Garth of Tregillis (18 page)

I nodded.

‘You knew?’ He sounded surprised, then frowningly added,

‘Yes, of course, Verity would have told you. Anyway, I always wanted something better than being the school’s brightest boy, so I studied hard and got a scholarship.’ He shrugged. ‘Well, to make a long story short, I grew away from my background.’

And away from Verity too, I thought.

‘Now I’m accepted by Garth and his friends, but financially there’s an abyss between us. You’ve seen our home, haven’t you?

I’ve no way of repaying the hospitality I receive from Garth or his friends, so I allow myself to be patronized,’ he added with uncharacteristic bitterness.

‘Simple pleasures?’ I said lightly. ‘You were speaking of simple pleasures. Just what do you mean? Such as?’

Immediately he reverted to his normal bantering tone. ‘I’ve been screwing up my courage to ask you to come along to a carnival that’s coming to the district. Do say yes.’

‘I haven’t much difficulty in saying that,’ I told him with a laugh.

‘There’s nothing I’d like better. I adore the chairoplanes, and push-penny, and the dodgems.’

‘That’s terrific,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘Then it’s a date.’

In the scented darkness I could faintly hear Armanell’s low laugh and French accent. What were she and Garth saying to each other in the velvety darkness? I suddenly felt lonely; an outsider.

They had each other and I had no one. Why was I turning down Paul’s offer of romance?

‘Do you know,’ he whispered, ‘when you came downstairs tonight suddenly I was afraid of you. You no longer looked like the girl who had first come here and, believe me, it took all my courage to suggest anything as mundane as a carnival.’

I discounted much of this as Paul’s habitual flattery. At the same time I knew it was true I looked different tonight—groomed and sophisticated, full of the self-confidence that a wonderful dress designed by a craftsman could inspire!

‘Tell me that you’re beginning to care a little,’ he said softly.

‘But, Paul, we’ve just met!’

‘That’s true,’ he agreed, ‘but I think I fell for you that very first moment when you stepped off the train.’

‘Like all the other girls you’ve been madly in love with?’

‘There you go again,’ he said sullenly.

I laughed. ‘Oh, Paul, no one need take away your character.

You’re such an obvious Casanova.’

‘So there is someone else!’ he said.

It was plain that Paul thought that if a girl didn’t immediately fall for his line of flattery it was because her affections must be engaged with someone else.

Again I heard Armanell’s light laugh and I strained my ears in an attempt to discover the relationship between herself and Garth.

Paul must have felt me stiffen at the sound of her laughter, because he said shrewdly, ‘I think I know what’s happened! You’re like all the other governesses who ever came here, you’ve fallen for Garth.’

‘Even the ugly ones?’ I said acidly.

He nodded. ‘Even the ugly ones.’

‘Well, you’re wrong,’ I said firmly. ‘I don’t love him. How could I? He’s the type of man I loathe; dictatorial, overbearing, arrogant!’

‘You protest a little too much,’ he said dryly.

‘No, I don’t. I’m just trying to convince you how utterly ridiculous it is of you to think I could fall in love with a man like Garth Seaton. Anyway, he doesn’t know I’m alive!’

It was true, I thought. There was not a soul in the world who cared for me or what became of me, and the knowledge brought with it a terrible loneliness. What had brought me to Tregillis in the first place? It had been the single-minded determination to find out the truth about Diana’s father’s death: that was what I had come for.

At that time I had perhaps had a vague idea of doing vengeance on Garth Seaton if I discovered he was in fact responsible for Giles Seaton’s death.

Since then, however, my attitude had changed: somehow I had got caught up in the life here at Tregillis and my intentions had become blurred. Garth Seaton, I now knew, was a complete enigma to me: I did not understand him in the least: I could not guess what he would or would not do in any given circumstances.

Nor, for that matter, did I understand Paul! There was something elusive, something that seemed to flicker in the depths of his eyes even when he was at his most light and bantering, and I suspected that his role of Casanova might be adopted as a mask to hide a deep and devious character. There had been violent scenes between Paul and his employer. How had Paul taken this? I knew nothing of him except that he had a smooth and facile tongue skilled in how to flatter a girl and boost her self-confidence. Suddenly in the moonlight his shadowed face turned towards me seemed sinister and unreadable.

But I thrust the thought away from me. Was I letting my mind become clouded with suspicion? Paul was more or less what he appeared, I told myself: he was simply a rather weak young man who tended to convince himself that he fell in love with every girl he met. He was a pleasant enough companion for the evening.

However short-lived his adoration might be, it was real while it lasted. Why should I not accept what he offered?

Would it be so wrong to lay aside for a little while the object of my quest—to forget, here in the moonlit garden where the air was full of the scent of roses, the mission that had brought me to Tregillis? Could I not snatch at the moment and what it offered—as, no doubt, Garth was now seizing a moment of intimacy with Armanell?

He was quick to sense the change in my mood and his arms were around me and we were kissing, but even in his kiss I felt no thrill of pleasure.

I heard laughter and, turning my head, found myself staring into Armanell’s eyes. ‘How romantic!’ Her light voice seemed to trill with amusement. ‘Moonlight and the scent of roses! What could make a better setting?’

Guiltily I sprang apart from Paul, then resented my own impulsive reaction. It was ridiculous to feel this way—after all, it was fairly obvious that Armanell and Garth had not been wasting their time.

Then I realized that my embarrassment sprang from the fact that from the tall figure who stood shadowed by the tree behind her emanated an unmistakable sense of anger—and was it also contempt? Did Garth despise me for falling so readily for Paul’s obvious line of approach?

But then again what business was it of his? I asked myself, as I regained my poise.

I turned to Paul and almost defiantly said, ‘I’ll be delighted to take you up on your invitation.’ Then I turned away to the sound of Armanell’s tinkle of silvery laughter.

During the next few days Paul’s invitation, simple as it was, came to mean a great deal to me. It was a sort of carrot held out to entice me onward, for, from that evening, I hardly saw Garth or Armanell. They would leave early in the morning, sometimes just after breakfast, and often would not return until late at night.

Occasionally, lying in bed, I would awake in the early hours of the morning to hear the car door banging and the sound of that now familiar light trilling laugh and once, when out of curiosity I got up and peeped out, I was in time to catch a glimpse of a tiny figure in a pale shimmering evening wrap, before it disappeared into the house.

My time was now spent almost exclusively in the company of the children. There were no more invitations to join Garth and Armanell at dinner. But then they were frequently away from home and it seemed only natural that, on the few occasions when they did dine at Tregillis, they should want to be alone.

Occasionally I would catch a tantalizing glimpse of them, but always at a distance; such as the day I saw them riding together through the woods. It was clear even to me, who knew nothing of such things, that Armanell was a magnificent horsewoman. Ignorant as I was, I could see at a glance the confident way she handled her spirited mount.

As I watched, the two children had run on ahead, but I must have shown too obvious an interest, for when Melinda raced back, I was startled to hear her say with every evidence of malice, ‘You’re watching Armanell, aren’t you? She looks marvellous at a distance, but you should see her without her make-up. She’s not a bit pretty.’

She stared up at me, her face pinched and knowing.

‘What do you mean?’ I demanded with as much disapproval as I could inject into my voice at such short notice. ‘How on earth could you know how the Comtesse looks without make-up?’

‘I know,’ she repeated, ‘and she’s not a bit pretty—not even as pretty as you are!’

I decided to ignore this backhanded compliment. ‘She’s very lovely,’ I said severely. ‘Anyone can see that.’

‘She wouldn’t be if she didn’t spend hours and hours and hours on her face and doing up her hair. I made a little hole in the panel and peeped in at her. She didn’t know I was watching,’ she added with satisfaction.

‘Oh, Melinda,’ I gasped, ‘you know you shouldn’t do such things. What would your uncle say if he knew you were sneaking around staring in at his guest?’

‘Oh, he’ll be glad later on when I frighten her away,’ she said confidently. ‘I didn’t make the hole just to peep at her, you know, because I’m going to lay a curse on her and I could only do it if she didn’t know I was watching.’

‘But I thought you liked the Comtesse,’ I protested.

She sniffed. ‘Well, I’ve changed my mind. I hate her now. I thought she would be nice, but she said I was a horrible, horrible child and she’s made Uncle Garth cross with me, and now he won’t even look at me and makes me stay up in the schoolroom most of the time with Emile and you. But I’ll pay her out yet. She’ll be sorry, you’ll see,’ she added fiercely.

‘Oh, don’t be so silly, Melinda,’ I said irritably. ‘You know you’ve no one but yourself to blame if the Comtesse was annoyed with you. You ruined her beautiful dress, and your Uncle Garth was bound to be angry with you for coming down and creating such a scene just when she had arrived at Tregillis.’

‘Oh, it’s not only that!’ Melinda scuffed her shoe on the pebbled path. ‘She’s wicked—I can tell. And she’s up to no good. But I’ll make her sorry she ever came here and she’ll be glad to go away when I’ve worked my spell. Just you watch!’

Something in her tone of voice filled me with alarm and I gazed at her in dismay. It was impossible to know what mischief this strange child was concocting, but I was afraid to question her too closely in case she attached too much importance to my curiosity.

‘Why do you hate everyone, Melinda?’ I asked, as mildly as I could.

‘I don’t,’ she protested. ‘It’s just that I heard Mrs. Kinnefer saying that the Comtesse is here to stay that she’s going to marry Uncle Garth and never go away again—and I couldn’t bear that.

Besides, I don’t hate everyone: I like you since you bought me that big box of paints.’

‘So you like people only when they give you things!’ But secretly I was glad to have made even this dubious amount of progress.

In Melinda’s painting I hoped that I had found the key to communication with the child. The only time I saw her absorbed and truly happy was when she was crouched on the floor over a big sheet of paper, painting with those wonderful, bold, sure strokes of colour that held a touch of genius. Her pictures were, like herself, stormy and wild and full of an unchildlike passion and vitality. But if ever Melinda wanted to make her mark in the world and to claim the attention of that other untamed person—her Uncle Garth—it would surely be through her painting she would do so.

If she had intended to sidetrack me she had certainly succeeded.

My thoughts were diverted from her threats to Armanell and I let the subject drop.

If only I could have known how Melinda’s childish jealousy of the woman who aspired to marry her beloved uncle would eventually show itself, I would have probed deeper. Perhaps I should have been able to gain her confidence and so have prevented further mischief—but all that was in the future.

THE expedition with Paul had been all that I had hoped it would be and more. He made a wonderfully gay companion. I had not realized how bored and dreary I had felt during the previous days until I obtained release for a few hours and escaped from life up in the schoolroom with only two children for company.

I had enjoyed the carnival from the moment we had gone through the giant doors painted with garish pictures of the delights to be found within and I had heard the loud, strident hit tunes from the past ground out as the hobby-horses sailed around and around, rising and dipping. We had had several rides before we moved on to the dodgem cars and the chairoplanes and I found myself screaming with delight as we whirled through the air high above the milling, good-natured crowd. Paul had won a little white stuffed poodle for me with soft curling ears at the shooting gallery and somewhere or other on our wanderings I had managed to acquire a giant mop of pink candy-floss.

During the evening I had forgotten Garth and Armanell. They had driven away together that morning after breakfast and had not yet returned when I dressed for my outing with Paul in a very simple-looking but really expensive gingham frock and had tied back my hair in a big bow to match the blue check in the material.

Now as we left the carnival grounds I wondered vaguely for a moment if they would be at home by the time I arrived back at Tregillis, but I wasn’t really very interested. I felt happy and carefree. Twilight was deepening into the velvety darkness of a summer evening. Paul caught my hand and I rested my head against his shoulder for a moment as we strolled along. We were just like the other happy couples drifting home after an evening’s entertainment.