Orphan Bride

by Sara Seale

  Flushed and brilliant-eyed, she answered seriously: “Something you’ve never had goes to your head at first.”

  He sat, snapping his lighter on and off, looking at her quizzically across the tiny flame.

  “Is that going to apply to everything, I wonder?” he asked.

  “Everything?”

  “Love—passion—two things that go very much to the head.”

  “I don’t know anything about either,” she said a little primly, and he smiled.

  “You didn’t know much about dancing until you tried it, did you?” He leant forward and his plain attractive face creased into its many wrinkles. “I’d like to teach you about love,” he said softly. “I have a hunch you would be an apt pupil.”

  She was out of her depth, and his blue eyes were sending her an invitation which was hard to resist.

  She asked quickly, changing the subject with a naiveness which made him smile:

  “Am I really in your new book?”

  “Someone very like you,” he replied. “Each time you, you give me a fresh slant on her character. Would you like to read it some time?”

  “Very much. Does your character come from an orphanage?”

  “Um.”

  “How far have you got?”

  “Oh, she’s growing up, young, naive, unspoilt, with a funny kind of wisdom that keeps popping out from time to time—rather like you. She’s just going to have her first affaire.”

  “Oh. Isn’t there somebody special for her?”

  “There’s a hero of course, but he hasn’t appeared much, yet.”

  “Is Julian in your book?”

  “Good gracious, no! Julian is much too unlikely a character to swallow—even in one of my books. Come and dance, my pretty.”

  It was the first of a series of such evenings. Luke never openly abused a privilege, but it became the normal occurrence for him to take Jennet dancing. Julian made no objection, but he never accompanied them on these occasions. He made it clear that Luke was privileged and would not accord the same favor to anyone else, and where Piggy commented, he said briefly:

  “I don’t want it to become a habit.”

  “Isn’t it becoming a habit with Luke?” Piggy asked a little dryly.

  He smiled.

  “Luke’s different. I can trust Luke.”

  Piggy was silent. She herself had never trusted Luke, but she was not going to say so to Julian.

  “It’s a pity, then, you don’t go with them sometimes,” she remarked.

  “What! Sit alone the whole evening and watch other people enjoy themselves!”

  “That,” said Piggy, “is a dog-in-the-manger attitude. Luke always did take your toys when you were little, and you let him take them. But you wouldn’t stay and watch him play with them.”

  “You don’t really like Luke, do you Piggy?” Julian said with surprise.

  “I always made a point,” she said primly, “of never allowing myself to dislike any of my charges. Luke was not a bad little boy, but he’s easy-come, easy-go.”

  The old-fashioned expression reminded him of his nursery days. She was a surprising person, Piggy.

  The weeks went quickly, and there was not, after all, a great deal of time for amusement. The days were occupied with French and singing lessons, and the daily walks in the Park which Julian insisted on for health’s sake. She had now started learning Italian, and Julian would have added German to the rest if Piggy had not put her foot down.

  “If you really had to make your living by teaching,” she told him severely, “you would realize how much or how little an untutored mind can receive. I can’t think why you didn’t send the child to a good finishing school and have done with it.”

  “Perhaps that would have been better,” he admitted slowly. “Though that wasn’t what I had in mind. This was a personal matter, you see. I wanted to do my own finishing, so to speak.”

  “The sort of finishing you have in mind would come more easily after marriage than before, I imagine,” said Piggy shrewdly.

  He regarded her plain, round little face thoughtfully. “But she’s so young,” he objected. “So immature in many ways. It seems unfair to hurry things.”

  ‘“Fiddlesticks!” Piggy snapped. “You know nothing at all about the girl, which isn’t surprising the way you handle her. How do you expect her to think of you as a husband when you behave like a cross between a school-teacher and a Victoria papa?”

  “Do I, Piggy?” he asked, and sounded quite taken aback.

  “Yes, you do, and I’ve no patience with your methods. Ever since your mother ran on with another man, Julian, you’ve been trying to rule affection out of your life. Well, you’ve a right to do so in your own case, I suppose, if that’s what you want, but you haven’t the right to do it to others. You’re riding for a fall, dear boy, and you’ll have only yourself to thank if your plans go awry.”

  “Well,” said Julian, observing her gravely, “that’s plain speaking. You seem to have very definite ideas about us both. What do you suggest I should do?”

  Her eyes behind her pince-nez snapped

  “Really, Julian, doesn’t your own observation of human nature tell you that? Make a fuss of the, child, treat her to some of the charming attention Luke flings around so freely. Give her affection, if you can. She’s had precious little of it.”

  “Yes,” said Julian. “Yes, I see.”

  But it was Luke who gave her that, Luke, who, with his alert writer’s instinct for dissecting his fellow beings, would, behind his facile charm, go to any lengths to find out how they worked.

  Jennet’s portrait was finished at the end of October, and as she sat for Jeremy one wet afternoon and he told her that he only needed one more sitting, she knew a sharp pang of regret.

  “You look sad,” Jeremy told her, working feverishly while the light still held. “You mustn’t look sad with only one more sitting, or else something foreign will creep into the picture, and that wouldn’t please friend Julian.”

  She smiled and said:

  “He’ll send me back when you’ve finished it.”

  “And you don’t want to go?”

  “Not now.”

  Jeremy glanced at her quickly.

  “No, the flower is opening, isn’t it? But when you do go back, it will only be for a little while, perhaps. When you marry, you’ll be back with us again. Or doesn’t Julian want to live in London then?”

  “I don’t know,” said Jennet. “He never talks about it.”

  “Why don’t you ask him what his plans are?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t,” she said. “I don t think he would like it.”

  Jeremy grunted.

  “You’re the queerest engaged couple I ever saw.”

  “But we’re not engaged,” she said quickly. “He’s never—I don’t even know when he means to marry me.”

  She moved in her eagerness to explain, and he flung down his palette and brushes.

  He sat down on the dais beside her.

  “Don’t you want to marry him?” he asked abruptly. She pushed the long hair out of her eyes with a tired gesture.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “It’s so difficult to think of him as a husband.”

  “As a lover, then? I’d rather rest on a true love’s breast ... Not my true love or the true love, you notice, Jennet, but a true love. Julian would be that, don’t you think?”

  She stared at him gravely.

  “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I think he would.”

  Jeremy hummed the air of “Searching for Lambs” in his cracked old voice.

  “What else does the song say? ‘For I am thine, and thou art mine. No man shall uncomfort thee ... It’s a charming word, Jennet, warm, and tender. No man shall uncomfort thee. Isn’t that what you really want?”

  Jennet’s eyes filled with tears.

  “But he’s not mine!” she cried. “I’m his because I had no choice, but he’s not mine—he could never be anybody’s.”

>   Jeremy said softly:

  “Do you love him, little Jenny-wren?”

  “Love?” It was a word remote in her conception of Julian. “No. No, I don’t love him.”

  He smiled.

  “I wonder ... The essence of your little song that means so much to you—have you never felt it with Julian—or any man?”

  ‘Yes, she had felt it. Once when she had leaned against his breast in the dusk of evening, once when he had taken her in his arms on the moor.

  “He’s become necessary to me,” she said with slow surprise. “I can’t break away even if I would.”

  “Necessary to each other—that’s what counts.” Jeremy’s old voice came softly. “When you’ve been starved of so much, it’s easy to fall in love, if you try.”

  She looked at him with swift repudiation.

  “I don’t want to fall in love with anyone,” she said. “I just want someone to love.”

  He patted her knee, then got to his feet.

  “So do we all, my child, so do we all,” he said, and went over to the portrait. “Would you like to have a look at yourself?”

  Jennet’s face was eager.

  “May I? Before it’s finished?”

  “It is finished, to all but a discerning eye,” he replied. “Come along.”

  She went and stood beside him and he lifted the drape.

  Her own face gazed back at her, delicate, ardent, with a lost, questioning look which was infinitely touching.

  Jennet stared for a long time, then she turned to Jeremy.

  “Am I really like that?” she asked, a little wonderingly.

  He replaced the drape.

  “I think so. But sometimes, you know, a painter’s eye sees what another’s does not.”

  She could hear Luke clattering up the stairs to fetch her back for tea at Julian’s flat, and the next moment he had knocked and entered.

  “Am I too early?” he asked. “Or is the session over?”

  “No,” Jeremy said, “we’ve finished for the day. There’s only one more sitting. I’ve just been showing Jennet herself for the first time.”

  “How exciting.” Luke’s bright eyes were glancing and eager. “Do you like yourself, my sweet? Has Jeremy flattered you nicely?”

  “I think it’s very flattering,” she said, “though somehow—somehow—”

  “Somehow what? You intrigue me! May I look?”

  He did not wait for permission but snatched the drape from the portrait and stood back, his head on one side. “Yes ... yes ...” he murmured. “Really, Jeremy, you’ve been very clever—very clever indeed. You’ve exactly caught that funny lost look and the awakening maturity in the eyes ... that plea for affection, the promise of the future—it’s all there. Julian should be impressed. Has he seen it?”

  “Julian won’t see her like that,” said Jeremy shortly. He seemed a little annoyed. “No, he hasn’t seen it. He’s coming for the last sitting.” He took the drape from Luke and covered the portrait again.

  Luke helped Jennet into her coat, and dropped a careless kiss on the top of her head.

  “You ought to feel very proud,” he told her. “Jeremy really has done you justice, you very charming creature. Good-bye, Jeremy, and congratulations.”

  Jeremy watched, them leave, a frown between his shrewd old eyes, then with a shrug he took up his palette and started to clean it.

  Julian opened the door to them, and they came into his flat, laughing and talking. “We’ve seen the portrait, Julian,” he announced, “and it certainly is a honey.”

  “You’ve seen it?” asked Julian sharply. It was only a small prick that Jeremy had shown Luke the portrait first, but it was a prick all the same.

  He looked at Jennet, observing her charming air of slight dishevelment, and said more curtly than he had intended:

  “You’d better tidy yourself for tea. They’ll be bringing it up in a moment.”

  She went away to his bedroom, conscious of his disapproval, but unaware of the reason. She peered in the mirror, trying to see herself as Jeremy had painted her, and was so long away that Julian was pouring out the tea when she returned.

  “I know just what you’ve been doing,” Luke accused her. “Prinking in Julian’s masculine mirror and trying to discover all those flattering details in Jeremy’s portrait.” He gave a shout of laughter as she blushed, and demanded of Julian; “Did you ever see such guilt? The conceited little minx! I want to take her to Pirrelli’s on Friday evening, Julian. They’ve got a new cabaret that I think I she would like.”

  “You’ll have to postpone it, I’m afraid,” Julian said casually. “We’re going down to Pennycross for the weekend. Here’s your tea, Jennet.”

  “Thank you. I didn’t know we were going away,” said Jennet, taking her cup from him. Julian never discussed his plans with her, but she had the impression that he had only that moment decided to take her away.

  “If you remember, I suggested it a little while back,” he said. “At that time you were rather missing the country.”

  “Oh, yes, I remember,” she said hastily, and avoided Luke’s bright glance which told her that he, too, thought Julian’s decision sudden.

  The conversation seemed to lag after that. At six Luke said he must be going.

  “Shall I drop you, Jennet, or does Julian want to bring you back, later?”

  “Unfortunately, I’m dining out,” Julian replied, “so if you wouldn’t mind, Luke—”

  Jennet fetched her things with relief, and once in the car, enquired of Luke what had upset Julian.

  “That I saw your portrait before he did,” said Luke carelessly.

  “Oh...” She gave a soft little laugh. “Like a little boy. Poor Julian.”

  “Not so much of the poor little boy,” said Luke whimsically. “It wasn’t the only thing that upset Cousin Julian, let me tell you.”

  “Not?”

  “He thinks I’m beginning to take too much interest in you, my sweet, and for once he’s right.”

  She wriggled in the darkness. “Oh, Luke, that’s silly.”

  “Why is it silly? You ought to know by now when man finds you attractive.”

  “Yes, but—you and me and Julian—that’s different. We’ve always been a trio, and you—well, you’ve just been very kind to me, that’s all.”

  “So much for my weeks of delicate approaches and nuances,” he said with a laugh. They were outside Piggy’s flat now, and he switched off the engine, and turned to her, his arm resting along the back, of the passenger’s seat. “Don’t you know when a man’s making love to you?” he asked, his head bent to hers. “Or did you think in your ignorance that it simply consists of being seized and clasped to a manly bosom?”

  “Of course not, but—”

  “But what?”

  “All those silly and charming things you say. They don’t mean anything. You talk like that to all women. Julian once said you couldn’t resist flattering and charming—perhaps he meant making love. I don’t know—”

  His arm tightened round her shoulders.

  “Julian!” He scoffed affectionately. “Julian knows nothing about the art of making love, and never has. For it is an art, you know, Jennet. More can be achieved by the right phrase than it ever can by the conventional embrace.”

  “Yes,” she said, with a little sigh. “Yes, I can imagine that.”

  “Not that kissing and all the rest of it isn’t very pleasant—like this,” said Luke and drew her head against his shoulder.

  He had kissed her before, but never quite like this. For an instant he was conscious of something too facile, too practiced in his approach, then she yielded to the comfort of the moment.

  It was cosy sitting in the darkness of the car with the rain pattering on the roof and Luke’s experienced fingers playing over her closed eyes and parted lips. Comfort ... No man shall uncomfort thee... But Luke was not like that. He would bring comfort to too many.

  She sat up, drawing away out of
his arms.

  “I must go in,” she said. “Piggy will be waiting.”

  “You’re so sweet,” he said, turning her face up to his again. “And so ready for love. What a fool Julian is.” She thought of Julian, of his dark, bitter face that still could be gentle, his firm hands which held all the strength and freedom denied to the rest of his body, and suddenly she wanted to cry.

  Inside the badly lighted hall he drew her to him and kissed her with infinite gentleness.

  “Don’t be upset, darling,” he said softly. “It’s all so very natural, and so very sweet.” Her lashes were wet and he touched them with a satisfied finger.

  “You don’t understand at all,” she said, and knew in that moment with instinctive wisdom that people like Luke would never understand.

  “Of course I do, silly one,” he said. “You’re shy. But why are we standing here with a perfectly good evening before us? Run up and change into that white debutante’s frock of yours and we’ll go to Pirrelli’s to-night instead of Friday.”

  “No,” she said. “Thank you very much, Luke, but I don’t think I will, all the same.”

  “As you like, sweet.” Luke never made the mistake of overloading his advantage. “I’ll run up with you and just say good evening to Pigling Bland.”

  Piggy looked up from her crocheting as they came in, and her eyes rested rather sharply on Jennet’s flushed face.

  When Luke had gone, she remarked with apparent irrelevance:

  “The Danes and the Fentons lived next door to one another when Julian and Luke were small. Mrs. Dane had a great fondness for Luke. I think she really preferred him to her own child—you see he was so much more charming.” Jennet said nothing, and Piggy finished prosaically: “And Julian, of course, adored his mother. It must have been a little hard to bear.”

  CHAPTER T H I R T E E N

  The weekend at Pennycross was not altogether a success. Bibi had died, and Emily was mourning him with a grief that irritated Julian and filled Jennet with wistful amazement.

  “Bibi might have been a child,” she said wonderingly to Julian. “Such an ugly, horrid little creature for Aunt Emily to have loved so much.”

  “She’s making a perfect fool of herself,” Julian returned impatiently. “I’m sorry, Jennet, we wouldn’t have come if I’d known. It’s not a very cheerful week-end for you.”