by Janet Tanner
‘Adam …’ she said silkily – and heard the approaching phutter of a motor car engine.
She looked up in fury to see the Panhard shuddering around a bend in the lane. Annie was driving, sitting up very straight and holding tightly to the wheel as if she expected the monstrosity to break away from her at any moment like a mettlesome horse. Max was sitting beside her and in the rear seat sat Sarah. The wind had got into her hair, loosening it from the pins, so that it stood out in a brown cloud around her head and her cheeks were pink.
Alicia swore silently but her smile was unwavering and she allowed her hand to remain on Adam’s arm as the car turned in at the gateway and ploughed across the uneven ground.
‘Sarah!’ Adam said warmly. ‘ What are you doing here? I thought Gilbert was keeping you busy at the works these days.’
‘Yes, but I decided to ride back with Annie and Max to see how the aeroplane is getting on,’ she said, smiling back at him.
Alicia saw the look which passed between them and it only served to strengthen her determination. How was it Sarah could get a look like that from him when she could not? An idea occurred to her – one more devious than anything she had so far tried in her efforts to win Adam’s attention.
‘I am very glad to see you are allowed some time off from your studies,’ she said smoothly. ‘Heaven knows we see little enough of each other for two girls who live under the same roof.’ She saw the puzzled look come into Sarah’s eyes and knew what she was thinking: even during the weeks that Sarah had been laid up Alicia had barely found the time to spend an hour with her – and neither of them would have wanted her to. ‘You work far too hard,’ Alicia went on smoothly. ‘You scarcely ever exercise Sweet Lass any more. Now, I am going to make a suggestion. Take an afternoon off tomorrow. First we will lunch together and then we will ride. And if Father objects you can refer him to me!’
‘Oh Alicia, I don’t know. Mr Isaacs has promised to go over the ledgers with me tomorrow …’
‘I insist!’ Alicia said sweetly.
‘You should, Sarah,’ Adam put in. ‘It’s true, you are working far too hard. A ride would put the roses in your cheeks and blow away the cobwebs.’
‘Thank you, Adam, for backing me up.’ Alicia smiled at him as if the two of them were conspirators, then removed her hand from his arm with a deliberate movement that implied relinquishing possession, if only temporarily. ‘I must go now. But don’t forget, Sarah, I shall hold you to our arrangement.’
She unhooked Baron’s reins and mounted with easy grace. Sitting there sidesaddle she made a picture and she knew it. She raised one gloved hand and smiled at them, then turned Baron and kicked him into a trot. The determination was as fierce in her as ever and her pulses were still hammering from the excitement of the encounter. But she set the horse up the field and though she knew they were watching her she did not look back.
‘Well, Sarah, this is exceedingly pleasant,’ Alicia said.
‘Yes it is,’ Sarah agreed.
They were walking the horses single file through a copse in the bottom of the Chewton Leigh valley, Alicia leading the way on Baron, Sarah following with Sweet Lass and in spite of her dislike for Alicia, Sarah was glad she had come. She had enjoyed the leisurely trot along the lanes and the brisk canter across the meadows for riding provided a wonderful means of relaxation and Sarah resolved she would find the time to do it more often. Provided of course that dear Sweet Lass was her mount. She did not fancy the idea of managing the mettlesome Baron one bit and she was filled with generous admiration for the easy way in which Alicia controlled him.
But then control was something Alicia was very good at. The way she had inveigled Sarah into riding with her this afternoon was a case in point. But Sarah was puzzled by her motive. Alicia had never made any secret of her disdain for Sarah – why this sudden change of heart? There is bound to be a reason, Sarah thought, and I think I know what it is. She wants Adam and she thinks the way to get to him is through me.
From the moment she had been introduced to him it had been obvious that Alicia was setting her cap at Adam, but it was only when she had come upon the little scene at Long Meadow the previous afternoon that Sarah had realised just how serious Alicia was in her intentions. A splinter in her finger indeed! She must think we are green as grass! Sarah thought scornfully. But Adam seemed to have been taken in by it – or perhaps he had wanted to be taken in …
Sarah gave her head a small impatient shake, trying to dispel the sudden doubt that had assailed her. But still it hung over her like the shadow of the trees across the woodland path.
If only they had been able to spend more time together! If only there had been more moments of passion and tenderness like the one they had shared on the way home from that first meeting with Annie and Max! But work on the aeroplane was claiming all his time and most of his attention.
Max was as bad, of course. Annie was forever complaining that if it were not for her visits to the shed to stitch wing fabric she would have quite forgotten what he looked like. But it was different for Annie. She was secure in the knowledge of Max’s love, his ring was on her finger and he left her in no doubt that she figured in all his plans for the future. Whilst Adam …
Maybe he thinks that kissing me until I am weak is enough – but it isn’t, Sarah thought. I am more crazily in love with him than ever but I still don’t know for sure how he thinks of me. Or how he thinks of Alicia for that matter …
Here under the trees where the sun could not reach the breeze was cool, even chilly, and Sarah shivered.
‘Shall we go back along the lane?’ Alicia called over her shoulder. ‘Yes, if you like,’ Sarah called back, and her tone gave no indication of her thoughts.
Leo de Vere was feeling annoyed. This was not unusual – Leo spent most of his life experiencing either annoyance or resentment or downright jealousy. Long ago he had decided that fate had dealt him an unfair hand and the conviction had eaten deeply into him, destroying any humour or compassion that might otherwise have tempered his rather dour nature and imbuing even his triumphs with a satisfaction that owed more to bitterness than pleasure.
As a child his world had been torn apart by the death of his father and though Leo had not missed him much since he had seldom been in evidence even when he was alive he soon became aware of the privations that came with his death. Cornelius de Vere had been a wealthy and respected banker who had been unable to face the disgrace and ruin when his empire suddenly crashed about his ears; he had taken a double-barrelled shotgun and put a bullet through the roof of his mouth, ending his life and Leo’s comfortable existence in one fell swoop. The luxurious house on Fifth Avenue had been the first thing to go, along with his riding lessons and exclusive prep school and Blanche had taken Leo and fled to the picturesque, but in Leo’s opinion, paltry, house in New Hampshire which was the home of Cornelius’s sister Elinor. He had hated the place, hated the unfamiliar accents and the remoteness, hated his mother’s enforced preoccupation with survival where before she had been principally concerned with his welfare. Most of all he hated the fact that he could no longer have all the things that money could buy at the merest snap of his fingers. During the year they spent in New Hampshire Leo had learned many things but the education had not made a better person of him. Instead it had set him on the downward spiral of resentment and bitterness.
At first he had looked forward to the visit to Blanche’s family in England as the cue for matters to improve. He had soon been disappointed. He liked England even less than he had liked New Hampshire and when his mother had told him she intended to marry Gilbert Morse and settle there he had been enraged.
Life in the Morse household had done nothing to make him happier. Money was no longer scarce it was true but once he had come to take the relaxed state of finances for granted he quickly began to find other things that were unsatisfactory. He was no longer the sole object of his mother’s attention for one thing. Her new husband was far more demanding
of her time than his father had ever been. And there were the Morse children, all older than him with the exception of James, all bursting with a confidence which only exacerbated his own feeling of inferiority, all far better looking than he. Leo had never been an attractive child, with his narrow face, prominent nose and cheekbones and rather thin lips, but he had never been as aware of his own lack of beauty as he was when he looked at the Morses with their good features and clear blue eyes. They disliked him and looked upon him as an interloper he knew and he felt they were united against him, again with the exception of James who attached himself to Leo like a shadow. But far from being grateful to James for his obvious adoration Leo despised him. James was ‘wet’, preferring his paint box to any rough and tumble game, always whining, often sickly, and prone to bursting into tears. Alliance with him, Leo felt, would be a reflection on himself yet friendship with the others was impossible. They treated him with thinly veiled resentment and he hated them for their overflowing confidence and for excluding him from all the things they took for granted.
Alicia he hated most of all. Because she was closest to him in age she took her lessons with him and he had thought that since she was a mere girl his position as kingpin was impregnable. But Alicia had had other ideas. Her pride and disdain were apparent in everything she did and the fact that James hero-worshipped him made him a target for her spite also. He did not want James’s adoration, yet perversely he was hurt and annoyed when Alicia made it clear that at a snap of her fingers she could take even that from him.
Matters had deteriorated still further when Sarah Thomas came to Chewton Leigh. Again he had felt that now, at least, he would no longer be last in the pecking order, again he had been disillusioned. Gilbert, who had no time for him at all, doted on her and even the tutor, Richard Hartley, seemed to favour her. Briefly he had formed an alliance with Alicia, whose hatred for Sarah was obvious, but he had been unable to capitalise even on this for the defects in his character made him seem more sly than bold, and Alicia was too strong and independent to wish to include him in any of her plans and schemes to disenchant her father with Sarah.
Boarding school had taken Leo away from his enemies the Morses but he had made no lasting friends there either. The chip on his shoulder made him sour and truculent when things went wrong and he crowed unpleasantly over his successes so that not surprisingly no-one ever seemed genuinely pleased for him. But he was a clever boy and with no chums and no schoolboy larks to distract him he produced a set of examination results which would have been the delight of his schoolmasters had they been able to summon up even a cursory liking for him.
Only his mother seemed willing to fight his corner. She championed him to such an extent that it only had the effect of making the others dislike him more and he relied on her encouragement as heavily as he had done as a small child.
‘Go to university, Leo,’ she had advised him. ‘ Then you will be in a position to head Morse Motors one day. Lawrence might be Gilbert’s eldest son but he is a thick head. You can run rings around him. Hugh will never take the slightest interest in the business and neither will James, unless I am much mistaken. He is talking, believe it or not, of becoming an artist. As for Alicia, she is only a girl. She will marry and spend her time raising a family and entertaining her husband. But you are clever. If you do well Gilbert will come to realise it is to you he must look to carry on the family empire.’
This advice had echoed precisely Leo’s own thoughts. He was aware that his intellect was his greatest asset and he had long harboured an ambition to beat the Morses at their own game. How wonderful it would be to take control of the family firm! He could see himself sitting at the head of the long polished oak table in the boardroom, taking the decisions, controlling all their destinies. And oh, how sweet revenge would be! When he was in charge he would make them pay, all of them, for their treatment of him. They would discover then the frustration of having to wait on his pleasure, of knowing that it was he, not they, who reigned supreme in this world of theirs. He would do things his way; he would have all the money and power he wanted. And he could do it. His mother was right. There was not one among them fitted for the throne. All he had to do was play his cards correctly, gain the qualifications to impress Gilbert and the experience he would need of the running of the firm, then sit back and reap his rewards.
Gilbert might have slighted him in the past but this time he would not be able to afford to do so. Not if he wanted to keep Morse Motors successful – and in the hands of the family.
These thoughts had spun a strong skein of ambition in Leo de Vere. It became his driving force and sustained him through all his depressions and moments of self-doubt. Each real or imagined slight only served to strengthen it until it became an obsession with him. Revenge – the revenge of being all powerful whilst they were forced to be as puppets in his hands. Day by day he had seen his goal coming closer. He would be going to university soon – three more years and he could begin to insinuate himself into a striking position at the works. Lawrence was not fit to take the reins, he had spent time there during the vacation and seen with his own eyes how slow and indecisive Gilbert’s eldest son was. His mother was right, just as she always was. With her help it would be easy.
And now, just when it seemed he was moving inexorably towards his goal, someone had appeared on the horizon whom he recognised as a threat.
At first he had not taken undue notice of Adam Bailey, dismissing him as something of a crackpot who, as a friend of the upstart Sarah, was barely worthy of consideration. The first seeds of disquiet had been sown when he had recognised Gilbert’s enthusiasm for the young man and his outlandish project but he still had not fully understood why he experienced concern. Adam was nothing more than a customer to whom Gilbert had given a certain amount of backing. He was not, and never would be, a member of the Morse dynasty.
But this morning he had had a conversation with James which had caused him to think again.
Relations between James and Leo had never changed much since their childhood days – Leo still disliked the quiet artistic young man and his airy-fairy notions; James still seemed totally unaware of that dislike. This morning both of them had been late for breakfast, Leo because he had been working late into the night at the books he thought would stand him in good stead when he started at Cambridge, James because he had been drinking and playing cards with some of his wilder friends. As they helped themselves to kidneys and bacon from the silver chafing dishes on the sideboard Leo had attempted to avoid conversation but James had had other ideas.
‘I say, I do believe Alicia is in love at last,’ he remarked cheerfully.
‘Really?’ Leo said discouragingly, opening the copy of the day’s Times which Gilbert had left on the breakfast table. Alicia’s affairs of the heart were not of the slightest interest to him.
‘Haven’t you noticed?’ James enquired, pouring himself black coffee from the silver coffee pot. ‘She has taken a great shine to this Adam Bailey fellow. In fact I have never seen Alicia set her cap at anyone with such determination.’
Leo grunted, his eyes still roving over the columns of financial news.
‘He’s a clever fellow,’ James continued unabashed. ‘Father is impressed with him I know. But I don’t think it’s his cleverness Alicia is interested in. She’s fallen for the chap, not a doubt of it.’
Leo was aware of the first niggle of disquiet. ‘He’s shown no interest in her has he?’ he said, his tone surly. ‘I thought he was Sarah’s friend.’
James grinned. ‘That is hardly likely to stop Alicia, is it? You know as well as I do what Alicia is like when her heart is set on something. She invariably gets what she wants. And she wants Adam Bailey – I’d wager a month’s allowance on it. As for Adam – well he’d be a fool to upset her, wouldn’t he? He and that friend of his with the withered arm have scarcely two half-pennies to rub together from what I hear of it. They’re scraping the barrel to finance this project of theirs. Thin
k what a difference it would make to them if he was to take up with Alicia! It would ensure father’s backing. He wouldn’t want Alicia married to a penniless adventurer. He’d pull out all the stops to make sure Adam had whatever he needed to be successful. Even take him into partnership if they were to get married, I shouldn’t wonder. Oh yes, Adam would be a fool to ignore Alicia’s interest – and he is no fool. There will be wedding bells before the year is out, mark my words, unless Alicia changes her mind. And somehow I don’t think she will.’
Leo swallowed hard. The succulent kidney seemed to have turned to cardboard in his dry mouth. Alicia and Adam. If James was right and she wooed him with the promise of Morse backing for his project it could be the undoing of all Leo’s carefully laid plans. There was no Morse fitted to take over the family empire – but supposing Adam became Alicia’s husband? Then things could be very different. Of course, as yet it was nothing but mere hypothesis. But as James said, Alicia was a very determined young woman. What she wanted she invariably got.
He set down his knife and fork with a clatter and pushed back his plate. He was no longer hungry.
‘I’m going to the works,’ he said. ‘I’ll see you at dinner, James.’
‘Oh!’ James looked disappointed. He had been enjoying Leo’s company, oblivious as ever of the other’s impatience with him. ‘In that case I think I shall take my easel and go out to do a spot of painting. It’s a nice day. The light is just right.’
Leo left the room without replying. He got himself ready and drove into Bristol and all the while the thoughts which their conversation had stirred up rankled in him like the sour taste left in the mouth after a night’s hard drinking. It would be just his luck if Alicia were to upset the applecart now. Why was it that things always went wrong for him?
