The Youngest Bridesmaid

by Sara Seale

  She had tried when she first came to the island to make friends with Sam, but he had met her advances with shyness, or perhaps it was just suspicion encouraged by Tibby’s attitude, but Melissa had clearly fared better. It was disheartening to be faced so bluntly with one’s own shortcomings, and the storm’s persistence did not make for ease or clarity of thought. Nowhere was there escape from the fury of the elements; slamming doors and rattling windows kept up an incessant clatter; fires smoked and gusts of wind blew down the passages, lifting the rush matting with eerie, sucking sounds, and by the third day Melissa’s careful facade began to crack. It was all very well to appear cool and entertaining for short intervals when Piers was about, or to amuse herself with the handsome young lout in Tibby’s kitchen, but another woman’s company bored her unutterably and the perpetual noise of the storm got on her nerves to the point of hysteria. It was even beginning to get on Lou’s nerves, or perhaps it was just her cousin’s sudden spurts of ill temper that left her feeling bruised and shaken; that and the ease with which Melissa turned on the charm for Piers.

  Lou found herself becoming gauche and awkward, knowing that that was how Melissa wished her to appear, and sometimes she caught Piers looking at her with impatience, even with irritability. She had no weapons with which to match Melissa at her own game, for she had never learnt the art of verbal hide-and-seek. Piers, she reflected, for all his professed experience of women probably did not realize how subtly she was being stripped of confidence, or how often his eyes rested on Melissa with speculation and, it could be, regret.

  She was aware that now she retorted sharply and often with childish petulance when he teased her, so that he began treating her with an exaggerated politeness in Melissa’s presence which was more hurtful than his casual banter, also she was afraid.

  This inopportune visit was no whim, she had begun to realize, neither was the blame laid on Cousin Blanche probably true. Melissa had unintentionally burnt her boats by running away for a kick, as she had expressed it, but now she wanted Piers back, and even if she could not have him for herself, she could very well wreck Lou’s marriage.

  On the third evening after she had slipped away early to bed; apparently unnoticed by the other two, Lou lay awake, listening to the storm and waiting with increasing trepidation for Piers to come up. She must, she thought, have the courage to get certain things clear between them, but when, at a very late hour, he answered her call and stood in the doorway between their rooms, she, could not remember what they were. He made no move to come into the room and had the air of a polite stranger willing to perform a trivial service but anxious not to be detained.

  “What did you want?” he asked.

  She could think of nothing but the proverbial childish excuse.

  “A glass of water, please.”

  “It’s by your bed.”

  “Oh—oh, yes, of course. Piers—”

  “Well?”

  She struggled up against her pillows, aware that she dealt clumsily with slipping bedclothes, that one of Melissa’s elaborate nightgowns appeared on her ridiculous rather than inviting, and such questions as she would have liked to ask could only sound impertinent.

  “Well?” he said again,’ and this time she forced herself to remember that she was his wife.

  “I want to know how long this is going to last,” she said, and his eyebrows shot up with unamused tolerance.

  “My dear child, I don’t control the weather,” he replied, and she said with brave doggedness:

  “I didn’t mean the weather.” At once she was conscious that he stiffened, that during those hours when she had so foolishly left him alone with Melissa he had suffered a sea-change. He did not, it became clear, even intend to afford her the solace of the usual tucking-up routine and blessings for the night.

  “Piers—” she said, drawing up her knees under the bedclothes and clasping her arms tightly around them. “I—I don’t think you quite understand my position. It—it isn’t very nice to be a cypher in one’s own home.”

  “You don’t,” he retorted quite pleasantly, “make much effort to assert yourself, do you—except to stress a shrinking for your husband’s possible advances?”

  “Is that what Melissa told you?”

  “Melissa gives a good deal away unintentionally. She doesn’t understand maidenly modesty. She has a very healthy attitude towards sex.”

  Lou’s indecisiveness vanished in a sudden, surge of anger.

  “Very obviously,” she snapped. “You or this other man—healthy, possibly, but hardly discriminating—or doesn’t that matter?”

  For a moment he looked taken aback, and even a little scandalized, as if a child had unwittingly thrown a dirty word at him.

  “What are you trying to imply?” he asked coldly, and she put her head down on her knees, answering from the muffled folds of the eiderdown with the forlorn defiance of a child that knows it is beaten by adult logic but refuses to give in.

  “Only what you yourself are implying—that you and Melissa realize your mistake—that I’m just the stumbling block. You once told me that if things didn’t work out you just forgot them or threw them away. You—you want your freedom, I suppose.”

  The silence that followed was so long that she thought he must have gone away. She was crying now, dismayed by her own lack of reticence and the evil genius which had made her blurt out such unconsidered opinions when she should have taken a leaf out of her cousin’s book and played it cool.

  “Does that mean you want yours?” he asked then, and his voice seemed to come from a long way off. When she made no reply he appeared to hesitate, then she heard him move and when he next spoke he was standing by the bed looking down at her.

  “Poor Cinderella ...” he said with gentle regret, “I’ve given you a raw deal, haven’t I? Melissa’s made me see that very clearly ... she says, quite rightly, that you aren’t the sort of girl to play games with.”

  She looked up then. The wind which, despite the well-fitting windows, had found out the cracks, made the lamp flare in a sudden gust, causing shadows to flicker across his face, giving him a strange expression.

  “Was it only a game?” she asked, aware that too late a ghost of the old tenderness was back, that had she pleaded with him, or simply confessed her own doubts and misgivings, he might have at least offered her comfort.

  “No,” he answered. “A thumbing of the nose, perhaps, even a rather ill-considered gesture of defiance, but never a game. Don’t cry, Cinderella ... I’ll put things right for you. Just pretend in your make-believe for a little while longer. When you come back to reality again this will all seem like the dream it is.”

  “And isn’t the island your make-believe?” she asked, tightening her hands round her knees. “Don’t you, when you come to Rune, escape from reality and enjoy a fairy tale of your own?”

  He stood there, looking down at her, the expression on his lean dark face suddenly unsure.

  “Clever of you,” he murmured softly. “Yes, perhaps we share the same need, after all, my dear ... Go to sleep, now.”

  She automatically lifted her face, but he did not kiss her. The hour was so late and the ceaseless noise of the storm so hypnotic that she could no longer think clearly if, indeed, she ever had.

  “Goodnight,” she replied, and lay down obediently, making no further effort to detain him. He turned down the lamp, pinching out the wick with practised fingers, and went back to his own room.

  II

  Lou awoke to an impression that the storm had abated. The sea seemed to break with less savagery against the rocks, and today it might be possible to get out of doors. If she could escape from the confines of these four walls for a time she might be able to sort out her unhappy problems or at least reach a compromise with herself. It had not occurred to her as yet to fight for her happiness, for had not Piers on his own showing, confessed to a realization of his mistake, and in admitting his folly would lose no time to rectify it?

 
She slipped out of the house before Melissa was down, and for a moment staggered against the porch as she met the force of the wind. But she had learnt the island’s geography by now and knew where the sheltered places lay. The rough scrub which was Rune’s principal vegetation had been torn up and scattered in wanton profusion and some of the cottage windows were crudely boarded up where the glass had been blown out, but along the shore, in the lee of the cliffs, there was sufficient shelter to make walking possible and it was good to smell again the salt and the seaweed and feel the sting of wind and spray.

  Forget it or throw it away ... forget it or throw it away ... the waves seemed to beat out monotonously, and a curious change came over Lou. Last night’s sad acceptance of the end of her fairy tale began to give way to a sense of outrage. She was Piers’ wife in law, whatever the circumstances, and the law was on her side. Until she was convinced in actual fact that it was Melissa Piers wanted, she was not going to help him to jump out of marriage as quickly as he had jumped into it.

  Brave resolve, she thought, turning homewards, or only wishful thinking? But her old doubts returned as she entered the house again and experienced the familiar sensation of trespass. Piers and Melissa were chatting companionably over pre-luncheon drinks, and Lou might have imagined that they paused long enough in their interrupted conversation to make her feel she was intruding. She did not, however, imagine the sudden constraint in Piers’ manner, reminding her that last night’s bitter interchange between them was still unresolved.

  Becoming conscious of both her cousin’s possessive ease and her impeccable grooming, Lou was tempted to turn tail and do something about her own dishevelment, but instead she demanded a drink. Piers looked surprised, for she seldom drank spirits, but he poured her a gin and tonic without comment except to suggest with unnecessary point that it might be better if she went upstairs to tidy.

  “Presently, when I’ve had my drink—possibly two drinks,” she replied calmly, and Melissa giggled.

  “Darling, you are breaking out!” she said. “Piers is right, though—you can’t imagine what a little scarecrow you look in those dirty old slacks, with your hair standing on end.”

  “Personally, I think she looks rather charming,” Piers observed unexpectedly. “No one dresses up on Rune.”

  Lou was grateful for the polite snub, but Melissa pouted.

  “Is that meant for me?” she asked plaintively. “You used to be both observant and critical of your girl-friends’ appearances, Piers. Why, only just now you were saying that poor Lou—”

  “I’m not aware that we were discussing Lou,” Piers interrupted on a cool, warning note, and Melissa lowered her long lashes and smiled up at him through them. She did not contradict him, but Lou thought there was a world of meaning in the look and the smile, and, ungratefully, she now felt angry with Piers for his defence of her. They had quite obviously been discussing her, and it was the first time she had known Piers to be a little embarrassed.

  “Well—mud in your eye, and here’s to holy wedlock!” she said with sudden defiance, gulping down her drink and holding out the glass for more.

  “And what do you suppose you mean by that? I think you’re a teeny weeny bit tiddly already,” Melissa said, but Lou thought Piers gave a faint grin. He refilled the glass and returned it to her gravely, advising her to drink more slowly.

  “You should get out of doors, Melissa,” Lou said with her new-found composure. “It’s not too rough today to walk, and tomorrow it might even be safe for the launch to put out, mightn’t it, Piers?”

  He made no reply, observing her thoughtfully, but Melissa, recognizing a new, unsuspected quality in her cousin, said quickly:

  “Dear Lou, you sound in a most unflattering hurry to get rid of me. Have you been consulting the oracle?”

  “The oracle?”

  “The voice in this phoney cave Tibby’s always talking about. It’s supposed to warn you of impending doom or something.”

  “You didn’t go to the cave, did you?” Piers asked sharply, and Lou looked bemused, her small advantage already lost.

  “No,” she replied. “What did you mean, Melissa? Piers says the cave legend is just superstition.”

  “Of course, it is, but Tibby believes—and Sam,” Melissa said carelessly. “Was it really a temple, Piers?”

  “Very probably—though whether the Druids had anything to do with it is a moot point. I’ve told you, Lou, to keep away.” Piers spoke so curtly that both girls looked at him with surprise.

  “I haven’t been there since that first time,” Lou assured him, and Melissa said, with a small gurgle of laughter.

  “I think you must believe in it too, Piers. Well, well, imagine the hard-boiled, worldly-wise Piers Merrick succumbing to local superstition! That will be a laugh when we all get back to civilization.”

  “If it amuses you to jeer, you’re welcome,” he retorted. “The cave has a bad name, that’s all. A girl drowned there.”

  “But you said the cave never filled except in times of storm,” Lou began, her eyes wide and startled at this unexpected evidence that her own feelings about the cave had not been misplaced, and Tibby, entering the room with her usual soft-footed secrecy to announce that lunch was ready, chipped in as if she had been part of the conversation.

  “And it’s a time of storm now, missis,” she said. “It was a time of storm when that other maid died—too afraid to live with her own conscience, so they say.”

  “Why? What had she done?” Lou asked, repelled yet fascinated by the gaunt old woman’s Cassandra-like utterances.

  “She had stolen another woman’s mate,” Tibby replied, with a long, piercing stare at Lou, and Piers rose angrily from his chair, knocking over his glass with a careless gesture of annoyance.

  “Keep your bedtime stories for Sam or anyone silly enough to listen, Tibby,” he snapped. “If one were to believe all the grisly legends that Cornwall boasts we’d be drowning in pools or jumping off cliffs from sheer suggestion. Take that dazed look off your face, Lou, and go and get tidy. What’s for lunch, Tibby?”

  “Starry-gazey pie,” Tibby replied, making the dish sound as sinister as a dose of poison, and Melissa uttered a little squeal.

  “What, for pete’s sake, is that?” she exclaimed. “Some local recipe guaranteed to lead us to the pearly gates?”

  For the first time Tibby’s mouth tightened with displeasure for Melissa, who was openly mocking her, and Piers, in no mood either for smart cracks at local customs, said tersely:

  “A Cornish dish, certainly. Merely pilchards with their heads sticking through the pie-crust, if you must know.”

  “Oh, God! Fish again!” Melissa groaned rudely, and helped herself to another drink without being asked.

  Piers went out immediately after lunch, and Melissa, once the need to appear gay and amusing had been removed, poured out an incessant flow of grumbles and ill temper. She needed a hair-do, she was sick or fish and those endless stodgy soups and puddings, the battery of her transistor set was nearly finished and without it life could not be endured, and she was out of cigarettes. No one would believe, she concluded waspishly, that the gilded Piers Merrick enjoyed playing at the simple life in such discomfort.

  “Rune isn’t a game, It’s real for Piers.” Lou said, but her cousin made a rude noise.

  “Don’t kid yourself. He’s only a little boy playing king-of-the-castle,” she retorted. “But enough’s as good as a feast, as you will find out. I would soon have talked him out of that caper.”

  “Would you, Melissa? But you tried, didn’t you? That was the quarrel that proved your undoing.”

  “It proved something else, too—that my quiet, mousy little cousin wasn’t above rushing in for the kill.”

  Lou was sewing a button on one of Piers’ shirts, aware that this wifely chore annoyed her cousin unduly, but she was irritated herself now; and bit off a thread with a sharp little snap of the teeth which told Melissa she had scored a hit.

&n
bsp; “Well, you did, didn’t you? Very clever, darling—all that lovely lolly just for the taking.”

  “You should know by now that Cousin Blanche scarcely has patience with girlish scruples, and the lovely lolly was important to her.”

  “You’re saying she pushed you into it—so what? Blanche was scared. If she hadn’t lost her head she’d have tried to find me, or at least given me the red light.”

  “Since you stated in your note that love was the only thing that counted, she might be forgiven for not understanding that you were only out for kicks,” Lou said crisply. “Besides, Piers wouldn’t wait. If I hadn’t agreed he’d have found someone else.”

  “So what have you gained, Cinderella? Not very nice, surely, to be picked at random, and you’re hardly the type to hold a man who’s married you out of pique. You can see for yourself he’s come back to me already.”

  “Don’t call me that,” Lou said sharply, then she laid down her work. The morning’s walk had sharpened her wits if it had not entirely cleared her thoughts; now was as good as any time to have things out with her cousin.

  “I don’t know what you mean to imply by that, Melissa, and I don’t want to know,” she said, “but I think it’s time we understood each other. You’re trying to take Piers away from me, aren’t you?”

  Melissa shrugged. If she was surprised that mousy Cousin Lou was prepared to do battle she was quite unperturbed. It might be amusing to see how far the silly little thing would go to fight for her imagined rights.

  “You can’t take away something that’s never been possessed,” she retorted a little cruelly, and had satisfaction in knowing from Lou’s sudden wince that that remark had struck home.

  “First blood to me,” she observed mockingly.

  For a moment Lou’s innate honesty nearly defeated her intentions. It was only too true that there was no physical bond between herself and Piers, and last night he had all but admitted his mistake. Pretend in your make-believe a little longer, he had said, and that, surely could have meant only one thing.