Could she have been sure that Mrs. Bannister would answer the telephone herself, Gail would have rung. But the thought that she might have to deal with a surprised Quentin Bannister or, still worse, Marc had prevented her. In weak indecision she had allowed the week to slip away, and now here she was—on the train.
At least Mrs. Bannister had said it would be she herself who would be meeting the train. Perhaps that would give one the very last-minute chance of withdrawing—of explaining that, of course, the idea was crude and ill-chosen. Mrs. Bannister would understand, Gail was almost certain. And then she could go back by the next train.
This excellent idea, however, had no chance of being put into practice. When Gail emerged from the country station, it was Marc who was standing by the car, holding the door open for her.
‘Oh—oh, Marc, how nice to see you,’ she said idiotically.
‘Is it?’ He smiled a little drily. ‘I thought you might like a short drive around, as it’s such a wonderful day.’
‘That would be lovely,’ she agreed despairingly, as he got into the driving seat beside her.
And they started off in a silence which seemed to Gail to rest on them like a tangible weight. She sought wildly in her mind for something which would fill the void. Some easy, conventional remark which could start them on a harmless round of conversation. But nothing came.
Presently, it was he who spoke. And he said quietly, ‘There’s no need to be so scared of me, Gail.’
‘I’m not scared,’ she asserted huskily. Then she had to swallow a great lump in her throat and to make tremendous efforts to hold back the tears which threatened to force their way under her lashes and down her cheeks in a humiliating trickle.
It was no good, however. A few did escape. And when he stopped the car with some stiff remark about the fine view he stared at her in dismay and exclaimed violently,
‘For God’s sake stop that! One would think you were expecting me to beat you or something. I’m not going to bully you or argue with you. You’re a perfectly free agent. You can sing in whatever you like and for whom you like. If you prefer Oliver to me—’
‘But I don’t! And stop shouting at me,’ sobbed Gail. ‘And I wish you’d turn the c-car and drive me straight back to the station. I’m c-catching the next train back to town.’
‘You’re doing nothing of the sort,’ he said, and he took hold of her and gave her an angry, despairing sort of kiss which was no comfort to anyone. ‘And what do you mean by saying you don’t prefer Oliver to me? You were glad enough to be in his damned show, seemingly—and out of mine.’
‘Of course I like Oliver and am glad to have helped him in his show. But do you suppose it wasn’t a thousand times harder to refuse to sing for you than to agree to sing for him?’
‘Hush!’ he said suddenly, but with such authority that she stopped crying on a sort of shaming hiccup. ‘Gail, I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Why did you have to refuse to sing in my opera?’
‘Because Erna Spolianska was ten times better,’ Gail said simply.
‘But I wanted you. I said I wanted you.’
‘It wasn’t true, though.’ Gail still spoke with that sort of desperate simplicity. ‘You knew she was better than I was. You’d have been a fool if you’d thought otherwise. Only you had more or less promised the part to me, and you meant to stand by that. Your father knew too, in his heart. But his professional pride was involved in the fact that he’d backed me and trained me—’
‘That too!’ Marc exclaimed accusingly. ‘How could you let my father use you to further his own confounded interference?’
‘I wanted the part so much,’ she said doggedly. ‘I knew he was right when he said you wouldn’t think much of me in the raw state. It was cheating, really, I suppose.’ She sighed. ‘What you heard and saw was not just me. It was the fine flower of your father’s miraculous coaching. I know now it was an unpardonable thing to do. It meant that your father’s idea of Anya was superimposed on me, so well that it shook your confidence in your own idea of your own character. But when you heard and saw that Polish girl, you knew. You thought it was too late—but you knew.’
‘But,’ he passed a hand over his hair in bewilderment, ‘you say you did all this to get the part. Did violence to your better feelings, agreed to let Father more or less make a tool of you. And yet, when it came to the point, you left me flat and went off to Germany. It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Yes, it does really.’ Gail drew another sigh, a rather unsteady one this time. ‘At first I thought only about my own success. Though I was convinced it would be your success too. I couldn’t imagine that your father wasn’t right. But then—I began to have uneasy doubts. And finally—it always comes back to this—I saw Spolianska auditioned. And I knew she could be the making of your opera.’
‘And, at that exact moment, you were offered this German contract?’ he asked sceptically.
‘No. Oscar Warrender got it for me.’
‘God! I could wring his neck,’ muttered Marc.
‘No, you couldn’t. His isn’t the kind of neck one can wring,’ stated Gail with spirit. ‘Anyway he was right. He was the only one of the three of you who was looking at the issue dispassionately. He knew it had to be Spolianska. He was grudging about admitting it at first, until he found I was really in earnest. Then he said that if he’d written a work like “The Exile” and had the chance of an artist like Spolianska, he’d have committed murder to get her.’
‘I’ll still never forgive him.’
‘Why not? Think back to that first night. Can you truly say, with all the artistic integrity you have, that he and I were wrong to force your hand?’
He was silent for almost a minute. Then he said, ‘And are you asking me to believe it was artistic integrity which made you do all this?’
‘Of course. I wanted the best for the opera.’
‘Liar,’ he said pleasantly. ‘Why won’t you tell me the truth?’ He leaned towards her, his eyes suddenly alight with amused triumph and joy. ‘What was the reason, Gail?’
‘I’m not going to say it first,’ she cried rebelliously, and she hid her face against him. ‘I’ve done my share of confessing.’
‘Very well,’ he said, and he laughed with a tenderness she would not have believed possible. ‘I love you, Gail. I adore you. My triumph was dust and ashes without you. Now what have you to say to me?’
‘Just that—that I love you too. There’s nothing else to say, because that’s all that matters.’
‘Oh, my darling—’ he kissed her, very gently this time, ‘that’s all that matters. That we love each other and have found each other at last. When are you going to leave that show Of Oliver’s and marry me?’
‘When the other girl is well enough to come back.’
‘Not before then?’
‘No. You wouldn’t have me start by breaking faith with your family, would you?’ She smiled up at him rather pertly.
He laughed, but he kissed her hard on her mouth.
‘Will you promise to sing in an opera of mine one day?’
‘If I’m better in the part than anyone else.’
‘And who is going to be allowed to judge that, pray?’
‘Oscar Warrender, I suppose. With perhaps,’ Gail added reflectively, ‘some assistance from your mother.’
‘My mother!’
‘Why not? I have an idea she knows more about this family than anyone else is ever likely to know.’
‘Except you?’ he suggested.
‘Oh, I’m just a beginner,’ declared Gail modestly.
‘But you’ll learn, my darling, you’ll learn. For a first-year student, you haven’t done badly already.’ And he started the car and drove towards home with the air of a man who had found his heart’s desire.
Music of the Heart (The Warrender Saga No. 6) Page 17
