Parfit Knight (10 page)

The teasing
note produced an uncertain smile but she said, ‘I mean I could
never dance properly – the way other people do.’

‘So?’ He drew
her hand through his arm and led her relentlessly away to the
parlour. ‘I can’t see that the way you do it matters in the
slightest. Come.’ He thought for a moment, then, standing beside
her, took her right hand in his and placed his left lightly round
her waist. ‘My apologies for the familiarity but I expect it to pay
dividends. Now. Lift your skirt in your left hand … yes, that’s it
… and it’s right foot first. Ready?’

For the next
hour, while Broody looked irritably on and spat the occasional
seed, the Marquis led Rosalind up and down the room, counting,
instructing and criticising. ‘Now … one, two, three, four –
forward, two, three, four. Yes. Again – and this time keep your
head up and relax. Just move with me and stop worrying.
And
– one, two, three …’

And Rosalind,
dutifully doing as she was told, placed her trust in the light
guiding hands and found that she was enjoying herself.

‘That’s much
better. Now, round me … and back, two, three, four – don’t forget
to curtsy. Very good. Let’s see if you can do it from memory.’

She could and
proceeded to demonstrate it with evident delight. Amberley smiled
down into the beautiful face, flushed now with exertion and
triumph, and raised the hand he held so that she could pivot
gracefully beneath. And then it happened.

As she returned
to face him, the violet eyes seemed for one extraordinary moment to
look fully into his and, in that second, all the baffling emotions
of the past week crystalised into a single, breath-taking
certainty. The things he’d taken for anger and compassion provoked
by her situation were neither and the simple truth was that he
loved her … and because of that, everything about her touched
him.

The safe shores
of friendship crumbled beneath his feet; she was so close that he
could smell the scent of her hair and he knew an overwhelming
desire to bring her just one step closer, into his arms. He wanted,
more than anything in the world or outside it, to kiss her. He
froze, his fingers tightening on hers, and forced himself to
remember that he’d given his word and that, even if he hadn’t, it
would be an unpardonable abuse of her trust.

Rosalind
stopped, her hand poised high in his, and raised enquiring
brows.

‘What is it?
Did I do something wrong?’

For an instant
he stared back without speaking and then, releasing her hand,
stepped abruptly away from her.

‘No – nothing.’
His breath returned slowly and he fought to keep his voice level.
‘You did it beautifully.’

‘That’s what I
thought,’ she said. ‘Aren’t we going to finish it?’

‘What? Oh –
no.’ He felt quite ridiculously vague except on one point – that he
didn’t dare touch her again until he had himself thoroughly under
control. ‘No. It isn’t necessary. You are such an apt pupil.’

A tiny frown
creased her brow but she merely swept a mocking curtsy and said,
‘Thank you kind sir!’ before sinking down on the sofa in a billow
of amethyst coloured silk.

A little pale
still, the Marquis hesitated for an instant and then, resolutely
putting aside his habit of the last five days, set a seal on
Rosalind’s confusion by electing to sit opposite her. There were a
dozen things he wanted to say and a hundred reasons why he must not
say them. And, since this was clearly not the time to think of
either, he willed himself to concentrate on covering his temporary
lapse.

For a time he
succeeded tolerably well and had the satisfaction of seeing the
faint shadow of anxiety vanish from Rosalind’s eyes. But the light,
amusing conversation occupied less than half of his mind while the
rest of it seemed hopelessly beyond his recall and was dwelling,
idiotically, on the curve of her throat and the sweet temptation of
her mouth.

A fraction too
late, he realised that she had not replied to his last remark – a
trifling reference to his mother and her Richmond home – and
suddenly alert, he wondered what there was in it to produce the
inexplicable tension he sensed in her.

‘What is it?
Have I said something to distress you?’

Rosalind
started slightly and then shook her head. ‘No. It’s just that
memory plays strange tricks. I haven’t thought of Richmond in years
and yet … yet when you mentioned it just now, I found I could
remember is quite clearly. A pretty village clustered about a green
and a steep hill leading up to the gates of the park.’ She stopped
and gave an uncertain laugh. ‘Do you know, I even remember the view
from that hill – and I don’t think I saw it more than once.’

Amberley was
watching her very closely. He said, ‘It hasn’t changed. I suppose
your uncle took you there?’

‘Yes.’ Her mind
was plainly far away and the violet eyes grew dark. ‘It was when we
lived with him in Sheen. He took us to the park and we had tea in
Richmond. And because I enjoyed it so much, Uncle George promised
that we would go again on … ‘ She stopped.

‘Yes?’ prompted
the Marquis gently.

There was a
long pause and then, ‘We were to go again on my birthday – only it
wasn’t possible.’

‘Why not?’ He
knew that he was on hitherto forbidden ground but he had to know if
she trusted him enough to remove the barriers and confide in him.
‘Why not?’

The slender
fingers were gripped tight in her lap and her face was strained but
she answered him. ‘There was an accident. And I was … ill.’

Suddenly he
could no longer bear to leave her to tell him alone and without
help. Because she never complained, because her blindness – oh, so
long ago it seemed – had ceased to matter, he’d begun to lose sight
of what it must mean to her. And he couldn’t watch her hurting
without giving some comfort.

Rising, he
crossed the space between them to sit at her side and take her
hands in his.

‘My dear, I
think I understand. And there’s no need to talk of it if you’d
rather not.’

‘But you want
me to.’ It was not a question.

‘I would like
to know how it happened, yes. But only if you are content to tell
me.’

Rosalind drew a
long breath and, unconsciously, her fingers clung to his. ‘Very
well.’

No premonition
of disaster warned Amberley of the axe that was about to fall and,
if Nemesis laughed, he did not hear her. Instead, he went on
lightly holding Rosalind’s hands and was merely glad that she
seemed to have relaxed a little.

‘We were
playing, Phil and I,’ she said quietly, ‘and I was chasing him into
the wood. I ran up the lane and I remember Phil suddenly shouting
at me to stop – only, of course, I didn’t. I thought he was just
teasing. And though I could hear the carriage too, I thought it was
passing on the road.’ She paused, trying to smile. ‘So it was quite
my own fault, you see. And when the coach came round the bend, its
driver must have been just as shocked as I was.’

Grim fingers of
fear clutched at Amberley’s heart and he was suddenly very cold.
Ghostly images invaded his mind; of the crumpled leaf-green figure
of a child, her face waxy-pale, her eyes closed and her long black
hair tumbled in the dust. ‘
It isn’t
possible
,’ he
told himself numbly. ‘
Please God – it can’t be. Not
that
.’

‘Is that all
you remember?’ His throat was dry and aching.

She nodded. ‘I
saw the horses sweeping down on me – chestnuts, I think – and then
… nothing. I suppose Phil came running. He was only fourteen and
for a long time afterwards I think he felt responsible.’ She paused
again, then went on. ‘When they found I couldn’t see, they started
summoning first one doctor and then another. My uncle brought them
from every place you can imagine and each one had a different
theory and a new remedy. I tried them all … but nothing
worked.’

The Marquis was
no longer capable of listening. If he had been pale before, he now
had no more colour to lose. The air hurt his skin and his stomach
coiled with revulsion; in horror and guilt … and bitter, crippling
devastation.

It was a waking
nightmare which wouldn’t go away. And coming hard on the heels of
the discovery that he loved her, its effect was cataclysmic. He had
managed – and God only knew how – to make a reasonably collected
exit from the parlour so that he was able to succumb, in private,
to the urgent need to be sick. And after that the night was an
endless torment in which he did not even try to sleep.

Instead,
plagued by twelve-year-old memories that were enshrined in his mind
like flies in amber, he lay open-eyed on his bed and stared
sightlessly into the fire-lit gloom. It had happened on the day
that his father, after years of ceaseless persuasion, had at last
agreed to buy him a commission - and he, elated, exuberant and
still unable to believe his luck, had been on fire to tell his
mother. Even in those days, she had preferred the Richmond house to
that in Hanover Square and so he had leapt eagerly into his chaise
and shouted to Pierce to spring the horses.

Over what
happened next he tried to pass lightly but ended by dwelling on it
in excruciating detail. He tried to understand how he had failed to
recognise either Rosalind or the portrait of her younger self as
the child he’d lifted from the dust that day … but cogent thought
was lost in a chanNancyed groove of repetition.

‘
I wasn’t
driving
,’ went the plea to himself.

‘
What
difference does that make
?’ came the harsh reply. ‘
You told
Pierce to take
the short cut through the lane
.’

Concussion, the
doctor had said and had seemed so sure. No bones broken, no damage
save a hard, glancing blow to the head. A headache, then; a few
days rest and all would be well. And the uncle – what had been the
fellow’s name? Furnival? Yes – George Furnival - had, like himself,
been too relieved to question it.

‘
I wasn’t
driving
.’

‘
No. But you
might as well have been
.’

They had not
wanted him, Furnival and the doctor, so he had repeated his
apologies and travelled on to Richmond, blithely unaware that he
had robbed a child of her sight, her youth. And now that child had
become a woman – bright, gallant, unique – and his love.

‘
I wasn’t
driving
.’

‘
Fine. Tell
that to Rosalind
.’

He flinched and
sat up, driving his face into the cold comfort of his fingers in an
attempt to shut out fear. How did you tell the girl you were deeply
and helplessly in love with that you were responsible for shrinking
her world to a place of darkness and solitary monotony? And, having
told her, what then? Even if she didn’t draw back in revulsion, it
could scarcely be described as an auspicious overture to an offer
of marriage.

He was torn
between relief and regret and he had not made that offer when first
he had thought it – before that second, damnable discovery. He had
held her hand and wanted to say simply, ‘I love you. Marry me.’
That he had not done so was due to other considerations; adherence
to propriety made necessary by the defencelessness of her position
and, more importantly, awareness of her inexperience which meant
that she had no yardstick by which to judge him. Both of which, as
things turned out, were mere bullets to a cannon-ball. He tried to
appreciate the macabre irony of it but his sense of humour had
deserted him and the sound that escaped him was not of
laughter.

This knowledge
of his own culpability was the worst thing he had ever faced. That
he should have so harmed anyone – especially a child – was
appalling enough; that the child had been Rosalind put him in hell.
But there was no going back and his problem now was whether or not
he should tell her.

Leaning back,
he clasped his hands behind his head and spent the next half-hour
convincing himself that there was no point. There could be no
possibility now of any close relationship between them, so to tell
her wouldn’t serve any useful purpose and might well cause her
unnecessary pain. Better, far better, to leave it alone and then he
need not put his courage to the test only to discover that, for
this one thing, it was inadequate. It would be no help, on top of
everything else, to find that he was a coward.

There was only
one sensible course and that was to leave before the damage spread
any further. As yet she regarded him as no more than a friend –
paradoxically, his only consolation in the whole, sorry mess – and
the least that he could do for her now was to take steps to ensure
that it stayed that way.

‘
But if I
leave, she’ll be alone – just as she was before
,’ something in
him protested.

‘
And if she
is
?’ replied Reason coldly. ‘
Be thankful it’s no worse. She
managed
without you before and she will again
.’

Indisputably
true but no comfort.

When Saunders
came bearing his shaving water, he was already up and gazing out of
the window, clad in his opulent dressing-gown. He answered the
valet’s routine greeting automatically and without turning round;
then he said abruptly, ‘Pack, Jim. We’re leaving.’

‘Leaving, my
lord?’ repeated Saunders, shaken. ‘Today?’

The Marquis
opened his mouth to deliver a bald affirmative and then hesitated.
Since go he must, he desperately wanted to go quickly … but there
was Rosalind to be considered and such a sudden departure wouldn’t
be kind. He owed it to her to stay just one more day … and had
somehow to find the strength both to endure it and to appear his
usual self.