Good or Bad

by Barbara Cartland

  Then he would drink the port ‒

  The rat took another bite.

  Then, as he decided that the meat despite its unusual taste was edible, he ate every scrap of it.

  “He then sniffed around the floor of the trap, as if he hoped that there was some more.

  Amalita knew then that the experiment had failed.

  If the port was as dangerous as her instinct had told her it was, the rat would now be showing some signs of being affected by it.

  Then suddenly and without any warning the rat turned over on its side.

  For a second Amalita could not believe it had actually happened.

  The rat did not move and she knew that it was dead. It seemed incredible that it should have happened so fast.

  At that moment the door opened and the Earl came in.

  Without thinking and without considering in any way what she was doing, Amalita ran to him.

  She flung herself against him.

  “She was – trying to kill him! She was trying to – kill him!” she cried. “How – could she do anything so – wrong and so – wicked.”

  Her voice broke and she hid her face against the Earl’s shoulder.

  He put his arm around her and said to his father,

  “What is all this about? What has happened?”

  The Marquis was staring at the rat as if he could not believe that the creature was really dead.

  In a voice of horror he replied,

  “Lady Hermione brought me a bottle of a rare vintage port as a present. I was just about to drink it when Lady Maulpin told me she was convinced that it was poisoned. It was and she has saved my life!”

  The Earl could see the rat lying dead in the trap and the bottle of port standing beside it.

  He understood at once what had happened.

  “I cannot believe that Hermione could do anything so wicked,” he said. “She must be mad! Did she come here herself and give it to you?”

  “She did,” his father replied. “She came to tell me that her husband’s condition has deteriorated and her gift was an expression of his gratitude for the dinner party the other evening.”

  The Marquis was speaking in a low voice.

  Then he walked towards the table where the trap was standing and picked it up.

  “It would be a mistake for anybody to know that this has happened,” he said. “I had better go and dispose of the evidence.”

  He walked out through the window into the garden.

  Amalita raised her head to look up at the Earl.

  “She meant to – k-kill him!” she sighed. “I knew it – but I was so – afraid he would not – believe me!”

  “But he did and you saved him,” the Earl commented.

  He looked down at her, at her green eyes shocked and horrified at what had happened.

  He could feel her whole body trembling against him.

  “You saved him,” he said again.

  Then very gently he bent his head and his lips found hers.

  For a moment, bewildered by all that had happened, Amalita did not realise that she was being kissed.

  Then the pressure of the Earl’s lips and the tightness of his arms as he held her against him swept away all the horror that she was feeling.

  It gave her instead an ecstasy she had never known before.

  It was so wonderful, so indescribable and at the same time so compelling that she pressed herself even closer to the Earl.

  As he kissed her and went on kissing her, she knew, as if somebody was telling her so, that this was love.

  She loved him and she had not realised it ever since he had come to her bedroom and she had sent him away.

  The Earl drew her closer still.

  Then he raised his head up and looked down into her eyes.

  He was thinking that it was impossible for any woman to be so beautiful and so unbelievably attractive.

  Although he could hardly believe it himself, she was a part of him.

  “I love you so much, my darling,” he sighed, “and I think, although you may not admit it, that you love me a little.”

  Then he was kissing her again, kissing her eyes, her cheeks and once more her lips.

  Her whole body seemed to vibrate to him.

  Thrills ran through her and she felt as if her heart was bursting with the glory of it.

  She knew now that this was the love she had always longed for but thought that she would never find.

  It seemed as if a century passed.

  Yet it must have been a few minutes before the Earl said,

  “My precious, how can you be so clever as to save my father’s life.”

  For a moment it was really impossible for Amalita to understand what he was saying.

  Then she said and the horror was back in her voice,

  “She has – failed, but she may well – try again – perhaps he should – go away – perhaps he should hide.”

  She was trying to think coherently, but then the words seemed to come without her controlling them.

  The Earl kissed her again.

  Although she knew it was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened, she was still worrying about the Marquis.

  When his lips were no longer touching hers, she said,

  “We have to – talk – we have to think of your father and if there is a scandal – that too would – hurt him.”

  “I have already thought of that,” the Earl replied, “and I love you, my precious one, for thinking of him.”

  “You must – save him ‒ you really must!” Amalita persisted.

  She thought that the Earl did not understand and she went on,

  “When she – knows that she has failed – this time, she may try – something else.”

  “You said we must save him,” the Earl said quietly, “and that is what we will do. It is quite easy if you will help me.”

  “Of course I – will help – you,” Amalita answered.

  She shivered.

  “It was horrifying – petrifying – to watch the rat turn on his side and – and die! It might – have been – your father who was – lying dead.”

  The Earl’s arms tightened.

  “It is something you must forget,” he said. “You and I will save my father from any further attempts on his life.”

  “H-how can – we do – that?” Amalita asked.

  “It is quite simple,” the Earl replied. “Hermione wants me to marry her, but if I am already married, she will have to accept the inevitable.”

  Amalita looked at him not understanding what he was saying.

  Then he added gently,

  “If you are my wife, my darling, you will be able to protect my father from any more murderous attempts. I will also make sure through my friends in Scotland Yard that it is something that she does not dare to try again.”

  Amalita could not take in what he was saying to her.

  Then she looked up into his eyes.

  She felt as if the whole room was suddenly filled with a dazzling light.

  “Are – you really,” she asked in a whisper, “asking me to – marry you?”

  “I intend to marry you, my darling,” the Earl replied, “and I will not take ‘no’ for an answer.”

  He pulled her a little closer as he said,

  “I am not just thinking of my father but also myself. I want you, Amalita. I love you as I have never loved any woman before.”

  Amalita felt as if the light covering now them was too dazzling to be borne.

  Then, as if a cold hand started gripping her heart, she remembered and hid her face against his shoulder.

  “I do love – you,” she whispered, “but – I cannot – marry you!”

  The Earl kissed her hair.

  “Why not, my lovely one? You know that you already belong to me.”

  There was silence.

  Then Amalita said in a voice he could hardly hear,

  “I-I have – lied to you, I am not – who you think
I am.”

  The Earl smiled.

  “I think,” he said quietly, “that your name is ‘Amalita’ and you are the elder daughter of Sir Frederick Maulpin.”

  What he said was such a surprise that Amalita raised her face to look at him, her eyes wide with astonishment.

  “H-how did you – know? How – did you guess?” she asked.

  The Earl smiled again.

  “I have been somewhat curious about you ever since you arrived,” he answered. “I knew there was something about you that was not quite right.”

  He felt Amalita stiffen and he continued,

  “Not wrong, my precious. So it is just that, like you, I have an intuition. It told me, to put it bluntly, you were not who you purported to be.”

  “H-how could you have – known that?”

  “How could you have known that the port would kill my father?”

  Amalita put her head back on his shoulder.

  “So you did not believe that I was – Lady Maulpin?”

  “Not after you had sent me away when I came to say ‘goodnight’.”

  “I-I was – shocked,” Amalita whispered.

  “I knew that” he said, “and I was ashamed of myself for being such a stupid clumsy fool. I should have realised that you were very young, very innocent and, my darling Amalita, very pure.”

  As if she excited him, he kissed her again and they clung to each other as he went on,

  “I think I am the first man who has kissed you and I swear I will be the last!”

  “How – how did – you know my – name?” Amalita asked when she could speak.

  “I went this afternoon after I had been playing polo,” the Earl replied, “to see a very old friend of your father’s, somebody who was very much in love with him and was broken-hearted when he married someone else.”

  “It was – clever of you to think there was – someone who knew – the truth,” Amalita commented.

  “She told me,” he went on, “that she very occasionally heard news of Sir Frederick after he went to the country. He wrote her a letter telling her that he had a daughter who was so beautiful that he had Christened her ‘Amalita’ because she looked just like a Greek Goddess even at that age.”

  “So – that is how you knew,” Amalita said. “I knew before that that you were not a married woman of twenty-six and the first thing I am going to do, my precious, is to take away the Wedding ring you are wearing on the third finger of your left hand, which I do intend to replace very quickly with my own to prove that you belong to me.”

  “You do – really want – me?” Amalita asked shyly.

  “I will explain to you exactly how much I want you as soon as we are married,” he said. “And that, my darling, because we are also protecting Papa, is going to be as soon as I can get a Special Licence. Then we will go away on our honeymoon.”

  “How can I – possibly marry – you when everyone – thinks I am Papa’s – second – wife and – his widow?”

  “That is something that we will work on together very efficiently,” the Earl said confidently. “I promise you I am an expert at solving problems and conundrums that puzzle everybody else.”

  “I love you,” Amalita said, “and I believe you could do anything, but I am a little afraid that if people discover I lied and pretended to be Carolyn’s stepmother, it might hurt her in some way.”

  “We will save Carolyn, just as we will also save my father,” the Earl answered, “and I promise that both of them will continue to be safe and protected by you and me.”

  “But – how – how?” Amalita asked.

  “You must trust me,” he said, “and the best way to do that is to tell me again that you love me.”

  “Oh – I do – love you – I adore – you!” Amalita said, “but I still – cannot believe – that you really love me.”

  “I love you until I have no words in which to express how much,” the Earl replied with deep sincerity.

  Then he was kissing her again, kissing her until they were no longer on earth but flying in the sky.

  The future for them both could be expressed in one word.

  Love.

  Coming back from the bottom of the garden where he had buried the dead rat, the Marquis put the empty trap down outside the window.

  Having done so, he straightened himself and looked inside the room.

  To his astonishment he then saw two people clasped together in a passionate embrace.

  He looked at them in amazement and then tactfully he went stealthily back into the garden.

  As he walked to the fountain, he thought that this was certainly something he had not expected.

  But as far as he was concerned, it could not be better.

  ‘Good comes out of evil,’ he said to himself and then chuckled.

  THE LATE DAME BARBARA CARTLAND

  Barbara Cartland, who sadly died in May 2000 at the grand age of ninety eight, remains one of the world’s most famous romantic novelists. With worldwide sales of over one billion, her outstanding 723 books have been translated into thirty six different languages, to be enjoyed by readers of romance globally.

  Writing her first book ‘Jigsaw’ at the age of 21, Barbara became an immediate bestseller. Building upon this initial success, she wrote continuously throughout her life, producing bestsellers for an astonishing 76 years. In addition to Barbara Cartland’s legion of fans in the UK and across Europe, her books have always been immensely popular in the USA. In 1976 she achieved the unprecedented feat of having books at numbers 1 & 2 in the prestigious B. Dalton Bookseller bestsellers list.

  Although she is often referred to as the ‘Queen of Romance’, Barbara Cartland also wrote several historical biographies, six autobiographies and numerous theatrical plays as well as books on life, love, health and cookery. Becoming one of Britain’s most popular media personalities and dressed in her trademark pink, Barbara spoke on radio and television about social and political issues, as well as making many public appearances.

  In 1991 she became a Dame of the Order of the British Empire for her contribution to literature and her work for humanitarian and charitable causes.

  Known for her glamour, style, and vitality Barbara Cartland became a legend in her own lifetime. Best remembered for her wonderful romantic novels and loved by millions of readers worldwide, her books remain treasured for their heroic heroes, plucky heroines and traditional values. But above all, it was Barbara Cartland’s overriding belief in the positive power of love to help, heal and improve the quality of life for everyone that made her truly unique.

  Good or Bad

  Barbara Cartland

  Barbara Cartland Ebooks Ltd

  This edition © 2021

  Copyright Cartland Promotions 1953

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