Island-in-Waiting (13 page)

To my surprise, the remark was greeted with total silence. Then Martha said softly, “Oh Hugo, I did tell you –”

I looked sharply from one to the other. “What's the matter? Is something wrong?”

“No, of course not.” Hugo's fingers crumbled the bread on his plate. “It's only – well, I shouldn't count too much on Neil, love. There's Pam in the offing, and –”

“I'm not
counting
on him at all,” I retorted, “but after all it is the second time he's asked me out, so –” I broke off at their exchanged glances. “Hugo, will you please tell me what's going on?”

“Tell her,” Martha urged. She didn't meet my eyes.

Hugo said awkwardly, “Of course, I didn't think you'd be here longer than a couple of weeks or so, but –”

“Go on,” I said tightly.

“Well, as you know I didn't care for the effect Ray seemed to have on you, so I – well, I hinted vaguely to Neil that I'd feel a lot easier if he could step in – as a kind of counterbalance.”

I could hear my heartbeats crashing round my head. I kept my eyes on Hugo's averted, embarrassed face. “You mean,” I said clearly, “you asked him to take me out a couple of times to divert my attention from Ray? Strictly no strings, of course – after all, I was only here for two weeks – that kind of things?”

“Not in so many words, naturally, but I imagine he knew what I was getting at. There didn't seem any harm in it. Damn it, there wouldn't have been if –”

“If I'd gone home like a good girl when I should have done. Well!” I drew a deep breath. “It seems I've been overestimating my powers of attraction!”

“Oh Chloe, love, don't take it like that! Neil likes you, after all. The idea wouldn't have occurred to me if I hadn't noticed that. I'm sure it was no hardship for him to –”

“Oblige?” I cut in viciously. “I must say he quite entered into the spirit of the thing. He even kissed me yesterday.” I scraped back my chair but Martha caught my arm.

“Can't we talk this over more calmly? I did try to tell Hugo it wasn't an awfully good idea but he was so anxious about you and Ray. And knowing him he'd have been so diffident about it, it's quite possible Neil never even realised what he was trying to say.” As I still didn't reply her fingers tightened on my arm and she gave it a little shake. “Chloe, don't let this weigh with your plans. You'll have to try to put both Neil and Ray out of your head if you're going to be businesslike about the Viking. Suppose neither of them was within a hundred miles of it. Would you still be interested in taking it on?”

“Yes,” I said after a minute.

“Right, then it seems worth looking into further. It's your career you're considering, after all, not a couple of dinner dates.”

If only it had been as simple as that.

I turned to Hugo. “You'd better release Neil from his commitment, then,” I said levelly, “and never, never do anything like that again.”

“I'm sorry,” he said quietly. “Believe me, if I'd realized –”

“And of course if I do decide to stay I'll be looking round for a place of my own, so let me know if you hear of anywhere suitable.”

“You know you're welcome here for as long as you want to stay.” He smiled slightly. “I haven't had indigestion once since you arrived!”

“Will you come with me to speak to the St Cyrs?”

“Of course. We'll need to know how much they'd like you to invest and what kind of a return you can expect. I think it might be wise to build in some kind of time clause, too, in case you find it's not what you want after all. You could agree to renew the partnership in, say, two years if both sides are agreeable.”

“I'll phone them and fix a time to go round. I want to borrow some recipe books as well. Vivian Quayle called this afternoon and persuaded me to take over the cake stall at the bazaar on Thursday.”

“Oh Lord!” Martha exclaimed. “I'd forgotten about that! I still haven't finished the shawl I'm knitting for it.”

“Don't commit yourself too far until we've sounded them out thoroughly,” Hugo called after me as I hurried to the phone. This, I told myself as I dialled with unsteady fingers, was what I must fasten my mind on. For the moment I didn't trust myself to think of Neil, nor dare to think of Ray. As Martha had reminded me, my career was must be – the most important thing to decide.

I was not looking forward to my sitting with Ray and found myself regretting the challenge I had so recklessly issued. Whether it was he or the unwitting Tom Kelly who had subjected me to the terrors of Slieu Whallian, I suspected that the more I saw of him, the more readily would those indeterminate barriers go down and I should slip with increasing ease into other dimensions.

To add to my wretchedness my pride was urging me to cancel the dinner date with Neil. The probability that I owed it to Hugo still rankled but the fact remained that with a concentrated day of Ray ahead I needed the thought of Neil to steady me, even if our evening together would be a contrived arrangement.

When Ray called for me I saw at once that there was a bandage on his hand and felt a stab of fear before I realized why. “What have you done to your hand?”

“Nothing serious, it's just a nuisance. My penknife slipped and there's quite a deep gash round the base of the thumb. Matron insisted I went for an anti-tetanus jab.”

My own hand throbbed briefly, stopping as my will-power clamped down on it. I said on a high note, “I wasn't sure what you wanted me to wear.”

“I brought some things with me.” He handed over a large paper bag. “I hope they fit.”

I opened the bag and drew out a long woollen skirt and matching stole in soft blue and green plaid. “Ray, they're lovely! Whose are they?”

“My sister's. She doesn't mind. Go and try them on. That white blouse you wore the other day should go with them.”

In my bedroom I changed hurriedly and found that the plaid skirt fitted to perfection. I draped the stole round my shoulders and turned to survey my reflection in the full-length mirror. There was no denying that the ensemble was very flattering and my pleasure in it helped to smooth away at least some of the constraint between us.

Ray gave a sigh of satisfaction. “Perfect. It's the Manx tartan, you see; traditionally made up of the blue of the sky, the green of the hills, the purple of the heather and the gold of the gorse. Sure now, it could have been designed for you.”

The sun was shining as we drove out of the lane and turned left for Ballaugh. Outside the school gates the stuffed guy, his face hidden by the wide-brimmed hat, lolled grotesquely in his barrow.

“Poor Guy Fawkes, what a death sentence!” I said lightly. “To be burned every fifth of November till the end of time!”

“I've always felt sorry for him myself, but then it wasn't my parliament he tried to blow up. I suppose the ‘come-overs' from the mainland brought the custom with them at some stage. Hallows' E'en isn't imported, though. Witches are part of our own history, as you found out yourself.”

Beneath his casual tone lay a deliberate reminder of his power over me and of the challenge given and accepted. It served as a timely warning that however innocuous our companionship might seem I would be wise not to lower my guard.

We followed the road for some five or six miles before Ray turned off and circled round the base of a small hill. “That's where we're aiming for,” he told me, indicating the summit with a jerk of his head. “It's easy enough going up this side but there's a very steep climb on the other. Can you manage the picnic basket if I take the painting equipment? I've to be careful not to strain this blasted thumb.”

As we started the climb I saw that Ray's assessment of ‘easy going' was not the same as mine. It was a full ten minutes before we were on level ground, but as I stopped to get my breath back I saw that it had been well worthwhile. Up here we were surrounded by grey rock, dried heather and turf, a scene surely unchanged over thousands of years, while beyond lay the coastline, majestic and awe-inspiring with its towering cliffs, its white shingle and the depth of blue which stretched unbroken to the Irish coast.

“I wanted it all, you see,” Ray said, watching as I took in the panorama, “hills, sea, gorse and heather – and you in your Manx tartan. The composite picture. Have a look round while I set everything up.”

I went cautiously over the uneven ground, picking my way round wind-bent bushes and outcrops of rock. He was right about the steep drop on this far side. The road seemed a surprisingly long way down. Here the salt wind blew full in my face and the gulls, screaming discordantly, were tossed up in the currents of air like scraps of white paper.

Something about the timeless majesty of the surroundings triggered in my imagination a misty awareness of those who over the centuries had stood here before me: Vikings, keeping watch and ward, Celts, Scots, all of them leaving some indefinable imprint on this exposed jut of land as, perhaps, would I.

“Ready when you are!” Ray called and I turned from my brooding and went back to him. He had set up one of the small stools by a clump of gorse, browning now but still with a touch of gold in its depths.

“I want you in semi-profile,” he told me, “staring out to sea. Yes, I know the wind's blowing your hair. That's the way I want it.”

I settled myself on the stool and he arranged the folds of skirt and stole to his satisfaction, moving my head with a finger beneath my chin. “That's fine. Now keep as still as you can and we'll break for coffee in an hour or so.”

For a while I sat motionless looking out across the short scrubby grass to the cliff edge, etched clear as a pencil line against the blue of the sky. The wind rustled in the drying gorse behind me and I was grateful for the soft warmth of the stole. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the movement of Ray's arm as he sketched in the preliminary lines of the portrait. It was very peaceful.

“Are you going to the famous sherry party on Friday?” he asked after a while. “No, don't move your head! Martha and Hugo won't be able to get out of it; there's one a term and attendance is more or less compulsory. Supposed to give us all a chance to meet socially, if you please, as if we don't see enough of each other as it is! Still, I usually manage to amuse myself by watching people's reactions to each other. It's amazing how they can say one thing with their mouths and something entirely different with their eyes or a movement of their heads. You can learn a lot if you know what to look for, and them never guessing they've given themselves away.”

“And you can also misinterpret a lot,” I put in severely, remembering his remarks about Neil and Vivian.

“Not I, my love. I can gauge these things to the nth degree – relationships that are brewing and others about to break up. Take Sheila Shoesmith and young David, for instance. I shouldn't give them more than a couple of weeks. How they've managed to keep it from Martin this long I'll never know. They've been making good use of the sports pavilion the whole of this term. Do you know them, by the way?”

“I've met Sheila,” I said stiffly, “but-”

“David's the games master, which you must admit is appropriate! More brawn than brain, of course, but at least he's bright enough to play two dolly-birds at the same time – he's got our delectable
mademoiselle
eating out of his hand as well. You know Claudine? Now there's a girl not afraid to toss her bonnet over the windmill! Wouldn't the fur be flying if Sheila found out? Sure, I might drop the odd hint and stand back to see what happens!”

“I don't want to hear any more,” I interrupted. “You know, I'd hate to see the world through your eyes, Ray. You make it all so – shabby.”

“But interesting, Chloe my love, interesting! It would be a dull world if we were all strait-laced, now wouldn't it? And you can take that disapproving look off your face, for if I paint it in it will spoil the picture entirely!”

He lapsed into silence and I could only be thankful. My neck was beginning to feel stiff and there was a stabbing pain between my shoulder blades. Before my fixed gaze the purple horizon shimmered and danced.

“O.K.,” Ray said at last. “Five-minute break. There's coffee in the flask.”

I stood thankfully, rubbing my stiff back.

“Warm enough?”

“So-so. The coffee will help.” I clasped my hands round the hot mug and walked over to the easel. The figure that was myself was still vague, a mere outline set against its background, yet the contours of the face were recognizable as my own. I stood looking at it while I drank the coffee in cautious sips and Ray, sprawled on the grass, watched me in silence.

“Right,” he said abruptly, getting to his feet. “Break over. Back to work.”

“I have the impression,” he remarked, breaking a silence of some fifteen minutes, “that your worthy brother doesn't entirely approve of our association.”

“Can you blame him?” I asked acidly.

He looked up. “He knows? About the connection we have?”

“No, actually he doesn't yet, but I gather your reputation with women isn't all that it might be.”

He smiled sourly. “Telepathy has its uses.”

A coldness caressed my neck under the fall of hair. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“Well now, my love, you might not have noticed but I'm not the most popular character around here. Wouldn't win any prizes for the ‘chap most likely' or anything like that. So it's extraordinarily useful to be able to persuade the odd delectable bird that she's simply dying to jump into bed with me. It's surprising how often it works.”

I turned to stare at him in incredulous horror. “You really do that?”

“Why not? I'd go a bit short if I didn't.”