Love is for Ever

by Barbara Rowan

  “True,” he agreed, and picked up one of her hands that was lying limply in her lap and examined the delicate pink nails as if they interested him. “One of these days,” he added quietly, after a moment, “I will go to England and remake the acquaintance of my father’s relatives.”

  “Then you haven’t kept in touch with them throughout the years?”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t. But I have a certain amount of property over there which it is only fitting I should visit occasionally, and when I do perhaps you, too, will be in England? I have a house on the Sussex coast which I would very much like you to see, because I think you would approve of it. Do you think we might arrange to meet, and that I might show you it, little Jacqueline. It is the sort of house you would fit into very well!”

  But Jacqueline felt the first chill breath of reality blowing upon that luxurious state of contentment in which she had been wallowing, and she also felt as if she had been brought up rather short by a highly necessary reminder of the kind of friendship between them. They were only friends—and yet she was lying with her ear pressed to the silk of his shirt so that the strong beats of his heart were actually vibrating under her cheek, and one of her curls was brushing against his cheek, and he could hardly be unaware of it. Also his long, firm fingers were gently squeezing her fingers, and the scent of his shaving cream was in her nostrils, and the fragrant odor of cigarette smoke which clung about him.

  Gently but determinedly she freed her fingers, and just as gently and determinedly she drew herself away from him, and he let her go.

  “Well?” he asked, watching her curiously as she patted mechanically her disordered hair.

  She looked away from him as she answered: “But what about your grandmother’s plans for you? Don’t you think that—when you do find time to visit England—it will be your wife who will wish to see your house? And although, of course, I shall be delighted to see it some time, it might not be quite— quite ...”

  “Quite what?” with the same waiting, interested look on his face.

  She fumbled with the clasp of her handbag, which he had rescued with her from the bull-ring, and managing to extract a comb ran it quickly and nervously through her curls.

  “Oh, it’s—it’s not very important, is it? And I’m not quite sure what I was going to say! But I do think the others will be wondering what has become of us if we don’t rejoin them soon, don’t you? I’m quite all right again now.”

  “Then in that case perhaps we had better return.” But his expression was slightly mask-like as he stared at the wheel. “And I really am sorry for spoiling your afternoon.”

  “Don’t mention it,” he replied, in polite, polished tones. Then just before he started up the car he looked at her and said: “We’ll forget about my grandmother’s plans today, shall we? Today is a day for fiesta—for forgetting everything but gaiety and light-heartedness, and there are many hours to go yet before it is all over. I am looking forward to the rest of today— if you really are feeling better?” studying her face keenly. “All the unpleasantness forgotten?”

  “Yes—yes,” she assured him.

  “And you wouldn’t prefer to go home and rest for a while before rejoining the others?”

  “No.” She smiled, with just a suggestion of something tremulous and uncertain about the smile, and he smiled back, not quite in the way she liked to see him smile. It was too cool,

  too full of a kind of brittle amusement, too almost cynically prepared to go forth and encounter enjoyment. And the almost soothing gentleness, the rather tender solicitude, of a few minutes before, seemed to have deserted him altogether.

  Jacqueline felt as if something had occurred to place them miles apart, although just those few minutes before she had been lying relaxed in his arms. And the rest of the day loomed for her without any prospect of pleasure, and as something she would have to live through whilst keeping a careful guard on all her emotions.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  When they arrived at Senor Montez’s villa, where a tea-party was taking place under the shady trees in his garden, everyone overwhelmed Jacqueline with expressions of concern. Senor Montez himself expressed so much concern that she felt more than ever ashamed of the weakness she had displayed during the afternoon, and a little inclined to regard that weakness as something she ought not to be capable of whilst living amongst such well-intentioned friends as these. But a faint twinkle in the senor’s eyes when he asked why Dominic had considered it more in the interests of her health to take her for a drive instead of taking her home to rest for a while discomposed her for a few moments, especially as Dominic ignored the question and went across to pay some attention to Martine, who was looking contemptuously at Jacqueline.

  Neville brought her some tea, and his eyes were genuinely solicitous as he looked at her carefully, and then placed her comfortably in a chair, in a delicious corner of shade.

  “If I could have got to you before Dominic I’ d have had you out before he did,” he said, seating himself beside her. “But he was nearer to you than I was, and the moment you chose to faint Martine distracted my attention. But I felt pretty certain you weren’t feeling too good when I looked at you once or twice beforehand.”

  “I feel as if I’ve disgraced myself,” Jacqueline confessed.

  “Nonsense,” he exclaimed, and reached out and quite openly patted her hand. “Senor Montez was quite genuinely upset about you, and he was even prepared to forego the rest of the fight to make certain you were all right. He went out after you and Dominic, just as I did myself, but by that time both you and Dominic had disappeared.” He looked at her rather quizzically. “But whatever the treatment he administered you seem more or less completely recovered now.”

  Jacqueline felt herself flushing.

  “We went up on to the cliffs,” she explained, “and it was so much cooler there.”

  “Of course. A good idea, because the heat of the bull-ring was insufferable.” But he went on studying her for a few minutes, with that mixture of quizzicalness and searching in his eyes, and then he looked across at Dominic, apparently only aware of one person in the whole of that colorful throng, and that one person Martine. Neville’s eyes narrowed and grew rather more thoughtful.

  “Did you enjoy the bull-fight?” Jacqueline asked, also acutely aware of Dominic’s smiling and admiring glances, now wholly reserved for Martine, looking at her loveliest under the trees.

  Neville looked round at her again.

  “I pretended I did. But I don’t honestly enjoy that kind of spectacle.” He paused, and then asked: “You’re sure you feel up to the dissipations tonight? You wouldn’t rather go home and spend a quiet evening?”

  “Of course not.” She forced herself to smile as if she was looking forward to the latter part of the day, and the night that stretched ahead. “I’m perfectly all right again now.”

  “Good!” Again he patted her hand, and for a moment she thought that there was something almost proprietary about the pat, and the look that accompanied it. “I wish I’d been sitting next to you this afternoon, Jacqueline—I wouldn’t have let you suffer so long.”

  She smiled, touched by his solicitude.

  “I warned you I’d turn squeamish!”

  “Never mind.” His fingers lingered over her hand. “I’m meeting you at The Golden Cockerel tonight, and I’m bringing my own car. I thought you might like to see some of the sights afterwards, and if the sights get too much we can take a drive along the coast. Would you like that?”

  Jacqueline hesitated, saw Dominic’s sleek dark head bent in almost a devoted manner over Martine’s rippling red-gold head—for her enormous shady hat was now lying beside her on the grass—and felt something inside her take a positive stand. All at once she recognized only too clearly that there had been occasions during the past few weeks when she had been in danger of behaving with an almost disastrous lack of wisdom, and in a manner which would have recoiled upon herself like a boomerang. But now for
tunately she realized the danger she had been in—the menace to every shred of pride she possessed—and knew that she would not allow herself to be placed in any such danger again. From henceforward, although her heart contracted at the thought, her attitude to Dominic would be seasoned with every possible caution, for he was undoubtedly that most dangerous animal, a devastatingly handsome masculine charmer, with very few scruples to make him less dangerous!

  She looked round again at Neville, and smiled into his eyes.

  “Yes, of course, I’d love it!” she said.

  “Good girl!” he exclaimed, and crushed her hand hard.

  That night Jacqueline realized that outward, at least, she was at her best, and that it was a best which called for admiration. She saw it for just an instant in Dominic’s eyes when he met her at the foot of the stairs in the Villa Cortina, and escorted her out to his car, and again—only much less fleetingly—in the eyes of Neville when he met them at The Golden Cockerel.

  Even Martine sent rather a long, appraising look in her direction when they had all four been bowed to their table, and comfortably seated. Jacqueline’s dress was snowy white cotton lace, and against it and by contrast with it her lightly tanned skin looked actually delicious. There was a peach-like color in her cheeks, because inside her something felt excited and almost reckless, and she had determinedly cast from her all thought of care and unhappiness or any of the other emotions which had weighed her down during the afternoon, and on many days since her arrival on the island. She was determined, if it was possible, to be uncaring and receptive only to the surface enjoyments that were likely to be offered her tonight, and to make the most of them when they were offered, and her determination made her eyes look bright and a little defiant.

  At least, they were defiant when they encountered Dominic’s across the table. They were bright when they met Neville’s, and Neville’s own eyes brightened as a result of the meeting.

  Quite unlike the other occasion when the four of them had dined together at the same restaurant, this time it was Dominic and Martine who displayed open interest in one another, and Neville and Jacqueline who got along splendidly together—or that was the impression anyone watching them would have received.

  Only at one stage of the meal did Jacqueline wonder whether Neville was acting a part just as she was, and whether his interest in Martine was still great enough to make him secretly unhappy. But, somehow, as they ploughed through the many courses, sipped champagne and listened to the thrumming of guitars in the background the impression grew that he was not acting. His eyes seemed to be genuinely all for her, and his voice was almost tender whenever he addressed her—tender and proprietary, as it had been during the afternoon.

  She wondered whether Dominic noticed the proprietariness, or whether his absorption with Martine left him with little room to notice anything else.

  After dinner they danced, and watched a floor show, as before. Only tonight the floor show was really spectacular, with a troop of girls with castanets and flowers behind their ears, who performed a wild fandago, and received tumultuous applause from the audience. There were also other lively dancers, and a singer who received so many encores that it was already late when they finally left The Golden Cockerel and went out into the moonlit wonder of the night to see something of the simpler festivities enjoyed by the mass of Sansegovians.

  The waterfront was outlined by fairy-lights, and fireworks were being let off, making a colorful blaze every few seconds or so of the starry heavens. Jacqueline stood on a flagged path and looked over a low wall at the whirling concourse of people milling excitedly just above the beaches, on to which a sleepy sea slapped murmurously, while Martine climbed as if it was all part of a pre-arranged plan into Dominic’s car— taking care this time that she had the front seat. Dominic looked towards Jacqueline, who appeared to be absorbed in what she was gazing at, while Neville walked towards his car.

  “Are you two coming with us?” Dominic asked.

  Neville opened the door of his car and smiled at Jacqueline.

  “Certainly not,” he said. “Jacqueline agreed this afternoon to let me show her some of the sights, and I’m sure you can do the same for Martine. Later, if you care to, we could all meet down at my bungalow for drinks. That suit

  you?”

  “Admirably,” Martine called softly, from the front seat of Dominic’s car, and Jacqueline heard the car door slam as Dominic climbed into it. He did not even reply to Neville’s invitation.

  The big car slid away first, its headlights bathing the whole of the square, as it had done before, and then Neville’s smaller, dust-colored roadster followed, with Neville driving cautiously because of the uneven surface of the ground.

  “What would you like to do first?” Neville asked, looking sideways at his passenger. There was a smile in his eyes, and he looked, she thought, thoroughly well satisfied with himself. But a chill, like a chill of desolation, had struck her unexpectedly when Dominic disappeared into the night ahead of her, and for a few moments the desolation was so great that, in spite of all her resolutions of the afternoon, and her inner conviction that she was behaving wisely, she had to catch hold of her lower lip with her teeth and bite it wildly for a moment, not merely to steady it but to give herself the strength to overcome the desolation. “We can park the car if you like and mix with the crowds for a bit—there’ll be dancing down there, and all sorts of jollifications, and you might like to join in—and then when you feel tired we’ll go for a drive and cool off. How does that programme appeal to

  you?”

  Jacqueline told him immediately—having caused a spurt of blood to stain the whiteness of her teeth before she released her lower lip—that it appealed to her very much, and he said “Good!” and they drove on down to the waterfront.

  The other car, turning off in a different direction altogether, had streaked off into the night.

  But nevertheless Jacqueline did really begin to enjoy herself once Neville had parked his car, and they left it and joined the crowds. In such a determinedly joyous community it would have been well-nigh impossible to feel cast-down for long, and also all this was completely new to her, and she was unfailingly receptive to new impressions.

  She had attended garden fetes, terminating in firework displays, English country fairs, and things like that before, but never had she experienced anything like the holiday spirit abroad that night on Sansegovia.

  What with the bull-fight, the competitions, the results of the cattle show, the manzanilla and lager beer that had been sipped and drunk all day; Sansegovians were definitely above themselves. Some of the younger ones were dancing wildly, and with that tremendous enthusiasm for dancing which most Spaniards have at some time or other in their lives; and although girls often danced with girls, and young men with young men, they seemed to be enjoying themselves just the same. The courting couples, or novios—a novio, in Spanish, means a sweetheart—wandered hand in hand through the press, seldom dancing together, but plainly in a seventh heaven of their own, which the Sansegovia stars looked down upon.

  Jacqueline and Neville were in such danger of being separated that Neville held Jacqueline firmly by the arm as soon as they became part and parcel of the crush on the waterfront. She found it gave her a curious sensation to be surrounded by so many excited and uninhibited people, and a little of their excitement seemed to possess her after a time, especially when they found themselves caught up in a bevy of dancers, with castanets and tambourines. The dancers’ eyes and teeth were flashing, one of them snatched a rose from behind his ear and offered it to Jacqueline, and she accepted it in the spirit in which it was offered, while Neville smiled with amusement. But after that he put his arm about her to keep her more tightly pressed to his side in case someone attempted to whisk her away altogether, and she accepted the possessive arm without demur, and even found it necessary to cling to him at times when the danger of being separated from him seemed very real.

  They went on and
joined the throng about the fireworks, which were still being despatched at intervals; and then, because it was a very warm night, and the press of effervescent humanity was a little exhausting, went down on to the beach to walk on the golden sands in the moonlight and recover from it, and enjoy a little cooler air.

  Then Neville suggested that they returned to the car, and he took her for an exhilarating drive along the coast road as far as the point at which it began to peter out and become nothing more than a mere track which encompassed the rest of the island, and they sat for a while and looked back at the lights they had left, strung out like myriads of fireflies in the gloom. When he eventually turned the car and she asked him the time she was not really surprised to hear that it was already one o’clock.

  “But you’re not in any hurry, are you?” he asked. “This is fiesta, remember, and nobody on Sansegovia will dream of going to bed yet. Let’s go back to my bungalow and have a drink and a snack. The others may turn up there, too, as I invited them.”

  But there was no sign of either Martine or Dominic when they got to the bungalow, and Jacqueline had the feeling that neither of them were likely to take advantage of the doctor’s invitation. But in spite of the fact that whenever she thought of Dominic that hollow lost feeling returned, she had not, tonight at least, been deprived of the ability to force him from her thoughts, and she quite enjoyed cutting sandwiches for herself and Neville in the tiny but beautifully equipped kitchen of the bungalow, and afterwards making coffee for them both, which he carried into the lounge and set down on a little table between them.

  With the lights glowing softly and making the lounge look infinitely attractive, herself ensconced in one of the comfortable chairs, she looked about her and was unable to keep back a little sigh.

  “This is nice!” she said. “You really have transformed the bungalow, Neville.”

  “Then why not come and share it with me?” he answered at once.