An All-Consuming Passion

by Anne Mather

  ‘Seems like either one of you could stand a little more flesh on your bones,’ retorted Lucinda, unrepentant. ‘If there’s anything else you need, Mr Kane, you just holler.’

  Morgan smiled, but he couldn’t help wondering what Andrew would say if he could see him now. No doubt the older man was already growing impatient because Morgan hadn’t been in touch with him. He wondered if he ought not to find the post office and telex him what had happened so far.

  ‘One or two?’ Holly was asking now, and Morgan dragged his thoughts back to the present.

  ‘Just one to begin with,’ he accepted, eyeing the thick wedges with some misgivings. It was just as well he had done some exercise that morning. At this rate, he’d gain weight whether he liked it or not.

  Holly served the pancakes, adding maple syrup to his after only a momentary hesitation. ‘The traditional way,’ she said, passing the plate to him. ‘They don’t make pancakes like this in England.’

  Morgan could believe it. The pancakes his mother used to make when he was a child had been much more modest, and Alison had only ever produced a French-style crěpe, which was definitely crisper. But Lucinda’s offerings were delicious, and he found himself accepting a second, when he ought not to have eaten the first.

  ‘Good, mm?’ Holly said, and he nodded, realising as he did so that he would not be getting in touch with Andrew today. His conscience simply would not allow him to loose her father’s anger upon her, not until he had put the situation to her. He would send word to Andrew tomorrow, when he knew for certain when they would be back.

  He was finishing his third cup of coffee, and feeling unpleasantly bloated, when Holly asked, ‘Do you ride?’

  ‘Ride?’ Morgan put his cup aside. ‘I assume you mean horses.’

  ‘Well, we don’t have anything else here,’ responded Holly ruefully. ‘Do you?’

  Morgan shrugged. ‘Why?’

  ‘Answer me, and I’ll tell you.’

  ‘Well——’ Morgan grimaced. ‘I went pony-trekking once, about twenty years ago. But—it wasn’t an unqualified success.’

  ‘Why not? Didn’t you like it?’

  Morgan hesitated, doubtful whether he ought to tell her the truth. ‘The—er—the friend I went with didn’t like it,’ he admitted. ‘I spent most of my time fishing——’ he baulked, ‘fishing him out of ditches.’

  ‘Him?’ Holly regarded him through half-closed lids, and Morgan sighed.

  ‘All right, her, then. Whatever, it wasn’t a holiday I remember with any affection.’

  Holly drew her lower lip between her teeth. ‘Was that your wife?’ she asked carefully, and Morgan bent his head.

  ‘No,’ he said at last, looking up at her again. ‘She was just a girlfriend. Someone I used to work with.’

  ‘At Forsyth’s?’

  ‘Yes.’ Morgan was growing a little impatient now. ‘That really isn’t at issue, is it? You asked if I rode, and I’ve told you. I don’t.’

  ‘Riding is riding. Once you’ve learned to sit a horse, you don’t forget.’

  ‘I doubt if the purists would agree with you,’ remarked Morgan evenly. ‘However, now that we’ve established the facts, why did you ask?’

  ‘Come and see my horses,’ said Holly, getting to her feet.

  ‘Your horses?’ Morgan frowned. ‘I understood your father let the horses go, when your grandparents died.’

  Holly pressed her lips together. ‘He did. But I rescued them. Come and see them, please. One of the mares has had a foal.’

  Morgan came to his feet with some reluctance. ‘But how have you managed to keep a couple of horses?’ he protested, and she grinned.

  ‘Not two horses, four,’ she corrected him gleefully. ‘Come on. I’ll show you where we keep them. Micah and Samuel help me to look after them, you see.’

  The stables were across a cobbled yard. The yard itself was sheltered by a wall, with fruit trees espaliered to its crumbling brickwork. Chickens pecked about the roots of a huge live oak, and there was a moist, earthy scent to the air.

  The two mares, and the stallion which Holly told him was called Trader, each occupied separate stalls opening on to a central aisle. Adjoining the stables was a corralled yard where the animals could exercise, but Holly explained that she and Samuel took them out at least twice a week.

  ‘It should be more, I know,’ she said, opening the gate into the larger stall where the mare, Bonnie, and her foal were housed. ‘Mm, who’s a handsome boy, then?’ she added, as the young colt nudged her pocket. ‘Here you are.’ She produced a sugar lump. ‘And for you, Bonnie.’ She stroked the mare’s nose and glanced at Morgan over her shoulder. ‘Aren’t they beautiful? Could you just abandon them?’

  Morgan came to make friends with the mare, taking the lump of sugar Holly offered, and holding it on his palm. ‘I gather your father doesn’t know about this,’ he remarked, feeling as if he was letting her down, and Holly’s face sobered.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘No, he doesn’t. Or rather he didn’t. I assume you mean you’re going to tell him.’

  ‘I didn’t say that,’ murmured Morgan mildly, but all the same he knew he should. ‘What does it cost to feed a horse of this size these days? And where are you getting the money to do it?’

  Holly led the way out of the stall and closed the gate. ‘I’m not stealing it, if that’s what you mean,’ she retorted, a little huffily. ‘What I do with my allowance is my affair, surely.’

  Morgan inclined his head. ‘Your father wondered why you asked for a raise six months ago. I believe he thought you must be buying a lot of clothes.’

  ‘I don’t need many clothes here,’ she replied, moving to the adjoining cubicle. ‘And I do get a small sum for teaching at the school.’

  Morgan absorbed this as she made a fuss of the mare next door. ‘This is Athena,’ she said, producing more sugar from her pocket. ‘She’s the most gentle of beasts.’ She paused, and then added softly ‘Do you think you could ride her?’

  ‘Me?’ Morgan gasped. ‘Holly, if that’s what this is leading up——’

  ‘Why not?’ She gazed at him entreatingly, her silky cheek resting against the mare’s well-groomed head. ‘Just for an hour,’ she begged. ‘I could show you the plantation. There’s not much of it left now, but you might find it interesting.’

  ‘Holly——’

  ‘Please, Morgan!’

  The indigo eyes were warm and appealing and, although it was against his better judgment, Morgan found himself giving in. ‘All right,’ he said, glancing at his watch. ‘But just for an hour. And then you agree we talk about why your father sent me.’

  Holly hunched her shoulders. ‘All right,’ she said offhandedly. ‘I’ll tell Lucinda where we’re going. Here’s Samuel. He’ll saddle the horses for us. Trader for me, please, Sam. And Athena for Mr Kane.’

  The boy—Morgan guessed he was probably still in his teens—regarded the newcomer without liking. Morgan suspected Samuel resented the fact that he was going riding with his mistress, instead of himself, and he was tempted to suggest the boy took his place. Only the suspicion that Holly might not keep to their agreement if he let them go alone prevented him from offering, and he met the boy’s sullen gaze with a conciliatory smile.

  ‘Er—thanks for lending me your jeans,’ Morgan ventured awkwardly, as Samuel brought the bay stallion out of its stall, and the boy shrugged.

  “S’all right,’ he responded, fastening the girth with an expert hand. ‘Miss Holly said I should. She said you didn’t realise you’d be staying so long.’

  ‘No. That’s right.’ Morgan wondered why Holly’s innocent statement should have such a permanent ring. ‘Well, I’ll look after them, you can be sure of that. And if I could get you a new pair——’

  ‘Ain’t no need for that,’ retorted Samuel ungraciously, slipping the bit between Trader’s teeth. ‘You riding Athena, is that right? That’s Miss Holly’s horse. I generally ride Trader.’

  ‘Do you?�
� Morgan eyed the stallion without affection. It was much bigger than the mare, it was true, but so far as he was concerned even the mare was a doubtful proposition. ‘Well, I’m afraid it’s years since I was on a horse of any kind, and quite honestly I’m not looking forward to riding either.’

  Samuel snorted, but happily Holly reappeared just then, her hands pushed into her pockets, her breasts bouncing provocatively as she sauntered across the yard.

  ‘Are you ready?’

  ‘As I’ll ever be,’ responded Morgan, taking the reins Samuel offered to him, and swinging himself up on to the mare’s back. ‘So far, so good. Are you sure you’re going to be all right?’

  ‘On Trader?’ Holly smiled at Samuel and swung herself up on to the stallion’s back without effort. ‘I gather Sam’s been telling you he usually rides him. Well, he does. But only because his legs are longer.’

  Morgan shrugged, adjusting himself more comfortably in the saddle. Already the slight exertion required to mount the animal and keep it under control was bringing out a film of sweat all over his body, and he thought the silk shirt he had been compelled to wear might really have to be abandoned.

  After assuring herself that he was not a complete novice, Holly led the way out of the yard and on to a grassy track that angled away from the house. Keeping the stallion on a firm rein, she kept their pace to a sedate canter, glancing around from time to time to ascertain that her companion was not in any difficulty. Morgan didn’t altogether enjoy the feeling of being at a disadvantage, and it didn’t help when Athena became skittish and started to chew on the bit.

  ‘You’re holding the reins too tightly,’ said Holly, over her shoulder, and Morgan’s mouth compressed. ‘Just take it easy. She won’t run away with you. You’re handling her like an unbroken filly.’

  Her tone was condescending, and Morgan guessed she was enjoying her moment of glory. On horseback, she was obviously in control, and he wondered if he had been wise to agree to this excursion.

  They had entered a tunnel now, cut between towering walls of vegetation. The horses’ hoofs crunched over a carpet of rotting stalks, and all around them the evidence of what had once been a thriving plantation fell into decay. Canes, which had once soared between ten and twenty feet into the sky, had gone to seed, and the weeds that grew between them had created a rank wilderness of plant and parasite alike.

  ‘Depressing, isn’t it?’ said Holly, half turning in the saddle to look at him. ‘Would you believe hundreds of slaves used to work in these fields? I used to think I could feel the atmosphere when I rode through here. A kind of anguish, or despair; the hopelessness of knowing there was no escape.’

  Morgan inclined his head. ‘It’s a fanciful notion.’

  ‘Maybe.’ Holly was defensive. ‘But I wouldn’t like to ride here after dark.’

  ‘Nor would I,’ agreed Morgan fervently. ‘Though not for the same reasons, I daresay,’ he added, as Athena performed another crab-like manoeuvre.

  Holly swung round again, evidently assuming he was making fun of her, and Morgan sighed. He hadn’t intended to hurt her feelings. In all honesty he was interested in learning about the island. It was simply that he would have preferred to make the tour in the buggy. The one Holly had used to go to Charlottesville the previous day.

  Holly had reached a gate and leaned down to unlatch it, leading the way into a yard, surrounded by the burnt-out shells of wood and tar-paper shacks. ‘These were the slave quarters,’ she said, as Morgan came up beside her. ‘They were destroyed by my great-great-great-great-grandfather, I believe.’ She grimaced. ‘I’m never absolutely sure how many greats there should be.’

  ‘But an ancestor of yours anyway,’ murmured Morgan gently, looking around, and Holly nodded.

  ‘Of my mother’s,’ she appended pointedly, and Morgan conceded the point before sliding down from the mare’s back.

  Even after only fifteen minutes in the saddle, his spine was aching, and he put his hands in the small of his back and stretched his stomach muscles. His rump, too, felt as if it had been systematically beaten, and he grimaced at the prospect of further punishment.

  One or two of the cabins were still standing, roofless perhaps, but capable of revealing the cramped conditions their occupants had suffered. Leaving Holly sitting on her horse, Morgan ventured through the doorway of one of the shacks, his nose twisting ruefully at the unpleasant smell of damp and decay.

  She was right, he thought, standing in the middle of what had once been both living and sleeping quarters. There was an atmosphere here. It was the desperate influence of suffering humanity, the pain and humiliation of years of oppression.

  As he stood there, absorbing this revelation, he heard the sound of a pipe being played. It was an eerie sound, its reed-like resonance echoing around the deserted buildings, evoking instinctively an image of the past. The haunting notes were not European in origin; they had a different intonation. It was the kind of music that had its roots in a darker continent, and with a flash of intuition Morgan guessed who was playing it.

  He was not surprised to find that both Holly and her horse had disappeared. He wondered that she had left Athena to give him any comfort. As her intention had obviously been to scare him, she might easily have hidden the mare as well.

  But a secondary consideration amended this impression. She no doubt had no desire to be caught, and if she had taken the mare away, how could she have explained her absence? As it was, she could pretend she had ridden on, and then, discovering he wasn’t with her, had ridden back to find him. As she knew the area so much better than he did, it would be a simple matter for her to circle the cane-fields, and then ride back as if she had never taken a detour.

  The piping had ceased when he emerged from the cabin, and Morgan realised he didn’t have much time if he wanted to outwit her. The simplest solution would be to hide, so that when she came back she wouldn’t be able to find him, and his lips parted delightedly at the prospect of her confusion.

  Athena was not too overjoyed at being tethered behind another of the shacks, and she whinnied in protest when a broken spar of wood scraped her flank. ‘I’m sorry, old girl,’ Morgan muttered apologetically. ‘But you want to be on the winning side, don’t you? Even if Holly is your mistress.’

  Morgan took up his position inside one of the burnt-out huts and, as he did so, another idea occurred to him. A sooty smear he had collected on his arm suggested another way he might be able to turn the tables, and with a mocking smile he daubed some of the charcoal on his face.

  As he had anticipated, Holly reappeared a few minutes later, riding into the yard with the unmistakable appearance of someone well-pleased with herself. Morgan, viewing her approach through a crack in the cabin wall, saw her confidence waver a little when she found Athena had disappeared, but she dismounted anyway, and looked doubtfully around the enclosure.

  ‘Morgan!’ she said, soothing Trader with a palm to his nose. ‘Mr Kane! Where are you? Did you lose your way?’

  Morgan didn’t answer. It was not part of his plan that he should walk out into the sunlight where Holly could plainly identify him. He wanted her to come looking for him. Then they would see who found the situation so funny.

  His shoulder brushed against the wall of the hut and he froze. He had taken off his shirt because its whiteness was too revealing, and the scraping sound seemed as loud as the piping had done earlier.

  ‘Morgan?’ Holly moistened her lips and looked in his direction. ‘Morgan, are you in there? What have you done with Athena?’

  He knew she couldn’t see him by the uncertainty in her step, and he felt sure she would have brought Trader with her if she had thought she could get him into the hut. Her face was flushed, and strands of silky gold hair were escaping from the barrette she had secured at her nape. She looked as anxious as she obviously felt, and Morgan was half inclined to abandon his ruse and save her any embarrassment.

  ‘Morgan, can you hear me?’ As she neared the hut, Holly
spoke again, but Morgan’s urge to confess his whereabouts disappeared at her words. ‘Morgan, I thought you were with me, honestly. It wasn’t until I’d gone about half a mile that I looked back and saw you weren’t there. I naturally assumed you were following.’

  Even then, he thought she was only half convinced he might be hiding. She had evidently decided to assure herself the hut was empty, but her real attention was elsewhere. Perhaps she thought he had taken fright and ridden back to the house. Probably that had been her intention. If he had abandoned the outing, he could hardly blame her if she wasted the rest of the morning looking for him.

  She came out of the sunlight into the shadowy confines of the shack, and her eyes could not have adjusted before he rose up in front of her. No doubt if he had given her time to get her bearings, his plan would not have worked so successfully. As it was, a combination of her impediment and the charcoal he had smeared upon his body—added to a lingering sense of the supernatural—created a situation where anything was possible.

  Her scream of terror was not feigned, and Morgan immediately regretted what he had done. It had been intended as a joke, that was all; a way to repay her for the trick she had attempted to play on him; but her response only left him feeling a heel. However, before he had a chance to voice his protest, she had fled, and he knew he had to catch her before she reached the stallion.

  He charged out into the sunlight, an incongrous sight in Samuel’s cut-down jeans and little else, his face and arms and chest all smeared with the blackening charcoal. ‘Holly!’ he yelled fiercely, as she dashed across the yard, and the urgency in his voice almost panicked the stallion. But it did, at least, have the desired effect. Holly stopped in her tracks and turned disbelievingly to face him, and Morgan halted, too, as he gave a rueful smile.

  ‘You!’ she said, incredulously at first, and then, as she realised she had been duped, her expression changed. ‘You—you bastard!’ she choked, clenching her fists. ‘You filthy, rotten bastard!’

  ‘Well, filthy, perhaps,’ Morgan was agreeing drily, surveying the dirt streaked on his arms, when she flew at him, her fists flailing wildly. A stream of profanities spilled from her lips as she fought with him, using both her hands and her feet to good advantage, and Morgan winced in protest when one particularly well-aimed punch struck home.