Moonrise Over the Mountains

by Lilian Peake

  “My secretary, to be exact. And on my instructions she booked the adjoining room for me.”

  “And all this to keep a watchful eye on me, to make sure I don’t go astray, that I do the work I was sent here to do?”

  He smiled mockingly in answer.

  “If you were so near to me all that time, why didn’t you join me?”

  “To let you stand on your own feet, to let you prove to yourself that you could do it.”

  “As if I were a child!” she commented indignantly.

  To his amusement her indignation increased. She asked irritably, “Why are you here, anyway?”

  “Annoyed with me for coming?”

  She did not answer. How could she when her heart was floating like those boats out there at his nearness? Instead she said, “I suspect you didn’t trust me.”

  “So you aren’t pleased to see me?”

  Pleased to see him? Her heartbeats were making her body vibrate. The trouble was that she had to find a way of hiding her delight from his discerning eyes.

  “If you really want to know why I’m here,” he said, “it’s partly on business—”

  ”By that I suppose you mean your fiancée—”

  He repeated a little coldly, “On business, and partly because I promised your father I would look after you.”

  “So you used the firm’s money to come all this way because you thought I was too stupid to take care of myself.”

  “First, let’s get this straight. How I use the firm’s money is my concern. Second, I knew by experience how little confidence you had in yourself. Third, I had little confidence in the many—shall we say—wolves you would meet on this trip, so—”

  ”So you’re also my self-appointed chaperone. Aren’t you a bit out of date?”

  “Thanks,” he said, rising, “for the gratitude. I don’t like your particular brand of gratitude.” He walked away.

  “Ewan!” She ran after him. She couldn’t let him go. He was the only familiar face for hundreds of miles. Besides, she wanted his company more than anything else in the world. “Please don’t go! I’m sorry, Ewan.” She grasped his aim, but he did not slacken his pace, so she had to run beside him. Passers-by looked amused. Lovers’ quarrel, they were plainly thinking. Who would win?

  The tears won. “Please stay with me, Ewan. I feel—terribly lost.”

  He stood still, looked into her moist eyes and held out his arm for her to put hers into it. “For your father’s sake,” he said.

  Gayle did not care for whose sake he had decided to forgive her. He was beside her again and that was all that mattered.

  He pointed out the Chateau de Chillon, the thirteenth-century castle on the edge of the lake. Its towers, its rough stonework and red pointed fairytale-like roofs had been immortalised in poetry by Lord Byron.

  Across the lake, towering with immense majesty were, he said, the range of mountains known as Les Dents du Midi, some of whose summits, sharp like the ‘teeth’ of their name, were called Fortresse, Cathedrale and Dent Jaune.

  “You wouldn’t believe,” Ewan commented, “that, although it’s set amidst so much beauty, the waters of that lake are so polluted here no one is allowed to go into it. See those notices?” He pointed. “They say ‘Swimming forbidden.’ Sad, isn’t it, to think that progress so often goes hand in hand with disfigurement and destruction?’

  When they arrived back at the hotel, there was still a long time to wait until dinner. As Ewan left Gayle at her door, she wondered what to do to pass the time. It would, of course, be necessary to dress for dinner. Ewan had warned her, but it was much too early even to start.

  She lay back on the bed again. Now Ewan was here everything had changed. The colours were brighter, the snow on the mountain tops more dazzling, the very air, as it filled her lungs, seemed intoxicating and heady.

  But, she asked herself, wasn’t she forgetting something? Carla, his fiancée, his ‘breathtakingly beautiful’ fiancée, as he had once described her? Gayle closed her eyes and in the sudden darkness Ewan’s face was there, three-dimensional and alive. There was a noise and her eyes opened. His face was there again, only this time it was real and tangible and less than a hand’s reach from her own.

  He was in deep blue swimming briefs and he was bending over her. “Tired?” he mocked. “I told you you lacked stamina.”

  If she could have spoken, she would have told him that, far from being tired, she was excited beyond belief. Every nerve in her body was inflamed by his nearness. He was broad and muscular and as he sat on the bed beside her, she wanted to stretch her fingers and touch him, his hands, the fine hairs on his chest, his broad shoulders, his cheeks, freshly shaved and smooth.

  She rolled on to her side, away from the magnetism of his body. She mumbled, “You shouldn’t walk into a lady’s bedroom uninvited.”

  “You shouldn’t leave your balcony door unlocked. But,” he rose, “believe it or not, I came for no other reason than to invite you to join me in the hotel pool.”

  “I’m a poor swimmer. What would be the use?”

  “You’ve brought a swimsuit?” She nodded. “Then get into it. If nothing else, you can parade round the edge of the pool and show off your figure. Then I can float on my back and admire you.”

  She coloured and shook her head violently.

  His hands came out and swung her round until she was sitting on the side of the bed. “Get into your two-piece or whatever it is. I’m a good swimmer. I’ll teach you. And you can stop shaking your head. You’re coming with me if I have to carry you there dressed as you are and throw you in.” He stood in front of her, hands on hips. “Now will you do as I say?”

  “If you go out while I change.”

  “My dear Miss Stuart,” his eyes opened mockingly wide, “whatever else did you expect me to do—stay here until the seventh veil falls?”

  The swimsuit was a two-piece and so brief Gayle felt selfconscious. But since nearly all the other women in and around the blue, rippling water were similarly dressed, her feeling of being grossly over-exposed receded.

  But one man in particular had her in his sights. Ewan was in the water and, as he had promised, floating on his back. His eyes moved swiftly the length and breadth of her, narrowed estimatingly and repeated the exercise.

  Gayle desperately turned her attention to her immediate surroundings, the great glass roof spanning the entire pool, the solid stone supporting pillars, the exotic flowers growing in the near-hothouse atmosphere, the bar at which people sat on high stools. Her back was to the man she was trying to forget, so when two strong arms swung her off her feet and carried her to the steps which led down into the water, she was taken completely off guard.

  “No, no,” she shrieked, kicking her legs, “I don’t want to swim! I told you—I’m no good.”

  “And,” said a voice close to her ear, “I said I’d teach you.” Despite her struggles he carried her down and lowered her to stand on the bottom step. “I’m being kind, I won’t throw you in.” He dived in himself, however, and trod water, holding out his arms. “Come down to me.”

  Her heart hammered, but she knew there was no alternative but to obey. She sat on the step and lowered a foot into the water, but there was no floor as she had expected and she plunged in up to the neck. But Ewan’s arms were round her and they lifted her until she was horizontal. They stayed round her and she said irritably, “I said I could float, so there’s no need to hold me.”

  Go ahead. Float.” He let her flop down on to the surface, plunged away and swam, arm over arm, until he was at the other end of the pool.

  Gayle stayed where she was, too frightened to do anything else. When he turned and swam back—he was what he had claimed to be, an expert swimmer—she called, “Ewan, please help me!”

  He laughed and swam towards her. “Thought you couldn’t do without me for long.” How prophetic those words sounded, she reflected.

  He pushed back his dripping hair. “Come on, turn over. You’
re going to swim.”

  “But, Ewan—”

  Two near-brutal arms gripped her and swung her round until she was face down. A hand supported her chin, keeping her nose and mouth out of the water. “I said I could swim a little,” she gasped.

  “Then swim,” he ordered, but he did not remove his hand. Her arms pushed forward, her legs moved together and out and slowly but determinedly she moved into the breast-stroke. “You’re not breathing properly,” Ewan said. “You’re not even as good as you claim to be. Come on, I can’t stand this snail’s pace.”

  He lay back in the floating position, reached out, turned her over on to her back and latched on to her under the armpits, pulling her on top of him. “No!” she pleaded, kicking her legs.

  “If you go berserk,” he warned, his voice just behind her head, “I shall have to take stronger action. This is one method of life-saving. Others are not so pleasant, so behave yourself and lie still.”

  So Gayle lay still, enjoying the sensation of gliding through the water, rejoicing in the feel of his body pressed against hers, his strength her support. She closed her eyes. It was a dream, it could not be true that Ewan Pascall was holding her so close to him they were moving as one.

  When he stopped, she was disappointed but dared not show it. Her long hair spread out over the water between his fingers.

  His chest and face were glistening, the muscles in his arms and shoulders telling of the latent power within. His eyes held hers for a long moment, then his head came down and his lips fastened on to her mouth. His arms went round her and pulled her close. She had to cling to him for support and even when he raised his head and laughed into her eyes, she could not let him go.

  “Why,” she gasped, “why did you do that? A swimming instructor doesn’t usually—”

  Kiss his pupil? No, but it’s an excellent way of ensuring a good employer-employee relationship,” he mocked, and moved to kiss her again.

  “Do you make love,” a voice called from the edge of the pool, “to all your fashion buyers, darling, and make improper suggestions?”

  His mouth, which was on its way to claim the lips beneath his for the second time, paused and lifted. He raised his head and answered the questioner, “But of course, darling. As I’ve just told the girl I’m kissing, as a way of securing loyalty to the firm, there’s nothing to beat it!”

  Gayle, recognising Carla’s voice, jerked herself from Ewan’s hold, trying to swim away from him, but she floundered and he came at her, seizing her round the waist. “It’s no good,” he whispered, “you simply can’t do without me. How many times do I have to tell you?” His eyes taunted hers.

  “I want to get out. Please let me go.”

  ‘If I did you’d sink like a stone.”

  “Take me to the steps,” she pleaded, “your fiancée wants you.”

  “Does she?” His voice was sardonic. “Supposed I don’t want her?”

  “Please, Ewan...”

  This time her appeal was successful. Holding her, he swam to the side and put her on the steps. “Sit on the edge until I come out. Then I’ll buy you a drink.”

  Gayle sat on the edge, biding her time. By now, Carla, the scarlet of her swimsuit brilliant against the background of the blue-tiled pool, was at the top of the diving board, arms outstretched. Ewan hoisted himself out of the water, sprinted along to the steps leading to the diving board and climbed them.

  No man in his right mind, Gayle thought watching miserably, could resist such a shape, such inviting curves. Carla must have known he was coming because she stood motionless until she heard him behind her. Then she turned and put her arms round his neck, whispering to him and reaching up to kiss him. Then, in a spectacular curve, they dived, locked together, into the water.

  While they were still beneath the surface—Carla was obviously as expert a swimmer’ as her fiancée—Gayle seized her towel, wrapped it round her and returned to her room. Carla the beautiful was in possession. She had the substance, the prize. Gayle, the undesirable, the ‘loyal employee’, had nothing but the shadow—and the memory.

  Gayle chose to wear for dinner a cream silk jersey dress. Its draped neckline hung low, revealing her white throat, the soft folds of the skirt emphasised the slimness of her hips, the ruched sleeves were wrist-length.

  Although it had been costly—one of Pascall’s most expensive models—Gayle was glad she had bought it. But she was fully aware of the fact that however beautiful the dress she chose to wear, it would become insignificant beside Carla’s. Carla Grierson, even in rags, would draw the attention and capture the imagination of every man in the room.

  But a number of men, seated at the small dining tables, raised their heads as Gayle passed and there was no doubting the admiration in their eyes; Gayle was shown to a table by a bowing waiter. There was no sign of Carla, nor of Ewan, who was probably even now waiting impatiently for his fiancée to finish dressing.

  Gayle could remember in the past how often, at the store, Ewan had rung through to the dress department to enquire whether his fiancée was ready to leave yet, and if not, how much longer was it going to take her to improve on her already perfect features?

  But to Gayle’s surprise, Ewan came into the dining-room alone. He saw Gayle and walked towards her, brushing aside the waiter’s offer to show him to another table.

  Ewan pulled out a chair, asking, “May I join you?” and doing so without waiting for an answer.

  Surely your fiancée will want—“ Gayle began, but Ewan broke in with, “Why did you run away from the swimming pool when I told you to stay?”

  Gayle flushed deeply, a flush of anger. “I can do as I like. I’m not in the store now.”

  Eyebrows rose. “Maybe not, but I’m still your employer. And you are here at my expense.”

  “I’m sorry if you think I’m not working hard enough to merit the large amount of money you’re pouring out on my behalf, but it was your idea that I should go swimming, not mine.”

  He said through his teeth, “Who’s talking about working and meriting financial expenditure? I offered to buy you a drink, so it would have been polite, if nothing else, for you to have stayed.”

  “Thank you, but I wasn’t thirsty.”

  “What’s eating you? Upset because it’s not your boy-friend sitting here instead of me? If it is, I’m sorry, but Pascall and Son aren’t philanthropists. They don’t pay the expenses of their employees’ hangers-on.”

  “Ewan darling,” wafted with a seductive whiff of perfume across the dining-room, striking sparks off the electric silence between the man the husky voice was addressing and his companion.

  The perfume drifted nearer and its wearer stood at Ewan’s side. Carla linked her hands loosely under Ewan’s chin and he seemed to have no objection to the touch of her. The dress she was wearing was pale blue and trimmed with interwoven gold at waist, cuffs and wrists. The neckline plunged to meet the midriff and the wrap-around skirt met the floor.

  Carla was, if anything, even more beautiful to Gayle’s jaundiced eyes than she used to be when Gayle worked as her assistant. The silver-fair hair was caught back with just a few wisps on each side left free to half-conceal her delicate ears. The long straight nose was perfection in itself, the mouth, which, when reflecting good humour, was curved and provocative, the almond-shaped blue eyes were misleadingly ingenuous, except that, at the moment, they were regarding Gayle with something like insolence.

  They were skimming over Gayle’s dress and mentally hanging it back on Pascall’s racks. “If I may say so, Miss Stuart,” Carla murmured, “your dress sense has improved a—little since we last met.”

  Gayle forced a smile. “But not nearly as much as yours has, Miss Grierson,” she murmured back.

  Ewan repressed a smile, removing the hands which still imprisoned his chin. Carla took Gayle’s remark as the subtle insult it was intended to be. Her eyes flashed, but before she could speak Ewan said, looking idly at Carla’s gown, “A model from the mind of
the great Hirondelle himself?”

  “But of course, darling, one of Pierre’s dreams. He designed it just for me.” Then, with a petulant frown, “Darling, our table is over there, not here. I reserved it for us.”

  “Please go with your fiancée, Mr. Pascall,” Gayle said tonelessly. “It’s some time since you saw her. You’ll want to be together. I quite understand.”

  The remark did not appear to please the man she addressed. He rose and said tersely, “Will you join us, Gayle?”

  “But, darling...” Carla protested.

  “Thank you, Mr. Pascall,” Gayle replied, “but I prefer to be alone.”

  This statement did not seem to please him, either. “I’ll remember that,” he responded, following his fiancée.

  After dinner, which Gayle ate with less than the enjoyment the excellent meal merited—the sight of the couple across the room talking and laughing did nothing to increase her appetite—she wandered into the lounge. The colour scheme appeared to be predominantly blue—the high chairs at the bar, the carpets and ceiling, the fabric of the wooden-armed chairs around the tables—all were blue, against which the bartenders’ scarlet jackets contrasted dramatically.

  Gayle wandered to the window. The view of the lake, beautiful though it was, with its multi-coloured border of flowers, the many-storeyed buildings almost touching the water’s edge and the mountains, always the mountains in the near and far distance, could not rouse her from her apathy. For a long time she lingered, watching the gold of the fading sun rippling over the lake, only half conscious of the other guests talking and laughing behind her.

  “Are you enjoying your loneliness,” asked a mocking voice, “self-imposed as it is? I hope you are, because I’m only invading it for a few seconds. Would you like a drink?”

  “No, th—” Gayle swung round, saw the rebuke in his eyes and changed her reply to “Yes, please.” He seemed to be waiting for something else. “Ewan.”

  “That’s better. No, don’t come with me. I wouldn’t dream of uprooting you. You’ve been standing there so long,” he consulted his watch, “nearly twenty minutes—I timed you—that you must have taken root.”