Beyond The Blue Mountains - Plaidy Jean - Страница 43

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What wretchedness! To have hurt Margaret like this Margaret, who had almost always been kind to her. What unhappiness to see Margaret growing thin and wan each day because of her.

Mrs. Orland said: “My dear Carolan, I must talk very seriously to you. It would be tragedy for you to marry Everard. You are old enough now to know that the squire is not your father. How could an Orland and one who has given his life to the church -marry a woman who was born as you were born? It would be as though he condoned immorality. It would kill the career he has planned for himself; one day he would reproach you if you married him.”

Could that be so? She did not know. She asked Everard.

“I would never reproach you,” said Everard. He was young and very earnest, very earnestly in love, very earnest about his career too. Marry Carolan he must, for his need of her was sinful; he would never forget her as long as he lived, and only by marriage and the getting of children could he be Christian. He could not talk of this to his mother, nor to anyone. But thus it was. And yet… why had she to be born in that sadly immoral way? Why had she to have a wanton for a mother? Would she have been Carolan if she had not? Would she have had that wild quality, that queer fascination, from which he could not escape? His mother said: “But, Everard, think, my darling, think!” He said: “Mother, I love Carolan … I must marry Carolan. I could never love anyone else.”

His father said: “You have a duty, my son, to God and the church. Such a marriage would be pollution. Is the girl suited to be the wife of a parson?”

“She is suitable to be my wife!” said Everard.

“The obstinacy of youth!” wailed Mrs. Orland.

“After all we have done for you …”

But Everard knew that, had he not been bewitched, he would not have chosen Carolan. They were right when they said Margaret was the wife for him. Docile, religious-minded, gentle, loving was Margaret. Sweetly pretty, without that wild beauty of Carolan’s which was hardly beauty at all. He knew, and he was wise and serious in all things except in love. But how could a man be wise, loving Carolan.

“I must marry Carolan, Mother, I must!” Mrs. Orland loved her son dearly; he was all her life, for her husband she had never loved. So she set about saving Everard from the disaster of marriage with Carolan, and she set about it wisely.

“I would not wish to spoil your chance of happiness, dear boy. I would want only to make sure of it. You are very young yet; Carolan is even younger. Why, only yesterday she was a baby in the nursery. I am very fond of Carolan; she is a wild, sweet child. But, darling, haste in all things is inadvisable; in marriage it may well prove disastrous. Will you do one little thing for me, darling?”

Everard kissed his mother’s hand. He loved her deeply, and the strong sense of chivalry in his nature made him long to protect her from any unhappiness he might cause her by this consuming passion for Carolan.

“I will do anything except give up Carolan and that I cannot do!”

“I would not ask that. I begin to see how you love the child. It is only your happiness that I think of.”

“You are an angel, Mother.” His face was alight with happiness, so that he looked just a boy again.

“Listen, darling,” she said.

“You have your new living; go to it. There will be plenty of work for you to do. Go to it for three months. Do not see Carolan during that time.”

“Not see her…”

“You could write, my darling… Believe me, it is wise…”

And eventually he had agreed to do that.

“Three months? What is three months, Carolan?”

An eternity! said Carolan to herself.

She let him go. And he had gone fifty miles away to the new living, and he wrote to her often and told her of the events of his day.

With Everard gone, and Margaret pining, and the strange secret silence of the squire, life was grey indeed.

Charles came home. A big man of twenty-two, very like his father, causing a flutter among the females of the countryside. He too watched Carolan with something of the secret silence of the squire. From under his heavy lidded eyes he watched her, and there were traces of that childhood cruelty about his mouth.

Once he found her in the stables grooming her horse, and he stood leaning against the door watching her.

“Damn it, Carolan,” he said, for he used oaths like the squire, ‘you have grown quickly!”

“Naturally,” she said, “I am older.”

“And good to look at too!”

She was silent, wishing him gone.

“Everard evidently thought so,” he added.

She was still silent.

“You are a sullen devil, Carolan! Have you no welcome for your … for your … what am I, Carolan? I am not your brother, am I? I do not mind that though, do you?”

“I do not mind in the least,” said Carolan coolly.

“Why should you? Do you still bear grudges for past offences?”

“I dislike you intensely, just as I always did, if that is what you mean.”

“Hoity-toity!” he said.

“What a little Miss she is. I could make you like me, Carolan.”

“You would set yourself an impossible task.”

“Would I? Would I?” He pushed through the half-door.

“Not impossible at all, Miss Carolan. By God, you have a damned pretty face! And cheeky too. But I always liked a bit of cheek.”

“Stand back!” ordered Carolan.

“I am not a child of five now to be teased by you.”

“Oh, no, not five. Almost a wife, eh, Miss Carolan? Almost the parson’s wife! Still, is that going to stop you having a little fun?”

“Fun? Do you think dallying with you would ever be fun for me? I assure you it would be far from that in fact quite the most unpleasant thing that had ever happened to me.”

“Good God, Carolan! Do you think I will stand for that?”

“Stand for what you will. I want nothing of you!”

He caught her suddenly.

“Little prude! Are you such a prude with Everard, I wonder?”

She kicked his legs angrily, and he released her.

“What a spitfire!” He grimaced, for she had hurt him. and all the desire to kiss her had vanished momentarily; he would have liked to hit her. He almost did, but the thought of the squire’s anger if he heard of this reminded him that he needed money from the squire, and he had to sing small for a while.

He said: “Do you imagine that you are so very attractive that you can kick and still be kissed?”

“You are ridiculous! Conceited fool, that is you, and always was!”

“By God, there are those who are only too pleased to kiss me.”

There are those doubtless, but you probably have to pay them well.”

She walked past him arrogantly, her chin up, her eyes flashing her contempt. But her heart quailed a little at the expression in his eyes; it reminded her of the squire’s eyes.

So there was Charles, a hateful presence in the house; and that scene in the stables had brought home a sudden and horrible realization. She would not face it, for quite a long time; but she did eventually. She dreamed once that the squire gave her a horse for her birthday as indeed he had many years ago and they went riding together, and he said: “Kiss me for my present, Carrie!” And he seized her, and he had two heads, and one was his own and the other Charles’s, and he would not let her go. She awoke from that dream, screaming, and then she could no longer hide the truth from herself.

Sometimes at mealtimes she would watch the big hands of the squire, peeling a peach, cracking a nut; sometimes she would find his eyes fixed upon her.

She would wake suddenly in the night and think she heard footsteps in the corridor outside her door. Once she thought she heard the door handle turned. Her door was locked; she had long ago taken to locking her door.

Panic grew on her. She was afraid to be alone, afraid of his coming on her suddenly, afraid to sleep, afraid to be off her guard, afraid to ride out in case he rode after her. The squire was a great shadow over her life, and beside it was the smaller shadow of Charles. Terrified she was. Nervous and pale. The storm was gathering; one day it would break. Something frightful was going to happen to her if she stayed … something inevitable and inescapable.

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