Tara got a strangely apprehensive feeling in the pit of her stomach suddenly when she saw his smile. 'Isn't there?' Philip asked softly.
She shook her head, horribly uncertain, but reluctant to relinquish her fight on Clifford's behalf. 'I -I agree that Cliff probably wanted me here to lend him some moral support,' she said slowly. 'But now that I've met you, I can see why!'
'You can?' The quiet voice challenged her to go on,
and she knew she was already beyond the bounds of conventional good manners towards her host, but there was little she could do to retract now.
'You have to admit that you'd have bullied him into joining your wretched firm by now, if I hadn't been here!'
He drew hard on the cigarette for a moment, then stood looking at the stub held between his strong, cruel-looking fingers before hurling the glowing end past her and into the river. He moved closer to her and Tara eyed him warily. 'So it was you that got him involved in this artist nonsense,' he said softly. 'I thought it might have been.'
*No, it wasn't!' Tara denied. 'Cliff made up his mind without any prompting from me!'
'But you could persuade him the other way,' he insisted, and Tara, remembering the last time he had sought to persuade her along those lines, wished she had chosen some other venue for her walk. 'Unless,' he added, 'you're intent on encouraging him in this art and starvation nonsense!'
There was nowhere she could move away from him, and she was becoming increasingly aware of the warm, exciting masculinity of him as he stood almost touching her. Then he reached out with one hand and touched the small, throbbing pulse at the base of her throat, his fingers so gentle that she felt it as barely more than a flutter of sensation against her skin.
'Why are you so nervous of me?' he asked softly, and she looked up hastily to deny it, meeting the black eyes head on, bright and glittering as coals in the dim
shadows of the trees.
'I'm - I'm not nervous!'
He laughed softly, stroking his fingers along the side of her jaw, and well aware of the sensation he was causing, she felt sure. 'You're as nervous as a kitten every time I come near you,' he argued, and laughed again quietly. 'I wonder why!'
'Philip, stop it!' She moved her face jerkily out of his reach and half turned away from him, anxious to hide the tell-tale signs of her slipping self-control.
'Stop it?' he echoed, and Tara bit her lip.
'Please don't go out of your way to embarrass me,' she said. 'It won't make me any more amenable, Philip, and if you make things too uncomfortable for me and I leave, how long do you think Cliff will stay after you've got rid of me?'
The hand that swung her round to face him was no longer gentle, and she saw the deep glow of anger in his eyes as his fingers dug hard into her arm. 'Don't make threats, Tara,' he said softly, ignoring her protests that he was hurting her. He held her firmly, and so close that his breath was warm on her mouth when he spoke. Angry, threatening and strangely disturbing words. 'I promise you I make a very bad enemy,' he said, 'and the fact that you're a very beautiful and desirable woman won't influence me in the least. If you persuade Clifford to leave here and not come back, I'll make you sorry. I promise you that!'
Tara stared at him, wide-eyed and wary, then she shook her head urgently, prising at the hard gripping fingers on her arms. 'I don't want to take him away,'
she told him breathlessly. 'I couldn't, I don't have that much influence over him!'
He laughed shortly. 'You underestimate yourself, Tara. You could make him break with me completely if you wanted to, that's why I want you on my side. I'd rather have your co-operation than your enmity.'
She was more than ever unsure of him in this new mood, and she looked up at him warily, seeing a glowing warmth in his eyes after the recent blaze of anger. 'I've - I've told you,' she said. 'I don't want to influence him either way, and I certainly wouldn't have anything to do with his breaking with you for good. It would make him too unhappy.'
'And you wouldn't want him to be unhappy.'
'No, of course not!' She prised at his fingers again, although they gripped her much less tightly now. 'Will you please let go my arm, Philip, you're hurting me!'
'I'm sorry.' The apology was both unexpected and sincere, and she stared at him uncertainly for several seconds through the dark shadow of her lashes, rubbing her arm to erase the marks of his fingers.
'I wish you'd believe me,' she said after a moment. 'I've no wish to take Cliff away from you or from Fair-winds. Truly I haven't, PhiUp.'
He smiled at her suddenly, that slow, enigmatic smile that was so oddly disturbing. 'Thank you,' he said quietly, and Tara realized vaguely that somewhere along the line she had already gone nearly halfway over to his side.
CHAPTER THREE
It was hard to believe that three weeks had passed since she came to Fairwinds, and Tara was still a little uneasy about staying so long. One big relief had been Madame Hautaui's acceptance of her, for she had proved most amiable, and had even declared her intention of being a guest at Tara and Clifford's wedding. She had rather spoiled things by adding - 'if it takes place' - but Tara suspected that had probably been done with the intention of quashing any impression she might have given that she was softening.
Tara had managed to avoid being alone with Philip, ever since their meeting in the spinney, and she hoped to be able to go on doing so, for he was the one person who did most to make her doubt the wdsdom of her stay. She tried to tell herself that she disliked him, but she knew in her heart that it was not dislike she felt so much as a kind of fear, because she found him so disturbingly attractive.
She spent most of her time watching Clifford while he painted. Now that he had his mind set on showing his brother just what he could do in that line, he seemed interested in little else. Tara would Uke to have taken a drive with him somewhere occasionally, and see something of the countryside, but he seemed disinclined to do anything but follow his own desires.
Just at the moment she had his undivided attention
for once, and the subject had inevitably turned to his grandmother. 'I don't know how you've done it,' Clifford said, 'but she actually likes you.'
Tara laughed, sitting beside him on a garden seat her eyes half closed against the glare of the sun. 'Oh, she really isn't as frightening as you make her out to be,* she told him. 'You shouldn't be so scared of her. Cliff. That's what annoys her so.'
'That and the fact that I'm a heathen Taffy,' Clifford said gloomily.
'Oh, nonsense!'
'It's true,' he insisted. 'Why did she have to choose now, of all times, to come and visit Philip?'
'Perhaps because she knew you'd be here,' Tara guessed, and he laughed shortly.
'Not on your life! / wouldn't drag her away from her precious Paris, she'd be more likely to stay away if she knew I was going to be here.' He kicked at the loose gravel on the path with one swinging foot. 'I suppose my abject cowardice does annoy her, but I can't help it. It's just that old habits die hard.'
'I wouldn't exactly call it that,' Tara told him laughingly. 'But I can't understand your attitude towards her. Philip isn't afraid of her, so why are you?'
'Because I am an abject coward!'
'Oh, that's nonsense! I expect Philip was just as scared of her when he was a little boy, wasn't he?'
Clifford shrugged, resting one arm along the back of the seat and twining the fingers of one hand into her black hair. 'I don't know,' he said. 'I wasn't around when he was a little boy, and he may have grown out of
it by the time I was. Don't forget he was about eleven or twelve by the time I arrived.'
'Is he so much older than you are?' Tara asked, frankly interested. 'I hadn't realized it.'
'Nearly twelve years. It's a lot when you're young and we were never really like brothers, especially when he became more or less my guardian as well.'
'Didn't your grandmother help?'
'Grand'mere?' He laughed shortly. 'Not with me, darling!'
> 'But it must have been quite a handful for a young man, to have to run a firm and look after a young boy as well.'
Clifford grinned ruefully. 'Have a heart, darling, I wasn't that young. It was only ten years ago, I was twelve, nearly thirteen.'
'But Philip must have been only twenty-four or five - not very old to have so much responsibility.'
He regarded her curiously for a second, then raised a brow. 'You should get together with Grand'mere,' he told her. 'Join the admirers of Philip Hautain society.'
'Now you're being silly!'
'Am I?' He sighed deeply and, she suspected, insincerely. 'Anyway, she'd never regard Philip in the same light as she does me. Philip, like our papa, was born in gay Paree, all very civilized and French. What's more his French is impeccable, whereas mine is distinctly rusty round the edges, and I never get the accent in the right place to suit Grand'mere Hautain.'
She could not restrain a smile at his determined
gloom. 'Your French sounds perfectly all right to me,' she told him, though not quite truthfully. Even she could tell the difference between Philip's faultless pro-nuciation and Clifford's rather stilted version.
'It isn't,' he argued. 'And it wouldn't do me any good even if it was. Grand'mere Hautain looks upon anyone from the Welsh hills as uncivilized barbarians. She never had time for our poor mamma, and she's even less for me. We're strictly warpaint and clubs as far as she's concerned, and I sometimes suspect Philip shares her view.'
'Oh, but he doesn't!' Tara declared impulsively, and with such conviction that he was bound to remark on it.
'No?'
She shook her head. 'No. He's very, very fond of you, Cliff, and very concerned about your future.'
He turned his head and studied her for a moment with curious eyes. 'You sound very certain,' he said at last. 'And very authoritative.'
Tara looked down at her hands, studying her nails with such concentration that she knew he was watching her suspiciously. 'I'm not exactly authoritative,' she denied,
'But you seem very sure of how Philip feels. I'm just wondering how you could know.'
She shrugged. 'He - he told me.'
He turned right round on the hard wooden seat then, and took her hands in his. His voice reminded her a little of Philip's too, when he spoke again - quiet and deep and very firm. 'Now why on earth would he
confide anything like that to you, darling? What have you been up to while I've had my head down over an easel?'
'I haven't been up to anything,' Tara denied hastily, and he laughed.
'Of course, I know you haven't, my darUng, but you can't blame me for suspecting secret confabs with Philip while I've been otherwise engaged. Not when you seem so well informed about him.'
Tara hesitated, wondering whether she should say anything or not, and if she did admit to discussing him with Philip, how far she should go. She had told Philip no more than the truth when she said she had no desire at all to prise Clifford away from his brother and his home, but Clifford would not take kindly to learning how she had been solicited for help, she felt sure.
'There were no secret confabs, as you call it,' she said at last, fearing a longer silence would give him even more wild notions. 'It - it was just that we were -talking, that's all.'
'About me?'
She nodded. 'I am supposed to be going to marry you,' she said. 'So naturally we mentioned you.'
'About my staying here and joining Hautain and Sons, no doubt?'
'That came into it, yes,' she admitted cautiously, and he nodded, as if it was all clear to htm suddenly.
'And I suppose he's been browbeating you again, to try and make you see things his way,' he guessed. 'Trying to get you to put the pressure on. I might have known Philip wouldn't give up after only one try.'
Tara looked up at him, anxious to impress upon him her own part in it. 'He didn't exactly browbeat me,' she told him. 'And anyway, I'm not easily bullied, Cliff. What he said made no difference at all to my decision not to interfere. I don't care what he does to try and persuade me, I won't try to influence you one way or the other. I told him so the first time he asked me, and I did so again.'
Clifford's blue eyes studied her intently for a moment, and there was a stronger, firmer look about his jaw when she looked at him. 'If he didn't browbeat you,' he said quietly, 'just what did he do to try and convince you to help him?'
'Why—' She shook her head. 'Why, nothing at all, not really.'
'But you don't trust him?'
The suggestion startled her and she looked at him wide-eyed for a moment, then shook her head. 'I didn't say that. Cliff. And I wish you wouldn't question me as if you suspect me of conspiring behind your back.'
'Oh, darling, of course I don't!' He raised her hands to his lips and kissed her fingers fervently. 'I'm sorry if I sounded suspicious, but I know Philip better than you do, and I know quite well he can be an absolute - you know what, when he wants something badly enough, and I've mucked up his plans by not wanting to join the firm. I know him, and I swear if he does anything to upset you, I'll pack up and leave, right now.'
'Oh, no, please. Cliff!' She put a finger over his lips to stem the threat. 'Please don't say or do anything you'U be sorry for, especially on my account. I'm sure
Philip will see things your way, if you give him time.'
He pursed his lips doubtfully and shrugged. 'I doubt it,' he said. 'He's not easily persuadable once he's dug his heels in, I know him. Unless—' His eyes gleamed suddenly and he smiled so that she already guessed what he had in mind even before he told her. 'Unless you put in a word in that direction,' he added.
'No, GlifT!'
'It might just work,' he went on, ignoring her objection. 'He's very susceptible to a beautiful face, and you could turn the tables on him, my darling, I'm sure of it.'
'No,CUff, Ican't!'
'Why not?' he asked cheerfully. 'It'd do him good to have a taste of his own medicine.'
'I won't!'
He looked at her for a moment uncertainly. 'Why not, for heaven's sake?'
'Because I'm not some - some object to be used by the pair of you for your own ends,' she said bitterly. 'First you, then Philip, and now you again.'
'Me? First?' He frowned, but it was obvious from the way he avoided looking at her that he knew what she referred to.
'Do you think I don't know by now,' she said, 'why you were so insistent on my coming with you when you came home? I wanted to wait a few weeks, give you some time with your brother first, then follow later, but you would insist I came now.'
'I didn't want to be parted from you for several weeks,' he told her, and Tara laughed shortly.
'You wanted me here to speak up for you when you told Philip you wouldn't be joining the firm,' she said. •Don't deny it, CUff.'
He said nothing for a moment, then he reached out for her hands and gently toyed with her fingers, raising them to his lips at last and looking at her contritely. 'All right, I admit it, darling,' he told her. 'And I'm truly sorry I wasn't more honest with you about it, but I was so afraid you wouldn't come if you knew my reason.'
'I probably wouldn't have.'
'There you are, you see! But I really wanted you to meet Philip - and not for any ulterior motive. Please believe me.'
Put so appealingly there was nothing she could do but believe him, and forgive him. ClifTord was very adept at being forgiven, and she smiled almost without realizing she was doing it. 'I believe you,' she said. 'But I wish you'd been honest about it, just the same.'
'So do I, now,' he averred, and leaned across to plant a kiss on her mouth. 'I love you, and I'd be lost without you.'
'I doubt it,' Tara said wryly, and laughed when he made a moue of protest. 'But you know now that I won't take sides with either you or Philip in what's purely a family argument. It can only cause more trouble.'
'You won't even help me by talking Philip round?'
She shook her head firmly. 'No. Do you realize,' she added, loo
king at him quizzically, 'what you're asking
me to do?'
He looked a bit puzzled for a moment. 'Just try and persuade Philip,' he said,
'The way Philip wants me to do with you?'
He nodded, a faint uncertain smile on his face. 'Why not?' he asked. 'Fair's fair.'
Tara took a deep breath. 'Philip asked me to - to work on you because I'm engaged to you,' she told him. 'He knows I might have some influence on you, some methods of persuasion not open to him.' She raised her eyes, huge and dark and full of meaning. 'Is that what you want me to do with Philip?'
Realization dawned at last and he looked at her in alarm. 'Good grief, no!' he said. 'I was thinking more along the lines of just - just talking to him.'
Tara smiled wryly, shaking her head. 'Philip,' she said with certainty, 'is not a man one just talks to.'
It was the following day that Tara, on impulse, set out on her own to explore the territory around Fairwinds without consulting Clifford. Truth to tell she was a little tired of sitting around while he painted, as he almost always seemed to be doing lately.
There was some beautiful countryside around, and she did not think it likely she would get herself lost if she did not venture too far. Clifford had warned her, once, that sudden mists sometimes came down without warning, even on a summer's day, but she thought she would be alert enough to see it coming and turn back.
Traochan Valley was not as well known as some
more popular areas, and it had few visitors, but it was pretty and quite unspoiled, and looked gently sad in the warm summer sun. A quality she had noticed in so much of the Welsh countryside.
The nearest hills were quite close to the house, indeed one of them actually sheltered Fairwinds from the worst of the elements, and so gave it its name. Her shoes were not really meant for walking, but she could not bother to go back and change them, and she would be quite warm enough in her sleeveless dress, for the sun was very bright and promising.
There was a path, she discovered, not very far from the house, that led across a rough pasture to the hills, then climbed away out of sight. Striding out in fine style, she wondered why she had not thought of doing this before instead of simply sitting about and watching Clifford paint.
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