`I must be mad,' he said harshly. 'A child just out of school who's barely been kissed in her life, and I have to fall head over heels for her!'
Marcy leaned her head against his shoulder, sensing his need for comfort. 'Poor Randal,' she murmured.
`Oh, God,' he muttered, his hands stroking her bright head. 'Oh, Marcy, you make my heart stop every time I look at you.'
She lifted her face and kissed him lightly, evading the hunger of his mouth for more. 'Come in and talk to Chumble and Lady Anne,' she told him gently. `And smile at poor Perry. He hates the legal department so much, poor soul. Couldn't you find him a nicer place somewhere ?'
`Yes,' said Randal grimly. 'Outer Mongolia or Siberia, perhaps.'
She laughed. 'Don't be a brute. Perry's petrified of you. Be nice to him.'
`If he so much as looks at you I'll cut his heart out and feed it to the pigeons in Trafalgar Square,' Randal promised. Then a frown came into his face. `What's he doing here, anyway? Perry never had an idea in his life. What brought him down here ?'
`Julia Hume,' she said softly. 'He let it out on the first day. Poor Perry was never cut out to be a conspirator.'
Randal's face grew savage. 'Did she, by God ? The little . .' The word he used made Marcy jump in shock.
`Randal!' she exclaimed, shocked. 'What awful language! Even in Paradise Street I never heard people swear quite like that!'
He grimaced. 'I'll teach that lady to keep her nose out of my life,' he said under his breath. 'If she'd succeeded in her clever little plot I'd have cut her up and fed her to the animals in the zoo . .
Marcy eyed him teasingly. 'What a savage pirate you are at heart, Randal,' she said softly. 'Perry said you were, and he was right. You would be at home making people walk the plank and being the terror of the seven seas.'
`And abducting all the beautiful urchins I found en route,' he said mockingly. His hand ran through her hair. 'I think it was your hair that captured my eyes—that incredible colour in the sunlight. I've seen dozens of far more beautiful women in very expensive, haute
couture clothes, then I had ta be knocked for six by a grubby ragamuffin in jeans!'
`I'm beginning to think you regret my jeans,' she said lightly.
`They suited your personality,' he admitted. His eyes ran over the blue silk dress. But in things like this you do something pretty drastic to my blood pressure, Marcy.'
She moved away, her smile backwards to him slightly provocative, 'Come and talk to Chumble, Randal . . . you've got such a one-track mind
CHAPTER SEVEN
PERRY was waiting apprehensively in the drawing-room with Lady Anne when they entered it with Chumble ten minutes later. Randal gave him a cool, unfriendly glance. 'How much longer are you staying, Perry?' he enquired.
Shifting nervously, Perry said with a stammer, `W—well, I suppose I should be leaving soon.'
Chumble gave Randal a sharp look. 'He's no bother,' she informed him tartly. 'Amused Miss Marcy, he did.'
Randal looked down at Marcy. Did he.' The remark was more threat than question.
Marcy made a face at him. `Stop huffing, Randal,' she said sweetly.
Perry looked at her, impressed. When's the marriage, Randal ?' he asked, obsequiously.
`Ask the bride,' Randal snapped.,
Lady Anne looked at Chumble, who gave a reproving click of her tongue. 'If you're staying here, too, Randal, I'll have to make up the blue bedroom for you.'
`I'll do it,' Marcy offered, turning to leave the room.
Randal slipped out after her, and Lady Anne looked at Chumble with a faintly harassed air. 'I wish I knew exactly what was going on between those two.'
Marcy has Randal tied up in knots,' said Perry gleefully. 'God, you should have seen his face when he came out and saw me kiss her on the croquet lawn. I thought he was going to kill me!'
Chumble's blue lips tightened. 'You're a very silly boy, Mr Perry. One day Mr Randal will lose his temper with your You'd better go and pack.'
`I thought you said I could stay,' he protested sulkily.
`Mr Randal was rude to you,' Chumble snapped. `He has no business inviting guests at this house to leave. But if you're dangling after Miss Marcy you'll have to go. Anyway, Miss Anthea will be coming tomorrow, apparently, and the house will be far too full with her here.'
Perry's eyes brightened. 'Anthea coming ?' He looked coaxingly at Chumble. 'Oh, let me stay, Chumble. I'll be good. I'll help to peel the potatoes for dinner, I promise.'
`Let him stay,' Lady Anne asked Chumble. 'He can amuse Anthea. Randal won't want two girls on his hands.'
Chumble snorted. 'Anthea's useless in the kitchen. All this finishing school nonsense and she can't boil an egg. Thank God for Miss Marcy !' She shuffled out mumbling to herself and Perry sat down with a sigh.
`Thanks, Aunt Anne.'
`Go and help Chumble with the potatoes,' said Lady Anne, returning to the book she was reading.
In the blue bedroom Randal lounged by the window, watching as Marcy deftly made the bed. When she had finished he caught her hand and drew
her down on to it, his face urgent. 'Marcy . .
She wriggled in his arms like a slim eel. 'Stop it, Randal !'
`I haven't kissed you for half an hour,' he said. 'I wish to God you felt the way I did.'
She was still, looking at him.. seriously. 'How do you feel, Randal ?'
He sighed, touching her soft skin lingeringly. `I can't keep my hands off you. I want to be with you every waking second.' He looked at her through his dark lashes oddly. 'And all through the night, Marcy. I want to wake up and hear you breathing in the bed next to me. I want to touch you whenever I feel like it, and see you smile at me when I come into rooms . .
Her face was absorbed as she considered his words. They sent a quiver of response through her whole body. She could remember seeing her father come into a room and look, at once, towards her mother, and seeing her mother smile back, their exchanged looks wordlessly intimate. As a child she had often felt shut out between them. They had needed no one but each other, and she had felt excluded.
She looked up at him soberly. 'What if we had children ?' she asked seriously. -
Randal's eyes glowed. 'Darling,' he said urgently, reaching for her.
`Randal, listen,' she interrupted still seriously. `How would you feel if we had a baby? Would you feel it was an intruder between us ?'
`Your baby ?' He smiled. 'How can you ask such a question? Any child of ours would be desperately wanted.'
A sigh came from her and she leaned her head against his shoulder.
Anthea is arriving tomorrow,' he said, into her hair. 'You'll like her, darling.'
`I've heard a lot about her from Chumble and Perry,' she said, then she laughed. 'Perry likes her a lot.'
His face tightened. 'Good,' he said tersely.
She looked round at him. 'Don't keep scowling
like that whenever I say Perry's name, Randal.' `Stop saying it, then,' he retorted.
`Randal, if a man of your age wanted to marry Anthea, what would you think ?' she asked.
He grimaced. 'I'd think he was a fool,' he said.
She gave him a curiously sober look. `Why?'
He caught her expression and went white. 'Marcy, don't compare yourself with Anthea. She's nothing like you.' He held her so tightly she couldn't breathe, his face against her hair. 'In age you're quite close, but you have a quality she lacks. She's still a schoolgirl in many ways, a child.'
`So am I,' she said sadly.
Jerkily he began to speak, but Chumble came in and said crossly, 'How many times have I told you not to sit on your bed, Mr Randal ? Look what you've done to it! I'm ashamed of you, Miss Marcy, letting him do it!'
They hurriedly got up and left the room with het following them, scolding them.
Randal was restless that evening, unable to take his eyes off Marcy, constantly rising and stalking about the room, refusing to play one of the noisy, quarrel-
some card games she and Perry immediately launched into, his eyes brooding on her bright head.
`Do sit down, Randal,' Lady Anne sighed. 'You make me feel as if I had a tiger in the room!'
`If Randal is here, Perry won't be able to ride,' Marcy observed, slapping Perry's hand as he cheated. `You can't play that card, you know perfectly well.'
`Do you want to ride, Randal ?' Perry asked innocently. 'I expect you'll be too tired after your journey, anyway.'
`Of course I shall ride,' Randal said curtly. `You can stay and help Chumble in the kitchen, Perry.'
Perry gave him a sulky look. 'What time is Anthea arriving ?'
`Around eleven,' said Randal. `You can drive to the station and pick her up.'
Perry cheered up. `Okay,' he said brightly.
`If you want her to get here in one piece I wouldn't advise it,' Marcy said. 'Perry is a demon driver. He'll kill himself one day.'
`Good thing, too,' said Randal nastily.
Marcy looked round as Chumble came into the room. 'I'm just going to bed, Chumble,' she said submissively, knowing the words which were on Chumble's reproving tongue.
`And you, too, Randal,' Chumble scolded. 'You look tired. All that flying around the world isn't natural.'
Outside her room, Randal caught her hand and looked at her pleadingly. 'Darling,' he whispered, searching for her mouth.
`Goodnight, Randal,' she said firmly, slipping out
of his grip. He would not let her close her door, his eyes blazing.
`Marcy, for God's sake,' he said thickly.
She was half frightened of the look in his blue eyes. `Please, don't, Randal,' she begged. `Chumble will come up in a minute and get cross.'
`Oh, damn Chumble,' he snapped, pushing her against the wall, and his mouth found hers hungrily. Marcy resisted for a few seconds, then she felt that curious shivering excitement rising inside herself again, and a soft groan came from her as she relaxed against him, yielding to his body. His hands were moving over her restlessly. She felt breathless and flushed. His touch was sensitising her skin to the point where every time he touched her she felt an intense reaction of pleasure and desire.
Randal jerked the door shut with his elbow and his kiss deepened. Her arms moved round his back and pulled him closer.
`I love you,' he said hoarsely. 'Say you love me, Marcy.'
She looked at him drowsily, half dazed by her own emotions. 'I don't know,' she said, whimpering slightly, a childlike confusion in her eyes. 'Is it love? Randal, I've never known anything like this before . . . how can I be sure ?'
He made an angry, hungry movement just as the door opened and Chumble came into the room, her gnarled old hands gripped crossly at her waist.
She gave Randal a furious glare. 'Well, I'm surprised at you, Randal, I really am! You know this is wrong . . . leave the child alone and get off to bed.
I'll have to speak to you tomorrow, I can see that.' Randal ran a shaking hand through his dark hair, muttered something and vanished.
Just as flushed and taken off balance, Marcy looked at Chumble, her lips trembling, and burst suddenly into tears. Chumble looked aghast. 'Why, Miss Marcy!' She put her thin arms around the girl and patted her back, leading her to the bed. Marcy sank down, sobbing weakly. Chumble sat beside her ' and stroked her hair.
`Now, you tell Chumble what's going on, miss. It's time someone sorted out Mr Randal. He can be very high-handed when he gets into the mood.'
Marcy began to pour out her story through muffled sobs, and Chumble listened soberly. When Marcy had finished, Chumble lifted her head and stared closely into her wet, flushed face, reading the sweet innocent green eyes.
`So you don't know if you love him or not, then ?' she asked.
Marcy gave a deep, quivering sigh. 'No,' she said. `I . . . I've nothing to compare it with. He's so different from anyone I've ever met. Oh, Chumble, how does one know if one's in love? If I'd had a boy-friend before, or even been kissed before, I might know, but there was never anyone before Randal.'
Chumble's mouth was gentle and amused. 'When I was a girl many young girls were in your position, married to a man before they'd had time to meet anyone else, and their marriages were often very happy indeed. After all, marriage is like life . . . you
have to work at it, make compromises, learn things about each other. If people tell you marriage is just love ever after, they're fooling themselves. Randal isn't going to be an easy husband, I dare say. He's not an easy man. He's had life all his own way for years. But if he's in love with you, you'll be able to manage him all right.'
A faint smile came into Marcy's green eyes. 'I know I could manage him,' she said, her mouth curving impishly. 'But do I love him ?'
Chumble laughed. 'Well, now, ask yourself this .. . how would you feel if he married someone else, say, Julia Hume ?'
Marcy looked stunned, then a dark red came up into her face. 'Oh,' she said breathlessly.
Chumble patted her hands. 'There, then, get yourself off to bed, Miss Marcy, and stop fussing about nothing.'
Lying in bed later Marcy thought about Julia Hume with a hardness in her small face. Julia had sent Perry down here to make trouble between herself and Randal. From what Perry had told her about Julia she was a hard, clever, very ambitious woman, and Marcy believed Randal when he told her that Julia did not love him. What was love, she asked herself thoughtfully, if it was not a true caring for the other person, a desire to help and protect them, a tenderness for them? Would she, in Julia's position, have done what Julia did ? No, she thought, she would not.
Sim had kissed her and she had been flattered but
unmoved. Perry had kissed her and she had been half amused. But when Randal kissed her, she felt as if her stomach were full of butterflies.
In the morning she and Randal rode alone, Lady Anne having stayed behind in the stable to lecture Grimshaw, who was in one of his nasty recalcitrant moods, reluctant to see any of his precious horses go out of the stable that day. 'These are my horses,' Lady Anne said tartly. don't keep them as ornaments. They're supposed to work.'
Randal grinned sideways at Marcy. `Grimshaw is getting worse. He-was always possessive about the horses. Now he really seems to feel they belong to him.'
`Poor Grimshaw,' said Marcy vaguely, aware of Randal's slim dark body in old riding breeches and thin silk shirt. He looked excitingly casual in those clothes. The elegant formality of his London clothes had removed him from her milieu. Now he looked quite different, and her pulses began to beat as she eyed him.
Terry seems to have taught you to ride quite well,' Randal said, observing her with approval. 'I'll buy you a pretty little palomino,' he went on thoughtfully. 'The colouring will go well with your hair.'
`Perry rides very well,' she said softly. 'He's a fantastic jumper. He clears that hedge over there.'
Randal's jaw tightened. He gave her a furious look. 'Does he ?' he asked jealously. He turned suddenly, setting his gelding at a tall holly hedge at least four feet higher than the hedge she had pointed at, and with a gasp of anxious alarm she saw him gallop towards it.
`No, Randal!' she screamed, her heart in her mouth. Randal rode on, ignoring her, and her slight body grew rigid with fear as he approached the hedge. The tall bay suddenly took off and Marcy stared, her eyes so wide they hurt, as Randal and the horse soared upward.
When she saw them clear the hedge and land the other side, a tide of icy coldness seemed to be washing over her body. She sat, staring at the great dark green hedge, shaking. Randal leapt back over the gate in the hedge and galloped towards her, a look of hard triumph in his face.
He halted, facing her, searching her white face. Marcy stared at him, so angry she could not speak for a moment. Then she slapped his face hard, her hand stinging with the blow.
Randal looked astounded.
`You might have killed yourself,' she said in quivering tones. 'What a stupid, childish, jealous trick!'
Then she turned a
nd set Ladybird at a canter towards the house. Passing Lady Anne, she averted her face, aware that tears were running down her face, and Lady Anne looked amazed and anxious. Randal was galloping after her, his hard cheek dark red from the blow she had given him.
She took Ladybird into the stable, slid off and ran into the house, while Grimshaw muttered sullenly as he led the white horse away. Chumble looked up from the stove as she ran past, taking in her pallor and her tears. Randal rushed into the kitchen after her, but Chumble called his name in the tart nursery command which still halted him.
`Mr Randal! Where do you think you're going ?' Randal turned, fuming, his lean body tense. `Chumble, she's upset. I . .
`I can see she's upset. Leave her alone,' said Chumble grimly.
Randal muttered, almost childishly, his feet scraping the floor, 'You don't understand.'
`I understand perfectly,' retorted Chumble, her tone final. 'You're hurrying that child. Leave her alone for a while. You're behaving just the way you did when you were little and wanted something badly. I've told you a hundred times not to snatch. Wait until you're asked, didn't I tell you?'
He laughed reluctantly. 'This isn't nursery tea time, Chumble. It's the man who does the asking when you're grown up.'
`You've asked,' said Chumble. 'Give her time to make up her mind. Stop bullying her. She's a nice little thing and she's very confused.'
He raked a hand through his windswept hair. 'Oh, God,' he muttered, and turned and went out.
Chumble took Marcy her breakfast upstairs. Marcy had washed her tearstained face and changed. She was sitting on the floor in her room, staring at her hands, which were shaking.
`Oh,' she said, taken aback when she saw the tray. `Chumble, there's no need . . . I was coming down. I'm sorry you had the trouble of doing this.'
`No trouble,' said Chumble. 'Now, eat a good breakfast, there's a good little girl. Anthea will be here before lunch and you'll want to make a good impression on her.'
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