Cast a tender shadow

by Dix, Isabel

  She was trembling as she pushed her chair away from the table and ran across to the mirror above the sideboard. Her hand actually shook as she touched the gold-brown silky skeins as they tumbled about her shoulders, she spoke a few words of gratitude that she had spent so much time after her swim last night shampooing, conditioning and then blow-drying her

  hair. Not, she assured herself as she looked at her parted lips, her tender expression, that she had meant to excite Charles's interest. All she wanted to do was wipe that superior smile off Francoise's face when she came to the party tonight, to make a great impression before, like an impressionist's stooge in a stage show, she disappeared in a flash of light.

  For the rest of the day she had little time to admire herself in the mirror or to ponder on the effect she would have on Charles's friends who would come expecting to meet the girl Francoise had described. There was little time for anything in the excitement and stress of preparing for the guests who would be arriving that evening. When she had helped Madeau and her sister Antoinette—whose name didn't cause Kate so much as a pang—in the kitchen, when she had advised Georges who was precariously balanced on a ladder draping coloured lights round the pool, she went out into the garden and began to pick huge bunches of flowers with which she intended decorating the hall and main rooms of the house, putting them for an hour or two in the coolness of one of the outbuildings where they rested up to their necks in baths of water.

  But the hours seemed simply to fly past, and at the last minute there was a panic when it seemed that the guests would be arriving while there were still a hundred jobs to be completed. At last everything was ready and they even had time to congregate in the kitchen for cups of tea and some sandwiches which Antoinette had been busy preparing for the last half hour.

  `I'm hungry.' Kate leaned back, supporting herself against the table. 'And these are delicious, Antoinette.' She listened while Madeau translated what she had

  said, trying to pretend that no compulsion was pulling her eyes to the tall figure who lounged against the wall opposite, drinking his tea.

  `I think we were all hungry.' He levered himself from the wall and placed his cup on the draining board. `It seems a long time since the soup and cheese we had at lunch time. And I've worked harder than I've done for a long time.'

  Kate got up and taking her cup to the sink washed and dried both of them. She turned towards the door when with what she considered sheer effrontery, Charles caught her lightly round the waist, swinging her about so that she would have lost her balance had she not put her hands to his shoulders. 'You can eat as much as you like tonight, cherie: He smiled down into her startled eyes. 'Although perhaps the guests will be surprised if the bride throws herself on the food as if she is starving!'

  There was a sound of laughter from the others as Madeau translated again, then into the silence, for the benefit of the three who were watching the scene Kate spoke sweetly. But then I'm not exactly a bride, chéri. Am I?' She smiled up into his face, then detaching herself firmly, 'I must go or I'll be late.'

  She knew that he held the door for her and followed her through into the hall. She knew that his eyes were on her as she paused by the huge arrangement of delphiniums, strikingly beautiful in the old copper jug; that he watched her as she moved to the staircase and began to climb

  `Kate.' Something in his voice made her falter, then turn without meaning to do either. She said nothing, but stood looking down at him, the deep violet of her

  eyes tortured as she tried to thrust aside feelings that she knew were futile. She waited, the moments seeming to stretch between them until he spoke again, and then it was with a dismissive shrug, a faint smile. 'Oh, nothing.'

  `You were going to say,' for once she felt that the initiative was with her, 'something about what I should wear.' Now hers were the lips that were mocking and she felt his eyes on them. 'Weren't you?

  `How clever you are, Kate.' He came forward to the rail and leaned against it, looking up at her admiringly. `Just like any long-married wife, knowing her husband's desires so well.' He smiled at the faint colour in her cheeks. 'Perhaps I was going to say something of the like. Now that I know you understand my wishes so well, perhaps there's no need.'

  Drawn by a force outside herself, Kate leaned down, putting the back of one hand against his cheek. 'Then can I ask you, Charles,' her voice was soft and tender, `to do something in return for me? Please shave. Because if there's one thing I can't stand,' her voice grew just a little sharp at the same moment as she drew her hand away, hearing the faint rasp of his beard, 'is dancing with a man who has a cheek like a bed of nails !' And without looking down at him again she ran quickly to the top of the stairs, ignoring the faint deep sound of laughter that followed her.

  But when they met again neither was in any mood for feeble witticisms, each was too conscious, too vibrantly aware of the other's presence to risk the shattering of the tautly controlled emotion that held them.

  As she walked slowly downstairs, Kate knew that she

  was about to give the performance of her life, the show that she would remember till the end. And for that leading role she was dressed like a star.

  The dress that Kulu had made for a rich American might have been designed for Kate instead of coming to her because of a whim of the original customer. There was a wide circular yoke encrusted with glittering beads, long ruby-coloured bugles, gold sequins, flat discs of jet and from the yoke hung a cascade of pleats reaching to her ankles. The pale pink drew attention to the honey bloom of her skin and the diaphanous softness of the sheer cotton floated about her as she moved.

  Never before had Kate taken such trouble with her appearance. The shining hair was pulled softly back from her face and piled with deceptive casualness just above her nape but with one or two wisps being allowed to escape and curl softly about her face. Her eyelids were cleverly shadowed with a soft grey colour and her lips had been touched with palest pink.

  About her wrist she had clasped a gilt glittery bracelet which drew attention from her face, then to her slender feet, encased in impossibly high gold sandals. She held her breath as she reached the bottom step, and the figure she knew had been watching her descent came forward to meet her.

  They stared at each other, then Kate found her hand taken, Charles's lips pressed against it briefly before it was held to his smooth freshly shaven cheek. 'I hope, my beautiful Kate, that I please you half as well as you please me.' When he had spoken the silence throbbed between them. Without taking her eyes from his face she could not mistake the tall litheness of his figure, nor

  ignore the sophisticated perfection of the smooth dark dinner jacket, the frill of the shirt front edged with black.

  `Come with me, Kate. I have something for you.' And she found herself being led, with an urgency that seemed to have little to do with the imminent arrival of guests to the small study which opened from a short corridor off the hall and-which Kate had seen only once.

  Inside the room she stood, watching while he went over to the small antique desk beside the window, opened the drawer and took out a small box, returning to her and holding it towards her.

  `What is it?' She felt that she daren't take it, that she had no right to become further involved with this man, that whatever was inside that box would only make it more difficult for her to stick to her resolve.

  `Open it, Kate.' His voice was deep and warm and insinuating so that without further consideration she pressed the button that held the blue leather lid in position.

  The ring she looked down at was blazing with the glory of a perfect sapphire—so perfect that even as she knew that she must not take it she found admiration impossible to resist. 'It's beautiful!' she exclaimed.

  `Then let me put it on for you.' He reached for the box, imprisoning her hand at the same time.

  `No.' She tightened her fingers, looking at him with frightened appealing eyes.

  `You must, Kate.' He seemed to share the tension that invaded
her at his touch. 'It's natural that my wife would have an engagement ring. I insist.' Gently he opened her now unresisting fingers and she watched

  him slip the ring on the finger where the plain gold band had been placed a week before. Then she trembled as he took her fingers to his mouth and kissed them. 'A perfect match for your eyes, Kate.' But as he spoke he seemed to have no interest in the costly jewel.

  CHAPTER NINE

  THEN before there was time to even think of anything else they heard the arrival of the first guests.

  Kate's first impression was that all Charles's friends were rich cosmopolitans who jetsetted round the world and who spoke transatlantic English almost as well as Charles himself did. She was introduced to men accompanied by beautiful elegant wives whose conversation was interspersed with references to Lagos and Riyadh, Algiers and Tehran, New York and Hong Kong.

  But tell us about yourself, Kate.' A short dark man whose name she thought was Claude admired her over the rim of his champagne glass, tried to draw her out. `It was such a surprise to hear that Charles had found a wife. And you are a very pleasant surprise indeed. I imagined someone quite different. Why is that, do you think, Lise?' He turned briefly to his wife, a tiny fair-haired girl.

  Lise shrugged and smiled at Kate. 'I can't say. I suppose I just got the wrong impression from what Francoise said.' Kate caught an exchange of looks between the women and was grateful when Charles came up behind them, slipping his hand into Kate's and smiling down at her.

  `I'm asking Kate why you've been hiding her for so long.' Claude spoke to his host although his eyes were

  still on Kate's face. 'It wasn't fair on the rest of us.' `That was what I liked about the idea,' Charles replied smoothly.

  But where did you meet?' One of the other women seemed intrigued. 'Was it in France? Or London?'

  `It's all a bit complicated, Nini, but in fact we met in France. Perhaps someday we'll feel like telling you the whole story, but at the moment we feel inclined to keep it to ourselves.'

  `Sounds very romantic!'

  `It was.' Kate thought it was time she took some part in the conversation, and anyway it gave her the opportunity to look lovingly up into Charles's face. 'It was the most romantic, unexpected meeting you can imagine.' She faltered a little as she saw the expression in his eyes and was glad that a flurry of new arrivals gave them the opportunity to leave the group round the pool and go forward to meet some older people who had just come and were being shown through the french doors by Antoinette.

  Gravely, courteously Charles introduced her to them, explaining carefully who each was; Monsieur and Madame Perrette farmed the land adjoining, Monsieur de Warens was the local vet and Madame Gardillou lived in the large house at the far end of the village. As none of these people spoke any English Kate had to content herself with a very limited conversation, using the words she was gradually picking up from Madeau and because of that trying particularly to make them feel welcome. She suspected that they, in their slightly old-fashioned formal clothes, might feel a little awkward with the younger, more trendy guests, and that was another reason for showing extra warmth. She sensed

  that Charles had the same idea and was grateful when he took the trouble to do some translating. She listened to a lengthy discussion, suspected from the way all eyes were concentrated on her that she was the subject, and turned enquiringly to Charles when it ended.

  `I am being congratulated, Kate, on my choice of a bride. They can quite understand why I chose an English girl.'

  `Oh . . .' Kate fluttered her eyelashes and blushed. Merci, Mesdames et messieurs. Et moi aussi.' She struggled to find the words. Je suis três contente avec mon franfais.'

  `Bravo!' Monsieur de Warens clapped his hands and reaching for his glass raised it to them both. 'A votre santé, madame. Et Charles.'

  Soon though there was little time to do more than welcome the guests as they arrived so quickly, one group after another until the terrace by the pool was crowded and the air was loud with the sound of conversation and laughter. Almost the last person to arrive was Francoise, with just a step behind her a short dapper man of middle age.

  Kate was standing by the open french door when they came through the sitting room and she stepped forward with a welcoming smile, her hand held out, knowing that Charles was a mere step behind her. As her eyes and Francoise's met, Kate knew that for a moment she had not been recognised. There was total absence of response in the pale eyes which almost at once flicked away from the girl towards the tall figure just behind her.

  `Charles!' The shrill voice was affectionate and she stood on tiptoe to brush his cheek with her lips. Then

  she noticed Charles had his hand on Kate's elbow and her eyes moved to her face, still with that blank expression of incomprehension. Another quick glance to Charles and back again before understanding dawned, a look of anger instantly disguised in a smile. 'And Kate. How wonderful you look tonight, chérie! Colour rose in the visitor's face as she wondered if she had betrayed too much of her feelings.

  `And you too, Francoise.' At least in that Kate thought she could be truthful. 'That's a simply sensational gown.'

  Francoise looked down at the gold lamé cheongsam, skin-tight and with the skirt slit to the knee on one side. `Thank you. It's one I had made in Hong Kong a few months ago.' She seemed to remember she had brought someone with her and looked round to where Charles and her partner were having a casual conversation. `Emil, this is the new Madame Savoney-Morlet.' There was a trace of sarcastic waspishness in her voice that made Kate wince, but she smiled as she held out her hand to the short stout man who was looking at her.

  ' Enchanté, madame.' He held her hand, bowing over it. 'You are not the lady I expected.' He spoke with such a strong accent that Kate had difficulty understanding his words. 'The picture you drew, chérie,' he smiled at Francoise, 'made me think of someone quite different.'

  Francoise shrugged without replying, her eyes searching the faces of the guests for someone she knew, and at the same moment Kate's eyes met Charles's, surprising there a tiny glint of amusement—as if he too were remembering the day when she had poured so much oil on her hair and had dressed in her oldest jeans

  and blouse. The shared recollection gave her a warm comfortable glow.

  The party seemed to be a considerable success, if noise and laughter were any guide. Kate circulated constantly, never feeling completely at ease except when Charles was by her side, but when his hand was on her arm, when they were presenting the picture of perfect romantic bliss, all her nervousness disappeared. He seemed to sense this, for he was rarely far from her side, always finding the role of devoted husband one which sat on his shoulders with ease.

  The food was predictably perfect, the boeuf en gelée cut into thin pink slices which simply melted in the mouth and the array of delicious salads offering a bewildering choice. Kate was so busy seeing that the guests had all that they wanted that she forgot that she was hungry till Charles appeared by her side holding out a plate with a careful selection of salads and meat.

  `Come.' The dark eyes entertained no refusal. 'You must be exhausted. I've found a nice quiet spot where we can eat in peace.'

  But won't they . . . Won't your guests expect you to be with them?'

  `I think they're all happy now. They're meeting lots of friends, they're all eating and drinking merrily enough. And that reminds me, I notice that you haven't had a glass of champagne. Come on, Kate.' And holding his own plate in one hand, leading Kate with the other, he took her to a small window seat in one of the corridors at the back of the hall.

  It was clear enough that he had made some previous arrangements, for on the sill were two tall glasses and an ice bucket with a bottle of champagne. Kate sat quietly,

  waiting while he eased the cork from the bottle and poured the sparkling liquid into the waiting glasses.

  `To you, Kate.' He stood looking down at her, his face hidden from her in the shadowy darkness, only the white of his shirt
front gleaming but faintly coloured from the lights that hung about the pool outside the window.

  `To you, Charles.' Her voice was low with an aching sadness and she felt like weeping while knowing that she must not. She sipped the wine, glad when he sat down on the seat beside her and began to shake out the large linen napkin.

  `That's better.' If she was moved by the occasion he seemed remarkably calm as he emptied his glass and reached again for the bottle. Kate followed his lead, feeling much more cheerful as the refreshing wine raced through her veins, holding out her glass again for replenishing.

  During the meal they spoke little, but there was a companionable quality about their silence, as if they were just any other couple relaxing during a successful party. When Kate had finished her main course, Charles removed the plates, returning a few minutes later with two large goblets of sugared strawberries and a plate with a selection of cheeses.

  `Tonight I shall do it the English way and have the fruit first. Then we can share the cheese.'