Strange Adventure

by Craven, Sara

But she had been too tired and nauseated to care very much either way, and was thankful to be shown to a large room on the first floor where an enormous but comfortable-looking bed awaited her, and a plump black-eyed girl with a ready smile and the unlikely name of Ariadne helped her undress and get between the lace-trimmed linen sheets, fresh with the smell of sweet herbs. She had been coaxed into drinking part of a bowl of delicious chicken soup, and had fallen asleep almost at once.

  She heard a noise like a sandshoe scuffling along a mosaic floor, and, turning her head, saw what had woken her. A young girl, her dark hair drawn into two bunches, sat cross-legged on the bedroom floor a few feet from the bed

  silently regarding her. She wore a pair of sun-bleached levis which looked as if they had been deliberately shrunk on to her body and a skimpy tee-shirt which revealed plainly that Eleni Andreakis considered the wearing of a bra an unnecessary refinement.

  Lacey propped herself up on her elbow and regarded her in turn. Then, hoping her voice would not betray her nervousness, she said Talimera, Eleni.'

  `For crissakes!' The girl tugged irritably at one of her bunches. `Do we have to go through all that stuff? And I'd rather be called Helen.'

  `OK.—Helen,' Lacey agreed equably. 'I just thought it would give me a chance to practise my Greek.'

  `Well, your pronunciation's lousy,' Eleni or Helen said sullenly. 'And you don't have to speak Greek. Everyone here is bi-lingual, even Aunt Sofia when she remembers.'

  `She was a bit upset last night,' Lacey told her carefully. `She didn't know where you were.'

  Helen grinned. 'Oh, I was around,' she said airily. 'But I didn't feel in the mood for formal introductions. Aunt Sofia's so old-fashioned she'd probably have expected me to curtsey or some dumb thing. I thought I'd rather take a look at you in my own time. I'll say this for you,' she went on generously. 'You sure look O.K. when you sleep. I mean, you don't snore or hang your mouth open or anything yuk like that. I guess sleeping with Troy, you wouldn't dare.'

  'No,' Lacey agreed meekly, 'I certainly wouldn't.' It occurred to her with a little shock of pain that she had never actually slept with Troy, or woken with him either, but she crushed the thought down.

  Helen was speaking again. 'Actually I shall probably never speak to Troy again for the rest of my life because he didn't let me come to the wedding. He kept it all so quiet, I wondered if you had two heads or something, but you look better than I thought. At least he didn't stick some creep on to me.'

  `I don't quite follow ...' Lacey began carefully, but Helen 'cut in.

  `Sure you do. You're supposed to stop me giving Aunt Sofia the run-around. I'm not that dumb, you know. She's

  been bleating for days about how nice it will be for me to have a sister my own age.'

  `I see,' Lacey said carefully, allowing none of her inward dismay to show. 'And how do you feel about it?'

  Helen's dark eyes considered her for a moment, and then she gave a faint grin. 'I'll tell you when I know,' she said. 'Are you getting up soon? I thought I'd show you around.'

  This was so blatantly an olive branch that Lacey could not help feeling a little suspicious, but she accepted the offer with every appearance of pleasure. After all, she thought, Troy had intended her to be a friend for Helen, and questioning her motives at the outset would not be an ideal basis for any future relationship between them.

  Some fifteen minutes later, showered and changed into a slim-fitting cotton shift, she was walking with Helen through the extensive grounds which gave the villa its privacy, and wondering what had happened to the parched wilderness she had imagined. Roses grew everywhere, their masses of fragrant blooms contrasting sharply with the dark, rather sombre green of the cypresses, and the delicate silver of the olive trees. Their scent hung on the air, intermingling with the sharper tang of citrus. Lacey took a deep wondering breath.

  `I never imagined anything so lovely,' she told Helen frankly. The younger girl made a slight grimace.

  `It's O.K.,' she said off-handedly. 'And it would be even better if there was just something to do once in a while.'

  `Where did you live before you came here?' Lacey tried to choose her words with care, but Helen's response was ready enough.

  `California,' she said. 'Aunt Dora had a house at Malibu which we used at weekends. Boy, this is some contrast,' she added; jerking her chin discontentedly at the warm stillness all around them.

  `It's rather different from what I'm used to as well,' Lacey said gently, and Helen's eyes flew to hers as if the thought had not occurred to her before. As they walked slowly back towards the villa, she chatted with increasing frankness of her life in the States, her friends at High School and the

  plan to set up a teenage commune which had so badly misfired.

  'Aunt Dora thought it was O.K.,' she told Lacey mutinously. 'I don't see why Troy had to play the heavy all of a sudden. He's never worried that much about me before.'

  `Perhaps he thought you were safe in your aunt's charge.' Lacey felt bound to respond in some way. 'It may be that it was the first time he'd thought there was any need to interfere.'

  'Maybe,' Helen agreed. But it was for sure he didn't like Aunt Dora, any more than Papa did. She and Papa had a big row once over the guardianship bit and he accused her of exerting undue influence on Mama when she was dying.'

  `But why should she do that?' Lacey asked rather helplessly.

  'Money,' Helen said succinctly. 'I guess she thought if she was looking after me, she would have control of my fortune too. Only Papa fixed things so she only got an allowance. Then when he died she tried to get Troy to push it up a little, and there was more trouble!'

  Lacey tried to appear noncommittal as she listened, but secretly she was appalled at Helen's cynical appraisal of the situation and her apparent acceptance of her aunt's shallow and mercenary set of values.

  'How did you get on with your aunt?' she asked eventually.

  Helen grinned. 'What do you want me to say—that she used to beat me and starve me and lock me in the cellar? She didn't. We got on fine. She couldn't help the way she was about money. She and Mama never had any when they were girls, but Mama didn't care about things like that. And when she married Papa, nothing changed. She never wanted to become part of the jet-set crowd. That's really why they built this house, so they could have an ordinary home and an ordinary family. Aunt Dora always said she should have married the millionaire, not Mama. She said she would have made better use of the potential.'

  Lacey had to smile in spite of herself. Helen's Aunt Dora might be a gold-digger, but at least she was almost naively open about it, whereas Michelle ... but she closed her

  mind to thoughts about her stepmother, relegating them to a corner of her consciousness.

  'What about you, Lacey?' Helen said. 'Of course it's not really so different for you, is it, your folks being wealthy too.' She stopped, her eyes, suddenly, round with dismay. 'What am I saying? Gee, Lacey, I'm sorry. I forgot all about your father. Me and my big mouth,' she added contritely.

  Lacey forced a smile. 'Don't worry. I—I have to face up to it some time.'

  Aunt Sofia was out on the tiled patio looking for them as they approached the house, but her brow cleared slightly as she saw them approaching the house in apparent amity and Lacey agreed eagerly to her suggestion that they should have breakfast in the open air. Two dark-clad maids carried out a table and chairs, and proceeded to set out freshly squeezed orange juice, hot rolls and a pot of the dark, strong Turkish coffee. Lacey was not enamoured of this brew, but she told herself that, like everything else in her new life, she would have to accustom herself.

  When breakfast was over, Helen took her round the villa. Lacey found that the rooms were spacious and airy, and far less ostentatious than she had privately feared. The room in which she had woken up that morning, together with its adjoining bathroom, were among the most luxurious, and she was not altogether surprised when Helen told her that Troy had had the suite entirely redecorated be
fore the wedding. Perhaps this was the surprise he'd said was waiting for-her on Theros, she thought vaguely. But when they arrived finally at the big saloni, Lacey realised how wrong she was. For there, dominating the quiet comfort of its surroundings, stood a brand new baby grand piano, and she knew without a second's doubt that this was her wedding present, brought from where? Corfu? the mainland? at heaven only knew what expense and difficulty. Her vision blurred ridiculously, and she had to shake her head impatiently to regain her self-control.

  It did not take much urging from either Helen or Aunt Sofia to persuade her to sit down and try the instrument. Its tone was perfect, she thought, as her fingers discovered familiar chords. It was not until she was well embarked into

  the piece that she realised' she was playing Liszt's Liebestraum and her fingers faltered slightly as the significance of her choice came home to her. A glance at Aunt Sofia's benign smile revealed that she too was perfectly familiar with the evocative music and thought it a perfectly suitable piece to be at the forefront of a young bride's mind. Lacey could have screamed with vexation, but she forced herself to play to the end and accept the admiring applause.

  'Meet the girl who has everything.' Was there a sour note in Helen's congratulations? Lacey found herself wondering. 'She has looks, she has money and now she even has talent. I bet you just never put a foot wrong, do you, Lacey?'

  `Yes, very often—and both feet,' Lacey hastened to assure her, but she felt that the hoped-for camaraderie had received a setback, and was not totally surprised when Helen disappeared after lunch, leaving her to her own devices. Aunt Sofia retired to her room for a rest and Lacey found herself at a loose end. She could not even occupy herself by unpacking her clothes as this had been done for her by one of the maids, she thought, wandering into the master bedroom and staring round with a critical eye. Not that she could fault any of the arrangements, from the king-size bed with its luxuriously padded headboard which dominated the large room to the fitted wardrobes with their louvred doors which ran the length of one wall. It was odd, too, to compare them with the modest amenities that had been hers at the convent not so long ago, and to realise that that part of her life was over and that she could not, even if she wanted to, go back to being the girl she was then. That brief, magical time in Troy's arms had changed all that—transformed her from a child into a woman and a wife. It was no use pretending to herself that this had been simply an isolated incident born of her distress either. Troy had always had the power to make her aware of her body. She could acknowledge this now and admit too that that awareness had been overtaken by sheer physical need and that until he came to her again, she would know an aching loneliness in that huge bed which had never been intended for single occupation.

  With a little sigh, she wandered across the room and pushed open the door that led to his dressing room. She did not know what she was seeking. There wasn't even a whiff of the familiar cigar smoke left hanging in the still air to evoke his presence. The rows of formal suits hanging in the clothes cupboard seemed blank and anonymous and gave no clue to the man who owned them and who now counted her as another of his possessions. There were no jarring notes. Everything was of the finest materials and fastidiously kept, she thought, almost pettishly slamming shut one of the drawers of the dressing chest. As she turned away, her arm brushed an onyx box standing on top of the chest, and sent it tumbling to the carpet.

  `Oh, no!' Lacey knelt down beside it ruefully. This was the retribution that fate dealt out to snoopers, and it would serve her right if the box was broken and she had to explain to Troy that she had caused the accident while she was going through his things.

  But the box was intact, although it had opened during its fall and the cuff links and studs it contained were now strewn on the floor. Lacey replaced the velvet-lined partitions, and began to sort the contents into matching sets. There only appeared to be one casualty—one of the cuff links was broken, and se began to search around on the floor for the missing half, the broken piece clutched in her hand. Where on earth was it? It was the wrong shape to roll and it would be such a shame if it was lost because it was such an attractive pattern, chequered in gold and enamel ... She suddenly felt very cold as she stared down at the cuff link. She knew quite definitely that her search was useless, and that she would not find the rest of the broken trinket on Troy's dressing room floor. She knew, because she had found it already in the bathroom of the suite she had occupied with Michelle in Paris all those weeks ago—where Troy had lost it.

  She sat back on her heels and stared down at the broken piece until it blurred under her eyes. Such a tiny thing, she found herself thinking, and yet it was the missing piece in the jigsaw which made everything else fall into place.

  It showed her Troy and Michelle—together in Paris. Pain

  and bitterness fought with disbelief making her feel almost physically sick. No wonder Michelle behaved with such hostility, seeing herself cynically jettisoned by her lover in favour of her own stepdaughter. What had Michelle said to her that night about her marriage? 'Not now—not to you.' Had she then expected Troy to marry herself? Like Michelle, he must have known it was only a matter of time before she was a widow and free to marry him. Why hadn't he waited for her?

  Or did he draw the line at making his wife the woman who had already betrayed one husband? Lacey found she was shivering uncontrollably. Instead he had chosen her—the inexperienced girl whom he could mould into the docile fidelity that his double standard of morality no doubt demanded.

  How could she have been such a fool? she asked herself despairingly. She had been so abysmally easy to beguile with his expert lovemaking, so ready to be blinded to everything but her awakening desire for him. She had not even recognised his voice as that of the man who had telephoned the suite that night. Was that part of her attraction as a wife, she wondered, that she was so pitifully easy to dupe?

  The thought stung and tormented, to be succeeded by the even more bitter realisation that she was now here, safely disposed of on Theros, while Troy was still in England. With Michelle. The marriage of convenience had suddenly become an inconvenience, she thought, biting her lip savagely, trying to blot out the memory of his lovemaking. He had simply used her because it was his right to do so, and as soon as she was out of the way had no doubt turned in relief from her inexperience to the practised charms of his mistress.

  Her eyelids were closed so tightly that they hurt, and her heart was thudding unpleasantly, nauseously and so loudly that it seemed to fill her ears. And then she realised that it was not merely her own tumultous pulses that she heard, and that someone was knocking at the bedroom door with a soft persistence.

  She dragged herself up off her knees and still holding the

  cuff link clutched in her palm went out of the dressing room and across the bedroom to the door.

  Stephanos was standing there smiling, but his eyes grew suddenly anxious as they took in her over-bright eyes and pale face.

  'I have come to take my leave of you, Mrs Andreakis,' he said gently. 'I shall join Troy in London some time tomorrow, and I was wondering if you would care to send any messages to him.'

  Lacey stared at him, for a moment hardly comprehending what he was saying. He had been a courteous and considerate escort, but she knew he had been shocked at the utter chill which had attended her scene with Troy in the breakfast room, of which he had been an unwilling witness.

  `No,: she said, her throat constricted. 'There's no message.'

  'Mrs Andreakis—Kyria Lacey.' He looked at her almost beseechingly. 'If you do not wish to send a verbal message, I quite understand. I would be happy to wait while you wrote a note.' He paused, but she remained silent. 'Forgive me, but this cannot be a happy time for either of you. So much sorrow so soon after your marriage and now this separation. I have been a friend of Troy's for many years and I know it would comfort him to hear from you.'

  She smiled then, a brilliant artificial smile without meaning or emotion beh
ind it.

  'I'm no longer a child, Mr Lindos,' she said quietly. 'I don't imagine Troy will be lacking comfort—do you?'

  She stepped back and closed the door quietly but firmly before he could intervene again. There was a pause, then she heard his footsteps going slowly down the corridor. She waited until she could hear them no longer, then threw herself across the huge barren width of the bed, pummelling the quilted bedcover with her fists while tears of rage, jealousy and hurt rained wildly down her white face.

  It was a subdued trio of women that assembled for dinner

  that night. Helen arrived at the table with an air of

  bravado. She had been returned protesting to the villa some

  time before by the annoyed father of one of the younger fishermen who had allowed Helen to persuade him to take her out on his boat. But Yanni's babas had reacted with vigorous disapproval. Apart from the fact that her behaviour was unseemly for a girl of her age, he had no wish to arouse the wrath of the Kyrios Troy, he had told Aunt Sofia flatly.

  The poor woman was so outraged by Helen's behaviour and the thought of Troy's probable reaction if he learned of her conduct that she spent most of the meal moaning softly to herself and addressing reproachful remarks in a mixture of English and Greek to the patently unrepentant Helen. And so it was that Lacey's wan appearance and almost utter lack of appetite passed almost unobserved. In fact, Lacey felt that Aunt Sofia held her partly to blame for the incident by failing to keep a proper eye on her errant young sister-in-law.

  `Oh, God, everything's such a drag.' Helen cut irritably across her aunt's mutterings. `I'd never have asked Yanni if I'd guessed he'd let his old man push him around like that. There's just nothing to do on this place.'

  `Don't you swim?' Lacey hastily forestalled another outburst of wails from Aunt Sofia.

  'Oh, sure, but that's not much fun on your own.'