A faint gasp was stifled at birth. Her senses reeled shockingly as sensation piled upon sensation. Emotions rioted through her body, so strong that she almost gave way to them completely - almost, but not quite. Part of her mind was still alert... and remembering. A word ran through it like liquid fire.
Experiment ... experiment ... experiment.
And Bart saying that anything could happen at fiesta time.
Duarte was kissing her for an experiment, to see if she did have normal emotions like any other woman, and she had never thought he would do anything like that. It somehow did not add up to the sort of man he was, yet he was a man after all, as well as the aloof Conde de Marindos and the charming and sometimes infuriating Duarte Adriano - and, as Bart had said, anything could happen at fiesta time.
She pulled back, away from him, with a choking little cry. “An ... an experiment!”
“I am sorry.” There was a strange, tense note in his voice that she could not place. “I should not have said that.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” she agreed chokingly. “And you shouldn’t have kissed me either.” Not when you are going to marry Alesandra.
With a sudden wrench she freed herself and fled blindly, hardly caring where she went. She heard him call something after her, but whatever he said was quite meaningless. Her ears heard it, but it just did not reach her brain.
She felt bruised and shaken, hardly able to believe that it had happened. That Duarte should have kissed her for an experiment! He had joked about it once, but she had never thought he would ever do such a thing.
Her breath was coming in panting gasps by the time she realised that she had reached the terrace again, but in a different part of the house. Tears were streaming down her face and her whole body was shaking. She hardly thought at all, but she realised instinctively that she could not return to the ballroom in such a state.
She paused and looked round to get her bearing and dully realised that she was at the back of the building, near the servants’ quarters. Well, that would suit her well. There was less chance of being seen by any of the guests. That any of the servants might see her and possibly gossip did not seem to matter. It was a few minutes before she realised that what she dreaded most was that Alesandra should see her and guess what had happened.
She was lucky in gaining her room without anyone seeing her, not even one of the servants. There she sat down on the edge of the bed with an almost blank expression.
She had thought that being in love with Duarte had hurt enough on its own, but this hurt even more. A kiss which had been so wonderful had left behind it only bitterness and disillusionment. Duarte’s voice echoed again and again in her mind.
Experiment ... experiment ... experiment!
There were so many facets to his complex character. He could be charming or infuriating, aloof or mocking, but she had never thought he would do anything ... well, not exactly dishonourable, but ... what would you call it? On the point of announcing his engagement to Alesandra - and Dona Teresa seemed to expect it that very night - he had kissed another girl, and for a reason that could only be some kind of piqued vanity, because she had once claimed that a career was more important for a girl these days than finding a husband. It did not tally with what she thought she had learned of Duarte. She must have fallen in love with an illusion of some kind.
She got up wearily, looking at her tear-stained face in the mirror. She certainly could not go downstairs like that. Perhaps a dousing of cold water would help.
She went into the adjoining bathroom, running the old tap and repeatedly bathing her eyes. No doubt they would be wondering what had happened to her, but let Duarte find some explanation to make. No doubt he would say she had gone to her room perhaps, to make some repair to her dress. He had probably seen her reach the back of the house and go inside - or was he still searching for her in the garden, to repeat the apology he had made to her?
Eventually her eyes looked a little less red and the rest of the damage she hid with carefully applied fresh make-up, then she pulled herself together firmly and bitterly, and went out into the corridor, downstairs and towards the ballroom. She had just opened the door when the final blow of the evening was struck. Across the other side of the room most of the guests were gathered around Alesandra, and there was the sound of laughter and congratulatory remarks. Aileen hardly saw them individually. All her fixed gaze seemed to see clearly was Alesandra, smiling and laughing herself - and holding out her hand on which something blazed with green fire.
So it had come at last. The Adriano emerald adorned that slim finger Dona Teresa had spoken of.
Hardly knowing what she was doing, Aileen stumbled out. Nobody would have noticed her. All attention had been centred on Alesandra. In the great marble-paved hall she stood for a moment with her clenched hand pressed to her mouth.
He had kissed her and then gone straight in to announce his engagement to Alesandra! Or had he already proposed to her earlier in the evening and just chosen that moment for the engagement to be announced?
A choking sob welled up - and then she suddenly realised that she was not alone. A hand touched her shoulder and she turned almost shrinking, but the next moment, with something almost like relief, she saw that it was Bart who stood at her side.
“Take it easy,” he said quietly. “Nobody saw you.”
“Oh, Bart ... I ... I ...” She paused, and then somehow managed to control herself. “You were right,” she said bitterly. “You said he would announce his engagement to Alesandra at fiesta time, didn’t you?”
She did not notice that he seemed to have received some sort of shock, nor that his eyes narrowed strangely as she spoke.
“You mean you think...?” He broke off, then turned her abruptly away from the door into the ballroom. “Let’s get out of here.”
She went unresisting when he took her arm and led her out of the hall, through the main doors and into the paved courtyard outside. He did not say a word until they had gone around the side of the house, down into the garden again, well out of sight from anyone near the house. There he found a stone seat and made her sit down.
“He kissed me ... then went in and announced his engagement to Alesandra.” She hardly realised that she was speaking aloud. “Just for an experiment, then he ... he ...” She could not go on, could not say it aloud again, because it sounded so very final to hear her own voice say that he was now engaged to Alesandra.
Bart was silent for a long moment. “So he kissed you, did he?” he said at last, very slowly.
Aileen looked up, biting her lip. “I ... I hadn’t realised I was speaking aloud.” She paused, and then suddenly she knew what she wanted more than anything, even more than Duarte at this moment. “Bart, I want to go home. I want to go back to people I understand.”
“Want to go home?”
“Yes. If only I could go this very minute!”
There was another pause. She was not looking at him and did not see the taut expression that crossed his face, as if he was struggling with some decision.
“You could go in the morning,” he said finally.
She turned to him impulsively, hardly realising what she was saying. The suggestion of a moment ago had become an overwhelming desire now.
“Would you take me, Bart? Would you drive me back to Madrid in the morning?”
“O.K.,” he said. There was another little pause. “We’ll take off early in the morning ... before anyone’s up. That will save too many explanations - if you’d rather have it that way.”
“Yes ... yes, I would rather have it that way,” she said almost feverishly.
Not to have to face Duarte again ... not to have to see the triumph in Alesandra’s expression. That was what she wanted. To run away and hide. That was the best way.
She agreed automatically to the arrangements he made, not really hearing them, or querying it when Bart suggested that it might be easier for her to stay in her room for the rest of the evening. He would mak
e her excuses for her ... say she had developed a very bad headache and had to lie down.
When Bart left her she went back to her room again and dragged her suitcases out of the cupboard, packed her things in a dull unthinking acceptance of what had happened. There was a kind of numbness in her mind. In some obscure corner of it she realised that this was the wrong way to act ... leaving so suddenly, leaving Peter like this, with no warning ... but she did not seem to be able to think of anything except that she had to get away.
She would write a note to Dona Teresa with apologies and making some sort of explanation. She would write a note for Peter too. That was something that did momentarily manage to prick its way painfully through the numbness and shock that held her, but Peter would soon get over it, she told herself. Already he was quite used to his new home and well settled in. Some time the parting would have had to come, and maybe in one way it was even better like this. If he had known beforehand it would have made it hard for both of them. He was sure to cry, and that was what she would remember afterwards. This way she would have no tears to remember.
There was Dona Teresa’s kindness to her as well. This was a bad way to repay it.
“But I’ve got to go!” she whispered. “I’ve got to get away.” By the time the letters and the packing were finished she was worn out, and fell into bed and slept almost immediately through nervous and emotional exhaustion. Tonight was the last night of an episode in her life. In the morning a new one would begin.
When he left her Bart went straight back to the ballroom. The crowd around Alesandra had dispersed now and the dancing had started again. Dona Teresa was still sitting on her rose damask couch, with Duarte standing at her side.
“You have heard the news of the engagement?” she said as he came up to them.
Bart nodded. “Yes, I’d just come in with Aileen,” with a nod towards the glass doors that led into the garden.
Dona Teresa smiled. “So that was where she suddenly disappeared to. And what have you done with her now, my friend?”
“As a matter of fact, she’s in her room,” Bart explained. He shook his head, frowning slightly. “Something seems to have upset her. I happened to have gone out for a breath of air and I met her running in from further down the garden, going like a tornado. She seemed as if she had been crying.”
Duarte’s face was inscrutable. “She did not say why?”
Bart shook his head. “No ... except that she seemed frightened.”
“Frightened?” Dona Teresa looked puzzled. “Perhaps I should go up to her.”
Bart shook his head again. “Maybe it would be better to leave it until the morning. She asked me to make her excuses for her ... said she couldn’t face the rest of the party.”
“But this must not be so. We cannot allow the poor child to spent an unhappy night.”
Dona Teresa had actually risen to her feet, but as Bart spoke again she sat down slowly.
“I think she’s probably already asleep. I gather she intended to take a sleeping tablet ... said they knock her over in a few minutes. Apparently she still had them around from when she had a bad spell of insomnia at one time in Sydney.”
“I see.” But it seemed as if Dona Teresa definitely did not see, because she shook her head with a puzzled air. “It seems that we shall have to wait until the morning. I wish she had come to me first.”
Duarte still said nothing, and Bart glanced round at him. “Maybe it might be an idea to have a look out in the garden. I wondered if someone from the village might have wandered up here ... after imbibing a bit too much wine ... and insulted her.”
Duarte’s eyes narrowed slightly. “She said that somebody had insulted her?”
“Not exactly. Not in so many words.”
“We must then have the garden searched,” Dona Teresa said instantly. “But it must be kept quiet. We do not want the rest of the guests to be worried.” Her hand reached out to a bell pull, but when Duarte spoke she drew it back.
“I will attend to it.”
“I do wish she had come to me first before taking this sleeping pill,” Dona Teresa said worriedly.
Bart shrugged. “You know what she’s like - as independent as they come. She’s so used to standing on her own two feet it probably didn’t occur to her to come and tell somebody else and let them straighten it out.” He gave a wry grin. “I’ve been trying to persuade her that she needs someone to look after her. After this maybe I’ll succeed.”
Duarte gave him a sharp glance, then seemed to withdraw in some strange manner.
“You will excuse me? I must see about this ... this stranger in the garden,” and with a slight inclination of his dark head he turned and left: them.
Bart watched him go, and there was something almost like satisfaction in his eyes.
CHAPTER XII
Aileen awoke with the dawn, tired and heavy-eyed. Her mind was still in that numbed state where she could think of nothing but the need to get away.
It seemed too dreadfully easy, as if fate herself had determined to end this miserable episode quickly. Bart knocked softly at her door and carried her suitcases down for her, while she hung on to the little portable radio that had come so far and through so many things with her; It had been with her when she ran away from Sydney, and now it was with her when she ran away from the Castillo Marindos, running back to people and customs she knew. Somehow she would make life begin again.
She had said that a career could take the place of marriage. Now she would have to live up to it.
“Write your letters?” Bart asked, after they had got safely out of the house without anyone seeing them and were on the way round to the garages.
She glanced at him and nodded without speaking.
“Hard?”
“Yes. It was difficult to explain.”
“I guessed it would be. You couldn’t exactly tell Dona Teresa that her nephew made a pass at you.”
“Please, Bart...!”
“Look, honey, you’ll get over it,” he said firmly. “It’s one of these things that pass. It couldn’t be anything else. These people think too differently from us for it to be anything else.” He paused and then added, before she could say anything, “What did you put in the letter - if it’s not too personal?”
“I didn’t really give any explanation.” She looked down at her hands gripped together in her lap. “I just said that ... that something had happened ... and I had to get back to Australia straight away. I said I had asked you to drive me to Madrid and apologised for doing it like this.” She stopped suddenly, looking up at him. “Bart, I’m not sure now. Maybe I should I have stuck it out and made arrangements to go in a normal manner. Dona Teresa’s been so good to me.”
“Not changing your mind, are you?”
She paused undecidedly, and he gave a grim little laugh. “Maybe I’d better make up your mind for you,” and with that he swung her cases into the back of his car, because at that moment they reached the garage.
She could not change her mind, she told herself. It was wrong ... but at least it left her with her pride - and she need not see Duarte and Alesandra together now. She need not ... she would not... She bit her lip and finished the sentence firmly. She would never see Duarte again - and then his tall figure was suddenly outlined in the open garage doorway.
She gave a little gasp and Bart turned. An expression of wry defeat crossed his face.
“So I’ve lost after all,” he said curtly.
Aileen hardly heard him. She was looking at Duarte, wondering how he came to be here, watching as his dark eyes flicked from her and Bart to take in the suitcases in the back of the car.
“It seems you are leaving,” he said in an almost expressionless voice. His glance flicked back to Bart, somehow almost like the flicker of a rapier. “I will not detain you, but first you will please remove Aileen’s cases. If she still wishes to leave I myself will drive her to Madrid.”
Bart seemed to hesitate, but something in Duar
te’s expression, some steely glitter that was beginning to show in the dark eyes, made him move almost automatically to remove her suitcases from the car, then he got in and drove off without a word.
Aileen listened to the sound of his car dying away and then turned slowly to Duarte, not knowing what to do; not knowing what to say or think.
He looked down at her, his dark face strangely set, but he did not speak for a moment. When he did it was almost bitterly.
“There was no need to leave like this. I would not have tried to prevent you from leaving. One can try to challenge fate only so far - but need you have told Renfrew that you had been insulted last night?”
She looked a little startled. “But I didn’t say anything like that!”
The bitterness seemed to be strangely more pronounced in his face, although what he had to be bitter about she could not think.
“No? You did not say that somebody had insulted you in the gardens? He told us this .... that he had found you in tears and suggested that we should search the garden in case there was some unauthorised stranger there.” He laughed harshly. “And I had to keep up the pretence! Was that what my kiss meant to you? An insult?”
She turned away so that he could not see her face. “No ... but you were on the point of being engaged to Alesandra ... a few minutes later you did announce your engagement.”
His hands suddenly caught her shoulders and turned her to face him almost violently.
“What is this? I’m not engaged to Alesandra.”
She looked up at him blankly. “You’re ... not engaged to her? But last night she ... I saw the ring on her finger.”
“So?” He shrugged. “It is customary to wear a ring when a betrothal is announced. She is to marry Pepe Cansino.”
The House of Adriano Page 20
