been my fault and I would have felt I was a murderess!’
She was early so had not expected the Marquis, but when she went into the drawing room, he was standing at one of the open windows, a glass of champagne in his hand.
He turned towards her and watched her walk into the room, aware without her having to say one word of what she was feeling.
He gave her the glass he was holding and then returned to the side table to pour another from the bottle that was standing in an ice-cooler.
When he came back to her side, she asked in a voice he could hardly hear,
“What – did you – find out?”
“What I suspected,” he answered, “that the chocolates had had a poison injected into them very skilfully! It would have been impossible for you to realise they had been tampered with until it was too late!”
He saw the shudder that shook Nadia’s body.
Then she said,
“I must go away! I – cannot stay here because – they must have – found me, and if they – strike again, it might – harm you!”
She was speaking without thinking.
Then she could see the expression of astonishment in Warren’s eyes before he asked,
“What are you talking about?”
She looked at him blindly for a moment, then away again, and he said quietly,
“I think we should be honest about this, and face facts. The poisoned chocolates came from Magnolia Keane!”
He realised as he spoke that this was not what Nadia had been thinking.
She stared at him for a long moment before she asked a little incoherently,
“Are you – sure of that? Are you – quite sure?”
“Absolutely sure and the only question the Surgeon kept asking me was how anybody who was not experienced could have inserted poison so skilfully without there being any outward sign of it.”
Nadia drew in her breath.
Then in a voice Warren was aware she was trying to make normal she asked,
“But – why should Miss – Keane wish to – poison me?”
Warren’s voice was hard as he replied,
“I should have thought that was obvious.”
“Yes – of course – how stupid of me!” Nadia said. “She did say that – you belonged to her – and she would never let me – have you.”
“Tell me exactly what she said.”
It was an order and although Nadia hesitated she knew she must obey him.
“She said first, ‘I understand you are trying to marry Warren’!”
“And what did you reply?”
“I said we were engaged.”
“Then what happened?”
Again Warren’s voice was very authoritative and Nadia replied,
“Miss Keane said, ‘you are not going to marry him, and if you try to do so, you will be sorry’!”
As she spoke, Nadia thought it was very stupid of her not to have thought in the first place that it might be Magnolia Keane who had sent her the chocolates.
She had never imagined any English lady would ever behave in such a manner, or that it was possible for her to be in that sort of danger in an English country house where there were servants to protect them and Warren never very far away.
“I can only say how sorry I am and it is my fault that she has upset you,” Warren said in a quiet voice. “I thought she might try to hurt me in some way I could not even imagine, but it never struck me that she would attempt to murder you!”
“Perhaps it would be – better if you m-married her as she – wants you to do,” Nadia said almost in a whisper. “After all – you – loved her once.”
Even as she spoke, as she had done spontaneously on a sudden impulse, she knew that she could not bear Warren to marry such a woman.
He was too fine, too noble and far too magnificent to waste himself on anyone who would stoop to murder to get her own way.
Then she saw the scowl between Warren’s eyes and realised how angry he was as he said,
“I would not even try to save Magnolia from the gallows, which is where she would have ended had it not been for poor Bertha.”
“The Veterinary Surgeon could not – save her?”
“She died instantly, as you would have done if you had eaten the chocolates, as Magnolia intended you should.”
His lips tightened before he said,
“She had not foreseen that I would be here, but anticipated I would still be looking after some of the relatives who might be expected to linger until it was quite late.”
His voice was deep with anger as he continued,
“She knew that Mama was not allowed chocolates and that left only you, who she expected would be here alone when you received her present.”
As he finished, he gave an exclamation that seemed almost like an oath as he added,
“That is what happened, and there is nothing I can do about it, no charge I can bring against her, although only by a miracle are you alive!”
Without thinking Nadia moved and held onto him with both her hands.
“It is frightening – very frightening,” she said, “but at least you did not eat one – as you might have done after dinner.”
“Bertha saved us, and we should be grateful for that,” Warren said. “I have left orders for her to be buried in the Dogs’ Cemetery where all our dogs lie, and where I like
to believe they are happy and undisturbed.”
For the first time since she had come into the room, Nadia smiled.
“We, too, had a cemetery for our dogs,” she said. “When I was a little girl I used to put a bone on their graves thinking they could eat it when nobody was there and it had always disappeared in the morning!”
“Where was your cemetery?” Warren asked.
As if Nadia realised she had been indiscreet she took her hands from his and said quickly,
“We were talking about poor Bertha and tomorrow I would like to see where she is buried.”
“You were also telling me about your dogs,” Warren prompted. “What sort were they?”
“I don’t – want to – talk about it,” Nadia replied. “You must tell me how I can be – safe from Miss Keane – and perhaps for your sake – I should go away.”
She knew as she spoke she had no wish to leave him. In fact, it would be very frightening to have to do so.
As if he knew what she was feeling, Warren reached out and took her hand in both of his.
“Now listen to me, Nadia,” he said, “I promise I will look after and protect you, and that I shall prevent anything like this ever happening again.”
He felt her fingers quiver in his and after a moment he asked,
“You still trust me?”
“You know I do.”
Then, as she looked up into his eyes, it was impossible for either of them to look away.
After dinner at which Nadia had tried to eat a little of each course, they went back into the drawing room.
The last dying rays of the sun were crimson on the horizon, and as they instinctively walked towards the open window the peace and fragrance of the garden made it impossible to believe there was danger and hatred in the world beyond it.
They walked towards the sundial and stood looking down at the ancient figures carved in the worn stone.
“I want you to be happy here,” Warren said, as if he was pursuing his own thoughts.
“I am happy,” Nadia answered, “and now I am no longer afraid of Miss Keane – or anything – else.”
He knew from the way she spoke the last few words that she was in some other kind of danger, which she kept a secret and which was very different from what had just occurred.
Warren longed to ask her once again to tell him the truth about herself, but he knew it would only upset her, and he was certain that she would refuse, as she had already, to satisfy his curiosity.
She looked so lovely and at the same time so fragile and insubstantial in the fading light that he thought it seemed almost absurd that she should be involved in such dramatic and dangerous circumstances.
“I have not had a chance to tell you,” he said, “how magnificently you played your part yesterday. All my relatives were captivated by you and think I am very lucky to have found such a suitable wife to reign at Buckwood.”
“They were all very kind to me,” Nadia said in a low voice, “and your mother has been – wonderful!”
“My mother says you are everything she hoped for in a daughter-in-law.”
“I am sure she is very upset by what has just occurred.”
“After I saw the Veterinary Surgeon I explained to her who was responsible and she merely said it did not surprise her.”
“But she feels afraid – as I am – that Miss Keane might try to – hurt you.”
“I don’t think she wants to kill me,” Warren remarked.
Nadia gave a little cry and once again put up her hands towards him.
“If she cannot get her way – if you don’t marry her after all – even after she had – disposed of me – then she will – hate you for not doing what she wishes – and might try to avenge herself – as you are doing.”
The last words were very faint, but Warren heard them.
Then, as if he thought it was a mistake to be too serious, he said lightly,
“I am quite certain that whatever happens you will save me, as you have done already, very effectively.”
“Have I – really been able to help you?”
“You know you have,” he answered. “If you had not been here, Magnolia somehow in some crafty way of her own might have persuaded my relatives that I was under an obligation to make her my wife. That was what I foresaw and feared when I asked for your help.”
There was silence.
Then Nadia said hesitatingly,
“I-I thought perhaps now you would – want me to – go away – but I can see that might be a mistake.”
“A very great mistake,” Warren agreed. “I want you to stay here, I want you to go on playing the part of my fiancée until we are both absolutely convinced that Magnolia will try no more tricks.”
After a moment, he added,
“Perhaps I am asking too much of you? You have been through so much already in your own life, although you will not tell me about it, and I should not ask you to risk being murdered by a jealous woman who is obviously mentally unhinged.”
Nadia smiled at him and he thought it was a very brave and rather touching little smile.
“You promised to protect me.”
“And that is what I will do,” he answered, “but, please, Nadia, stay. I want to have you help me getting to know the people who are now my responsibility and, when it comes to planning alterations or improvements, two brains are obviously better than one.”
“I think you are flattering me,” Nadia replied, “and really you are quite capable of doing all those things without any help at all! At the same time you know I want to stay here.”
He knew there was a fear behind the words that she would not express or explain and he said with the smile that many women had found irresistible,
“I am pleading with you to stay! In fact, I should be very hurt and upset if you run away and leave me.”
“Then I will not do so.”
“Now I am going to send you to bed,” Warren said. “When I said goodnight to Mama she said that if she needed her beauty sleep, so did you, and as you are aware, I want you to look very much fatter than you are at the moment.”
Nadia laughed and the sound seemed to ring out like music in the quietness of the garden.
“I keep forgetting now that I have such lovely gowns that you are shocked by my appearance,” she said. “I really am trying very very hard to eat, but you will have to give me time.”
“I can think of quite a lot of things I should give you as well as time,” Warren answered, “but you will have to wait until I go back to London.”
He had forgotten as he spoke that Nadia was unlike all the other women he had ever met, wanting everything he was ready to give them and pleading for a great deal more besides.
Nadia took her hand from his and said in a serious little voice that he now knew so well,
“Please – I have accepted these beautiful gowns from you because I could hardly appear as your fiancée in the threadbare dress which was all I possessed. But I don’t expect – anything else and I should be very – upset if you tried to give it to me.”
Warren thought for a moment.
Then he said,
“Surely you must be aware that everybody will expect me to give you, as my fiancée, all the things that would express my love rather more eloquently than words.”
“No!” Nadia said.
She spoke so firmly that Warren was surprised.
Then, as if she felt she must explain herself, she said,
“When you asked me to help you, you said you thought of me as a lady. So as a lady, I will not and cannot accept anything from you except what is absolutely essential for the part I have to play.”
She spoke with a dignity that was very impressive.
Then she added in a child-like and pleading voice,
“I know Mama would not have approved – so please – do not embarrass me.”
Warren knew there was nothing he could do but capitulate and he said,
“Very well, Nadi
a, but I can only say that you are a very unusual and very surprising young woman, and apart from that, somebody I respect and admire for the courage you have shown.”
Because of the way he spoke, he saw the colour flood into Nadia’s cheeks.
Then, as her eye-lids flickered and he knew that she was too shy to look at him, he thought it was very attractive, very endearing and in every way very different from Magnolia.
Chapter Six
Nadia walked round the sitting room looking at the pictures and ornaments.
Every time she did so she thought how beautiful they were and how each one had a history of its own that she wanted to remember.
She had asked Warren about the pictures and he told her how they had come into the family, one of them being a present to his father and mother on their marriage.
“Everything in this house Mama treasures, because it is part of her life with my father, and of course mine,” he said with a smile.
“I can tell that it was all chosen with love,” Nadia commented softly.
He smiled, thinking it was the sort of remark that only she would make and which he found himself remembering when he thought about her during the night.
For her, he felt sure, every day was an enchantment that she could not express in words.
He knew that her sufferings, which must remain a secret, were something she did not wish to talk about because they had been so painful and had resulted in her mother’s death.
But he could not be unaware that for Nadia to have come to Buckwood was like being lifted from the horrors and terrors of hell into a special Heaven that was filled with sunshine.
‘How could I have wanted to die, when I can live here?’ Nadia asked herself.
Then, as always, when she reflected on just how marvellous everything was, there was a little stab of pain in case it should suddenly all come to an end.
She would wake in the night, thinking how wonderful the previous day had been and how much she was looking forward to the next.
Then she would ask herself how many more days there could be before Warren told her that her usefulness was at an end.
It was such an agony to think of it that she tried to force herself to live for the day, the hour, the second – and miss nothing.
Revenge of the Heart Page 10