To reach her room on the next landing, she had to pass near the more masculine room her aunt had given Mr Stephens. And try as she would to keep her wild imaginings under control, Arden just could not resist taking a step out of her way and tiptoeing to his door to listen.
All, by the sound of it, was quiet in there, she heard. It came to her then to wonder if in the cold light of day she would think herself ridiculous to have been standing there when the exhausted-looking man must by now be in a deep sleep.
There was probably a perfectly valid reason for him being there, she decided. She remembered his strong autocratic face, that straight nose, and - although unsmiling—that well shaped mouth, and she mused then that he didn't look like a criminal, did he? Though since, as far as she knew, she had never come into contact with any criminal, she had no idea what one looked like anyway. It wasn't as if criminals wore a badge or anything, was it?
Scolding herself for her flights of fancy, for her panic in wanting to get back with all speed, Arden was on the point of creeping away, when a shout heard from within the room had her suddenly transfixed to the spot.
For the moment, what was being shouted was incomprehensible. Her next thought, as more words were shouted, was that the man inside was arguing with someone in the room. But as his voice came again, and only his, no other voice to be heard answering, unashamedly Arden did something which in normal circumstances she would never have done. She put her ear to the door, and listened.
All was quiet in there, so that for a second she wondered if she had imagined she had heard him shouting out. But, sure she had heard him shout, she needed no more convincing when again she heard him roar, his words taking shape this time as he cried out, 'The door!' Anguish, fear, frustration, a suffering in that shout coming from him speedily sent imagination on its way, leaving her with fact only as he continued to shout, this time, 'It won't open—the door won't open!' It was then that she knew that something, was dreadfully wrong in there.
Without giving herself time to think, she had her fingers on the old-fashioned door knob, was turning it and going in; it did not dawn on her that their guest must have little to hide since he had not bothered to lock his door.
But once inside the room, she saw a small table lamp was still on as if the occupant had been so tired sleep had claimed him before he could stretch out a hand to switch it off, then Arden's glance went straight to the bed. And what she saw there was sufficient to have her disregarding all the other thoughts that had gone through her head while she was absent from Hills View.
All at once all the sensitivity in her came together to go out to the occupant of the green room, who was obviously deep in the throes of some ghastly, terrifying nightmare.
'Fire!' he cried, though even that word did not impinge on her mind to connect him in any way with the arsonist she had been ready to believe he was. 'I can't …' he went on to yell, his face working, sweat in beads on his brow, his bare chest glistening with perspiration from the violence of his dream.
Hurriedly Arden approached the tangle of bedding, kicking an eiderdown that had fallen to the floor out of the way. She knew only that she should wake him up, that sensitivity in her having her forgetting what a rude man she had thought him, her only aim to get him out of that world that had his subconscious in turmoil.
'Mr Stephens!' she called, touching him, holding on to the arm nearest her that was thrashing the covers.
But he was too involved with the terrors besetting him to hear her. Though he must have felt her touch. For suddenly Arden was part of his nightmare too, and she found he had grabbed, hold of her and the next she knew was that with superhuman strength he had hauled her off her feet and had thrown her on to the bed beside him.
She heard him swear, but after her initial flutter when her feet had left the floor, one look at his closed eyes told her he was still in the grip of tormented sleep, that he had not, as she had thought, come awake and in doing so had gone back to swearing at her.
'Mr Stephens!' she called more loudly, the woollen stole that had been around her shoulders lost somewhere in between her feet leaving the carpet' and her landing.
But he was not answering to his name, his hands were busy on her, touching, feeling, yet she was positive, to fear for herself in her, that there was nothing sexual in his touch. It was more in the manner of a man feeling for broken bones.
'Oh God!' she heard him moan, in an anguish that had her knowing that something too terrible to be thought of had happened in his dream. That anguish in him then became so tortured that she could not bear to watch. Never had she thought to witness such suffering in another human being.
It was then that instinct alone took over in her. His hands on her were still, and when Arden found that his head was somehow at an angle with her shoulder, she could do no more than put her arms around him. There was no thought in her of the time; that it had gone one in the morning, or that somehow her dress had become torn, no thought in her at all as she cradled him to her breast, softly crooning, 'You're all right. It's all right now.'
'Oh God,' she heard him moan just once more, his voice defeated now, and then he was quiet. A peace was in him at last as he leaned his head against the swollen curve of her partly naked bosom where her dress had torn.
Thinking it was all over, Arden looked down into his exhausted face. Some inner voice told her she could leave him now, and that come morning he would have no idea that she had seen him as being far more sensitive than he would have anyone believe. For sensitive he must surely be, she saw, to have had such a hideous nightmare that it had left him bathed in perspiration.
She moved then with some idea of gently putting a pillow under his head, of putting the covers over him. For apart from a knot of bedding wrapped around his thighs and hips, his legs and chest were uncovered, and the temperature in the room was down.
But before she could make more than the most minuscule of movements, the eyes of the man resting against her shot open. And Arden, seeing he looked stupefied, was rapidly putting herself in his position. She saw at once the reason for his stupefaction, for if he didn't remember his nightmare, though surely he must—it must be totally bewildering for anyone to go to sleep alone and to wake up to find they had a stranger, complete with ball gown, sharing that bed with them!
'You had a nightmare,' she said gently. 'I heard you shout as I…'
'Oh God,' he groaned, turning his face into her breast, none of the terse rudeness leaving him with which she had been served before.
'It's over,' she said softly, her heart going out to him that he was still distressed—must be, since there was no sign of that aggressive front being erected again.
He was nowhere near to being the person he had been, she saw, feeling his weight against her chest as momentarily, exhausted still, he rested against her.
Then suddenly, as if just aware that it was her bosom he was resting on, he pulled back. To her mind he still looked bewildered at waking to find her there—or was it, she wondered, seeing the light of remembrance in his eyes, that the memory of the nightmare that had torn him apart was returning?
'It's over,' she repeated, softly again. 'Try to forget it and go back to sleep.'
With that she made to take her arms from him. But suddenly she became conscious of the tear in her dress, aware, as she had not been before, of how much bosom she was exposing, made startingly aware when her eyes followed his as they raked down the front of her.
Feeling all at once uncomfortable, she made to move again, only to have her tender heart touched once more when quietly he said: 'Stay with me.'
Gently she smiled at him, seeing nothing sexual in his request, seeing only that after what he had just been through, even a grown man was capable of feeling like a small boy who had awakened afraid of the dark. Unbeknown to her, her eyes were giving away the innocence of her thoughts as she sought again to reassure him.
'You'll be all right now,' she soothed. And she had so far forgotten that he
was indeed a grown man, and not some small boy who wanted company until he was able to sleep again, that taking her arms from him she moved from the bed and began to straighten the covers around him, reassuring again, as she smiled, and said:
'You'll be just fine, I'm sure.'
Her head bent, she looked up, startled, when she heard him exclaim:
'Good God!'
Stunned, she stared at him, her eyes taking in that all the aggression that had been in him before was suddenly roaring into life. That aggression was such a contrast from the quiet acceptance that had been in him that Arden could scarcely believe he should now look at her with that awful hard-eyed look. Hard eyes that were flicking cynically over her by now not so well covered swelling breasts the moment before he shattered her so completely, that for once in her life she had no answer.
'I can only think, Miss Kirkham,' he rapped nastily, 'that your date for the evening didn't come up to expectations!'
Witlessly, her cheeks flushed as she tried to cover herself with the torn material of her dress, Arden stared at him.
'Expectations?' she queried, innocence in her wide brown-eyed stare.
Sourly he looked back at her. 'The man I saw you leave with earlier,' he elucidated, letting her know he must have been at his window watching, 'looked to be man enough to give you everything you're hot for.' And while she went a furious red at what he was suggesting, he added offensively, 'What went wrong, that you had to come and wake me from my slumbers?'
'How…' choking on rage, Arden had to swallow before she could splutter out, '… dare you! You were…'
'Sleeping soundly,' he cut her off, when she knew full well he was aware he had had a nightmare. And chopping her off again before she could splutter anything else, dismissively he told her, 'When I want room service, I'll ask for it!'
Slamming out of the green room at gone one in the morning was not something Arden was normally given to doing either. But as she charged out, the crash of the door threatening to bring the walls down, she was too boiling mad to give consideration to anyone who might be sleeping. That man, she thought, that fiend of a man!
Why she hadn't hit him she didn't know, she fumed, as she got undressed and into bed. One thing was for sure, though, New Year's Day or no New Year's Day, tomorrow first thing was going to see the back of him!
But her blood was boiling, and it took an age for her to get to sleep that night. In consequence, the lie-in Louise had said Arden should have became an extended lie-in. So that by the time she presented herself downstairs, breakfast was over, and she was learning from her aunt that Mr Stephens had been out walking before it was light and that though he didn't look any better than he had done, he had eaten some breakfast before going back to his room.
'He's still here, then?'
'And staying another night,' said Louise. And before Arden could suggest differently, she was telling how he had paid for last night's accommodation, plus cash to cover a further few nights' stay.
Beaten before she started, Arden, having thought about J. Stephens almost entirely from the moment she had opened her eyes, was back to being sure he was a criminal. No wonder he had nightmares! With all the crimes she'd like to bet he had down to him, it was a wonder to her that he was able to sleep at all!
'I heard at the dance that there's an escaped arsonist on the loose,' she said, on the point of revealing her suspicions about their guest.
'He's been caught, or rather, he gave himself up,' Louise informed her. 'It was on the radio this morning. Poor man, he was near to suffering from frostbite.'
Only slightly relieved to hear that their criminal, for she still thought of him as that, the swine, was not the arsonist, Arden did not get a chance to suggest that she would rather they gave Mr Stephens his money back and told him to go, because Louise was launching into a hundred and one questions about the dance. So that by the time she had settled her aunt's natural curiosity, Louise was then saying she was in a bit of a rush and that she had seen to the Colonel's room, but could she leave Arden to see to Mr Stephens' room, as she had promised to show Colonel Meredith where the badger's sett was.
To ignore Mr Stephens' room, and him, would have been far more preferable to Arden. But somehow she sensed that Louise was taking more kindly to the Colonel's overtures than she had. And while her aunt would certainly raise no objection if she asked her to forget the badger's sett and to attend to the green room for her, she decided that romance, and her aunt's future happiness, could do without any hindrance. Arden bit down hard on the request.
Though he could jolly well wait to have his bed made, she thought mutinously, her thoughts as she put his bed straight far from the sweet sensitive ones they had been early that morning.
But when the kitchen was tidy, and all the downstairs rooms dusted, pride also nudging her that all housekeeping duties should be attended to before midday, at a quarter to twelve Arden picked up a duster and the carpet sweeper and climbed up to the first floor landing.
A cursory knock was all she afforded his door that morning. Nor was she waiting for his non-answer. With not a smile about her she followed her short tap on the woodwork by opening the door and going straight in.
That he did not care for the interruption, for all he appeared to be occupied with nothing more than moody thoughts, was quickly borne in on her as he turned from his dark contemplation of the view from his window.
Having nothing to say to him—in her book he did not warrant even the politeness of her saying she had come to tidy his room—Arden went over to where the bedcovers had been pulled over. She set to work, aware that his eyes were following each deft movement as she re-made his bed and made it much more to her liking.
If she had nothing to say to him, then it seemed that he had nothing to say to her either. But she was aware of the disgruntled way he had watched her shake up his pillows, and if she had no mind to communicate with him, that did not stop her from thinking.
Where had she seen him before? More convinced than ever that she knew him from somewhere, Arden tried to picture him without that recent scar, hoping that memory would be assisted that way, since he could not have been wearing it wherever it was that she knew him from. He probably hadn't been looking ill either, she thought—then promptly had to shelve delving into her memory for a while because, deliberately she was sure, just to be awkward she was positive, he was standing on precisely the piece of carpet that required a little attention.
'Excuse me,' was forced from her, much against her will.
It annoyed her that for an insolent few moments it didn't look as though he cared to shift himself. But in flicking a speaking look at him, Arden saw for herself that, as her aunt had said, Mr Stephens was not looking any better this morning. And much though she would rather it had not, that sensitivity in her chose just that moment to rise to the surface. To her it was obvious, from the deep grooves beneath his eyes, that not once had he closed them after she had stormed out in the early hours of that morning.
He is ill, she found herself thinking, and the many thoughts she had had on what a despicable character he was went far from her mind. All the thoughts she had had, that even if the arsonist was now again in custody that did not mean to say that the occupant of the green room was not a criminal, were nowhere near. And that sensitivity in her soul for a human being who, without the evidence of his terrible nightmare, she could see was suffering, had her forgetting that the only words she wanted to say to him were 'Get out—and don't come back'.
'How are you this morning?' she found herself asking, her sensitivity out in the open as she stared into tired dark eyes.
What she had expected him to answer she had no idea. Though had she given herself time to think before making her enquiry, she would have realised that since they had not parted on the best of terms, his answer might be far from polite. But when after a brief second when his face registered surprise, giving her the uncanny feeling that it had been years since anyone had enquired into his welfa
re, he was at once over his surprise, his look far from sociable as he barked in reply:
'What the hell is it to you how I am?'
Sensitivity, sympathy, and feeling for her fellow man went, rocketing as his harsh words hit her ears. It was plain to her then that Hills View was unfortunately harbouring a man who didn't need anybody. In perfect health or recovering from some setback, as he undoubtedly was, Mr J. Stephens wanted solicitude from no one.
'Not one damn thing!' Arden flared hotly, the pink of anger tinging the faint olive in her complexion. 'You can rot as far as I'm concerned!' And, too instantly wound up to leave it there, she was going on to blaze, 'It was purely a civilised courtesy on my part to enquire into the welfare of any guest who's had a—a disturbed night.' And she added, sparks flashing from her eyes, 'It was a mistake on my part to imagine that you were in any way civilised!'
Abruptly, because her temper invariably only ever came in short bursts on the rare occasions she had been needled into letting go, Arden came to an end. She felt better for letting him know what she thought of him. But in her surmise that that was the end of it, her surmise that her temper had blown itself out, she was to discover she still had temper to spare.
Insolently the tall man facing her tilted back on his heels, surveying her loftily as the sparks left her eyes. Then he was wasting no time in letting her know that he hadn't been left behind either when aggression had been handed out—if she hadn't learned that already.
'Your imagination, it would seem,' he told her curtly, 'has a lot to answer for.'
'What do you mean by that?' she asked shortly, anger to the fore again at his tone.
'I should have thought it was obvious,' he tossed arrogantly. 'You, Miss Kirkham, have no power whatsoever to disturb me in the slightest.'
'Dis…'
Aghast, she realised what he must be implying! He had to be meaning that when she had gone into his room at past one in the morning, she had thought she had—sexually—disturbed him, that being the reason for his 'disturbed night'. Anger such as she had never before known shot into her then. And she was in there fast and furious to round on him as she recalled:
Ruthless in All Page 3