Dare to Love (2 page)

My mother had been only a year older than I am now when she died. The Lawrences had been the most prominent family in the district, Graystone Manor a fine mansion. My grandfather had owned vast properties, and he had been proud of his aristocratic blood, his connections with royalty, however tenuous they might have been. His two daughters had been a disappointment, for naturally he had wanted a son to carry on the line. The oldest, Meg, a serious, bookish girl, seemed destined for spinsterhood, but he hoped to make an important match for Alicia—wild, impetuous Alicia who was so very beautiful, so willful, so gay. While Meg read her books or sat lost in daydreams, Alicia had suitors by the score, but she wanted none of them. They were far too tame.

Alicia, my mother, preferred to race across the moors on her stallion, sometimes not returning until very late at night. When my grandfather learned that she was spending her time at the gypsy camp, he was outraged and forbade her to return. Alicia paid no heed to him, for she was passionately in love with a man whose fiery spirit matched her own, and nothing was going to keep her from him. With his powerful connections, my grandfather was able to have the gypsies banished from the area. When they left, my mother left with them, riding off in one of the brightly painted caravans with her Ramon.

My mother had done a watercolor of her lover, a watercolor which Meg had carefully preserved all these years. Ramon was tall and dark and dashing, his black locks unruly, his brown eyes ablaze with savage fires. Moody, mercurial, frequently violent, he had loved his aristocratic mistress with a fierce, possessive love that caused him to seethe with jealousy if another man so much as looked at her. One night, in Kent, Ramon's brother Juan had displayed too much interest in the lovely blonde who shared his brother's caravan. A violent quarrel ensued. Knife blades flashed in the firelight. Juan was killed. Ramon died two days later of wounds his brother had inflicted. The gypsies blamed Alicia for turning brother against brother and causing the deaths. She was thrown out of the camp. She was five months pregnant at the time.

She arrived in Cornwall two weeks later, pale, penniless, broken with grief. Her father refused to take her in. He forbade his wife and daughter to have anything to do with the shameless creature who had given up all right to be called a Lawrence. But Meg slipped out of the house and went after her sister. She gave Alicia all of the money she had carefully hoarded, enough money to allow the girl to take a small cottage and hire a midwife as her time drew near. Meg continued to defy her father, slipping off to visit her sister, trying to give her comfort, trying to console her in her grief.

Three and a half months later, I was born. It was a difficult birth, taking over thirty hours, and serious complications set in afterwards. My mother had lost all will to live, and she died four days after I was born. She was buried here in this unmarked grave, and I was placed in an orphanage, for my grandfather adamantly refused to take a gypsy's bastard into his home. He died of a heart attack six years later, just days after my grandmother succumbed to lung fever, and it was only then that Meg was able to take me out of the orphanage. It was an unconventional thing to do, of course, and the county was scandalized. My aunt didn't care that the gentry no longer called, that the villagers held her in contempt. Still unmarried, heiress to all her father's estate, she devoted herself to me, to doing all she could to compensate for those first six years.

A gentle breeze ruffled through the oak leaves overhead. Pale shadows played over the grave of Alicia Lawrence. Once, long ago, I had hated her, had blamed her for those six years spent in the bleak gray orphanage, for the cruelty and the taunts of the village children after I came to live at Graystone Manor, but I understood her now, and I felt only sadness. She had loved unwisely, perhaps, but she had loved with all her heart, and I knew it would be that way with me, too. A faded watercolor and an unmarked grave were all that remained of my parents, but their blood was alive inside me, and after years of hurt and bitter resentment I had learned to be proud of it.

II

Closing the cemetery gate behind me, I walked on down the road leading out of the village, and soon there was nothing on either side of me but wide open land. To the west the land extended for several acres to the edge of the cliffs that plunged down sharply to the waters below, and on the east, beyond the low graystone wall, there were flat fields spotted with towering haystacks. The road curved inland, disappearing below a slope, appearing again atop the slope beyond. I could see a small open carriage far away, heading in my direction, a tiny black toy in the distance, horse and driver barely visible. The sky stretched overhead a luminous gray-white barely stained with blue. The air smelled of salt and sea. I could hear the waves crashing against the rocks below the cliffs, and seagulls crying out as they dipped and soared. After Bath with its elegant Georgian buildings and narrow streets and formal gardens, Cornwall seemed like a foreign country, bleak, brooding, with a stark, primeval beauty all its own.

Despite the grief so heavy inside me, I responded to the land and its harsh beauty. I longed to clamber over the rocks below, again, and feel the sea mist stinging my cheeks, as the waves slammed against ancient stone and sprayed geysers of water into the air. I longed to rush across the moors once more with the wind tearing my hair, to feel again that wild, untamed feeling that had possessed me when I used to race to meet the gypsies and dance the savage, sensual dances they had taught me. Three years at the academy and ballet school had given me polish and poise, but behind the demure, wellbred facade the lonely, restless spirit remained the same. I could never be like the other girls at school, no matter how much I tried. Perhaps that was why dancing meant so much. In dance I could express all those surging emotions. Even in the carefully stylized steps of ballet, I felt a release.

Walking slowly down the road, surrounded by country air and sunlight, I thought of Madame Olga and the ambition she had inspired in me. The once renowned Russian ballerina had come to the academy to give lectures on the dance. She was ancient, a tiny woman with wrinkled skin and enormous black eyes that seemed to burn. Her hair was sleeked back, fastened in a tight bun on the back of her neck, and she was swathed in sables. She wore a gigantic emerald on one finger of her scrawny hand, the huge stone glittering with greenish-blue fires. A quarter of a century before, she had been the toast of Europe, and one heard that kings had vied for her favors, that the Czar had given her a fortune in jewels, that an English duke had committed suicide when she refused to return his affections.

I was dazzled, and so nervous I could hardly contain myself when, after the lectures, she watched us go through our paces. She scowled disdainfully all the while, making acid comments to poor Miss Brown, who had worked so hard to get us into shape. Later on, though, Madame Olga admitted that at least one of us showed promise. “The little girl with the raven hair and dark blue eyes, the one with the high cheekbones, she's not so bad,” Madame confided, and when Miss Brown relayed the comment to me I was ecstatic. I wrote to my aunt at once, begging to be allowed to leave the academy and rush off to London.

At the time, I was only sixteen, and Aunt Meg was naturally too sensible to allow any such rash action. I must finish my training at the academy first, she informed me. I could continue my dancing classes there, along with all my other studies, and if when I graduated I still wanted to go to London, well, we would see about it. I studied harder than ever, learning everything Miss Brown could teach me. I also took private lessons from a retired Italian ballet master who had a shabby studio in Bath near the academy. Giovanni, who had known Madame Olga during her heyday, wrote to her about me, recommending me in the highest terms, just this month. And she had written back, agreeing to take me on as a student in September.

I was unbelievably happy. Madame Olga was the best teacher in all England. She took only a select number of students each year, and after studying with her almost all of them were placed in important companies. I was going to be one of those students. I was going to be a famous ballerina as Madame Olga had been. I would become the toast of Europe and drink champagne, and men would fall in love with me. The future was aglow with glorious possibilities, and life seemed magical. I seemed to walk on air, so great was my elation, and then I received the urgent message from Doctor Reed. I arrived back in Cornwall only hours before Aunt Meg passed away.

A light gust of wind caused my skirt to flap and sent my long hair fluttering. My magical future had vanished in one great swoop, and I was faced with stark reality. Things couldn't have been worse, yet for some reason I refused to worry. I was strong. I would survive. Somehow or other. I had six more weeks before Chapman would foreclose and all Aunt Meg's goods would be sold at auction. Stubbornly, I clung to the conviction that something would happen during those weeks. What I felt couldn't be defined as optimism. It was, rather, a steely refusal to give up. I wasn't ready to admit defeat, not yet.

I suddenly had the feeling I was being watched as I passed one of the haystacks. I paused, vaguely disturbed, for the sensation was powerful, impossible to mistake. I could almost feel the eyes boring into my back. Another gust of wind lifted my skirts. I turned. Jamie Burns and Billy Stone were moving away from the haystack, both grinning wide grins. Jamie waved and leaped over the low stone wall. Billy called my name. I watched them saunter toward me, and my heart skipped several beats. They had known I would be coming this way. They had come ahead of me, had hidden themselves behind the haystack. Every instinct told me to flee, to run down the road as fast as I could, but I knew that would be pointless. They would overtake me in moments. I must be very, very calm. That was my only hope. They sauntered across the road, arrogant in their youth and superior strength.

“Well, well, well,” Jamie drawled. “What 'ave we 'ere?”

“Look at 'er,” Billy said. “Ain't she somethin'? Never seen such a ripe 'un in all my born days.”

I stood very still, trying to control my breathing, telling myself I mustn't panic. My pulses were leaping, and my knees seemed to go weak. I held myself erect through sheer willpower and stared at them with my chin held high, eyes cool and haughty.

“Always wanted to 'ave me a gypsy wench,” Billy remarked. “I 'ear they're real special, all fire an' fight. Reckon I'll find out this very afternoon.”

Jamie's cold gray eyes glittered. His lips twisted into a leer. Shoving a lock of unruly brown hair from his brow, he stepped nearer. There was hatred in his eyes, hatred and lust that seemed to smoulder. Billy came up beside him, slinging a powerful arm around his friend's shoulders. My heart was pounding. My throat felt dry. Waves of panic threatened to sweep over me. I held them back, willing myself not to show the least sign of fear.

“What'd they teach ya in that swell school you been to, Mary Ellen?” Jamie asked.

“They taught me not to be intimidated by oafs like you.”

My voice was surprisingly calm. Another gust of wind swept across the flat, open land. My skirts billowed. My hair blew across my cheek. I pushed it back, holding myself straight and distant.

“I reckon they musta fed you real good at that school, Mary Ellen,” Jamie said. “You're all growed up.” He nodded. “Yeah, you're all growed up. Real ripe an' juicy.”

The panic was very near the surface now, and I was trembling inside. I felt so weak, so vulnerable. They were both as strong as oxen, hard with muscle, and I would be powerless against them. Rape was jolly sport for youths like these, any nubile lass their natural prey. How many maidens had they forcibly deflowered? Like animals bursting with energy and appetite, they thought of nothing but release. Right and wrong failed to exist for them. It would be useless to plead, useless to fight.

“Soon as I saw you prancin' down th' street so 'igh an' mighty, I knew what I was gonna do,” Jamie snarled.

He moved another step nearer, eyes glittering, his face tight, a mask of hostility. He seemed to seethe with it. I drew back, my composure slipping fast. My heart was beating louder and louder, so loud I felt sure they both could hear. I moved back another step, almost stumbling. Billy chuckled and shoved Jamie aside with rough amiability.

“You're scarin' 'er,” he said. “I keep tellin' ya, Jamie, you gotta gentle 'em a little, gotta feel 'em up and get 'em in th' mood. 'Ere, I'll show ya 'ow it's done.”

“Don't touch me,” I said hoarsely.

Billy shook his head. Dark blond waves spilled over his brow, and the almost-pretty face seemed to glow with pleasure. The blue eyes were merry and lascivious, and he smiled a tender, taunting smile.

“Come on now, wench,” he said. His voice was husky and seductive. “Don'tcha wanna be friendly? Me an' Jamie, we're a couple o' swell fellows, really know 'ow to make a wench 'appy. Ask Daisy Clark. Ask Mollie Jeffers. Ask any uv th' girls. They're all just pantin' to 'ave us come a-courtin'.”

That taunting smile widened, pink lips curling up at both corners, and the eyes were aglow with anticipation. As he seized my arms and pulled me toward him, everything seemed to whirl in a blazing haze of fear and fury. I struggled violently, trying to pull away, and he laughed a rumbling laugh and held my arms even tighter, his fingers biting into my flesh. I cried out and kicked him, slamming my toe against his shin with all the force I could muster. There was a mighty yell, but it wasn't Billy. It was Jamie. Jamie yelled, and Billy's eyes widened in dismay.

Neither of us had heard the horse and carriage, that carriage that had seemed so tiny when I had seen it in the distance. It was standing but a few yards away, and Jamie was struggling with a man in a dark blue suit. They seemed to be hugging each other, rocking to and fro, and then they broke apart and Jamie staggered backwards and shook his head as though to clear it. Then he charged at the stranger like an enraged bull. The stranger stepped to one side and, smiling a tight smile, stuck his foot out to send Jamie crashing to the ground with a terrible thud.